Outline of an Occupy-Acceptable Black Bloc

Taking "Zuccotti Park Is Everywhere" Literally

The Occupy encampments themselves were peaceful protests. They were necessarily non-violent, as any violence could be used as a pretext to end the protest. Not only were people encouraged to be non-violent, but also keep the places clean. This was a particularly heavy concern for the camps, especially NYC, where the evictions were carried out under pretenses of unsanitary conditions. Combined with free food, de-escalation teams, and safe spaces, these were places parents could bring their children. A march however, even one connected with an Occupation, has no underlying presumptions of non-violence. Just as Occupation is a form of protest with a set of practical concerns particular to it, marching is a different form of protest, and has its own set of underlying assumptions and practical concerns.

The language of "violence/non-violence" or being "peaceful" or "non-destructive" shouldn't apply to protest marches, as the oversimplification may prevent us from considering tactics that are beneficial to their success. There are certain actions that may be categorized as "non-violent" that interfere with the success of a march. These can include marching on the sidewalk as to not confront the police, or creating dangerous conditions when trying to film an arrest. There are also actions that might be categorized as "violent" that can make a march successful, such as kettle-breaking. Hurling projectiles at the police could fall into both categories. If an individual uses the cover of the march to throw a bottle at a cop, then he very well may endanger the safety of peaceful marchers or cause the police to move in and start making arrests (to say nothing of the reports of this in MSM). However, if there is a clearly established no-man's land between a march and a line of police, projectile throwing can keep police at bay while protesters escape from the rear, or a group of militants can mobilize behind a police line to throw projectiles in an attempt to break a kettle.

This is not to say that marches or large gatherings are inherently "violent." The October 5 Union March, the October 15 Convergence on Times Square, and the November 17 Convergence at Foley Square and subsequent March over the Brooklyn Bridge were by and large peaceful affairs. The march after the attempted October eviction of Zuccotti Park, The First and Second Oakland Solidarity Marches, and the March on the night of the actual Zuccotti eviction, all saw confrontations with the police and the application of certain Black Bloc tactics. Of these marches, all of them with the exception of the Second Oakland Solidarity March were more hampered by "peaceful marchers" than those using Black Bloc tactics.

In all of these instances there were people who generalize the assumptions that belie Occupy encampments to the realm of marches. They literally fear militant tactics of any kind, and see garbage bag roadblocks in the street as a Rolls Royce smashed to bits and set ablaze by black-clad anarchists to be hidden away from view before FOX News can capture an image and beam it into the heads of their viewers, forever and irrevocably destroying their precious liberal tea-party. For them a bottle or two thrown from a crowd is tantamount to someone shooting a police officer and scrawling #OWS on their forehead with a switchblade. A flaming trashcan may as well be a terrorist bomb. My point is that their concern with PR trumps the tactics that are widely seen as beneficial. This concern with how we appear to the public via the MSM makes events that are unfortunate but should be overlooked as anomalies (and not manifestations of the more controversial tactics employed by the Black Bloc) become the locus of the success or failure of the movement as a whole.

In light of this I will present a sketch of what may be an Occupy-acceptable Black Bloc. This is a compromise without a doubt, and doesn't even reflect my own views.



