Date: Fri, 21 Apr 2000 00:29:33 -0700
From: Joshua Houk <jlhouk-AT-uswest.net>
Subject: Re: Fwd: Mike Flugennock's Account of the Black Bloc




Erik wrote:

> Serious now : although i am in favour of standing ferm against any
> police and other (state) violence, i hear undertones in this talking
> about the black bloc that scare me. And not only because we have a
> brown flemish bloc here in Belgium (plain racists/neonazis trying to
> look respectable) but mainly because i sense some the feeling of
> power in people describing it that goes far beyond the personal and
> seems only to be rooted in that blocness. If the loss of of the
> individual is what gives strength to black bloc then we should be
> very watchfull of it. If people can be as rich an individual inside
> as outside the bloc i certainly do applaud it. If it won't get
> institutionalised i applaud it. But if they're going to be the
> green berets of the revolutionary mouvement we will be in for a big
> nasty surprise. It's sometimes good to look beyond the jokes.

I think that a part of what you're now seeing can be attributed to pure
elation. After Seattle, the question on everyone's mind was whether the
direct action types could even be in the same protest as the
non-violence folks. This was supposed to be the wedge that drove the new
radicalism apart in the US... and A16-17 proved that widely-believed
conjecture dead wrong. So it's more exulation that everyone worked
together and worked well than any exultaion of the black bloc.

But that's my feelings. I could be wrong.

And besides, you'll have a hard time trying to get me to wear something
other than a rolled-up longsleeve shirt and blue jeans.

joshua h