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As a Saint Paul DFLer about the potential for violent demonstrations at the Convention this fall, and most of them will say “oh, they’re just a lunatic fringe. Mainstream Tics won’t stand for that kind of thing” (not to mention “the rioters are just a strawman”).
If only it were true. I got this from a Saint Paul politics discussion forum:
When considering the feasibility and likelihood of unlawfulness and property destruction at the RNCthis summer, a number of posters here have presumed that riots are counter-productive to the interests of protesters, and that the Seattle experience was a failure for those protesting the WTO. Let’s look at the these presumptions again.
Since the WTO debacle in Seattle, there has not been single new multilateral trade agreement signed between North American or European powers and the Third World, and several attempts of advancing the WTO agenda through the Doha round of talks has failed. In view of this, the Seattle protests, including the “brick-throwing” tactics, should be seen as an unqualified success for the organizers of the protests, both lawful and unlawful, not a failure.
Likewise, the civil rights riots following the death of Martin Luther King are largely credited with providing Washington with a sense of urgency for reforming and funding the urban renewal and anti-poverty programs of the 1970’s, such as the Community Development Block Grants (CDBG), a federal form of Minnesota’s LGA.
Brick-throwing, under certain circumstances, does work, particularly when employed by groups who have few other options for exercising political power over a given policy question. In light of this, and the unpopularity and powerlessness many feel regarding the war in Iraq, it seems pretty reasonable to expect that more radical forms of action will occur than merely exercising one’s right to free expression.
In other words, “they may be thugs, but they’re ourthugs”.
I don’t know how representative the writer is of Tic opinion in Saint Paul - you be the judge, but he appears to be a garden-variety lefty rather than a spittle-flecked radical.
I think - and this is just my opinion - that the majority of DFLers are opposed to the brick-throwers. But I think there are a few, like the writer, who can think of all sorts of obtuse rationalizations - and a bigger minority who’ll look at the convention like a hockey game or a NASCAR race or a Britney Spears appearance, looking for the spectacle. Perhaps they’re wistful for their lost youth forty years ago; perhaps they’re teenagers (literally or emotionally) who love drama. Whatever. A riot, to these people, might be counteproductive - but it’d sure be fun, woonit?
Cross-posted and comments (or verbal bricks) welcome at Shot In The Dark.
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