hiya, Thanks Olga for bringing this up. I'm sometimes made uncomfortable by the subsitution ofprotest by carnival however anything that makes public and social space strange, like camping on the streets or combatting police aggression with clownish antics (a personal favourite Clandestine Insurgent Rebel Clown Army http://www.clownarmy.org/about/about.html) is worthwhile because it gives us a glimpse of an alternative ordering of the world.
Also, I know it's a bit tangental but has anyone noticed how climate change protesters seem to be being singled out for especially rough treatment from the police (and so, I assume, the government)? A couple of young people were allowed to smash the only unprotected bank windows in the city, those of RBS, (or is that an urban myth?) in front of a cagillion people with cameras. And yet the Independent reported how a group of peaceful climate-change protesters were cordoned off and detained in a small area, bullied and held there for hours by police who had their identity numbers obscured and were therefore personally unaccountable. I remember reports of the same kind of disproportional police response to Kingsnorth protesters last summer. Thoughts? best things Ruth -----Original Message----- From: marc garrett <[email protected]> Reply-To: NetBehaviour for networked distributed creativity <[email protected]> To: NetBehaviour for networked distributed creativity <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [NetBehaviour] On the hurricane of the G-20... Date: Tue, 07 Apr 2009 16:39:21 +0100 Hi Olga, An essential post. I also find it interesting that it was not discussed here - from my own position, I'd rather let others start the ball rolling rather than me, myself forcing the issue onto everyone else. I found the whole thing typical and disgusting. I am willing to discuss it if others are also. Having said this, I would not wish to presume that no one has been involved in these activities or exploring their own forms of activism, whether it be with others on the street, on the net or anywhere else. marc > I met a friend last Tuesday that told me that Liverpool Street seemed > to be preparing for a hurricane, that the buildings had their windows > shot and protected with wooden panels. And yes, the media was also > preparing us for a hurricane, so much that the hurricane almost didn't > come. > > I went down to Bank on Wednesday and played the game of trying to > break the police barrier. It all felt so symbolic and useless. > > I am particularly interested in the manufacture of fear as a mode of > control. The UK authorities master the technique and they used it once > again this time. They spread the hype of a really dangerous wave of > protests, they deployed an army of policemen and in the finally, to > me, it all felt so little... > > I just read this post at K-punk > http://k-punk.abstractdynamics.org/archives/2009_04.html, and thought > it was weird that we haven't discussed anything here in > Netbehaviour... Not only the hurricane almost doesn't come, but it > leaves almost no traces.. In the post M. Fisher argues that is time to > move on, that these protests lead nowhere. I agree. However, even if > there is no response from the governments, there is something about > camping on the streets that I still find worth it. It's a day of > deviation, of using the street in a completely different way... and > even if it's just for the feeling that this gives you I think it is > still something. > _______________________________________________ > NetBehaviour mailing list > [email protected] > http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour > > _______________________________________________ NetBehaviour mailing list [email protected] http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour _______________________________________________ NetBehaviour mailing list [email protected] http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour
