# Reclaim the Streets - what happened??



## wanderlust19 (Jan 10, 2008)

Sorry for the ignorance. I'm reading No Logo by Naomi Klein and to my massive shock I learnt about the Reclaim the streets movement/parties that were so prolific in the late 90's! I'd never heard ANYTHING about these before?! What happened?! There are documented RTS parties from about 1996 onward, every year until 2003 ... then next to nothing? Youtube has footage from one or two in Europe around 2006 - Zurich and Helsinki - but that's all ... they seemed a smaller scale, too. The movement seems to have dwindled out ... ?? Agh! I was only 9 when they were in their peak ten years ago!

What happened?

What are the chances of it starting up again, newly improved?

The philosophy behind it and the medium of protest is genius.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 10, 2008)

Have a look around the website - what happened? Things evolve, Mayday became a focus for a bit, the Wombles began, Critical Mass, Disarm DESI, etc etc. Will it start again? I doubt it. But don't let that stop you doing your own thing


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## Minnie_the_Minx (Jan 10, 2008)

and then there's the Editor's lot

http://www.urban75.com/Action/reclaim2.html


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## co-op (Jan 10, 2008)

They were wonderful but fell apart a bit after the fiasco of the Parliament Square/Cenotaph-defaceing RTS which was rubbish for a host of reasons. 

I'd love another one in Brixton, it was one of the best festivals I've been to.


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## Brainaddict (Jan 10, 2008)

You'll hear many reasons why RTS fell apart. People say there were reasons such as police tactics and changes in the party scene, but sadly, as far as I can make out, one of the main reasons RTS London as a group fell apart was that their decision-making processes no longer worked above a certain size. They became too big to operate as a group, at some point a decision was made to break up into smaller groups, but that failed to work properly and the group fell apart and faded away.

One of the things that bothers me about this is that other non-hierarchical groups in London often use similar decision-making techniques to RTS and then wonder why they don't grow...


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## Dillinger4 (Jan 10, 2008)

Its a real shame RTS fell apart imo.

It would have been nice to see the original group staying the same size and inspiring other people to start organizing their own things and stuff, which I suppose is what was expected to happen.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 10, 2008)

Imo, ultimately, the reason it 'fell apart' is that all such things have finite lifespans - like i said, it evolves and becomes something different as different actors leave and join, as external forces and issues change, as reactions to and motivations towards develop. Some of that may be very mundane, like Brainaddict notes, unwieldy decision-making structures and so on but some of it isn't really tangible, it's just that nothing lasts forever.


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## bluestreak (Jan 10, 2008)

wanderlust, how old are you and where are you based?

RTS were a great movement, I'd love to see something like that again.

edit... i see you're young, so no wonder you didn't hear of them.  like most protest movements they don't get talked aobut in history class, you know.


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## laptop (Jan 10, 2008)

RTS London turned into or spawned Indymedia worldwide, Disarm DSIe, social centres, and more.

Like the Samba band(s). "Let's focus on a cool way of offering crowds a direction to go in". "Er, where did all the crowds come from back then?"

Oh, and


```
-> J18
RTS -> Birmingham G8 protest 
				-> Seattle -> lots of things :)
```


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## Dillinger4 (Jan 10, 2008)

It was very much of its time as well, the pre 9/11 anti capitalism movements and stuff.

I imagine RTS would look quite a bit different now. 

But for what its worth, I would love to see something like that again as well.

It is what it is all about, for me.

Coz I like situationism.


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## London_Calling (Jan 10, 2008)

Fashion changed.


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## Brainaddict (Jan 10, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:
			
		

> Imo, ultimately, the reason it 'fell apart' is that all such things have finite lifespans - like i said, it evolves and becomes something different as different actors leave and join, as external forces and issues change, as reactions to and motivations towards develop.


Hmmm, a bit of an easy get-out clause to explain the group break-up if you ask me. The fact is there were a lot of people involved, a lot of energy to do things, and though the organisation would have had to evolve, it would have been great if it could have created some kind of permanent rallying point for red/green/black positive-acting anti-capitalist ways of thinking. Instead it fell apart in what was quite an acrimonious way - I met a few people who left it because they just couldn't stand the meetings and the ways people were behaving any more - after a fantastic few years it became a sad failure of non-hierarchical organising and in my opinion should be recognised as such.

If you don't admit it when you fail, how are you going to learn?


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## Blagsta (Jan 10, 2008)

I think 9/11 was a big reason.  Up until then, it had a momentum.  Roads protest camps, RTS, J18, Seattle, Mayday etc.  After that, the energy seemed to dissipate.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 10, 2008)

Brainaddict said:
			
		

> Hmmm, a bit of an easy get-out clause to explain the group break-up if you ask me. The fact is there were a lot of people involved, a lot of energy to do things, and though the organisation would have had to evolve, it would have been great if it could have created some kind of permanent rallying point for red/green/black positive-acting anti-capitalist ways of thinking. Instead it fell apart in what was quite an acrimonious way - I met a few people who left it because they just couldn't stand the meetings and the ways people were behaving any more - after a fantastic few years it became a sad failure of non-hierarchical organising and in my opinion should be recognised as such.
> 
> If you don't admit it when you fail, how are you going to learn?


In what way did it fail? To fail implies not meeting certain criteria or standards or something and I wasn't aware that there was a big-picture gameplan as such - maybe there should have been. As i explicitly acknowledged in the part of my post that you chose not to quote, the internal dissent and disagreement and so on certainly played a part, and I would agree with Blagsta that 9/11 seems to have impacted in unforeseen ways and I do think the establishment reaction became much more punitive subsequently. 

But I don't particularly remember people involved in RTS explicitly having a desire to become what you describe as a "_permanent rallying point for red/green/black positive-acting anti-capitalist ways of thinking_" - political movements come and go, some maintain in some form, most don't but its a fact of life that most overground in action but underground in origin movements have a "shelf-life" for want of a better way of putting it.


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## laptop (Jan 10, 2008)

If you were going to hold the 2008 equivalent of an old-skool RTS, what genres of music would you play?


Yes, this is an indirect suggestion for one of the many reasons for it fading.


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## Hocus Eye. (Jan 10, 2008)

I don't think it matters that the specific 'organisation' Reclaim The Streets appears not to exist. The spirit of opposition to world Globalisation still exists and is spread through many different areas of life.  RTS has spawned offspring, and while protests at the G8 meetings or at the Arms Fair in London might seem to be ineffective in an immediate radical sense, there is massive support for anti-capitalist ideas including the anti-war movement which is part of it.  The media now report these activities with less hostility and don't always automatically support the status quo.  Opposition to the economic system is more generalised and the need for strident individuals or small groups to raise issues is less desparate now.  'Softly softly catchee monkey' perhaps.

That is my hope.


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## Brainaddict (Jan 10, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:
			
		

> In what way did it fail?


I say it failed because in the end a lot of people walked away feeling pissed off - that's a failure in my book. And they walked away not because they weren't interested in the ideas any more (which is why I say it should have been able to continue in some form) but because of meetings and processes that destroyed any kind of positive feeling they had about it.

You acknowledge that there was bad feeling at the end but you seem to want to downplay it as some kind of minor factor compared to other external pressures. From talking to a lot of people involved it was not a minor factor - and it left a lot of people disillusioned and pissed off.

It's very sad, and I'm sure the original poster will feel disappointed that it ended as it did, but I think the problems that occurred should have been (and still should be now) more openly discussed so that they don't have to happen again.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 10, 2008)

Brainaddict said:
			
		

> It failed in the end because a lot of people walked away feeling pissed off. And they walked away not because they weren't interested in the ideas any more (which is why I say it should have been able to continue in some form) but because of meetings and processes that destroyed any kind of positive feeling they had about it.
> 
> You acknowledge that there was bad feeling at the end but you seem to want to downplay it as some kind of minor factor compared to other external pressures. From talking to a lot of people involved it was not a minor factor - and it left a lot of people disillusioned and pissed off.
> 
> It's very sad, and I'm sure the original poster will feel disappointed that it ended as it did, but I think the problems that occurred should have been (and still should be now) more openly discussed so that they don't have to happen again.


I downplay it by openly acknowledging the fact, discussing it, and recognising other factors as well? Strange views on downplaying something imo.


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## Kid_Eternity (Jan 10, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> I think 9/11 was a big reason.  Up until then, it had a momentum.  Roads protest camps, RTS, J18, Seattle, Mayday etc.  After that, the energy seemed to dissipate.



Yep, a huge effect, that and the lack of ability to morph into an effective anti war movement (which incidently allowed the trots to have their wicked way)...


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## Brainaddict (Jan 10, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:
			
		

> I downplay it by openly acknowledging the fact, discussing it, and recognising other factors as well? Strange views on downplaying something imo.


You only acknowledged it when I pushed you to (see your first post), and you're still waving it away with the 'Nothing lasts forever' line. It's true that nothing lasts forever, but that's not why RTS ended - it's just a cop-out line. It ended when it did for very specific reasons due to some very specific actions. I've been told a couple of different versions of it but they all involve a pretty dismal failure of the supposedly democratic decision-making methods.


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## laptop (Jan 10, 2008)

Brainaddict said:
			
		

> And they walked away ... because of meetings and processes that destroyed any kind of positive feeling they had about it.



But the thing is, whatever you were pissed off about, not everyone was pissed off about the same thing.

*Whatever it was*, it was in part *a sign* that the movement/disorganisation had reached a certain point in its life-cycle. 

Often, people who've felt and exhibited amazing dedication and commitment want to look for one thing or person to "blame" when the fact that it's time for them to move on and do something else - when in fact it's that time because of perfectly understandable personal needs, like wanting to have a child, or more than four hours' sleep a night, or a home.


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## Brainaddict (Jan 10, 2008)

Hocus Eye. said:
			
		

> I don't think it matters that the specific 'organisation' Reclaim The Streets appears not to exist.


I agree with this. Whether RTS exists or not is not particularly important. What is a real shame though is that I've met people who after being involved in RTS and a few other similarly run groups swore that they would never go to another political meeting in their life.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 10, 2008)

Brainaddict said:
			
		

> You only acknowledged it when I pushed you to (see your first post), and you're still waving it away with the 'Nothing lasts forever' line. It's true that nothing lasts forever, but that's not why RTS ended - it's just a cop-out line. It ended when it did for very specific reasons due to some very specific actions. I've been told a couple of different versions of it but they all involve a pretty dismal failure of the supposedly democratic decision-making methods.


Oh whatever, you're clearly right and I don't know what I'm talking about  

I'd go so far as to say, in fact, the entrenched "_I'm right, you're wrong_" attitudes that you're displaying here are exactly why people do walk away from such ventures.


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## Brainaddict (Jan 10, 2008)

laptop said:
			
		

> But the thing is, whatever you were pissed off about, not everyone was pissed off about the same thing.
> 
> *Whatever it was*, it was in part *a sign* that the movement/disorganisation had reached a certain point in its life-cycle.
> 
> Often, people who've felt and exhibited amazing dedication and commitment want to look for one thing or person to "blame" when the fact that it's time for them to move on and do something else - when in fact it's that time because of perfectly understandable personal needs, like wanting to have a child, or more than four hours' sleep a night, or a home.


Firstly I wasn't involved before the 'break-up' and only met the people afterwards, so I don't have any personal investment. But my understanding is that the RTS open meetings broke up because there were *too many* people, more than because people wanted to move on. I'm happy to be corrected by people who attended the meetings in its last days if that is a misinterpretation - but I've been told it by a few people.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 10, 2008)

Brainaddict said:
			
		

> Firstly I wasn't involved before the 'break-up' and only met the people afterwards, so I don't have any personal investment. But my understanding is that the RTS open meetings broke up because there were *too many* people, more than because people wanted to move on. I'm happy to be corrected by people who attended the meetings in its last days if that is a misinterpretation - but I've been told it by a few people.


Ah so, even though you weren't involved at all, you're quite happy to tell me that I'm talking bollocks, even though i was involved from the 2nd party at the Angel onwards. Fucking priceless.


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## Brainaddict (Jan 10, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:
			
		

> Ah so, even though you weren't involved at all, you're quite happy to tell me that I'm talking bollocks, even though i was involved from the 2nd party at the Angel onwards. Fucking priceless.


It's you that's treating me like I'm your enemy. I'm really not y'know


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## bluestreak (Jan 10, 2008)

London_Calling said:
			
		

> Fashion changed.



I take it you were involved in protest groups because it was fashionable?


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## Blagsta (Jan 10, 2008)

Brainaddict said:
			
		

> You only acknowledged it when I pushed you to (see your first post), and you're still waving it away with the 'Nothing lasts forever' line. It's true that nothing lasts forever, but that's not why RTS ended - it's just a cop-out line. It ended when it did for very specific reasons due to some very specific actions. I've been told a couple of different versions of it but they all involve a pretty dismal failure of the supposedly democratic decision-making methods.



Hang on, which RTS group are you on about?  Just London?


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## editor (Jan 10, 2008)

9/11 and the subsequent _trrrrsm_ hysteria put paid to any chance of similar protests happening.


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## bluestreak (Jan 10, 2008)

Brainaddict, do I know anyone of these people who talk about who walked away pissed off?  Like paulie I was involved in RTS from the beginning, albeit in a minor way, and I'd be interested in speaking to them.

See, for me, what damaged RTS was that I found myself going on street parties that had no politics.  To an outsider they would have looked like it was just a bunch of peopl having a party and not a political action.  However that wasn't due to RTS per se, it was due to no individual taking responsibility for explaining to passers by and the media why it was happening.


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## Brainaddict (Jan 10, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> Hang on, which RTS group are you on about? Just London?


yep, sorry, should have said that clearly


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## bluestreak (Jan 10, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> 9/11 and the subsequent _trrrrsm_ hysteria put paid to any chance of similar protests happening.


I agree with this completely.  9/11 changed everything.


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## Blagsta (Jan 10, 2008)

Brainaddict said:
			
		

> yep, sorry, should have said that clearly



OK.  So there were problems in one group.  How does that explain other groups?  Personally I found the London group much better than the Manchester one - certain members of the Manchester group seemed to use it to play out James Bond fantasies.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 10, 2008)

Brainaddict said:
			
		

> It's you that's treating me like I'm your enemy. I'm really not y'know


No?






			
				Brainaddict said:
			
		

> Hmmm, a bit of an easy get-out clause to explain the group break-up if you ask me.<snip>If you don't admit it when you fail, how are you going to learn?






			
				Brainaddict said:
			
		

> You acknowledge that there was bad feeling at the end but you seem to want to downplay it as some kind of minor factor compared to other external pressures.






			
				Brainaddict said:
			
		

> You only acknowledged it when I pushed you to (see your first post), and you're still waving it away with the 'Nothing lasts forever' line.


And then you admit you weren't actually involved _at all_ but are instead relying on second-hand accounts from other people. If you can't understand why I may become slightly peeved, if I'm polite, in repeatedly being told that I'm wrong in those circumstances, I think you've got a bit of learning to do my friend


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## Brainaddict (Jan 10, 2008)

bluestreak said:
			
		

> Brainaddict, do I know anyone of these people who talk about who walked away pissed off? Like paulie I was involved in RTS from the beginning, albeit in a minor way, and I'd be interested in speaking to them.
> 
> See, for me, what damaged RTS was that I found myself going on street parties that had no politics. To an outsider they would have looked like it was just a bunch of peopl having a party and not a political action. However that wasn't due to RTS per se, it was due to no individual taking responsibility for explaining to passers by and the media why it was happening.


Did you go to the big open meetings? I'm not denying there were all sorts of reasons for individuals to stop going to parties when they did. But the big open meetings where a certain amount of organisation was meant to happen ended somewhat unhappily. It's fine if people want to 'focus on the positives' but it could have been a learning experience I reckon  

A rough sketch being that the meetings became too unwieldy to be useful - after much fervent debate a decision was made to break into smaller groups - the break-up happened but the smaller groups didn't really - and that was more or less the end of RTS London. I'm happy for Paulie or others to comment on factual accuracy, as my info is second-hand.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 10, 2008)

*sigh* It's not inaccurate to say that organisation became problematic, my point is that this (1) wasn't the only reason RTS tailed off, and (2) *imo* all such/similar movements have finite lifespans, regardless.


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## laptop (Jan 10, 2008)

bluestreak said:
			
		

> See, for me, what damaged RTS was that I found myself going on street parties that had no politics.



It seems to me, somewhat depressingly, that there's a regular cycle here:

Movement / current / campaign launches on *a* specific issue
Does exciting things
Starts affecting the issue at hand
Those most active get more politicised
They start slagging off "single-issue politics"
They move toward organising events that are about *everything* 
Those whose involvement is offering their body and soul for a day or so go "eh?"
The activists start complaining about people who just come on the events (experts say this is a symptom of lack of sleep)
Fewer come on the events
... ... pause ... ...
A significant part of the original issue is actually won - though the exciting movement gets none of the credit
Those who were most involved get angry if you remind them they won a reform, 'cos they didn't win the quite different things they wanted at the time they stopped being most involves


No, this isn't the whole story either. But I've seen it be part of the story through three generations of campaign/activism/politics


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## editor (Jan 10, 2008)

The full argument for the demise of RTS is pretty complex, but here's my thinking-out-loud thoughts:

I'd say the issues simply got bigger and the movement lost its focus as a result.

When it started it was primarily against road building and car culture, but then people started to look at what was driving this forward, leading to the focus moving on to the broader issue of capitalism. 

The Mayday/anti-capitalist movement was dealt a massive blow by 9/11 (and the subsequent hysteria), given a killer punch by the total failure of the Stop the War march to change a god-damn thing and, coupled with a wider acceptance of consumerist lifestyles, most people's appetite for street protest seemed to have been finished off for now.

When RTS was going on you felt that you could bring about real change and force the political agenda. It felt the same with the CJA marches. Who feels that now with issues like the Iraq war?


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## Brainaddict (Jan 10, 2008)

I agree the anti-war movement (and its failure) sapped a lot of energy from people - that's been a problem for all kinds of political activism lately I think


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## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 10, 2008)

Brainaddict said:
			
		

> It's fine if people want to 'focus on the positives' but it could have been a learning experience I reckon


Ok, 10 learning experiences for you, off the top of my head:

1) it can be fairly straightforward to organise single issue political events initially and create impacts that far outweigh the effort needed to create that action.
2) it is a good thing to do 'politics' in different ways that attract the attention of people who would otherwise run a mile from anything political - see the Westway RTS, for eg, whereby many of the local residents from along the M40 came along and joined in and enjoyed their area without fumes and noise and traffic.
3) music is a rallying point for people, always has been, always will be (see the Samba band now as mentioned before).
4) surprise is your biggest ally. taking the piss completely isn't far behind.
5) too many cooks can spoil the broth, when making and taking decisions.
6) joining forces with other sympathetic people is obviously worthwhile (see the Trafalgar demo with the dockers and others).
7) you will be tolerated for a while, then if you become too good, you'll be stamped on, repeatedly.
8) external forces, issues and motivations change over time, which is why political bodies need to evolve or die. RTS was about reclaiming the streets for people primarily, making people open their eyes a bit and think about where they were living and how. It spawned many more offshoots and in that sense, simply cannot be held to have failed.
9) infiltrators, egoists, arseholes are, unfortunately, a fact of life.
10) make it fun and people want to participate, become dogmatic and turn into a swappie.


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## Dillinger4 (Jan 10, 2008)

laptop said:
			
		

> It seems to me, somewhat depressingly, that there's a regular cycle here:
> 
> Movement / current / campaign launches on *a* specific issue
> Does exciting things
> ...



That is interesting. I am doing a module about radical protest in this next semester, about protest cycles and how radical protest groups actually function. 

*saves post*


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## rocketman (Jan 10, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> The full argument for the demise of RTS is pretty complex, but here's my thinking-out-loud thoughts:
> 
> I'd say the issues simply got bigger and the movement lost its focus as a result.
> 
> ...



Yep.
And they bought poll tax in anyway. Under another name, and slightly fairer. But not much fairer.


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## Brainaddict (Jan 10, 2008)

That's interesting stuff Paulie. At the risk of sounding like I'm harping on (I am genuinely interested in terms of future organising - not just poking with a stick  ) what implications would you draw from Lesson 5 for organisations that would like to grow but want to remain directly democratic?


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## laptop (Jan 10, 2008)

Dillinger4 said:
			
		

> *saves post*



* invoices Dillinger4 *


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## Dillinger4 (Jan 10, 2008)

laptop said:
			
		

> * invoices Dillinger4 *



Don't worry. I will cite you.

 

I was thinking of writing one of my essays on RTS anyway, coz its sort of the area of protest I am interested in.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 10, 2008)

Brainaddict said:
			
		

> That's interesting stuff Paulie. At the risk of sounding like I'm harping on (I am genuinely interested in terms of future organising - not just poking with a stick  ) what implications would you draw from Lesson 5 for organisations that would like to grow but want to remain directly democratic?


Well there's the rub innit? You either accept that certain key decisions need to be made and played out by a certain select few, with wider discussion only on the wider issues involved, or you try to be completely egalitarian and let everyone have their say and watch as it eventually develops and/or descends into a "_who can shout the loudest_" competition essentially. 

I'm not sure I've got an answer to how to balance those issues, and if you take the former approach, you not only risk being accused of elitism or imposition of ideology and approach, you also risk missing out on harnessing the energies of people who can really help to move things forward. Further, like laptop says, people come, people go, some get tired, some don't agree with where things are going, some want something else again, so you need to continually strive to maintain momentum and involve more people.

However, if you take the latter approach, you'll soon realise that not everyone is involved in things for the same reason (sounds obvious but its never a bad thing to be explicit) and there are inevitable competitions of ideas (not a bad thing), activities (again, not a bad thing) and egos (guess what?). Throw in a healthy dose of paranoia for obvious reasons, with some strange faces coming along with strange ideas and it can be hard to put a lid on it.


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## Brainaddict (Jan 10, 2008)

Paulie, I agree with all you've said. My understanding is that RTS London did develop something of an 'inner circle' to some extent, but that some people considered it undemocratic because there were invite-only meetings going on and these were not necessarily always transparent to others involved (again, open to factual correction, though I think it was also viewed differently depending on where you were sitting). My feeling is that if you're going to have some kind of 'select few' - or let's say a Working Group - who will make a lot of the decisions, it's better to formalise the arrangement for the sake of transparency and openness. This isn't a solution that is favoured by people of an anarcho persuasion who hate institutions of any kind, but I reckon it is more democratic than falling into the 'informal institutions' trap - which I have witnessed myself in other 'direct democratic' organisations. What are your thoughts?


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## mitochondria (Jan 10, 2008)

laptop said:
			
		

> If you were going to hold the 2008 equivalent of an old-skool RTS, what genres of music would you play?
> 
> 
> Yes, this is an indirect suggestion for one of the many reasons for it fading.



ACID TECHNO all the way!!!


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## The Black Hand (Jan 10, 2008)

Dillinger4 said:
			
		

> That is interesting. I am doing a module about radical protest in this next semester, about protest cycles and how radical protest groups actually function.
> 
> *saves post*



You need to read more about autonomist politics then, and autonomist Marxism in particular. Their concept of 'cycles of struggles' is what you need to know more about.


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## Blagsta (Jan 10, 2008)

mitochondria said:
			
		

> ACID TECHNO all the way!!!



No way.  It suited the times then but it's way too dated now.


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## Blagsta (Jan 10, 2008)

Brainaddict said:
			
		

> This isn't a solution that is favoured by people of an anarcho persuasion who hate institutions of any kind



Eh?


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## wanderlust19 (Jan 10, 2008)

Thanks everyone for the replies and the interesting discussions. 



> Originally posted by bluestreak
> _wanderlust, how old are you and where are you based?_


I'm 19 and in Sydney, Australia. From what I gather there were some pretty decent RTS parties on here back in the day. I'm disappointed I missed them.



> Originally posted by Brainaddict
> _after a fantastic few years it became a sad failure of non-hierarchical organising and in my opinion should be recognised as such._



I don't have any knowledge of its internal workings and structural shortcomings or whatever, but I don't think I could ever consider the movement a failure even if it did split at the seams and (arguably) fail to progress to anything significant. The reason I was so shocked and surprised when I read about it was that living in this time of complete political apathy and numbness by most of the general population and especially other young people, I couldn't even imagine things like that happening so spontaneously and successfully now. It made me thrilled to hear that there ever were such things ... even if it didn't amount to mass changes. 


