right, if everyone just dressed like the people in this picture, then it would have been "creative." Right.

The only people who wore a uniform are the same people saying the rest of us are "typical."

I appreciate the sentiment, I think.

See man the anarchists talk tough but then they just do the same stuff everyone else does.

What like no one else had a banner or chanted stuff? please.

What because you have piercings and all dress in a "unique" way that makes you special? Shea right.

Borang.

Not that WWP demos are really exciting and thrilling but...

Looks like a fairly tepid typical anarchist contingent.

you can see what people are wearing who are standing behind the banner? that's AMAZING!

I find the 'outfits' unnecessary and elitist. as an anarchist that does not fit the visual stereotypes, I often find it hard to naturally assimilate and feel accepted by the larger (and young) community.

clash & scuffle brigade is the silliest name i have seen in a LONG time.
this reportback is pompous and doesnt offer anything. in fact, it shows the clash and scuffle brigade is all about looking cool with really nice banners. 75 punx? thats sad.

'75 punx'
'hot for mayhem'

umm. there was no 11th hour enthusiastic response to this call. many local anarchists found it silly and questioned the intent and intelligence of the call.

This was the most fun protest i ever went to, i was there for all of this, it was fucking awesome and really captured the spirit of youth. It was great, numbers don't matter, happiness matters. Great job everybody.

Fuck this shittalk, this was fun as hell and we're not going to change the way we dress just to please a few people. I was there for all of this, it was the most fun protest i've ever been to and i met a lot of awesome people. Happiness is what matters, not "mass" or crap. Everyone I know had a great day and really enjoyed it, what's more important to an anarchist than enjoying herself?

"This was the most fun protest i ever went to, i was there for all of this, it was fucking awesome and really captured the spirit of youth. It was great, numbers don't matter, happiness matters. Great job everybody."

At least somebody had fun...this wasn't the least fun protest I went to ( The "Million Worker March" has got to take the cake for that) but it wasn't too exciting. I mean it's just your standard protest. Nothing out of the ordinary. The usual pachulli stenched tables selling photocopies of antique marxist pamphlets and musty copies of some trotsky book or another, maybe some small herds of anarchist wanders about the field, various hippies sit around looking stoned, the same old slogans make an appearance ("somewhere a village is missing an idiot", gee i never heard that one before...) same speakers say the same stuff. You know what you're getting when you go to one of these things. It's not _bad_ per se but it's hardly exciting. Just the standard stuff.

it's not 'shit-talk'. your action was tiny and ineffectual. yes, there are more important things than *just* having fun. how about having an impact on the events in the world around you?

there is nothing particularly interesting or excting about young people in black clothes marching. sorry.

by 'bring the war home' do you mean make cool banners, dress in all black and write 'hot' calls?

Mega props out to the anarchists who put together this sexy little parade. Your protest was just one of many anarchist protests this weekend around the world. Keep up the good work NYC anarchists!

sexy? wait, what the hell do you mean by that?
cuz it looked cool? what about why we are actually out here?

To "Clash & Scuffle"- In reference to "we are anarchists involved in the nyc community," you must be speaking in the royal We, as it is clear that one individual put this call out. It's admirable that you pulled something off and didn't get arrested, but maybe something more could have come out if you'd sought to work with other people. After all, we all knew the anniversary was coming, and maybe in the future we could put effort into organizing for an anarchist action that is more than an add-on to some larger liberal or authoratarian socialist event.

'we' were not referring to the royal 'we', but to those of us who make up the clash and scuffle brigade!

as m19 approached it became apparent to us that 'other people' were not organizing around this event, and as anarchists it seemed more appropriate to take action to fill that void rather than allow ourselves to be incapacitated by others' inaction.

we realized that a last minute call would not be an effective organizing tool, but hoped that it would be an inspiration for others to join us in the streets in our best attempt to throw something together in less than a week.

all we can say is at least we were there, and it is hard to understand why people feel the need to sit back and criticize almost every single thing that fellow anarchists do, rather than support each other or create alternative projects that they feel more comfortable with.

the negative commentary on our original call, the whining about youth and black clothing, and the criticism that our brigade isn't large or wise enough to plan an effective action would all be justified if they had been used to develop something better than we offered, instead of merely contributing to more inane internet arguments meant to bring us all down.

(although the hypothetical ideal bloc that would apparently be made up of elderly, non-sexy, non-black wearing, non-cool looking people with ugly banners sounds a little depressing...)

