Black Bloc Organizers Respond to Mike Dolan

Okay... this form seems to not be working for us and thus all our neatly indented paragraphs have turned to mush. Please note that Mike Dolan's indymedia post was included at the end in order to provied context and we had intended to uuse this space to publish all our previous correspondence with him. We are going to publish it here as comments 1 letter at a time. Sorry for the unreadability

Solidarity,
Anti-Racist Action Columbus

Count me with the anarchists.

Middle-class liberals who are content with their non-profit jobs sucking the life and money from mainstream Gore/Nader political machines make me sick. Where is the potential for real social change?

Think of the time, money and energy that is spent making greenpeace infomercials, or 50,000 junk mail flyers endorsing nader, or jet-setting around pressing palms with government bureaucrats... if this money was spent on actual community-building, supporting groups like Copwatch or Food Not Bombs or artist/worker collectives, maybe we could see a real shift in how people are able to spend their lives. Instead, we have a few non-profit parasites who suck every last cent that people contribute to see real change in their lifetime.

Single-issue non-profits, while maybe creating 4-5 jobs in a community, act as a siphon for any incoming funds, resources, etc. Meanwhile, their typical middle-class control mentality takes over and they end up talking shit and wasting time writing position papers on nothing instead of actually getting something done.

The benefit of Seattle (and since) is that left-minded folks are leaning down their movement. We don't need a mass movement that broadly includes middle-class fucks like Dolan. We need a class movement that seeks to self-organize and overthrow all bosses, regardless of their ideology.

From: Michael Dolan <mfrancisdolan [at] yahoo.com
To: ARA Columbus <stop_tabd [at] hotmail.com
Subject: Re: N16-17
Date: Tue, 10 Oct 2000 14:27:30 -0700 (PDT)

Dear Columbus ARA,

Odd, I don't know your name(s) and here I am writing
you on Columbus Day. I assume you all are involved in
a local protest against the imperialist legacy
represented by this holiday. I am back in the Bay
Area where I live with my anarchist direct action
organizer partner Hilary. We are expecting a child on
or about N16 so I won't be able to be in Cin'ti myself
for the confrontation with the TABD.

I was surprised by a couple of aspects of your reply
and I just want to clarify a bit, after which we can
discontinue this dialogue, if you like. But first,
thanks for explaining who Strasser was. Now I know.

I didn't realize that you had a preexisting
disagreement with me, nor that you had ever heard of
me. I reached out to introduce myself -- a cold
email, as it were. But of course that exchange with
Berlet has bounced all over the place and poisoned
many wells for me.

Not that it probably matters to you, but I replied to
Chip privately, in response to the last of several
inquiries he sent to my office in DC. I replied very
impatiently (I was really busy on the China vote at
the time) -- hence the "tone and tenor" stuff to which
you have objected. Then he shared my reply with the
world. I have never spoken to him, but I hate him for
that. Live and learn; by the way, I consider this
exchange to be brivate between us, whoever you are.

I think you misunderstood my hasty reply to Chip
though. I didn't mean to suggest that the Left are
all navel gazers or lotus eaters. I am of the Left
also. But I am an organizer with little patience with
those that try to distract me from the coalition
building and grassroots education (about the
institutions of global corporate capitalism) that this
movement demands. In particular, Berletian lefties
who occupy themselves with marginalizing one another
are singularly annoying and, I believe, part of the
problem, not of the solution.

I think we can identify enough real enemies of the
working class without turning on our putative allies
in the movement, in other words. Which leads me back
to your original call to action. I was VERY GLAD to
see the call bouncing on DAN and other list serves. I
appreciated the anti-nationalist temper. My only
comment was that it was _unnecessary_ to throw in the
dig at the so-called 'fair traders' (which we all know
is short hand for NGO's like Public Citizen).

I should mention in this context that I am concerned
about digital agents-provacateur, anonymous voices
on-line who join discussions of message and action and
endeavor to sow seeds of division among us. You could
be cops or corps, for all I know (I do not suspect
this, nor am I accusing you, note), anonymous as you
are behind your organizational cadre tag. But even if
you are not working for the Man, you are giving aid
and comfort to the enemy when you taunt others in the
movement. I reached out to you to ask you to cease
and desist as we prepare for the TABD; and I do so
again here.

Finally, please understand that I was not suggesting
that we work together. If you re-read my orgiginal
note, you will see that I spoke only of our "tandem"
and "parallel" efforts. My only hope is that we all
keep our eyes on the prize and remember who the real
enemies are. They want us to snipe at each other;
they want the progressive anti-globalization movement
to fracture.

I won't give them the satisfaction (again, I despair
that Berlet posted my petulent response to him for
this reason); you will never hear me marginalize any
of us or you publicly in either the mainstream or
independent media. Can you please say the same?

Respectfully,

Mike Dolan

--- ARA Columbus <stop_tabd [at] hotmail.com wrote:
Dear Mike,

Thank you for your letter. It's nice to know that
other folks out there
consider Cincinnati an important battleground in the
fight against
oppression and its reorganization. We are also
pleased to see that you are
alert enough to see and respond to our call so
quickly. We apologize for
taking so long to respond. We feel this is a very
important issue, and took
the time to deliberate each word as a collective
before responding.

