For though Morgoth’s might was greatest of all things in this world, alone of the Valar he knew fear
By Thoreau
So, there were indeed some anarchists in MN, and they did indeed smash some windows. Those accused of doing these things should of course be arrested and, if found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, receive punishments proportional to their crimes. But reading the accounts from the Twin Cities, I read of a city that has been militarized unlike anything seen in the US for a very long time. Are punks breaking windows such a terror that a city must be militarized, that journalists must have their homes raided by SWAT teams, and that all who would carry a sign must risk arrest or worse? The answer, of course is obvious: The pen that makes the sign is far mightier than the stick that breaks the window, and so they fear that pen.
This is a culture of fear. The police tactics will be rationalized on the grounds that “if it saves just one officer’s life” even though the officers have many ways to defend themselves. The war being fought was pitched as a response to a hypothetical threat that might materialize in some distant day, if a dictator were to ignore his own interests and every disincentive and conduct an attack that would not increase his power one iota. The police state we face is justified largely in response to a terrorist organization that has killed many fewer Americans than the cars we drive. We accept the stationing of troops in every corner of the globe, and meddling in every conflict on the earth, because we are assured that this is necessary for our safety. We are the safest people on the face of the earth, and yet we unleash a horror upon ourselves and others because we are afraid.
At the risk of reaching too far, I don’t think it’s entirely a coincidence that these things are done by a country that removes swingsets from playgrounds, even if the swings are above a soft, sandy patch that is safer to land on than the hard dirt underneath the swings where I played as a kid. (Even worse, I can remember climbing on a jungle gym that was above concrete!) A culture that will spend money to get rid of fun toys because of exceedingly rare risks seems to be the sort of country that would go to any length in response to even the most remote threat. When people actually feel safer at the airport because some dumb thug took away their shampoo in response to an implausible threat, they will go along with anything.
I don’t want to yearn for an era where people were hardier and tougher because the good old days were never as good as we think they were. The people of an earlier era had all sorts of irrational and dangerous notions that they were willing to act on, both individually and collectively. If a disaster were to befall us and we became poorer and more endangered, we might gain some perspective on swingsets and shampoo bombs, but we’d probably succumb to all sorts of other ideas and prejudices that we currently consider discredited. Or perhaps we’d go to dangerous extremes with ideas that we currently accept, ideas whose dangers are not apparent from my current perspective.
Whatever the case, I do not yearn for a hardier, less spoiled era. Rather, what I hope for is progress: That just as we pride ourselves on rejecting certain errors of the past, perhaps we might also learn something by comparing our current security and prosperity with the more dangerous world of the past, and with that perspective adopt sanity. It will not happen overnight, but I am just naive enough to believe that progress is possible–as somebody whose job is all about passing on knowledge while uncovering new knowledge, I sort of have to believe that progress is possible. Or maybe I’m not so much naive as I am prejudiced to believe that my income is derived from a useful pursuit.
Comment by John Emerson —
September 2, 2008 @ 9:37 am
The Feds appropriated $50 million per convention to rent police from neighboring cities and otherwise harden the city. A friend of mine in Mpls verifies that the police presence was pervasive and overwhelming.
In one case, a houseful of 25 or so people, mostly college-age kids, was invaded by a larger number of heavily armed, armored, Darth Vader policemen. The total weapons seized were about five: one gun and a few knives. And the police intelligence was good because of infiltrators, so they knew there were no weapons. Shock and Awe.
I ended up asking myself how many times TAC squad militarization has ever been, by any stretch of the imagination, actually necessary in the last 20 years or so. That is, how often have the police actually had to deal with heavily armed groups holed up in fortified buildings, or out of control mobs intent on destruction?
This was not a rhetorical question. My guess is that nationwide in a population of 300 million over a 20 year period, there were more like dozens of cases than hundreds. (In many of these cases you might also also ask whether the TAC squad approach was the best to begin with, too, but I’m not talking about that. I’m just asking, granting the premise that TAC squads are sometimes necessary, how often they really have been necessary.)
