The violence and non_ violence

Article by Sameh Saeed Abbood 

              There’s a common mistake, even among the intellectual elites , which relates non-authoritativness to terror and violence .That even some of the writers in Arabic newspapers. Linked 11^th of September events of New York and the possibility of anarchist and unauthoritative groups standing behind it, to defend extremist Islamic groups. While actually the unauthoritative general opinion of terror is complete condemnation since it is considered a violation of human rights, also they oppose the violence that is separate from the masses considering it an authoritative act that replaces the masses with elites. And except for a short period in the end of 19^th century and the beginning of 20^th century in Italy and France, non-authoritatives never practiced terror though they were always accused in the minds of some and by their enemies. And despite the ultimate rejection to terror that characterizes the current non-authoritative practice and thought , for accuracy we should differentiate between leftist terror and rightist terror : the first practiced by a marginalized isolated minority of leftists and non-authoritatives that had mixed-up through their history , and we’ll find that it never exceeded individual acts of assassination against political , military, and ruling personals, or hijacking planes and abducting people to ask for ransom , or simple blow-ups in formal institutions vehicles, destroying public property and transportation  means and it is all acts ,most probable ,didn’t harm innocents and civilians and never targeted them intentionally. While the other type (rightist terror) is represented in the horrifying acts which reached civilians and innocents ,and which always aimed at increasing the number of victims intentionally and without differentiation example the last events and the Polonia train station of Italy , and the Oklahoma federal building , and blowing the Davied hotel in Jerusalem by Zionists.

The general rejection of non-authoritatives to violence is based on two bunches of reasons : the first bunch is according to the materialistic explanation for history and the human reality , while the second bunch arises from moral and human aspects , in which I see no mistake to include our reasons for different situations : for example the explanation of nuclear structure and reactions is subject to materialistic and scientific explanation , while moral and human aspects interfere in determining the usage of this theory : we either use it for peaceful goals or non-peaceful goals(war).thus with the ongoing admission of the necessity of materialistic explanation of social and human phenomenon’s when we want to determine our position against this phenomenon , we must take into consideration the moral and human aspects in general . and that there’s no contradiction between the materialistic explanation and the moral aspect . for we might admit that violence is the materialistic  explanation  ,but doesn’t mean we reject it and condemn it for moral and human reasons.

And since violence is one of the sources of materialistic authority, non-authoritatives according to their basic goal work to destroy monopolizing that source by some, and thus they stand against organized violence, that exists separately from the masses, and that is monopolized by some institutions; whatever was its names and goals.

          And so we have to differentiate between two types of violence, the first of which practiced by armed elites that is separated from the masses, which is fighting the ruling authority to replace it, using or targeting wide supporting for its political programs, and whether this kind of violence is terror against civil targets as a type of armed propaganda (Example: the Red Priorityies or Badr Mainhof group), or a guerrilla  warfare against military targets to defeat the authority army (Guivara and Maw type ), are both ultimately rejected for their elites authoritativeness and militarism . The second type of violence, is the violence of the absolute unarmed majority that explodes spontaneously in moments of objection and upheaval against the ruling authority, which are rare moments in history. And this type needs us to determine an accurate position towards it        

And to determine our position we should ask, what could the revolting masses do in the face of violent suppression practiced by the authority against its objecting and rebelling movements? Which means that the masses become in a self defense situation, the position is either to accept such mass violence and help change it from being spontaneous to being organized, but according to some conditions which are: violence is to be practiced by masses itself and by its own will, and to be the only option against the fierce repression of authority. While if there’re other options of non-violent opposition, like a public strike, or stop cooperating with authority bodies, and try replacing these bodies with other institutions, in this case we should choose the non-violent option and channel the masses toward it since it is a better option.

And non-authoritativness with its intellectual nature generally stands as an enemy to militarism since it is considered a companion to authority and hierarchy in their highest degree. For armies can’t be organized by non-authoritative rules and thus non-authoritatives are fighting to eliminate all military and semi-military institutions that are separate and arrogant, and to dismiss all armies, and eliminate all weapons industries. And fights for a complete removal of weapons from the entire world. And struggles war as a mean of ending disputes. Which defiantly means it won’t work to create replacing military institutions, oppositely it adopts wide public activities which makes the mission of such institutions (military institutions) impossible for example, what could the strongest army do in the face of a public work strike, and what could the state bodies do in the face of public non-cooperation with governmental bodies.

