Accounts from March 2006 antiwar protests

From Infoshop OpenWiki

[edit] Europe

[edit] United States

[edit] Milwaukee

account of the anti-authoritarian feeder and then breakaway in milwaukee wisconsin

"About 45-60 people showed up to the beginning of the anti-capitalist feeder at Catheral square park. To outsiders and people less involved with the planning and less experienced with protest culture the appearance of the crowd was probably off putting. I tried to balance this out by being friendly to people I didn't know and offering them things to bang sticks on, vegan muffins to eat and bandanas to put on if they felt so inclined. The benefits wearing all black, covering your faces, carrying signs like ones that read "death to the state" with a skull and an ak-47 crossed with an insurrectionary flag on it, brandishing huge pirage flags and black flags on large sticks and pipes, and generally looking menacing, may outweigh the negative aspects depending on the goals of group and individuals involved.

My goal was not to make friends with apologetic liberals (although I did want to show solidarity with them by going to their event), but show to those in our group and others that actual resistance is possible and does happen (or try/intend to happen). I want to resist reformism and compromise as well as the war itself. The most important thing that can be gained from protest is the empowerment in knowing that there are actually other options, this is more than just voting, just holding signs, just marching two blocks and then going home and back to our lives. These options can be varied and creative resisting single organizers and organizations.

Maybe we have relatively a lot in common with the organizers of peace organizations, but I think it is definitely a strech to say that those who oppose all hierarchy and those who oppose two or three have a lot in common. Yes, they have more in common than those who oppose no hierarchy and obey all orders, but they are still hierarchical and therefore perpetuate hierarchical society.

At about 12:00 am, After we were done making sure all the buckets were unstuck from each other, all the muffins were eaten and all of our friends who we expected to show up had come we decided to make our way to the peace action rally by walking toward it on Lincoln memorial drive. The moral was really high at this point mainly because we were the biggest black bloc there had ever been in Milwaukee and we looked really militant, with makeshift drums pounding out basic rhythms and black flags flying. As we neared the peace action rally we were met with supportive cheers from the crowd of people dispite our appearance and obvious difference of opinions. We joined the crowd and formed in a section to the right of the stairs that were being used by the organizers of the event to give speaches and lead the rally.

The speakers were for the most part the same as they usually are and have been for the last three years. George martin gave the same general kind of speech that he's made himself into a stereotype with starting with the rediculously funny and cute "no more war" chant, starting off slow and gaining momentum as it went on. The best speaker was a war veteran who talked about his experiences in Iraq and about how he and other troops were given orders to show insurgents even if there are thirty or less civilians in front of them as well as how envoys are supposed to drive through childen in the roads because they are apparantly used sometimes by insurgents to act as decoys for roadside bombs. How I reacted to these facts stood out in stark contrast to the organizations recommend laying of roses on the court house steps as if the bricks which made up an insitution had a heart. I am amazed that people can hear these things and then just put money in a bucket to pay for future rallies to be planned so they can put more money in buckets and feel good enough to or have a semblence of an arguement for why they shouldn't feel just as guilty as all the others (who didn't come to the "protest") who allow this country to exist through their continued obedience to repetition, habits of disempowerment and worship of authority. This war happens because we allow it to every day we continue to do nothing, not because kerry didn't win the elections, not because we didn't hold enough signs that poke fun at the intelligence of our supposed leader, not because didn't read enough progressive magazines or donate enough money to corporate and media watchdogs. For people who are first starting to question how this society is run, this kind of protest and the gradual questioning associated with these tactically useless options, it may make sense, but for people who are beyond this point and percieve no other sizeable or accepted options this is far too disempowering.

A list of orgizations were read off a list who helped and supported the rally. Although we were 60 strong and spent a month of our time working for the same day all we got in recognition was a comment like "our young people are here today and we're sorry that you all have have to wear masks." (or "how cute that you kids dressed up.")

After the rally at the sunburst sculpture was over the march made its way toward the court house. The black bloc stayed in the back making efforts to stick together in a tight group. When the march got to the corner of the courthouse the bloc turned to the left and started on it's own toward the south and the third ward. Once the bloc made it to the third ward dumpsters were tipped over in the middle of the street, banks were vandalized, a number of circle (A)s were scrawled in hurried hand writing, two shop owners came out and chased after individuals attacking them and spreading panic and then everyone dispered. The situation escalated when it didn't need to and way too fast. People didn't stick together when they had nothing to fear and everything ended before it really started. Some kids were detained, arrested and given tickets for disorderly conduct, but that was the main extend of the legal trouble (specifically regarding the protest).

Specific targets weren't reached and the intention to hold and actually reclaim a street were never met, but people who had experienced nothing like it before were euphoric by even a minutes worth of freedom the idea of the actualization of physical resistance can afford. If the long term goal is revolution, an empowered society can only come about through empowered means, and the mistakes of this can be learned from, then the short lived moment of chaos was not in vain. Yes, it was disorganized, but its integrity was purer than a rose left to die and be thrown away on the cold steps of a beauracracy which we've tried to humanize.

It is not a few circle (A)s or a number of tipped dumpsters that the police have to be affraid of, but the fact that more and more people have become empowered and no longer obey their orders or those of established means of social change, that a radical community is growing and hopefully learning from it's mistakes.

Let's stay brave and creative."

http://mke.indymedia.org/en/2006/03/205113.shtml

This page is part of the Anti-war and Peace Resources section.