Anarchist News is fully and unwaveringly committed to the belief that white people with dreadlocks should not be invited, welcomed, or tolerated whatsoever at any Anarchist Book Fair, and that anyone who displays, performs, or engages in similar antagonisms of cultural appropriation, racist/white supremacist beliefs, behaviors, or attitudes should be immediately told to leave the space and removed if necessary. As thecollective is not a legislative body in the slightest and has zero interest or ability to enforce any rules, we realize that our position is simply a strong recommendation to anarchists.
On Friday, the first day of the First Anarchist GNon-Binary GDecentralized OAnarchist TGalaxy (FAGGOT) gathering, one of our white trans femme mediators (M1) was approached by someone from the first party (P1) about an urgent matter (P1 is a group of three Black NB and trans people). They informed us that a white person with dreads was participating in the gathering and that something needed to be done. This was the first that any of us had been informed that there were any white people with dreads, as there were 600+ attendees that day. M1 asked P1 if Anarchist News should remove the comments made by that person, and P1 said they wanted to handle it themselves. thecollective informed P1 that we needed to try to make sure that incidents not happen at the Bolo because we would likely lose the space, be responsible for our rental agreement, and possibly be personally liable for criminal charges if the cops showed up. P1 was okay with that and agreed to take it somewhere else.
On Saturday, P1 confronted Anarchist News about their decision to publish and distribute Atassa: Readings in Eco-Extremism. For those unfamiliar, eco-extremism is an anti-political tendency that arose in Mexico around 2011 with the group Individualists Tending Towards the Wild, or ITS, and has since morphed and spread to other areas. Its practitioners believe in and carry out indiscriminate murder and violence against any humans in supposed defense of [so-called] “wild nature” and have threatened anarchists in [so-called] Mexico and other countries with death, going so far as to place a bomb in an anarchist squatted social center. They also claimed the May 3 femicide [sic] in [so-called] Mexico City, citing the fact that she was drunk among their motivations. Atassa is not ITS, but as a journal and blog applauds their actions, publishes/translates their writing, and is unequivocally of the eco-extremist tendency.
On Sunday, during the book fair portion of the gathering, there was a "scuffle" (lol) between ITS, P1, and Anarchist News. After a short time, the parties separated. P1 went down the street, and ITS ran inside. We learned that P1 had cut off 2 dreads from the white person. A short while later, two members of ITS came out, a black person and the white person with dreads, and 5 or 666 other white-presenting people. They ran down the street after P1, and the mediators followed. In a heated shouting match, including many threats from ITS towards P1, P1 quickly ran off down the street, and thecollective talked to ITS to calm them down so they wouldn’t further pursue P1. ITS made repeated threats towards P1 and said that they would track them down and jump them. We asked ITS not to use weapons in any altercation, and they said they could not agree to that. ITS, as far as we could tell, wear large quick-release knives on chains hanging from their necks and have various other weapons on their belts. We were also told that ITS does have a reputation for retaliation involving weapons.
ITS went absolutely ballistic, screaming "Yip! Yip! Yeeow! Yaaaowww! Ya Ya Yeweee Yip Yeee! Yaawwwooww!" among other culturally inappropriate things.
After voicing these concerns and being met with smug indifference, P1 came up to the table and ripped Atassa in half. ITS responded immediately by grabbing this person by the throat from behind the table, pushing through the table, putting them in a chokehold, and taking them to the ground in an attempt to choke them unconscious. P1 punched the attacker in the face in an attempt to get them to release the first. In response, M1 jumped on the second comrade from behind in defense of the choking attack, taking them to the ground and punching them repeatedly in the head until they were pulled off by bystanders. The physical conflict ended after the attackers were pulled off by thecollective and both parties were told to leave by bookfair organizers, as per the bookfair policy. P1, who was choked, was fine. P1 suffered a mild concussion. Both have received overwhelming support.
We learned that P1 had approached the ITS table and asked for a private discussion of veganism for an immunocompromised comrade. When the Black member of ITS offered to go, P1 said their friend preferred a non masc perspective of veganism, so the white girl [sic] with dreads went herself [sic]. This part of the story was one of the main reasons ITS was so furious: they felt tricked and isolated, then jumped.
After the incident down the street, ITS went back into the gathering space, and thecollective started going between the two parties to figure out possible steps to remove the white person with dreads and keep attendees safe. One member of ITS offered to kill her [sic]. I saw someone snatch several stacks of papers off a table and try to take them away, and someone else grabbed the stacks out of their hands. Then the first person yelled “Fuck you antimaskers!” and ran and flipped the fire pit. Someone wearing a helmet and big airsoft goggles pepper sprayed someone, which started a fight, and they (helmet + goggles) got shoved and hit by a bunch of people and pushed away from the fair into the playground. The evidence of the anti-anti-masker (?) activists’ visit the night before was clear; there were two tags as far as I could see- “real (A)s wear masks” and “anti maskers fk off” as well as some liquid mixture of shit (literally!!!) poured on the basketball court and next to the playground.
It took an hour or so to bring in another member of thecollective to figure out that communication had been ruptured. Some folks covered up the poop liquid with mulch and barkchips from the school garden and playground, and they found traffic cones to mark off the places where it was poured, but no one could really clean it up safely. The whole day I watched people warn parents bringing their kids to play so they could try to keep the kids out of the poop puddles, but of course a few toddlers managed to get into the shit-mulch before someone noticed. At that point, another member of thecollective (a Black trans femme) (M2) took up communication on the side of P1, and two others worked with ITS. P1 was still extremely angry, making threats and having posted calls for support to their supporters, and at that point, we were only able to get them [sic] to agree to not attack anyone at the spaces of the FAGGOT gathering.