The anarchist movement IS alive and well. This action that took place was further proof of this. For the rightwing trolls in here (probably being paid to be in here) who seek ONLY to perpetrate discord and malcontent (an old and tired tactic), they see that the radical wing of today's progressive movements are beginning to pick up steam again for the first time in post-911 America, which, for obvious reasons frightens them. So to those in the anarchist movement (btw, I believe the clothes ARE a tad elitist...at least the more extreme outfits, even though that's hardly the point) keep on truckin', you are beloved and appreciated, and keep on building this newfound re-kindled momentum.

We hope to see you in the streets of Washington D.C. next month to confront the next round of IMF/World Bank talks! The anti-corporate globalization movement LIVES...and lives, and lives.

 http://www.globalizethis.org
 http://www.a16dc.org

ha!
"it is hard to understand why people feel the need to sit back and criticize almost every single thing that fellow anarchists do"

wow! it's funny to read what you write this week considering your hyper-critical posts on imc about the parade earlier this month. ironic, isnt it?
damm, squeaky, you just don't get it.

what happened, 'clash and scuffle' aka one person aka _____. wasnt there an anti-war march in philly today...

"They see that the radical wing of today's progressive movements are beginning to pick up steam"

Why? Because a handful of kids in black clothes carried a banner at a WWP march? Wow, stop the presses! How radical!

"we' were not referring to the royal 'we', but to those of us who make up the clash and scuffle brigade!"

so, you're saying more than one person wrote it?
afraid not

it was more like 25-30 under 18 kids in black clothes.

when they burned the flag a cop took it away from the person who was holding it and they scattered like scared rats. there was no threat of arrest. yet they ran.

these "anarchists" did not seem serious about any sort of real action. it was a little silly....

better luck next time i suppose.........

oh yeah, and why not get educated about anarchy and what it means to be an anarchist. then maybe it could be something interesting. have NYC anarchists ever been anything worthwhile? because they certaintly weren't at M19

Oh, to be free of the life of a soldier, to use what I have learned. To counter the weak, cowardly, impotent and craven worthlessness of
liberal, pacifist, anarchist and progressive
politics of White America.
"To die, to sleep. To sleep, perchance to dream."
"Every meal is a banquet, every paycheck a fortune. I love the Marines."
For those of you that don't believe and the
thin skinned,knee jerk reactionaries.

Dwayne Chandler:  dwayne.chandler@us.army.mil

all this negativity is too thick. I'm not an anarchist and I think it's silly as a philosophy for reasons that most people see as self-evident. But I'm glad as hell a bunch of punk kids were out there in solidarity with the rest of the world and urging resistance here at home.

Part of the issue seems to be that anarchists spend so much time thinking about THEMSELVES and what they think everything means FOR THEM. For many years I've seen anarchists routinely call everybody else boring, authoritarian, blah, blah, blah. Because anarchism is so incoherent, it is a kind of catch-all for the dissastisfied. It's a scene more than a movement.

Other groups spend time figuring out how to bring people together, then anarchists show up to do something "creative." Okay, cool. Do that. But why they have to hate on the socialists and others who work hard to bring people outside of "activist communities" together is beyond me.

This negative mindset also means that anarchists are proprietary with each other. Everybody who wants an "Anarchist card" gets one by saying, "I'm an anarchist." So all kinds of silliness is inevitable. They then argue over who is doing it right, or why the others are wrong. This is REALLY boring.

So, thumbs up to the Clash and Shuffle Brigade for doing SOMETHING. I'd take one of these punk kids to any legion of jock losers anyday. I just think we have better choices than that and that we can agree to respect everyone making an effort to make this world a better place. Radicalism is the opposite of a zero-sum game.

"why they have to hate on the socialists and others who work hard to bring people outside of "activist communities" together is beyond me." -observer

I like most other anarchists have no problems with most libertarian socialists and others of the like, but authoritarians be they left (WWP) or right (The National Alliance) are not worth making alliances with. Such an alliance would be very short lived or one sided. We share some beliefs with both groups. They both claim to be against the war and in support of anti-imperialist struggle in Palestine, etc. Both groups in the end are opposed to what anarchists hold most dear: freedom from oppression for all. In the past when such alliances have been made consequences have been deadly for anarchists and more libertarian minded socialists, but that's history.

