General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Anarchists? We don't have no steenking anarchists... [View all]tama
(9,137 posts)"Anarchism is a belief that society should have no government, laws, police, or any other authority. Having that belief is perfectly legal, and the majority of anarchists in the U.S. advocate change through non-violent, non-criminal means."
http://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2010/november/anarchist_111610
FBI article is, of course, about "anarchist extremism", one of the four main threats of "domestic terrorism", others being:
- Sovereign citizen extremist threat
- Lone offender threat
- Eco-terrorist and animal rights extremist threats
Article continues:
"For todays generation of American anarchist extremists, the rioting that disrupted the 1999 World Trade Organization meetings in Seattle is the standard by which they measure successit resulted in millions of dollars in property damage and economic loss and injuries to hundreds of law enforcement officers and bystanders. But fortunately, they havent been able to duplicate what happened in Seattle
which may be a combination of the improved preparations of law enforcement as well as the disorganization of the movement."
The success of "anarchist extremism" (and of course representatives of many other political philosophies were also present) of Seattle was not "millions of dollars in property damage" etc., but that WTO process was interrupted and has been stagnated ever since, which was the purpose of the action.
OK, good enough, in that comparison the "standard of success" was not repeated by OWS, Wall Street is still corrupting politics and destroying our lives as before. That would have been indeed BIG, given that those who made the initiative were totally amazed by what it turned into, changing the national discourse and revealing how fed up so many people were with the system and how ready for radical changes. If anyone wonders why national security machines are targeting anarchists and naming them public enemy number one, that's why.