Frustrations with the So-Called “Movement"
A Reportback from 04.18

A debate on so-called transgenderism, an action planned, tensions high. What a perfect moment for the usual activist vultures to swoop in. We must defend the peace! Don’t scare the piggies! Ah, doesn’t that sound familiar.

Show me what the fuck “the movement” is. Is it bullhorns and signs? If so, that’s shit. That’s nothing but shit, and you’ll get nothing but shit with that.

Explain how the fuck escalating gives the fascists what they want? You do realize that’s the same exact talking point the liberal propagandists use to stamp down on anything more radical than pouting about how the orange man is bad. It means even less when you regurgitate it.

Why is it that when people say “listen to black trans women” in moments like this it is always code for “listen to me, in particular, and especially when I tell you to put your head down and stop being anarchists.” Why is it that the black trans women who are militant anarchists are always completely ignored?

Is movement building nothing but staking a claim to being the figurehead to a whole ass identity? Is it really community safety to whine about how the outside agitators white anarchists are big bullies who just want to cause chaos for no good reason? Huff and puff and blow out a big bunch of hot air, because in my mind community safety means not letting rich assholes in suits and ties discuss how best to go about slaughtering us all. Does throwing a firework accomplish that? No, but good god how the fuck do you think standing in a big group and looking a little bit grumpy about the state of things is gonna do that either.

Did everybody forget that there is safety in numbers? The entire fucking point of showing up to these things is so that the crowd can protect its own. Why are people screaming at potential accomplices to tiptoe around the police? Why are we still expected to hang on to playing it safe, avoiding risk at all costs, when the risk of letting events like the debate happen in the first place is so much more dangerous? If you are one of the people who are out there visibly shouting about keeping the peace and respecting the sanctity of protest, chances are the police see you as more of an ally anyway, you’re not going to be the one getting roughed up. This is even visually demonstrated by the disparity between people who showed up with the intent to actually shut shit down facing out from the crowd, and those who had the main concern of maintaining personal control of the inherently uncontrollable situation standing next to the line of police and facing inwards!

It’s extremely fucking tiring having to tread these same tepid waters over and over and over again. New activists coming into the scene with big heads, thinking they know everything there is to know about protest because they read a few infographics and got real into the DSA thanks to Bernie, only to wash out of the scene the moment they realize they don’t actually give a shit about re-configuring the world, instead focusing on what they actually got out of it all: a social life to maneuver and a hierarchy to climb. Old activists trying to maintain an iron grip over everything because they’ve got big fuckin heads too, thinking they know everything there is to know about protest because they talk loud and walk big, acting as if their bullhorn bolshevik antics are a natural extension of the masses. Acting like a big-shot organizer who speaks for The People, doing everything to believe that you hold the only key to “protecting the community” without actually protecting the community, puts you in league with those who betray the masses when they act to materially change the conditions which are strangling them.

You’re not out here winning hearts and minds. The fascists still want you dead, they want me dead, and they’re actively working towards wiping us all off the face of the earth. Right now. Wake up to the reality that we live in. There’s no room for this bullshit anymore. 2020 fizzled out because the abstraction of “the movement” overpowered the reality of an actual movement to abolish the current state of things taking shape. Our enemies still act like they face that actual movement, and in their paranoid state are moving quickly to take their next steps. Let’s fucking act like that actual movement again, and this time without the goddamn liberals, peace police, “leaders”, and “organizers” stepping in to turn the temperature back down.

A fucking firework got thrown. What should have happened was Michael Knowles being dragged through the street. Think on that.

Signed,

– a militant anti-fascist who doesn’t want to wind up in a death camp because of people who like to be revolutionary cosplayers