Now, a lot of people here have mentioned that RTS just split off into smaller groups. But wasn't the point in the first place to join groups with similar anti-capitalist/corporate interests? Isn't that how it kind of started?


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## The Black Hand (Jan 11, 2008)

wanderlust19 said:
			
		

> Thanks everyone for the replies and the interesting discussions.
> 
> I'm 19 and in Sydney, Australia. From what I gather there were some pretty decent RTS parties on here back in the day. I'm disappointed I missed them.
> 
> ...



Have you met Australian Class War yet? 

Have a look here for references to Darren;
http://ianbone.wordpress.com/


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## The Black Hand (Jan 11, 2008)

I have saved you the trouble - read this for Darrens adventures in London in the 1980s. VERY GOOD;

http://ianbone.wordpress.com/i-fucked-thatcher/

SOme old AUstralian Class War stickers on this page;
http://lemming.mahost.org/classwar/pictures.htm

For interest;
http://libcom.org/forums/class-war-federation/australian-tv-documentary-about-class-war

I can't find the Australian Class War website - there used to be one...


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## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 11, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> No way.  It suited the times then but it's way too dated now.


I dunno. Can you imagine a contemporary RTS party with broken beats and nu-rave???


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## bluestreak (Jan 11, 2008)

Yaeah, the acid techno and penny whistle soundtrack to the revolution back then really did my nut.

If we're gonna go old school can we not at least go for some old school D&B?


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## Blagsta (Jan 11, 2008)

Old skool jungle/d'n'b.  Get Megabitch out of retirement!


----------



## chilango (Jan 11, 2008)

Intersting stuff...

Note that EF! (who in the mid 90s had dozens of groups across the UK several of which were pretty sizeable and active) dissappeared more or less at the same time. So i donb't think the idiosyncrisies of London RTS meetings are the cause...maybe a symptom.


----------



## editor (Jan 11, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> Old skool jungle/d'n'b.  Get Megabitch out of retirement!


Old skool!







http://www.urban75.org/brixton/features/cooltan4.html


----------



## Brainaddict (Jan 11, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> Eh?


Sorry, badly phrased - was not meant to imply all anarchists hate institutions - 'people who hate institutions of any kind' would have been sufficient I suppose.


----------



## Badgers (Jan 11, 2008)

I saw one of them the other day, he was working for Barratt Homes


----------



## mitochondria (Jan 11, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> No way.  It suited the times then but it's way too dated now.



It still suits imo. There has to be some punk in the music. Can't really do a revolution with r'n'b, can you?


----------



## laptop (Jan 11, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:
			
		

> Can you imagine a contemporary RTS party with broken beats and nu-rave???



I always had an ambition to get a string quartet to show up.




Trouble was, couldn't find a disposable bass or viola - though the picture of cops smashing classical instruments might have been worth a couple grand...


----------



## Taxamo Welf (Jan 11, 2008)

Brainaddict said:
			
		

> You'll hear many reasons why RTS fell apart. People say there were reasons such as police tactics and changes in the party scene, but sadly, as far as I can make out, one of the main reasons RTS London as a group fell apart was that their decision-making processes no longer worked above a certain size. They became too big to operate as a group, at some point a decision was made to break up into smaller groups, but that failed to work properly and the group fell apart and faded away.
> 
> One of the things that bothers me about this is that other non-hierarchical groups in London often use similar decision-making techniques to RTS and then wonder why they don't grow...


50 POINTS TO THIS MAN!

well said sir, fucking well said


----------



## Taxamo Welf (Jan 11, 2008)

bluestreak said:
			
		

> Yaeah, the acid techno and penny whistle soundtrack to the revolution back then really did my nut.
> 
> If we're gonna go old school can we not at least go for some old school D&B?


No 

LONDON

ACID

CITY


OUR TIME - IS NOW

(seriously, i'm not giving any fucking credit to other genres that weren't involved, its acid techno's glory to revel in and no one else's. Fair?)


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 11, 2008)

mitochondria said:
			
		

> It still suits imo. There has to be some punk in the music. Can't really do a revolution with r'n'b, can you?



Acid techno is more like Status Quo than punk.  Jungle, grime and hip hop are way more punk.

What's wrong with r'n'b btw?


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 11, 2008)

Taxamo Welf said:
			
		

> No
> 
> LONDON
> 
> ...



Well, it's time was 1996, but never mind eh?


----------



## Taxamo Welf (Jan 11, 2008)

wanderlust19 said:
			
		

> Thanks everyone for the replies and the interesting discussions.
> 
> 
> I'm 19 and in Sydney, Australia. From what I gather there were some pretty decent RTS parties on here back in the day. I'm disappointed I missed them.
> ...



Yes. What you've got to grasp is that RTS, pretty much wherever one happened, was based on the event - people 'came together' for the event. The splitting off into smaller groups is one way of looking at it, the other is that there could never have been a coherence outside of the events themselves.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 11, 2008)

Taxamo Welf said:
			
		

> Yes. What you've got to grasp is that RTS, pretty much wherever one happened, was based on the event - people 'came together' for the event. The splitting off into smaller groups is one way of looking at it, the other is that there could never have been a coherence outside of the events themselves.



Hmmmm.  Yes at the beginning.  Less so towards the end when RTS started linking up with the Liverpool Dockers, striking tube workers etc.  That had real potential.


----------



## Random (Jan 11, 2008)

Taxamo Welf said:
			
		

> Yes. What you've got to grasp is that RTS, pretty much wherever one happened, was based on the event - people 'came together' for the event.



you're ignoring all the organised planning and preparation that this event required, though.  These were not spontaneous happenings, but the fruit of a lot of subterranean work.  The events stopped happening when the networks and groups of people that underpinned the events fell apart.


----------



## Random (Jan 11, 2008)

plus the greatly expanded police ability to contain publc order situations i should have added


----------



## free spirit (Jan 11, 2008)

my perspective, as someone who was pretty instrumental in organising 2 RTS attempts in newcastle (nearly but not quite proper rts's - sound system getting pigged both times), plus a travelling contingent to most of the bigun's.

1 - the guerillay gardening event in 2000 confused the fuck out of a lot of people who'd been with RTS through the late 90's, and looking for them to build on the J18 success. People went with it, but it was a bit of an odd one, with half the crowd getting stuck in traf square with no music or anything for hours, the rest in parliament square... essentially it was at best a draw with the police, prob a police win compared to j18, and no music in traf square killed it for anyone stuck there.

2 - focussing on mayday after this was IMO a mistake, as there's already lots of stuff happening on mayday, so it'd lose numbers as many people would go on the union march / lots of regional events also take place (newcastle was holding green festival on mayday weekend, so it lost all support from up here). Getting kettled every year as the police learnt and addapted tactics, and RTS (or it's mayday offshoots) failed to adapt fucked  things as peeps lost interest.

3 - Not getting sound systems into the events after j18 pretty much fucked it for me, as if you're trapped in an area by the police, but have a sound system to dance to it's not so much that you're trapped, more that you've taken the space and are dancing and protecting the system... if there's no rig, then you're just trapped by the police.

4 - I get the impression that a lot of the main people who'd been involved through the late 90's got sacked off with it for one reason or another, and it would have been a major commitment for the core people (having been involved as a volunteer in putting the green fest on up here, I know that it can easily suck 6 months a year out of your life). I also get the impression that the link was lost between the rave crews who'd had the kit and the fuck the law attitude needed to bring the PA's in (and spread the word to the party crowd) and the more political anticap / ecohippy types. I remember some comments around the guerilla gardening time about wanting to move RTS away from the street party thing, and make it more political, which for me was completely missing the point of why RTS was so successful (I've since been told that a rig did attempt to get in to the guerilla gardening event, but got stuck the wrong side of police lines).

5 - IIRC much of the funding for j18 had come from some compensation some of the rts crew had been given from the met for some incident the year before, which had enabled RTS to really go to town on the J18 thing. I guess it's hard to continue doing stuff to the same level once that one off funding runs out.

6 - 911 really took the wind out of the entire anticap movement IMO, as nobody really knew how to respond. It seems odd to say this now, but it's true IMO.

7 - A fair few of the old rts hands were instrumental in setting up the DISSENT network and organising for the g8 protests in 2005. This was a 2 year plus organising effort, so if nothing much happened from 2003 onwards it was because the focus was on the g8. This also spawned an effort to set up a national network of social centres, which sapped the time and energy of 10 groups nationally, with patchy levels of success.

8 - A lot of the RTS ideas have actually gone mainstream, with council organised no car days, increased levels of pedestrianised areas, cycle lanes, bus lanes etc. On an anticapitalist front, many of the big multinational charities and campaigning groups took up much of the RTS message, and ok watered it down a fair amount, but stuff like corporate social responsibility, and the DOHA 'developing nations' round of the trade talks happened largely as a result of the pressure started by RTS and it's PGA allies around the world  OK so these are watered down versions of RTS ideas, but RTS as an instigator of ideas was incredibly successful IMO.

9 - Globalise Resistance - let's not underestimate the role played by the SWP in confusing the situation, claiming credit for the global anticap movement when they'd done fuck all other than sell the odd paper, then attempt to beome the lead player in organising the anti cap movement, pissing loads of people off in the process, ignoring the working methodology of the pre-existing anticap movement, being generally clueless, fucking it all up before eventually moving on to do the same with the Stop The War Movement. Cunts.


----------



## bluestreak (Jan 11, 2008)

Taxamo Welf said:
			
		

> No
> 
> LONDON
> 
> ...



If I can't dance to it, it's not my revolution 

No other genres were bloody allowed except gabba IME.


----------



## mitochondria (Jan 11, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> Acid techno is more like Status Quo than punk.  Jungle, grime and hip hop are way more punk.
> 
> What's wrong with r'n'b btw?



Come on, jungle is dead just as acid techno. Grime and hip hop are not hardcore enough.

And imagine reclaiming the streets with Alicia Keys blasting the speakers.


----------



## chilango (Jan 11, 2008)

mitochondria said:
			
		

> Come on, jungle is dead just as acid techno. Grime and hip hop are not hardcore enough.
> 
> And imagine reclaiming the streets with Alicia Keys blasting the speakers.



Pah! Islington High Street rts started with The Carpenters blaring out of the apc/soundsytem thing iirc.

Easy listening all the way.


----------



## free spirit (Jan 11, 2008)

mitochondria said:
			
		

> Come on, jungle is dead just as acid techno. Grime and hip hop are not hardcore enough.
> 
> And imagine reclaiming the streets with Alicia Keys blasting the speakers.


arrrrgh please god nooooo.


not entirely sure the acid techno's dead line is totally true either, though it's prob nowhere near as big as it was in london i guess.


----------



## mitochondria (Jan 11, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> arrrrgh please god nooooo.
> 
> 
> not entirely sure the acid techno's dead line is totally true either, though it's prob nowhere near as big as it was in london i guess.



Acid techno is not quite dead - it is just less acidic and more techno I guess. Immersion still releases records. So do Liberators.


----------



## Kidda (Jan 11, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> my perspective, as someone who was pretty instrumental in organising 2 RTS attempts in newcastle (nearly but not quite proper rts's - sound system getting pigged both times), plus a travelling contingent to most of the bigun's.
> 
> 1 - the guerillay gardening event in 2000 confused the fuck out of a lot of people who'd been with RTS through the late 90's, and looking for them to build on the J18 success. People went with it, but it was a bit of an odd one, with half the crowd getting stuck in traf square with no music or anything for hours, the rest in parliament square... essentially it was at best a draw with the police, prob a police win compared to j18, and no music in traf square killed it for anyone stuck there.
> 
> ...



nice one free spirit.

Not to mention burn out, sell out, people falling out, people dying, groups just growing apart, people getting targetted heavily by the plod, key people moving away.

Its a shame, but things move on and people change. I used to be really active (not specifically in rts but things surrounding it) and started being so just off the back of the Mayday rts, yet havent done much for a couple of years (maybe im a sell out? i dunno ) we used to try and use the same tactics as people had who had done this stuff before us and a lot of the time found that the police had got wise to it. So we tried new things, some of it worked some of it didnt. Thats life aye. 

The one thing that i did notice after a while was there seemed to be a focus on ''Big actions'' and they happened one after the other. a lot of time, effort and resources went into organising, planning and doing those things and those involved around me (including myself) seemed to get disillusioned and burnt out. There was attempts from various places to create something that was sustainable but that doesnt appear to have worked.

Im not sure what the answer is, maybe there needs to be a new focus, a new way of thinking, tactics and thought has to change and adapt to the time its in and perhaps we didnt do that fast enough. Perhaps we were too scared of loosing what we had, or maybe our dreams werent big enough. Maybe people grew up and had to take on more responsibilitys which meant the risks had to be fewer and fewer. I certainly feel like im one of those people.

Theres still hope yet though i think, though i doubt will see much for another few years.


----------



## Loupylou (Jan 11, 2008)

Badgers said:
			
		

> I saw one of them the other day, he was working for Barratt Homes



An apple doesn't fall far from its' tree.


----------



## laptop (Jan 11, 2008)

Kidda said:
			
		

> The one thing that i did notice after a while was there seemed to be a focus on ''Big actions''



That was an issue.

I was in Trafalgar Square mostly to dance, looking at S Africa House and Candada House and thinking "we've taken the centre of the old empire.... now follow that!"








There are some very nice dance spaces about 12km in from each end of the Channel Tunnel


----------



## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 11, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> my perspective, as someone who was pretty instrumental in organising 2 RTS attempts in newcastle (nearly but not quite proper rts's - sound system getting pigged both times), plus a travelling contingent to most of the bigun's.
> 
> 1 - the guerillay gardening event in 2000 confused the fuck out of a lot of people who'd been with RTS through the late 90's, and looking for them to build on the J18 success. People went with it, but it was a bit of an odd one, with half the crowd getting stuck in traf square with no music or anything for hours, the rest in parliament square... essentially it was at best a draw with the police, prob a police win compared to j18, and no music in traf square killed it for anyone stuck there.
> 
> ...


Yep. i got to thinking about J18 and i do think that's when the gloves came off. I had my kids with me and it felt scary for them which i didn't like and was something that had been absent previously. Bastard cops.


----------



## mitochondria (Jan 11, 2008)

btw. this thread kinda inspired me to dig through my hd and ...

/nl Routepile02 - Free The State

hellyeah

terrorizing neighbours and flatmates rocks!


----------



## Buds and Spawn (Jan 12, 2008)

Mostly agree with Laptop. Here's my tuppence worth anyways...

IMO most people not involved with RTS will find it difficult do understand the how's and why's of how RTS worked, was successful, and ultimately disintegrated because the people involved haven't a clue either.. Or rather everyone had there own equally valid story... And to be honest we mythologised ourselves more than we should have (e.g. everything is spontaneous - well apart from a year of planning etc...).

The open meetings WERE dysfunctional nightmares - but it never failed to piss me off that people would turn up to one and think they had sussed RTS. You really needed to go to every meeting for a few years running before getting to grips with why they did sometimes work amazingly. 

The gap between 'activists' and 'punters' was a problem. The Guerilla Gardening really showed this up - it was explicit in the agitprop that nothing was being laid on beyond the concept and the usual banners, critical mass, compost etc.. Obviously the expectations were for soundsystems etc.. The real mistake was a genuine 'accident' involving the samba band who many people followed up Whitehall to Trafalgar Square.

What people also forget was the criticism following J18 - it was too full-on for many. In some ways the Guerilla Gardening accommodated this viewpoint. And as a point of general information some of the peeps involved in organising the RTS part of J18 may also (m'lud) have been involved in organising the Guerilla Gardening.

The whole context of activism in the UK also changed.

Gone were the long running large scale on site protests that empowered so many people - there was simply less opportunity to experience direct action and as a result there were fewer up for it savvy activists. People who had been involved for a while moved on, burnt out, changed focus etc.. but weren't 'replenished' - as had previously been the case.

Globalise Resistance, as has been mentioned, appeared and muddied the water for people new to protest. Cheers SWP....

Twits like Monbiot and Susan George put the boot into RTS - presumably from J18 onwards liberals couldn't stomach the fact we weren't towing their liberal line. I think it's a misnoma that RTS were 'anti-car' then became 'anti-capitalist' (although I understand why people think this - I did too back in 96) - just look at the agit prop and you'll see everything was joined up... although it did become better articulated.

If you're interested there is an attempt underway to produce a book of sorts about London RTS.


----------



## kenny g (Jan 12, 2008)

Maybe the growth of bulletin boards had something to do with it as well.


----------



## smokedout (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> Well, it's time was 1996, but never mind eh?



our time was then


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

mitochondria said:
			
		

> Come on, jungle is dead just as acid techno. Grime and hip hop are not hardcore enough.
> 
> And imagine reclaiming the streets with Alicia Keys blasting the speakers.



Grime and hip hop not hardcore?  Wtf?!?!  Are you hard of hearing or summat?  And what's wrong with Alicia Keys?


----------



## editor (Jan 12, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:
			
		

> Yep. i got to thinking about J18 and i do think that's when the gloves came off. I had my kids with me and it felt scary for them which i didn't like and was something that had been absent previously. Bastard cops.


It wasn't just the cops.

I was at J18 and some absolute cunt toytown anarchists in their little black hoodies and masks started randomly lobbing bottles about. The bottles were bouncing off people, or  smashing against walls with the shattering glass spraying the crowd

There was a woman with a small child next to me and she was in tears, she was so scared. 

It seemed like all the humour and innovation was fast draining out of the day to be replaced by twats hell bent on pointless vandalism and, err, 'smashing the system'. Or a nearby window. Or scraping someone's car. Anyone/anything would do.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> Grime and hip hop not hardcore?  Wtf?!?!  Are you hard of hearing or summat?  And what's wrong with Alicia Keys?



I am making a genuine point here - the focus on acid techno can feel rather excluding.  Not everyone likes it.  One of the best things about the M41 RTS IMO was the Unsound rig playing all sorts of different stuff.


----------



## mitochondria (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> I am making a genuine point here - the focus on acid techno can feel rather excluding.  Not everyone likes it.  One of the best things about the M41 RTS IMO was the Unsound rig playing all sorts of different stuff.



I like all kinds of music and I am not saying there's something wrong with Alicia Keys here (she is a great money-making corporate machine). My point is that the perfect soundtrack for RTS is/was acid techno. You may feel rebellious at an illegal street demonstration listening to (lost) love lyrics or Burial's hypnotic sounds but that just wouldn't work for me. 
I need the CHARGE! effect (jungle has it, too).

Perhaps a long slow march of thousands with a dub soundsystem providing musical background would be fiiiiiiine as well. Different kind of demo though. Spliff Parade!


----------



## free spirit (Jan 12, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> It wasn't just the cops.
> 
> I was at J18 and some absolute cunt toytown anarchists in their little black hoodies and masks started randomly lobbing bottles about. The bottles were bouncing off people, or  smashing against walls with the shattering glass spraying the crowd
> 
> ...


yeah, towards the end of the day there were a few fucking idiots, mostly brew crew types (the ones I saw actually were sporting cans of special brew) launching bottles randomly towards the police, but not giving a shit really where they went or who they hit. I remember having it out with 2 absolutely twatted lasses who'd just lobbed a couple of bottles passed my head, and about 45 degree angle away from where the police actually were, their response was to try to start on me - we left at that point.

Earlier in the day though was absolutely incredible, most empowering thing I've been involved in, fluffy as fuck but still taking no prisoners - I remember taking some road junction on the outskirts of the protest with a random female sax player and a few others, about 20 of us just going fuck it this junction's ours, taking it and holding it for a god hour or more with nothing more than a saxaphone.


----------



## free spirit (Jan 12, 2008)

Buds and Spawn said:
			
		

> If you're interested there is an attempt underway to produce a book of sorts about London RTS.


Anyone involved in writing the book, please make sure it doesn't miss out the input of the regional RTS groupings in pulling off the Birmingham, J18 and Guerilla Gardening. The power of having sorted, up for it affinity groups of 20-40 experienced activists landing fresh in london, doing their own thing and supporting the London RTS where needed shouldn't be underestimated IMO, though only a few peole in the London RTS were probably really aware of this or involved in liasing with us. 

On J18 in particular other than the Critical Mass thing, it was the out of london affinity groups who were out and about in the morning doing independent actions - our lot had already blockaded the internatinoal petroleum exchange, bank of england, and a couple of other targets, plus led 3 fit teams on a merry chase around london and flypostered half of london before turning up at liverpool street. We then met someone from london RTS who gave us one set of the flags and instructions for leading one of the groups to the main site, and a load of the printed instruction masks to distribute to the crowd - I think the logic being that london RTS was probably infiltrated, so give the trusted out of town affinity groups the task. 

If memory serves me right, I'm sure we came across groups from manchester, Brighton and Leeds, out in the morning - Manchester (I think) had closed off one of the main london bridges into the city for over an hour in the morning rush hour with activists dangling on ropes from the bridge to block the traffic with a J18 banner, and I'm pretty sure there were a few other groupings around doing stuff as well, which also helped to keep the fit teams busy and off the back of the folks sorting stuff for the afternoon.

The first mayday guerilla gardening thing kept the regional link as it followed on from a weekend gathering / conference type thingy which most of the regional affinity groups came down for. From our point of view, we'd also moved the green festival to the last weekend in may that year which allowed us to attend. That was the last one pretty much any of the newcastle lot went to as the newcastle green festival moved back to mayday, and a fair few of the leeds, manchester, brighton, edinburgh crews also came to us rather than going and getting kettled in london. While it's not the only reason for the demise of the mayday's, I'm sure the loss of the regional affinity groups was a contributory factor - these types of affinity groups of experienced activists are pretty good at spotting kettling actions, and leading / supporting the break outs before the police get their act together.

None of this is to take away from what the main London RTS was doing, it was always London RTS's baby, and we were following your lead, just  making sure our role also get's a mention.


----------



## The Black Hand (Jan 12, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> yeah, towards the end of the day there were a few fucking idiots, mostly brew crew types (the ones I saw actually were sporting cans of special brew) launching bottles randomly towards the police, but not giving a shit really where they went or who they hit. I remember having it out with 2 absolutely twatted lasses who'd just lobbed a couple of bottles passed my head, and about 45 degree angle away from where the police actually were, their response was to try to start on me - we left at that point.
> 
> Earlier in the day though was absolutely incredible, most empowering thing I've been involved in, fluffy as fuck but still taking no prisoners - I remember taking some road junction on the outskirts of the protest with a random female sax player and a few others, about 20 of us just going fuck it this junction's ours, taking it and holding it for a god hour or more with nothing more than a saxaphone.



Like it or not - ANY mass campaign will have a rich variety of people at it. They are, after all, the people. I think it was actually the lack of political experience of RTS which was their downfall, they couldn't and did not prepare (which they could have) for situations that arose on J18 and the political aftermath. That was because their political form had not developed in any serious way - they had no communities of support and a lack of outreach and 'serious politics'. By serious, I mean networked politics, where people give mutual aid reciprocally to each others groups. RTS was the group at the meeting, and this is OK for organising events, but very very poor and actually inadequate as a model of social change.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

mitochondria said:
			
		

> I like all kinds of music and I am not saying there's something wrong with Alicia Keys here (she is a great money-making corporate machine). My point is that the perfect soundtrack for RTS is/was acid techno. You may feel rebellious at an illegal street demonstration listening to (lost) love lyrics or Burial's hypnotic sounds but that just wouldn't work for me.
> I need the CHARGE! effect (jungle has it, too).
> 
> Perhaps a long slow march of thousands with a dub soundsystem providing musical background would be fiiiiiiine as well. Different kind of demo though. Spliff Parade!



I liked it back then, but that was 10 years ago!  These days acid techno bores the pants off me.  Horses for courses.

btw, what makes you think acid techno doesn't make money for corporations?  What do you think vinyl is made from?


----------



## free spirit (Jan 12, 2008)

Attica said:
			
		

> Like it or not - ANY mass campaign will have a rich variety of people at it.


yeah I've no problem with that, what I have a problem with is pissed up fuckwits standing 50 yards away from police lines behind the main mass of protestors lobbing bottles in the vague direction of the police, but no having a hope in hell of actually reaching the police, an way more likely to land on the protesters.

If peeps want to have a go at the police, fair play, go and have a go at the police, but these pricks really didn't give a shit if it was the police or us lot that their bottles were landing on so long as they got to play smashy smashy.




