g8 Schnews 15th July 2005
schnews fwded | 18.07.2005 03:03 | G8 2005 | Globalisation | Social Struggles
SchneIssue 503/4 G8 [EXCERPT]
Date Sat, 16 Jul 2005 12:59:58 +0300
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WAKE UP!! WAKE UP!! IT'S YER SEEING THROUGH THE FOG... SchNEWSMEETINGS, SCHMEETINGS
On Sunday the chasms between the protestors opened even wider with
three separate conferences in the city happening at the same time.
In one hall: the liberal NGO's (where some excellent speakers
outlined their opposition to the G8 and the world order with one
telling us we had to put a stake through the heart of the World
Trade Organisation!) (Talk's cheap but it takes money to buy
whiskey). In another The George Galloway Personality Cult
(Respect, G8 Alternatives and the rest of the ragbag authoritarian
left) We saluted their indefatigability!! Meanwhile a broadly
anti-authoritarian gathering disagreed about what to call
themselves at Edinburgh University. Sadly there was little traffic
between camps. The bulk of those attending the G8 elected not to
participate in direct action against the summit. We have to ask
ourselves why.
FLOWER POWER
Next up was Monday's Carnival of Full Encirclement where the sheer
weight of cops stopped anything carnival-like dead in its tracks.
Hemmed into a park, clowns and black block rained flowers on the
police. Local youths showed us how it was done with flying kicks
at riot shields. The Metropolitan Police did their best to look
like an invading army, their screaming faces all over next
morning's front pages. But while shoppers looked on bemused a few
of us were there to hand SchNEWS to people eager to know what
these anarchists and anti-capitalists supposedly hell bent on
razing Edinburgh to the ground were on about.
------------------------------------------------------------------
CONVERGENCE - FINALLY FACING MY PORTALOO
The Anti-G8 protesters were based around three convergence
centres: Hori-Zone - a rural camp of 3000 near Stirling, plus
centres in Edinburgh and Glasgow.
Horizone
The Horizone in Stirling was, um, a sterling example (sorry) of
how people can organise and make the impossible happen. The police
leaned on a whole series of land-owners who offered us space and
they caved in one by one. The site we ended up with was just
outside of Stirling, miles from Edinburgh and the wrong side of
the Ochil Hills for Gleneagles. So some serious walking was on the
way for the happy campers.
Although the backdrop was beautiful there were a few drawbacks.
First it was surrounded on three sides by a notoriously
treacherous tidal river where many people had drowned, which later
helped the cops block us in. Second it was a landfill site with
potentially explosive methane seeping out, so no campfires or even
smoking allowed on the riverbank because of the fire danger!
Thinking about it it's a surprise the whole of Scotland wasn't
declared a fire risk with the amount of methane seeping out of
certain celebrity orifices!
The site only turned up only two weeks before the summit, leaving
a few people with the mammoth job of making it liveable. Despite
the obstacles people pulled together and did without sleep for
days to make the camp not only a harmonious living space for some
three thousand protesters from all over Europe but an effective
base for action. A staggering achievement. It was truly inspiring
to see people voluntarily tackling logistical nightmares. The crew
even dealt well with the emergency caused by the police stopping
the shit-pumping trucks from emptying the portaloos for days
during their siege of the camp.
There were fifteen kitchens, all working hard to keep everyone
fed. Brighton's Anarchist Teapot and Rampenplan, a Dutch kitchen,
joined forces to form an uber-kitchen feeding a thousand people a
day. Throughout the week there were medics and legal support
tents, the Indymedia tent with free internet access, and the
24-hour 'tranquility team' (who kept an eye on the cops and any
on-site conflicts).
It was also a place where we could organise under pressure and
meet like-minded people without having to split ideological hairs.
The focus on direct action caused a remarkable chaotic cohesion.
However in some ways the strengths of the ghetto worked against
us. There were 60,000 people at the G8 Alternatives rally being
'entertained' by tired old rockers and being hoodwinked into
thinking they were making a difference. Meanwhile a few thousand
of us almost stopped the summit and outran, outsmarted, and in
some cases outfought an enormous police presence. Horizone was too
far away for the curious to wander into, apart from some Stirling
locals, most of whom were pleasantly surprised. It would have been
nice if more people from outside the 'scene' had the chance to
participate in this mostly successful living experiment, but it
would also have made planning actions more complicated than it
already was.