 After clarifying the non-authoritative position towards violence, terror, and war in general, we should know the reasons behind this position.

For example, the violence that some relates foolishly to revolution ,heroes ,and liberalizing, is most often big bright mask which hides goals of authority, crime, deceit and enslaving, which doesn’t represent a mean for the total liberalizing aimed by non-authoritatives , even it is the one of the most important means of social change in general. This is because violence is practiced only by those who are able to carry weapons and who are psychologically and physically qualified, and thus they are a minority, and they are subject to military hierarchy, which forces them to be totally obedient to those who’re higher than them in the hierarchy, so oppressing those in the bottom of the hierarchy is its basic law. For in an armed struggle, no one enjoys the quality and luxury of discussion and contradiction. And respect is to the one who owns power and authority. Not to who owns a right. Oppositely in non- violent struggles which depends on individuals and group actions, which allows diversity of thought and practice, and allows discussion and contradiction and is based on convincing and rebelling to power and scorning it, and not obeying, subduing and worshiping power. Non-violent practices cannot be practiced or be successful without the agreements of all the wills and actions of all those who take part in such a struggle.

The most important is that, those who practice organized violence, who are the armed minority, will have supremacy over those who don’t own means of materialistic coercion, who are the unarmed majority. And thus will gain privileges because of the supremacy and because of their history that is full of sacrifices, also because of mechanisms of worshiping heroines and power that always deceives the masses. This is the law that affected all written human history; who owns armed power, owns the right to rule those who doesn’t own such a power, and to snatch the social surplus form its producers. If real liberalizing means erasing such a law from human society, then the way to this ultimate liberty won’t be by replacing those who monopolizes violence (police, army) by others who raise mottoes by liberty and representing masses and defending them regardless of their good intentions. Oppositely liberty won’t happen, but by an organized group act which paralysis all violence, terror and oppression from the human relationships. For non-authoritative is destroying the law of the jungle which ruled the human history, despite of the civilization, which states that who owns violence means can force his will over those who don’t own such means.

The problem in which all rebels who practice authoritative; organized violence, gets involved in is that while time passes, they discover its very costly, for they need weapons and food and other things to on go practicing their activity, so we’ll find them involved gradually in criminal acts (who they claim revolting) to finance their activity ; starting from robbing banks , to kidnapping personals and hijacking means of transportation to get ransoms, to collecting taxes from those under their rule, and ending to smuggling and drug dealing…….etc. for example, in Colombia, the leftist Farak movement became an ordinary gang which deals in the regions it control and cooperates with “Madeline” cartel , in the same time Taliban, El qaada and the north alliance all exchanged control over planting and trading opium in Afghanistan which represents 70% of world production of opium during all the era of civil war. This happens despite of their Islamic ideology that prohibits producing, consuming or trading opium; put the end justifies the means! Also ensuring weapons and armaments needs cooperating with the world of organized crime, and with intelligence agencies of countries which have interest in supporting violence and terror, which opens a wide door to corruption, crime and conspiracy, and lastly using violence as a mean to finance like what Carlos did.

Also it’s important to mention the first successful models in China , Cuba and Vietnam , who all didn’t involve in such acts, all depending in financing on former Soviet Union in the beginning, and afterwards on both China and the former Soviet Union also more important than finance, is the relatively low cost of violence in the time of practicing these successful experiences .While with the increasing experiences of disciplinary armies in the face of terror and guerrilla  warfare ,practicing violence became much more costly and difficult ,which requires more support and finance ,which became rare ,thus involving in crime world becomes the easy option specially when winning gets further away (Example Farak) .For there’s only a thin hair between revolting and crime ,which is either cut or kept according to opportunists goals .Specially that opportunists and those who have crime in their minds or psychology finds it easy to wash their dirty pasts in such rebelling armed groups which have bright attractive mottoes .And it often happens that differences between the criminal and the rebel disappears when power becomes the judging law in relations between colleagues in the struggle and their enemies. And in the relations between the armed minority with the unarmed masses who they claim to represent and defend.

Organized violence doesn’t only need a specific psychological structure that doesn’t exist in all humans, but also with actual practicing and repetition ,it destroys and deforms those whoa practice it psychologically ,mentally and physically ;just the way it destroys and deforms those practiced upon involuntarily. For example ,getting used to seeing dead or wounded people and other forms of destruction is not a thing that helps the development of humans to the better ,and is definitely harmful to the psychological and mental well-being ,because those who practice violence as well as their victims both loses the delicate sensitivity which characterizes human beings from other living things ,as well as many psychological and mental disorders.

