US Politics, May 2024: They Shoot Puppies, Don't They?

I will gladly defer to people with more history in organizing, however, in my limited experience… it’s more like the sincere organizing attracts kooks and “extremists” who are drawn to the excitement and energy.

I have sat in too many meetings about organizing “a thing” where some rando shows up who says things that are kinda wtf but there is an impulse to inclusion and building momentum/people power so they stick around

Protests are for idiots and achieve nothing. Terrorism doesn't work as well as you'd hope, either, and outcomes are unpredictable at best. Political goals are most often achieved through bribery, extortion, and occasionally assassination.

Some of them develop a toxic dependency and end up being “helpful” and “valuable” so there is an aversion to kicking them out even when their behavior is alienating… sometimes there are cops/infiltrators, but I feel like it’s usually kooks

Protests are for idiots and achieve nothing. Terrorism doesn't work as well as you'd hope, either, and outcomes are unpredictable at best. Political goals are most often achieved through bribery, extortion, and occasionally assassination.

The reason people are still talking about the Civil Rights Movement 60 years later is that it was the one time that protest marches and sit-ins and whatnot actually fucking worked. It's been diminishing returns ever since.

And even then, everybody hated those people at the time. Martin Luther King had like a 25% approval rating in polls while he was alive.

They often are more effective at the local level, like recently people protested outside the place of business of a local “slumlord” and demanded he fix the building… and it worked

Everything works better locally. That's why people who are tempted to run stupid vanity campaigns for president, for example, should try running for city council instead. It's why people who think America should be a socialist country should try establishing socialism in their town, or even their neighborhood, and build outward from there. But that's too much like work.

The DSA is actually trying to do that work fwiw

I think organizing and protesting can make an impact and often do. There wouldn’t be so much backlash if they weren’t having any impact. Having really good protest leaders and organizers is especially good, tho kind of hard to come by. (Alinsky’s whole project, right?)

I have a good friend who's heavily involved in DSA work in Chicago. I have tremendous admiration for that, and tremendous irritation about how much time he wastes bitching about Biden online.

Trust me, we’re all tired of hearing people simp for Biden, too

Exactly how anyone evaluates Biden and his value depends entirely on the frame within which they view his policy goals and achievements. The more the frame is enlarged to encompass an ideal outcome, the smaller and more inadequate his actions appear.

Whenever there is a conversation about his administration, even when both participants share the same ideals (which I think describes almost everyone posting here), the disagreements always center on the size of the frame placed around him. To those whose frame is uncompromising and satisfied with nothing less than justice in all aspects of society, he is going to look wholly unsatisfactory, puttering around the edges of social justice and making slight tweaks.

To those whose frames are only the size of what they see as possible to achieve, Biden looks more than passable, he's above average. To which the idealist will retort that 'above average' is no different than 'dismally insufficient'. To which the (for want of a better term) pragmatist will retort that no matter how grand one's wishes, you can't fly to your desired ends on the power of wishes, without turning those wishes into a series of concrete intermediate steps. So, taking insufficient steps is always built in to the process.

The successful protests (i.e. Brown) have forced administration to at least consider divesting from funds to Israel. I can't believe we're having these chats here. I've been arguing this shit for 48 hours.

protests that involve obstruction, destruction, and/or violence are the only ones that work.

it's always this endless cycle of 'work within the system' shouted largely by large pockets of people who haven't experienced the bad side of said system.

not that I'm calling anybody out specifically here but....the general attitude towards protests.

Fwiw, I was impressed by the discipline and organization of the protests and I thought they were on the whole effective even if they may not achieve their stated divestment goal (in part because unless divestment is narrowly defined, markets are too complex today to completely disentangle Israel-tied investments)

The reason people are still talking about the Civil Rights Movement 60 years later is that it was the one time that protest marches and sit-ins and whatnot actually fucking worked. It's been diminishing returns ever since.

I don't think this is true at all. It may even be possible one is happening right now in Tbilisi! Otherwise we could look at EDSA, Maidan, Stonewall, Solidarinosc off top of head, arguably Vietnam, depending how you measure these things

protests that involve obstruction, destruction, and/or violence are the only ones that work.

i agree that obstruction, destruction, and/or violence are powerful influencers of society, but they are hard tools to use constructively and if used destructively they work best if concentrated on the specific salients are blocking progress and coupled with some kind of suggested direction toward a positive alternative.

this endless cycle of 'work within the system' shouted largely by large pockets of people who haven't experienced the bad side of said system.

the real system that matters is society and our common humanity, which are much bigger and more basic than laws and government. if you place yourself outside that system you will fail totally and abysmally. (I'll note here that, while both society and humanity are obviously not reliably sociable or humane, that if you seek a more humane society, then using inhumane means to reach your goal produces very bad effects.)

it’s more like the sincere organizing attracts kooks and “extremists” who are drawn to the excitement and energy.

