"We condemn the use of violence against ordinary people"

So none of you were in Stirling then?

Well for those of us who werent actually in Stirling, can you explain what you mean by that?

What I meant was that over the last few days we have seen supposed "anarchists" indulging in the kind of violent actions that the above statement appears to condemn. The image that then appears of the anarchist movement is of a bunch of people running around in black seeking a ruck with the police and wilful destruction of property and of parked cars that are a bit too shiny for their liking.

The reason why I mentioned Stirling is because such actions took place there.

I myself am rather unsure of what the anarchist movement really stands for, apart from "do what the f**k you like and damn the consequences".

If you seek no order and no police, then does that mean that I am entitled to rob you if I think I can get away with it and that you are then entitled to bash my head in if you can?

I am not being faux-naive here, but I really would like a concise explanation of what you stand for, and of what your movement's relationship is to those supposed "anarchists" or the "Black Bloc" that we so frequently see running around smashing things...and people.

What a boring and pathetic statement. Who said you were in favour of blowing up passengers on tubes and buses in London? No-one? Well what's the point of tail-ending the bourgeois propaganda then, albeit adding a mild anti-war twist. You are implicitly supporting the western rulers' propaganda line that this was done by 'Islamic' 'terrorists'. And by the way, British soldiers are volunteers. Most of them sign up because they want to kill foreigners. How on earth can you put their dying in Iraq on the same level as their killing?

Did you know the term 'loved ones' was invented by the owners of the funeral industry, as exposed by Nancy Mitford? (No? So look it up?) What DO you know, other than how to pose in your own little corner of the bourgeois political spectrum? Most of what you say in this statement could have been said by George Galloway, the obvious SIS stooge who does his Leninist turn for certain audiences. (Yes, SIS. Who do YOU think he was reporting to when he came back from Iraq? The proletariat?)

For several hours, many anti-capitalist critics have had the intelligence to be discussing the hypothesis that this was a Reichstag operation. Not exactly the last thing that an intelligent critic would think of, given the huge psy-ops effort that has been ongoing in the UK for the past week or so, is it? Were you born yesterday or something? Or too busy preparing to be the pseudo-opposition to 'Make Poverty History'?

Either try to get to grips with propaganda, pseudo-opposition, false consciousness, and the bourgeoisie's use of this shit called 'democracy' (i.e. volkstaat), or fuck off back to the early 19th century.

Chuck your 'politician' role in the bin, and admit you were at least partially wankers to be playing it in the first place. That way, some of you may win some respect from working class fighters who were born with more sense in their little fingers than you've got in your whole bodies. Your statement that you express sympathy with the victims means fuck-all to anyone. The survivors and the families of the murdered people aren't going around saying 'oh great, at least there are some politicians who genuinely feel our pain - yeah, those ones with the black flags, who use that illiterately-written 'A' symbol'.

Your use of the term 'ordinary people' is just STOMACH-CHURNING. You mean people who aren't 'sussed' like you? All get together, do you, to tell each other how sussed you are? Well here's a thought for you, you twits - the 'country' isn't run by make-up-wearing Tony Blair with his hand gestures and head movements. Or were you just pretending to think it was, to get the 'ordinary people' on your side? Or have you long forgotten the difference between what you think, and what you say you think? What a bunch of politicans!

Down with the State.
Down with anarchism.
Down with politicians of all varieties.
Long live autonomous working class struggle.

b

Well done! We translated this statement in Dutch:  http://www.devrije.nl/archives/00000453.htm

... for doing this. The terrorists and the government must be brought to account for this.

Oops, my apologies, the person who wrote the exposure of the funeral industry was Jessica Mitford, not Nancy!!!

translated to polish:
 http://pl.indymedia.org/pl/2005/07/15088.shtml

The statement was in response to corporate media reports earlier today that ''anti globalisation protestors'' ''anarchists'' and ''anti globalisation anarchists'' were responsible for the attacks.

Claims that all of the above mentioned groups deny, and previous reports from this evening confirm.

As for the comments about Stirling, i take it the author themselves wasnt in Stirling when the supposed ''violence'' happened?