Unfortunately you did not give our call the reading
it deserved. You attach
too much to "silent foot soldiers," and not enough
to "We reject narrow
economic nationalism," which is more relevant to
our disagreement with you.
We don't disparage other progressives or liberals
who don't want to go the
full distance against capitalism. We do, however,
disparage those who will
get into bed with Pat Buchanan, who's populism
becomes fascism. When you
accept money from people like South Carolina textile
magnate Roger Milliken,
a union busting, red-baiting, arch-conservative, you
do so at the expense of
your legitimacy in this movement. We are not in
this movement to exchange
foreign Chinese sweatshops for Roger Milliken's
domestic ones.

Columbus ARA is an anti-fascist organization. That
means we fight in the
streets against fascism. The term fascists loosely
includes people you are
far from ashamed to accept money from and build
coalitions
with.

We read with interest your e-mail exchange with Chip
Berlet some months ago
concerning your strange political bedfellows. We
felt that the tone, tenor
and attitude you employed in that exchange more
accurately reflects your
politics than does the letter we have below.

After calling the left a bunch of "navel-gazers" and
"lotus-eaters" you
responded to Berlet's mention of Gregor Strasser by
asking who Strasser was.
We feel that this was and is an important and
relevant question, as
Strasser was a figure who exemplified the populist
and socialist currents
within fascism.

Gregor Strasser was a nazi and a contemporary of
Hitler's before the nazis
seized power in Germany. As you may know, "Nazi" is
an acronym for National
Socialist German Workers Party. Strasser and his
clique advocated the
Socialist and Workers part of the acronym more than
the National part.
While they were socialists, they were still nazis
and met an end such as
nazis deserved. Having outlived their usefulness
to Hitler's schemes, they were eliminated in
Hitler's "Blood Purge" of 1935,
also called the "Night of Long Knifes".

We think that this history is relevant to the
anti-globalization struggle
now. Unlike 70 years ago, some of us refuse
categorically to make deals,
temporary or tactical as they may be, with right
wing forces. We feel that
there is no place for fascism in any movement we are
a part of; nor is there
space in any such movement for people who would make
common cause with them.

The point is that you can't make common cause with
our enemies and claim you
share a movement with us.

This may seem harsh, but after your letters to Mr.
Berlet we know where you
really stand. Now where we stand is on the table as
well.

Sincerely,
Columbus ARA

From: Michael Dolan <mfrancisdolan [at] yahoo.com
To: stop_tabd [at] hotmail.com
Subject: N16-17
Date: Thu, 21 Sep 2000 18:04:37 -0700 (PDT)

Hi there --

This is Mike Dolan with Public Citizen's Global
Trade
Watch. We are organizing some of the permitted
stuff
during the TABD confab in Cincy, plus a Teach-In
opportunity to educate people and press about the
TABD's pernicious corporate agenda.

I have seen your call for anti-capitalist action
boucning off a few lists and I just wanted to check
in
and tell you that I am quite pleased that you all
will
be coming down from Columbus for this historic
confrontation between civil society and corpoate
rule.

I want to assure you further that we will never
endeavor to marginalize your message or your
actions.
As we all learned in Seattle, this
anti-globalization
movement is large enough to accomodate a broad
continuum of critique and tactics. It does none of
us
any good to taunt one another for being "reformist"
or
unstrategic. I believe -- and I hope you agree --
that we can work in tandem against the TABD (and
all
institutions of corporate globalization) without
disparaging our parallel approaches.

In that spirit, I just want to point out that the
bit
about "silent foot soldiers" does not accurately
characterize the relationship of the Fair Trade
movement to the direct action network, anarchist or
other sectarian cadres, either in Seattle nor
before
nor since.

I will be in Cincy next on 10/2 for a couple of
days,
setting some things up, and another GTW organizer
will
be on the ground working with local activists the
following week. If you would like to get together
and
discuss this challenge, please don't hesitate to
reply
hereto.

On behalf of the Citizens Trade Campaign and Global
Trade Watch, I honor your call and your
committment.
I look forward to seeing you on the streets of
Cincinatti.

In Solidarity,

Mike Dolan
Deputy Director, Global Trade Watch
Field Director, Citizens Trade Campaign

A Call for Anti-Capitalist Action in Cincinnati, OH for N16

We are calling for Revolutionary Anti-Capitialist people to come to Ohio and join us in opposing yet another undemocratic authoritarian structure functioning quietly in peace this year. On November 16th thru 18th the Trans-Atalantic Business Dialog (TABD) will hold their annual CEO meetings in downtown Cincinnati. The TABD has positioned itself as the executive vanguard of the World Trade Organization. They represent the interests of the European Union and North America in the process of the globalization capitalism. These meetings will bring more than 100 CEOs and top government officials together to resolve trade “issues”. This body represents the interests of the white, first world, capitalist elite, and exists to impose their collective will, not only the governments and capitalists of other nations, but on the working peoples of the world as well. Anti-capitalists of all backgrounds and philosophies must come together to opposed these authoritarian and exploitive policies and procedures. The TABD is yet another anti-democratic structure in the capitialist elite’s march toward unoppossed world supremacy. Along with the WTO, IMF, World Bank, UN, NATO, and NAFTA, the TABD is just one more tool for reducing inter-capitialist conflict, allowing them to better exploit the rest of us.

