To argue that a protest that declares non-violence is safer and therefore more accessible to marganilized groups is to fundamentally misunderstand what it means to declare a non-violent protest, which is only a declaration about the behavior of the protestors themselves.
The cops might still be violent. Fascist counterprotestors might still be violent. Both groups have demonstarted countless times that they are very willing to use violent against non-violent groups.
So a declaration of non-violence really only says ‘if you use violence to defend yourself against these groups, we don’t have your back. We didn’t set up a legal team for you and we won’t try to hide your identity from the cops’.
That’s not safer at all.
Non-violent protests only achieve temporary safety by being so moderate and non-confrontational in everything they say and do that they never pose a real challenge to the system and never trigger a violent response. The illusion of safety they create at their protest is build on the mercy of cops and fascists.
Honestly, in my experience cops tend to be more violent when policing non-violent protests. If it has been made clear that all available tactics are welcome within the protest the cops often focus more on damage prevention and they’re more likely to try to avoid provoking violence from protesters.
However, if the organizers have made a declaration of non-violence the cops know that people taking part will do their best to stop any violence from the side of the protesters which means that they can go wild and beat people black and blue and still not expect any serious resistance.
Honenstly, same.
The only time when non-violent protests are able to take place without police violence is when the protestors have elite support from politicians and celebrities, such as MeToo protests and anything lovey-dovey about human rights in a different country (that’s not a close ally of the country you’re in). And even then there’s a constant risk of violence if any of the signs are speaking a little too much truth to power.
But you can not have a non-violent anarchist protest, or a non-violent anti-capitalist protest. Just look at what happened to those activist groups at the G20 that specifically declared non-violence. None of them where safe from police violence. All their non-violence meant was that they were defenseless and basically had to take whatever was coming their way. The only groups able to build safe zones without police violence were those that were ready to build barricades and fight back.
And yet non-violent groups often have the audacity to claim that their methods are more accessible to marganilized and vulnerable people, when all they’re doing is telling
marganilized and vulnerable peoplenot to fight back.
Some other things that came to mind:
At protests where there was a visibly identifyable non-violent block and an identifyable block that rejected more violence, we’ve also seen the cops use close-up violence against the non-violent block (like battons) while not risking a close-up confrontation with the other block and using things like teargas instead, which gave the block that had not declared non-violence more opportunities to respond or get away and regroup.
When police violence does happen, it’s also pretty common for the non-violent block to go looking for excuses why their ‘non-violence is safe’ strategy failed. They often end up blaiming the block that did not declare non-violence, either claiming that they stood too close to the non-violent block, or that they stood too far away and abandonned the non-violent block, or that they shouldn’t have been there at all.
Alliances made before the protest based on a diversity of tactics often fall apart when the non-violent block feels the need to explain away the fact that their experience of violence directly contradicted their theory of safety.
It often becomes a situation where the block that had not declared non-violence gets blamed no matter what exactly happened and no matter what was agreed upon before the protest. If you see police violence as a reaction, not a default state, you’re always going to blame the activists that rejected non-violence.
QueerAnarchism 