Having spoken to people who were in Stirling at the time, id rather much believe their accounts of things, rather than an hysterical media and corrupt police force hell bent on portraying all the protestors to be violent anti social thugs.

anarchists come in many different forms. and dont always agree on tactics or ideas. So trying to label all anarchists as one thing because you percieve (or have been fed by the media) a small miniority of anarchists to be ''black blockers'' who just wanted to smash shit up, is irresponsible.

why are 'ordinary working people' singled out as people you stand with...?

Aren't 'ordinary working people' the exact same people who questioningly or unquestioningly perpeptuate this sick society... I'm a 'working person' and presumably quite 'ordinary' and utterly ashamed of it.. when I work i'm selling my life away to someone to pay for things that I should be taking back and making free (by squatting, shoplifting, community gardening etc)...

The mindset of the worker is that of the facist, unquestioning obedience and recognition of a higher authority, the rejection of the self.


working is in total opposition to a philosophy of anarchy.


Violence, perpetrated by individuals or state is abhorrent. My love goes to those grieved. Lets make a world where this isn't an inevitability.

Artaud, it might be an idea to read the anarchist FAQ (type it into google, or it's on wikipedia) if you're not sure what anarchists stand for. It's long, but when you get to the anarcho-syndicalist/libertaian communist bit, which is the background of most of the posting groups, it may explain the difference between the statement above and the actions of the black bloc if they put a brick through your daughter's window (which afaic, as an anarchist, is completely out of order if it happened as you say. You don't give me the impression that you're lying).

All of the groups listed above are 'class conscious', so while being against the rich, they are also dedicated to fighting the corner of the working class, not bricking their windows. As has been amply demonstrated on the comments part of this report, some people who call themselves anarchists (wrongly, imo) have either decided the working class are also the enemy, or are out of touch enough with reality to think that condemning the murder of innocents is playing some sort of party political game. They don't speak for everyone.

Having said that, I think there is a major difference between the actions of some idiot kids who didn't know their way around Stirling, and bombing a tube train/bus full of innocent civillians, which I have no hesitation in saying would never be carried out by anyone I've ever heard of in the anarchist movement, idiot kid or not.

Could you tell me one media organ that accused anarchists of doing this?

If that really happened, then why wasn't it referred to in the anarchist declaration?

If the 'Daily Mail' accused me of involvement, I would publicly call them liars to a wide audience.

It seems to me that you just thought it could be a useful occasion on which to do some marketing.

I notice that you seem more at home answering ludicrous and idiotic criticisms from Artaud, who calls all working class people 'fascist', than criticisms from me.

My question is - what 'corporate media reports' said " 'anti globalisation protestors' 'anarchists' and 'anti globalisation anarchists' were responsible for the attacks".

Please could you answer this question. If you did not read these reports yourself but someone told you about them, I suggest you look at why they said it and why you believed them. You won't find the answer in any statement of ideology. I am saying I think it is untrue.

It appears the Stirling stuff is tabloid bullshit now being spun by BNPers claiming that it happened to them. This is from a report of someone at the camp

"In the evening others in the camp went to a meeting between the Eco-village and local activists. The people they met were community workers or activists who all lived locally and would have been broadly against g8 activity. We expected hostility and but didn't find it. It was decided that the residents of Stirling would be invited to dinner in the camp on Friday. Every Friday and Saturday they have a stall in the center of Stirling and it was agreed that some of us would join them on their stall this week.

Those present from the camp wanted to find out if we could donate money to anyone who had the windows of their homes broken. The residents said that besides newspaper reports, they hadn't met anyone who knew anyone to whom this had actually happened, but they would try to find out more. I have spoken to quite a few people on the black block action and haven't been able to find any who saw damage to domestic houses. One told me that he saw an unmarked police car being trashed (it was known to be a police car because their were hats inside) and it is possible that this car is being presented within the press as one owned by local inhabitants. "

From  http://www.anarkismo.net/newswire.php?story_id=894

A commentator had accused 'Anti-globalisation extremists' on BBC News 24 within about half an hour of the bombings as a possibility.

If you check though the Indymedia posts, this has been followed by a senior Australian figure making precisely the same accusation, which was widely repeated.

So yes, it has been mentioned in the press, and thus, should be refuted. That you don't like the way it was done is irrelevant at this point, and that you attatch imagined political motives to it is just a bit sad.

If the UK antiwar movement wants to achieve something similar to what we did here in Spain a year ago, you have to act quickly and not let Blair convince too many people that their only option is "closing ranks" - around him of all people.