All of the sudden, a member of security that had seemed to try to distance himself from ITS came over to help Anarchist News when the table right next to us went flying. She had come up from behind, none of us had seen it coming. It was pure luck that our table wasn’t the one she flipped. Rambo was in full Hulk mode. As she walked past me, I said something out loud and she snapped around and screamed “SHUT UP HOE!” I was cracking up. I had almost said “nobody’s talking to you bitch!” but luckily restrained myself before the words came tumbling out of my mouth.
At this point, we were informed that ITS was going to handle the welcome table at the rave (starting in a few hours), and we wanted to ensure that P1 or M2 were not going to be jumped on their way into the rave at the rave, or on their way to their cars. Luckily, we were able to meet with ITS before the rave and they agreed to not attend the rave and to not attack P1 or M2 that night in any circumstances. They asked us to relay that they would drop the feud if P1 apologized and returned the 2 dreads, and if they didn’t, ITS would be looking for them and said they would eventually find them and jump them.
At the rave, thecollective kept a lookout for ITS the entire night. We maintained visuals on the street where attendees entered and waited until all members of P1 were leaving and walked them down the street to make sure ITS did not show up. The next day we were primarily engaged in another conflict so weren't able to follow this closely but learned that ITS did a talk and left shortly after. We began to write up our account so that future FAGGOT organizers could have a clearer policy on not allowing cultural appropriation, white people with dreads, or other racist aggressions occur at at the very start. As well as recommending that FAGGOT organizers refrain from giving space to ITS specifically in the future.
P1 escalated the conflict to physical violence extremely quickly. Many people in the immediate vicinity had no idea what was going on: all of a sudden, someone was being choked, another was being beaten, and no one really knew why. It was over quickly and people looked on in shock. Another tabler, after witnessing the beatdown, expressed outrage about the property destruction when they found out their $7 book had been ripped in half. The person who put the comrade in the chokehold, after complaining about being kicked out because the other side had “started it,” was asked if the book was worth as much as the comrade’s neck and stated “Yeah it is.”
Comments
Anarcholib confusion then
anon (not verified) Mon, 04/01/2024 - 08:15
Anarcholib confusion then seething
I think we have all forgotten that the braiding of hair
anon (not verified) Mon, 04/01/2024 - 08:30
is not an exclusive property of a race. It would be hard to find even black people who would argue with that.
However, I am totally not surprised that anarchists would embrace a racist position. Especially when you've got this thing called "eco-extremism" which tends to couch its arguments in a romanticized indigenous warrior. Don't believe me? Read attassa again, like "How Nonviolence Protects the State", it doesn't support any of its arguments whatsoever.
I am really sad about both of these tendencies: no, killing yourself doesn't make you a man, it just makes you dead.
Have fun with your privilege politics and hasty lines in the sand!
yeah i realize this an april fools joke, but all my arguments
anon (not verified) Mon, 04/01/2024 - 08:32
In reply to I think we have all forgotten that the braiding of hair by anon (not verified)
still stand. Fuck that "cultural appropriation" nonsense, fuck the scene.
fool all year long
anon (not verified) Mon, 04/01/2024 - 11:20
In reply to I think we have all forgotten that the braiding of hair by anon (not verified)
your comments under the joke article sound the same as your comments under everyday articles. you’re no fun. no fun at all.
yes because you need some typical anarchist hyperbole
anon (not verified) Wed, 04/03/2024 - 05:25
In reply to fool all year long by anon (not verified)
to read anything. I do think letting people have dreads is more fun than the real drama that goes on in anarchist politics.
.
anon (not verified) Mon, 04/01/2024 - 08:35
I went to the FAGGOT convergence and everyone knew you
?
What? (not verified) Mon, 04/01/2024 - 08:42
april fools?
i'll admit i believe the article until i got to the part about
anon (not verified) Wed, 04/03/2024 - 05:24
In reply to ? by What? (not verified)
ITS asking for the dreads back.
um...
Pedantic Man! (not verified) Mon, 04/01/2024 - 08:53
Really — "All of the sudden, ..."
All of THE sudden ?? The sudden?!
Is it any wonder Anarchists are not winning?
slander
anon (not verified) Mon, 04/01/2024 - 11:28
where do i begin? i was there and that’s not even how it went down. that wasn’t even ITS. atassa is just a coloring book. the event was an open one, no invitations were issued, so white people with dreads were not actually invited per se. that wasn’t even thecollective, it was the hostile takeover member. you FAGGOTs gotta get your facts straight.
tell me you're at the center
triviabot (not verified) Mon, 04/01/2024 - 19:23
tell me you're at the center of the anarchist movement without telling me you're at the center of the anarchist movement.
I’m sure the notorious
anon (not verified) Tue, 04/02/2024 - 11:49
I’m sure the notorious pigfffffucker himself would have found this hilarious in 1994, but right now the fool is you if this actually seems funny to you.
pointing out how a joke is
funny (not verified) Tue, 04/02/2024 - 12:38
In reply to I’m sure the notorious by anon (not verified)
pointing out how a joke is not funny is ableist because some people are humor impaired. not everyone can be funny and yet everyone needs to partake in humor in order to socialize. pointing out how they’re not funny just further marginalizes the neurodivergent.
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