Why Occupy Needs a Black Bloc 

1. Black Bloc has the resolve to take and maintain the streets. Marching on the sidewalks is not only counter-revolutionary, but also dangerous. Sidewalks are tighter than roadways, making it easier for police to attack/arrest Marchers, and any attempt to do so puts a stop to the march as a result. The freedom of movement of the marchers and spontaneous application of tactics is all severely limited since the police are already dictating the terms on which the march can take place. Your more timid marcher may be reluctant to take the streets, but the Black Bloc is enthusiastic about it. 
2. Black Bloc protects peaceful marchers. Varieties of shields can be used to counter ranged attacks by police (tear-gas, less lethal rounds) as well as melee attacks by police (batons). Banner-holders at the front and sides of marches can prevent the police from entering the march and arbitrarily picking people off for arrest or brutality. Alternatively, Black Bloc could create a distraction for the police, allowing peaceful protesters to escape unharmed and not-arrested. 
3. Black Bloc breaks kettles. Kettling as a practice is supposed to suppress dissent in both the short term and the long term. Its short term effects are obvious, it puts an end to the march, but its long term effects are more insidious. Once hundreds of people are successfully kettled and placed under arrest they have to be processed and loaded into police vehicles, which can take hours. In this time one has no access to bathroom facilities and it could be in inclement weather (bitter cold, heavy rain/snow, extreme heat). Then there is the ordeal in jail where in the light of the mass arrest the time spent incarcerated before arraignment could be longer than usual (I personally spent over 44 hours awaiting arraignment after my arrest on Zuccotti Eviction Night). One may be charged with a violation or a misdemeanor for having been kettled. All of these factors combine to make people not want to go to protest marches, not only if this has happened to you, but also if you take these things into consideration as a possibility beforehand. This is why it is important for Black Bloc to do what they can in recognizing the formation of kettles and helping people get to safety before it can close around them, and in the event of its closure do what they can to physically break the kettle. 
4. Black Bloc Unarrests People. There can be few things as demoralizing on a March as watching people get arbitrarily plucked from the crowd and arrested. There can also be few things as infuriating as watching a cop knock someone over only to pick them up, put them in zip-tie handcuffs, and lead them away. The act of unarresting not only saves a comrade, but also invigorates everyone who sees it happen. 
5. Black Bloc Slows Down the Police: The best way to keep a March safe is to keep it away from the police. Being a block or two ahead of them means they cannot attack you, and cannot attempt to arrest you. This can be achieved by stopping traffic, and having the ability to accelerate and change directions quickly. These may indeed be recognized and catalyzed by Black Bloc members, but the more Black Bloc specific method of slowing down the police involves building barriers or placing obstacles in the path of the police. Anyone who doubts that placing bags of garbage in the middle of the street is effective in slowing down the police has never seen advance police officers come down a barricaded block and move everything to the sidewalk to make room for the motor vehicles coming up the rear. 

How Black Bloc Can Change to Co-Exist with Occupy

1. Drop the Black in Black Bloc. The point of this is obvious: if there are no black clad individuals getting together at a march to engage in militant activity then there is no Black Bloc. The reason for Black-Blocing in the first place is one of great tactical and practical concern, and by eliminating this aspect of it the tactic is less effective in many ways. This has to do with both maintaining anonymity and the psychological effects of this anonymity. On the positive side one is willing to take far more risks than one would be willing to take, but on the negative side one must fight engaging in reckless behavior brought on by this feeling of empowerment. After all, this is the psychology behind riot police. The psychological aspects apply not only to the people in the bloc, but those outside of it who perceive it as something frightening. Wearing all black at a protest march is in some ways asking to be arrested. Police know good and well what a Black Bloc is and what it does, and so black-clad militants might be singled out for arrest. This could be beneficial for "peaceful" marchers, as Black Bloc can be a distraction take the heat off them. But one credo for the Black Bloc is "do the right thing, just don't get caught doing it." Avoiding arrest is something that everyone should be concerned with, not only Black Bloc. This shows the strange nature of the all black: we wear it for privacy and anonymity, and yet it makes us even more of a target for arrest. We attempt to play this to our advantage by being a distraction, yet wish to hold on to our provisional freedom (time not spent in jail). To compound the problem the color black carries great symbolism in militant movements. It is the color traditionally associated with Anarchism, and is worn in solidarity with prisoners and other oppressed people. To give it up is not so easy for many reasons, but in doing so a great many tactics can be elevated to the level of acceptability and we can shed some of the connotation of the Black Bloc with property destruction and vandalism.
2. Refrain from Wanton Property Destruction and Vandalism If there's one thing Americans love more than violence it's property. Property destruction is seen as something that goes against the core values of the movement, and the worst kind of fodder to give the MSM. This is a pervasive view, especially among the moderates of the movement. Traditionalist Black Bloc defends property destruction as a latter day propaganda of the deed which seeks to smash the internalized capitalist psychology that property is more sacred than life in both fellow marchers and the outside world. However many modern militants, especially those associated with Occupy, would agree that these actions are alienating and divisive within the movement and most likely don't present a good image to the average American. Moderates will say that besides being terrible PR, actions such as smashing windows draw police attention and put "peaceful" marchers at risk. To anyone with experience in or of a Black Bloc this is patently ridiculous. Property destruction can be used as a tactic to divert the police from attacking peaceful marchers, and even if the goal of a particular Bloc is to be destructive (to make a point), they usually break off from a march to do it. Some acts which might qualify as vandalism or property destruction can be completely uncontroversial, an example of which would be when masked militants disabled NYPD vehicles by releasing air from their tires on Eviction Night in NYC. Having considered this we really have more of a reason to refrain from these tactics than to totally disavow them. 