Edinburgh
The Jack Kane centre in Edinburgh played host to several thousand
protesters throughout the week. It certainly wasn't pretty -
walled in, with a Stalag Luft holiday camp feel due to the
watchtowers and constant security patrols. But the security turned
out to be sound and apparently mostly Welsh for some reason.
Craigmillar is a poor outlying bit of Edinburgh. Some local kids
came and helped out in the kitchen and the community centre opened
up their doors and gave people free access to all their
facilities.
The Forrest Cafe was a major meeting point with the Indymedia
centre being run upstairs.
Glasgow
In Glasgow there was a self-organised crash space. It was smaller
than the others, holding less than two hundred at a time,
including affinity groups from all over who used it as a base.
------------------------------------------------------------------
PLANNING - WE ARE ALL OVER THE PLACE
Our disorganisation is our strength! Hori-zone the eco-village
convergence centre was a decentralised and effective entity for
planning actions. Co-ordinating protests in a consensus manner
with three thousand vocal activists seemed an impossible task.
Faff, paranoia and strange hand signals seemed to doom the project
from the start. But it worked!
"But there's all along been a chaotic, slippery quality to the
energy of this project, something that resists plans and
timetables and logical organization. By the end of the day, we
have plans, multiple plans, plans so complex and overlaid with
fallbacks that even if we're infiltrated, I doubt the cops can
understand them. We barely do. Suddenly all the plans seem
completely chaotic-but then, chaos is what we're trying to
create," said Starhawk, freelance facilitator and American
Eco-Witch. Because so much of the action was organised through
small and larger groups talking among themselves and all sorting
out their own little parts of the picture, nobody knew the whole
story least of all the cops.
Our correspondent in Glasgow had a tough time with meetings ending
up hamstrung by disagreements. In the end groups left and did
their own thing which might have been for the best.
Although we're all over the place, we can't be everywhere. SchNEWS
didn't have any info on how Edinburgh campers managed to organise
themselves, but evidently they did. ws 15th July 2005
Date Sat, 16 Jul 2005 12:59:58 +0300
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WAKE UP!! WAKE UP!! IT'S YER SEEING THROUGH THE FOG... SchNEWSMEETINGS, SCHMEETINGS
On Sunday the chasms between the protestors opened even wider with
three separate conferences in the city happening at the same time.
In one hall: the liberal NGO's (where some excellent speakers
outlined their opposition to the G8 and the world order with one
telling us we had to put a stake through the heart of the World
Trade Organisation!) (Talk's cheap but it takes money to buy
whiskey). In another The George Galloway Personality Cult
(Respect, G8 Alternatives and the rest of the ragbag authoritarian
left) We saluted their indefatigability!! Meanwhile a broadly
anti-authoritarian gathering disagreed about what to call
themselves at Edinburgh University. Sadly there was little traffic
between camps. The bulk of those attending the G8 elected not to
participate in direct action against the summit. We have to ask
ourselves why.
FLOWER POWER
Next up was Monday's Carnival of Full Encirclement where the sheer
weight of cops stopped anything carnival-like dead in its tracks.
Hemmed into a park, clowns and black block rained flowers on the
police. Local youths showed us how it was done with flying kicks
at riot shields. The Metropolitan Police did their best to look
like an invading army, their screaming faces all over next
morning's front pages. But while shoppers looked on bemused a few
of us were there to hand SchNEWS to people eager to know what
these anarchists and anti-capitalists supposedly hell bent on
razing Edinburgh to the ground were on about.
------------------------------------------------------------------
CONVERGENCE - FINALLY FACING MY PORTALOO
The Anti-G8 protesters were based around three convergence
centres: Hori-Zone - a rural camp of 3000 near Stirling, plus
centres in Edinburgh and Glasgow.
Horizone
The Horizone in Stirling was, um, a sterling example (sorry) of
how people can organise and make the impossible happen. The police
leaned on a whole series of land-owners who offered us space and
they caved in one by one. The site we ended up with was just
outside of Stirling, miles from Edinburgh and the wrong side of
the Ochil Hills for Gleneagles. So some serious walking was on the
way for the happy campers.
Although the backdrop was beautiful there were a few drawbacks.
First it was surrounded on three sides by a notoriously
treacherous tidal river where many people had drowned, which later
helped the cops block us in. Second it was a landfill site with
potentially explosive methane seeping out, so no campfires or even
smoking allowed on the riverbank because of the fire danger!
Thinking about it it's a surprise the whole of Scotland wasn't
declared a fire risk with the amount of methane seeping out of
certain celebrity orifices!
