#and living in a state that isn’t doing trans genocide right now makes me almost feel guilty? like that’s stupid why do I feel that way

[fishing-lesbian-catgirl]

Its important to reblog news, even if it sucks as hard as this did, ive been reeling from it all day and I cant tell if I want to cry or start killing fascists, I live in Missouri and its all but illegal for me, a trans woman, to exist here now

The revolution for trans equality must escalate accordingly

Whenever I read news like this I feel so crushed and desperately wish there was something I personally could do to help. Like I can’t even donate money to help people or anything at the moment, I feel helpless and just have to exist knowing how bad it is for my trans siblings who are unfortunate enough to live in the states escalating trans genocide. God this country is so fucked.

[ms-demeanor]

Thanks for answering my ask, but I wasn’t really asking about the actions of the black bloc/violent protestors at a given protest. What I want to know is if this actually works in any larger sense - cause it seems mostly like it’s just a weird kind of performance, gesturing at full armed rebellion but never going there and never actually effecting change. And like, I accept that I’m a fool for wanting nonviolent change, but I’m not sure the presented alternative does much better?

Now, it’s not really discussed in that article (only vaguely touched on when they mention that the anarchists showed up early for the counterprotest) but based on the timing of certain tweets and calls to action it’s pretty clear that the march fizzled because Andrew Aglin couldn’t get people to show up when there was already a large group of counterprotesters who had made it clear they were not going to respond to violence with nonviolence.

Alt-right protests and marches before Charlottesville didn’t have such clear uniforms and tactics - the khakis-and-polos along with sticks and shields are a fairly clear (to me) indication that the white supremacist organizers saw black bloc as a tactic worth preparing against.

The KKK didn’t fear the hippies. They feared the Black Panthers.

In 2017 20 states saw bills to limit protesting put before their legislatures. Thankfully not many of them passed, but a few did.

These bills varied in their terms, a few naming masks and facial coverings as being a problem but most of them focused on something else: blocking roads.

THAT’S the tactic that these states think is too extreme - blocking the road.

You know, that thing those protestors in Hong Kong were doing. That thing that a bunch of folks online are praising for being “polite” and “classy” and that Hong Kong’s police commissioner is calling a riot.

Here’s the thing, if you’re asking “does black bloc” work you’ve kind of got to ask “does any protest work?”

What does protest accomplish?

About six million people marched at the Women’s Marches in January of 2017. Did they accomplish their goals?

I’m going to say, just from the rollbacks on trans protections and widespread bills that erode abortion protections, “no.”

Now, that doesn’t mean that their mission is complete and that they didn’t hit the mark and decided that “eh, one day of pussy hats was good enough.” They’re still working.

But is it doing anything?

That’s really hard to say.

Also, I’d like to point out that while the Women’s March was praised for its nonviolence commentators were quick to point out how rude and lewd their signs were and how much trash was left behind.

Which is why a lot of anarchists react to the question of “does black bloc accomplish anything” as a form of tone policing that’s almost meaningless.

Black bloc forms up and protects nonviolent protesters and carries injured people away from riot cops. Someone punches a white supremacist and it becomes a meme. All antifa are violent thugs, they’re the real fascists because they want to limit speech through violence.

Black Lives Matter and Occupy Wall Street and Labor Day marches block freeways to protest violence and inequality. They part for ambulances, someone breaks a window. These leftists don’t have any respect for people who are just trying to live their lives and get to work; they care more about burning trashcans and breaking windows than they do about the workers they claim to protect - what if it was a black woman who owned that starbucks that they damaged in their riot, did they ever think of that?

The women’s march is full of speakers telling deeply personal stories, individuals reaching out and offering care and comfort to one another, and even a few stories about how well these protestors can get along with the police; we’re not so different after all! But wow, a lot of their posters had genitals or sexual slogans on them, and they left behind a lot of trash. This isn’t appropriate for children, and if they care about the environment so much why are they littering? What a bunch of nasty, shrewish women. They’re just mad that Hillary lost.

You say:

it seems mostly like it’s just a weird kind of performance, gesturing at full armed rebellion but never going there and never actually effecting change

and I’m going to have to say that all protest is performance. Protests aren’t about *doing things* they’re about showing up and being seen in support of an idea. And I do think that protest accomplishes some things; it lets people know they aren’t alone, it raises awareness of issues. Those are fine things.

As to the armed insurrection bit - well, have a tremendously ironic image:

That sign, being held by a navy veteran, says “if you need violence to enforce your ideas then your ideas are worthless.”

I don’t think you could have a clearer image of the concept of “the state monopoly on violence” than a military veteran chiding protesters for throwing rocks at cops and breaking windows.

