There were a lot of things that bothered me about the lead up to the G20. This gathering in Friendship Park, essentially a meet-and-greet for the punks and the media, was one of the more absurd events I've seen.
I do have to be clear that just because people gathered in the park didn't mean they self-identified as punks. I'm assuming as much based on dress and conversational topics. And just because I showed up in flowing linens, stepping out of a fancy car with fancy camera gear didn't mean that I was in complete opposition to all the things the punks are about.
For weeks prior to the G20, we've been reading and hearing all sorts of rumors about what was going to happen when the world leaders convened in Pittsburgh. Whether it was from the anarchists themselves or the panicked populace, there was an uneasy anticipation that tens of thousands of black-clad punks would arrive in Pittsburgh like hungry, cranky locusts, devour our resources and spoil the milk for miles around. Businesses large and small shuttered for 3 days. Residents locked their doors and gladly took the days off given them. Was this part of their plan, to make us fearful of an uprising? When they champion the idea of a "people's uprising" as the massing in Lawrenceville will be on the 24th, do they consider that they're losing the trust of those who could most change things?
Why is fear involved at all? I can understand the desire to keep the police on edge and torment those in power with the potential loss of it but I don't get why they let fear spread among the plebes. Should we be scared because they represent an ending in their objective to change the socio-political landscape, where all the comforts and luxuries of living in modern America will cease to be? A punk agenda rising to a place of populist support would have us all earning less at the top, equalize our qualities of life, and potentially lead to less violence and more peace. I can see this as being resonable. I do agree with it in some capacity, as long as I get to keep doing what I want. I like things but I don't think things are everything, and the pursuit of really nice things isn't my reason for being. I digress.
We don't perceive the punks as coming here looking for social change or justice, or as prophets of a better way to live. We think of them as brick-hurlers, destroyers of the physical world, chaos unbound. We think they want to bring and end to everything. Some of them say they do.
Yet I don't get real impression that they're working truly for change. They're smarter than that. They're well-educated, often come from middle-class backgrounds, have had money, have known wealth, have accessed the Internet and have been schooled in self-branding like everybody else who's grown up in a MTV-influenced world. They're as aware of their PR as we. They're riding the waves of paranoia and taking the opportunities to stir up a little trouble because they can get away with it. And if they can't get away with it, they know that there will be cameras there to document them when they get caught, bloggers to chronicle all of their persecutions and a voice sympathy to cry out from around the world in comments, status updates and like buttons. They really can't lose. This isn't movement, it's a club. And they're having a blast with it.
And that brings us back to the event in Friendship Park. From the Pittsburgh G20 Resistance Project website:
Let's show them how a real civil gathering works: good people, good food, good times. Locals in the East End have already confirmed an Anti-G-20 Community Gathering in Friendship Park from 5:00 pm to 7:00 pm. Besides food, music and conversation, Rustbelt Radio, a project of Pittsburgh Indymedia, will be on hand collecting stories for its G-Infinity Media Project. The live, streaming audio project is a non-corporate, participatory media forum for the voices of the people who will not be in the room during the summit, who are affected by the G-20 economic policies but whose stories go largely untold.
They wanted to show that they had a soft side, to play a little game with the public and the media who've only found common grounds of contention prior. All the media in town showed up. All the media from out of town showed up. Every videographer had set their rigs on perpetual record in hopes of catching some sensational shot of chaos breaking out. They were, as Matt Stroud points out, praying for broken windows. Cleverly, the punks didn't give it to them. While it was free food for some, this was a game for all.
Going here, seeing the small turnout, the absence of black blok punks, the bored individuals wandering about, and the mass of mass media put everything in perspective for me. Where is the "community" gathered here? These events are not about action. They're about publicity. They lured the media to a near-meaningless event, aware that all the camera jockeys and reporters had to file something (like the videographers recording out of tune banjo dirges) for their editors since it cost money to send them out for the evening. It's so post-modern: as long as the event is recorded, it doesn't matter how big it was or what it accomplished. It happened, and it goes down in history.
There was no story here. There was no social change. The status quo remained constant. The punks got their press, the media got their story, the cops got their recon.
What is there to see? Dreadlocks and vegan food?