Livestreaming and Occupy: Activism, Journalism, Propaganda and Truth

The moving image is powerful. In the context of social movements they can change popular perceptions, radicalize and inspire. Video of police violence against peaceful protesters on the Edmund Pettus Bridge changed the face of the Civil Rights Movement. Video of Anthony Bologna pepper-spraying young women behind a kettle-net helped bring Occupy into the public mind like nothing else up to that point. Beyond their immediate impact, moving images can become historical touchstones emblematic of an era. Videos of police dogs and fire-hoses being used on demonstrators in Birmingham, hundreds of people tearing down the Berlin Wall, or the lone man standing in front of a line of tanks in Tienanmen Square come to mind. The reasons for this are manifold, but it mainly has to do with the medium. Unedited video doesn't lie. It approximates how we actually see the world. Events happen in four dimensions and the still image can't capture that. A photograph can be deceptive insofar as it is but a slice of action. Once the propaganda value of American Marines raising of the American flag atop Mt. Suribachi on Iwo-Jima was recognized, the event was staged a second time with a larger flag and photographers present.  Still shots of "Tank Man" in Tienanmen Square are iconic indeed, but the video of him stepping in front of the tank each time it attempts to go around him show him to be even more courageous.

The Occupy movement has been shaped by something rather unprecedented in history: livstreaming. While the moving image may seem objective it is localized to both a particular vantage point and a definite span of time. What happens before the camera is rolling can cast doubt as to whether the video is really being 'truthful.' Unedited Livestream as raw visual data seems to be as objective as it can possibly get: it is only subjective insofar as a camera can only be pointed in one direction at any given time (barring any editorializing done by the livestreamer). The question of what the streamer isn't showing is both a good question and at the same time such a basic consequence of working with the medium that it is uninteresting. The more interesting question is exactly what are the livestreamers focusing on at any given time? Are they somehow manipulating the medium to the advantage of the movement? If they are should we see what they're doing as a form of activism? If they are not then should we view live-streaming as mere journalism, something that may or may not be beneficial for the movement?

'Truth at all costs' is the realm of journalists. The importance of journalism was recognized by the founders of the United States who saw it necessary to protect the profession in the Constitution. It is often pointed out that it appears first in the Bill of Rights, along with freedom of speech, assembly, and the non-establishment of religion. But when it comes to Occupy should we really value truth above all else? Journalists, even ones that are sympathetic to the the cause, have an obligation foremost to the truth. This can be illustrated by the spate of articles that came out in the weeks prior to the eviction of Zuccotti, when many journalist "sympathizers" wrote unflattering articles about the social problems of the park (drug use, class divisions, etc.) that I would describe as 'older brother journalism.' In this case, 'truth' put even these sympathetic journalists in league with the most virulent demonizing from the right-wing press. One has to wonder whether we really need truth-tellers or propagandists in our ranks. I imagine that the story of the Boston Massacre would not have had the effect that it had if the event wasn't immediately mythologized and turned into propaganda, and even less so if there existed incontrovertible video evidence from the scene (or even worse, an uninterrupted livestream).

