pamphlet on the Thessaloniki Seven (arrested in June at the anti-EU summit demo)
enemy within, thessaloniki | 20.10.2003 13:25 | Thessaloniki EU | Analysis | Globalisation
5 of our comrades are on hunger strikes in Greek prisons. Free the prisoners of the anti-EU summit demo. Solidarity is our weapon.
English version of the pamphlet that is being distributed (among others) by the "enemy within" in Thessaloniki, with the groups thoughts about the anti-summit demos in June and the meaning of solidarity to the Thessaloniki prisoners today
September 2003, Enemy Within
1. Already a year before June 2003 we had decided to take part in the actions against the EU summit meeting in Thessaloniki. We never considered the summit meeting an isolated moment that could magically condense our struggle or bring it to its ultimate climax. For us, the whole summit affair, as any "mass anti-globalization" business would be one battle fought in an everyday war, one of many moments in our struggle for autonomy and freedom, a chance to meet more people and become exposed to other people’s ideas and practices. Our goal was to openly raise the issue of social subversion in its totality and variety, in all areas of everyday life. We were aware of both the dangers and the inherent problems in participating at such events (they can be predictable, they can be transformed into meaningless spectacle, they can allow too much disorganized mass direct action at the expense of conscious and well-prepared confrontation, they can be coopted by power, they can leave behind prisoners and repression).
During that adventurous week last June, we didn’t stay at home: we were on the streets and in the occupied buildings on the university campus. There we met with thousands of others. Any triumphant celebration of what happened would be pretentious -and wrongΠ as much as any condemnation would be unfair. It is true that there were many shortcomings and many problems that even cancelled out liberatory and libertarian visions. Yet the whole event did confirm our faith in the force of collective organization and action. The game is far from over.
There are many things to be said about the days of June, none of them heroic. For one thing everything happened against the backdrop of a conspiracy of the police, the media, the innocent citizens, all of whom knew beforehand how they would judge the paranoid destroyers and how they should all be exemplarily persecuted. There was a sense that the whole world was united against the four thousands of people who show no respect for the new religion of security and private property, and are thus the arch-enemies of the system. Anarchists became isolated before they even showed up. Even on Thursday, after a huge black and red demo, the climate did not change.
2. It is interesting to note certain tactical moves by the State and the police during their preparation for the summit meeting. Choosing Marmaras in Halkidiki as the location for the meeting, which is a holiday resort (mostly for people living in Thessaloniki) actually handed Thessaloniki over to the demonstrators without a red zone. The prerequisite was of course a fully consenting and cooperating Left. Indeed, the Left had no problem accepting housing and facilities by the State. What interested the various parties and Social Forum organizations was merely to show off their numbers and force to each other. The result was a boring parade of weakness, lack of imagination, inspiration or numbers. If such is the movement "aganst globalization", then the bosses can easily find their place within it.
In order to put to use the ideology of security, the chosen ideology of domination on a global and a regional level, the bosses require important social support. The presence of thousands of policemen in every corner of the city was complemented by security light steel sheets shielding larger and smaller shopwindows from expected attacks. It is true that the police sold the steel, alongside the insurance companies salesmen - but they were not alone. The warning visits to the shops were accompanied by the cries of the media, happy to oblige with yet another emergency situation. Yet what matters is not just who sells security, but also who buys it, what makes up this mixture of multiplied fear, indivisible loneliness, private property, ridiculousness, TV addiction, ice-cold resignation, dead time.
There remained only those people who are against any kind of negotiation with the institutions of power and cannot walk along the party lines. They were thus isolated, and they stayed alone. All moves of power were designed with them, with us, in mind. When we managed to shock, as we did at the huge demo in solidarity to immigrants on Thursday, we unfolded passion, reason and determinacy. Yet on Saturday, we were unorganized, with no actual political goal, had to a large extent incorporated spectacular stereotypes about ourselves and about such "anti-globalization activities", and were thus painfully predictable.
3. In a city practically occupied by the police, with an atmosphere loaded with terror for the awaited paranoid destroyers, some chose to go out into the street or defend the squated university buildings on campus Πas if ready all along. We are not willing to devalue this very choice. Fully or less aware of what we were doing, with a clear or a muddy view of our possibilities, each carrying with us different negations and contradictions, some chose to be out there. Some just needed a break, others just sought a thrill to get away from the misery of everyday life, some wanted an instant clash with the police at whatever cost, some wanted nothing, some would go for all of the above. All those people, whatever one calls them, comprise a tidal wave of negation within society. And that becomes all the more important, at a time when antisocial individualism and the ethics of property and security are reigning and are leading people at an astonishing pace to side with State power and identify with commodified relationships.