Our slogans at the “spontaneous” demos were “The bombs of Baghdad have exploded in Madrid”, “Your lies – our blood” or “Your war – our dead”.

Good luck.

artaud do you think we're any different as 'workers'? we stand together with ''ordinary working people'' because we ourselves are ''ordinary working people''. I personally also ''sell my labour'' to survive. Because i need money to live. I dont like doing this, which is where my personal politics come from (anarchism). So i do things to try and reclaim my time and my community, as do many people, whether that be squatting, or partying, or gardening, or sweeping, or chilling out with my neighbours, or looking out for each other ect ect ect

It is possible to be ''an ordinary working person'' and NOT
'' have the mindset of a fascist, unquestioning obedience and recognition of a higher authority, the rejection of the self'' Infact that sentance, is actually quite offensive to many people. How many fascists, or people who go through life day to day just obeying without complaining about , do you have in your workplace if that sentance is true? i cant think of a single one in mine.

I want a world where i can be free to think, and choose, and love, and do what i want, to be me.
I want a world where no one tells us what to do, but instead ASKS us what we want. I want my community to stop being so scared of each other and actually sit down and talk. I dont want to live anywhere divided by the haves and the have nots, or by homophobia or sexism or racism or mistrust.

what kind of world do you want?

If you wanted to read more on it, the Anarchist FAQ can be easily found, and ive always found the teapot intro really good aswell  http://www.eco-action.org/teapot/intro_to_anarchy.htm

yaknow, if we all stopped fighting, we'd probably find we have a lot more in common than people think.

take it easy

Love and Rage

---------------------------------------

'b' before calling us dishonest, wouldnt it have been better to have a closer look at other articles on indymedia that might have given you the answers, a quick glance reveals this straight away

 http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2005/07/317260.html

a couple of hacks live on tele yesterday morning also tried to put their weight behind the above claims. Which again, we deny and are total bullshit.

Why didn't you say this in the response? Can you answer that question, please? Or did you expect all your readers to search at Indymedia? You don't sound serious. Being framed for mass murder means armed goons smashing down your doors with sledgehammers. It means all sorts of psy-ops campaigns against your scene. It means decades in the slammer. It very probably means one or more anarchists - e.g. those who suss the identity of one or more long-standing State agents - being killed. If you thought there were signs that that was going to happen, you should have taken care to describe exactly what had happened so far, rather than vomiting out politicians' platitudes about 'ordinary people'. Do you understand my point? If you are accused of such things, extreme care for the truth is your friend.

Of course, one minute's clear thought would have suggested that the Australian High Commissioner had just had a rush of blood to his doubtless drug-addled head, rather than this being the start of a move to stop targeting Muslims and start targeting middle-class youth who wear black clothes instead. If you cared to get the ideology out of your head, you might notice that underlying propaganda messages are very very simple. 'British people must pull together in the war against fanatical anti-western Muslims' is the message here. If you want to be 'against the State', reflect on how its propaganda works.

(Similarly, the crap by the tea plantation owner and Trotskyist playwright Tariq Ali, in which he mentions 'Islamo-anarchists', is unlikely to take off in a big way:

 http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1523681,00.html )

Not that I'm saying you shouldn't have been on your guard. Indeed you are quite right to be. But it sounds to me as if you wouldn't have the sense to withstand a real 'anarchist bomber scare' campaign against you even if one were launched. If you're in a position where you have to fight against something in a public arena (rather than strutting your stuff on stage by choice) it makes sense to say as clearly as you can exactly what it is.

Of course, the reality is that your scene is just as penetrated and controlled by State agents as any other part of the left or for that matter, anywhere else on the political spectrum. Mind befuddlement is the order of the day for the lower downs, secret hush-hush plans for the higher ups (oh how 'secure'!), and there is zero chance of the decent people among you organising themselves without the scumbags finding out, unless you leave the scene entirely and go through some serious 'attitude readjustment' where working class mental and physical struggle is concerned.

Your response mentioning my supposed 'attachment [to you] of imagined political motives' (I think you mean 'ascription') shows how weighed down you are by the 'concepts' (or non-concepts) spewed out in the media. What does this phrase mean? Practically nothing. My criticisms were much more precise than this piece of almost meaningless pillocky verbiage that you appear to think summarises where I'm coming from. I did say you were coming across like politicians, but rather than just saying that as a slogan (which would really just 'echo' what I was opposing, rather like you do!) I tried to communicate what I meant by it.

