Finally, we’re seeing some semblance of the George Floyd Uprising now and the militants in action. The west coast has been particularly example setting, but we also must commend those incarcerated uprising in Delaney Hall, a detention facility in New Jersey, along with the militants who’ve arrived to support the unrest. Solidarity to those not simply dreaming of liberation, but acting on it.
I would like to offer some guiding lights in this moment for any would-be insurrectionaries or insurrectionaries contemplating what to do next as a result of conversations I’ve had with friends and what has been seen in recent actions.
Bring the War Here
Angelenos were able to disrupt ICE operations through their militant actions on the streets, politicians later confirmed. In the Bay, although non-violent and not as escalated as it could be, two courts were shut down ensuring no immigrant would arrive to a proceeding just to get removed by ICE whatever the outcome. Many of us know this, but to put it more precisely into words:
Every ICE, cop, and soldier occupied by a militant is one less boot putting someone in a camp or helping Israel perpetuate its genocide. A total upheaval, regardless of what comes after, will force the state to contend with it and unable to carry out its will in the ways it’d prefer. If we can force the government to bring its soldiers back from abroad and if we can keep ICE from deporting people, we’re doing more than whatever any reformist can offer. We must find avenues to escalate and adapt as the situation adjusts. Whatever works for fueling the fire, toss it in.
We can’t shy away from the moment, despite whatever complaints from pearl-clutching legalitarians may have about adventurists. They’ve shown their worthlessness over the course of their whole existence, but they’ve shown how especially worthless they are since Oct 7th, 2023. The opinions of those whose existence is materially indistinguishable from being six feet under should roll off us like water off an umbrella.
Every Camera, A Cop
Waymos were treated rather wonderfully, called into protests, and then burned, like a barricade delivery system rather than its original intent: a shitty alternative to taxis and buses while doubling as a surveillance entity. The burning of Waymos was a direct attack on the surveillance state and we must expand it further. I have not seen this come up as much as it had during the first Trump admin, but back then, people with cameras, phone or otherwise, were regularly treated with hostility even if they were on “our side”.
There are too many fucking people holding a phone and thinking they’re doing something other than preserving evidence for cops. No, you getting the “truth” out into the world is not doing jack shit, the truth hasn’t been relevant for some time, but you are certainly in proximity to being a cop more than you are some form of resistance. We need to reignite that hostility and if we want to be polite about it, tell these fucks to do something more than doubling-down on being a bystander, otherwise, let them know they’re doing cop work, and if they don’t adjust accordingly, treat them like a cop.
It is not enough to go after them either. We have to create entire zones of hostility towards every form of surveillance. Rip off those ring door cameras whenever you see them, whatever camera you can’t reach, spray paint. If you clear a few city blocks of cameras, wheatpaste signs letting folks know that area is a no-surveillance zone, and cameras will be actively attacked. If we could create entire city blocks without cameras, people like Luigi would have an even better chance of getting away. If you know a protest is going down on a Friday, it might be worth doing a camera-disabling tour that Thursday.
Don’t Vacate The Bullshit
Maybe I am writing this to convince myself, but we cannot abandon all of the normie protest bullshit. It should be our turn to co-opt, but the challenge is navigating this without losing a sense of self, going mad over the usual bullshit, and committing to action while dodging peace police. I remember what initially led me to anarchism, to anarchists. I was at a very normie protest, huge, but a typical march. I forget what started it, a cop was moving to arrest a protestor, and someone I knew who had identified as an anarchist mumbled, “Someone should intervene.” They then intervened, it was the first time I had ever witnessed a de-arrest, and I was awestruck. I did not know if I was an anarchist then, but what I do know is that sealed my fate with anarchists, that they would be the ones I ride and die for, that if I did anything, it would always be with them.
Although that was my individual experience, I have seen this happen to newer comrades as well. Propaganda of the deed, but the deed being something as small and as hardcore as de-arresting, it is these moments of breaking from the usual routine that inspire onlookers that there is perhaps something more, that they too could do this. I know this is a tough ask because so-called radicals have gotten worse, there is no denying it. The way they tossed Elias Rodriguez under the bus, they way the fedjacket those rightfully critiquing PSL, or how AROC actively prevented protestors from occupying boats, the worst part about being a militant since 2023 has not been the state, but the heightened hostility of leftists towards militants within this moment. I’d argue they are significantly worse this time around than they were under the first Trump administration and this makes it harder to share space, not just in the streets, but in community spaces, organizing spaces, the list goes on.
In my recent experience, I saw a list from Palestinian liberals talking about how Elias was “not a part of the movement” and how his actions undermined it. I’d like to resoundingly say, fuck them and whoever’s movement they claim to be apart of. I’d rather be aligned with a thousand Elias’ than a single Palestinian-American two-state organization that is condemned by Palestinian militants in Palestine. This experience made me want to burn ties with the groups I’d been involved in that at least tolerated this messaging, although fortunately did not actually make any comments.
