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Middle of a weekend in approved areas. That accomplishes so much. Big “vote out the fascists” vibes.
Pretty much, we see this sort of thing happening every few years and people still don’t understand that protests on their own accomplish nothing. You have to build dual power to organize things like strikes and work stoppages. That’s what hurts capital. The protests come after that.
I honestly think it’s a lot more effective on overseas populations and that’s part of why the CIA runs this shit. The whole free speech zone thing is great for cameras and looks a lot better than driving thru rural Minnesota, Wisconsin, New York, Washington, actually anywhere, it’s all awful
Yep exactly. There’s no backbone to these. It’s a weekend parade then back to brunch.
You have to build dual power to organize things like strikes and work stoppages. That’s what hurts capital. The protests come after that.
Yes, although protests can complement that process of building dual power, they don’t have to come afterwards. Like you’ve said, protests on their own accomplish nothing, yet they can still be an important way to gain awareness and introduce a broader range of people to these politics and groups involved.
I am speaking generally, I haven’t paid attention to these No Kings ones, but they’d surely be an avenue for fresh faces to meet socialist parties among all the spectacle.
Right, I agree with all that, my impression is that this particular form of protest is entirely performative though. They never seem to translate into actually building things like mutual aid networks, unions, or any other kind of permanent structures. It would be nice if people would start doing those things for a change.
Some are trying, but it’s a slow process going from toothless protests to a serious movement. It took decades for the civil rights movement to reach a point where people took it seriously. It took generations for union labour to gain legitimacy. We let the tools of community organizing and collective action rust away in complacency. It’s going to take time to reforge them.
I think it actively diffuses people’s political energy. Orgs like this weren’t effective back when they could organize strikes. Now there’s disunity between labor and activism, which are both riddled with opportunists, utter psychopaths if you’ve been in these movements Too much corruption, SSleazy informants everywhere ruining people’s lives in ways that are too odious to describe, deals with the ruling class aligning on foreign policy that eventually became their political goals. Now they’re just PR orgs that are financially dependent on a network beholden to the same entities as demokkkrats. In the alt media it is a bit more subtle but just as bad. Even when the messaging is good (it isn’t btw), they just tell you to sit around with your thumb in your ass about it.
A bunch of armchair defeatist rhetoric is definitely going to move the needle though? Networks built in the George Floyd era were critical for organizing anti-ice activity, but clearly that’s just coincidence.
If you don’t want to go, don’t go, but spare us the moral pretention and self-soothing nihilism.
God forbid someone point out your goal is an alliance with child-rapists who will betray you bruh. This strategy already failed, creating the environment you “organize” in without any standards. There were no “networks” built by people like this via BLM. You are organizing with the people who ruined those protests with pathetic behavior like kneeling before their beloved cops. You’re either appalling stupid, or disingenuously butthurt. You will fail again. You won’t listen. It doesn’t have to be so bad. But this is all you people want, complaining complaining complaining, & to be lauded for complaining, as a reward. Zero self-respect.
Where is the Revenge™? What is wrong with your SOUL?
“Let’s have all the thoughtcrime people gather in one place and one cluster of cell towers so we can keep track of them”
Yeah just mindlessly going thru the motions of the civil rights movement without studying how it was disassembled & the new tools the privatized state apparatus has is pretty suicidal imo
Please direct your punches upwards toward the powerful, thanks ❤️
If you want to punch powerfully, you need to build strength. Constructive criticism of your workout regimen is vital to that.
Imho getting people out on the streets constitutes putting in reps. Add to the protests as you see fit. Not everyone is going to be black bloc
Talk to any of these people about seizing power and they will call the cops
That what really show me how much of a waste these were. They had to get approval and only certain times and places. Fucking toothless. The maga and trump administration is laughing at us while they continue to move forward to turning us into a police state under a dictatorship of Trump.
a waste of what? your time? what else did you do today
Acting like you value you time and energy more than people you’re scolding to engage in utterly performative action is pretty rich
that doesn’t make any sense
Because you have no goals
I’ll never understand this “protesting doesn’t work” talk. I’m pretty sure it’s just false, but I don’t know where it comes from. Just stay inside if you want. who the fuck cares? what are you exactly?
The group that keeps throwing these events is constantly telling people how to contact their congresspeople and what to say to them, and is gathering support for a strike on may day. at these events people are handing out flyers for their groups, zines, petitions. I met a couple who do a marxist quarterly, and an environmental group organizing more serious demonstrations.
It was great to get out and just chat with people and feel sane for a little bit. The reason it was on a weekend and with proper permits was to get as many people out as possible.
Protests work. History shows mass action forces change. This event however is not a protest. It is a parade. Parades (like other events BBQs, picnics etc.) have their place for morale and recruitment but they are not political weapons. Confusing spectacle with action harms the movement.
Real protest needs specific actionable goals. It needs a strategy for disruption that hits capital where it hurts. It needs a plan for escalation when ignored. It requires a solid organized base ready to act. This event has none of these. No Kings is not a demand. It is a slogan without a material target (and even if it was the fact it drops the kings label in countries that retain a monarchy really is kneecapping itself).
Contacting congresspeople accepts the bourgeois state as the solution. They serve capital. Begging them for change is a dead end. Permits mean the state approved your dissent. That is managed opposition. There is use here though. Meeting organizers builds networks and recruiting is possible. But calling this a protest pretends action is happening when it is not. It funnels revolutionary sentiment into harmless spectacle. It dissipates energy rather than concentrating it. Do not mistake spectacle for struggle.
