'we need to reclaim the streets from Reclaim the Streets'

luka

Well-known member
that was a quote from crumbling loaf. i just read it and it really made me laugh. i remember when i first heard about that lot and i thought they were a bunch of pricks. making a nuisnace of themselves in places like tottenham and brixton. yeah, the dark heart of capitalism, way to stick it to the man, inconviencing the locals and making a bloody great mess. i was a bit more impressed when they did the motorway but, i dunno. what do you lot think about the feral tribes? i know mark k is contemptuous and that eden is in favour so there should be scope for a good fight.
 

john eden

male pale and stale
I don't think RTS exists any more so there's not much to reclaim.

Having said that, I think there were some good bits there (I am not entirely pro!). The name, is a good example - cars dictate how large parts of urban and rural space can be used. If you try and walk around Milton Keynes, there are big fuck off signs everywhere saying "pedestrians do not have priority". The way cities are planned, and the spaces between cities, is not focussed on humans walking about, talking to each other, but on cars - generally transporting people to and from work.

The early RTS actions were extremely inventive and took place in spaces where they would receive good support - Camden High Street, Angel, the Westway. I was at the Westway one, and it was incredible to be part of something so full on - dodging past the cops to try and protect the soundsystems (I got there earlier than most) and then turning round to see thousands of people pouring down the road behind me with all the cars gone... it wasn't just ravers either there were all sorts of things going on.

I think RTS realised the limitations of the "party as protest" shortly after this - remember that they also held actions in solidarity with striking tube workers, and the march on Trafalgar Square which was done in conjunction with the Mersey Dockers. This sort of linking up of social movements is something I find incredibly exciting personally - people learning from each other and putting aside their differences to work together towards a common aim.

The Brixton/Tottenham event was piss poor however. I assume the idea was to get "local people" involved, but the nature of RTS events is that they have to be covert and organised by the usual suspects. Brixton was great but it was clear to me that the ideas were thin. They did get in some local soundsystems to play the occupied space tho, not just the crusty rave ones. And a mate of mine was involved with organising a kids play area, which I think is something good also - not just for your twenty somethings.

What I've heard about Tottenham was that it was pretty crap - people pissing in local people's gardens, loads of litter, etc.

Anyway, after that RTS went on to organise a huge event in the form of J18 in which the hordes decended on the Square Mile for a day. That event was also amazing from all sorts of perspectives - a total disruption of a sector of the finance industry, with a brilliant carnival atmosphere. The stuff of which legends are made. The entrance to the Liffe Building was completely bricked up, for example! :)

I suppose J18 became a new model which lead to the Mayday stuff. Which has become ritualised confrontations of little value.

One of the main criticisms of all this is that a lot of good people spent huge amounts of time preparing for one spectacular day, which people would then turn up to. But this changes little and can be managed easily by the powers that be. Sure, people perhaps get a glimpse of what another world could be like, but it often ends up with people showing up as punters for a party and doesn't lead anywhere else.

Personally I think the way forward now lies with deeper low level work on a more constant basis, at work, where you live, etc.
 

luka

Well-known member
i spose the thing is john, what you're advocating is incredibly boring and only borderline saints like yourself are going to get involved. i guess trying to make social protest/revolution fun is one of the strengths of those crusty type people. i didn't hear about the square mile thing, i must have been in nz. thats more the sort of thing i would approve of. mayday is a farce now and as you say easily controlled by the police. it would be pretty funny is small groups of mates did annoying things whenever they felt like it. it wouldn't bring down capitalism but it would be entertaining, picnics in corporate lobbys, filiming yourself doing boris johnson up the arse, that sort of thing. you'd get at least one incident a week. all in the papers and that.
 

satanmcnugget

Well-known member
well, ive been involved in RTS Toronto for a good deal of time now...and i think most of the criticisms are cogent...until some type of social transformation/revolution comes about--if it comes about (which i highly doubt)--ANYTHING people try to do is going to be open for criticism...revolutionary acts have their limitations, no doubt about it

HOWEVER, i got involved with and go to RTS street-parties because they are FUN!!!!!...let the revolutionary theorists and grumps sit back and write their critiques all they want and publish them in obscure ultra-leftist journals all day and night...i'll be running through the streets with a bottle in one hand (beer or molotov cocktail??) and a black flag in the other, like i did a few years ago here in Toronto

i disagree with Luka's assertion that only borderline saints get involved with activist/revolutionary type stuff...iam notoriously NO SAINT and ive never hesitated in getting involved in stuff and have always been welcome among others who do that type of thing...people arent perfect and revolutionary types are no different
 

sufi

lala
the way forward now lies with deeper low level work on a more constant basis, at work, where you live, etc.
seen :)

is incredibly boring and only borderline saints like yourself are going to get involved.
arse :mad:

sort yerself out luka,

peace & love from sufi
(rts/j18 vet, lowlevel non-stop activist, but not saintly or bored at all :D )
 

luka

Well-known member
what interminable meetings in cold church halls with earnest dogooders, you trying to say thats fun, c'mon son, it might give you an inner glow but its not going to be fun, theres no point lying ed.
 