So why have I remained? Because I see who I intercept by being here. This org will never do what I think is important, many of its members won’t commit to any meaningful actions, and many of them are here in a ritual of guilt. The few who show restlessness, who show discontent, who want more though, they come here looking for something, and they won’t find it, but I will work with them to find it for them and hopefully set them on a path that will actually generate conflict. I think these relationships are worth the suffering of dealing with this incessant liberal bullshit and from there, further develop our own networks. It isn’t enough to remain, we must also be vocal in our disagreements, but articulate. I’ve come out of discussions where I was the primary voice of dissent and that attracted people to talk to me, to vent their similar frustrations, and those are the moments of interception we seek.
An additional, tiny note. I notice the orgs committing to most action (I won’t name names) tend to be associated with Maoists and get derided by anarchists as a result. Completely understandably. I also know the anarchists deriding them. Yes, you, I know you, and I know you’re an armchair shit talker whose highest crime will always be tagging at best. An armchair anarchist is hardly worthy to be called an anarchist, why are you being upstaged by Maoists? An associate of mine was angrily handwringing about the Houthi’s politics back in 2024 and I commented, I certainly don’t disagree, so how does it feel when such a group with shitty politics is doing more and risking more to confront a genocide than you are? How do you come to terms with that? The silence was loud. Your silence is also loud. Get in the fucking streets and do more than sign holding. I’d rather be with some weird Maoist in the streets than sharing a couch with you deriding them.
The world is offline
I have seen, particularly among disabled leftist twitter, an obsession with shitting on anything about in-person organizing. I’ve mentioned this in prior posts as someone who is pretty severely disabled, these folks project rather painfully onto the entirety of radicals who rightfully talk about the importance of organizing in-person. I am also writing this while I have COVID as a result of my job putting me in a situation where I got exposed. Oh to have a chronic respiratory issues and now having COVID on top of that.
I cannot understate, especially after my time in union organizing, that if you are not meeting in-person, then nothing is materially happening. You cannot organize militancy over signal, you cannot organize confrontation over the internet. If you are confronting the state, you must be socializing in-real life. There is no way around this. If a person is not willing to meet up in person to hash things out, that person isn’t reliable for anything, it doesn’t matter what they say over the phone or over signal. I’ve been in a thousand zoom/jitsi meetings and every in-person meeting is worth at least a hundred of them.
The communities you build online you can find are easily broken the moment the transition to real world, that is the test. Don’t mistake talking in a bunch of online group chats to share gofundmes as actual, material organizing. I’ve witnessed a hundred “online organizers” and witnessed nothing of rapport having emerged from them. Anyone disagreeing with this, I am going to hold your hand when I say this, I’d bet my life you are never engaging in direct confrontation with the state, so you aren’t even the audience of this writing. If your organizing doesn’t lead to some kind of physical confrontation, it is organizing that seeks to exist within the confines of capital and the state, not against it.
The Now, Not The When
I’ve frequently heard radicals (liberals) say “don’t let perfect become the enemy of good” and it is always used in defense of not actually doing anything meaningful and having standards for actions, like when you inform them a march or a protest isn’t a direct action.
What does the actual logic of don’t let perfect become the enemy of “good” when we put it into practice?
People have an obsession with that we are not prepared enough, we do not have alternative networks, we don’t have “dual power” (bullshit), so therefore, we should be wary about committing to actions we do not have the infrastructure to support.
No.
Abandon the measure. Don’t let “dual power” or some other myth become the enemy of actually doing anything. Could we confidently say we are underskilled and under-resourced in relevant things? Certainly, but measuring the capacity for action is strictly a measurement founded in a lack of courage. We may never have the resources, even if we have the skills, and that should never stop us (partly because the actions could get us those resources).
We must treat this as a day-to-day affair. The left’s obsession with a long-term strategy is precisely why we’ll sooner die of an ecological collapse than have any kind of liberation. I won’t name orgs, but I’ve seen the documents where the “movement” has propositions for what should be done over the course of a coming decade.
We don’t have a decade, you chucklefucks will be lucky if you get another worthless election to participate in a few years.
We must ask ourselves what the moment now demands of us and answer it. If it’s Saturday and it calls for you dropping caltrops in front of an ICE van, then so be it. If it’s Sunday and it calls for you doing pepper-spray drills, then so be it. We must also ask what we demand of the moment. Do we need to meet more people, do we need to try to pull those that are willing into the fray and show them what to do? You aren’t a fighter until you try. It is all confidence. No one came into this world all ready experienced at de-arresting or knifing tires, its something that happens when the fear of failing yourself, loved ones, and your beliefs outweighs the fear of repression. I’m so afraid of death, I am so deeply terrified of it, and I am infinitely more terrified of dying as a coward, as someone unworthy of being an anarchist.
The limitations of the George Floyd Uprising was our inability to keep the flame going, to tolerate peace police, to allow counterinsurgents like APTP to get away with shutting down actions because of their own cowardice. We must find a way to let the fires burn and keep them burning until everything is consumed.