When Occupy Oakland was raided, many people watched the livestream of Spencer Mills, aka @OakFoSho for a very good reason: it was no coincidence that both ABC and CBS's helicopter images went dark one moment and then the next every twitter feed across the Occupy-verse lit up with reports of tear gas and less-lethal rounds being fired by the OPD. It is obvious that the mainstream media had no intention of allowing images of police doing this to unarmed protesters to be broadcast to the entire internet. Coupled with the fact that Oakland Mayor Jean Quan had much interest in the planning and carrying out of the raid (as leaked e-mails have shown) it is very likely that these news organizations had advance warning that this type of repression was to take place and were told that they damn well shouldn't film it.  Myself and many others watched as Spencer ran to retrieve another battery for his Droid-X phone so that we could see those images, and many people were grateful to him for doing it.  He stood there at the police lines, literally shining a light on police officers who had concealed their badge numbers with black electrical tape, which led to a ruling by a district court against the officers.

The case of Spencer Mills shows us two things about livestreaming: it can do the job mainstream journalists cannot be relied upon to do (as in the case of the helicopter streams going down before a brutal police action, the act of merely showing what is going on), and it can hold the authorities accountable (as in the case of the police who covered their badges with tape). That being said, Spencer knows better than anybody else that he would not get the viewership or approbation he received unless he was (one of) the only one(s) filming those now-famous and all-too-familiar scenes. After all, you're not getting ten-thousand views showing some people standing around in a public space talking radical politics and smoking Roll-Your-Own cigarettes. Sex sells, and police-oppression porn not only gets big numbers, but helps the movement as well.

On the night of the Zuccotti Eviction, Tim Pool, aka @Timcast, chose to livestream masked protesters releasing air from the tires of NYPD vehicles, despite the pleas from the masked people engaging in the activity to do otherwise. One might say that this was one of the only interesting things happening on Broadway and Pine at that time, and so for the sake of those viewing, he had to film it. One might say that he had to do it in the interest of truth, or objectivity, and that to not do it would betray some journalistic oath or duty. One might take a more cynical stance and say that he is interested in neither truth nor propaganda, and purposefully straddles the line between observer and protester for the advancement of his own career.  

Something has to be said of the self-perception of the livestreamer as well as how they are perceived by those around them. The complex interplay between these two things can be seen in a number of examples. While many live-streamers do consider themselves activists, some may be regarded as outsiders by protesters even to the point of derision and scorn, like Tim Pool. This however does not preclude them from being (ostensibly in Tim's case) viewed by the police as a "protester." Reports of police confiscating devices and deleting the photographs on them have come in from Nashville to New York City, where there have been many examples of livestreamers being selectively targeted for arrest and harassment by the NYPD. It doesn't begin and end with 'citizen journalists,' however, as Police Departments show the same contempt for the mainstream media. The New York Times has written a second letter to the NYPD requesting that they stop harassing journalists. If this is the way they treat them what chance does a live-streamer have?

Live-streaming is propaganda and the cameraperson is an activist insofar as the camera is pointed primarily at the police. I say this because if acts of unjustified police violence are one of the strongest tools available to any movement then it should be the job of the livestreamer, if s/he is an activist, to make this their primary focus. Luke Rudkowski, whose edited videos (which are mostly compilations of the NYPD beating and arresting protesters) and livestreams primarily focus on instances of police brutality would qualify as a propaganda, as would the work of Spencer Mills, despite the fact that both of these men have professed that they are not "protesters," and Luke Rudkowski has referred to himself as a journalist on countless occasions. They are propagandists whether they like it or not. If you don't think so, just imagine how much different the NYPD TARU videos of marches look like compared to video from either Spencer or Luke. These videos might resemble the perspective of Tim Pool, who has consistently turned the lens on protesters, in the name of truth or what have you.  

On February 1, 2012 Susie Cagle tweeted this:  "If spending the time to get the #OO story makes everyone think I'm "a protester" too, so be it. #OO needs more than fly-in reporting." This seems very much like a justification or defense of purposefully distorting the line between observer and participant. One of my mentors in radical politics and activism was an English teacher at my High School. When I told him I was going to the Iraq War protests in NYC he gave me this advice: "Go there with a pen and pad in hand, put a little slip of paper in your hat that says 'Press' and if the police try to arrest you tell them you are not a protester, but simply covering the event for your school newspaper." When one sees a Ryan Devereaux or Gavin Aronsen on an Occupy march it isn't always clear just by looking at them that they are journalists, and when it really comes down to it, they are just another body in the crowd. That is not to say that simply because they don't outwardly appear as journalists and are indeed indistinguishable from the protesters they are covering that they cease to be journalists, but rather to point out that the lines in this case are blurry, even when both external and internal perceptions align. By this I mean that in these cases both of these men are credentialed journalists (from albeit progressive news sources), but not livestreamers, and certainly not activists at any rate.