OK so we've got...

a commentator on BBC News 24... apparently followed by...

a senior Australian figure...widely repeated (WHERE was it widely repeated? could you answer this too, please - if you search at Google news for 'anarchists' and 'bombs', hardly anything relevant comes up), followed by...

a couple of hacks live on tele yesterday

"Which again, we deny and are total bullshit"

What do you mean, "again"? You didn't even mention these claims in your 'response' that various anarchist groups have pretentiously signed! Wake up!

I doubt that you will answer my other points, e.g. about 'ordinary people', 'loved ones', and what these bombings are actually about. Try please to reflect on your use of bourgeois platitudinous phraseology and 'concepts' if you do.

My political viewpoint is broadly anarchist, but I still have to criticise "Class War", if this is their site:  http://www.londonclasswar.org/intro_english.htm . How can you 'condemn the use of violence against ordinary people' when your logo is a skull and cross bones?!?! I really hate to say this, but *grow up*!! If that's not your site I recommend you always sign off with your real web address, because that was what I found first when searching google.

Facts...

1. no stirling hospital knows of admission of 11 year old girl need 18 stiches on wednesday morning

2. no media coverage of what would have been a major slur campaign against g8 protesters.

3. no police report of broken windows in houses in stirling on wednesday.

Indymedia should remove any further posts making these bullshit claims as they are clearly untrue and aimed at creating an environment of distrust and hate against those protesting in scotland.

Get some perspective!

This was a quick, timely comment in response to a bombing that has had a few people blaming anarchists, not a bloody platform for the various groups' (differing) views, a strong campaign against a police clampdown, a lengthy political analysis of the situation, or anything else. That sort of thing can wait until the situation has become clearer and people don't have to sound like they're just mouthing off for the sake of it so they can sound important, (unlike certain individuals appear to be doing on this comment thread).

Why would it need specific examples? For your sake? For the sake of the media? It's, a statement of refute and solidarity not a dissertation on the coverage of the event.

And speaking of pretentious, if I'd wanted to say ascribe, I would have said ascribe. Either word is acceptable in the context it was written.

The skull and crossbones was always just a silly logo. Class War are jokers nowadays. I mean, look at their stickers urging people to buy cigarettes and alcohol on the black market. Who are they trying to recruit - Millwall supporters?

>Get some perspective!

Our perspectives clearly differ a great deal.

>This was a quick, timely comment in response to a bombing that
>has had a few people blaming "anarchists,

Why not present it as that, then? That would be a bloody serious matter. Look up names such as 'Pietro Valpreda'. Like I said, it didn't sound as though it was written by serious people living in the real world at all.

>not a bloody platform
>for the various groups' (differing) views"

Of course it was a 'platform'.

>a strong campaign against a police clampdown, a lengthy
>political analysis of the situation, or anything else. That sort
>of thing can wait until the situation has become clearer

You don't understand how State propaganda works, do you?

Reichstag fires should be denounced AS SOON AS POSSIBLE AFTER THEY HAVE HAPPENED.

You implied that these bombs may have been laid by militant Muslims - you didn't even mention the possibility that they were done with western State involvement! You are A LONG WAY AWAY from a response to these murders that helps the working class side and harms the capitalist side.

>and people don't have to sound like they're just mouthing off
>for the sake of it so they can sound important, (unlike certain
>individuals appear to be doing on this comment thread).

No need to be elliptical - there is no danger in saying you mean both me and the person who said working class people are fascists - although of course pretentious twittery was one of the criticisms I made of the stupid 'declaration', signed by a number of ridiculously titled ORGANISATIONS, and opening with the idiotic words "As social anarchists and libertarian communists, we deplore [...]"

You didn't get the point about the difference between British volunteer soldiers dying and British volunteer soldiers killing either, by the sound of it.

My response was in fact full of content...that might be useful to one or two individuals in the anarchist scene who don't feel happy in it and are thinking of wising up.

>Why would it need specific examples? For your sake? For the sake of the media? It's, a >statement of refute and solidarity not a dissertation on the coverage of the event.