And if the Zionist butcher Menahem Beigin ,who by the way won the Nobel  “Peace” prize ,said once :l fight then l exist ;we say that such barbarous existence is worthy for jungle animals and not human beings ,for violence moves us nearer to that beastly primitive existence which doesn’t care about the sanctity of human life and rights ,and which brings out the worst human feelings and behavior ,while non-violent practices move humans away from the jungle and it laws. Looking at another aspect: whereas those who practice violence ,war ,and terror suffers different mental and psychological disorders ;others who don’t practice violence enjoy a better mental and psychological well-being ,since the overcome their fear of violence machine and oppression by their cooperation in challenging those who own it and their success in making it lose its effectiveness when it can do nothing in the face of their organized group action.

And we can see that the national Indian movement didn’t expel the British imper from their homeland with armed violence ,and thus we notice it’s the only country among all third world countries that didn’t experience the tyranny of national leaders :as far as l know. And it still practices bourgeois democracy despite all the problems and contradictions  the Indian society suffers from , whereas much less problems in other countries was the justification for the worst oppressions and tyrannies.

May be the most logical explanation for this ,is that the Indian national movement was the sole creator of peaceful resistance to colonization and may be this gets back to a whole culture that cherishes and sanctifies the value of life ,that it never hurts any creature even if it was an insect .But this doesn’t mean that the Indian society never knew violence ,for Ghandhi was assassinated by Hendoc bigot who was taught not to harm any living creature ,but he became bigoted because of what he was taught and he ended up killing someone like Ghandhi ,who spent his lifetime trying to establish the meaning of non-violence in human relations ,which is the basis of  the same culture to which his killer belongs. This includes a remark about the limited role of the cultural effect generally. And we shouldn’t forget that Stalinism in Soviet Union and East Europe didn’t fall using violence .For the democratic powers stood the most strong forms of Tyron states ,and these states fell down by the virtue of civil rebellion just like sand castles fall when waves come. The Berlin wall was destroyed and the two Germanys united despite the differences in the existing systems politically ,economically and socially ,when unarmed masses moved to the wall ,passed through it and destroyed it despite the violent machine that guarded it.

In my early teenage hood l read about two different struggling personalities ,who both affected me much ,and wished to follow their track in some short periods of my early life .One of them was Ghandhi ,whom thinking about faded away in such a short notice because of the prevailing culture then .which helped the other to become more prominent which is Gouivara ,whose way and thoughts ,according to the prevailing culture ,was better and revolting ,whereas Ghandhi wasn’t revolting. Because revolution and blood were always companions in minds of naïve romantics who fancied that any rebellion against any existing authority is progressive and liberalizing ,while it might lead to regression and tyranny ,and so it was said that Ghandhi was doing the British colonization in India no harm ,as if blood itself  became a target. And as l grew mentally more mature Gouivara’s picture faded gradually (in my mind of coarse) and the romantic worshiping of his charming personality turned to doubting his violent method ,and I discovered the fatal mistakes in his method which totally contradicted with the non-authoritative liberal ideology. Which eventually intensified the clearness of the Ghandhi method as a type of practicing that doesn’t contradict with the non-authoritativeness as the best way for liberalizing.

Another discovery was the genaral  strik as a basic mean for social change , as Rosa Luxembourg and her students from councils communists as well asthe anarchosyndicalist believed ,and as the most suitable weapon for the non-authoritatives in the face of both state and capitalism. This idea wasn’t clear or popular because of the prevailing culture and ideologies like Leninism and its different sub-ideologies in different leftist movements ,which all adopted elites ,violence ,and military coup d’etat as means of change and abandoned the principle of self-liberalizing for the used and oppressed ,which states that: The masses that are deprived from authority because they’re deprived from its sources are the only ones who’re capable of self-liberalizing themselves without needing anyone to speak ,represent ,or guardianship them ,so that they’ll end up used or oppressed by the so called representatives .

     And its about time this great human heritage should be retrieved in the face of the prevailing violence cultures and ideologies .For true freedom can not spring from the opening of the gun as bloody authoritative rebels claim. But it might spring from Gandhi’s she-goat and spindle as symbols of  self-liberalizing as humanist non-authoritatives foreshadow .