The article that featured that photo shows a fascinating tension. You’ve got people at a peaceful protest saying “we’ve got to make sure the nazis know they can’t just show up and spew their hate” who don’t seem to realize that the nazis showed up in spite of the peaceful protest and were chased away by a black bloc. You’ve got the alt-right protest organizer failing to do her paperwork (typical; if your protest fizzles you can always say “the city would’t give us a permit” or “there were logistical problems” instead of “I couldn’t get more than twenty guys to commit to showing up”). My favorite bit of the article is where they admit that police were overwhelmed by antifa and that thirteen arrests were made and there were 6 people injured, two of whom were taken to the hospital. Man, for an out-of control bunch of thugs hellbent on punching nazis that’s some admirable restraint.

So there’s this conflict I’ve got. On the one hand a pretty goddamned big part of me *wants* armed insurrection against, for instance, the police. The police kill people with impunity and I think it’s a gigantic problem, especially considering the issues that we have in the US with white supremacists “infiltrating” the police and military and such.

On the other hand if you’re driving your reinforced bulldozer into an old lady’s house because she used to be married to the mayor who wouldn’t grant you a permit for your muffler shop you’re not exactly part of the solution.

Getting back to insurrection:

One of the things that I DO think black blocs accomplish is to get people to question the legitimacy of the state’s monopoly on violence. The nonviolent clergy could have been badly beaten while the cops looked on impassively except that a bunch of ballsy motherfuckers decided not to let that happen. And some of them got arrested for it. People went to protest Donald Trump’s inauguration and a bunch of protesters got injured after there was some property damage - but there was also video of police targeting people who were helping street medics and of of people protecting injured people from the police. THAT I think is valuable, the illustration that you can do the right thing even if it is illegal. I think that’s effective and I think it’s heroic.

Anarchists have been debating the value of violence as a mover for social change for, like, a hundred years. You’ll note that we’re not dealing with assassinations or bombings in this discussion, but punching a few guys. Like, seriously, this is something that is very contested among anarchists and that individuals feel conflicted about even within themselves.

But, like, black bloc isn’t generally an “armed” insurrection unless you count baseball bats.

Here’s the deal: in my ideal world every time the alt right showed up with twenty dipshits talking about a white homeland there would be ten thousand peaceful protesters there with kazoos buzzing their nonsense away. (Credit where credit’s due; I think I saw this concept articulated this way by tumblr users argumate and pervocracy before I started using that phrasing myself) Actually one of my favorite kind of protests is simply drowning out the bullshit or making it appear ridiculous. Wanna see one of my heroes?

GOOD JOB. DIRECT ACTION. FUCK YEAH.

Making nazis look ridiculous is almost as memeworthy as punching them in the face and much more palatable to the wider public. Also the nazis FUCKING HATE IT. Hard to be taken seriously with your talk about white genocide when you’re backgrounded by the baby elephant walk.

(god, seriously, everyone go get electric kazoos and mini amps and practice bagpipes, you don’t have to be good at it you just have to be loud)

If you want nonviolent change over time I recommend looking into Food Not Bombs; they’re doing good, nonviolent work that they still get arrested for and that hasn’t really made a dent in policy since they were founded in 1980.

I don’t think you’re a fool for wanting nonviolent change. That’s what I want too. But honestly all of the alternatives look kind of shit right now. You’ll get just as arrested for throwing a milkshake at someone as you will for nonviolently blockading a courthouse. Six million people peacefully marched to support reproductive rights and we’re still looking at the possibility of seeing Roe V. Wade overturned. Journalists covering the J20 protests were charged with felonies (until charges were dropped), maybe a simple assault charge for decking some asshole isn’t that bad.

But until we do figure out something that works I’m not gonna shit too hard on the only tactic that has been proven to suck the fun out of being a nazi.

Because remember - it’s not really the government that black bloc is deployed against; it’s the fascists for whom that the government provides no impediment.

(oh also a general reminder that most direct action is criminalized: be a good anarchist and feed hungry people in your community today)

[themanyfacesofkat]

On The Whole Abortion Mess going on, just a vent

Gonna save you all the trouble of scrolling past and reading something you’ve probably heard enough of.

I have never had an abortion, I hopefully never will. I personally don’t like the idea of foreign objects in my hoohaa to remove something that could grow to be something more.

But I am Pro Choice.

Why? Because it’s not my fucking place to say what others can and cannot do with their damn body. People, not just women, but PEOPLE, Trans, nb, genderfluid, anyone with a working uterus should have the choice to decide.

My mother had an abortion, it was the first time she ever got pregnant, and it was going to be a baby boy. I would have had another older brother, but my mom found out that he was going to have a birth defect, one that could potentially cause him much difficulty in life, ranging anywhere from dying after birth, or living with a severe disablilty. She chose to get an abortion because she felt that it was the most ethical choice rather than let this kid suffer his whole life whether it be five minutes or several years.