While it is clear that live-streaming is a necessary journalistic service in many ways, the sad but true fact remains that the proliferation of the means of journalistic production has made quality sources hard to find. This is a problem inherent in the very idea of livestreams, since each one is potentially as important as any other because not all eyes can be everywhere at once. We obviously value a higher definition image when we watch, but also would like to see content that helps to advance our struggle in some way. I've said this before and I'll say it again here: journalists (in the strict sense, that is to say for the purpose of this point, not live-streamers) have an obligation to truth above all else. They might sympathize with our movement but as journalists whose job and duty it is to uncover and report the truth they will never be our propagandists, nor should we expect them to be. Knowing that many livestreamers consider themselves both journalists and activists (some only when it suits them) further confuses this. We should value livestreams for their obvious functions as doing the job that (mainstream) journalists won't do, keeping people all over the world abreast of events about which they might never hear any fair coverage, and helping to advance our cause. But when livestreamers straddle the line between protester and journalist, particularly in the case of generating donations and helping to advance their career at the expense of the movement, then we should realize that livestreaming is not an absolute good, and there is nothing sacrosanct about it.

Bloc the Livestream (or How Occupy Should Learn to Stop Worrying and Love the Bloc)

I haven't been totally at ease that the issues stemming from the assault on Tim Pool, aka @Timcast, at Sunday's (Second) Oakland Solidarity March in NYC have been totally put to rest. There has been much written in both the mainstream press and in the blogosphere about what happened, and many a conversation on Twitter has been had on the subject. I neither intend nor believe that I will put these issues to rest here, indeed they have the potential to be divisive enough to cause people to leave the movement. I do believe, however, that certain things deserve clarification, particularly in regard to what is called "Black Bloc," and specifically the supposed 'contingent' here in NYC.

In several articles there has been a conflation of Tim Pool's attacker as a member of the Black Bloc simply because he was wearing a mask. An article in Tech News Daily (http://www.technewsdaily.com/3716-smartphone-journalists-resistance-sides.html) that highlights not only the attack on Tim Pool but other attacks on Livstreamers (by protesters or police) at occupations around the country defines them as "fringe anarchists who resort to vandalism and are shunned by other protesters." This definition is very similar to the one I saw in a local NYC NBC article about Sunday's March. I find it problematic in many ways, and also pervasive even within the confines of the Occupy Movement itself.

If one concedes that there is a Black Bloc in NYC (which I contend that as such there is not) I seriously implore anyone to show photographic or videographic proof of any property destruction that has happened in NYC since September 17, 2011 by their actions. By this I mean broken store windows, destruction of luxury cars, graffiti, things that one would legitimately call "vandalism." I am trying to narrow the definition here because I have indeed witnessed attempts by "Black Bloc" to build roadblocks using things found on the street (orange traffic cones, metal barricades, trashcans and bags of trash) but as these aren't permanent and can't have a dollar-sign attached to them, they don't qualify as "property damage" or "vandalism." Even when Zuccotti Park was evicted the "Black Bloc" did not resort to these tactics, although in one incident that night it was perhaps the closest that it ever has. After the eviction and a March, a large crowd gathered on Broadway and Pine. Tim Pool was there livestreaming and came upon a group of masked protesters releasing air from NYPD vehicles' tires. He was approached by these masked protesters ("Black Bloc") and a confrontation ensued when he refused to stop livestreaming their illegal actions. Here the Tim Pool connection is a bonus, and not really the point of me relating this story. The point is that this is the closest I have seen in NYC of so-called "Black Bloc" resorting to vandalism and that this particular action, as a tactic, had a definite goal (that the NYPD wouldn't be able to load brothers and sisters into them and take them away) and wasn't capricious aggression.

