"The racism of the judicial system, a major and violent component of our society, though one rarely prioritized for opposition by pacifists, has had a major impact on the American psyche. Violence and criminality are nearly interchangeable concepts (consider how comfortable pacifists are in using the terminology of statist morality- for example, “justice”- as their own), and a chief purpose of both concepts is to establish blame. Just as criminals deserve repression and punishment, people who use violence deserve the inevitable karmic violent consequences; this is integral to the pacifist position. They may deny believing that anyone deserves to have violence used against them, but a stock argument common among pacifists is that revolutionaries should not use violence because the state will then use this to “justify” violent repression. Well, to whom is this violent repression justified, and why aren’t those who claim to be against violence trying to un-justify it? Why do nonviolent activists seek to change society’s morality in how it views oppression or war, but accept the morality of repression as natural and untouchable?
This idea of the inevitable repressive consequence of militancy frequently goes beyond hypocrisy to outright victim-blaming and approval of repressive violence. People of color who are oppressed with police and structural violence every day are counseled against responding with violence because that would justify state violence already mobilized against them. Victim-blaming was a key part of pacifist discourse, strategy even, in the 1960s and 70s, when many white activists helped justify state actions and neutralize what could have become anti-government outrage at violent sate repression of black and other liberation movements, such as the police assassinations of Panther organizers Fred Hampton and Mark Clark. Rather than supporting and aiding the Panthers, white pacifists found it more fashionable o state that they had “provoked violence” and “brought this on themselves."

Peter Gelderloos, Why Nonviolence Protects the State - Nonviolence is Racist
@6 months ago with 89 notes
#nonviolence #militancy #pacifism #panthers #black panthers #black panther party #bpp #jusicial system #america 

"Nonviolence declares that the American Indians could have fought off Columbus, George Washington, and all the other genocidal butchers with sit-ins; that Crazy Horse, by using violent resistance, became part of the cycle of violence, and as “as bad as” Custer. Nonviolence declares that Africans could have stopped the slave trade with hunger strikes and petitions, and that those who mutinied were as bad as their captors; that mutiny, a form of violence, led to more violence, and thus, resistance led to more enslavement. Nonviolence refuses to recognize that it can only work for privileged people, who have a status protected by violence, as the perpetrators and beneficiaries of a violent hierarchy."

Peter Gelderloos, Why Nonviolence Protects the State- Nonviolence is Racist
@6 months ago with 1772 notes
#racism #why nonviolence protects the state #nonviolence is racist #militant #pacifism #nonviolence 

"White pacifists (and even bourgeois black pacifists) are afraid of the total abolition of the white supremacist, capitalist system. They preach nonviolence to the people at the bottom of the racial and economic hierarchy precisely because nonviolence is ineffective, and any revolution launched ‘by those people,” provided it remains nonviolent, will be unable to fully unseat white people and rich people from their privileged positions. Even strains of nonviolence that seek to abolish the state aim to do so by transforming it (and converting the people in power); thus, nonviolence requires that activists attempt to influence the power structure, which requires that they approach it, which means that privileged people, who have better access to power, will retain control of any movement as the gatekeepers and intermediaries who allow the masses to “speak truth to power."

Peter Gelderloos, Why Nonviolence Protects the State - Why Nonviolence is Racist
@6 months ago with 44 notes
#privileged #nonviolence #violence #pacifists #pacifism #reform #white supremacist #white supremacy #racism 
"The racism of the judicial system, a major and violent component of our society, though one rarely prioritized for opposition by pacifists, has had a major impact on the American psyche. Violence and criminality are nearly interchangeable concepts (consider how comfortable pacifists are in using the terminology of statist morality- for example, “justice”- as their own), and a chief purpose of both concepts is to establish blame. Just as criminals deserve repression and punishment, people who use violence deserve the inevitable karmic violent consequences; this is integral to the pacifist position. They may deny believing that anyone deserves to have violence used against them, but a stock argument common among pacifists is that revolutionaries should not use violence because the state will then use this to “justify” violent repression. Well, to whom is this violent repression justified, and why aren’t those who claim to be against violence trying to un-justify it? Why do nonviolent activists seek to change society’s morality in how it views oppression or war, but accept the morality of repression as natural and untouchable?
This idea of the inevitable repressive consequence of militancy frequently goes beyond hypocrisy to outright victim-blaming and approval of repressive violence. People of color who are oppressed with police and structural violence every day are counseled against responding with violence because that would justify state violence already mobilized against them. Victim-blaming was a key part of pacifist discourse, strategy even, in the 1960s and 70s, when many white activists helped justify state actions and neutralize what could have become anti-government outrage at violent sate repression of black and other liberation movements, such as the police assassinations of Panther organizers Fred Hampton and Mark Clark. Rather than supporting and aiding the Panthers, white pacifists found it more fashionable o state that they had “provoked violence” and “brought this on themselves."
Peter Gelderloos, Why Nonviolence Protects the State - Nonviolence is Racist
6 months ago
#nonviolence #militancy #pacifism #panthers #black panthers #black panther party #bpp #jusicial system #america 
"White pacifists (and even bourgeois black pacifists) are afraid of the total abolition of the white supremacist, capitalist system. They preach nonviolence to the people at the bottom of the racial and economic hierarchy precisely because nonviolence is ineffective, and any revolution launched ‘by those people,” provided it remains nonviolent, will be unable to fully unseat white people and rich people from their privileged positions. Even strains of nonviolence that seek to abolish the state aim to do so by transforming it (and converting the people in power); thus, nonviolence requires that activists attempt to influence the power structure, which requires that they approach it, which means that privileged people, who have better access to power, will retain control of any movement as the gatekeepers and intermediaries who allow the masses to “speak truth to power."
Peter Gelderloos, Why Nonviolence Protects the State - Why Nonviolence is Racist
6 months ago
#privileged #nonviolence #violence #pacifists #pacifism #reform #white supremacist #white supremacy #racism 
"Nonviolence declares that the American Indians could have fought off Columbus, George Washington, and all the other genocidal butchers with sit-ins; that Crazy Horse, by using violent resistance, became part of the cycle of violence, and as “as bad as” Custer. Nonviolence declares that Africans could have stopped the slave trade with hunger strikes and petitions, and that those who mutinied were as bad as their captors; that mutiny, a form of violence, led to more violence, and thus, resistance led to more enslavement. Nonviolence refuses to recognize that it can only work for privileged people, who have a status protected by violence, as the perpetrators and beneficiaries of a violent hierarchy."
Peter Gelderloos, Why Nonviolence Protects the State- Nonviolence is Racist
6 months ago
#racism #why nonviolence protects the state #nonviolence is racist #militant #pacifism #nonviolence