The site only turned up only two weeks before the summit, leaving
a few people with the mammoth job of making it liveable. Despite
the obstacles people pulled together and did without sleep for
days to make the camp not only a harmonious living space for some
three thousand protesters from all over Europe but an effective
base for action. A staggering achievement. It was truly inspiring
to see people voluntarily tackling logistical nightmares. The crew
even dealt well with the emergency caused by the police stopping
the shit-pumping trucks from emptying the portaloos for days
during their siege of the camp.
There were fifteen kitchens, all working hard to keep everyone
fed. Brighton's Anarchist Teapot and Rampenplan, a Dutch kitchen,
joined forces to form an uber-kitchen feeding a thousand people a
day. Throughout the week there were medics and legal support
tents, the Indymedia tent with free internet access, and the
24-hour 'tranquility team' (who kept an eye on the cops and any
on-site conflicts).
It was also a place where we could organise under pressure and
meet like-minded people without having to split ideological hairs.
The focus on direct action caused a remarkable chaotic cohesion.
However in some ways the strengths of the ghetto worked against
us. There were 60,000 people at the G8 Alternatives rally being
'entertained' by tired old rockers and being hoodwinked into
thinking they were making a difference. Meanwhile a few thousand
of us almost stopped the summit and outran, outsmarted, and in
some cases outfought an enormous police presence. Horizone was too
far away for the curious to wander into, apart from some Stirling
locals, most of whom were pleasantly surprised. It would have been
nice if more people from outside the 'scene' had the chance to
participate in this mostly successful living experiment, but it
would also have made planning actions more complicated than it
already was.
Edinburgh
The Jack Kane centre in Edinburgh played host to several thousand
protesters throughout the week. It certainly wasn't pretty -
walled in, with a Stalag Luft holiday camp feel due to the
watchtowers and constant security patrols. But the security turned
out to be sound and apparently mostly Welsh for some reason.
Craigmillar is a poor outlying bit of Edinburgh. Some local kids
came and helped out in the kitchen and the community centre opened
up their doors and gave people free access to all their
facilities.
The Forrest Cafe was a major meeting point with the Indymedia
centre being run upstairs.
Glasgow
In Glasgow there was a self-organised crash space. It was smaller
than the others, holding less than two hundred at a time,
including affinity groups from all over who used it as a base.
------------------------------------------------------------------
PLANNING - WE ARE ALL OVER THE PLACE
Our disorganisation is our strength! Hori-zone the eco-village
convergence centre was a decentralised and effective entity for
planning actions. Co-ordinating protests in a consensus manner
with three thousand vocal activists seemed an impossible task.
Faff, paranoia and strange hand signals seemed to doom the project
from the start. But it worked!
"But there's all along been a chaotic, slippery quality to the
energy of this project, something that resists plans and
timetables and logical organization. By the end of the day, we
have plans, multiple plans, plans so complex and overlaid with
fallbacks that even if we're infiltrated, I doubt the cops can
understand them. We barely do. Suddenly all the plans seem
completely chaotic-but then, chaos is what we're trying to
create," said Starhawk, freelance facilitator and American
Eco-Witch. Because so much of the action was organised through
small and larger groups talking among themselves and all sorting
out their own little parts of the picture, nobody knew the whole
story least of all the cops.
Our correspondent in Glasgow had a tough time with meetings ending
up hamstrung by disagreements. In the end groups left and did
their own thing which might have been for the best.
Although we're all over the place, we can't be everywhere. SchNEWS
didn't have any info on how Edinburgh campers managed to organise
themselves, but evidently they did. ws 15th July 2005
schnews fwded
Comments
Hide the following 10 comments
Schnews or Confused? Do you really have a clue?!!!
18.07.2005 04:54
They contrast "60,000 people at the G8 Alternatives rally being
'entertained' by tired old rockers and being hoodwinked into
thinking they were making a difference"
with "Meanwhile a few thousand
of us almost stopped the summit..."
Are Schnews confusing 'G8 Alternatives' protest with the 'live 8' concert?
The 'G8 Alternatives' demo was not 60,000 unfortunately. It was more like 5,000 - 10,000. And it was not a concert, but a demo.
BUT IT DID ACTUALLY MARCH ON THE GLENEAGLES SUMMIT! AND A SECTION OF THE CROWD ACTUALLY PULLLED DOWN AND BREACHED THE FENCE!
It was grand, and should not be written out of history!!!
And many of us from the eco-village also took part in this, alongside our friends who did the blockades.
