From: phil osborn (philosborn@hotmail.com)
Date: Sat Dec 04 1999 - 23:13:53 MST
>From: Kathryn Aegis <k_aegis@mindspring.com>>Subject: Re: clarification on
>WTO protests
>Date: Wed, 01 Dec 1999 22:24:40
>
>From what I hear, no one has really identified the small cadre of persons
>dressed in black who began the looting and pillaging, although some reports
>say that they were 'anarchists'. If someone knows otherwise, please post
>the info.
>
>It is not unheard of for agitators to plant themselves into a protest for
>the purpose of agitating a nonviolent action into a violent one, and
>thereby destroying the credibility of the organizers. I hope that has not
>happened here, because the WTO leadership had actually invited some of the
>protesters to meetings during the sessions.
>
>Kathryn Aegis
>
See my previous posting - there is a rather disorganized and chaotic
"anarchist" movement in the U.S. that really hardly knows the meaning of the
term. These people include some of the radical animal rights crazies as
well as eco-terrorists and other assorted nut cases. There are also some
good, sincere proponents of the left/Europpean anarchist syndicalist
variants who are lumped into the same bag by association, both physical and
idealogical. I suspect the former group of causing the trouble.
At the same time, there is IWW, which was present at the WTO protest, but
reportedly did NOT participate in the violence. They are mostly old-line
Euro-anarchists by reputation (and almost became the American labor movement
until Gompers sold out to the industrialists). Then there are the modern
libertarian anarchists, often referring to themselves as
anarcho-capitalists, agorists, or free market anarchists who tend to think
of computers, AIs, and internet as vehicles of smashing/replacing the state.
About a decade ago, I accidentally ran into a bunch of the animal rights
crazies trying to infiltrate the libertarian movement in Orange County.
Some time after attending one meeting of the group I received an anonymous
mailing containing copies of documentation showing that the head of the
group - which was talking violence - was on the payroll of the sheriff's
office. So it's also plausible and likely that at least some of the
instigation or money and logistics to make it happen came from the sources
that benefit from violence - various state enforcement agencies.
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