what the fuck do you expect? play acting anarchists, be prepared for fucks sake all your 'fluffy' self righteous passive aggressive bull shit will get you no where, wake up and learn to defend your self, I've never come across this tactic being used to evict a squat before, take some lessons from greece, squat attacked by nazi's with molotofs in presence of riot police, they fought them off, we need to be ready for all the pit bulls

the house is of course in brentford, not brentwood, sorry

mate you need to calm the fuck down. Do not take it for granted that everyone who squats or does this kind of publicity based action is an anarchist, and certainly do not take it as read that they are able and willing to use violence. I fully agree that people whould be ready to defend themselves against anti social scumbags, but for fucks sake how can you assume that they could have done that night if you weren't there? being attacked by scallies is fucking tricky - they don't ask you out for a fight, they fuck with peoples heads then attack one or two people. It is INCOMPARABLE to an organised fascist attack or an attck by the police.

Being violent does not come naturally to a lot of people, it certainly doesn't come naturally to me - and i've been considered quite an up for it activist in the UK scene. Passing judgement on people over their ability to use violence, assuming they are pacifist hippies just cos they got done over, is a cunt thing to do.

also, please tell us about the time you've successfully defended yourself against pitbulls....

You twat.

i had that coming to me. Unfortunately my own personal experience of squatting was that no one wanted to talk about security, it was a grand assumption for me to project this on to a squat i had nothing to do with, i apologise, i'm scared basically and i hope everyone was alright after this, personally I feel very ground down by the kind of thing you're talking about-bullying I guess, behaviour not quite full on attack but none the less very intimidating, I don't have any solution so it is stupid of me to criticise, believe it or not my intention is not to judge... it's one of the many ways in which outside of the public domain(or just plain ignored by the media) activists suffer brutality at the hands of hired thugs or vigilantees or whatever the people with bull terriers were, no again you're right I have no suggestion regards these dogs other than apparently the classic stick something up their arse, also on a more general level apparently dogs don't like having their legs pulled appart though this assumes it's possible, they tend to be pretty muscle bound. Lastly, although I recognise I may have lost my credibility in peoples eyes from the outset, I would say that I think the whole movement(and I do not want to advocated violence or anarchism, words words useless words) would benefit greatly from serious martial arts, muay thai kick boxing, wrestling that sort of thing, anything serious that will actually work in order to defend ones self. It's really not about advocating violence, and the benefits as many will know are much more than just physical but psychologically empowering. Well any way, we all have to do own thing, i hope that one balance the whole experience was productive/empowering

Securing a building means securing the doors and windows and welding equipment seems essential.

Judo and T'ai Chi are better options for self-defence against stronger people imo. Nobody can break out of a decent judo lock no matter and tai chi uses their strength against them.

You are right, a dog won't like it's legs being pulled apart, but it isn't going to kill it just annoy it and distract you - pulling a dogs legs apart to burst it's heart is a myth seemingly:
 http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20081003124210AA1itsr
If a pitbull has locked on to your arm then consider gouging it's eyes before it gets to your throat if you are unarmed. I'd recommend having some home made pepper spray as an alternative to a knife if you are anticipating canine or human assailants. I'm working on a souped up sonic dog alarm but it'll be a while coming if it works.

i've heard from one of the residents that no-one was hurt when the party was attacked by local youths - it is unclear whether the youths were targeting the squatters or the house itself. they caused quite a bit of damage to the building and behaved in a threatening manner, but no-one was directly injured.

the residents will apparently be issuing a press release shortly

dude, by the time all this happened there where like two of us left to fight off a group of about 60 of them (plus dogs) ready to kick the shit out of us, i am not playing anarchist thank ya but those odds where not in our favour - we got the hell outa there.It went wrong, we'll put our hands in the air and admit that, we made bad decisions and it kicked us in the ass - we wont make that mistake again, for this time though there was very little we could actually do

my comments were pretty pointless, sounds pretty terrifying, does seem like the hard thing cos it's hard to keep squats occupied all the time with more than a couple of people... at least no one hurt right?
In relation to talk about Judo/Tai Chi I agree to a large extent, I actually train in mixed martial arts-the basis is Wing Chun Kung Fu(a lot of similarities with Tai Chi I think) and have done some Brazilian Ju Jitsu so I'd agree strongly that technique is paramount and you don't just want to train brute force though I think there's some sort of balance...
It's inspiring that people took this upon themselves, it makes the ruling class seem less untouchable and that people can still legally enjoy themselves and not just live in fear... Psychological control is one of their most powerful tools and when you get a reaction you know you're having an effect, respect to all those who took risks to act freely, maybe one day we won't be a minority but till then all I want at the very least is us able to protect ourselves and guess regardless of this something on my mind a lot, it's really not about being violent or aggressive, it's amazing the way good training enables you to actually reduce the amount of violence, any way I'll get off my stupid internet soap box, chess boxing any one?...

i object to your original criticisms of the squatters that night, but you are totally right to be critical of peoples' dangerous naivete and pacifism in the wider radical scene. I fucking hate the way autonomous spaces are terrorised by enterprising scallies and the way left wingers these days are generally "nice people" who just want to avoid trouble. I think you are right to suggest people train in fight sports (full contact, genuine fighting only - fuck silly shit like kung fu mate, sorry but its a very pretty con job. BJJ and Muay Thai. Only. We need to be used to fighting, giving and taking blows n throws, not trained in some fancy moves).

BUT - its not about being able to fight so much as having people switched on enough to know not to let dodgy cunts in, and if they do get into our scene, that we get together and rain hell on them til they fuck off forever. Generally people who call out the the dodgy crews or individuals at squats or parties are left entirely on their own by people who "don't want any trouble". Great, until your friend is battered and mugged, they steal the lead off your roof (ramparts), or they rape someone.

"understand a little more, forgive a little less"

I can't fight for shit, but i'm happy to weigh in when people stand tofuckingether.

Most other North European anarchist scenes include regular 'Fight Clubs', simply an extension of the traditional self-defence courses that used to accompany every feminist group. One useful thing the feminist instructors taught is to train to react quickly, but it isn't just women who freeze. If someone attacks you out of the blue, there is a crucial period (in my experience of up to 30 seconds) where you are just too shocked and surprised to react, and a further period where your bodies flight-or-fight response kicks in enough hormones to match the already excited attacker. Every day we condition ourselves to react slowly, deliberately and peacefully but every martial art trains your body to react quicker than your mind can, through dance and practice, the same way your fingers remember your ATM pin code even when your mind has forgotten it.
Sometimes the choice isn't between violence or non-violence but between resistance or death, and recognising that is the most important skill.