So hey Schnews...how about a correction in the next issue?
barrykade - pedantry in the service of accurate reporting
Socialists and anarchists - time for some fresh thinking
18.07.2005 11:43
The direct action scene is in serious danger of isolating itself into a subculture where being in a group of like minded people is more important than working out how we make links with other people and groups on the basis of political agreement to actually change things. John Holloway's nonsense justifies this sort of approach. It is now pretty explicit that people don't want to build a movement at all, just have lots of small affinity groups (groups of mates).
The difference between climbing over a mountain at night with a small group of mates in secret to get to Auchterarder or organising buses open to all and challenging police attempts to ban the march is quite symbolic really. The DA scene has a lot to offer but I'm worried it will get more and more isolated and unpolitical.
In the 60s it meant going away to communes in the country. Today might not be any better.
Best of luck anyway.
diss(id)ent
G8 Alternatives demo
18.07.2005 11:57
lunch
Pedantry gone mad!
18.07.2005 12:01
For G8 read Live8 at Murrayfield.
Angus
Angus McTavish
G8 Alternatives
18.07.2005 12:06
However, the leader of the G8 alternatives march decided that the people that breached the fence had ruined the march and "made it all about their egos".
If he gets that pissed off about a tiny bit of direct action on one of "his" marches, do you think there's much chance of engaging such an organisation in real resistance?
I for one don't, at least not through it's leaders. Most Respect members however are generally more radical than the leadership.
Sim1
Exactly
18.07.2005 13:03
Exactly.
That's why people from a direct action tradition need to get involved in marches, demos, campaigns etc instead of staying in a separate world and justifying it with talk of the 'authoritarian left'. There are leaders in the anarchist movement too and they are just as keen at preventing joint working with socialists as SWP leaders are against direct action.
I think it comes down to the lack of political culture (I don't count unreadable Italian books that no one understands and are treated like holy texts - how non-heirachical is that) in the direct action scene where questions are answered with do more or be weirder. Some people go along with that, some people leave and thousands don't get involved. They get involved in SWP type stuff cause at least they're allowed to. They soon get pissed off becuase they want to do it different from the SWP, with more direct action and genuine democracy at meetings, etc, but they're isolated cause direct action types call them names for even getting involved. Sad.
just me
Lets get together and feel alright
18.07.2005 15:12
I went to Edinburgh and was looking forward in meeting people from other traditions other to my own but i found it very difficult to actually meet people in the dissent tradition. First of all there were 2 trains , dissent & GR, 2 campsites, Stirling and Craig miller and 2 different types of action- i.e direct action and demonstrationg with partial direct action.
Having said that i did meet a nice bloke from critical mass who got involved in direct action and have to say i learnt from his experiences.
The only place where people tended to mingele had been in the forest cafe. I had a good chat some people , played chess and enjoyed the dancing on the streets outside. They even tolerarted the fact that i belong to the SWP. In the past i would endure all kind of abuse for this. (There's alot of misinformation about the members of the SWP, most of them are alright and whom you can get on with, we are not all wierdos.)
we have to learn that we have more in common than seperates us. Both traditions need to get their act together and we need to stop behaving in such childish manner.
P.S. I was proud that we did manage to tear down one of the fences in Gleneagles dispite being a SWPer
red letter
Should I stay or should I go...
18.07.2005 15:25
revolutionary
Balancing act
18.07.2005 15:57
the way I see it is that protesting, in order to be effective, has to be a multi-faceted thing. There is no point people slagging off others over their methods. The more different ways that we can come up with to let the capitalists/leaders know how we feel the better.
G8Alternatives did a great job assembling many excellent speakers, and it is hard to ignore the fact that 10000 people were there. On the other hand, many people are happier being involved in more direct action, such as those seen in the fields and surrounding areas at Gleneagles.
The more diverse our approach the more chance we have at success
Reeltime
well worth it
19.07.2005 10:36
Went up from Wales as part of a group of 4 people and got involved in the actions and the demos and I've got some sympathy for the comments here. It was good to see that lessons have been learnt since Evian 2 yrs ago (when the cops just corralled everyone into the council-sponsored camp and took us to a detention centre!), but i agree theres not enough crossover between groups. In particular groups like the SSP are often up for direct action but i think they should tone down the paper selling a bit as i noticed it caused a bit of aggro on the eco camp in particular....
In my experience with the SWP and other grouplets the grassroots are always more symthathetic than the leadership and when you sit down and have a dialogue with them over a period of time it does actually work - after all, if you're not talking to the grassroots then it's all the more likely that they're going to buy into the bullshit produced by the leadership.
jim