I firmly believe that people who have working uterus’s should be the only ones who get to decide these things (that includes trans women who got the transplant, trans men who didn’t, nb people, etc.) The reason I specify WORKING is because those who’re infertile and want kids, or are infertile and don’t want kids, know that this won’t affect them, thus it’ll influence their choices. Before anyone says “but it will also influence ppl w/ working ones” I want to say, YES it WILL because THEY WILL BE THE ONES GOING THROUGH THIS. It’d be like people with disabilities that limit their mobility talking about how to make things more accessible to them, then someone with no disability that could hinder their movement saying “it doesn’t affect me so I’ll vote for the ppl who say less accessible things” Or maybe people who are in the army and intend to stay talking about how they could improve conditions for troops and someone who signed for the draft and will only stay the required amount of time saying “Lessen their rations and give them less ammo”

Both of these people may be in the target group, but they both have something that should disqualify them from these discussions

I have a Pro Life Conservative friend, I love her to death even though we don’t agree on most things political. One time, out of curiosity I asked why she didn’t like Medicare for all/universal Healthcare. Her reasoning was that she, and likely many other conservetives, don’t want the Government to have a say in their medical choices. I’m sorry friend if you’re reading this, you’re probably not, but this needs to be said.

I think that is VERY hyppocritical. They don’t want the Government to decide that whether they live or die, but they want a hand up every woman’s uterus.

Most of this entire thing is centered around religion too. It is generally a religious belief that life begins at conception. Science says that it’s when the fetus has a brain. In all technicalities, it’s not honoring freedom of religion. It’s not honoring seperation of church and state. Though there are some athiests who subscribe to this belief, and are pro life, and there are some theists who don’t and are pro choice, it is STILL a religious belief, just as much as Climate Change deniers and anti-vaxxers have their grounds in religion. If we let ‘life begins at conception’ be the main argument, then that’s not fair to people who don’t subscribe to that belief, thus not granting freedom of religion, forcing us to do this under god’s book, hell, the Alabama Govorner literally involked God’s name in banning almost all abortions

And what of the literal children being raped and forced to carry grown men’s babies? What of people being taken advantage of by their own family? What of the person who’s life is at risk if they carry to term? What of the person who wants the child, but the baby will not live through birth? What of the person who wants the baby but the baby will have some severe defect that will make it needlessly suffer?

And NO. Abortion is NOT baby genocide. You SHOULD NOT compare it to the holocaust because that is not what this is. It’s very insensitive to make the comparison.

Genocide is killing a specific group of people with the intent of wiping out their race/ethnicity, etc. Pro Choicers don’t want to kill all babies. What Pro Choicers want is to have their voice fucking heard and aknowledged. What they’re doing right now to the right to a safe abortion is telling people who actually matter in this debate that they DON’T matter.

The bill in Alabama was written by a woman, yes, but she doesn’t matter in this debate, why? Because it won’t affect her. I don’t mean to be rude, but she is old, so is the govorner that signed it in to law. And the ones who voted for it? All of them were white, cis men. Why does the white matter? Because marginalized groups will be targeted far more than white people (For ref: I am whiter than a new bed sheet, I look like I don’t know what the sun is.) This makes POC who have abortions or miscarry more at risk

And Miscarriage... You can get sent to jail if you miscarry. That is fucking evil, a woman who really wanted this child will have a miscarriage, and while she’s covered in it’s blood, she’ll be treated like a criminal, and then she may end up in prison if they somehow come to the conclusion that it was an abortion.

This isn’t a conversation piece, I just felt like I needed to vent about all of this, I don’t want to end up exploding on my friends and family, I just have a lot of thoughts on the matter. In a perfect world, abortion wouldn’t exsist. I don’t WANT abortion to exsist. But it does and for good reason.

If you want abortion to end, you need to make things safer for those who may need one. Give them healthcare, give them assistance, give them love and support. Banning abortions like this isn’t the way, you’re just endangering more lives than you can possibly imagine. Give rapists heavier sentences, give free and accessible birth control. We need to help them. Not just force them to carry an unwanted child to term then dump them in the gutter.

This is a post to all the people raped and ended up pregnant

This is a post to all the victims of incest and ended up pregnant

This is to all of the children who ended up pregnant

This is a post to all the people who wanted the kid but made the hardest choice of your life

This is the post to all the people who just couldn’t

And this is a post to all the people who died because of DIY abortions, pregnancy complications, and black market abortions.

I love you, stay strong, stay safe, and let’s keep fighting for the right to safe and legal abortion.