In Support of Uprisings -- On to Revolution. The Role of Organization in Rebellion

Hey I wrote this before I got caught up for a few days and wanted to share it with yall

Let me know what yall think

 In Support of Uprisings -- On to Revolution. The Role of Organization in Rebellion


The Minneapolis Uprising and rebellion for George Floyd has inspired other cities to rise up in solidarity for the countless police killings that have happened throughout the U.S. Empire.  Let’s get this clear—what we are witnessing is history and moments like these is rare.  Black youth are at the forefront along with other people of color, supporters, and allies.  We should celebrate this moment and these uprisings especially in the time we are living in where capitalism and fascism has put the market above all human life, and police and military are encouraged to continue to murder us by those in power.

Uprisings are spontaneous reactions by the people to the injustices they experience and witness.  We've reached a point where we are angry and the only way to express our anger is to be in the streets and show our indignation towards the police and the system.  It's an explosion in a historic timeline.  I've seen uprisings before, but this is something I've never seen before and it's a good thing.

Activists who are used to marches and protests usually organized by professional leftists and non-profits might not know how to plug in or how to support these rebellions.  One thing is clear, it's not your role to police how people choose to "protest."  I've seen too many times where instead of joining in and helping the youth in rebellion, activists just get in the way or actually help throw salt and water over the fire of the people in the street.

As someone who's goal is liberation, I want to see this energy sustained.  Usually, you have police repression and then you have professionals and sell-outs come and try to calm the people in press conferences calling for "peace."  Next, the promise of some reformist concessions and then eventually it's back to business as usual.  The police will continue to kill us.

The question for revolutionary anarchists at the moment is what is our role and how can we support and help sustain this resistance?  In my opinion, the only way to move to the next stage of rebellion is revolutionary organization.  I'm not an authoritarian leftist, so I feel this comes from within the struggle—within the communities in resistance—not from outside like from communist vanguard parties.  Us with some experience as organizers, can help—not in a paternalistic way—but share from experience so we don't repeat mistakes or tactics/strategies that have been tried and have failed or have been compromised.  We need revolutionary organization that helps build momentum and can respond to attacks, misinformation by the media, and to all opportunists that seek to destroy the organic nature of rebellion by coopting or policing the resistance.  Revolutionary organization can help escalate rebellion and connect locally and with other regions where we can learn from each other and share resources.

After talking to folks and comrades from different places, many asked what can we do either as individuals or collectives.  While I'm not claiming to know all the answers, these are just ideas that come from my own experience.  Hopefully others can add to these ideas and we can create some discussion around these.

The things to do now as individuals or collective groups of anarchists and organizers to support the rebellions:

First, if you're able to get together a group of friends you know and trust, do so and begin discussing forming a collective/affinity group or organization.

The basics of organizing and action (can be applied to any escalation in actions):

1. Make plans

2. Carry them out to the best of your ability

3. Debrief (in my opinion this is the most important part—this is where collective knowledge and experience happens—we fight during the day and study at night, we learn from our mistakes and see how we can grow, what went wrong, what went right. You better believe the police and law enforcement agencies debrief on our tactics and discuss how to better contain and counter our actions)

4. Make New Plans


Not everyone needs to be in the streets, especially if you're at risk or you have other responsibilities, but you can help by other means such as:
-Raise funds for bail and other legal fees for people out in the streets
-Research
-Offer support to the youth in the frontlines (solidarity means to fight alongside them while not trying to police the way people choose to fight against injustice)

-Show some more advanced tactics in action, security, and self-defense (either through examples or have print outs of literature on advanced protest tactics, self-defense, and security)

-Use and show tactics that have been effective around the world in mass uprisings against police

-Share resources with them (these can be gear, funds, masks, gloves, anything you can and have)

-Spread information with them and revolutionary literature (on organizing, history, analysis, tactics)  Obviously should be right time and if you have some time to engage people, do so.

- Recruit people into the movement (not necessarily an organization) -  this is a process for most, and it doesn't happen overnight, but we can start by planting ideas and seeds into the people into the rebellion we encounter

-Study collectively (this is where we democratize our knowledge and understanding).  Study history, theory, and tactics and strategy together.  There are many resources out there online, too many to link on here, but we can begin creating a list to check out

-Build our Self Defense Tactics (to defend ourselves and our communities from the police and all white supremacists and fascists

Just some ideas.  Long live the Rebellions for George Floyd and all other lives stolen from us by this system.