What a stupid thing to say. It's not a matter of 'examples'. The declaration doesn't even say that anarchists were being accused at all! IIt doesn't even say what it's supposed to be a response to. If you want to know 'why' I think a sensible response, if there had been a real anti-anarchist smear with regard to the bombs, would have taken another form, I refer you to what I've already written, because you obviously haven't reflected on it properly. I might ask you what the point of the declaration was at all.

I am going to stop shouting at the willing deaf now.

"Who are they trying to recruit - Millwall supporters?"

Apparently not, according to their links page:
 http://www.londonclasswar.org/links.htm
They link to "The site of Millwall fanzine, House of Fun." and then comment, "No one likes them, they don’t care!"

I hadn't bothered looking at the site before, because the front page put me off, but it is full of bollocks like this, e.g. a merchandise page (go anti-capitalists!) selling a sticker that says, 'Make Poverty History, kill the rich'. Anyway, that's enough free publicity for them. I dunno, maybe it's supposed to be subversive humour, but that would imply that it's funny, and it's not.

But I do have to ask, why are the anarchist federation, West Midlands Anarchists etc, who seem serious about what they're doing, issuing joint statements with such a stupid group? Or is this another case of somebody claiming to be speaking on behalf of a lot of groups without their consent?

I'm broadly anarchist in my outlook too, but in the interest of accuracy, I'd like to point out that anarchist terrorism did exist about a century ago. Please have a look at the two Wikipedia articles. I didn't read Tariq Ali's article, but I suspect that when he talks about "Islamo-anarchists" (apart from smearing anarchism) he wants to refer to a very strong similarity between Islamist terrorists and anarchist terrorists - both see/saw terrorism as a form of propaganda that would inspire people to rise up.

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchist_terrorism
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_by_the_deed

'' Why didn't you say this in the response? Can you answer that question, please?''

Because im human and I made a mistake, i obviously didnt put that part in as i first thought i had.

i apologise.

but ive explained now. To be honest a lot of us involved in that statement, spent most of yesterday getting over the shock of having to phone round checking that people we loved were still alive, after seeing what had happened.

If we'd have had a day or two of calm and lots of time, im sure we could have sat down and created a statement much better than the one we did, but understandably at the time all we wanted to do was get a statement out with our thoughts denying our involvement (as we have done elsewhere, just not on here at first, again my fault) as quickly as possible, so we could get back to checking that our loved ones hadnt been blown up.

"Did you know the term 'loved ones' was invented by the owners of the funeral industry, as exposed by Nancy Mitford? (No? So look it up?) What DO you know, other than how to pose in your own little corner of the bourgeois political spectrum?"

I thought this was bullshit at the time when I didn't find anything doing a quick google search. Since then, coincidentally, I found myself reading a compilation of investigative journalism by Jonathan Pilger, which features an extract from Mitford. She doesn't say the funeral industry invented the term 'loved ones', only that it became common practice to refer generically to people's dead relatives as such. To say that they could have invented such an obvious phrase is ridiculous. Anyway, that was obviously not the sense in which the phrase is used in the anarchist statement above, in fact it's quite the opposite.

Good statement. Great idea from Tom in Spain, really: the bombs of Baghdad exploded in London.
But, I really have more and more problems seing this kind of terrorist attacks as a political statement - in contrast to many fellow leftists. The (prodominantly left wing) groups which used terror attacks in the past - like the Brigate Rosse in Italy, the Red Army Fraction in Germany and many others - attacked POLITICAL targets, leaders of capitalist enterprises like Deutsche Bank, in the short: the Mighty, the ones who are running and controlling the system. The London bombers didn´t bomb Downing street No. 10 - that would have been a political act. The attacked, to copy Ken Livingston`s very correct statement: black and white, Hindus and Muslims, Cristians and Jews, men and women, ordinary working people.
The left should not make the terrible mistake to confuse this so-called "Islamist fundamentalist" movement (sorry, I`m not really sure about which term I could use that would express it better)with the national liberation movements of third world countries we saw in the seventies. Compagneros, the al-Quaida is not the left wing PLO of the 70ties! They are what the late Edward Said called a "postcolonial right", deeply reactionary, fundamentally anti-emancipatory and only COPY, I very much stress COPY the anti-imperialist slogans of the powerful and progressive anti-colonial and anti-imperilialist movements we saw several decades ago!

Down with the State.
Down with anarchism.
Down with politicians of all varieties.
Down with Marxism.