Many coalitions are calling for actions, rallies, marches, and teach-ins during this latest undemocratic meeting to divide the the world’s resources and the fruits of all people’s labor for the benefit of an elite few. Many of these actions will be legal, permitted, and reformist. Others will be of a non-violent, civil disobedient nature. But regardless of these various coalitions’ stances on tactics, none of their political statements represent our views or needs. For this reason, we find it necessary to organize in solidarity with these coalitions, but autonomously, on our own terms and with our own explicity anti-capititalist analysis.

We are not necessarily calling for any specific tactic aside from revolutionaries visibly standing together against imperialism and exploitation. We feel it is important that we stand apart from the advocates of “fair” trade and green capitalism. Whether it is the TABD or another global capitalist structure, our opposition is the same, we stand with indigenous people and the working class the world over against the facade of “improvements” on global capitalism; capitalism cannot be improved, it must be destroyed. We stand for a bright future, when the fruits of the world’s labor are used for the needs of the people that do the producing.


To that end we are against narrow economic nationalism. We refuse to play the game of pitting the working peoples of one nation against the working peoples of another, one state against another, or one eco-system against another. Capitial is globalized; the resistance of the working class must be as well.

The first-world business leaders who comprise the TABD think they can quietly meet in a very conservative midwestern city, plan, dine, drink, play, and slip back to their palaces and offices. We aim to show them that even here they will meet resistance. This is why we reach out to anti-capitialist people of all ideological persuasions to join us in our disruption of business as usual in Cincy.

We feel it is important as well to stand together with the rest of the movement in solidarity and oppostion, but at the same time visibly apart in our presence and analysis. It is time we spoke out about what we want, both within the anti-globalization movement and to the world at large. It’s time for the world to hear the voices behind the masks.


Our place and purpose is to keep resistance solidly anti-capitalist, uncompromissing, total, and global. Let the capitalists have no quiet city. Let the forces of reform no longer use us as silent foot soldiers. Let capitalism feel another blow.

We ask other like minded collectives and networks to move quickly to both endorse this propostion and join us in the planning and execution of this action. Join us in showing the capitalist class that the midwest is not their playground, that resistance can happen anywhere, and that revolution is afoot the world over.

Toward the new world we carry in our hearts,
In Solidarity,
ARA Columbus

Endorsed by:

The Anti-Racist Action Network
Eugene Anarchist Action (Eugene OR)
Kent Anarchist Black Cross Federation Branch group (Kent OH)
Kent Anti-Racist Action (Kent OH)
Chicago Anti-Racist Action (Chicago IL)
Radical Artist Terrorist Team (Yellow Springs OH)
Antioch Anarchist Group (Yellow Springs OH)
Chicago Anti-Racist Action (Chicago IL)
Yellow Springs Anti-Racist Action (Yellow Springs OH)
Prole Revolt (Morgantown WV)
Some Cincinatti Anarchists (Cincinatti OH)
Infoshop.org (Washington DC)

Dolan get a new job.

Folks,

In spite of my total support for your decision to take on Dolan's rhetoric v. acts discrepancies, as well as appreciation of your clarity in statements posted here, publishing someone's private correspondence without their permission is really, really, really bad process.

This was done to me after i confronted an anarchist organizer who sits on the board of a national anti-nuke organization about rape and his bad process afterward - the amount of anguish his international broadcast of my email caused me is something i am still working on getting over and it has severely impacted my ability to work with a number of [former] colleagues on nuclear issues. i received hate mail from people i don't even know, who should never have seen my private correspondence.

A hard lesson, but you can learn off my dime. Since i know Mike Dolan a bit socially, i feel confident in saying that while he can be arrogant and abrasive at times, he does know how to listen and debate and if you wanted a public debate with him on these issues i assume he'd participate. In effect, his post on indybay served to create that forum. There was no need for you to violate his trust re the privacy of your joint correspondence, and i would imagine that if he had posted it on a different sort of website where *you* would have been bashed, that wouldn't have been acceptable to you, either.

it really pisses me off to see this kind of divisiveness built on violations of privacy and respect. your arguments with him stand on their own and do not require the added email background, imho.

While I share a sympathetic stomach knot seeing someone else's correspondence plastered all over the web, I find it interesting that some people are surprised when this happens. Especially when corresponding with people you really don't know.

While a certain degree of confidentuality is expected between close friends or associates (people you know in meat-space) even in email, to expect it for other email conversations is dangerous and foolhardy.

If you don't want it plastered on the front page of the New York Times or to have to explain it to a prosecutor in court, don't put it in an email message to someone. Further, don't make comments about people or issues in private email that you are not willing to defend/explain in public.