			
				Attica said:
			
		

> They are, after all, the people. I think it was actually the lack of political experience of RTS which was their downfall, they couldn't and did not prepare (which they could have) for situations that arose on J18 and the political aftermath. That was because their political form had not developed in any serious way - they had no communities of support and a lack of outreach and 'serious politics'. By serious, I mean networked politics, where people give mutual aid reciprocally to each others groups. RTS was the group at the meeting, and this is OK for organising events, but very very poor and actually inadequate as a model of social change.


and who should RTS have modelled themselves on? Class War? SWP? 

IMO RTS was as successful as it was precisely because it didn't ram 'serious politics' down people's throats, though there was serious politics running through it.

You could have a point about the networking, which I think partially links in with what I was saying about the regional affinity groups. I kinda disagree with you about RTS as a potential model for social change - I'd agree with you if you were talking about it being a bad vehicle for social change, ie RTS being a group to lead the revolution etc. but from what I understand, RTS was more along the lines of prividing inspiration for DIY groups around the world, to provide the call to arms (so to speak), and inspire people to get off their arses and do it themselves. In this way I think they were incredibly successful, inspiring global protests that kicked off the global anticapitalist protest movement.

The main problem with this model was that when London RTS fell apart, much of the rest of the global network who'd been inspired by London RTS either followed their lead and also fell apart, or in many cases just moved on slightly and operated under slightly different names but with a similar ethos.


----------



## co-op (Jan 12, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> It seemed like all the humour and innovation was fast draining out of the day to be replaced by twats hell bent on pointless vandalism and, err, 'smashing the system'. Or a nearby window. Or scraping someone's car. Anyone/anything would do.




I left before the trouble on J18 so was left on a total high by it, but the Parliament Square/Guerilla Gardening day - there were some really dodgy activity, I smelt crack being smoked all the way up Whitehall, it's never been a smell I link with a good vibe or anything very constructive going on.


----------



## mitochondria (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> I liked it back then, but that was 10 years ago!  These days acid techno bores the pants off me.  Horses for courses.



I agree. It's not the freshest sound  I have heard a whole 303 spectrum already.




			
				Blagsta said:
			
		

> btw, what makes you think acid techno doesn't make money for corporations?  What do you think vinyl is made from?



I never said it doesn't - most of things we buy make money for corporations - but you know that Alicia Keys makes zillions more than some punky tramps releasing obscure music on vinyl. 

Black PVC:  EUR 0.94/kg
Alicia Keys CD: GBP 7.98

Lawrie Immersion dropping Fallin'('avin it remix): priceless


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

mitochondria said:
			
		

> I agree. It's not the freshest sound  I have heard a whole 303 spectrum already.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



So what?  It's a funny thing to criticise her for.


----------



## mitochondria (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> So what?  It's a funny thing to criticise her for.



where have I criticised Alicia Keys? I have just used her as an example.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

An example of what?  That the music industry makes money?  Is this news to anyone?


----------



## mitochondria (Jan 12, 2008)

An example of a performer that doesn't go along with RTS imo. Neither on the musical nor ideological side.

Maybe we should make a poll.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

mitochondria said:
			
		

> An example of a performer that doesn't go along with RTS imo. Neither on the musical nor ideological side.
> 
> Maybe we should make a poll.



I find this attitude really bizarre.  Is there only certain music that is idealogically pure enough?  What a crock of divisive elitist shit.  Unfortunately it's an attitude that appears to be prevalent among some people on the "underground" party scene - only certain types of music are acceptable.  If you like _this_, you can't like _that_.  I remember people on the Sorted mailing list slagging off UK garage as not being "underground" enough - as if pirate radio is too commercial for them!  I hate this attitude, it's fucking juvenile.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

Sorry if that came across a bit angry, nothing personal.  It's just that your attitude illustrates one of the problems with RTS IMO.  It only really appeals to a very small group of people.  There seems to be something about ownership here - acid techno is "our" music, i.e. punky, crusty, squatting music.  Only "our" sort of people will get it.  If you're into r'n'b then you won't get RTS.  That's what I get from your attitude and I find it quite snobby tbh.


----------



## free spirit (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> I find this attitude really bizarre.  Is there only certain music that is idealogically pure enough?  What a crock of divisive elitist shit.  Unfortunately it's an attitude that appears to be prevalent among some people on the "underground" party scene - only certain types of music are acceptable.  If you like _this_, you can't like _that_.  I remember people on the Sorted mailing list slagging off UK garage as not being "underground" enough - as if pirate radio is too commercial for them!  I hate this attitude, it's fucking juvenile.


eh - I think I'm with you to an extent if you're arguing that more musical diversity would be good, but alicia keys wtf.

besides it's all a bit irrelevant isn't it? as I understood it, the music that got played was largely the music that was the chosen music of the rig who had the balls to get their rig in, risking arrest, equipment being impounded etc. The acid techno crews had those balls, alicia keys and her ilk don't.

besides it'd be a bit odd having an anticapitalist protest fronted by corporate lacky style musicians... if you want that sort of thing, bob & bono are probably moe what you're looking for.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> eh - I think I'm with you to an extent if you're arguing that more musical diversity would be good, but alicia keys wtf.
> 
> besides it's all a bit irrelevant isn't it? as I understood it, the music that got played was largely the music that was the chosen music of the rig who had the balls to get their rig in, risking arrest, equipment being impounded etc. The acid techno crews had those balls, alicia keys and her ilk don't.
> 
> besides it'd be a bit odd having an anticapitalist protest fronted by *corporate lacky style musicians*... if you want that sort of thing, bob & bono are probably moe what you're looking for.



What does this even mean and how is Alicia Keys one?


----------



## mitochondria (Jan 12, 2008)

Oh, come on. I was not slagging anything, I have not used the U world (I don't divide music like this). I simply don't envision Alicia Keys performing at RTS street party. Music is connected to the set & setting of a party and you can't deny it.
2 hours of a great string quartet would not fit a posh nightclub where r'n'b is usually spinned, you could do it but I wouldn't bet on the punters to be happy. It would fit a restaurant (along with r'n'b) where techno would not be a music of choice. And so on...

Is that hard to grasp?


----------



## free spirit (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> Sorry if that came across a bit angry, nothing personal.  It's just that your attitude illustrates one of the problems with RTS IMO.  It only really appeals to a very small group of people.  There seems to be something about ownership here - acid techno is "our" music, i.e. punky, crusty, squatting music.  Only "our" sort of people will get it.  If you're into r'n'b then you won't get RTS.  That's what I get from your attitude and I find it quite snobby tbh.


i think it's pretty fair to say that if you're into R n B, chances are you won't get RTS, rnb being mostly about bling culture, which is pretty much the antithesis of what RTS is about.

bad example IMO.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

mitochondria said:
			
		

> Oh, come on. I was not slagging anything, I have not used the U world (I don't divide music like this). I simply don't envision Alicia Keys performing at RTS street party. Music is connected to the set & setting of a party and you can't deny it.
> 2 hours of a great string quartet would not fit a posh nightclub where r'n'b is usually spinned, you could do it but I wouldn't bet on the punters to be happy. It would fit a restaurant (along with r'n'b) where techno would not be a music of choice. And so on...
> 
> Is that hard to grasp?



I don't envisage Alicia Keys performing either.  I wouldn't have a problem with some r'n'b being played though.  I don't get why you would.  You seem to have very fixed ideas of what constitutes party music.  I find that attitude a bit snobby.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> i think it's pretty fair to say that if you're into R n B, chances are you won't get RTS, rnb being mostly about bling culture, which is pretty much the antithesis of what RTS is about.
> 
> bad example IMO.



Come on, this is really patronising.  If you like *this*, you won't like *that*.  Come on...


----------



## free spirit (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> What does this even mean and how is Alicia Keys one?


she has been contracted throughout her career to various Sony Records offshots, she has fuck all to do with the DIY ethos espoused by RTS. 

I've no major beef with Alicia Keys, I even quite like some of her stuff, but it / she would have had no place at an RTS IMO.


----------



## mitochondria (Jan 12, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> i think it's pretty fair to say that if you're into R n B, chances are you won't get RTS, rnb being mostly about bling culture, which is pretty much the antithesis of what RTS is about.
> 
> bad example IMO.



Exactly. 

Where would they drive their Escalades if the streets were reclaimed??


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> she has been contracted throughout her career to various Sony Records offshots, she has fuck all to do with the DIY ethos espoused by RTS.
> 
> I've no major beef with Alicia Keys, I even quite like some of her stuff, but it / she would have had no place at an RTS IMO.



So no records on major label subsidiarys ever got played at RTS parties?  Really?


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

mitochondria said:
			
		

> Exactly.
> 
> Where would they drive their Escalades if the streets were reclaimed??



Fucks sake.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

This is exactly the sort of elitist divisive crap I'm on about.


----------



## free spirit (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> Come on, this is really patronising.  If you like *this*, you won't like *that*.  Come on...


they are polar opposite viewpoints - one promotes the bling image, the worship of money, and the aquisition of stuff, the other promotes an anticonsumerist, anticapitalist message.

You'd not expect to see a tory politician being invited to speak at an RTS, why'd you expect to hear music being played who's message was entirely counter to the RTS message?

besides rnb's shite


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> they are polar opposite viewpoints - one promotes the bling image, the worship of money, and the aquisition of stuff, the other promotes an anticonsumerist, anticapitalist message.
> 
> You'd not expect to see a tory politician being invited to speak at an RTS, why'd you expect to hear music being played who's message was entirely counter to the RTS message?
> 
> besides rnb's shite



So everyone into r'n'b is a raving capitalist?  Patronising shit.


----------



## free spirit (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> So no records on major label subsidiarys ever got played at RTS parties?  Really?


not none at all, but with acid techno, the vast majority of it was released on small scale independent record labels owned and managed by people from the scene, and the whole thing was built around a DIY punk ethos, same as RTS.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> not none at all, but with acid techno, the vast majority of it was released on small scale independent record labels owned and managed by people from the scene, and the whole thing was built around a DIY punk ethos, same as RTS.



Yes, I'm well aware of that.  However, some records played at RTS would have been on major label subsidiaries.  Rather scuppering your argument.


----------



## free spirit (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> So everyone into r'n'b is a raving capitalist?  Patronising shit.


are you hung over or something?

I'm not saying everyone into RnB is a raving capitalist, but the major theme running through the music is either bling, or stuff about girls etc. I fail to see the relevance.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> are you hung over or something?
> 
> I'm not saying everyone into RnB is a raving capitalist, but the major theme running through the music is either bling, or stuff about girls etc. I fail to see the relevance.



Why does party music have to be relevant?  Were all the records played at RTS "relevant"?


----------



## free spirit (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> Yes, I'm well aware of that.  However, some records played at RTS would have been on major label subsidiaries.  Rather scuppering your argument.


erm nope, not at all, the vast majority of that style of music at that time was being produced, and released by artists and labels that were linked directly with the RTS scene, and had the same or similar DIY ethos as RTS was espousing. A few of the records that got played were also probably on major labels, but this would be the minority.

If it was RnB getting played, the vast majority of the music would be from artists on major labels, with very very little available on small scale diy labels.


----------



## free spirit (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> Why does party music have to be relevant?  Were all the records played at RTS "relevant"?


well personally I'd have felt a bit odd dancing around under an anticapitalist banner to music that had an entirely different message.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> well personally I'd have felt a bit odd dancing around under an anticapitalist banner to music that had an entirely different message.



Most acid techno doesn't have a message, except that saying ketamine is great.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> erm nope, not at all, the vast majority of that style of music at that time was being produced, and released by artists and labels that were linked directly with the RTS scene, and had the same or similar DIY ethos as RTS was espousing. A few of the records that got played were also probably on major labels, but this would be the minority.
> 
> If it was RnB getting played, the vast majority of the music would be from artists on major labels, with very very little available on small scale diy labels.



Yes, you have a point. But whether RnB is played is irrelevant and it wasn't me that mentionned it in the first place. My point is that concentrating solely on acid techno is rather ghettoised and excludes a lot of people. If there are going to be RTS parties again, I'd like to see a more inclusive and varied music policy.   I wouldn't expect a whole 8 hours of RnB or a whole 8 hours of anything. What I'd like is an attitude to music that isn't exclusive and doesn't subscribe to elitist notions of 'underground' purity.


----------



## mitochondria (Jan 12, 2008)

So gimme your RTS stage lineup.

Mine could look like this:

The Clash
Dub Syndicate
Can
Lawrie Immersion 
Chumbawamba
Fila Brazillia
Nitzer Ebb
Derrick May
Henry Rollins spoken word

Sorry, couldn't really mix any r'n'b into this 

Your turn, Blagsta. Give it a shot.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

mitochondria said:
			
		

> So gimme your RTS stage lineup.
> 
> Mine could look like this:
> 
> ...



It was you that mentioned r'n'b, not me.  I don't have a problem with much of that.  Not much of it has any kind of message though.  Actually, I'm sure Derrick May could chuck in some r'n'b.  After all, Detroit techno has roots in soul.


----------



## free spirit (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> Yes, you have a point. But whether RnB is played is irrelevant and it wasn't me that mentionned it in the first place. My point is that concentrating solely on acid techno is rather ghettoised and excludes a lot of people. If there are going to be RTS parties again, I'd like to see a more inclusive and varied music policy.   I wouldn't expect a whole 8 hours of RnB or a whole 8 hours of anything. What I'd like is an attitude to music that isn't exclusive and doesn't subscribe to elitist notions of 'underground' purity.


so in essence you're now agreeing with my first sentence about this?


> eh - I think I'm with you to an extent if you're arguing that more musical diversity would be good, but alicia keys wtf.





the problem with what you're suggesting being that in general the rig would largely get to dictate what dj's got to play as it was their rig being risked. Some rigs had a more diverse policy than others i guess - unsound vs immersion / liberator, but in general rig politics would usually dictate that the rig owners decide who plays. 

The other way to get more variety would be to have more rigs, plying different stuff, but this would be difficult to pull off being as the entire thing's illegal, and smuggling rigs in through police lines is difficult, never mind having the numbers of people to protect multiple rigs. besides, at j18 there was a fair variety of music played, I'm sure there was a live punk band, samba band, a couple of 12 volt bike PA's playing random stuff (jive?), lots of random bits of live sax, guitar etc. as well as the main techno pa. In birmingham I'm pretty sure there were actually 3 rigs planned, 2 of them got stuck behind police lines, and the only rig that made it in was a little techno rig (dj playing from the back seat of a car).

At the end of the day I'm pretty sure a lot of it came down to which crew's had the balls to bring a rig in and kick the party off, the acid techno crews had those balls and did it, others didn't - therefore the sound track was mainly acid techno.


----------



## Gmart (Jan 12, 2008)

Went to so many of these in the late 90's. The best one for me was in Brummy where the music was vvery hardcore, but we had lots of fun until the police moved in late, herding us towards a decent noght at the Q club. Great night.

I suppose that the new millennia proved to be a turning point, with a good many crackdowns up North and many campaigns just being ignored.

I remember taking over the Hacienda in Manchester which was a very big deal. Got into NME, but eventually did  very little for the movements of the time. A few went to prison, moved on and that was that. Police were OOO, but no change there of course.

That was also the 'Occasional Cafe' movement when we used to scout out an empty building, get in, post section 6's to the doors and have parties/political events for a month while the landlord got rid of us.

Often resulted in the building being used after, but even now some are still empty 10 years on... Sad really, but few people are particularly interested in empty buildings and the abuse by landowners this represents.

In the end there just weren't the numbers of people prepared to continue fighting, hard as this might be to accept. When one of your mates goes to prison, injuring his/her life prospects it makes a lot of people think twice.


----------



## HackneyE9 (Jan 12, 2008)

Painful as it is to acknowledge it, once the surprise element was lost at the end of the 90s, the police tactic of just corralling everyone into a space and keeping them there for eight hours or so was frustratingly effective.

There were also a couple of suspicious things going on at the 2000 Guerilla Gardening one - unlike the previous RTS things there'd been loads of mainstream press coverage in the build up, all of it alarmist 'bringing pitchforks' bollocks. I was part of a big CM bike ride within the square and late afternoon some (in retrospect) short-haired cop-lookalike on a bike suggested everyone cycled off on a pointless detour around Victoria - and by the time we got back Parliament Sq had been sealed off by the cops, so somebody had done an effective job of getting all the cyclists out of the square. I got back in through police lines however.

And before that, nearly all the shops on Whitehall had shut for the day - apart from the Macdonalds that got trashed. Funny coincidence that.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> so in essence you're now agreeing with my first sentence about this?



It wasn't me that initially mentioned Alicia Keys.  However, the snobbery against r'n'b displayed here is symptomatic of the problem.




			
				free spirit said:
			
		

> the problem with what you're suggesting being that in general the rig would largely get to dictate what dj's got to play as it was their rig being risked. Some rigs had a more diverse policy than others i guess - unsound vs immersion / liberator, but in general rig politics would usually dictate that the rig owners decide who plays.



Agreed.  There is a lot of musical snobbery on the free party scene.  I remember some squat crew coming to Birmingham and staying at our place for the G8 RTS.  One of them came into our living room, where someone was playing some REM and said something like "you're a party crew, yet you like REM? Pah!".  This is indicative of attitudes that can be prevalent on the scene - a real narrow mindedness.  They also tried to squat somewhere for an after party, despite being told they don't have a chance in Brum at that time  - and got nicked twice.  They were arrogant fools and fucked a lot of people off.  Along with some James Bond fantasists from (I think) Manchester EF/RTS who insisted on meeting in some bushes in the park.   We got treated a bit like hicks from the sticks and it pissed a lot of people off.




			
				free spirit said:
			
		

> In birmingham I'm pretty sure there were actually 3 rigs planned, 2 of them got stuck behind police lines, and the only rig that made it in was a little techno rig (dj playing from the back seat of a car).



Yeah, that was our rig.




			
				free spirit said:
			
		

> At the end of the day I'm pretty sure a lot of it came down to which crew's had the balls to bring a rig in and kick the party off, the acid techno crews had those balls and did it, others didn't - therefore the sound track was mainly acid techno.



True.  Although I seem to recall a house system (Smokescreen?) at an RTS in Sheffield in '97.  That rocked.


----------



## editor (Jan 12, 2008)

Really can't see the connection between RTS and Alicia Keys to be honest.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> Really can't see the connection between RTS and Alicia Keys to be honest.



There isn't one.  That's not the point though.


----------



## mitochondria (Jan 12, 2008)

The point was one can't do a revolution with r'n'b.


----------



## editor (Jan 12, 2008)

mitochondria said:
			
		

> The point was one can't do a revolution with r'n'b.


I'm pretty sure you can, you know!


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

mitochondria said:
			
		

> The point was one can't do a revolution with r'n'b.



You can't do one with acid techno either.  That's the point.


----------



## Dan U (Jan 12, 2008)

laptop said:
			
		

> If you were going to hold the 2008 equivalent of an old-skool RTS, what genres of music would you play?
> 
> 
> Yes, this is an indirect suggestion for one of the many reasons for it fading.



Lawrie Immersion playing 'London Acid City' out the side of a truck or stfu  

i miss RTS a lot. and that whole time of big protests, a sense that things could change, energised people.


----------



## free spirit (Jan 12, 2008)

Dan U said:
			
		

> Lawrie Immersion playing 'London Acid City' out the side of a truck or stfu
> 
> i miss RTS a lot. and that whole time of big protests, a sense that things could change, energised people.


me too, do you think we've been laying low long enough to regain the elements of surprise?


----------



## Dan U (Jan 12, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> me too, do you think we've been laying low long enough to regain the elements of surprise?



sadly, legislation has moved on  

considering a Free Party crew were being prosecuted under a section of anti terror legislation until a judge belatedly threw it out of court


----------



## free spirit (Jan 12, 2008)

blagsta - had a feeling that rig in brum had something to do with you, respect - that had me dancing all afternoon, and it was a pleasure sitting in front of rows of riot police to help protect your rig

we'll probably have to just agree to disagree on the R n B front. IMO the link between the squat party scene and RTS was too important in terms of bringing in party heads in sufficient numbers, and sufficiently up for it to face down riot police to protect the rig etc. I just don't see that you'd get that if you were playing rnb / pop / oasis, and you'd defo lose the main party crowd at that point. People who want mtv friendly music can access it all over the shop, so they're not going to be so up for the idea of fighting for their right to party, when they could much more easily go to any cheesy bar in town and listen to it / switch on mtv dance.

If you took your concept to it's logical conclusion you'd end up with the equivalent of some local commercial radio roadshow, which is about as subversive as an orange, and as likely to inspire a big crowd willing to risk arrest to listen and dance to it.


----------



## free spirit (Jan 12, 2008)

Dan U said:
			
		

> sadly, legislation has moved on
> 
> considering a Free Party crew were being prosecuted under a section of anti terror legislation until a judge belatedly threw it out of court



hmm - I know what you mean, but then I can't help thinking that this whole ban on protests in parliament square thing's a bit like a red rag to a bull - I'd happily get nicked in a protest that helped get rid of that bit of legislation (at least drew attention to it), and a big RTS would be my chosen method of protesting it.

fuck, I just realised j18's 10th anniversary is next year


----------



## soulman (Jan 12, 2008)

That 'thump thump thump' music isn't for everyone. Personally, I prefer a nice live band. Samba, Pipe or Brass...


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> blagsta - had a feeling that rig in brum had something to do with you, respect - that had me dancing all afternoon, and it was a pleasure sitting in front of rows of riot police to help protect your rig
> 
> we'll probably have to just agree to disagree on the R n B front. IMO the link between the squat party scene and RTS was too important in terms of bringing in party heads in sufficient numbers, and sufficiently up for it to face down riot police to protect the rig etc. I just don't see that you'd get that if you were playing rnb / pop / oasis, and you'd defo lose the main party crowd at that point. People who want mtv friendly music can access it all over the shop, so they're not going to be so up for the idea of fighting for their right to party, when they could much more easily go to any cheesy bar in town and listen to it / switch on mtv dance.
> 
> If you took your concept to it's logical conclusion you'd end up with the equivalent of some local commercial radio roadshow, which is about as subversive as an orange, and as likely to inspire a big crowd willing to risk arrest to listen and dance to it.



But I'm not talking about pop, Oasis etc.  Not all r'n'b is commercial pop music.  What I'm saying is that there is room for eclectic music.  R'n'b can fit in a set with reggae, hip hop, funk, soul etc.  Hip hop, reggae, soul and funk have produced some quite subversive records in their time.  I want DJ's and crews to have some imagination with what they play.  Heck, I'm not a great DJ but even I can play a set that spans from Sister Sledge to KRS1, that incorporates punk and soul.  The free party scene can be very narrow minded with music sometimes and I don't like that.


----------



## Gmart (Jan 12, 2008)

DJ's are often purists who refuse to play popular dance hits like The Prodigy etc. Even the music at that Brum RTS was closer to Gabba than Acid Techno, and I've lost count of the number of free parties completely destroyed by the DJ's playing obscure techno which only they and the Ket Headz like...


----------



## HackneyE9 (Jan 12, 2008)

Wasn't there one about a month after J18, outside Euston station? Police van set alight.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

Gmarthews said:
			
		

> DJ's are often purists who refuse to play popular dance hits like The Prodigy etc. Even the music at that Brum RTS was closer to Gabba than Acid Techno, and I've lost count of the number of free parties completely destroyed by the DJ's playing obscure techno which only they and the Ket Headz like...



There was no gabba played at the Brum RTS.  Acid techno and hard techno, but no gabba.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> Hip hop, reggae, soul and funk have produced some quite subversive records in their time.



There's also a history of hip hop, funk and soul illegal warehouse parties, illegal reggae blues parties etc.  I'm sure you could get a crowd to protect a rig.


----------



## editor (Jan 12, 2008)

To be honest, the music being played at a protest isn't the most important thing to me: it's the vibe that matters.

That's what I liked best about Cooltan - there you could hear the lot - techno, folk, rock, jazz  and more, with a bit of dodgy performance art thrown in.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

HackneyE9 said:
			
		

> Wasn't there one about a month after J18, outside Euston station? Police van set alight.



Wasn't it in November, N30?

Yeah, here we are
http://rts.gn.apc.org/n30/n30tms.htm


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> To be honest, the music being played at a protest isn't the most important thing to me: it's the vibe that matters.
> 
> That's what I liked best about Cooltan - there you could hear the lot - techno, folk, rock, jazz  and more, with a bit of dodgy performance art thrown in.



