[This] is not a
“communique” from the blac bloc, but it is participants giving their
opinion: The blac bloc is not an organization (as in something that you
join which has bylaws and a clearly defined membership boundary). It is a
tactic used by anarchists and egalitarians in opposition to
government-backed corporate control of peoples lives and the economy that
we all exist within.
[This] is not a
“communique” from the blac bloc, but it is participants giving their
opinion: The blac bloc is not an organization (as in something that you
join which has bylaws and a clearly defined membership boundary). It is a
tactic used by anarchists and egalitarians in opposition to
government-backed corporate control of peoples lives and the economy that
we all exist within.
During the week of the Democratic Party National
Convention in LA many persons masked up and wore black clothing to join
the marches as a large and visible contingent of invisibles. We marched
under a banner with a circle A (anarchy) and a circle E (equality) which
said “Whoever They Vote for We are Ungovernable.”
Someone asked us, “so do you think you got your message out?” I
wonder what that message would have been. We can only speak for ourselves
as four individual participants in the blac bloc (many blacblokers felt
they were sending a message), but to us we weren’t a message. We just were
there.
And maybe that confused some people.
Black masks provide anonymity and safety for individuals yet
visibility as a group. When we stand in front of the police, the
government, politicians, and their bosses in the corporations, they can
not question our legitimacy (are we “good” protestors?) because we dont
care what they think.
And they know it.
Is that a message? What message is being sent by 9000 police in
black and blue riot armor with clubs and teargas?
If you’ve never noticed someone and then they put on a black mask
and you can suddenly see them, that isn’t necessarily a message, but
something has changed.
Every organism, life itself, will fight to stay alive. It is
healthy to be willing to protect yourself to stay alive. Our presence
represented a growing healthiness of the movements to end corporate
dominance. By no means is the blac bloc the only indication of this
growing healthiness or the most significant, just one of the most visible
(Note that as the week went on and we discovered we were being treated as
a message, we worked hard to prevent the police and the media from
wielding our image to eclipse the many other messages of the protests.).
The blac bloc is no different from the rest of the protest movement in the
same way that my liver is no different from me. My liver is a part of me
and having one makes me healthy. Just so, the protest movement isnt any
different from the general public. We’re a part of you (the part that’s
willing to defend yourself) and that makes you healthier.
Personally (speaking as four individuals), we don’t think the
phrase “class war” is a very good metaphor for what protestors do. Rich
people can romanticize war, reach out and touch the danger, feel the
thrill, and tell the tale. The rest of us get killed or maimed. War
sucks. Immunology offers a better metaphor, because the democratic
wellbeing of this nation has become diseased. Corporations are a cancer
that will kill us if we let them. The blac bloc is just one tiny element
of the growing movements dedicated to bringing health and strength to the
body of the nation and healing to the community of peoples throughout the
world. We’ll do our bit to eliminate the cancer.
Anarchists never problematise the relationship between collective
strength and individual freedom (why would we?) so therefore we can end
this letter with the traditional anarchist salutary:
Solidarity and Autonomy,
Antibody, Spazz, Sketch, & Entropy
of blac bloc D2KLA
Author: Antibody, Spazz, Sketch, & Entropy
News Service: A – I N F O S N E W S S E R V I C E
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