I think this makes sense, but to me its a question of scale. Protests and movement are always going to attract a certain type of early adopter regardless of what the issue is, as they are opportunities for self-aggrandisement and influence the same as any other newly formed social structure. But beyond a certain scale they're diluted - and protests become more universal.

I think for protests to succeed (which they absolutely do!), they need two things, a) a clear goal, b) substantial numbers. Destruction/Violence aren't a necessary component, they can work depending on the context, but can also work without. Clear discrete goal and numbers are what matters

I guess maybe I don’t understand what an “outside agitator” is

aiui, the key phrase for defining an outside agitator is "stirring up trouble", but those who decry political agitators conveniently overlook that the necessary precondition for an agitator to stir up trouble is for there to be existing widespread unresolved grievances and dissatisfaction. instead, it is always claimed that the grievances and dissatisfaction were somehow magically produced in a calm, happy and peaceful population by the agitator, which is absurd, but is part of the mythology.

right, and in the case of college students who may have never participated in a protest other than a few hours marching, it's useful to get advice on tactics from someone with experience in these things. The Eric Adams version of this is that some mustache-twirling radical showed up to say, "hey kids, put down the Tiktok, I know of something even better!"

I don’t see how anyone says “outside agitators” with a straight face in 2024, but I guess we’re gonna play all the hits.

Its a clumsy phrase but any protest movement is susceptible to outside influence of agent provocateurs, in this case they would presumably come from Israel, but there could be others that either want to try present protests a particular way, or even just heighten division

I don't get the hand wringing over "outside agitators." Protests need older, more experienced hands too.

The successful protests (i.e. Brown) have forced administration to at least consider divesting from funds to Israel. I can't believe we're having these chats here. I've been arguing this shit for 48 hours.

I don't get the hand wringing over "outside agitators." Protests need older, more experienced hands too.

It's also paternalism: administrators like parents don't want to believe their kids would do this shit on their own.

i think colleges might be quick to blame outsiders just to avoid liability. i'm sure they have lots of lawyers telling them what to say. if some kid gets hurt at a protest and the parents sue the school the school can blame trespassers. maybe. i wouldn't put it past them.

the only way kids are getting hurt at these protests are when administrators collude with the police to crack some heads, scott. The violence is being directed by the university administrators and their collaborators in police departments, not by "outside agitators."

From a letter George Wallace wrote in 1964:

“White and colored have lived together in the South for generations in peace and equanimity. They each prefer their own pattern of society, their own churches and their own schools—which history and experience have proven are best for best for both races. (As stated before, outside agitators have created any major friction occurring between the races.)”

like i can't believe we're having this fucking discussion right now, it's patently ridiculous that people on this board are eating up ruling-class talking points so readily.

like i can't believe we're having this fucking discussion right now, it's patently ridiculous that people on this board are eating up ruling-class talking points so readily.

I don't think it's ridiculous to have this or any other discussion. People believe different things about all issues. Those beliefs aren't immutable, they can change, but the only way to do that is through engagement.

A few days late but good to see the times reporting this. IMO the only reason this didn’t happen at Columbia (and I’m not joking) is that there is no street parking for F150s in manhattan https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/05/03/us/ucla-protests-encampment-violence.html

“the only way to do that is through engagement “

okay: mainstream reporting about “outside agitators” is patently false and used to buoy up ruling class talking points meant to further divide coalitions on the left and distract from the utter moral and ethical failings of the Dem establishment, the police state, and the neoliberal university

When you've lost the NYT....

A New York Times review of police records and interviews with dozens of people involved in the protest at Columbia found that a small handful of the nearly three dozen arrestees who lacked ties to the university had also participated in other protests around the country. One man who was taken into custody inside Hamilton Hall, the occupied campus building, had been charged with rioting and wearing a disguise to evade the police during a demonstration in California nearly a decade earlier.

But the examination also revealed that far more of the unaffiliated protesters had no such histories. Rather, they said, they arrived at Columbia in response to word of mouth or social media posts to join the demonstration out of some combination of solidarity and curiosity.

There was little evidence to suggest they had helped organize or escalate the protests, and many were arrested without having ever set foot on campus. Typical among them was Matthew Cavalletto, a 52-year-old computer programmer who has lived within a half-mile of Columbia for most of his life. Mr. Cavalletto, the gardener with the dog bowl, was arrested on the street outside Columbia after he stood in the middle of the intersection and refused to budge. He dismissed the notion that any outsiders were pulling the strings.

“I sort of had to laugh because I guess you could think of me as an outside agitator,” Mr. Cavalletto said. “Not that far outside, like six blocks away, but, you know, almost outside.”

