thanx for the news and the actions in gothenberg are an inspiration for all anarchists. the police actions mirror those employed in the may day rally in london and demonstrate the necessity for careful planning and rigorous organisation to combat state power. the actions of the european police state against protesters will i am sure be anwered.
mike

A friend has been arrested in Gorheburg. See

 http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/dynamic/news/top_story.html?in_review_id=401016&in_review_text_id=349020

We need to rally to his defence. At the PGA benefit in Hackney (Chats Palace, Saturday 23rd June) we will be collecting for him. Come and help.

Fucking heavy shit. Calls upon everyone to really start analysing what we are doing, and this is oh so important.

With people being killed and the oppression we are starting to see there is no room for doubt that this is the most important time in our lives. This is where we must look into our hearts and make a very major personal decision.

This is not a game, though it MUST be fun if the victory is to mean anything at all.

This is not about being "famous" or in the news or impressing your mates, unless that is more important than your life.

This is about, pure and simpe, right and wrong. This is about The Future. We are at such a crossroads in history. We have a fucking huge door in front that is slowly closing trying to trap us forever in a cell of capitalism and authoritarianism. And hugely bloody terrifying though it is, we must throw ourselves into every little gap still left open, shout, scream and dance in a whirlwind of unpredictable speed and self empowerment until there's no lock in the world that can bolt the door.

Coz, to quote someone (who? dunno, someone cool) if not you, who? if not now, when? The answer seems to be No one and Never...

But on the flip side, the energy and power and fucking incredible people involved on *our* side means we have the potential to create something not just alternative to the grey bleak trap that seems our inevitable fate if we don't fight, but something more beautiful, humane and brave than humanity has ever seen.

What have we learnt in one hundred years? For me history tells me not to trust anyone who feels wrong, that the end does not justify the means, that we are all so incredibly big and strong and intelligent that the only way the powers that are can keep us in our boxes is by continuously telling us we're not.

Look into the mirror. Look all around you. See what humanity can create, how beautiful it can be, lift your chin high, hold your heart steady, and with a song in your throat fight for the future of us all.

Let me just say that for starters I hate the shit that capitalism has done re. slavery, the native americans, the rainforest, all the people out of work / in shit work in the west, etc., and I also hate the shit that communists have done re. Stalin, Tibet, etc.

I stand for similar ideals to the anti-capitalists, and I was disgusted to see the protester being shot by the Swedish police.

But can I just say that violence at these events does not further our cause. It indeed plays into the hands of the enemy. Of course, perhaps this suggests that we should stand around simply eternally debating in a committee, whilst our people die (like the old left always did). But in my opinion some of the people that have achieved the most with direct action have done so with the non-violent type: Gandhi, Mandela, etc. At the end of the day we all want to see a better world. But ripping up paving stones will not do anything to achieve that.

I say that not becausse I oppose the cuase, but because I support it. I am not a commie-subscribing old leftie, I am an individual thinker who hates the anti-intellectual nature of free-market society, but I am also worried about the way that the anti-capitalist movement has descended into a similar sort of conformism. We all have the right to think for ourselves. And mob violence is just a. being just like the pigs and b. playing into their hands.

We must carry on, but be more thoughtful next time.

"Playing into the hands of the enemy.."
Appeasers still trot that one out, do they? There was a little property damage in Seattle; did that play into their hands? The poll tax riot was instrumental in the abolition of the tax; 'right into their hands'?

You asshole. Slag off the old left then (heard of the Spanish Civil War?). Have a pop at the Communists (without whom the Allies never would have beat the Nazis). Claim the ANC were non-violent (don't you remember the car bombs?).

Smashing a few windows, burning some cafe furniture, throwing rocks at police is nothing compared to the *real* violence that neo-liberalism inflicts on the poor worldwide.

You do your own thing, free thinker. Sitting on your arse moaning about a few angry young men *really is* "playing right into their hands".

Many ordinary people wouldn't even know there was oppostion to globalisation without the people who throw rocks (fewer than 1% of the protesters).

Want a peceful alternative? Go to the protests and don't throw rocks. It's just that simple.

Whilst I understand that some people who are horrified at state violence may wish the struggle for a better world to be non violent, I think you are kidding yourselves.

The idea that our demonstrators or strikers have to peacefully let the cops beat them up or set dogs on them is all wrong.

Sometimes, pushed too hard, people fight back. I saw it in the Miners strike in Britain. I have seen it when ever we stop the fascists meet or demonstrate. At the inner city riots of the early 80's we gave the police "a bloody good hiding".

