Why would protesters on the left wear masks?

[politicat]

76. I'm someone who did it. I can give you my reasons.

I was involved in direct actions from about 1992 to 2004, and protests (demonstrations) from about 1984 to present. (I don't count the ERA demonstrations that my grandmothers took me to as an infant and toddler, but we could call this lifetime demonstration at this point.) I stepped out of direct action as my joints got older and more fragile, and as the legislative and political solutions became more effective, and as my professional work ramped up. I can't leave a client hanging out in the midst of a bad PTSD break because I got myself put in lockup.

Just so we're clear: A direct action is hanging a sign, or keeping a clinic from being blockaded, or sitting in where we're told we're not wanted -- civil disobedience, and sometimes doing things that are technically illegal, like hanging a very large banner from the side of a tall building, or removing an illegal barricade (like barbed wire fences on federal land not installed by the Feds. SovCits pull this shit.). A demonstration is a march or a rally. They're different. There's a fine line between a demonstration and civil disobedience, and it's not at all bright, and Phoenix-metro cops have never had a consistent policy. (As we saw last week, when they shot gas cannisters without warning and without issuing a disperse order. There's video. Just because they've got a new sheriff doesn't mean the culture has changed in the PDs or on the force.) Direct action also means protecting fragile or frail bodies who are demonstrating -- as in, AIDS patients who are protesting for medical rights. We'd bloc to keep the cops from hurting them, because they could be hurt. My group did not use weapons; we did use shields, because when there's 25 of us, and 75 cops with batons who just want to kill them a _____, and 100 people in wheelchairs...

My primary focuses were HIV/AIDS/LGBTQ activism, reproductive rights, and justice issues. If my accomplices in environmental, immigration, or Econ justice needed bodies, I'd go to demonstrations, just as they'd come to ours, but when I went to theirs, I was there as part of the crowd (not usually masked, and not on front line) and when they came to ours, they were not on our front line. The reason for this is because specialists know their ground, and activists in a focus area know what's more likely to cause issues. We tried not to run amateur hour.

We tried not to be amateurs because 90% of my protest action from 1993 to 1997/8 was in Maricopa County, Arizona, and our primary adversaries were abusive cops, not Nazis. Now, even abusive cops are easier than Nazis, because even the most abusive, useless, nepotistic, Biff of a cop has a teeny bit of jobsworth in their shriveled souls, and would like to keep their pension, please. Nazis, not so much. Yes, the MCSO was profiling and keeping files on activists. It's one of their lesser crimes. They took pics and made very bullshit arrests that destroyed lives or at least took activists out of action for a while. I also did not yet have my professional license, and would not get one with any arrest record, and I had a scholarship that could be revoked for any political action, as defined by the extremely conservative, very religious, but publicly elected Board of Regents. (I had to sign a "Not a Communist" document every single semester. Doesn't matter that I've never considered myself a communist nor an anarchist; the BoR did not have an appeals process accessible to a student with no money for legal representation.) The cops -- not allies. Very dangerous, and I was a white chick with a 4.0 who could pass as straight, semi-conservative and middle class. Much worse for those who couldn't pass.

I also did Pink Bloc - defending the space around clinics so people could access them without being harassed. Some of the forced-birthers were stalking us. Literal stalking, as in sitting outside our houses, following us, brandishing weapons, and splashing red paint or beef blood on our doors. And the MCSO/city PDs were not doing anything about it, because stalking laws in the mid 90s did not have teeth, and the majority of the police and dominant culture would have been happy to see the clinics burnt and all of us tossed on the pyre. So, yeah, we used light-weight, wet cotton scarves like hijab, wore reflective sunglasses, hats and other facial obscurations. Sunglasses, scarves and hats were also for pure protection -- that sun is brutal.

Before pepper spray became common (so early to mid 90s), when the cops wanted to break a line, they'd pick a woman to target. If we were all masked and wearing similar, dark, baggy clothes, they had a tougher time picking their target. Masks helped *prevent* violence, because when the cops target a chick in the line, the guys tended to get protective and would turn from defensive line to offensive line (and start throwing punches back). Nobody ever said demonstrators are perfect at gender equality, and White Knighting hadn't really entered the vocabulary then.

I don't mask now. I'm less vulnerable. I have privilege. I can deal with an arrest, we have the money and connections for a decent lawyer. I no longer live in a place where being arrested has a double digit chance of ending my life and a high double digit chance of a sexual assault in custody. (More of the MCSO crimes.) If my photo makes it into a "horrible person" database, ok. It's already there, because of my professional work, my political work, and because I happen to share a first name and a birthday with an IRA problem child. (I get the SSSS tag on my boarding passes, were I so inclined to fly. I don't.) They can't take my degree, or my doctorate, and they can't take my academic work, and I don't strictly need my professional license to do my work, but I also cannot lose it for anything less than a specific set of felony convictions. But if I were a politically active student aiming at my same professional license? I'd tell her to mask, or at least wear a runner's buff. (They're also useful for holding back hair, and staying warm or not sunburnt.)

And it's a much nastier surveillance culture now. Back then, all the photos had to be developed, and they were on film, and the cameras had to have the film changed every 36 pictures, and good cameras were expensive, big, and bulky, so obvious, and photography required more skill. Facial recognition was very nearly science fiction, and not nearly as easy as it is now. Now? It's so much easier. And let's not even go into amateur surveillance, online stalking and harassment -- I can refer you to people who have been SWATted, and people who have had their financial and personal lives disrupted by malicious trolls. Read up on GmrG8. (The more I write about this, the more tempted I am to mask 24/7/365. Which I won't, but I can understand why someone would.)

If I may, can I suggest a piece of fiction that is fairly good at describing the reality of surveillance and protest now? Cory Doctorow's Little Brother and Homeland. Some of the tech doesn't exist (like his xbox-Linux and mesh networks are proving more difficult than expected) but the way dissent is crushed and young activists' lives can be ruined is accurate.