Reply #5: Incorrect

[alcibiades_mystery]

I worked with Black Bloc in San Francisco, 1998-1999. They are not provocateurs, as much as the liberals on this board try to claim that they are. They actually genuinely believe in the tactics, and they are not necessarily incorrect. In some cases, it doesn't work at all, and many people who deploy black bloc tactics themselves understand that and go with the consensus. In other cases, it does serve to provoke the authorities into action, which they consider useful and strategically justifiable for a number of reasons. In some cases, I agree. In other cases, no. In this case, I would tend to argue against these tactics because other tactics are actually working well. In Seattle in 1999, the Black Bloc tactics were successful (and anybody who claims they weren't doesn't know much about how it unfolded). There is an argument to be made for defamiliarizing the everyday spaces of capital, for carving out temporary zones where capital is not in complete control of of everyday space. The temporary autonomous zone, and etc.

I know a lot of you liberals automatically assume that Black Bloc protest tactics are agent provocateurs, but you really couldn't be more wrong. They simply disagree with you on strategy and tactics. In some cases, you are right. In some cases (Seattle especially), they are.