Bingo!


----------



## editor (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> Wasn't it in November, N30?
> 
> Yeah, here we are
> http://rts.gn.apc.org/n30/n30tms.htm


Report here: 
http://www.urban75.org/archive/news095.html


----------



## mitochondria (Jan 12, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> I'm pretty sure you can, you know!



I want to see that


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 12, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> There was no gabba played at the Brum RTS.  Acid techno and hard techno, but no gabba.



Although, tbf, Heretic could bang the techno out pretty hard!


----------



## laptop (Jan 12, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> me too, do you think we've been laying low long enough to regain the elements of surprise?



Quite soon, I think 

Though I rather expect it to be people who were conceived at the M41 afterparty who come up with the surprises


----------



## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 12, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> erm nope, not at all, the vast majority of that style of music at that time was being produced, and released by artists and labels that were linked directly with the RTS scene, and had the same or similar DIY ethos as RTS was espousing. A few of the records that got played were also probably on major labels, but this would be the minority.
> 
> If it was RnB getting played, the vast majority of the music would be from artists on major labels, with very very little available on small scale diy labels.






			
				Blagsta said:
			
		

> Most acid techno doesn't have a message, except that saying ketamine is great.


free spririt has a good point you know, Laurie Immersion and the Liberators and Gizelle and one of the Desert Storm(?) rigs were all involved at the start, London Acid City really did feel like where it was at. Acid techno was a definite backdrop and as much as i love listening to other music, you can't getaway from the fact that it energised people, before k came along and fucked tings up royally....


----------



## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 13, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> It wasn't just the cops.
> 
> I was at J18 and some absolute cunt toytown anarchists in their little black hoodies and masks started randomly lobbing bottles about. The bottles were bouncing off people, or  smashing against walls with the shattering glass spraying the crowd
> 
> ...


I'm not going to disagree with what you remember but i would point out too that this was the party when the cops basically ran over some young women in a riot van, there was baton charges that provoked a great deal of anger and the stockbrokers in their jackets had been joining in with the fun until it got quite heavy. I didn't enjoy J18, it was when the sense of fun got lost and suddenly it all became very confrontational. And boys is black masks, for all the problems, were essential in basically getting the space on the streets, ime.


----------



## editor (Jan 13, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:
			
		

> And boys is black masks, for all the problems, were essential in basically getting the space on the streets, ime.


Maybe some of them were - I didn't see it - but the cunts near me were just mindless cowardly morons. 

Seeing that woman with her kid in tears because of their stupid actions was when the fun really went out of it for me that day.

And your time line is confused: the tossers were lobbing bottles way before the woman got hit.

Horrible picture here: http://www.urban75.org/j18/Img/j18_15.jpg
Report here: http://www.urban75.org/j18/j18_r6.html

PS I used to go out with the girl who was charged with attempted murder that day!


----------



## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 13, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> Maybe some of them were - I didn't see it - but the cunts near me were just mindless cowardly morons.
> 
> Seeing that woman with her kid in tears because of their stupid actions was when the fun really went out of it for me that day.
> 
> ...


If you remember, there was a right mix-up of party people, footie fans, hunt sabs, all the CJA people as well as loads of random ravers, then a confused bunch of masked-up young uns. i'm not condemning the people who do that cos lately, and beforehand, you've needed people to stand up for everyone. unfortunately, and almost inevitably, that means there'll be an idiot or 2, and that's without agents provocateurs, which you either accept or become deeply paranoid after a while. but i've seen chelsea and millwalll fans getting stuck right in and doing everyone proud at these things and if you believed the stereotypes, that wouldn't happen. but it did, i saw it.


----------



## editor (Jan 13, 2008)

But these were like little 17 year olds who weren't 'standing up' for anyone. 
They were just being arseholes and the protest was all the worse for them being there. They threw bottles, people got hit by the shattering glass and the they ran away and hid in the crowd. 

Wankers.


----------



## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 13, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> But these were like little 17 year olds who weren't 'standing up' for anyone.
> They were just being arseholes and the protest was all the worse for them being there. They threw bottles, people got hit by the shattering glass and the they ran away and hid in the crowd.
> 
> Wankers.


I think we got the picture already.

Good night


----------



## editor (Jan 13, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:
			
		

> I think we got the picture already.


Can't I rant a little bit more?


----------



## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 13, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> Can't I rant a little bit more?


Feel free, i've got one more beerio to go


----------



## editor (Jan 13, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:
			
		

> Feel free, i've got one more beerio to go


Aw. I've lost my momentum and run out of rant now.


----------



## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 13, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> Aw. I've lost my momentum and run out of rant now.


S'old age innit  I got the same ting meself.......i generally reclaim the armchair these daze


----------



## free spirit (Jan 13, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> But I'm not talking about pop, Oasis etc.  Not all r'n'b is commercial pop music.  What I'm saying is that there is room for eclectic music.  R'n'b can fit in a set with reggae, hip hop, funk, soul etc.  Hip hop, reggae, soul and funk have produced some quite subversive records in their time.  I want DJ's and crews to have some imagination with what they play.  Heck, I'm not a great DJ but even I can play a set that spans from Sister Sledge to KRS1, that incorporates punk and soul.  The free party scene can be very narrow minded with music sometimes and I don't like that.


ok, so other than the RnB bit, which I entirely disagree with you about, I don't think there'd have been any problem with a rig turning up playing hiphip, reggae, funk, soul style stuff. IIRC there quite often was a 12 volt bike pa kicking around playing that kind of stuff anyway.

point is though that it's a DIY thing innit, you want that sort of music at RTS, then go off and sort it out - don't expect someone else to do it then complain when it doesn't happen.

btwI love the way we seem to be talking about this as if RTS is still happening... I do prefer to think of it as just sleeping rather than defunct


----------



## editor (Jan 13, 2008)

On some Critical Masses, I've heard RAAAWCK blasting out from a cycle trailer and no one seemed to complain.

free spirit: yep. RTS is gone and it ain't coming back again - least not it any form recognisable to how it was. That's a real shame too: they were some of the best parties ever - the M41 event was awesome.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 13, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:
			
		

> free spririt has a good point you know, Laurie Immersion and the Liberators and Gizelle and one of the Desert Storm(?) rigs were all involved at the start, London Acid City really did feel like where it was at. Acid techno was a definite backdrop and as much as i love listening to other music, you can't getaway from the fact that it energised people, before k came along and fucked tings up royally....



Oh yeah, I already admitted he has a point.  Our rig was playing acid techno at that time, we were the first crew to bring that sound to Birmingham.  However, this thread is rather Londoncentric.  The first RTS in Birmingham in 95 had a pub rock/rhythm and blues (old meaning) band playing from the back of a truck!

Anyhow, we were talking about what music could be played now...not then.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 13, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> ok, so other than the RnB bit, which I entirely disagree with you about, I don't think there'd have been any problem with a rig turning up playing hiphip, reggae, funk, soul style stuff. IIRC there quite often was a 12 volt bike pa kicking around playing that kind of stuff anyway.
> 
> *point is though that it's a DIY thing innit, you want that sort of music at RTS, then go off and sort it out - don't expect someone else to do it then complain when it doesn't happen.*
> 
> btwI love the way we seem to be talking about this as if RTS is still happening... I do prefer to think of it as just sleeping rather than defunct



We seemed to have wondered off the point - I'm not complaining about something not happening for a hypothetical RTS that isn't happening.  I'm complaining about narrow minded musical attitudes.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 13, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> On some Critical Masses, I've heard RAAAWCK blasting out from a cycle trailer and no one seemed to complain.
> 
> free spirit: yep. RTS is gone and it ain't coming back again - least not it any form recognisable to how it was. That's a real shame too: they were some of the best parties ever - the M41 event was awesome.



Yep.  That M41 RTS was one of the best days out ever.


----------



## editor (Jan 13, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> Yep.  That M41 RTS was one of the best days out ever.


It had the lot: a strong, focussed political message, an audacious action, humour, innovation, barely a whiff o'trouble, bags of fun for all the family and the joy of completely wrongfooting the police.

Planting trees in the concrete by drilling under the cover of the giant ball gowns was an act of _absolute genius. 

_It was an awesome day out.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 13, 2008)

You can see me in one of the videos, sat on top of the Unsound truck, wearing an orange t-shirt.


----------



## free spirit (Jan 13, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> We seemed to have wondered off the point - I'm not complaining about something not happening for a hypothetical RTS that isn't happening.  I'm complaining about narrow minded musical attitudes.



If it's decent underground music with a bit of bite then I'd be happy, in fact I'd be up for sorting a non acid techno rig should an rts ever happen again


----------



## editor (Jan 13, 2008)

As an aside, how many people do you think would have turned up for something like this ten years ago?
http://www.urban75.org/photos/protest/starbucks-protest.html


----------



## free spirit (Jan 13, 2008)

I'm not sure we ever even managed any actual amplified music at the 2 newcastle rts attempts due to some slightly comic mistakes in setting up the pa (standing there holding the decks going 'where the fucks the table' only to spot the table sat at the other side of the road etc), plus not enough numbers to protect it from the police.

It mostly ended up being a load of peeps dancing around to some drumming, the odd sax, a guitar and some random beatboxing when the police had snaffled the instruments. 

was all good fun though, and we always got the rig back and even the tripod.... lock up sergeant 'is this your scafolding I keep tripping over? can you take it with you please or I'll be tripping over it all year...'


----------



## free spirit (Jan 13, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> free spirit: yep. RTS is gone and it ain't coming back again - least not it any form recognisable to how it was. That's a real shame too: they were some of the best parties ever - the M41 event was awesome.


nooooooo - say it ain't so


----------



## Dan U (Jan 13, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> the M41 event was awesome.



i'll never forget that day.

by pure luck my friends and i were some of the first people to run up the motorway. when the curtain came back on the truck and the tunes started blaring and everyone went to help the stuff coming over the wall was amazing.

there is a fantastic panoramic pic on the net somewhere but i cant remember where


----------



## Nixon (Jan 13, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:
			
		

> Ok, 10 learning experiences for you, off the top of my head:
> 
> 1) it can be fairly straightforward to organise single issue political events initially and create impacts that far outweigh the effort needed to create that action.
> 2) it is a good thing to do 'politics' in different ways that attract the attention of people who would otherwise run a mile from anything political - see the Westway RTS, for eg, whereby many of the local residents from along the M40 came along and joined in and enjoyed their area without fumes and noise and traffic.
> ...



good points..good thread.

i wasn't around when this was all gwanning so i can't say much.i just think it's a shame the group lost it's focus.however a lot of good seems to have evolved out of it.

reclaim the future is about nowadays though.it's not the same,but it's got similar ethics and they throw a raw party


----------



## Dan U (Jan 13, 2008)

Nixon said:
			
		

> reclaim the future is about nowadays though.it's not the same,but it's got similar ethics and they throw a raw party



they do indeed.


----------



## Blagsta (Jan 13, 2008)

free spirit said:
			
		

> If it's decent underground music with a bit of bite then I'd be happy, in fact I'd be up for sorting a non acid techno rig should an rts ever happen again



Could you make a list of idealogically sound music?  Just so as I know, like.


----------



## free spirit (Jan 14, 2008)

Blagsta said:
			
		

> Could you make a list of idealogically sound music?  Just so as I know, like.


I'm trying to fucking agree with you, you daft radgee.

funk, soul, hip hop (though I'd prob steer clear of the more bling stuff), reggae, dub, electro, breaks, dubstep, punk, ska, ragga, doowop, jive, house, jungle, drum & bass.

basically anything that'll get people dancing, has a bit of attitude and doesn't sound like the sound track to daytime commercial radio / galaxy would be ok by me.

I'd still have a techno rig as well if possible mind


----------



## e19896 (Jan 14, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> Can't I rant a little bit more?


 
ha please do what fun what joy..


----------



## chilango (Jan 14, 2008)

editor said:
			
		

> It wasn't just the cops.
> 
> I was at J18 and some absolute cunt toytown anarchists in their little black hoodies and masks started randomly lobbing bottles about. The bottles were bouncing off people, or  smashing against walls with the shattering glass spraying the crowd
> 
> ...




Well, yeah...and no.

In hindsight, it seems that such scenes were very much a symptom of the problems within the movement(s) mentioned above.

On the one hand, for a few years prior the police had been getting heavier and heavier with the peaceful/non-violent protests and some folk had had enough. J18 was seen by some within the movement as a chance to hit back...sadly quite literally. There were many within the movements who had originally been committed to nonviolence who by that point no longer were.

Also within the movement there was a big push towards a more "hardcore" (ych, I hate that term) political praxis, the moere confrontational froms of action (drawn from the european scene) mirroring an equally "insurrectionary" idae of theory. As one of those responsible for pushing these ideas of revolutionary anticapitalism, I now think I was wrong, very wrong. But at the time it seemed both logical and necessary as the older nvda strategy was already stalling at that point. A rethink was needed, but many of us got it wrong sadly.

However, whatever the reasons I think the Eds point does some up a scene that did really illustrate the end of that era. J18 was the end, not the beginning.


----------



## Brainaddict (Jan 14, 2008)

chilango said:
			
		

> As one of those responsible for pushing these ideas of revolutionary anticapitalism, I now think I was wrong, very wrong.


That's interesting - and very honest of you. Out of interest, do you have any thoughts on what might have been a more productive path to go down?


----------



## chilango (Jan 14, 2008)

I dunno, the creative single issue nvda had been extremely successful, but the police had wised up and could np it in the bud, I think maybe more community based stuff...some of which was happenning, but not enough.

Of "community based stuff" is very vague and problematic in itself.

tbh. I still don't really know the way forward.

...and also and I think very important was the whole "green" thing...why did we lose our focus on this? It is more at the forefront of peoples minds than ever, yet we pretty much ditched it...


----------



## Brainaddict (Jan 14, 2008)

Well, as I remember, a lot of people were talking about doing more community-based stuff in the wake of the break-up of RTS - some of it happened but not much as far as I know. Perhaps because of the problem you identified - that no-one really knew what it meant 

Or perhaps they didn't know how to resolve the contradiction between having non-mainstream views/ways of working, and wanting to 'work together' with or 'act within' mainstream* communities.



*for want of a better word


----------



## chilango (Jan 14, 2008)

Brainaddict said:
			
		

> Well, as I remember, a lot of people were talking about doing more community-based stuff in the wake of the break-up of RTS - some of it happened but not much as far as I know. Perhaps because of the problem you identified - that no-one really knew what it meant
> 
> Or perhaps they didn't know how to resolve the contradiction between having non-mainstream views/ways of working, and wanting to 'work together' with or 'act within' mainstream* communities.
> 
> ...



Yeah.

There's also the problem that in many places there is no sense of community. I`ve not managed to live in many places with one. So the conditions simply aren`t there to do this.

To be fair, many people tried hard to do this...the redbricks in Hulme has some good ideas. Dunno how succesful they were though.

By that point though I think it was too late, the momentum had been lost. Many local EF! groups had already folded. 

I think the seeds may have been sown quite early with division between the fulltime activists and those somewhat sneeringly  referred to as "weekenders". 

I think local based groups whilst often despèrately trying to orientate themselves towards a vague enitity known as "locals" were alienating their immediate periphery...people who probably would've provied a more natural link.

This was happenning as early as '96 iirc. In this respect Newbury may well have been the killer blow.


----------



## Brainaddict (Jan 14, 2008)

Interesting points chilango - you seem to have thought about this stuff a bit. Do you find that attempting to discuss the success of their methods with most activists will get you little but a load of ideological ranting?

Maybe it's just the way I do it


----------



## Paulie Tandoori (Jan 14, 2008)

chilango said:
			
		

> Yeah.
> 
> There's also the problem that in many places there is no sense of community. I`ve not managed to live in many places with one. So the conditions simply aren`t there to do this.
> 
> ...


Similar criticisms were made against the lack of local involvement in the Disarm DESI events, in that a load of "outsiders" (for want of a better way of putting it) simply came along and started protesting, without demonstrably looking to inform or involve anyone living in the locality. Now, I didn't agree completely with such criticism as there clearly was a degree of local involvement, both beforehand and in some of the actions taking place, but I do think the criticism was justified in that more could and should have been done to, for eg, leaflet local properties, speak to local community groups, etc. Problem is finding the bodies, the enthusiasm and the contacts though.


----------



## untethered (Jan 14, 2008)

chilango said:
			
		

> ...and also and I think very important was the whole "green" thing...why did we lose our focus on this? It is more at the forefront of peoples minds than ever, yet we pretty much ditched it...



Wasn't RTS _perceived _as being more green than anarchist?


----------



## Buds and Spawn (Jan 14, 2008)

untethered said:
			
		

> Wasn't RTS _perceived _as being more green than anarchist?


Anarchist and Green thought were arguably the two most dominant perspectives / philosophies / views in London RTS - although in a very diverse, and at the group level contradictory way - e.g. Social Ecology v. Deep Ecology, and several shades inbetween. 

Additionally, RTS in London was essentially London EF!. The majority of RTS actions were also pretty much unknown outside the people doing them - RTS wasn't just about the big 'spectaculars'.


----------



## lightsinthebay (Jan 16, 2008)

This is a really interesting thread. Looking from the outside I'd have to say this...




			
				chilango said:
			
		

> Also within the movement there was a big push towards a more "hardcore" (ych, I hate that term) political praxis, the moere confrontational froms of action (drawn from the european scene) mirroring an equally "insurrectionary" idae of theory. As one of those responsible for pushing these ideas of revolutionary anticapitalism, I now think I was wrong, very wrong. But at the time it seemed both logical and necessary as the older nvda strategy was already stalling at that point. A rethink was needed, but many of us got it wrong sadly.



and what Chilango was saying in a subsequent post in regard to losing a green focus being a bad thing, and a needing more of a loca/community focus, seem pretty spot on, if not of course the whole story. 

I think where people are in their lives and how mobilisation itself can build a sense of misplaced optimism, even if it is actually quite marginal mobilisation, builds this kinda "things are happening"!!! buzz, which will inevitably have to meet the cold light of day no matter what.  

It is good to read the reflections of participants on this thread, I havn't seen much published reflecting back from a more long term perspective, it is important, insights that were hard won, and of interest to people like me who became interested in eco-defence, protest camps, RTS, and the like, after the period people are talking about.


----------



## Taxamo Welf (Feb 5, 2008)

Blagsta said:


> Well, it's time was 1996, but never mind eh?



that was my point you div 

read the post


----------



## brasicritique (Feb 6, 2008)

wanderlust19 said:


> Sorry for the ignorance. I'm reading No Logo by Naomi Klein and to my massive shock I learnt about the Reclaim the streets movement/parties that were so prolific in the late 90's! I'd never heard ANYTHING about these before?! What happened?! There are documented RTS parties from about 1996 onward, every year until 2003 ... then next to nothing? Youtube has footage from one or two in Europe around 2006 - Zurich and Helsinki - but that's all ... they seemed a smaller scale, too. The movement seems to have dwindled out ... ?? Agh! I was only 9 when they were in their peak ten years ago!
> 
> What happened? .



one half went to demonstrate outside the other halfes homes in nottinghill 

see bash the rich thread for more details ....


----------



## chilango (Feb 6, 2008)

Just been reading Movement of Movements and what is interesting is that most people seem to take Seattle as a starting point, whereas for me, it showed the limits of these movements and thus was more of an end...


----------



## sus (Feb 8, 2008)

J18 and the resultant Anti Terrorism Bill put the screws on direct action protests/demos in the UK imo.. Seattle and 9/11 gave Authority the credibility to stamp on dissent.. fundamental disagreements between advocates of NVDA and those considering violence as an option split RTS irrevocably.. there's no way that RTS was a failure tho' , it inspired and politicised people from all corners of the globe, and the ripples are still spreading....job done

And the M41 was one of the best days of my life too...take it and shake it  we played pretty much everything (apart from acid techno, someone else was looking after that)  .. loads of punk, loads of ska and reggae, loads of jungle and D+B,  and if we'd been into R+B we'd have played that too..if I'm a survivor by Destiny's Child had been released then we'd have rinsed it to fuck


----------



## Blagsta (Feb 8, 2008)

Yeah, your rig rocked that day.  I spent most of the day sat on top of your truck!


----------



## Paulie Tandoori (Feb 8, 2008)

Dan U said:


> i'll never forget that day.
> 
> by pure luck my friends and i were some of the first people to run up the motorway. when the curtain came back on the truck and the tunes started blaring and everyone went to help the stuff coming over the wall was amazing.
> 
> there is a fantastic panoramic pic on the net somewhere but i cant remember where


This one? That's a motorway and we took the piss completely


----------



## sus (Feb 9, 2008)

here's a good pic from the day.. this was in the evening standard a few days later


----------



## treelover (Feb 9, 2008)

I was actively involved in RTS in the sticks but attended many of the events across the country, it was some of the most exhilarating experiences of my life, yet I was no raver or hedonist. Some of the things that happened took my breath way with their chutzpah and bravado, and yes there was a sense of freedom and possibilities. However, I do think it was successful because it was primarily a cultural movement, rather then a political one. Many of the participants were there for the 'partyyy man’ and nearly every teenager/student had heard of RTS. I clearly remember the tensions when RTS came down to support the dockers, a fine body of men and their womenfolk. They once gave a standing ovation to a poster on here for maintaining the base while the rest went on the picket line .I also recollect Jimmy Nolan(fifty odd att) dancing on top of a phone box! I also think there was a level of real paranoia, suspicion and indeed nastiness to those who didn't fit in, particularly if you were working class or a bit older: some of the posters on here may have even been the perpetrators of such behaviour. The other thing was the incredible hostility/focus to the police, although the Miners Strike had happened and they couldn’t be forgiven tbh, it was the Govt that was my main focus. .Having said all that I met some incredible inspiring people and some had amazing times. It certainly helped germinate/cross fertilise the A/C movement, which yes was hit badly by 911 but also Genoa(in some quarters called the 'Weekend War') but ultimately imo, what changes things as well is hard applied work, no more for me.


Whew, wanted to get that off my chest for years…


----------



## treelover (Feb 9, 2008)

I always thought that 'Don't Fence Me In' should have been the RTS anthem!


'Sorry if that came across a bit angry, nothing personal. It's just that your attitude illustrates one of the problems with RTS IMO. It only really appeals to a very small group of people. There seems to be something about ownership here - acid techno is "our" music, i.e. punky, crusty, squatting music. Only "our" sort of people will get it. If you're into r'n'b then you won't get RTS. That's what I get from your attitude and I find it quite snobby tbh.
Reply With Quote


----------



## TopCat (Feb 14, 2008)

My recollection was that the movers and shakers in RTS shat themselves after June 18th and did not want things to go that far let alone as far as some of us planned to go.


----------



## chilango (Feb 14, 2008)

TopCat said:


> ....let alone as far as some of us planned to go.



meaning what?

...and would that have REALLY moved things on?


----------



## TopCat (Feb 14, 2008)

There were alot of people on June 18th for whom the day was as much about revenge for Stop the City as any thing else.  Myself and many mates would tend to think the best way forward would be to excalate the situtation with more free parties in reclaimed space together with more robust opposition to the police if they dared show up. Some of the movers and shakers in RTS were/are quite posh and were worried about being blamed and then banged up.


----------



## chilango (Feb 14, 2008)

TopCat said:


> There were alot of people on June 18th for whom the day was as much about revenge for Stop the City as any thing else.  Myself and many mates would tend to think the best way forward would be to excalate the situtation with more free parties in reclaimed space together with more robust opposition to the police if they dared show up. Some of the movers and shakers in RTS were/are quite posh and were worried about being blamed and then banged up.



so...more confrontational?

fine.

How would that broaden the movement...as opposed to narrow it down?


----------



## Brainaddict (Feb 14, 2008)

TopCat said:


> Some of the movers and shakers in RTS were/are quite posh and were worried about being blamed and then banged up.


Jesus, what a load of divisive bollocks. Yes, from what I've heard they were concerned about the police and media harassment they were getting. People do tend to be concerned about things like that. But I suspect they also recognised confrontation with the police as the dead-end it is. But don't worry about that - just let your testosterone and resentment flow...


----------



## Paulie Tandoori (Feb 14, 2008)

J18 was a shit day imo. Gained nothing, lost a lot. Revenge for Stop the City? Please....