Your other comments were right on. while I have some issues with the way the contingent came about I support it and I am glad it happened.

The "anarchists" were there -- selling t-shirts. God bless Capitalism!!!!

Thadeus: you're comparing WWP to the NAZIS? That is just not alright inside a movement. You can have whatever disagreements with WWP you want - my own are quite serious - but your statement is the kind of thing that should be coming from the mouth of a cop, or the ADL, not someone on the left.

And the only reason the National Alliance or any Nazi party ever says anything critical of Israel is anti-Semitism, but they'd be the first to want to kill Arabs too. So it's also highly misleading to say they support struggle in Palestine. The only Palestine demo I've been on where skinheads dared to try to show, we pushed them out and I was proud to do it.

OK, I was not at this protest, I was busy here in Jersey doing what you all should have been doing. After seeing all the comments I think we can agree on one thing. DIRECT ACTION. Us anarchists are always talking about how ralls and marches don't acomplish much, though they do raise awareness and remind people of what's going on. But you guys just did the same thing except under the title of anarchists. If the 75 of you had planned an awesome direct action, I think we would have gotten a lot more respect than if we had complained about others "just marches" and then held one ourselves. April 16 World Bank/IMF meetings are coming up in DC and we can't all just go down there with black clothes and masks and banners excpecting something awesome to happen. PLAN FOR DIRECT ACTION

-Ryan

P.S. These anarchist rallys and marches are too confrontational. Unless you are doing a direct action, become less confrontational and use the march to educate passer-bys by speaking to them or handing out some flyers about what anarchism really is. Here's a fairly good one. Check it out -  http://anarchism.ws/pdf/leaflets/whatisanarchism.html

What the bloody hell is going on here?! You wankers spend so much time and effort on this site insulting one another, that you say little or nothing about the war, Bush and Co., their brown-shirt supporters, the fakes and cowards in the media or the corporate scum, who run this country, they are the enemy. Get over your petty sectarian squabbles, it's unproductive and ultimately counter-revolutionary.

Fight Bush, the fascists, struggle for peace and justice and stop squabbling against one another, this country is heading closer and closer towards fascism we need to fight those right-wing bastards, not each other.

Hey noa who apparently saw that action, 1. nobody took the flag away, we dropped it. 2. I'll admit that was the most adolescent thing I saw all day, resembling neighbors yelling at you to get off their lawn. There was like one cop, one person shouted "pig!" and everybody panicked without even looking behind them and ran, but it was fun as hell. And after that, the cops were EVERYWHERE. That one little thing caused one hell of a comotion. Cop cars started blocking off exits, cops on motorbikes started circling around the park, the helicopter in the sky was redirected to be directly over the park at a time when nothing was happening there, it was clearly for us. And we heard undercover cops talking into their shirts around us. I'm not bragging, just saying that yes, it was a bit childish to run away but this more had to do with one person, who gave off the idea that a ton of cops were coming, but you all seem to be making stupid assumptions. Firstly you claim that we know nothing about anarchism, that we've never read anything at all, how do you know? Every person that was there, myself included, have read extensively on anarchism, know a lot about it, and it is very non-anarchist of anyone to falsely assume something about a group just because they're dressed differently that the socialists. You criticize us as well for not fighting the power enough but despite the enormous amount of undercover cops around, there were hardly any cops there, anywhere in the city. It was a very laid back march in general, and actually funny when some were doing the "what does a police state look like?" chant since there were so few cops around yesterday. Also, again, this was not about having a cool banner, the majority of us acutally weren't around that banner for the majority of the time altough it was good to meet up with those people eventually, and how unbelievably discriminatory it is to say "you're just a bunch of punks with piercings and weird clothes with patches on them." Several people from Not In Our Name joined us early on and throughout the whole day, so we weren't all like that, and who cares even if we were? Again, would you like it if someone told you that to be an anarchist you have to not dress a certain way or more importantly that you can't be a certain age? Thanks for your discriminatory ageist "ass out of u and me" comments. I forgot that all you old people were never young ever.