Rambler

Awanturnik
RTS is still going strong in Warsaw - there was loads of stuff going on for European No Car Day last month.
 

john eden

male pale and stale
Angels With Dirty Faces / Angels from Nowhere Places / Kids Like Me and Yooooooooooo!

There's loads of stuff people do which isn't fun - even in their "spare" time. Even on a night out there is all the travelling around London, waiting for people, dealing with wankers, etc. But you do it because you know there will be laughs aplenty and overall it's worth it.

Same with politricks innit. You find some people you can work with and have a laugh with and then get on with it. And yeah sometimes it will be pants - hanging around cruddy estates in the rain. Other times it will be a right old laugh. When it all comes together and you begin to see it working, or you pull off something audacious, well that's a buzz and half...

As long as you don't flog yourself to death doing it or think of yourself as some kind of martyr it's alright - it adds another dimension to your life - something other than work/shop/go out/sleep...
 

sufi

lala
luka said:
what interminable meetings in cold church halls with earnest dogooders, you trying to say thats fun, c'mon son, it might give you an inner glow but its not going to be fun, theres no point lying ed.

no lie - you naughty one luka... ;) i get salary for pursuing social justice - church halls are not part of the plan
 

satanmcnugget

Well-known member
im not lying atcha, Luka...we met in a public park...sat around on the lawn for a half hour once a week...usually cracked jokes and stuff until people showed up...got to know a bunch of cool new folks...got invited to cool parties...even the planning and other "dreary" stuff was pretty cool...not as fun as the event itself, mind you, but hardly drudgery either

mind you, the only inner glow ive ever gotten from activism is from the spliffs sparked before/after meetings

and, of course, the event itself is always a hoot! :)

but i also want to add that i also laughed my ass off at Loaf's statement...there's a part of me that agrees with him

and the thing is, if you personally find activist type stuff boring, by all means stay home...i seriously doubt the fate of the world hangs in the balance...i gave up the illusion that we activist types are going to save the world from itself a long time ago

and besides, there are a million things that people can do besides the typical activist stuff...like putting people who need a place to crash up for the night, loaning/giving away books, feeding friends who are broke, etc.....all pretty cool things that go against capitalism's law of value
 
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wonk_vitesse

radio eros
The most important event was the M41 day. That was pre-Newbury and affirmed that road protesting was a big issue, it being the biggest every anti-road event ever. It worked on so many levels and really showed that people could just make it happen even if the police did everything to stop it.

I got sunstroke and went a bit mad in the evening on stella.....
 

Wrong

Well-known member
RTS stopped (or, rather, morphed into various other things) around about the time of J18. Various reasons why can be found in their pamphlet Reflections on J18 . I thought Crumbling Loaf's post was funny, but I don't think RTS are really the problem. Rather, when RTS-style tactics went massive and global with things like the Seattle and Prague protests, a lot of fundamentally boring leftists saw people having fun on demonstrations and attempted to appropriate the style without understanding the politics. For example, if you read any SWP propaganda these days you'll hear talk of 'festivals of resistance', which of course are all festival and no resistance (on which, see this article in the current issue of Radical Philosophy).

I guess this is a general problem with innovative forms of protest becoming empty gestures - for example, the way geurilla theatre has gone from being a rigorously situationist assault on the spectacle to being precisely a spectacle itself - an opportunity for activists to dress up and salve their consciences at the same time.
 

martin

----
I attended May Day 2002, for the sole reason that a female friend wanted to chat up a member of socialist youth group / Workers Power's 'posh baby wing' "Revolution". The day was a farce. A bit of bottle throwing, college kids shouting 'Get stuck into the pigs!' when they obviously didn't intend to (I actually sympathised with the fuzz that day, it was that bad). To make it all more embarrassing, the main 'mob' got sealed off in Soho for two hours in the rain, and had to beg the cops to let them out for a pee.
 

MBM

Well-known member
Permanent Revolution

Reclaim the Streets was the politics of the Carnival. And no bad thing in and of itself. But Carnivals necessarily have to end.

Living a life of permanent revolution is too hard for most of us.

So what's left? My current approach is about everyday life. How do I, as someone with a regular job n stuff, try to make the world a better place? I do a bit of volunteer work. I try to make the life of my colleagues easier when they let me. I look to invest in people and give them opportunities they might never have. I try to be part of my community.

I don't necessarily do this very well - which is why I need like-minded people to support me. And I have been lucky enough to find these.

There's a saying in Chaos Magic circles: "Initiation Never Ends". OK - so you've climbed mountain Everest off yer face on acid. What do you do next? How does that experience inform your life from here on in?
 
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