----------



## TopCat (Feb 14, 2008)

Brainaddict said:


> Jesus, what a load of divisive bollocks. Yes, from what I've heard they were concerned about the police and media harassment they were getting. People do tend to be concerned about things like that. But I suspect they also recognised confrontation with the police as the dead-end it is. But don't worry about that - just let your testosterone and resentment flow...



You assert that confrontation withn the police is a dead end and I and many others do not agree with your _view_.


----------



## TopCat (Feb 14, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:


> J18 was a shit day imo. Gained nothing, lost a lot. Revenge for Stop the City? Please....



The moment when the female mounted police person galloped into the crowd only to be faced by hundreds _running at her _who then dragged the horse to the ground remains one of the proudest moments of my life. It changed the use of mounted police on demos for ever.


----------



## Paulie Tandoori (Feb 14, 2008)

Yes, what a success eh? At least one protestor run over by a police van, lots of people put off coming to demonstrations at all, subsequent demo's so heavily policed and supervised that virtually all actions were shut down, the _"taking the piss but having a laugh"_ ethic which had previously worked so effectively lost for good. And you say that its revenge for something 15 years or more previous. It's all gravy eh?


----------



## chilango (Feb 14, 2008)

TopCat said:


> The moment when the female mounted police person galloped into the crowd only to be faced by hundreds _running at her _who then dragged the horse to the ground remains one of the proudest moments of my life. It changed the use of mounted police on demos for ever.



Yeah.

Meaning they've learnt btheir lesson and will do it better next time.


----------



## Taxamo Welf (Feb 14, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:


> J18 was a shit day imo. Gained nothing, lost a lot. Revenge for Stop the City? Please....



depends what you were aiming for really doesn't it? Whilst i think TC's assertion that RTS mioved back from the brink cos some movers and shakers were 'posh' is retarded, there is certainly a split between people who actually wanted massive confrontation in the centres of finance and with whoever dared to defend it, and those who wanted 'creative protest'.

This is not and has never been, a class cleavage - there has been a tendency with some less reflective anarchists to label all those who don't want to bathe in the blood of the constabulary as irredeemably bourgoise, but it is untrue in this case.

It is true that JJ Wotsisname is very much into 'creative protest' , hence the clowns etc. and i think it is true a lot of RTS people didn't want the confrontations BUT

 - to say that there wasn't a huge amount of interest in the confronations is utter bollocks. What, did you miss the following 5 years of summit hopping and rioting?

If anything it is the rioting apects which have survived, not the 'creative protest'.

FWIW IMO J18 was the best thing RTS ever did as well.


----------



## Paulie Tandoori (Feb 14, 2008)

Clearly different strokes for different blokes. Fair point about the wider impact, i was meaning in terms of the RTS stuff, which is/was the topic of the thread.


----------



## Taxamo Welf (Feb 14, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:


> Yes, what a success eh? At least one protestor run over by a police van, lots of people put off coming to demonstrations at all, subsequent demo's so heavily policed and supervised that virtually all actions were shut down, the _"taking the piss but having a laugh"_ ethic which had previously worked so effectively lost for good.



this utterly baffles me.



> lots of people put off coming to demonstrations at all, subsequent demo's


 - demo's about what, for what?



> which had previously worked so effectively lost for good.


worked so effectively in achieving what?

I don't understand at all. You can continue protesting all you like, but if at the heart of your 'protest' (and was RTS a protest?) is something so totally opposed to capitalism and the status quo, you will either end up in conflict or you will have failed.

I'm not pretending RTS and J18 are incredible anti-capitalist achievements, i just don't get what the fuck else they were meant to be if they weren't attempts at such.

My apologies to anyone who went on an RTS thinking it was all just for a laugh, you were heartlessly duped by anarchists.


----------



## Taxamo Welf (Feb 14, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:


> Clearly different strokes for different blokes. Fair point about the wider impact, i was meaning in terms of the RTS stuff, which is/was the topic of the thread.



that's not what i said is it....?

where did i mention wider impact? My point about summit hopping was that clearly there was a mass of people up for violence against the cops and the financial centres, it isn't some projection by TC.


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## chilango (Feb 14, 2008)

Taxamo Welf said:


> that's not what i said is it....?
> 
> where did I mention wider impact? My point about summit hopping was that clearly there was a mass of people up for violence against the cops and the financial centres, it isn't some projection by TC.



I think you over estimate the appetite for confrontation.

Sure, many were increasingly frustrated with the growing abilty of the police etc  to neutralise more pacific methods of protest.

And, yeah, there were those who wanted to move beyond "mere protest".

But, and its a big but, this was not anywhere near the majority within the movements. 

...and even amongst this "core" that wanted increased confrontation, or at least more physical contestation of space, some I'm sure sooner or later realised the limits of a strategy of escalation.I certainly did. I think the failure of summit hopping clearly illustrates these limits. (though tbh a recap of Europe in the 1970s should've done that...)


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## The Black Hand (Feb 14, 2008)

Brainaddict said:


> Jesus, what a load of divisive bollocks. Yes, from what I've heard they were concerned about the police and media harassment they were getting. People do tend to be concerned about things like that. But I suspect they also recognised confrontation with the police as the dead-end it is. But don't worry about that - just let your testosterone and resentment flow...



It is *confrontation *that* created *the *anti globalisation cycle of struggles* from J18 and Seattle onwards - not 'hippy party love each other pacifist bollocks'.


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## chilango (Feb 14, 2008)

Attica said:


> It is *confrontation *that* created *the *anti globalisation cycle of struggles* from J18 and Seattle onwards - not 'hippy party love each other pacifist bollocks'.



Utter rubbish.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Feb 14, 2008)

Taxamo Welf said:


> that's not what i said is it....?
> 
> where did i mention wider impact? My point about summit hopping was that clearly there was a mass of people up for violence against the cops and the financial centres, it isn't some projection by TC.


oh do fuck off you pedantic twat. wider impact? well what about your statement _"the following 5 years of summit hopping and rioting?"_, if not pointing to a series of co-ordinated political actions around the world, following some of what went on on J18? And as i said, as any fule could see, i think that impetus from the RTS parties and protests was lost - that had confused many in authority because it had been good natured, people dancing and smiling and testing the limits, as well as making many other people aware that there's more to all this around us than meets the eyes. 

I am capable of thinking any particular thing has more than one particular impact or effect you know. I love the way that you criticise by asking what was achieved - you're buying into an idea that everything must have a result or hit a fucking target imo. Well sorry that revolution didn't happen, must have been too busy having fun as well as other stuff, crazy eh?


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## durruti02 (Feb 14, 2008)

chilango said:


> so...more confrontational?
> 
> fine.
> 
> How would that broaden the movement...as opposed to narrow it down?



well simply that a lot of my mates and work mates who generally laughed at the fluffy RTS stuff were pretty impressed with J18 and that we had the courage to 'attack' the City/Boys .. it could and should have been made part of wider struggles .. ( and was briefly thru teh dockers stufff whihc was brilliant )

more generally not sure though how J18 it coukd have been progressed - STC stopped for the same reasons .. it was just not possible to repeat what with the police response 

and for RTS? police harassment and the tensions between greenies and reds got too much .. like as  AFA found too a high confrontation strategy is very hard to keep going


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## Blagsta (Feb 14, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:


> ots of people put off coming to demonstrations at all,



Did it?  I thought it was ace as did most people I know.  What put people off was the kettling tactics the police used subsequently.


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## Blagsta (Feb 14, 2008)

Attica said:


> It is *confrontation *that* created *the *anti globalisation cycle of struggles* from J18 and Seattle onwards - not 'hippy party love each other pacifist bollocks'.



Not really true, seeing as the first anti-globalisation RTS wasn't J18, it was Birmingham the year before.  There was a mini confrontation at the end, but the real purpose was joining the dots between RTS as an anti-car/environmental thing and the G8 and broader issues.


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## laptop (Feb 15, 2008)

TopCat said:


> There were alot of people on June 18th for whom the day was as much about revenge for Stop the City as any thing else.



Precisely the problem with J18. 

There were many great things about it - and then there was this element of "we're-so-hardcore" anarchists celebrating their powerlessness, just like Stop the City.

More so with Maydays from 2000 on.


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## The Black Hand (Feb 15, 2008)

chilango said:


> Utter rubbish.


And you my friend are deluded. Refusing to take the fact that confrontation has been high on the agenda of all the large rallies from the beginning as being the causal factor of success. It was not the weak willed and effete middle of the road pacifist nothingness which led to the success of anti globalisation struggles 

Do not overestimate the effect of, and the amount of boring waffle led social forum type meetings which the usual sad politicos tended to dominate. Rather it is the white heat of confrontation and direct struggles by people who seriously mean their politics, who were willing to put their bodies on the line, who ensured that class confrontation was central to the meaning of those mobilisations.


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## TopCat (Feb 15, 2008)

I could have been less rude in my posts above and apologise.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Feb 15, 2008)

Blagsta said:


> Did it?  I thought it was ace as did most people I know.  What put people off was the kettling tactics the police used subsequently.


What can i say, other than what i said above? I didn't enjoy j18 at all - i was scared for my kids, who had previously been able to attend demo's and get involved (eg being some of the first people running up and onto the m21 was quite a buzz), it felt like people were spoiling for a scrap for no real reason, we ended up sitting in a boozer on the south bank watching cops and demonstrators attacking each other on the opposite side.

Yes of course kettling causes consternation but there's two things to consider, one is the fact that this tactic arose from the plods perceived need to actively control and restrain people (which i think was an outcome of j18 and other events). The other is that people allow themselves to get kettled to a degree - when the oxford st action took place (02?), we managed to keep away from and then break free from solid cordons of cops, i was part of a group of people who were chased from TCR right down to fucking Clerkenwell and beyond by riot clad cops who had to keep stopping for breathers.

And in the air of conciliation, apologies to Tax for my brusque language above, no offence mate


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## chilango (Feb 15, 2008)

Attica said:


> And you my friend are deluded. Refusing to take the fact that confrontation has been high on the agenda of all the large rallies from the beginning



Confrontation was rarely "on the agenda", certainly not from the beginning either. For sure, sometimes you could predict which were going to "kick off", but that's a different matter.




> as being the causal factor of success. It was not the weak willed and effete middle of the road pacifist nothingness which led to the success of anti globalisation struggles



Confromtation with police is not, and was not a causal factor of success. But I suppose it depends how you define success. 

One thing is for sure, those confrontations that were "militarily" victorious were largely those that came as a surprise, and were spontaneous cathching the police off guard. Not the pre-planned rucks of a militant minority. 



> Do not overestimate the effect of, and the amount of boring waffle led social forum type meetings which the usual sad politicos tended to dominate.



For sure. i never went to meetings like that.



> Rather it is the white heat of confrontation and direct struggles by people who seriously mean their politics, who were willing to put their bodies on the line, who ensured that class confrontation was central to the meaning of those mobilisations


.

Martyrist nonsense. Re-read your Vaniegem on "roles" and "sacrifice".


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## chilango (Feb 15, 2008)

durruti02 said:


> well simply that a lot of my mates and work mates who generally laughed at the fluffy RTS stuff were pretty impressed with J18 and that we had the courage to 'attack' the City/Boys .. it could and should have been made part of wider struggles .. ( and was briefly thru teh dockers stufff whihc was brilliant )



Certainly, the "fluffies" unwillingness to defend themselves (or those they dragged onto protests) was often as equally disempowering...

...not the point TC was making though.



> more generally not sure though how J18 it coukd have been progressed - STC stopped for the same reasons .. it was just not possible to repeat what with the police response
> 
> and for RTS? police harassment and the tensions between greenies and reds got too much .. like as  AFA found too a high confrontation strategy is very hard to keep going



Quite.

I'm not a dogmatic pacifist. Just pointing out the limitations of a strategy of confrontation...particularly in the cintext we are talking about.

Even the Zapatistas (the guns and balaclava poster boys and girls of the time) recognised this.


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## Taxamo Welf (Feb 15, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:


> oh do fuck off you pedantic twat. wider impact? well what about your statement _"the following 5 years of summit hopping and rioting?"_, if not pointing to a series of co-ordinated political actions around the world, following some of what went on on J18? And as i said, as any fule could see, i think that impetus from the RTS parties and protests was lost - that had confused many in authority because it had been good natured, people dancing and smiling and testing the limits, as well as making many other people aware that there's more to all this around us than meets the eyes.
> 
> I am capable of thinking any particular thing has more than one particular impact or effect you know. I love the way that you criticise by asking what was achieved - you're buying into an idea that everything must have a result or hit a fucking target imo. Well sorry that revolution didn't happen, must have been too busy having fun as well as other stuff, crazy eh?


this is a truly classic post.

I am printing this onto fabric and framing it.

Sums things up perfectly.


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## Taxamo Welf (Feb 15, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:


> And in the air of conciliation, apologies to Tax for my brusque language above, no offence mate



oh i just saw that. 

No probs - i genuinley wasn't being pedantic. I know i'm a bit of a novelty by actually _being an anarchist_, not an 'anarchist inspired...' or 'situationist influence...' so forgive me for asking something from RTS which perhaps wasn't there for a reason. I find it very trying wehn people 'well, thats not socialism' and you are thinking, when did we say it was? Forgive me if I sound like leftist hack.

Even so, you have repeatedly mentioned a 'protest' or a campaign in RTS and debated which events or tactics 'worked' in relation to this. My question is then - what was the campaign? Whar was the protest? Once we have established that, then we can debate how successful an event or tactic was.

My view: RTS was a coming together of a lot of disparate groups and it developed a kmomnetum all of its own. Hoever, outside of it and within it too, was a strong anticapitalist confrontational element that wanted to really get stuck in in a way that was not protesting, but a demonstration of opposition and anger - and yes, that dates back to STC in the 80's amongst other things. Cos that's what i think, i see J18 as being a big success. They took london OFF the fucking stock exchange or something mental. They fought hand to hand with capital. Which is laughable in a lot of ways but was also really really inspiring and revealing, for people in the rest of the world especially. RTS's best hope was to create a genuinely subversive series of events that disrupted the atmosphere of 'business as usual' and the idea that this was just the way things were - and they achieved that. In my opinion, they achieved that best, with J18.


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## Taxamo Welf (Feb 15, 2008)

Just to add - J18 changed my life - and i just read about it in the papers. It really succeeded in getting people i know into a certain kind of politics and looking at things in a certain kind of way.

It kicked of a flurry of interest and liberal approximations of what was going on that lead a lot of people onto 'the hard stuff' and we'e been hopelessly hooked ever since


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## kyser_soze (Feb 15, 2008)

And how did it all feed back into the class struggle? How did the wider w/c perceive the events and groups being discussed?


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## chilango (Feb 15, 2008)

Taxamo Welf said:


> Just to add - J18 changed my life - and i just read about it in the papers.





On the other hand...

J18 changed my (political) life. For me, it represented the end of the road for a certain way of doing things. Yeah, it was impressive in many ways...but also it became blindingly obvious that we couldn't we repeat it (in the UK at least) without "military" escalation...and that such escalation was not going to broaden or deepen the struggle.


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## TopCat (Feb 15, 2008)

chilango said:


> On the other hand...
> 
> J18 changed my (political) life. For me, it represented the end of the road for a certain way of doing things. Yeah, it was impressive in many ways...but also it became blindingly obvious that we couldn't we repeat it (in the UK at least) without "military" escalation...and that *such escalation was not going to broaden or deepen the struggle*.



Why would it not? 

I faced this back in the day when as a member of Class War back in the 80's. 

I wanted to escalate things more and more and achieve increasing levels of confrontation with the state and it's representatitves the police and also with examples of rapacious capitalism. I ended up leaving Class War because the "shit their pants" tendancy were all scared of getting imprisoned but instead of admitting this, hid behind bollocks about vanguardism and not substituting one self for the working classes. 

They followed this shit up with an analysis that said Capitalism would suffer an inevitable demise and that the role of good classs warriors was to wait and influence events when this long awaited day happened rather than kicking harder each day until it breaks.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Feb 15, 2008)

Taxamo Welf said:


> Just to add - J18 changed my life - and i just read about it in the papers. It really succeeded in getting people i know into a certain kind of politics and looking at things in a certain kind of way.
> 
> It kicked of a flurry of interest and liberal approximations of what was going on that lead a lot of people onto 'the hard stuff' and we'e been hopelessly hooked ever since


So when you stated earlier on that _"FWIW IMO J18 was the best thing RTS ever did as well"_, it wasn't from any kind of actual comparative experience of what had gone on previously, or even actually on the day itself, but from reading about it in the newspaper. And you go onto say that inspired you to get involved in political actions. _It changed your life_. And then you question the _"success"_ of it all..... And if you missed the Trafalgar/Liverpool dockers march/party and the M41 party, then your statement that j18 is the best thing RTS did simply ain't true, cos i found these to be far more inspiring.

AFAIC, RTS was about reclaiming public space, it was about reconnecting people with each other, it was about making people realise that they could get out onto the streets without deference to the car culture that prevails, it was about environmental justice, it was about taking actions and making statements to try to inspire people, it was about many different things for many different people. But it was, for a while, "for" things rather than intrinsically "against" things - it was for reclaiming common space from capitalist enclosure, however you want to view that.

Public demonstrations are about either confrontation or celebration i read today. I enjoyed the celebration, i enjoyed seeing members of the public join in with street parties spontaneously, i enjoyed seeing orthodoxies being challenged in innovative ways, i enjoyed seeing massed ranks of people dancing and talking and planning what next. Sorry if that doesn't meet your novelty anarchist achievement benchmark. I'll make sure that all concerned try harder in future.


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## chilango (Feb 15, 2008)

TopCat said:


> Why would it not?
> 
> I faced this back in the day when as a member of Class War back in the 80's.
> 
> ...




If Class War didn't fancy risking imprisonment for a strategy of escalation, you can bet that the vast majority then why do you (did you) expect everyone else to as well.

Unless you can give a pretty damn good reason why people should risk imprisonment, injury etc then they ain't gonna.

A ruck with the cops is not going to acheive anything tangible enough for people to adopt it as a strategy.


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## TopCat (Feb 15, 2008)

chilango said:


> If Class War didn't fancy risking imprisonment for a strategy of escalation, you can bet that the vast majority then why do you (did you) expect everyone else to as well.
> 
> Unless you can give a pretty damn good reason why people should risk imprisonment, injury etc then they ain't gonna.
> 
> A ruck with the cops is not going to acheive anything tangible enough for people to adopt it as a strategy.



It _was _our strategy for a while, Class War members turned up at every bloody riot and picket and fought the police hand and boot. We had for a time an influence far in excess of our numbers and the split between the pro ruckers and the beardy theorists had not yet happened. Whilst this _was_ our strategy we were selling 15,000-20,000 copies of our paper too, not bad for a load of letraset and pritt stick. .


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## Paulie Tandoori (Feb 15, 2008)

TopCat said:


> It _was _our strategy for a while, Class War members turned up at every bloody riot and picket and fought the police hand and boot. We had for a time an influence far in excess of our numbers and the split between the pro ruckers and the beardy theorists had not yet happened. Whilst this _was_ our strategy we were selling 15,000-20,000 copies of our paper too, not bad for a load of letraset and pritt stick. .


You're right about the public profile being far greater than the actual numbers involved - this was when there were two papers on the go presumably? The monthly(?) CW newspaper as well as the Heavy Stuff. Personally at the time, i never went for the hospitalised copper pieces, it was the kind of thing that put me off getting involved with CW tbh. But there was some tremendously humorous content and covers as well, there was the rioter lobbing a scaffold pole thru a cop car window with the headline "I bet she drinks Carling Black Label" which i remember.


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## chilango (Feb 15, 2008)

TopCat said:


> It _was _our strategy for a while, Class War members turned up at every bloody riot and picket and fought the police hand and boot. We had for a time an influence far in excess of our numbers and the split between the pro ruckers and the beardy theorists had not yet happened. Whilst this _was_ our strategy we were selling 15,000-20,000 copies of our paper too, not bad for a load of letraset and pritt stick. .




Yeah yeah.

But how many people were actually involved?

Not many.

Sure CW had an influence on the anarcho scene, and to an extent on a cultural level. I'd heard of you as a kid.

all well and good, but could you have kept it up?

Nope. Nor did you.

For valid reasons.

The same reasons that RTS could never have gone down that road, even if it had wanted to.


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## kyser_soze (Feb 15, 2008)

TBH I can understand TCs argument - no revolution ever happened without people being locked up for it, and you *could* argue that it's a measure of the dedication to achieve change that many people aren't - I know it's a trite example, but Aung Sun Kyi in Burma _has_ been imprisoned for her beliefs, as have 00s of Falun Gong followers in China...and they're all peaceful protestors!

OTOH I don't think you're going to build a better society in any way on the back of the continued legitimisation of violence as a means to achieve permanent social change, nor do I think that groups like RTS ever represented the views of more than a few 00000s of people...and that's even before you start looking at the class composition by background...(In case anyone's asking, I wasn't involved in any RTS but I met LOTS of people involved in the 90s protest groups and most of them were as far away from my experience of what w/c people were like, or what they wanted, as it was possible to get)


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## TopCat (Feb 15, 2008)

chilango said:


> Yeah yeah.
> 
> But how many people were actually involved?
> 
> ...




Do you mind posting your _valid reasons _up for us to debate?


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## chilango (Feb 15, 2008)

TopCat said:


> Do you mind posting your _valid reasons _up for us to debate?



Sure...

1) People are not willing to risk arrest, imprisonment or injury without very good cause.

2) Based upon a small group of people such a strategy is not sustainable. Some will drop out scared, others if they keep going will end up in prison.

3) The police etc. will easily develop tactics to neuter such strategies (we've already seen this). Only surprise and/or numbers will allow victories in tests of force against the state. A strategy of escalting force will have neither.

4) Many of your potential allies will consider increased violence uneccessary, counter productive or ethically wrong in this context.


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## chilango (Feb 15, 2008)

chilango said:


> If Class War didn't fancy risking imprisonment for a strategy of escalation, you can bet that the vast majority then why do you (did you) expect everyone else to as well.
> 
> Unless you can give a pretty damn good reason why people should risk imprisonment, injury etc then they ain't gonna.
> 
> A ruck with the cops is not going to acheive anything tangible enough for people to adopt it as a strategy.



...or these reasons.


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## TopCat (Feb 15, 2008)

Or you could also throw in that many liberals masquerading as anti capitalists had a keen eye on what a spell in prison would do to their chances of following the same route as Hilary Clinton IE from Sheepskin coat and bell bottoms to climbing the greasy pole to the top.


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## chilango (Feb 15, 2008)

TopCat said:


> Or you could also throw in that many liberals masquerading as anti capitalists had a keen eye on what a spell in prison would do to their chances of following the same route as Hilary Clinton IE from Sheepskin coat and bell bottoms to climbing the greasy pole to the top.



Do you not see that _most _people, not just "liberals", wouldn't fancy a spell in prison unless it was for a damn good reason?

Can you not see the alienation here?


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## TopCat (Feb 15, 2008)

chilango said:


> Do you not see that _most _people, not just "liberals", wouldn't fancy a spell in prison unless it was for a damn good reason?
> 
> Can you not see the alienation here?



I think trying to overthrow capitalism is about as good a reason as you can get.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Feb 15, 2008)

TopCat said:


> Or you could also throw in that many liberals masquerading as anti capitalists had a keen eye on what a spell in prison would do to their chances of following the same route as Hilary Clinton IE from Sheepskin coat and bell bottoms to climbing the greasy pole to the top.


Or you could throw in that encouraging attacks on coppers for barely explained reasons and faulty logic isn't a very productive strategy in growing the numbers of supporters for your strategy, particularly if they follow an ethos of non-violence.


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## TopCat (Feb 15, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:


> Or you could throw in that encouraging attacks on coppers for barely explained reasons and faulty logic isn't a very productive strategy in growing the numbers of supporters for your strategy, particularly if they follow an ethos of non-violence.



Anyone who follows an ethos of non violence in trying to overturn Capitalism is a naif mug.


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## chilango (Feb 15, 2008)

TopCat said:


> I think trying to overthrow capitalism is about as good a reason as you can get.




yes.

but that is WAY too abstract.

Part of the problem with RTS/EF! etc. from about `97 onwards was the move towards ant-capitalism without a clear projection of what steps were to be made to acheive this.

