RIP broken window

Now, I don't advocate property destruction.
But it is not violence. It's vandalism.
It's still arguably wrong.

But it's not violence.

Shooting somebody in the face with a tear gas canister and sending them into a COMA, as the OPD did... that's violence.
Beating protesters over the head with batons for simply sitting down in a park. That's violence.
Spraying protesters with chemical weapons for sitting down on the sidewalk. That's violence.

Breaking a window? That's property destruction.



Tactically, it's stupid.

It turns people away from the movement. It marginalizes the movement, so that the 99% who don't know that they should be part of this movement, they become more reluctant to join.

We need the drones to wake up and join us, to go on strike, to unionize, to go on wildcat strikes, to stop allowing themselves to be used as mindless gears in a system that grinds the poor like hamburger meat.

Property destruction is not sexy to anybody but the "aesthetic anarchists" -- those who prefer the appearance of anarchy to the substance of it. It's not a good move, as it weakens us and turns people off.

The way forward is through overwhelming love and joy. We have no enemies. We have only two groups of people in our movement-- those are aware that they are part of the movement, and those who are not yet aware that they are part of the movement.

We're still in the nacent stages of movement building. Let's continue recruiting, through joy, exuberance, and taking the moral high ground through non-compliance and non-participation.

Occupy Boston- Mass arrests and property destruction by Boston Police

Well, This is certainly going to blow up in the police's face

As you can see from the video a group of Veterans For Peace were standing at attention using their bodies to block the police, using vets for peace, and American flags to help take up more space. Apparently, during the arrests, veterans were thrown to the ground, and the American flag was literally trampled underfoot by police.

What I'm hearing from Lance Matos, who I understand has been at Occupy Boston, the police, about 200 of them, made mass arrests this morning at 2am:

" People's property is being put into dump trucks and destroyed. Tarps, tents, chairs, and who knows what other equipment. Cameras and phone as well no doubt."

The AP reports:

"The protesters, part of the national Occupy Wall Street movement, had tried to expand from their original site in Dewey Square to a second site across the street, along the Rose Kennedy Greenway. A local conservancy group recently planted $150,000 worth of shrubs along the greenway and officials said they were concerned about damage."

Apparently shrubbery is more important than 1st amendment rights.