I think there's something deeper here, which is when we come across viewpoints we disagree with, we can think of them as permanently fixed, part of their identity. I don't think this is necessarily true, people change their minds and lots of things, they hold contradictory beliefs, some beliefs are low conviction

One of the things that has maybe got lost along the way somewhere is the idea of persuasion, why is engagement or persuasion on anything ever necessary when everything is self-evident and everything is a manifestation of the same thing. I think one of the goals of engagement is to try and shift people's perspective on things

I think something which I've started to notice more, is people criticising others for parroting talking points from the likes of Putin, Biden, Hamas, or Mourinho rather than engaging with the talking points directly.

today is the 54th anniversary of the Kent State massacre, just sayin

I always took "outside agitators" to mean "people who don't give a fuck and just want to cause trouble showing up under the guise of a cause", so that they can basically say "the people we arrested were all THOSE guys, the peaceful ones we didn't arrest", much like "the people we bombed in Gaza were all militants, they're the only ones who died" bullshit.

Much like the time the Maple Leafs lost a playoff game and their fans rioted and social media/the news initially reported it was actually anarchists who had pre-planned a riot and that it had nothing to do with hockey, which was proven to be false in later police statements (they were indeed just angry hockey fans)

It just lets officials have their cake and eat it too, "we support the protests, just not those guys who actually are just violent people here to cause trouble and take advantage of the kids, see we were actually looking out for the students"

I think there's something deeper here, which is when we come across viewpoints we disagree with, we can think of them as permanently fixed, part of their identity. I don't think this is necessarily true, people change their minds and lots of things, they hold contradictory beliefs, some beliefs are low conviction

One of the things that has maybe got lost along the way somewhere is the idea of persuasion, why is engagement or persuasion on anything ever necessary when everything is self-evident and everything is a manifestation of the same thing. I think one of the goals of engagement is to try and shift people's perspective on things

I think something which I've started to notice more, is people criticising others for parroting talking points from the likes of Putin, Biden, Hamas, or Mourinho rather than engaging with the talking points directly.

― anvil, Saturday, May 4, 2024 10:13 AM bookmarkflaglink

Yeah it's basically

Person: says thing
Other people: uh oh, saying that thing means you're a <convenient label>
Original person: oh I see, you're one of those <convenient labels>

And then they both ignore each other or tell each other to harm themselves and never actually discuss anything. It's basically Messi fanboys v Ronaldo fanboys for every topic.

Not that every bullshit statement is worthy of debate, but people seem less willing than ever to have any kind of discussion without this or accusing each other of "gaslighting" or "perpetuating harm" and the winner is who dispenses the most effective insults

This is pretty much the only place I'm willing to have any serious discussions any more

outside agitators is false flag bullshit

kent state never meant a thing to me. not when millions in south east asia go un-mourned in this country. no catchy songs for them. you can't even read books about them here. you can buy a million books about u.s. soldiers losing their innocence though. or about hippies finally stopping the vietnam war in 1975. actually i have no idea if that's a book. it sounds like a bestseller though.

Xpost Man you said it better in only six words.

Otm

scott that seems wildly ahistorical and disconnected from reality; at best myopic

"outside agitators is false flag bullshit"

i agree. i still think colleges would use them as an excuse though. its convenient to blame the outsiders.

those counterprotesters in california were scary though. they looked like skinheads. or cops. i am afraid more proud boy types will start showing up to these things. my kid is camping out up in montreal. which is fine as long as he doesn't get himself deported.

these guys wanted to hurt people:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/05/03/us/ucla-protests-encampment-violence.html

outside agitators is false flag bullshit

this can't be repeated enough

"scott that seems wildly ahistorical and disconnected from reality; at best myopic"

i'm wildly immature when it comes to politics. i stopped growing at 16. its a shame. i try to fight it. i have never in my life heard an american citizen in my presence express remorse or sadness for any of the murder inflicted upon the people of Vietnam or Iraq or Afghanistan. i don't think people here even think about it. which makes me want to say: fuck them. fuck this place. i would move if i had the money. but i don't. so here i am. it's mean. i know. i just never fucking need to hear about kent state ever again. great photo. we love the photo. it should be on the flag.

oh shit sorry i think i need more coffee! my bad. i didn't sleep well...

"outside agitators is false flag bullshit"

i agree. i still think colleges would use them as an excuse though. its convenient to blame the outsiders.

those counterprotesters in california were scary though. they looked like skinheads. or cops. i am afraid more proud boy types will start showing up to these things. my kid is camping out up in montreal. which is fine as long as he doesn't get himself deported.

these guys wanted to hurt people:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/05/03/us/ucla-protests-encampment-violence.html🕸