To use your example ( i think) How would going to a summit, rucking with cops and smashing the centre up actually threaten capitalism?

I can see that

a) the capitalists would be maybe a little threatened

and

b) some of those involved in the action would have increased confidence

but conversely

a) the police would stop you the next time

b) you would lose activists

c) you would alienate allies

d) capitalism would still be functioning just as well.

e) many people would not see the connection between fighting outside a summit and the abolition of capitalism or at least how one leads to another. 

The EZLN and APPO here have recognised that even in their context military escalation is not a strategy they should CHOOSE, why would you advocate it?


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## Paulie Tandoori (Feb 15, 2008)

TopCat said:


> Anyone who follows an ethos of non violence in trying to overturn Capitalism is a naif mug.


yeah right, cos violent confrontation has really produced some startling successes on that score hasn't it?


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## nessuno (Feb 19, 2008)

*Genova, 9-11 and beyond*

I think the success of RTS in the late 90's was that there was a growing concern that globalization was going to effect young people and they looked for ways to party and protest. there was also the spin off criminal justice demos of the mid 90's.

alot of people forget the Genova G8 and the continuing trials there. I have seen how the movement could be a threat to the state in 2001. It paid a heavy price at genoa when captain Mondelli disobeyed orders and attacked Tute Bianche and caused a thousand casualties. There was also the Diaz raid. Never forget what happened at the Diaz school. 

It could also be the decision making process. alot was to do with ego's and people trying to take lead of the movement in europe.

Then there was 9-11. no wonder the movement has been fly squatted out of existence. it didn't fade. it was partially lack of faith but it was also the state wanting to smash down. Don't forget the state has other bigger problems to worry about. Sure the civil population demonstrated on feb 15 2003. By the time of Gleneagles, the movement was a shadow of its former self and totally outwitted by the G8 in terms of location and show of force.

7/7 convinced the population to give up civil liberties in exchange for security. It is almost impossible to demonstrate about anything in central london.

Is there a positive future? forget anti-capitalism. anything described as anti is a non starter with most people. Drax and the Heathrow climate camp have shown a new active path of protest. Also bush is almost gone. positive alternative change....


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## free spirit (Feb 19, 2008)

nessuno said:


> I think the success of RTS in the late 90's was that there was a growing concern that globalization was going to effect young people and they looked for ways to party and protest. there was also the spin off criminal justice demos of the mid 90's.
> 
> alot of people forget the Genova G8 and the continuing trials there. I have seen how the movement could be a threat to the state in 2001. It paid a heavy price at genoa when captain Mondelli disobeyed orders and attacked Tute Bianche and caused a thousand casualties. There was also the Diaz raid. Never forget what happened at the Diaz school.
> 
> ...



I agree with most of this, other than the G8 bit. In 1997 in Birmingham at the G8 RTS mustered around 3000 people to do a one off afternoon demo / party in birmingham city centre, when the summit was actually at some posh hotel miles away.

In 2005, dissent mustered at least the same number (over 3000, probably nearer 4000) people from all over europe to travel all the way to a 5 day long camp in Stirling, with hundreds of the protesters so up for it that they fucking hiked overnight the 12 miles from the campsite to gleneagles to blockade the roads around the G8 from dawn, with another 6-700 marching out of the site on mass at 2am to fight their way through police lines to block the motorway, and hundreds more heading out all the next morning, and a total of something like 600 people getting nicked from the dissent side of things, and the police forced to use fucking chinooks to move their forces around because the roads were so fucked.

Then later the remnants who'd not been nicked on the blockades went back out and joined the more militant end of the socialist mob in storming the fence. Oh, and not forgetting the kids column of getting 50 odd cars, double decker busses etc chock full of activists with kids, that set off in the morning to reinforce the blockades in a highly effective yet very fluffy way.

The only way they managed to stop us was to stick 700 riot police outside the gates to the site on the second day of the protests, but even then several hundred sneaked out to joint an rts style street protest in glasgow.

I don't think we were totally outwitted at all, for much of that morning we were running rings round the police, who couldn't redeploy their forces because the roads were blocked. Had the g8 alternatives mob allowed people off the coaches they'd got organised to join the blockades, who knows how long we could have carried it on for, and don't forget the REVO lot actually got through the fence unopposed, but bottled it after half a fieldm declared a moral victory and turned back round and went back through the fence again. The reason they were able to do that was because we'd got the police so run ragged they'd not got the forces in the right place to deal with it, just a shame REVO bottled it IMO.

oh yeah, we were also running convergence centres in edinburgh and glasgow at the same time as the camp in stirling, so that probably takes the total numbers upto more like 5-6000.

I think it was probably more difficult for those actually out there doing the blockades to know how successful the action actually was, as they'd only see their individual blockade which might only be 20-30 people, or even some smaller groups of 5-6 people who would still manage to pin down 7-8 riot vans for hours at a time... I was on the gate at the camp, with the information coming in from all the blocakdes, and from 4am til around midday we pretty much continuously had every road into the gleneagles hotel blocked at one point or another. anyone that arrived later for the g8 alternatives fence attempt may also be under the impression there weren't many dissent types there, but that was largely because we'd already had 4-500 people nicked by that stage, and been out blockading since 2am, so most that weren't nicked headed back to the camp to sort themselves out, before mostly heading upto the fence late afternoon.

Another thing to remember when thinking about why the protests fizzled out after the first day is that we'd had so many people nicked that people had been taken to police stations and court houses all over scotland, and all the 8 minibusses and all the minibus drivers pretty much were on a continuous mission to pick up prisoners as they were released, meaning we'd got no transport left for protesting on the thursday... never mind the london bombings demotivating everyone.

bottom line, the government laid down the challenge by moving the G8 to gleneagles coz they thought we'd not make it up there, but we did, and in force, and we very nearly had them on the run.


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## free spirit (Feb 19, 2008)

btw I'm not taking anything away from RTS, that demo in birmingham was the focal point of the first proper global day of action, largely initiated by RTS (following the call from People's Global Action), and I know that j18 etc got way more people, I just needed to set the record straight about stirling/  gleneagles.

also most of the core dissent mob, and regional groupings were old RTS types, and the G8 pretty much was what a fair few of the still active RTS bods were focussing on pretty much exclusively from 2003 onwards - the point at which the Mayday things started to fully fizzle out IIRC.

I'm not entirely sure what happened to dissent post g8, if everyone else was anything like me though they were just totally burnt out by the end of it, as it had been a fucking stressfull hard slog. I'd only properly jumped on board 3-4 months before it, so I hate to think what state the crew who'd been doing it solidly for 2 years were in.


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## northernhord (Feb 19, 2008)

The last RTS party I went too was on the Cowley Road in Oxford, a decade ago.
Someone should restart RTS, I cant think of a better time for them to exist doing what they do.


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## Blagsta (Feb 19, 2008)

free spirit said:


> btw I'm not taking anything away from RTS, that demo in birmingham was the focal point of the first proper global day of action, largely initiated by RTS.



<point of order>
It was initiated by people from Birmingham who had been involved in some RTS actions previously in Brum.  You couldn't say it was initated by RTS though.


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## free spirit (Feb 19, 2008)

Blagsta said:


> <point of order>
> It was initiated by people from Birmingham who had been involved in some RTS actions previously in Brum. You couldn't say it was initated by RTS though.


I stand corrected... though I'm guessing the london rts mob were more involved in pushing the whole global street party thing, which was what I was really on about in terms of RTS initiating the first proper global day of action against the G7 (as it was then IIRC).

I've got total respect for the crew who organised the brum rts btw, I loved every bit of it, from choice of location (with easy access to the pub / toilets etc by walking under police lines through the pedestrian underpasses) to the banners up lamposts crew, to the crowd that actually managed to stop the couple of 'overenthusiastic' heads from moving from lobbing rotten cabages at police to bottles, thus ending my slightly dangerous game of dodge the bottle while sitting in front of the line of riot police, and then the final act of marching the car with souind system straight through police lines to the safety of the que club... genius

Actually when I think about it, when I said the Dissent G8 thing was mostly ex RTS types, in reality there wasn't really that much support from london, most of it was the old regional RTS groups, who were mainly based on Earth First groups anyway... So I guess maybe nessuno was correct in that the London RTS activists and supporters were a shadow of their former selves in Scotland, with most of the effort focussed around some of the wombles efforts to hire a train to bring a trainload of activists up from london. I'm not sure how that actually went, I could be wrong, but I get the feeling it didn't work too well, as I don't remember there being anything like a trainload arriving from london, though I think the Wombles mostly stayed in edinburgh at the convergence centre there rather than coming camping with us lot, so I don't really know what happened - anyone?


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## kyser_soze (Feb 19, 2008)

kyser_soze said:


> And how did it all feed back into the class struggle? How did the wider w/c perceive the events and groups being discussed?



So, no takers then?


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## free spirit (Feb 20, 2008)

kyser_soze said:


> So, no takers then?


mostly I think the working class probably thought it was a bunch of hippies having a party in the street, sticking 2 fingers up at authority with some vague hippy politics behind it that they couldn't be arsed to bother to try to work out.

which isn't too far wide of the mark to be honest.

That's presuming you're on about the working class in this country, not the millions of members of the various militant landless peasants movements, Zapatistas etc. across much of the global south that made up People's Global Action who'd been the ones to issue the calls for the global days of action, who I believe saw the RTS protests that linked with the Global action days as recognition that not everyone here was ignorant of their situation, and that people over here were prepared to stand up and protest in support of them.

RTS was more linked to the global poor than to the UK working class IMO, which I personally don't view as necessarily being a bad thing.


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## shaneC (Feb 20, 2008)

Fascinating thread, relived a few old memories.  Reclaim The Streets Action Network started in '91 to bring an urban focus to the anti car movement - us urbanites feeling guilty that lots of our mates were getting trashed at Twyford Down.  The first action was blocking Waterloo Bridge as part of an anti-car day, seem to remember dumping a load of chalk from Twyford Down on Hyde Park Corner and smashing up a Mini we have taken apart at CoolTan put on the tube, reassembled at Hyde PK Corner, added supermarket trolley wheels, pulling it up Park Lane and pulverising it in Hyde Park in May '92.  The original RTS office was at CoolTan  and we had groups all over the country where ever  the Tories road building programme was taking place.  Things morphed into the Freedom Network and the campaign against the CJB and the then the M11 campaign took in most of the original RTS activists.  After M11 RTS regrouped with a wider understanding than just road building, but the huge road camps at Newbury, Bath etc provided a space for a different life style and lots of people up for doing lots of stuff. Lets not forget we did stop the Tories road building programme.  The rise of the street parties led to a cross fertilisation with Seattle and it really looked like things were going somewhere as the focus shifted to anti-globalsisation G8 protests.  The Street Parties made it hard for the state to marginalise us.  Some RTS activists moved on to anti GMO stuff and again changed the public view on GMO food and i'm sure if they did'nt GMO would be widespread in UK now.  The links with the Liverpool Dockers were truly inspiring and  the dealings with Liverpool Police at the squatted customs house truly terrifying. That night's lock in & drunken  sing song at a knocking shop in the docks with the dockers cemented what had been a standoffish relationship up till then. It led to the Trafalgar Sq Support the Dockers demo / party which failed to take a large empty government building but did take the Square and what a party that was.   J18 gave the police and media an easy 'violent thug' label to put on us and that was the excuse they needed for increased FIT (Forward Intelligence Team) to harass, watch, filming anyone coming in and out of meetings and just changed the public impression from street parties to smashed up city buildings.  That created a strange dichotomy of trying to have open consensus meetings which were infiltrated by FIT so decisions were made in small groups, which did create inner cabals and made things seem less open to new comers.  The CJA (Criminal Justice Act '94 from the then Home Sec Micheal Howard assisted by a young advisor called David Cameron) made tresspass a criminal offence and protest a lot harder, but it did unite road protesters, ravers, squatters, hunt sabs, & football supporters all who came together and made the Street Parties and politicised a good part of that late '90's generation.   What J18 did in UK 9/11 did in US and changed the agenda hugely so we are in the state we are in now.  A peak oil inspired recession / depression looming and the state thinking it is ready for a bit of societal breakdown again.   Their only recent setback is losing half the population's data which has set back ID cards a few years but otherwise tightening up the dole, loans instead of grants for students, a lack of empty buildings for squatted community centres  and a compliant media  means activism seems to be at a low ebb right now and does make the late '90's seem like salad days when we were actually making good progress, lost a lot of battles but were winning the bigger wars.   Anyway let's see what happens when the recession/depression hits.


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## chainsaw cat (Feb 20, 2008)

Paulie Tandoori said:


> Imo, ultimately, the reason it 'fell apart' is that all such things have finite lifespans - like i said, it evolves and becomes something different as different actors leave and join, as external forces and issues change, as reactions to and motivations towards develop. Some of that may be very mundane, like Brainaddict notes, unwieldy decision-making structures and so on but some of it isn't really tangible, it's just that nothing lasts forever.




Not sure.


Compare with Tories, Lloyd's Bank, the Catholic Church, gentlemen's clubs, Cambridge Footlights, CAMRA, Monster Raving Loonies, IRA, NRA, Shining Path, Quakers.


They're all lasting or lasted, all of them are special interest or single issue pressure groups.


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## free spirit (Feb 20, 2008)

shaneC said:


> Fascinating thread, relived a few old memories.  Reclaim The Streets Action Network started in '91 to bring an urban focus to the anti car movement - us urbanites feeling guilty that lots of our mates were getting trashed at Twyford Down.  The first action was blocking Waterloo Bridge as part of an anti-car day, seem to remember dumping a load of chalk from Twyford Down on Hyde Park Corner and smashing up a Mini we have taken apart at CoolTan put on the tube, reassembled at Hyde PK Corner, added supermarket trolley wheels, pulling it up Park Lane and pulverising it in Hyde Park in May '92.  The original RTS office was at CoolTan  and we had groups all over the country where ever  the Tories road building programme was taking place.  Things morphed into the Freedom Network and the campaign against the CJB and the then the M11 campaign took in most of the original RTS activists.  After M11 RTS regrouped with a wider understanding than just road building, but the huge road camps at Newbury, Bath etc provided a space for a different life style and lots of people up for doing lots of stuff. Lets not forget we did stop the Tories road building programme.  The rise of the street parties led to a cross fertilisation with Seattle and it really looked like things were going somewhere as the focus shifted to anti-globalsisation G8 protests.  The Street Parties made it hard for the state to marginalise us.  Some RTS activists moved on to anti GMO stuff and again changed the public view on GMO food and i'm sure if they did'nt GMO would be widespread in UK now.  The links with the Liverpool Dockers were truly inspiring and  the dealings with Liverpool Police at the squatted customs house truly terrifying. That night's lock in & drunken  sing song at a knocking shop in the docks with the dockers cemented what had been a standoffish relationship up till then. It led to the Trafalgar Sq Support the Dockers demo / party which failed to take a large empty government building but did take the Square and what a party that was.   J18 gave the police and media an easy 'violent thug' label to put on us and that was the excuse they needed for increased FIT (Forward Intelligence Team) to harass, watch, filming anyone coming in and out of meetings and just changed the public impression from street parties to smashed up city buildings.  That created a strange dichotomy of trying to have open consensus meetings which were infiltrated by FIT so decisions were made in small groups, which did create inner cabals and made things seem less open to new comers.  The CJA (Criminal Justice Act '94 from the then Home Sec Micheal Howard assisted by a young advisor called David Cameron) made tresspass a criminal offence and protest a lot harder, but it did unite road protesters, ravers, squatters, hunt sabs, & football supporters all who came together and made the Street Parties and politicised a good part of that late '90's generation.   What J18 did in UK 9/11 did in US and changed the agenda hugely so we are in the state we are in now.  A peak oil inspired recession / depression looming and the state thinking it is ready for a bit of societal breakdown again.   Their only recent setback is losing half the population's data which has set back ID cards a few years but otherwise tightening up the dole, loans instead of grants for students, a lack of empty buildings for squatted community centres  and a compliant media  means activism seems to be at a low ebb right now and does make the late '90's seem like salad days when we were actually making good progress, lost a lot of battles but were winning the bigger wars.   Anyway let's see what happens when the recession/depression hits.


good post, sounds like you were part of the first wave that inspired me to be a part of the second wave or something like that... respect

eta - not that swp version of respect either


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## free spirit (Feb 20, 2008)

chainsaw cat said:


> Not sure.
> 
> 
> Compare with Tories, Lloyd's Bank, the Catholic Church, gentlemen's clubs, Cambridge Footlights, CAMRA, Monster Raving Loonies, IRA, NRA, Shining Path, Quakers.
> ...


Tories = political party of the rich, paid for by the rich to keep themselves rich.

Lloyds bank - bank, people get paid to work there...

catholic church - believe they are guardians of the legacy of christ, plus it's been a fucking good scam for a lot of powerful people for much of the last 2 millenia.

gentlemans clubs - mix of socialising and scratching of backs for mutual economic and political gain.

cambridge footlights - recognised work experience type root for students to gain exposure and get a foothold in the drama world post university.

CAMRA - yorkshire men thinking someone might be taking away their bitter and replacing it with fosters taps... not to be messed with lightly.

Monster Ravign Loonies - erm fair play I guess, everyone's got to have a hobby, but I don't remember them ever getting kettled or having the fit outside their houses, plus they only have to do anything once every 5 years or so.

IRA - when you've been occupied for several centuries and the choice is oppression or fighting back, it's not really surprising the IRA lasted a bit longer than RTS, though they've had their share of splits and changes over the years... IRA, Provo, sin fein, Real IRA etc.

NRA - americans love their guns, and it's hardly anti-establishiment, or run by volunteers

SHining path - don't really know enough about em to comment

Quakers - generally genuinely good people

erm anyway, RTS as a group that was entirely voluntary, relied on volunteers to spend months of their lives planning the big protests, and was under severe state pressure from infiltrators and fit, plus involved people risking having rigs worth thousands confiscated... ah it'd have been a miracle if it hadn't burnt itself out to some degree. Besides RTS in many ways was a tactic, and one that the police had increasingly got wise to, and the RTS method was really to be sneaky and outwit the police by adapting, and changing so RTS is dead, but long live RTS (or something).

Our resistance continues to be as transnational as capital... well as soon as we back away from the pc screens and actually do something again that is


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## co-op (Feb 20, 2008)

free spirit said:


> so RTS is dead, but long live RTS (or something).




*leaps to feet*

Long live RTS! (or something!)







*sits down again*


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## Taxamo Welf (Feb 20, 2008)

chilango said:


> yes.
> 
> but that is WAY too abstract.
> 
> ...



an excellent post 

I fully agree with that.


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## kyser_soze (Feb 20, 2008)

free spirit said:


> mostly I think the working class probably thought it was a bunch of hippies having a party in the street, sticking 2 fingers up at authority with some vague hippy politics behind it that they couldn't be arsed to bother to try to work out.
> 
> which isn't too far wide of the mark to be honest.
> 
> ...



Interesting post, esp given what ShaneC says about the roots of RTS, and refreshingly honest about the perception held by the w/c in the UK.

So essentially while it was clearly a good party time, fuck all was actually achieved in terms of changing the UKs car culture or the situation of the w/c in the UK.


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## Taxamo Welf (Feb 20, 2008)

kyser_soze said:


> So, no takers then?



free spirit is on the money here i think. i'll add:

how did it link up? - it didn't really, but would have inspired people just getting into politics (regardless of their class background) in many ways to follow certain forms of activity. There's the dockers thing, but having chatted to the people involved and read a decent enough book they did, that was pretty much the beginning and end of RTS in an explicitly class strugle setting. Not for lack of trying and it was great etc, but that is where it began and ended really... There as the campaign agaist that agency tht killed that lad - simon jones? - too. But neither lead things towards bread and butter class struggles. I mean what is an RTS? Its a party, a street party. Its organisation is a group of people who will organise said street party. It cannot be criticised for not being an organisation that could fight on class issues/social issues then, cos unless they need a street party done then its not in their remit.  

how was it perceived? - dunno. Due to its fairly flowery prose and the simple fact (as has been pointed out) that RTS was only explicity anti-capitalist at the end of its life, being seen as a class influenced group was probably very rare. This is not a criticism, RTS's mystique was probably really good for it. If you are to explicit you are not much fun,and it needed to be fun.

Most RTSers who kept going on other things i have worked with are the kind of people who are more 'anti authoritarian' than class struggle, so its not neccessarily the media's fault: class took a backseat in a lot of things. If we look at a lot of the prop, as free spirit kinda says, its more about the third world and ow shit cpaitalism is over there. There isn't much on the fact that you get paid x and your boss gets 2x for the value of yer work etc etc.

I'm not saying that would have have made it any more interesting to workers in the UK mind  Maybe slightly more relevant, but only on paper.

you can't blow up a social realationship/you can't rave-up a social relationship


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## Taxamo Welf (Feb 20, 2008)

kyser_soze said:


> So essentially while it was clearly a good party time, fuck all was actually achieved in terms of changing the UKs car culture or the situation of the w/c in the UK.



eeeeh,maybe going a bit too far their...

it did defeat the roads program, but that was EF! not RTS alone, and i thinkit has certainly certainly radicalised people in environmentalism and introduced a lot of them to anti-capitalist politics.

as for the situation of the working class - not really no, but there were far huger proccesses at work throughout that time... New forms of employment and employers, New Labour...


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## chilango (Feb 20, 2008)

Some of EF!/RTS did get involved with more traditional workplace stuff.

The dockers were the famous example, but there were EF!ers on strike support committees in some places and active in Unions. EF! also took (or talked about) action in support of the striking siganal workers.

Also open-cast mines in working class communities in South Wales were oppossed and some were cancelled due to this opposition iirc, thus directly benefitting the working class, no?


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## kyser_soze (Feb 20, 2008)

Fair enough there tax, but I have to say that were anyone on this thread presenting the results of actions taken at a meeting, most of the replies on here are full of equivocation and pretty flimsy:



> It cannot be criticised for not being an organisation that could fight on class issues/social issues then, cos unless they need a street party done then its not in their remit.



I'm proud of you sometimes Tax


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## Taxamo Welf (Feb 20, 2008)

aye if it weren't for people like you, bombarding me with annoying memes for shit i do not want or want to want, perverting mediums i always saw as creative and reconstituting them as entirely destructive and soul crushing, i'd never have the capcity for cold hard analysis that i do


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## kyser_soze (Feb 20, 2008)

See? Capitalism works


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## Crispy (Feb 20, 2008)

kyser_soze said:


> See? Capitalism works


But it also likes to party sometimes.


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## kyser_soze (Feb 20, 2008)

EVERY day is a party for the capitalists. A party of DEATH!!!!!


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## Taxamo Welf (Feb 20, 2008)

ha ha ha laugh it up mr 'the boss just came in and served us canapes and we've been on the beer since 2' :x


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## Taxamo Welf (Feb 20, 2008)

Crispy said:


> But it also likes to party sometimes.



see now that *would* be in the remit of RTS. You could book yourself a really edgy and real event that would put you head and shoulders above the competition in terms of social talking-point capital - a market which needs to be cornered if your product will identify with today's post political youth.

Just say your about the whales or something.

If any ad types are reading this,i offer my services. I can throw you a riot for less than £80,000 or a cool mil if you want clowns. 

Clowns are extra.


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## kyser_soze (Feb 20, 2008)

Taxamo Welf said:


> ha ha ha laugh it up mr 'the boss just came in and served us canapes and we've been on the beer since 2' :x



Tax I haven't worked in ads for about 3 years now, please try and be current.

Besides, go back 500 years to before capitalism and you'd still find a rich minoroty opressing the majority. Go back 2000 years and you still get the same thing. Until someone, somewhere works out why large scale human societies gravitate toward hierarchies not a single thing will change, because so far no one has come up with a convincing argument for how 6bn people can self manage without hierarchy of some kind.


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## Taxamo Welf (Feb 20, 2008)

sorry there was meant to be a smiley there you touchy cunt i was only kidding you 

why, what do you do now, care work? 