The lack of big action was totally due to the lack of people there to begin with, because many anarchists didn't take the clash and scuffle call seriously and that's alright, we have massive numbers at other marches, most notably ones in DC.

while i will be the first to admit that this was, in a lot of ways, one bad protest among many, and therefore not particularly inclined to dispute all the above criticisms, some of them have a disturbing tendency to kind of imply that people who are young, who wear black, who listen to punk rock, who live in the suburbs, etc, don't have a right to come to protests?

let's face it - i was once one of those kids, so were a LOT of anarchists i know in nyc including some who have been making ugly noises about this. and we eventually became more effective and more informed activists/actionists by going to events, learning things, meeting people. as here, a lot of older activists were nasty to us because we weren't from their circles.

yes, a lot of young kids from out of town who didn't know a ton about anarchism, protests, (or music, or fashion) or whatever else you want to castigate them for being ignorant of, came to this, got angry, marched around, burned a flag, had some fun, met other anarchists, networked and found out about upcoming events like the mayday festival, jersey anticapitalist gathering and the philly biotech protests. it seemed that a lot of them were specifically attracted by the c&sb call.

if we are all too jaded and arrogant to see anything positive in that... what kind of revolution are we making?

oops.

also while WWP does totally suck, i'd like to point out that not everyone at every WWP-front-organized event (in this, case, troops out now) is a stalinist, or even knows who actually organized the event and what it stands for. unfortunately, this is what was happening yesterday in nyc, and if not for our people joining in there might have been no black flags at all.

"not everyone at every WWP-front-organized event (in this, case, troops out now) is a stalinist, or even knows who actually organized the event and what it stands for"

whereas probably everyone within 20 miles of a national alliance rally would know what was up with that, which is where i think the comparison falls a bit flat.

"some of them have a disturbing tendency to kind of imply that people who are young, who wear black, who listen to punk rock, who live in the suburbs, etc, don't have a right to come to protests?"

No, actually we're just sick of people who wear black, listen to punk rock and live in the suburbs acting like they ARE the "movement" instead of a little tiny minority. There was what? 10,000 people at this rally and a very generous estimate of 75 anarchists (i saw them running away...not being chased by anyone i should add) and it looked more like 10-15 but hey whatever, either way they were a teeny tiny itsy bitsy part of the over all protest attendence so we are all just getting sick of these little minority sects inflating their own importance.

ageism form both part from both the 'fuck the anarcho-punx" and the 'an elderly non black warng black isnt atractive" parties.
i'm a young narchist and while i was not at the march to bloombergs house (lol i went to get someting to eat and y'all were gone) i was around for the arrests at the recruiters station. and i did feel intimidated by the other anarchists there, being that many looked me up and down and rolled their eyes (maybe i don't look hardcore enough?) and that was alienating.anarchy is not a fashion statement, and whil i sometimes punk out and do see myslef a sa memeber of the punk community i didn't feel like wearing a uniform that day. at them same time as a young activist it feels alienating to get the whole "you don't know what your talking about" or "yer nt taking this shit seriously" from activists who are just a bit older than me, like college students.i ALSO see that as elitest. esp because much older activists (such as in there 40s,50s and 60s) do not have that same condescending attitude.
like the clash and scuffle brigade said, the anarchist contingent was quickly planned, and this time we achieved visibility as anarchists in the rally,even if we did not plan any actions.
however, if one is to plan an anarchist contingent, try not to make it so punk-oriented as not all anarchists are punks.

To "no actually" and anyone else - first of all the reason we wear black and black masks is for direct action purposes - black bloc and others - this is so police can not determine who did what if we all look the same and so that our faces are unable to be seen on camera. A direct action could have come out of this march but it did not - so what. That's no reason to rag on us for wearing black. Secondly, maybe this was only 75 people but we had over 2000 in the anti-authoritarian/anarchist bloc at the inauguration in DC.

You know I often find the most radical people dress more conservatively. Sometimes you see someone totally decked out in "rad" gear, peircings, tatoos, more black punk stuff than 1980's london and all that but then they are like slightly left of democrat...but you talk to some dude in jeans and t-shirt and he's read all the classics, all the contemporary stuff and he's talking about violent overthrow of governments.

It's an old saying but "You can't judge a book by it's cover".

As for the D.C. anarchists maybe the reason they are more successful is because they do reach out to people even if they aren't dressed up in uniform.

I sort of get this vibe that Anarchists in NYC are punk first and anarchist second where as in DC anarchists are anarchists first and then may or may not be punks second. Know what I mean?

Clash & Scuffle doesn't exist and yeah a lot of Anarchist were annoyed at the call that was put out. This report back is equally silly.

