Occupy Oakland agreed from the beginning that a diversity of tactics was to be allowed and celebrated by the community. We all come from different backgrounds and experiences and have divergent beliefs on how to protest.
I want to argue here, however, that part of that respect for diversity of tactics means also respecting a diversity of risk. If you want to protest differently from me, all power to you – but don’t use my body and the bodies of thousands of others who show up for one kind of tactic as a shield to protect you. When you throw a projectile or destroy property within a larger crowd of people, you are USING THEM AS SHIELDS WITHOUT THEIR CONSENT. Arrests and police violence can happen at any time, but when you use the crowd as a buffer, you are increasing their risk of both, and I repeat, WITHOUT THEIR CONSENT.
I am trans. I’d rather not get arrested for this reason. Transgender people are at increased risk for violent and generally shitty treatment in jails. Read the story of the transgender person who got handcuffed next to a toilet in the aftermath of the Brooklyn Bridge OWS arrests. (I have issue with some of his takeaways from that, most notably his lack of empathy with the “violent criminals” he believed he was housed with, but I’ll save that for another discussion.) The cops had a system for separating men from women and he confused them. Research also the horrid history of rapes and beatings of transgender prisoners by the authorities.
Other people want to avoid arrest – people on probation, people who have children or elders to care for, people who have special medical or dietary needs, etc. As for police violence, these same groups are all at increased risk, and those with limited mobility (the disabled, people marching with children, the elderly, etc.) are more likely to be injured in a mob of people trying to run away from projectiles.
I have heard complaints from those who espouse more radical tactics about the community trying to “police” them. Those who are “policing” from a moral perspective need to reexamine their self-proclaimed authority, but many of those who shout at provocateurs (whether they are internal or external) in a crowd are doing so out of a real fear for their safety and a desire to build a movement that is bigger than those who are able-bodied and willing to put themselves on the line to be arrested.
So if you want to include more creative forms of direct action in the next protest, band together with a group of people who agree with you and remove yourself from the larger crowd. Give the protesters around you the room to remove themselves from your form of protest and carry on with their own. That is another way to respect diversity of tactics, and one that will foster better will between groups who espouse different methods.
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