(genuine question actually - been ages... come to my night in march )


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## free spirit (Feb 21, 2008)

kyser_soze said:


> Interesting post, esp given what ShaneC says about the roots of RTS, and refreshingly honest about the perception held by the w/c in the UK.
> 
> So essentially while it was clearly a good party time, fuck all was actually achieved in terms of changing the UKs car culture or the situation of the w/c in the UK.


woah there... I never said fuck all was actually achieved.

there's a hell of a lot of stuff that was in the RTS manifesto's that is now pretty much mainstream thinking, car free days, cycle lanes, priority for public transport, moving away from the dominance of the car and accepting that we can't just go on building more and more roads to acomodate every car journey everybody might want to make. RTS essentially set the scene IMO for ken's congestion charge, and ramping up of london's public transport. I'd also bet serious money that if you were to do a survey of people now implementing public roads and transport policies for councils, virtually all of them that have graduated in the last decade would have used RTS literature at some point in their degree's, and a fair few of them would have participated in at least one.

Then you've got the anti-capitalist, anti G8 / WTO thing... it's no coincidence IMO that we had the 'millenium develpment round' of the trade talks focussing on debt relief and developing countries, or that the g8 in Gleneagles at least paid lip service to issues like climate change, debt relief etc. I'm not saying this was all down to RTS, but it was a response to the huge protests that were now taking place outside every international trade meeting - a process of global protests planned and initiated by People's Global Action, the international grouping for whom RTS was the UK convener, and as stated above it was RTS who inspired the first true global day of action to protest against the G7 at the request of PGA.

Then you've got most of south and central america turning radically left wing, and venezuala effectively leading the way to set up a left wing alternative version of the IMF to effectively kick the IMF out of south america... much of this came out of the huge Social Forums organised by the various local PGA conveners across south and central america in the mid to late 90's - the same movements that RTS were both raising awareness of, and supporting by supporting their calls for global days of action.

Basically you can't look at RTS in isolation, it was a major part of a global movement, a movement that has unquestionably changed the face of much of the world, and given an alternative to the US led neoliberal hegemony that looked like happening in the 90's.


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## co-op (Feb 21, 2008)

kyser_soze said:


> Tax I haven't worked in ads for about 3 years now, please try and be current.
> 
> Besides, go back 500 years to before capitalism and you'd still find a rich minoroty opressing the majority. Go back 2000 years and you still get the same thing. Until someone, somewhere works out why large scale human societies gravitate toward hierarchies not a single thing will change, because so far no one has come up with a convincing argument for how 6bn people can self manage without hierarchy of some kind.



Yes, and go back 50,000 years to the ancestral environment (or the "environment of evolutionary adaptation", ie the 100,000 year or so period when our brains turned into what they are now, & all our basic social-emotional coding was laid down) and you find no evidence at all for major hierarchies, nor do you among groups that have survived in similar cultural forms into the modern age. In fact all the evidence is that the "wealth gap" (which would be represented by social approval from group members - a form of power) was very slim indeed.

Looks like we aren't evolved to live in highly unequal societies, and maybe that's why a deeply hierarchical conception of govt and society (such as the one you describe) has produced so much war, social violence, unhappiness and - finally - a new super-destructive economy that looks like screwing our species' ability to live on the planet. Most animals, and certainly the 'higher' mammalian forms, seem to become self-destructive when placed in intolerable conditions or captivity, often self-harming and indulging in ritualistic, repetitive behaviours and consumption patterns which will accelerate their own decline.


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## laptop (Feb 21, 2008)

free spirit said:


> there's a hell of a lot of stuff that was in the RTS manifesto's that is now pretty much mainstream thinking, car free days, cycle lanes, priority for public transport, moving away from the dominance of the car and accepting that we can't just go on building more and more roads to acomodate every car journey everybody might want to make. RTS essentially set the scene IMO for ken's congestion charge, and ramping up of london's public transport. I'd also bet serious money that if you were to do a survey of people now implementing public roads and transport policies for councils, virtually all of them that have graduated in the last decade would have used RTS literature at some point in their degree's, and a fair few of them would have participated in at least one.
> 
> Then you've got the anti-capitalist, anti G8 / WTO thing... it's no coincidence IMO that we had the 'millenium develpment round' of the trade talks focussing on debt relief and developing countries, or that the g8 in Gleneagles at least paid lip service to issues like climate change, debt relief etc. I'm not saying this was all down to RTS, but it was a response to the huge protests that were now taking place outside every international trade meeting - a process of global protests planned and initiated by People's Global Action, the international grouping for whom RTS was the UK convener, and as stated above it was RTS who inspired the first true global day of action to protest against the G7 at the request of PGA.
> 
> ...



All the best reforms are the result of would-be revolutionaries' work - much to their annoyance 





Then there's the phenomenon I've talked about before, by which:


people start off with specific demands
in the process of working for these, they become revolutionaries
they have kids and "retire"
*only after that* are the specific demands won


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## free spirit (Feb 21, 2008)

laptop said:


> All the best reforms are the result of would-be revolutionaries' work - much to their annoyance
> 
> 
> 
> ...


I think thee and me are pretty much on the same page on this.


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## upsidedownwalrus (Feb 22, 2008)

It was definitely much fluffier earlier on.  My mum even attended one of the earlier London ones, in Camden High Street (I think I was in India at the time).


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## co-op (Feb 22, 2008)

RenegadeDog said:


> It was definitely much fluffier earlier on.  My mum even attended one of the earlier London ones, in Camden High Street (I think I was in India at the time).




The fluffyness is easy to mock - especially in the context of revolutionary politics and revolutionary thinking - but it was quite intoxicating I thought - beautiful parties in public space, genuinely passing strangers would slow down and stop and talk because they knew that whatever it was that was happening it was warm, interesting, humane and _fun_. 

God that made a change after being corralled by rows of police on marches or events which were just broken up with casual violence so easily it was utterly demoralising.


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## kyser_soze (Feb 22, 2008)

co-op said:


> Yes, and go back 50,000 years to the ancestral environment (or the "environment of evolutionary adaptation", ie the 100,000 year or so period when our brains turned into what they are now, & all our basic social-emotional coding was laid down) and you find no evidence at all for major hierarchies, nor do you among groups that have survived in similar cultural forms into the modern age. In fact all the evidence is that the "wealth gap" (which would be represented by social approval from group members - a form of power) was very slim indeed.
> 
> Looks like we aren't evolved to live in highly unequal societies, and maybe that's why a deeply hierarchical conception of govt and society (such as the one you describe) has produced so much war, social violence, unhappiness and - finally - a new super-destructive economy that looks like screwing our species' ability to live on the planet. Most animals, and certainly the 'higher' mammalian forms, seem to become self-destructive when placed in intolerable conditions or captivity, often self-harming and indulging in ritualistic, repetitive behaviours and consumption patterns which will accelerate their own decline.



Hmmm...that sounds a bit like Marx and his orginal state of man period, not to mention being a secular retelling of the Eden story - I think there's something in what you say, but you're not comparing like with like. 

From what I remember reading about this time, human groups tended to be small, highly mobile hunter gatherers - groups for whom size, lifestyle and environment would have created very high levels of interdependency on each other for survival. Mass agriculture, the foundation of modern civilsation, changed all that - post ice-age there was an _urban_ population explosion, driven I suspect by migration to warmer climes and the increased population densities that followed, which required an new social strucutres, or more likely the formalisation of pre-existing 'loose' hierarchies based around age, religious standing etc...what I really want to know is how the switch to hierarchy happened, how the concept of land ownership arose (again, I suspect that this grew out of pre-existing concepts of hunting and living territories).



> Looks like we aren't evolved to live in highly unequal societies,



Hmm, again, we don't evolve toward something, we adapt into an environment - the primary difference with humans is that we create much of the environment we exist in through culture, which in turn drives changes to the physical environment. You're wrong, however, in saying that capitalism is unique in it's environmental destructiveness - the ethics that permit the use of the land by humans are very, very old, and cross many cultures in the proscriptions against how _not_ to use it, and there are several records of large city states and other civilisations dying off through destruction of local natural resources, over population, poisoning of the water table etc.

I'd also take issue with you that war is something that comes from mass-hierarchies. Within existing traditional cultures and tribes there are often conflicts that are small in scale, but can be devastating for both - if your tribe is only 20 people and 4 of them die you've lost 20% of your population, a higher % of casualties than any country has ever experienced in a major conflict...and they do happen - hell, one was practically documented by Bear Gryhlls when he did Tribe and was in Papua NG with the last cannibal tribe who had a dispute with a neighbouring group and 3 lives were lost in what was a small, brief war between them.


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## co-op (Feb 22, 2008)

kyser_soze said:


> Hmmm...that sounds a bit like Marx and his orginal state of man period, not to mention being a secular retelling of the Eden story - I think there's something in what you say, but you're not comparing like with like.
> 
> From what I remember reading about this time, human groups tended to be small, highly mobile hunter gatherers - groups for whom size, lifestyle and environment would have created very high levels of interdependency on each other for survival. Mass agriculture, the foundation of modern civilsation, changed all that - post ice-age there was an _urban_ population explosion, driven I suspect by migration to warmer climes and the increased population densities that followed, which required an new social strucutres, or more likely the formalisation of pre-existing 'loose' hierarchies based around age, religious standing etc...*what I really want to know is how the switch to hierarchy happened, how the concept of land ownership arose (again, I suspect that this grew out of pre-existing concepts of hunting and living territories)*..





Big subject...





kyser_soze said:


> Hmm, again, we don't evolve toward something, we adapt into an environment - the primary difference with humans is that we create much of the environment we exist in through culture, which in turn drives changes to the physical environment.



Correct - when I said "looks like we aren't evolved to live in highly unequal societies", I should have said "looks like our brains evolved in highly egalitarian societies". But that does imply a cost in living in a different environment - it is very likely to be extra "work" in the evolutionary sense - (eg plants will survive in certain conditions, but flourish in others, the difference in quantity and quality between the two = the "cost")

There is a good body of evidence that the experience of inequality on a sustained basis is just bad for us - even in the absence of any "absolute" poverty - this is the basis for the whole Relative Poverty measure. Poor people die younger even when all other factors are controlled for (smoking, diet, medical care etc). And they die younger at a greater rate in a nice neat correlation with the degree of inequality in a society. That's some good evidence. The exact pathway is unknown but it seems likely to be related to evolutionary roots - permanently suppressed status in the group would have reduced the likelihood of reproducing that's a classic environmental stressor in Darwinian terms. Probably something to do with parasymapthetic nervous system.

This is why the NHS is doomed in an increasingly stratified society. You can pour all the billions of pounds you want into it, it will get clogged up with the poor with chronic debilitative diseases, the diabetics, the obese, the cancerous - and you can spend billions treating them. But you will never undo the process that produces them without broad structural change to our economic system to reduce inequality.

In brief; inequality is bad for us.



kyser_soze said:


> You're wrong, however, in saying that capitalism is unique in it's environmental destructiveness - the ethics that permit the use of the land by humans are very, very old, and cross many cultures in the proscriptions against how _not_ to use it, and there are several records of large city states and other civilisations dying off through destruction of local natural resources, over population, poisoning of the water table etc.



I didn't mean to suggest that only capitalism is capable of it, just that it's a rather good example of it. The other examples you talk of also come from highly stratified (?pathologically so) societies.




kyser_soze said:


> I'd also take issue with you that war is something that comes from mass-hierarchies. Within existing traditional cultures and tribes there are often conflicts that are small in scale, but can be devastating for both - if your tribe is only 20 people and 4 of them die you've lost 20% of your population, a higher % of casualties than any country has ever experienced in a major conflict...and they do happen - hell, one was practically documented by Bear Gryhlls when he did Tribe and was in Papua NG with the last cannibal tribe who had a dispute with a neighbouring group and 3 lives were lost in what was a small, brief war between them.



I don't mean to idealise the ancestral environment. If, by "war" you mean "organised violence", then I'd suggest that there weren't any wars, but not because there wasn't violence but more because there wasn't any organisation. There's certainly very good evidence that the murder rate in hunter-gatherer societies was very high indeed compared to settled urban ones (x80 times more according to some studies).

It's clear that we are capable of adapting our behaviour to new situations, but whereas inequality always seems to produce basic physical level detriment to people, suppressing the urge to violent revenge for slights produces great benefits and has no "cost" (except arguably the extra workload required to sustain whatever punishment or reconcilliation mechanism you choose to install to replace individual vengence).



Anyway - this isn't really about RTS now, maybe we should do another thread?


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## kyser_soze (Feb 22, 2008)

Maybe, altho that was an early morning, just had the coffee blast of intellect 

It is a subject of great interest to me tho...


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## ska invita (Feb 22, 2008)

Taxamo Welf said:


> how did it link up? - it didn't really, but would have inspired people just getting into politics (regardless of their class background) in many ways to follow certain forms of activity.
> ...
> Its organisation is a group of people who will organise said street party. It cannot be criticised for not being an organisation that could fight on class issues/social issues then, cos unless they need a street party done then its not in their remit.
> 
> how was it perceived? - dunno.



I think the Brixton one makes an interesting example, becasue unlike the others a lot of people there jsut lived there and joined in. The atmosphere was great, and I think people just saw it as a good thing to do, and may well have been radicalised by it, just a little.

*on the subject of what happened to RTS: I think one problem is that in a 'campaign' like this you can never consolidate your gains - all you can do is to provoke the state/police into reacting in more restrictive ways. 

The only way around this that I can see is to make the parties less regular and more random, and try and catch the police on the backfoot (hint hint - throw another part asap!)


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## co-op (Feb 22, 2008)

kyser_soze said:


> one was practically documented by Bear Gryhlls when he did Tribe and was in Papua NG with the last cannibal tribe who had a dispute with a neighbouring group and 3 lives were lost in what was a small, brief war between them.



Just a point of info; the 'tribal' organisation of PNG is not in the devolved hunter-gatherer form that is believed to have existed in the evolutionary environment. Firstly, there's quite a lot of internal variety within PNG - but secondly, in general, it is closer to what is often called the "Big Man" state - a semi-chief led form of semi-settled living. If you arrange these things hierarchically - you fascist  - it's often considered the next step 'up' from hunter-gathering, although there are h-g forms of Big Man organisation which sort of loiter in between.


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## free spirit (Feb 22, 2008)

co-op said:


> The fluffyness is easy to mock - especially in the context of revolutionary politics and revolutionary thinking - but it was quite intoxicating I thought - beautiful parties in public space, genuinely passing strangers would slow down and stop and talk because they knew that whatever it was that was happening it was warm, interesting, humane and _fun_.
> 
> God that made a change after being corralled by rows of police on marches or events which were just broken up with casual violence so easily it was utterly demoralising.



precisely, the fluffy, deliberately non-violent ethos was a way better strategy than lobbing bottles at the police IMO... the rotten fruit and veg from the end of the market in birmingham was one thing, the bottles and stuff at j18 was another (though the police did provoke it, we shouldn't have allowed ourselves to be provoked - and to be honest the fluffies like us should / would probably have stuck around and tried to de-escalate it had there been a clear policy of non-violence so we'd known where we stood with it, instead we fucked off and left the brewcrew to it)


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## chilango (Feb 22, 2008)

free spirit said:


> precisely, the fluffy, deliberately non-violent ethos was a way better strategy than lobbing bottles at the police IMO... the rotten fruit and veg from the end of the market in birmingham was one thing, the bottles and stuff at j18 was another (though the police did provoke it, we shouldn't have allowed ourselves to be provoked - and to be honest the fluffies like us should / would probably have stuck around and tried to de-escalate it had there been a clear policy of non-violence so we'd known where we stood with it, instead we fucked off and left the brewcrew to it)



It wasn't just the brew crew though was it?

There were as, we've seen from this thread, people _within_ the movements who felt the time was strategically right to escalate.


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## TopCat (Feb 22, 2008)

It's insulting to label those who wanted to escalate confrontation with the police as _brew crew_.


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## free spirit (Feb 23, 2008)

TopCat said:


> It's insulting to label those who wanted to escalate confrontation with the police as _brew crew_.


ay, well it was the brew crew lobbing bottles from 50 yard back that were my final memories of the day, and they were drinking cans of special brew...

I do realise feelings were running pretty high with that lass getting run over, plus the police deliberately escalating things by sending in 50 odd riot police to get stuck in the middle of us all so thay had an excuse to come and rescue them... but IMO rising to the bait was a mistake.


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## free spirit (Feb 23, 2008)

chilango said:


> It wasn't just the brew crew though was it?
> 
> There were as, we've seen from this thread, people _within_ the movements who felt the time was strategically right to escalate.


yes ok so it wasn't just brew crew, though there were a fair amount that'd fit that description by that point in the afternoon.

and yes there were people within the movement who felt it was strategically right to escalate... if by that you mean dropping the non-violence, than they were strategically wrong IMO.

eta - thinking about it, I'm not entirely against strategic use of violence in some circumstances, my main gripe really is with pissed up arseholes hiding at the back and lobbing bottles in the vague direction of police lines, but not really giving too much of a shit whether they hit the police or those of us who have the balls to be at the front facing the police directly who are neither wearing helmets or have eye's in the back of our heads to tell us to dodge the bottle. 

I'm also not a fan of the smashy smashy crew attacking property, after the experience in scotland where we went from one day having tacit support from the majority of the locals (that we'd won over 2 weeks of hard work sorting the site out, and doing outreach stuff), to the day of the protests being hated because 10-20 people had taken it upon themselves to smash up the local business park, including the diy shops we'd been using to buy the kit to get the site running, and the supermarket that had been feeding us. Stirling didn't care if we went and blocked roads etc over in gleneagles (their historic rivals), but they were well fucked off when we trashed part of their town, after the council had stepped in and given us the site for the campsite and really helped us out a lot.

I guess what I'm trying to say is if you're going to use violence then pick your target's carefully, and make sure it's not a few pissed up hangers on that end up dictating what get's smashed up, and losing a lot of hard won support in the process.


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## chilango (Feb 25, 2008)

free spirit said:


> yes ok so it wasn't just brew crew, though there were a fair amount that'd fit that description by that point in the afternoon.
> 
> and yes there were people within the movement who felt it was strategically right to escalate... if by that you mean dropping the non-violence, than they were strategically wrong IMO.
> 
> ...



Sorta what I've been saying throughout this thread.


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## TopCat (Feb 25, 2008)

June 18th _was not _a bunch of pissed up hangars on dictating the violence. To assert it is is disengenouous at best.


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## chilango (Feb 25, 2008)

TopCat said:


> June 18th _was not _a bunch of pissed up hangars on dictating the violence. To assert it is is disengenouous at best.



True.

As I did point out above.

Yet the strategy of escalation pursued by a minority since the 80s at least has often relied upon the availablity of the brew crew to facilitate the kick off. J18 was a rare exception to this.


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## butchersapron (Feb 25, 2008)

TopCat said:


> It's insulting to label those who wanted to escalate confrontation with the police as _brew crew_.



Aboslutely. I think this is getting into the realms of better done in person than on here though.


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## TopCat (Feb 25, 2008)

butchersapron said:


> Aboslutely. I think this is getting into the realms of better done in person than on here though.



Yeah, no statute of limitations in the UK is there!


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## TopCat (Feb 25, 2008)

I think the debate of non violence and limited violence vs total kick it till it breaks would best be carried out when/if anything builds in the future, then and only then will the context be truely apparrant.


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## chilango (Feb 25, 2008)

TopCat said:


> I think the debate of non violence and limited violence vs total kick it till it breaks would best be carried out when/if anything builds in the future, then and only then will the context be truely apparrant.



Well, having witnessed the "almost" revolution in Mexico last year, the APPO etc. my points have been made with a relevent context...


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## Paul of Medway (Feb 27, 2008)

free sprit...

"if you were to do a survey of people now implementing public roads and transport policies for councils, virtually all of them that have graduated in the last decade would have used RTS literature at some point in their degree's, and a fair few of them would have participated in at least one" 

Bingo!


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## The Black Hand (Feb 28, 2008)

chilango said:


> True.
> 
> As I did point out above.
> 
> Yet the strategy of escalation pursued by a minority since the 80s at least has often relied upon the availablity of the brew crew to facilitate the kick off. J18 was a rare exception to this.



Rubbish. You clearly have no experience of the many 'Offs' in London. Brew crew just lurked around at smelly gigs most of the time. I remember one fight in Stoke Newington when a brew crew lady knocked one of our ladies off a table and the fight just escalated... We came out of it OK but the night was ruined.


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## chilango (Feb 28, 2008)

Attica said:


> Rubbish. You clearly have no experience of the many 'Offs' in London. Brew crew just lurked around at smelly gigs most of the time. I remember one fight in Stoke Newington when a brew crew lady knocked one of our ladies off a table and the fight just escalated... We came out of it OK but the night was ruined.



*bows down before Attica's praxis*


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## nessuno (Feb 29, 2008)

*In answer to free spirit about what the movement of movements acheived.*

First, i am sure other people can add to what is written here. it is by no means a comprensive list.

I notice you joined Urban75 at the time of Genoa in 2001. I like to ask you what you thought of the demo....

For me Genoa achieved alot. I think the movement of movement coincided its rise with a wave of concern over the effects of Globalisation and climate change. A kind of globalisation that only benefited the west and America.

Looking back, i realise that the Genoa Social forum went on to be the blue print of the World Social Forum in Brazil. The formation of the European Social Forum has its roots in the GSF, WSF and the Florence social forum that hosted a 1.5 million demo in november 2001.

Bush's first visit to italy ended with the death of a protester whilst being treated as america's worst ever president. He would get a reputation as the 'climate devil of Kyoto'

 Whilst the Movement struggled and died in the years after Genoa, so did Neo-conservativism. Bush's entry into the book of presidents with be Kyoto, 9-11, iraq,iraq and iraq.

The G8 was, by Genoa...caught in the spotlight. Forced by Africa, the Doha talks were enabled. Doha was/is an attempt to open the free market by removing subsidies thus enabling the southern hemaphere to trade. In later years, the world would see France and the US as protectionist and anti-free market. Doha reached boilling point at Cancun where a Korean farmer committed suicide. Cancun also saw the creation of the Cancun 47 southern hemesphere countries. This still threatens the collapse of the WTO....

By 2002, any veteran movement protester was instantly outnumbered by the number of peace protesters. Iraq was different to Vietnam in the sense that it took four years to build a peace movement in america where it took a matter of a few months. The existence of the internet amplified and massively enlargened the peace movement resident on the web at the same time. With Iraq almost over however, protest numbers have shrunk from 1.4 million to almost nothing. It is this that we are dealing with now.

RTS, Indymedia and a host of other protest groups could not of done it with out the internet. The web has come along way. the name movement of movements takes its name because it had used the web to join up parts of other movements. This is the first global NETsocial community (like urban75) to do this. The Genoa demo and its legacy has been witness to this.

South America could not have happened without Genoa. For the first time south american countries learnt about the G8, WTO and IMF/WB. months later, argentina would explode into revolution and then to suspend payments to the IMF/WB...Today most countries have elected left wing governments which are opposed to the Bush neocon polices. Genoa was the seed for this.

I could go on free spirit....


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## The Black Hand (Feb 29, 2008)

chilango said:


> *bows down before Attica's praxis*


Respect Incidentally, I cannot remember one off in London started by brew crew, they were generally too out of it or carrying their cans to do such things, or they were not there at all.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Mar 1, 2008)

its funny nessuno but i know people who got caught up in the shit storm of the diaz stuff in genoa who have basically gone back on what they were trying to achieve and have decided that the approach was basically wrong-headed, because essentially trying to meet violence with violence is not a rewarding game plan. people who got nearly beaten to death may not think of the events as a victory tbh.


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## nessuno (Mar 1, 2008)

*hmmm, interesting...*

my response to free spirit was to list the achievements of what came out of Genoa. I certainly do not see genoa as a victory. 

Apart from black block, and a few other italians, nobody i know who went to genoa ever thought that the movement could take on 22,000 police and army inside and around Genoa. Neither do i think 'closing down the G8' was a viable idea either. for starters, there was a 'shoot to kill' policy inside the red zone. The 800 US marines stationed around the Palace Ducal (plus italian snipers) would make sure the G8 would never be touched.

you are obviously thinking about Tute bianche because you saw them padded up as 'armoured activists'. I suggest you do some research into the history of Tute Bianche. Given the ability of the italian police (I cited carabineri commanders Mondelli and Bruno and state police commander Canterini) to cause extreme violence themselves, it was a wise idea to go protected.

Also, i seems that i am fighting the established propaganda on both sides of what happened at Genoa. I think in my post http://www.urban75.net/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=240693 reports on the outcome of the trial of the 25 protesters which has just finished in December 2007. Mondelli and Bruno have been sent for trial at the Rome supreme court for disobeying orders and attacking Tute Bianche when he should of travelled on to North Genoa to deal with black block attacking the Marrassi prison (Canterini is still on trial for Diaz).