There were Anarchists really planning actions. The War Resisters League planned actions targetting military recruitment centers. The NYC IWW endorsed this action as well.

I wish more of these people where in Times Square getting arrested with me and my fellow workers from the IWW.

"As for the D.C. anarchists maybe the reason they are more successful is because they do reach out to people even if they aren't dressed up in uniform.

I sort of get this vibe that Anarchists in NYC are punk first and anarchist second where as in DC anarchists are anarchists first and then may or may not be punks second. Know what I mean?" -Yeah

The D.C. march which you are referencing as being large and successful was organized by anarchists from New York City who are anarchists first and maybe punk as well but maybe not.

Your experience with whoever can't be applied to everybody. We didn't care if people were punk or not, there were several "adults" and young people that didn't look like us and we hearily welcomed them, if you welcomed more people into your group that don't look like they're like you, you find out how many are just like you. Anarchists are of all subcultures, races, ages, and all, it just happened to be that the majority of people in this group wore black, oh god forbid, it's the DEVIL'S COLOR! Not that this has anything to do with it, but since all of you have a problem with the color black, shouldn't it be noted that black is an anarchist color and the black flag has long represented that? That had little to do with how people dressed, but this is such a stupid conversation it shouldn't even be taking place. Practice what you preach, don't go around denouncing discrimination when you can't get over your own.

you know what's effective?

the march through adams morgan in dc the night after the inauguration was effective direct action. gluing up locks on recruitment centers is effective direct action. students chasing military recruiters out of schools is effective direct action. organizing your workplace is effective direct action. kicking fascists out is effective direct action.

also, so starting a community center, day-care center, community garden, infoshop..that's all effective direct action.

marching around in circles is not effective.
listening to boring, amplified speeches in the park is not effective. it's not revolutionary.

on the same note, anarchists of the clash and scuffle variety: if you don't have the numbers in the streets (in dc there were 1000+, but even a few hundred can fuck shit up) then you have to act smart.

i was at dc, it was amazing. very uplifting event. the gates fell and bushs car stopped.

the anarchist presence in NYC seemed very young. age doesnt matter, it is life experience that does. but the two are often correlated. im sure you have all read and blah blah blah (im not trying to be patronizing, i was before though). i suppose all in all i was disappointed with the fact that my hometown anarchists didnt do anything more, and when they did it came off as childish.

when you refer to the exits being blocked off, you are refering to the one cop car and the 3 cops video taping. i was there, i saw, it wasnt intimidating. there was no trapping. i am sorry i got the fact about the cop taking the flag part wrong, when i looked over it was in his hands.

its always great to see solidarity. but there was still something lacking. anyone going to A16 in dc?

Noone is particularly better than anyone else. Many of these comments are pretty thick with hypocracy. Lay off them. Nice picture.

what rally were you at? i saw maybe 400

Keep creating divisions, keep mocking of the younger generations; you’re changing a lot in the world. The black dress, and flags you may see as trendy and ridiculous, actually helped us identify one another. And what little of us got together stuck together the whole day. We went to the park, all chipped in what little money we had and all ate. We had a fun time. We marched, and yea the flag-burning thing was stupid, whatever. I think everyone that was at the park were among some of the most fun, kind hearted, and intelligent people I’ve ever been privileged to meet. If any of you guys see this email me if you want to keep in touch. As for the rest of you real hardcore anarchist maybe you'll realize that we're young and that we're still learning, but at least we are trying. If you know so much more than us, be the mature ones and organize events, teach the next generation, instead of discouraging us to give up. How can we hope to change anything if we can not get along amongst ourselves. We all want the same thing.

"what rally were you at? i saw maybe 400"

I guess you were at that little spectacle for tourists down at times square instead of the WWP rally. There was probably 3,000-4,000 at the WWP rally.

wtf with all the trash-talking? good for the clash & scuffle brigade for actually doing something. are people really so insecure that as soon as someone protests in a way they disagree with they feel the need to discredit that protest? if you don't want to march with the clash & scuffle brigade, don't. join another march / event / direct action or plan your own to suit your whims. but don't belittle people because they don't look / act / march like you. hey sigh, heh, bung, k., a serious anarchist, @, and everyone else, does everyone need to check with you before an action is planned? i mean, just to make sure they're doing it the right way, the effective way, the "intelligent" way, the fashionable way, whatever? because i noticed that most of you didn't leave real names or email addresses, so it might be hard for you to get involved in actual planning and organizing instead of just criticizing after the fact.