Capitalist society cannot avoid friction and resistance Π this resistance can at times be unexpected, or even entirely predictable. The expression of "rage", (add or omit the inverted commas, that is really not the point) on Saturday the 21st of June was such an instant of friction, unfortunately a very predictable one. We feel that any negation that does not find a conscious and collective expression, any negation that does not point towards the creation of structures and relationships that are competent and competitve towards existing capitalist relationships, that does not recreate community structures, whether in struggle or in response to everyday needs, will ultimately come to face the void of its own purposelessness.
And indeed, many people were on the streets led by an imposed strereotypical understanding of the event, or by the spectacle of their own desire. Our criticism is directed against ourselves too, those of us who joined and those of us who didn’t join the demo, since we actually failed to make a difference. We failed to invest with meaning and quality a demo that in the end was erratic to say the least. Worst of all it was joined by lone individuals Π everybody was there for themselves, or at best with their pals, reflecting a society of private and individualized choices, which pushes one deeper and deeper into isolation and apathy.
In other words, we are not really concerned with the technical aspect of the streetfight. The issue was not just a lack of arrangements that could have saved the battle. There is a crucial social and political issue at the heart of this whole affair. And our solidarity to the arrested is a first move in dealing with it.
4. The thirty comrades arrested at the demonstrations in Thessaloniki, Greece, against the bosses’ EU summit meeting held in Halkidiki last June are guilty of some of the greatest crimes of our times.
In a world that has fallen silent, they chose to cry out. In a world that has gone inert, they decided to act. They had the nerve to stand up against power mechanisms that should be feared as overwhelming and "invincible".
We are not on the side of power and its institutions. We are on the side of our comrades, guilty of the same crimes, in solidarity with them, having attempted to live one of the most worthy adventures of our time, the struggle to demolish this ageing world and to create a society free of exploitation.
We share this dream with thousands of others on this planet, consciously conspiring against repression, against having our lives taken away from us drop by drop.
Our solidarity to the seven prisoners of Thessaloniki and to the 23 demonstrators with the same charges, is inextricably linked to this struggle. Prisons are not wide enough for us all. The passion for freedom cannot be locked up and buried -it’s getting stronger and stronger, adding force to the tide of resistance.
Solidarity is not charity. It is the mark of a life that does not accept profit and consumerism as real social values. The seven prisoners are victims in a war against society that is being fought overty and covertly on all fronts of everyday life: Before the TV set, at the computer screen, on the factory chain gang, in the army camps and hospitals and sweatshops, on all production lines of the industry of alienation, loneliness, exploitation and death that is capitalism.
Noone has the right to remain indifferent in the face of this reality. When society chooses neutrality in the war of control and discipline actually fought against society itself, then society is consenting to its own slow death.
FREE OUR SEVEN COMRADES NOW-
SOLIDARITY TO THE HUNGER STRIKERS
September 2003, Enemy Within
1. Already a year before June 2003 we had decided to take part in the actions against the EU summit meeting in Thessaloniki. We never considered the summit meeting an isolated moment that could magically condense our struggle or bring it to its ultimate climax. For us, the whole summit affair, as any "mass anti-globalization" business would be one battle fought in an everyday war, one of many moments in our struggle for autonomy and freedom, a chance to meet more people and become exposed to other people’s ideas and practices. Our goal was to openly raise the issue of social subversion in its totality and variety, in all areas of everyday life. We were aware of both the dangers and the inherent problems in participating at such events (they can be predictable, they can be transformed into meaningless spectacle, they can allow too much disorganized mass direct action at the expense of conscious and well-prepared confrontation, they can be coopted by power, they can leave behind prisoners and repression).
During that adventurous week last June, we didn’t stay at home: we were on the streets and in the occupied buildings on the university campus. There we met with thousands of others. Any triumphant celebration of what happened would be pretentious -and wrongΠ as much as any condemnation would be unfair. It is true that there were many shortcomings and many problems that even cancelled out liberatory and libertarian visions. Yet the whole event did confirm our faith in the force of collective organization and action. The game is far from over.
There are many things to be said about the days of June, none of them heroic. For one thing everything happened against the backdrop of a conspiracy of the police, the media, the innocent citizens, all of whom knew beforehand how they would judge the paranoid destroyers and how they should all be exemplarily persecuted. There was a sense that the whole world was united against the four thousands of people who show no respect for the new religion of security and private property, and are thus the arch-enemies of the system. Anarchists became isolated before they even showed up. Even on Thursday, after a huge black and red demo, the climate did not change.
2. It is interesting to note certain tactical moves by the State and the police during their preparation for the summit meeting. Choosing Marmaras in Halkidiki as the location for the meeting, which is a holiday resort (mostly for people living in Thessaloniki) actually handed Thessaloniki over to the demonstrators without a red zone. The prerequisite was of course a fully consenting and cooperating Left. Indeed, the Left had no problem accepting housing and facilities by the State. What interested the various parties and Social Forum organizations was merely to show off their numbers and force to each other. The result was a boring parade of weakness, lack of imagination, inspiration or numbers. If such is the movement "aganst globalization", then the bosses can easily find their place within it.