So i think your quote "trying to meet violence with violence is not a rewarding game plan" is misguided. Tute Bianche were being led by a police liason team and had permission to mount its demonstration right to the red zone fence.

As i said in my other article, i will posting within the next three weeks the ultimate article on the Diaz case to date and all will become clear. What i can say is that the fate of the Diaz victims was sealed at Naples in March 2001 where Fini put the Diaz plan into its final stages of active planning. The events surrounding Diaz go much deeper than just the rioting that happened in the lead up to the raid. It did not matter whether the movement was going to be peaceful or not, Gianfranco Fini had made up his mind to launch the Diaz raid (with the assistance of US government) weeks before the G8.

If anything, Genoa was to be a trap for the movement violent or non-violent. Fini did not care if the streets of Genoa would be a battleground against black bloc or that loads of non-violent hippies got hurt. He wanted to crush the Genoa Social Forum, set up Berlusconi, defeat his left wing opponents and take the credit for policing the G8. 

As for Diaz, I would love to know who you have spoken to who was there. can you name the people at Diaz who were advocating violence on violence at G8?  Were you at Diaz? did you testify at the diaz trial to help the plaintiffs or did you run away?

so, please, please...lets get everybody away from the self revolving, self defeating roundabout on the subject of violence vs violence, ok? Fini arranged the G8 to be his bloodbath. the question of who started the violence in genoa has been proved in court. it was the police directed by Fini. It is only people like the Daily Mail (who love Fini) who continue to argue that the movement caused all the trouble at Genoa.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Mar 1, 2008)

nessuno;7180777]my response to free spirit was to list the achievements of what came out of Genoa. I certainly do not see genoa as a victory.[/QUOTE]fair enough said:


> Apart from black block, and a few other italians, nobody i know who went to genoa ever thought that the movement could take on 22,000 police and army inside and around Genoa. Neither do i think 'closing down the G8' was a viable idea either. for starters, there was a 'shoot to kill' policy inside the red zone. The 800 US marines stationed around the Palace Ducal (plus italian snipers) would make sure the G8 would never be touched.
> 
> you are obviously thinking about Tute bianche because you saw them padded up as 'armoured activists'. I suggest you do some research into the history of Tute Bianche. Given the ability of the italian police (I cited carabineri commanders Mondelli and Bruno and state police commander Canterini) to cause extreme violence themselves, it was a wise idea to go protected.
> 
> ...


I know 2 of these people. And i would agree that the second half of my previous post probably was misguided, for similar reasons as those above. What i would amend that too is that at least one of the people concerned has questioned fundamentally about the approach of protestors because of what took place at genoa, what is possible and desireable in such situations, and what motivations lie behind people getting involved in such movements. I wouldn't want to comment further cos its not my place to in essence. Look forward to your update in due course.


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## nessuno (Mar 1, 2008)

*i am sorry paula...i am very fatigued and still dealing with my injuries for Diaz.*

Both the trials have been an enourmous burden that we must carry. I was a bit sharp with you. i am sorry.  I know Sam, Dan and Norman very well. I know all of them are non-violent protesters (two were from UNISON). I was with them all in Genoa in January 2006 when we all testified at Diaz.

I spent longer in Genoa and at diaz than most other people. I got to know the italians very well at the Genoa Social Forum and I do know that there was never the view that actually trying to take on 22,000 cops was a viable idea. I think no-one realised until they actually arrived in the city in the days before G8 on the sheer scale of miltary and police buildup.

I am sure that if anyone on that friday morning in Genova who still had the view that taking on the state was a winnable situation, myself, dan or norman would of argued the issue or walked away.

anyway back to the RTS question....


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## Paulie Tandoori (Mar 2, 2008)

no worries, i think its good that you're still raising the profile of the incident and what the cops/carbineri/etc got away with. so, like say, make sure you let us know how things pan out.

RTS question? the question for me is whether there is the will amongst the youth, the imaginative, the committed, the dynamic to create anything getting towards anything similar? i simply don't see it atm. which makes me feel a bit sad and old. where has the energy gone?


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## emanymton (Mar 2, 2008)

HackneyE9 said:


> Wasn't there one about a month after J18, outside Euston station? Police van set alight.



Haven’t read the whole thread yet (and it’s an old question) but sod it.
This sounds like the demo that was organised to coincide with the one in Seattle.


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## butchersapron (Mar 2, 2008)

That is the one. Pathetically worked.


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## Paulie Tandoori (Mar 2, 2008)

the thing at euston was embarassingly awful.


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## emanymton (Mar 2, 2008)

Made a good front page photo for the tabloids.


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## free spirit (Mar 4, 2008)

nessuno said:


> First, i am sure other people can add to what is written here. it is by no means a comprensive list.
> 
> I notice you joined Urban75 at the time of Genoa in 2001. I like to ask you what you thought of the demo....
> 
> ...


erm - I think you may have picked up the wrong end of the stick as to where I'm coming from on this. Although I wasn't in genoa, I'm fully aware of what went on and supportive of the aims of the 'movement of movements' as you put it, and was involved in the anti g8 stuff in the UK in 1997 (organising coachload from newcastle to brum for rts), J18 (helped run a week of actions in newcastle plus an affinity group doing autonomous actions in london prior to the big rts) & 2005 Gleneagles (2 weeks onsite setting up and helping run the dissent campsite). We're on the same side

I've also got no problem with the white overall movement / taute blanche's ideas and methods - actually i've a hell of a lot of respect for them - that's different to people hiding among the crowd lobbing badly aimed bottles.

now that I've got that bit out of the way though, I feel I need to correct you on part of what you're saying that I believe is inaccurate.

Saying that for the first time south american countries learnt about the g8, WTO, IMF/WB from Genoa is just plain wrong, disrespectful of the South Americans, and completely rewrites the actual real history of the 'movement of movements.

I'd really suggest that if you're going to write about the movement, you need to study it's history a bit more first.



> *I*t wasn't in the acridmist of Seattle's tear gas that this global movement was born, but inthe humid mist of the Chiapas jungle, in Southern Mexico on New Years Day 1994 the day. This was the day the North American Free Trade Agreement (*NAFTA*) came into effect, a day when two thousand indigenous peoples from several groups came out from the mountainsand forests. Masked, armed and calling themselves Zapatistas, their battle cry was "Ya Basta" - "Enough is Enough". An extraordinary popular uprising, which was to help change the landscape of global resistance, had begun. Using a jungle battered laptop computer and intermediaries to get the discs to an internetconnected computer, the Zapatistas were able to bypass the media censorship of the Mexican state and communicate directly. People everywhere soon heard of the uprising.


[source=PGA history]

the first international gathering of activists that went on to form People's Global Action was in 1996 in the jungle of Chiapas, Mexico with 6000 people showing up - this formed the basis of the model for the largescale social forums that was then exported to Europe, rather then the other way round.

sure Genoa, Seattle, J18 etc all helped to reinforce the belief of the South Americans that change was possible, and that they weren't alone and had support they could call on in the north, but to claim that South America could not have happened without Genoa is just wrongheaded IMO.

this movement is so different precisely because it's not about the north imposing their solutions on the south, it's about the southern movements taking the lead and being supported by groups on the north.


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## free spirit (Mar 4, 2008)

damn my memory, it appears birmingham and the first global protest against the G8 following a PGA call for action was in May 1998 (not 1997 like I said), with the main g8 meeting and protest in geneva, I think maybe it was the finance ministers meeting seperately just outside birmingham or something like that.


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## free spirit (Mar 4, 2008)

shit it's been a long time since i looked at the people's global action website - I've gone and got all nostalgic, almost forgot the last 7 years had happened and started believing the 'another world is possible', 'we are everywhere' stuff again.

methinks a long trip to south america could be in order to go see what's going on for myself. I've been meaning to do this since the late 90's, about time I got round to it.


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## chilango (Mar 4, 2008)

Mexico is in* North *America.


Point stands though.


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## free spirit (Mar 4, 2008)

chilango said:


> Mexico is in* North *America.
> 
> 
> Point stands though.


hmm well geographically I guess. I was going to say that the Zapatista's identified most with the indigenous populations of central and southern america, but that's doing them a diservice, their message from the start really was an international one focussed particularly on downtrodden indigenous people largely in the global south, but also at all those being fucked over by neoliberal globalisation policies.



> To all who struggle for human values of democracy, liberty and justice.
> To all who force themselves to resist the world crime known as "Neoliberalism" and aim for humanity and hope to be better, be synonymous of future.
> To all individuals, groups, collectives, movements, social, civic and political organizations, neighborhood associations, cooperatives, all the lefts known and to be known; non-governmental organizations, groups in solidarity with struggles of the world people, bands, tribes, intellectuals, indigenous people, students, musicians, workers, artists, teachers, peasants, cultural groups, youth movements, alternative communication media, ecologists, tenants, lesbians, homosexuals, feminists, pacifists.
> To all human beings without a home, without land, without work, without food, without health, without education, without freedom, without justice, without independence, without democracy, without peace, without tomorrow.
> ...


[source=The Zapatista's "[SIZE=2]First Declaration of La Realidad for Humanity and Against Neoliberalism"][/SIZE]

the real beauty of the way the Zapatistas organised this was the fact that they managed to bring together groups of indigenous people from all over the world who were fighting the impacts of neoliberalist policies in their own ommmunities and in their own way under one umbrella, but with a bottom up approach rather than the usual leftist top down 'we know best' approach. So they had movements like the 'movement of ogani people' from Nigeria, 'Movement Sans Terra' from Brazil, the Indian Farmers movement that I forget the name of, and loads of other's coming together to discuss how to support each others struggles and unite to fight the neoliberalist agenda together with representatives of european and north American movements like RTS / Earth First etc.

Pulling together 4-6000 people from 44 different countries to travel to the jungles of Chiapas to discuss the formation of a new global movement of movements against neoliberalist globalisation was no minor achievement, and the fact that this movement of movements went on to blossom into PGA, launch a wave of huge global protests everytime the wto / G8 met, and act as the launchpad for the wave of leftist, pro-indigenous people / anti neoliberalist governments to sweep through south america is, to me, a stunning achievement. 

We do these people a huge diservice if we do not recognise the true history and development processes of the momement - we also jeapardise it's continued success as it allows the traditional left in europe and america to jump in and try to dominate things in the way that the SWP did with their Globalise Resistance garbage that did more damage to the movement in this country than anything else IMO.


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## chilango (Mar 4, 2008)

free spirit said:


> hmm well geographically I guess. I was going to say that the Zapatista's identified most with the indigenous populations of central and southern america, but that's doing them a diservice, their message from the start really was an international one focussed particularly on downtrodden indigenous people largely in the global south, but also at all those being fucked over by neoliberal globalisation policies.
> 
> [source=The Zapatista's "[SIZE=2]First Declaration of La Realidad for Humanity and Against Neoliberalism"][/SIZE]
> 
> ...



Quite.

Its annoying when the left posit Seattle as the start point.

The background of the Zapatistas is very interesting. There was a fairly hefty change in ideas at some point during their "cold accumulation of forces" prior to 1994 that has never been completly explained...


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## free spirit (Mar 4, 2008)

chilango said:


> Quite.
> 
> Its annoying when the left posit Seattle as the start point.
> 
> The background of the Zapatistas is very interesting. There was a fairly hefty change in ideas at some point during their "cold accumulation of forces" prior to 1994 that has never been completly explained...


exactly - actually it has been explained, but I'm fucked if I can remember where I read it / who i discussed it with etc as it was around the late 90's, actually I've got vague recollections of having a really good book about the zapatista's 1994 uprising that went right into the history - I think it was a writer who'd actually hooked up with the zapatista's the year before the uprising and spent a good couple of years with them. I must have lent it to someone though (this may be it, not sure)

essentially IIRC the EZLN formed when a group of hardcore marxist revolutionaries (i forget exactly what ideology) headed to chiapas to try stir up an armed marxist revolution among the indigenous people in the area in the mid 80's sometime. They were spectacularly unsuccessful in recruiting people to start with as their marxist ideology had fuck all relevance to the problems of the indigenous people, or their traditional cultures of decision making etc. After a while the marxist revolutionaries realised this, and began to learn from the indigenous people's and to adapt their ideology to incorporate much of the traditional methods of decision making which IIRC were based around collective concensus decision making by the wntire village, listening to all points on an issue even if it took days to reach a decision etc, and a very bottom up approach with a leader expected to be more of a spokesperson for the group once a decision has been taken rather than to lead the group and attempt to impose their will onto the group.

At the same time, the marxist revolutionaries were able to bring their understanding of economics, capitalism, neoliberalism etc combined with internationalism and an understanding of what works and an understanding of how to link up with and mobilise civil society in support of a cause.

The EZLN armed wing was formed following concensus decision making meetings in the villages with each village deciding whether or not they wanted to participate in the armed uprising, meaning that when the uprising took place it had the full support of vast swathes of the local population, rather than the more traditional leftist model of a small group of armed men starting an armed insurrection in the hope that the local people will then see the light and join in (ie. cuba).

The fact that they picked new years day 1994, the day the NAFTA agreement came into force, to launch the uprising was undoubtably down to the influence of the marxist revolutionaries ideas and understanding of the impact such a free trade agreement would have, but the methodology and decision making process etc were decidedly not marxist, drawing more from traditional indigenous ideas.

from memory.


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## chilango (Mar 4, 2008)

free spirit said:


> exactly - actually it has been explained, but I'm fucked if I can remember where I read it / who i discussed it with etc as it was around the late 90's, actually I've got vague recollections of having a really good book about the zapatista's 1994 uprising that went right into the history - I think it was a writer who'd actually hooked up with the zapatista's the year before the uprising and spent a good couple of years with them. I must have lent it to someone though (this may be it, not sure)
> 
> essentially IIRC the EZLN formed when a group of hardcore marxist revolutionaries (i forget exactly what ideology) headed to chiapas to try stir up an armed marxist revolution among the indigenous people in the area in the mid 80's sometime. They were spectacularly unsuccessful in recruiting people to start with as their marxist ideology had fuck all relevance to the problems of the indigenous people, or their traditional cultures of decision making etc. After a while the marxist revolutionaries realised this, and began to learn from the indigenous people's and to adapt their ideology to incorporate much of the traditional methods of decision making which IIRC were based around collective concensus decision making by the wntire village, listening to all points on an issue even if it took days to reach a decision etc, and a very bottom up approach with a leader expected to be more of a spokesperson for the group once a decision has been taken rather than to lead the group and attempt to impose their will onto the group.
> 
> ...





The core of the EZLN from what I've read were a handful of survivors/refugees from a Maoist (ish) group the FALN (iirc) who headed into Chiapas for safety basically.

Guerilla groups have been active in Mexico since the 60s. Sometimes on a large scale (in the 70s particularly Lucio Cabañas' Party of the Poor) at the mo the EPR and its offshoots are pretty active.

Yet, the EZLN somehow, (the legend is the one you recount above) ditched the militarism and leninist politics to become what we know today.

You read much on APPO?

An interesting recent story, that is still playing out...


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## free spirit (Mar 4, 2008)

yeah - FALN rings a bell.

APPO - erm I've sort of been keeping a vague eye on the situation from afar without really getting round to looking into it in detail. IIRC there's links between APPO and EZLN - as in key people in APPO would have been to some of the EZLN meetings / been active in Cancun etc.


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## Taxamo Welf (Mar 4, 2008)

APPO and EZLN totally different entities. Wikipedia is your friend - in fact it is your freind on your questions about the zaps too 

also narconews.


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## chilango (Mar 4, 2008)

Taxamo Welf said:


> APPO and EZLN totally different entities. Wikipedia is your friend - in fact it is your freind on your questions about the zaps too
> 
> also narconews.



APPO and EZLN howver both part of a "revolutionary wave" in Mexico...the EZLN themselves did their "other campaign" attended Atenco, itself a precursor to what happened in Oaxaca. Linked in  networky way exactly as the EZLN are trying to encourage.

Some political differences however. The old left still have an influence in Oaxaca,  of sorts, the PCM (m-l) though tiny tend to make thier presence known in Oaxaca and in the "other campaign".

Probably have similar roots n all.

Whilst the EZLN attempt to break out of Chiapas, APPO (and the many similar initiatives) represent the manifestation of this desire....

Narconews is reccomended, though a little selective.


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## free spirit (Mar 4, 2008)

Taxamo Welf said:


> APPO and EZLN totally different entities. Wikipedia is your friend - in fact it is your freind on your questions about the zaps too
> 
> also narconews.


where did either of us say APPO and EZLN are the same, I said there were links between the 2 groups - by which I mean both idealogical and actual physical links in terms of people involved in APPO who've also participated in stuff like the Zapatista caravan, and the EZLN inspired National Indigenous Congresses.

seeing as you mention wiki - this quote from wiki backs up what I'm saying


> Included in the resolutions of the APPO are a recognition of indigenous rights and autonomy, gender equality, political accountability, opposition to neoliberalism and Plan Puebla Panamá, a demand for an alternative education, and collectively-run media, amongst others.
> The Popular Assembly of Oaxaca takes as inspiration indigenous political practices called 'usos y costumbres' (traditional usages and customs) that have been incorporated into the municipal level government of Oaxaca. These practices stand apart from standard electoral politics in that the assembly structure does not include secret voting procedures, but rather open meetings to make decisions.
> "'The executive branch' (the authorities) is charged with accomplishing the tasks the assembly gives it. The municipal president, foremost among the authorities, leads (as the Zapatistas’ phrase explains) by obeying. For the population of Oaxaca, the idea of governing by consensus remains part of the common cultural heritage. Therefore, as APPO was convoked, the modest people who comprise 80% of Oaxaca’s population, recognized it immediately. And they support it, despite the obvious difficulties of convening authorities from around the state. Since these authorities receive no pay, a trip to the capital city is not easy. But it’s happening."[5]


ah yes, here's the route of the Zapatista Caravan - note that it spends 3 days travelling through Oaxaca.







I'm also pretty sure that the Zapatista's sent a delegation to assist in Oaxaca when it was kicking off in 2006, unfortunately the documentation on the pga site is in spanish (?) so I can't tell exactly what it's saying.


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## free spirit (Mar 4, 2008)

Here we go, I thought I could remember the Zapatista's calling for global action in support of APPO and the people of Oaxaca...



> The Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca greets with joy the initiative that the EZLN has taken calling to a great world-wide mobilization in solidarity with our people. A great attack against the democratic forces of the mother country it is plan today by the extreme right positioned in the political class , and symptom of that attack is the state of emergency that is lived in Oaxaca, the capital of the resistance.





> Communiqué of the Indigenous Revolutionary Clandestine Committee -
> General Command of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation.
> Mexico.
> 
> ...


[source]


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## Taxamo Welf (Mar 4, 2008)

yes.... I'm not denying aaaany of that.

Links is one thing, but it is worth stressing the APPO is a different entity; your talking about a popular assembly in a city that includes everyone from indigenous groups and anarchists to political parties. Compared to well, the zaps. No you didn't say they were the same, i'm pointing out how different they are 

There was some talk of dissapointment with the lack of Zapatista involvement in the oaxaca revolt, but another comrade said this was horseshit... I don't know who to believe really. The Zaps seemed to have been on some utterly pointless jolly around the country at the time, and i know they stopped off and sent people etc but from my uninformed viewpoint i feel they should have just quite the silly fucking tour and rallied all to oaxaca.

Now they are on the backfoot in their *own* territory 

anyway, i'll be in chiapas in 2 moths so i'll tell you then


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## Taxamo Welf (Mar 4, 2008)

also, statements statements. People lurrrve these kinds things in mexico. Order a beer and you get a salutation of solidarity with it.


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## chilango (Mar 4, 2008)

Taxamo Welf said:


> yes.... I'm not denying aaaany of that.
> 
> Links is one thing, but it is worth stressing the APPO is a different entity; your talking about a popular assembly in a city that includes everyone from indigenous groups and anarchists to political parties. Compared to well, the zaps. No you didn't say they were the same, i'm pointing out how different they are
> 
> ...



I{ll be in Chiapas meself in about 3...

Was in Oaxaca last month...all was calm.


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## free spirit (Mar 4, 2008)

Taxamo Welf said:


> yes.... I'm not denying aaaany of that.


cool, just thought it was a bit of an odd way to jump into the debate.



Taxamo Welf said:


> Links is one thing, but it is worth stressing the APPO is a different entity; your talking about a popular assembly in a city that includes everyone from indigenous groups and anarchists to political parties. Compared to well, the zaps. No you didn't say they were the same, i'm pointing out how different they are
> 
> There was some talk of dissapointment with the lack of Zapatista involvement in the oaxaca revolt, but another comrade said this was horseshit... I don't know who to believe really. The Zaps seemed to have been on some utterly pointless jolly around the country at the time, and i know they stopped off and sent people etc but from my uninformed viewpoint i feel they should have just quite the silly fucking tour and rallied all to oaxaca.
> 
> Now they are on the backfoot in their *own* territory


IMO (from a long distance away), people who'd expected the Zapatista's to do much more than send a delegation to support the Oaxaca revolt, and call for international action in support probably haven't really quite understood the realities of the situation the Zapatista's themselves were in, or their ethos and methodology.

The year long 'Other Campaign' was also a bit more than just a silly fucking tour - it was a campaign to spread the Zapatista message, to other indigenous groups across mexico, act as inspiration for them to rise up themselves and promote links between the different regional indigenous groups. That way they could hope to be able to force a national solution as the government couldn't use the army to repress all of mexico at once in the way they were in Chiapas.

I think the army still had 60,000 odd troops in chiapas at the time of the oaxaca uprising, and there would have been a legitimate fear that had the Zapatista's sent a significant number of armed people to Oaxaca, that the army would have used this as an excuse to attack the Zapatista areas in Chiapas while the Zapatista's were weak.

anyway, that's just my take on things, and I'm a long way away...



Taxamo Welf said:


> anyway, i'll be in chiapas in 2 moths so i'll tell you then



nice one - check your pm's, got some mates I've lost track of who last i heard were in chiapas working with the zapatistas... just removed their names from public display to protect the not so innocent


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## chilango (Mar 5, 2008)

free spirit said:


> The year long 'Other Campaign' was also a bit more than just a silly fucking tour - it was a campaign to spread the Zapatista message, to other indigenous groups across mexico, act as inspiration for them to rise up themselves and promote links between the different regional indigenous groups. That way they could hope to be able to force a national solution as the government couldn't use the army to repress all of mexico at once in the way they were in Chiapas.
> 
> I think the army still had 60,000 odd troops in chiapas at the time of the oaxaca uprising, and there would have been a legitimate fear that had the Zapatista's sent a significant number of armed people to Oaxaca, that the army would have used this as an excuse to attack the Zapatista areas in Chiapas while the Zapatista's were weak.



Quite.

Part of the EZLN's big shift prior to 1994 was a move away from the military vanguard idea. To parachute into Oaxaca would've been contrary to that. Besides I doubt the EZLN has the military capacity for a full on urban battle...as would've happenned. The govt here was perfectly happy to escalate the situation into full on conflict...a conflict it wouldve won...remember they were facing a huge wave of protest against the fraudulent election, the middle classes here were terrified of "revolution" and would've backed any onslaught the govt chose to unleash in Oaxaca or in Chiapas.

The other campaign was a very importnat move, there are many many isolated movemts, insurgencies, popular assemblies etc all working pretty indepently and the state here is picking them off one by one. An attempt to coordinate them all was a smart move.

Sadly, I don't think the EZLN are strong enough anymore to have pulled it off.


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## giuseppegirardi (May 24, 2009)

Shoplifting fits in with Rts politics so could everyone start shoplifting in central London its not stealing as your not depriving the owners of the goods so we could start off in Harrods then to South Kensington Sloane Square High street Kensington Shoplifting everything so could everyone shoplift every saturday


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## giuseppegirardi (May 25, 2009)

Harrods Harveynichols Knightsbridge South kensington Sloane street Regent st piccadilly  Gloucester road Royal Albert hall High street kensington everysaturday shoplifting when the shoplifters shoplift phone a head and the staff will bag it up ready to go every building will be shoplifted time


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## giuseppegirardi (May 25, 2009)

TIME


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## editor (May 25, 2009)

giuseppegirardi said:


> TIME


...for you to go, weirdo.


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