Here in small-town Minnesota, one of the lowest-crime areas in the nation, a TAC squad gathered and closed off the street for a domestic hostage-taking incident. It ended uneventfully, but it almost certainly would have ended uneventfully with old-fashioned police methods. My guess is that the PDs needed incidents to justify their hoped-for grants.
I tracked the situation at my site (at my URL). My link goes to my hour to hour liveblog which is more or less obsolete now, but at the beginning I link to a lot of valuable sources. One thing that seems clear is that the media were targeted.
Comment by John Emerson —
September 2, 2008 @ 10:10 am
I might add that for me the most bothersome thing was the series of raids in the days before the actual march. A few key people were arrested, but the intent seems to have been intimidation. This probably also had the effect of frightening off a fair number of the more peaceful marchers.
Comment by Jaybird —
September 2, 2008 @ 10:32 am
Have there been any reporters arrested or is the week young yet?
Comment by radish —
September 2, 2008 @ 1:09 pm
No coincidence at all, and I would argue that the causal chain runs from the existential fears to the trivial ones. When we can’t assuage the existential fears we go crazy trying to deal with the little ones. That’s the mechanism of tyranny, but also OCD.
When I was about eleven I heard a weird noise, looked over, and saw one of my classmates stand up with an arm that had three 90° joints. “That ain’t right” I thought, just before she started wailing. Broke one of my own wrists on the same playground a few months later. Best playground in town. Almost as good as climbing the big trees (though apparently a lot more dangerous
).
I did some things that it’s a wonder I survived, talked to plenty of strangers, and eventually figured out that yes, the world is a dangerous place. But by the time I was fourteen the truly scary thing was that the world as I knew it was liable to end any minute, and that there was most likely fuck-all I could do about it, really, even if I were to devote every waking minute of every confusing teenage day to the task. When I was about 20 I had an epiphany about the whole thing and found myself crying with relief, right out of nowhere.
The only way to win that game is to stop playing it. The only way to keep your freedom is to let go of your fears.
Comment by Jaybird —
September 2, 2008 @ 1:42 pm
As it turns out, Amy Goodman and a couple of her producers have been arrested.
So I take that back.
Comment by John Emerson —
September 2, 2008 @ 2:41 pm
Also one or two people from AP.
Some of the preemptive raids were aimed at media, especially freelance independent media.
Comment by Jaybird —
September 2, 2008 @ 3:03 pm
Truly, we are all freelance independent media.
But I was more wondering about stuff on the level of those reporters who got arrested while filming the lobbyists.
But the Democracy Now lady… that counts.
Comment by Brian24 —
September 2, 2008 @ 7:05 pm
Awesome. Title.
No doubt the irrational fear of swingsets was one of the lies sown by Sauron among the Numenoreans as he plotted their downfall.
I think parents are just born to worry. When young children commonly died of smallpox, or TB, or whatever, playground accidents didn’t even show up on the worry radar. The more we solve the big problems, it just frees our minds to obsess about ever-smaller dangers to our children.
Comment by The Raven —
September 3, 2008 @ 10:33 am
You’re an anarchist too, ya know–you’re just not violent. On the other hand, the violent lot in Minneapolis may just be plain old criminals, taking advantage.
Caw!
Comment by Randolph —
September 3, 2008 @ 3:54 pm
US code and safety authorities are usually really conscientious; if swingsets are being removed there’s a pretty good chance that real injuries were occurring at a fair rate. You might want to find out more about the situation before assuming the caution is unreasonable.
Comment by Brett Peters —
September 3, 2008 @ 9:46 pm
“He began with the desire of Light, but when he could not possess it for himself alone, he descended through fire and wrath into a great burning, down into Darkness.”
Comment by Dave W. —
September 3, 2008 @ 10:00 pm
I missed this post. Not sure if I agree, but very well-written — semi-poetic in that way Mr. Henley gets sometimes. Good work, then.