Despite the Pink Heart in the banner, "the war machine keeps turning death and hatred to mankind".
Marches are necessary but no sufficient.
Hot for mayhem or for Revolution?

It's effective but not so much.
It's eneffective but not su much.

the clash and scuffle brigade made it onto democracy now!s footage of saturdays antiwar "protest" you can see it here:
 http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/03/21/1455238

I feel a little hesitant about commenting to this thread but i guess there are a few things i want to bring up.
I can certainly understand the sentiment of people feeling alienated as I have felt the same way on multiple occassions while trying to plug into an anarchist community. Years later I am still not sure where it stems from although I have some suspicions that part of the reason could be the very obvious white alpha male majority that still overwhelmingly exists in the anarchist community. The comments made by Empty, @, j.and question(which I suspect were made by the same person) and several others, are great examples of the alpha male self importance that still exists today. Part of the attraction to the radical community for me was the fact that I thought as a female, who was kind of punk rock but not totally or obviously that I could comfortably "fit in" and feel welcomed and accepted. I have since learned that this was a huge misconception on my part.
Yes, the march itself was pretty boring, yes there were alot of younger kids there(however those of us who a) made the banner, b) wrote the callout, c) did'nt wear all black(as this seems to be an important topic strangely enough to some of you),d) had a good hearty chuckle over the flag burning, cop running debacle, were generally in the mid twenties and quite a bit over 16 or 18 or whatever.
I think people need to stop taking themselves quite so seriously (on all fronts) and realize it's OK to poke a little fun at ourselves(which is obviously what the original post was trying to do).
One silly little march does not determine how good or bad of an anarchist you are...in fact I'm pretty sure we all get that most marches are inneffectual(it WAS a permitted march after all). It's what you do after you leave the march and how you apply it to everday life that is going to permeate change. Everything from outreach and networking to riding a bike or squatting a building to building a community garden and all the other hard work that these people are doing should not go unnoticed or unapprecitaed.
well there's my rant...feel free to follow this post with nasty remarks about how I should have been in philly instead of ny or complain that my brown hoodie wasnt black enough for you.
Oh and props to all the "old" people who sat down and got arrested...at least the cops gave you the courtesy of giving a dispersal order before hand!!

yeah, it was kinda fun. Good to see fellow anarchists in my first NYC protest. Since I'll be in NY more often, I better help organise these things so we can get a better turnout.

Protest and survive,
Davey Defiant

Oh and to comment on the quote:
"The D.C. march which you are referencing as being large and successful was organized by anarchists from New York City who are anarchists first and maybe punk as well but maybe not."

That march was organized by NYC anarchists, but being from Baltimore, I can proudly say that the B-more anarchists did much more organizing than either DC or NYC and really brought J20 to success. This isn't to be elitest, but rather to remind everyone that it takes anarchists from every city to collaborate, make the numbers, and make an impact. If B-more worked more with NY and DC, we could done something even bigger, but we must work together and plan these things thoroughly. Stop fighting each other over stupid drama and penis envy ego trips, and let's improve our world one direct action at a time. This march was a personal success for me because I got to meet some fellow activists (anarchist and not) and get some information about future actions.

Up the bloc!
Davey

Yeah I'm going to A16. For anyone who doesn't know, the World Bank and IMF are having there yearly meetings in Washington DC on April 16. The World Bank and IMF are disgusting institutions of capitalism which rape thrid worl countries and control world economics. Hope to see everyone in DC giving them all hell. Does anyone know esactly what is being planned?

it probably should stay off the net for now. i dont know though, im just saying. i too am curious. also i am looking to plug into the anarchist community in NYC, can someone help me out?

overall it was a fair event. i suppose i dont mean to come off as negatively as i did. it is just far too easy to be disappointed in the majorities actions (the entire group not just anarchists) because if we all acted together in an organised fashion the police would have a hard time arresting everyone. 10,000+ people calls for a lot of paddy wagons.

"but being from Baltimore, I can proudly say that the B-more anarchists did much more organizing than either DC or NYC and really brought J20 to success."

i'm sorry but you've got to be fucking kidding me.

I am glad to see that for the most part this little post argument has led to a better understanding of issues within the anarchist groups, I hope we can all begin to organize and act as one instead of competing like children, which to some extent we all have done at some point. I will be at A16 as well; I hope to see a fairly large turn out, and hopefully without the petty bullshit. We are much more affective collectively as one group as opposed to several groups bickering amongst ourselves about who does more. I hope to see you all at A16.

