The Bruce Report

The incident began predictably enough when a group of anti-free-traders, fresh from the picket line that blocked the entrance to the 2007 Atlantica Conference, noticed Crowley emerging from a downtown restaurant. Recognizing him as the founder of the Atlantic Institute of Market Studies, and one of Atlantica’s most ardent proponents, they formed a ring around his car hoping, as one protester later explained, “to get our message through to him.” 

Apparently, though, Crowley didn’t notice the two who had affixed themselves to the front of his ride. Police eventually stopped the vehicle and removed the offenders like so much bird poop, but not before one turned to the other and chirped, “Who is Brian Lee Crowley?” The vocal conservative commentator and architect of establishmentarian ambitions refused to press charges. Still, the fracas left him fuming. “What the hell do they mean, ‘Who is Brian Lee Crowley?’,” he was overheard to grumble.

Is this, then, the future of protest in the new age of Atlantica? Lo-jacking, confusion and comic relief? It’s a question that has members within the protest community, itself, increasingly divided. Does civil disobedience, even violence, work in the absence of knowledge, an overarching strategy, and organized tactics?

Following the June 15 arrests of 21 people for pelting police cruisers and a bank with rocks and paint bombs (most of the 70 charges have since been dropped), protestor Mike Doyle told the Globe and Mail, “Violence against corporate property isn’t really violence. It’s just another form of speaking. I’m not going to throw a rock at a bank, but I’m not going to criticize someone who does.”

Many seemed to agree. According to one blogger, “I think people fuking shit up for the sake of it is a good thing, an important thing, and something that needs to happen more and more often.”

Added another: “It’s less important what you’re protesting in this day and age, than the fact that you actually get out there and protest. There are so many reasons to fight all types of authority. It’s Atlantica today. Tomorrow, it’ll be something else.”

And another: “There are no such things as facts. Everything is subject to falsification. For this reason, I think that every single person in the protest had a different reason for being there. They understood the facts differently. I can understand why some protesters just wanted to fuck shit up. I think it’s actually a positive thing rather than a negative thing. They wanted to just break windows and smash cars and hit police. That’s an entirely positive thing because the Atlantica protest, for some, was about authority in general and not just ‘Atlantica’ as it exists through geographical trade sensibilities.”

Others were not so sure. Commented one blogger: “While it is important to resist authority and ‘hit them where it hurts’, I think it is just as important to be informed on why you are doing so. If you are aware of how Atlantica will and is hurting us then there is so much more meaning to your action. Using the people who just want to fuck shit up to help further your agenda and oftentimes do the things that you (global you, not you specifically) don’t want to take part in is exploitation.”

Said another: “While I agree with the point that the external media made about members not understanding who Brian Lee Crowley is, I also agree with the protesters for not giving a shit. [It] illustrates one particular example of why some of our movements are falling apart: We don’t want to listen to other people, talk politics, challenge each other. We just follow the herd and do as others do. Block this car? Sure!”

For their part, organizers of the Alliance Against Atlantica were quick to point out that most of the mayhem was perpetrated by members of a splinter group unconnected to the main rally. Dave Bush indicated that his preferred mode of operation is to produce fliers, petitions and teach-ins, but he also acknowledged that these tactics typically have limited effect without the headline-grabbing antics of a determined few.

A recent article in the Utne Reader makes some interesting points on the future of protest in general. Quoting a student organizer in the United States, the piece reported: “Many of us are disillusioned with the tactics, strategy and partisanship within the antiwar movement. There doesn’t seem to be much interest in talking strategy. Action has become ritualized. And, frankly, without a major shake-up of the status quo in the movement, I can’t imagine how the movement could ever become a relevant force in shaping U.S. foreign policy.”

Now there’s an idea: Protesting the regional protest movement until it gets its collective act together, or at least knows the answer to the question, “Who is Brian Lee Crowley?”

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