Every time it has happened the cops have been made to look innocent and we have been condemned.
You'd think we are the ones with batons and shields, guns, dogs and horses.

Some people on our side are more ready to fight than others than others and yes, some people are pushed closer to the edge by life and are more angry.

But when Palestinians fight armed police with rocks we applaud them and call it the Intifada. When we fight armed police with rocks....er.....
(Of course I am not compairing living in Palestine to living in the West, but at the heart of it the structures behind the oppression of the Palestinians are US imperialism, the IMF, WTO etc. ie the same people.)

I would remind the previous writer that Mandela SUPPORTED VIOLENCE. He was kept in prison for so long, BECAUSE HE REFUSED TO RENOUNCE THE ARMED STRUGGLE. (Go and look it up)

Ghandi was at the heart of a MASS struggle WHICH INCLUDED VIOLENCE.

But you've really got to ask yourselves why Mandela is being written into history as this non violent fella (by people who did not support him at the time), and why Ghandi is held up time after time (and in all those bloody adverts) as a model to follow, by the very system that sucked India dry.

Could it be that we are being duped?

Fundamentally self defence is no offence and sometimes that means picking up a rock and throwing it at people who want to crack your skull or shoot you in the back.

When our friends and comrades are being held in prison, and the International state is getting ready to hang them out to dry, instead of condeming them you should be doing everything you can to give them your support.

I do!

And I feel that everyone who does, helps to make it look like a better movement.

Do you really think that the writers of the Daily Mail, etc, don't sit there rubbing their hands with glee every time there is violence at one of these protests? Of course they do! Being violent is giving them what they want, because then they can dismiss us as "thugs".

Incidentally, these protests didn't start off as violent. The Newbury Bypass protests were all peaceful, as were early Reclaim The Streets protests.

Oh god, the violence debate...

I really don't see what the fuss is about.

1. Most people's definition of violence does not involve property damage.

2. Most people agree with genuine acts of self defence.

Problems arise when property damage is, or appears pretty random. Smashing fuck out of a McDonalds, yay, trashing the tourist place next door, uhhhhhh.....

There is also hyperbole around self defence and fighting the police. It's insulting to compare the situation we're in with that of the Palestinians or the OPM. Again, I think most people think that harming another person is something of a last resort. It might have to happen sometimes, but glorifying it or talking it up is a bit wanky. The point isn't to win a streetfight (very unlikely anyway, as the cops will always have the upper hand in terms of equipment and resources), but to build a movement. I don't think this is best achieved by always being ready for a ruck. Sometimes important things do come out of confrontations - Stonewall being one example, but they're generally spontaneous outbursts; trying to engineer them is bogus, and will be seen through.

it looks like not rupert marsh has already got there before me, looking down the discussion, but my point is that the media, official and corporate all attempt to elide the difference between two different objects of 'violence'; ie. violence against people with violence against property. A salient example might be the hue and cry following Mayday 2000. What was all that about? As I remember, it was largely concerned with 'defacing' a few statues and trashing McDs. It's obviously in the interests of the capitalist hegemony to equate property, inanimate objects with living people, and to us its indicative of their priorities, but it can't be said too often that the police are generally [there are exceptions, eg. ANL in Oldham]at demonstrations to protect property. It needs pointing out and loudly to anyone who'll listen. After all, their job is to police Capital. The system gets its name, its identity from property. Capital launches the violence against people, time and again. The Daily Mail incites, foments their violence by reinforcing that identity, finding something in RTS to call violence, and repeating it over and over again. Isn't the Newbury Bypass built now? Have we reclaimed the Streets? Or did the Poll Tax get abolished?

Fair point about the poll tax v reclaim the streets/newbury bypass, and this is often trotted out by pro-violence people, but don't forget that the poll tax was a "single issu" debate. That is why violence worked in that issue. But you can't just have a few rucks and expect the governments to say "oh! yes! we'll ban all cars totally" or "oh yes, actually, we'll in fact dismantle the entire capitalist system".

Such progress takes years and years of work and campaigning, and that is why non violent direct action will always seem better than the violent type.

having said that, the past few "violent" protests have brought these issues to the forefront of the general agenda very effectively. So maybe it is worth people going to prison for.

when you come here throwing stones, what kind of treatment do you expect....?

The activists had it coming. get out of your oblivius lies and see that the rioters started it.

Sweden does not welcome any violence, other than from the policeforce who have our support.)