No joke man. NYC even accused b-more of hijacking their march. This is why we need to work together more. Organize more. Get some serious shit done.

Seriously,
Davey

i was at this march and ended up spending most of the time with the contingent in question. those who marched behind the banner were largely comprised of two groups: one group who had assembled at times square and walked up to central park, and a second (who had made the banner) who the first group encountered in the park.

i'm in no position to comment on the second group, as i spoke with very few of them, but i had a few hours before and after to converse with the first group to whom i'm referring. firstly, i'd like to make clear that the vast majority of this group were high school students. to anyone who is critical of them, consider where YOU were in high school - what YOU believed and how YOU dressed - that said, they had some very good notions for high school students and their hearts were very clearly in the right place, but they lacked the experience both in life and in activism to coordinate any large-scale direct action.

that said, the entire day was somewhat disappointing. many have said that the strength of the anti-inauguration actions were the planning and communication - both of these were entirely absent on m19 in nyc. there was no coordination among anarchists or anarchist groups - i certainly never heard of any planning meetings or anything of the sort.

if we are to build a vibrant community of resistance, we can't be sniping at each other about how we dress or what sort of music we listen to. we must respect the autonomy of individuals and work together for common goals. we must build alliances founded on greater principles rather than squabble over details. we must establish a network of communication, we must establish clear goals and aims, we must plan and organize, and perhaps most importantly, we must have more than 75 people involved.

to the person who commented last, a)people don't protest was cause its cool, they protest war because war is not cool. And as for getting laid, a)your on the internet making fun of people, maybe your the one who needs to get laid b) i had sex with my girlfriend who i've been with for almost 2 years later that evening, so I don't think I was at the protest to be cool and try to get laid. on a lighter note, the coolest sign i saw was "you can bomb the world into piece, but you can't bomb the world into peace".

anybody remember that guy standing in front of a small pothole and shouting to all the passing marchers "be carefull, watch the hole!!" that was freaking hysterical.

haha I remember guy. But on another note, seriously everyone who has gotten upset because of what other people were wearing, what they may or may not stand for, and their actions at the protest, what do you care. Everyone needs to drop the concerns of what other anarchists do and wear. is your goal to discourage others to the point where they give up. And if that is your goal, to accept only a select few of the most elite anarchists, then take your elite group and create change on your own. You'll find it very difficult to change anything on your own. You all have some serious superiority issues. to those of you who are trying to unite us all and are just trying to do you part, don’t stop and don’t allow what a few hypocrites say affect you.

remember what I wrote. "these were teenagers looking for a scene, they would be protesting for more war if it was "cool". Jeez, the guys especially would pretty much do anything to get laid. "

I'm not makingf fun of peopole, just pointing to truth

i am really not concerned about your sex life either, nor is anyone else for that matter i'm sure, so you do not have to validate your manhood with tales of sexual conquest. tall tales even maybe

You claim to be pointing to the "truth" about the teenagers at the protest. Do you know any of them on a personal basis? I highly doubt it. You claim that their only concern is looking cool and how they dress, but if that was that was the case they could have stayed at home and done that. They didn’t have to spend the night before sleeping in Penn station as some did, and spend money on bus or train fees. If their intent was just to be cool and to have pictures taken they could have stayed in time square where most of the media was all day, and they wouldn’t have walked around the city all day and completed the march from start to finish. And even if some were there to just look cool, what do you care? Is your life so empty that you have resorted to exposing teenagers at protests as frauds? Are they hindering change by dressing in black? Are they holding the anarchist movement back, I think if anything the more people who show up under the black flag the better, if you have a problem with them, don’t march under their banner or their flag, it's as simple as that.

"these were teenagers looking for a scene, they would be protesting for more war if it was "cool". Jeez, the guys especially would pretty much do anything to get laid."

I doubt it. If you're in high school and you want to get laid there are a lot easier ways than fighting imperialist war. All you have to do is play football and or basketball and you'll get more pussy than you can shake a stick at. Anarchism really isn't something people get involved in looking for sex.

that last comment was for the guy picking on draft beer not draft beer, sorry

this is getting pretty rediculous. we will get nowhere as a community picking fights. thats some cointelpro shit.