You raise some good points, infact it is along the lines of an article I was thinking of publishing on indymedia.

Activism and protestors are often portrayed by the main line media as being a bad lot, I have heard many negative comments by Joe public whilst at actions. We do need to be more public friendly, this is after all our recruiting ground. Any action or protest we attend is not just about being against something, but is also for something that we feel strongly about that needs to change. Be it corporations or the far right, if we can use our protest to educate the masses then they will join us.

Mind it is hard enough getting involved even if you are an activist!!

I'm in my 40's, ex punk, old school labour family background, got involved with the unions etc. Over the years I have been involved with anti fascist action, done some time in the early nineties for hunt sabbing and am very politically and socially aware. My activist focus at the moment is climate change and peak oil. Recently I posted a comment on a article about smashing the BNP festival, I was making a point about freedom of speech being important in this country and that I worry when anyone is denied this right. After all we complain about our rights as protestors often enough. Result, I get accused of being a BNP troll!!! If only they knew me!!!

This is the same as most posts on indymedia regarding the BNP, if you dare to make any comment that aint totally anti BNP then some goon pops up and accuses you of being a undercover Troll! Someone dared to ask if the activists arrested at the BNP festival needed any help with the fines (this is something we have always done to help people out when arrested on actions), he was accused of being a BNP troll. I am beginning to wonder if the troll aint the person making the troll accusation just to start a row. If that puts me off making comments on here, then joe public aint got a chance.

Where I live we have a local social centre, great place, cheap beer, vegan food etc. Used by a lot of activists for organising etc. But if your face is not known they don't exactly make you feel welcome. I'm as paranoid as most about police and undercover people infiltrating groups, but this social centre is a good way of getting the public more involved, especially the local community.

I know that being an activist means that you are passionate about a cause, I just wish this didn't mean being so narrow minded. I am prepared to look at a situation from all points of view.

On the subject of not knowing what the protest is actually aimed at, I have found from past experience that the many different cause banners that turn up at demo's are usually to do with the SWP. They do seem to hijack every cause going, racism, the anti war movement, etc etc. I have seen it time and time again.

Excuse me for my ranting, just some thing that has been annoying me recently and your post sparked it off. I hope this raises some good debate..... but maybe I'll just be accused of being a troll!!

Is that the activist sees herself as a specialist, and therefore if everyone became activists, she would lose her speciality. maybe it's the idea of "the activist" that's the problem.

that is not my clever insight or philosophy btw, got it from here:


 http://www.eco-action.org/dod/no9/activism.htm

"The problem with activism/campaigning and getting the everyday person involved...! "

The problem with activism/campaining is very much that it's practicers should even view people not activists as everyday people. The starting point should be all people are sovereign , and have new and fresh ways of fighting back. If we are to believe that people are capable of being spontaneous and creative, then why do we refer to them as the general public, or everyday people?

The other problem as I see it is, in this country at least, is that very little happens around work the very unfair relation at the base of all things crappy. That is were most people face there daly struggle, I know I do. The cost of living has just risen, I have to work more, don't have much free time or money to play with, can't afford the time off to go to climate camp, and at the risk of sounding selfish or to feel the wrath of activists on here, I don't feel a kinship with the eco movement - it simply doesn't hold much with my current predicament. Now I here the sound of metaphorical guns being loaded, but before you aim to take fire with your keyboards, listen to this: It's the same for a large portion of other people too, and I don't think that us everyday people are being inspired to get on board by the "it's the future of our planet and our children" argument. although it is, and if even the modest predictions are right, we are going to have problems, but, it is not successfully turning into a mass campaign. People have a tendancy to fight back or put there energy into the point they are under attack. One of the most inspiring actions for me was the the support of the Liverpool Dockers by the "activist" community. Interestingly a lot was learn't by both parties. If we are to succsessfully mount a challange to enviromental devestation we need to see more of the same. moving away from heavily policed climate camps full of the converted, professional activist, into the realm of us everyday normal folk who are actually sovereign.

From  http://www.eco-action.org/dod/no9/activism_postscript.htm
"In conclusion, perhaps the best thing would be to try and adopt both of the above methods. We need to maintain our radicalism and commitment to direct action, not being afraid to take action as a minority. But equally, we can't just resign ourselves to remaining a small radical subculture and treading water while we wait for everyone else to make the revolutionary wave for us. We should also perhaps look at the potential for making our direct action complement whatever practical contribution to current workers' struggles we may feel able to make. In both the possible scenarios outlined above we continue to act more or less within the activist role. But hopefully in both of these different scenarios we would be able to reject the mental identification with the role of activism and actively try to go beyond our status as activists to whatever extent is possible.."

For me this means helping to radicalise struggles in our communities, like the direct action taken against BNP's Red White & Blue fest recently.

I gave up activists groups because they do not understand that every person needs an inner journey, they do not like the values of the corporations and governments. But neither do I like bullies, cliques and people who just want you to be like them and do not give you space to be you. Inner strength comes from being allowed to discover yourself, your ideas and values when you are young and then being allowed to interact and compromise with others.

I could not believe it when 2 million people marched against the war, I will never forget and I noted many activists did not want to engage with the masses and I thought that is sad and this is perhaps their experience with the masses mirrors my experience with them. I am no longer part of the activists network in the same way because of this inability to find a way forward but I am still an activist and I stick to my values.

That said, I think the activist world is a whole lot better than the sell out scum NGOs world of the likes of Oxfam, which support dialogue with corruption while simultaneously getting sweat shop workers to produce make poverty history sweatbands, the irony!

People have their ups and downs for sure. G8 Scotand and Stop the War took quite a few older campaigners and activists back to the streets, to existing protest sites like Faslane and new ones like Rossport. And the younger generation's eco-activism esp. around road building has certainly helped breathed some life into the anarchist movement recently. So it can go both ways, and at least some of the radical end of eco-activism is aware of the need for strong community linkages. The network of anarchist social centres is not perfect but some have created a real community base as well as a focal point for activity. Some anarchist organisations are growing. The warmongering and authoritarianism of the British state can easily grind you down. But let's not be pessimistic. Initiatives like climate camp and no borders are attracting good people as well as reformists and opportunistic political parties - main thing is to stop them taking over.

A big concern I have is that the far left seems to me to be as radical and extreme as the far right so I for obvious reasons see both as the enemy to true freedom and refuse to associate with either, To me the idea of a protest is to change things not to create more of the same, why replace our current fascist state with something that will go down the same route, better the devil you know. And I do believe this a concern to a lot of people out there, another problem is that most people know the govt have stopped listening and due to this they believe nothing will change. What the protesters need to realise is there main audience has change and with it so should there approach for instance most protesters speak in a language we don’t understand that is aimed at the Politian not the public when what they need to be doing is getting the public involved and making them realise that they own the govt and eventually the govt will listen but not untill they get involved.
Also I believe more respect ,communication and cooperation between protest/campaign groups would make a lot of difference if only they could work together and swallow there pride for a moment they would realise that there unified numbers alone would make a difference.
A few Comments on your comments.
I have read a lot about the SWP hi jacking methods and understand now what is happening but unfortunately most don’t and of course the reasons don’t change the effect, the effect being that no one has a clue what the protest is about.
In reply to harry Purvis who wrote “The freedom of speech is truly one of the great things that this country has, and is enshrined in law.”
We have not had true unrestricted freedom of speech since the days of the miners strikes and Thatcher if not longer, the current misuse of S.O.C.P.A, public order legislation, council bye-laws and anti terror legislation are clear indications that not only do we not have freedom of speech our government and police force is more than willing to publicly display this.