I'd like to take a moment here to say why I believe there is no legitimate "Black Bloc" in NYC, and why we should take to calling what there is that resembles a Black Bloc something else. First off, Black Bloc, as a tactic, is supposed to involve everyone wearing all black clothes and black masks so that authorities will have a hard time pinning a particular action on a particular person (especially in the case of their arrest). For this tactic to work a Black Bloc not only needs the proper attire, but also large numbers and organization. If there are only two or three people in masks in an area the tactic is far less effective than if there are twenty or one-hundred. On this level there is no organized Black Bloc in NYC, as I have never seen an actual organized Bloc on the streets, but perhaps only what could be defined as affinity groups of two to six people at most. That said, one can dress in all black, don a black mask, and never engage in a 'Bloc' of any kind (you might even throw a bottle at a cop and run away like a coward or assault a livestreamer). Many of the people I have seen engage in "Bloc" activities in NYC, myself included, think wearing all black is tantamount to putting a huge bullseye on your back, so many people simply wear normal clothes and don a mask. I think this is effective in first of all shedding the connotation of all black with property destruction, and also elevating effective tactics to the forefront of what a Black Bloc does.

A hallmark of Black Blocs in North America has been property destruction, and when they hear the phrase "Black Bloc" many people rightly think of broken windows of Starbucks and McDonalds locations from the Battle of Seattle. However, as I have pointed out at length above, I have never seen any of this in NYC. What I have seen are two things that are incredibly important to every protester, whether "peaceful/non-violent" or willing to engage with the police. These are unarresting people and breaking kettles. I have yet to hear a convincing argument against either of these things, especially kettle-breaking, kettling being one of the most heinous things a police department anywhere can engage in. In many ways I'd rather be a victim of police violence than be kettled. There is nothing fun about going to jail and facing criminal charges. Having a bullshit felony or misdemeanor on your record could ruin your life, and so especially if you are a peaceful protester with no inclinations toward resistance of any kind (when people say 'non-violent resistance' they really mean 'non-violent submission') you have to wonder who is going to break that kettle, or who is going to help you up from the floor before the police do. This is something I have seen time and time again on marches in NYC. Whenever a man gets helped up from the pavement, pulled from the clutches of a cop and certain incarceration, and whenever a kettle is broken and hundreds of people come streaming through what used to be a line that demarcated those who were free and those who were not, it is always a bunch of people in masks (not necessarily black ones) who are putting their safety and freedom on the line to make sure these things happen.

If we can accept that there will be selfish, violent people in any large grouping of human beings, and that things like a bottle thrown randomly here or there are going to happen, we can take heart that Black Block is taking "peaceful/non-violent" protesters' feelings into account by not engaging in property destruction (which benefits nobody) and only doing things that are beneficial to everyone. Before I continue, I want to point out that in a true Black Bloc the safety of other demonstrators is always taken into account and so they tend to break off from the March to engage with the police or destroy property.

So now when we reconsider where we started off, with Sunday's attack on Tim Pool at the (Second) Oakland Solidarity March, we have no reason to tie the attacker to the Black Bloc, and furthermore we have no reason to say that a Black Bloc does or even should exist in NYC. However, by making the conversation about "black bloc" on a flimsy correlation and not the person's action itself, you deflect from the discussion about the efficacy of livestreaming and onto the very existence of Black Bloc and resistance against police. Why would anyone not want Tim Pool to livestream? Why was he specifically targeted while Dwayne_wins and Luke Rudkowski went on filming unmolested? In that article from Tech News Daily, after caricaturing the Black Bloc's function and what people think about them they add this, literally parenthetically.

"(Several people, including Pool, theorize that Sunday's attacker may have been an undercover officer acting as a provocateur.)"

If we are reasonable about this and don't fetishize non-violence (remembering that it is only a tactic, and like any tactic should be used to reach a goal, and when the tactic becomes destructive of those ends it should be discarded) I think more of Occupy can learn to stop worrying and love the Bloc.