To Be Fair, He Is a Journalist: A Short Response to Chris Hedges on the Black Bloc | Revolution by the Book : The AK Press Blog

Some of this is personal to me, in the interest of full disclosure. I have friends in Oakland. They’re brave and awesome. Seeing them stand up to police repression and attempt to take an empty building while people sleep in the streets was exciting and invigorating for me. It was a welcome sight in today’s age of non-violent fundamentalism, where so many are beset with the crippling belief that if we just get beat up badly enough we’ll attract “the masses” with our moral superiority and somehow the wealthy and powerful will recognize the error of their ways and give us the world back that they’ve so successfully turned into their nightmarish, authoritarian, and wasted playground. My friends were gassed, beaten, given broken faces, broken dreams, and locked in cages for their bravery. And now they’re being denounced by a comfortable journalist who wasn’t there who refers to them as a “cancer”.

I don’t want to suggest that they shouldn’t be critiqued. Self-critique is important for any improvement of practice—if it’s honest.

But here I feel betrayed. When Hedges wrote about the Greeks, notorious for their black blocs, he praised them for “getting it.” Indeed, according to Hedges, they knew what to do. In Hedges own words:

“They know what to do when they are told their pensions, benefits and jobs have to be cut to pay corporate banks, which screwed them in the first place. Call a general strike. Riot. Shut down the city centers. Toss the bastards out. Do not be afraid of the language of class warfare—the rich versus the poor, the oligarchs versus the citizens, the capitalists versus the proletariat. The Greeks, unlike most of us, get it.”

Apparently for Hedges, that’s good enough for the Greeks. But, by God, don’t you dare bring this filthy resistance to his home! You might accidentally (horror of horrors!) break a window! Perhaps it might belong to Hedges! Well, I passed around his piece on Greece thinking that perhaps there was, in fact, a journalist that “gets it.” I was wrong and I feel betrayed.

So I am angry at Hedges. I know it shows and it will look ugly to some people, but at one point, I trusted his work. And now, I have broken and brave friends that he is denouncing in a movement that he is dividing and presuming to speak for.

After the Move-In Day, the Mayor of Oakland, Jean Quan, asked the Occupy movement to “disown” Oakland because they were militant, uncompromising, and because they were willing to engage in the kinds of “class warfare” that Hedges once praised in Greece. Occupy groups quickly dismissed this as a divisive tactic, but Hedges and Derrick Jensen seem all too eager to help Mayor Quan out. We live in interesting times, but we need to see these kinds of attacks for what they are—forms of recuperating needed and justified rage. When rigid ideologues who think they have some kind of special access to “Truth” come in swinging like this, particularly right after being politely asked to by liberal Mayors like Quan to do so, it’s time to do some quick disowning. We should reject the attempts to divide us by the likes of Quan, Jensen, and Hedges and, more importantly, reject the lies and distortions embedded in these facile “critiques.” Shame on you, Chris. If you want to denounce “violence,” you might use your time to target the police and Mayor Quan instead of doing the work they’ve asked Occupy “leaders” to do for them.

via www.revolutionbythebook.akpress.org

Comments

[rjs]

from a friend of a friend: http://www.wildwildleft.com/diary/2612/perspectives-on-hedges-cancer-in-occupy

[Robert Allen]

I found Diane Gee's article on Wild Wild Left wildly idiotic except for the line about "non violent fundamentalism". It is good that Black Bloc is bringing class conflict back to the fore, taking the stage away from the peaceniks who have infested our Occupy group with blather about "corporatism" instead of denouncing capitalism in terms of class conflict. Shooting the messenger Chris Hedges, however, when he points out that Black Bloc idiocy will turn away the support of the masses just when it was within our reach, is astounding however, especially gross is connecting Hedges with the cancer that killed her husband. Extremely offensive; I am appalled that people would buy into such complete shit, and the above article, with its hissing anger at Hedges, is also ignorant in the narrow sense of the word-- as a revolutionary socialist I am for all out class warfare, and everybody knows the police are mean,, but to attack Hedges as if HE is the one dividing the movement is well, dare I say kind of idiotic and ignorant, though I would wish for a kinder choice of words but there don't seem to be any.

[Jodi Dean]

Bob--I appreciate your comment. At this point, though, I don't agree. Hedges used the term cancer in his piece, so he opens himself up the criticism. Also, Hedges is the one screaming against Black Bloc as divisive, as if that were the biggest problem, rather than police violence, say. So, I think the response to Hedges make sense. He's also wrong on so much of what he says, yet seems so self-righteous, that, again, I don't think the attacks on him are unfounded--I think they are spot on. It's particularly maddening because he has been on the right side of all this (as far as I know) up till now. And, it's an empirical question, I think, whether tactics that are not suitable for toddlers are useful/attractive or not. Some people appreciate the bravery and the standing up to power a lot more than they do a useful march with flowers and banners.

[D]

Emma Goldman:

"The ignorant mass looks upon the man who makes a violent protest against our social and economic iniquities as upon a wild beast, a cruel, heartless monster, whose joy it is to destroy life and bathe in blood; or at best, as upon an irresponsible lunatic. Yet nothing is further from the truth. As a matter of fact, those who have studied the character and personality of these men, or who have come in close contact with them, are agreed that it is their super-sensitiveness to the wrong and injustice surrounding them which compels them to pay the toll of our social crimes. The most noted writers and poets, discussing the psychology of political offenders, have paid them the highest tribute. Could anyone assume that these men had advised violence, or even approved of the acts? Certainly not. Theirs was the attitude of the social student, of the man who knows that beyond every violent act there is a vital cause."

[par4]

This ain't Greece. This movement isn't even a year old yet. The rough removal of peaceful protestors will build support random violence and window breaking will lose it.

[Dusty Taylor]

I think Hedges came off, in the article, as a very pompous individual.

Black Bloc in Oakland has been hiding behind the OWS movement and has not taken personal responsiblity for their actions, which should tell anyone that the possibility exists that they are nothing more than agent provocateurs..which the rightwing has already done in several OWS actions..take the one in DC where a rightwinger, acting as part of the OWS movement, stormed a museum and then wrote about how the rest of the protesters did not follow his lead.

If and when they claim responsibility for their actions I will support their right to do whatever they see fit in protesting and/or reacting against the inequality in our systems here.

We had plenty of types of violent and non-violent actions during the Vietnam War, The Weather Underground comes to mind. They were pilloried by the non-violent wing at the time, so these types of actions are not new in our recent history. At least the WU took full responsibility for whatever they did. This is not the case for the Black Bloc actions in Oakland..not yet anyway.