In order to put to use the ideology of security, the chosen ideology of domination on a global and a regional level, the bosses require important social support. The presence of thousands of policemen in every corner of the city was complemented by security light steel sheets shielding larger and smaller shopwindows from expected attacks. It is true that the police sold the steel, alongside the insurance companies salesmen - but they were not alone. The warning visits to the shops were accompanied by the cries of the media, happy to oblige with yet another emergency situation. Yet what matters is not just who sells security, but also who buys it, what makes up this mixture of multiplied fear, indivisible loneliness, private property, ridiculousness, TV addiction, ice-cold resignation, dead time.
There remained only those people who are against any kind of negotiation with the institutions of power and cannot walk along the party lines. They were thus isolated, and they stayed alone. All moves of power were designed with them, with us, in mind. When we managed to shock, as we did at the huge demo in solidarity to immigrants on Thursday, we unfolded passion, reason and determinacy. Yet on Saturday, we were unorganized, with no actual political goal, had to a large extent incorporated spectacular stereotypes about ourselves and about such "anti-globalization activities", and were thus painfully predictable.
3. In a city practically occupied by the police, with an atmosphere loaded with terror for the awaited paranoid destroyers, some chose to go out into the street or defend the squated university buildings on campus Πas if ready all along. We are not willing to devalue this very choice. Fully or less aware of what we were doing, with a clear or a muddy view of our possibilities, each carrying with us different negations and contradictions, some chose to be out there. Some just needed a break, others just sought a thrill to get away from the misery of everyday life, some wanted an instant clash with the police at whatever cost, some wanted nothing, some would go for all of the above. All those people, whatever one calls them, comprise a tidal wave of negation within society. And that becomes all the more important, at a time when antisocial individualism and the ethics of property and security are reigning and are leading people at an astonishing pace to side with State power and identify with commodified relationships.
Capitalist society cannot avoid friction and resistance Π this resistance can at times be unexpected, or even entirely predictable. The expression of "rage", (add or omit the inverted commas, that is really not the point) on Saturday the 21st of June was such an instant of friction, unfortunately a very predictable one. We feel that any negation that does not find a conscious and collective expression, any negation that does not point towards the creation of structures and relationships that are competent and competitve towards existing capitalist relationships, that does not recreate community structures, whether in struggle or in response to everyday needs, will ultimately come to face the void of its own purposelessness.
And indeed, many people were on the streets led by an imposed strereotypical understanding of the event, or by the spectacle of their own desire. Our criticism is directed against ourselves too, those of us who joined and those of us who didn’t join the demo, since we actually failed to make a difference. We failed to invest with meaning and quality a demo that in the end was erratic to say the least. Worst of all it was joined by lone individuals Π everybody was there for themselves, or at best with their pals, reflecting a society of private and individualized choices, which pushes one deeper and deeper into isolation and apathy.
In other words, we are not really concerned with the technical aspect of the streetfight. The issue was not just a lack of arrangements that could have saved the battle. There is a crucial social and political issue at the heart of this whole affair. And our solidarity to the arrested is a first move in dealing with it.
4. The thirty comrades arrested at the demonstrations in Thessaloniki, Greece, against the bosses’ EU summit meeting held in Halkidiki last June are guilty of some of the greatest crimes of our times.
In a world that has fallen silent, they chose to cry out. In a world that has gone inert, they decided to act. They had the nerve to stand up against power mechanisms that should be feared as overwhelming and "invincible".
We are not on the side of power and its institutions. We are on the side of our comrades, guilty of the same crimes, in solidarity with them, having attempted to live one of the most worthy adventures of our time, the struggle to demolish this ageing world and to create a society free of exploitation.
We share this dream with thousands of others on this planet, consciously conspiring against repression, against having our lives taken away from us drop by drop.
Our solidarity to the seven prisoners of Thessaloniki and to the 23 demonstrators with the same charges, is inextricably linked to this struggle. Prisons are not wide enough for us all. The passion for freedom cannot be locked up and buried -it’s getting stronger and stronger, adding force to the tide of resistance.
Solidarity is not charity. It is the mark of a life that does not accept profit and consumerism as real social values. The seven prisoners are victims in a war against society that is being fought overty and covertly on all fronts of everyday life: Before the TV set, at the computer screen, on the factory chain gang, in the army camps and hospitals and sweatshops, on all production lines of the industry of alienation, loneliness, exploitation and death that is capitalism.
Noone has the right to remain indifferent in the face of this reality. When society chooses neutrality in the war of control and discipline actually fought against society itself, then society is consenting to its own slow death.
FREE OUR SEVEN COMRADES NOW-
SOLIDARITY TO THE HUNGER STRIKERS
enemy within, thessaloniki
