Re: Quebec-anarchists?

["Jay Moore" <research@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

My impressions from the scene are that it was really an "anti-capitalist
bloc" doing the most militant actions -- not exclusively an anarchist
("black") by any means.  I didn't see this myself on Saturday. But the
videos I saw from Friday, the first day of attempts to penetrate the fence,
showed some younger people proudly waving large red flags in the face of the
cops and with tear gas swirling all around.  I also saw the radical
autoworkers marching up to the fence on Saturday, some with red colors on.
On the other hand, Marxists do have an ideological challenge to deal with
here because a great many of the younger militant activists (ones I know
here in Vermont, too) have not been so much attracted to socialism (although
some have, gravitating towards the ISO -- who also had a large contingent in
the legal march in Quebec, although I don't know whether they went later
into the action) as to anarchism of various sorts.  Here in Vermont, we have
the home base of Murray Bookchin's ecoanarchism, the Institute for Social
Ecology, but also various other types like anarchosydicalists and
anarchopunks.

As another writer on the List said, I think we should remember the attitude
of Marx (and Lenin) and not get too carried away dissing them and their
sometimes infantile tactics (at least in the public arena).

best,
jay


----- Original Message -----
From: "Richard Partridge" <richardj.partridge@xxxxxxxxxx>
To: <marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Monday, April 23, 2001 8:07 AM
Subject: Quebec-anarchists?


> We have all seen the biased, censored and manipulating reports on the
> demonstrations in Quebec, i am fully behind these demonstrations and do
> believe direct action is the only way to change anything with the state
and
> even corporates controlling and influencing this 'democracy'. However on
> news reports and even indy reports the demonstraters are called
'Anarchists'
> even a writer on this site claimed that anarchists were largely involved,
> while it is obviously hard to get support from armchair watchers with this
> type of reporting, what are the chances if the people who protest the
> hardest are anarchists( people who subscribe to anarchist beliefs, not
> simply 'thugs' as the reporters believe) surely it is worth more to
protest
> from a socialist or marxist perspective rather than against any type of
> state. Would these people to protest under a fully competant, working
> socialist government?
>