Probably the saddest sign of our times is how many people respond with complete bewilderment if you mention direct action. Cutting border fences? punching nazis? sharing resources? blocking arms transports? building alternatives? They’re not even outraged, they’re just confused.
It’s like they’re so caught up in the spectacle of petitions, calling senators, ‘awareness’ and media visbility that they’ve completely forgotten that you can also just do shit without begging for permission.
Seriously, we’ve been so conditioned to seek permission for literally anything that the idea of just doing something yourself is seen as utterly unfeasible, pie in the sky, nonsense.
I for one am a huge believer in direct action and just making the changes we want to see instead of asking the powerful to implement them.
Want to house the homeless? Occupy some abandoned buildings. Want to replace your yard with a vegetable garden? Get you hands on some seeds and plant that shit. We can accomplish so much more by doing instead of begging.
One counterpoint to this, that I think is important to consider is people who want to do direct action accidentally discouraging other people from doing direct action by being really bad at organizing direct action.
Like – I’ve been to protests where I attended assuming “Oh, we’re going to make signs, do some chants in front of a park, and then walk to a government building holding our signs,” and then I get there and one of the organizers was like, “btw we’re going to block access to [area] and stay there until we get arrested” and … that’s not something you spring on people. That’s not a good idea!
- Getting arrested is not something you really want to just do an a whim.
- If you’re going to get arrested doing direct action, you want to know the people you’re with and be able to trust them. I’ve known people who were arrested doing direct action during Occupy, and having other people there with you to talk to, and advocate for you, and who you can compare arrest records with to make getting charges tossed out easier.
- If you’re organizing direct action where arrest is a possibility, it’s probably a good idea to try and figure out who will be there – you might not want Mr. Inappropriate Escalation there, or you might want to get minors away from the area before arrests happen
In terms of direct action that isn’t arrests-related, I’ve also seen people suggesting that people do [action] or avoid [thing] and we could make real, substantial change! It could be the next Montgomery Bus Boycotts! But the bus boycotts didn’t just spontaneously fall into place, and the part where you plan how to support people while they do [action] is elided or pushed back continuously, because if local activists were really passionate, this would all just fall into place! (Meanwhile, local activists are working on protests, and legal action, and community support, and full-time jobs.)
None of this is to say direct action is bad, or to disagree with OP at all – it is super important and a lot of activist groups are so squeamish about it. I remember one group continuously shooting down an idea to tape posters covering up names of slaveowners on buildings because it was “too disruptive”, in favor of another community forum, where the same people as always showed up. But especially as your direct action gets more direct, you need to be conscious of what you are walking into, because it does nobody favors to hurt yourself or leave a string of abandoned projects in your wake.
Yup, I’ve seen this happen too and it’s BAD.
Most of the times when I have seen this happen, the people doing it also specifically believed in non-violent actions that are mostly about the spectacle of getting arrested.
When I say ‘non-violent’, I don’t mean ‘any action that doesn’t include violence’. I mean dogmatic ‘everybody should be non-violent like us within the boundaries we have set’ activism. Those tend to be the kind of activists that believe that it is reasonable to ask everyone to sit down and get arrested and that passively submissing yourself to police violence will somehow be an inspirational experience that people will want to repeat.
like… no thanks.
& the opposite of this kind of dogmatic non-violence isn’t violent action, it’s diversity of tactics. Allowing people to figure out which level of engagement they’re ready for right now and acting accordingly. Diversity of action is better because it is far more accessible for activists of different experience levels and physical abilities, because it doesn’t force people to ditch their great plans in favor of one that can get mass consensus, because it makes us unpredicatable and more difficult to control, because it’s flexible, etc.
❤ Diversity of tactics, baby. ❤
QueerAnarchism 