Riots as Release – and Capitalist Counterpunch

Last week’s rioting throughout Greece that was ostensibly set off by a police shooting reminds us how fragile our modern sense of order can be and how institutions and political leaders often fall short in ham-handed attempts to deal with crisis. But why look only internationally? The unfolding of this drama recalled lessons not necessarily learned from our own Rodney King riots. Look at the parallels and at the weak, unreported signals, of what may have served as a tipping point to curbing the anarchists’ attacks. There we may find a lesson about what works and what doesn’t in such situations.

Trigger or Pretext?

First, is the triggering event a true motivator of mayhem, or a pretext for opportunists to exploit? I argue the latter. In Athens, by accounts of facts that are starting to emerge, the event that allegedly ignited the recent powder keg of fuming anarchy was supposedly an act of police oppression. Early accounts focused on two policemen confronting stone-hurling youths and shooting a 15-year-old to death in a seedy Athens suburb. There immediately followed official media releases about how the government intended to hold the police officers accountable and was charging the shooter with premeditated murder, while his partner was to be tried as an accomplice. Another story, which may be supported or refuted by forensic examination of bullets, differs dramatically from a hysterical and theatrical account oddly shared by rioters and government alike. It appears the police officer may have fired a warning shot which ricocheted and struck the youth by accident. But the youth himself was no angel. Else, why would a lad from the well-to-do neighborhood of Psychico be marauding at night with 29 peers in the seedy neighborhood of Exarchia known for drug sales and troublemaking? It certainly wasn’t for ministering to the unfortunate, as such action tends to be difficult to accomplish while hurling stones at police cars. To a mature Athenian still living in Greece, the kid was most likely there to buy drugs or get into trouble. Not that this makes him qualify for extermination. But it hardly makes him a noble martyr for some higher cause, either. So now he suddenly becomes the trigger for a week of national rioting throughout his country. What kind of logic explains this?

Answer: None. Any pretext will do. True, Greece is in a political and social tailspin, so no one is happy with present conditions. Does this justify wanton destruction? A lifelong media communications observer who has also lived in Los Angeles for two decades told me he saw an uncanny similarity in the start of the riots that flared at the reading of the verdict of the Rodney King trial. The first people he saw smash windows and damage other property were not minorities inflamed by injustice against their own but relatively young, Caucasian anarchists. You know the kind. The same variety surfaced for the Battle of Seattle riots in ostensible protest of the World Trade Organization’s summit a few years later. Historically the same kind of disaffected, anti-social radicals range the planet and plunge deeply, without restraint, into whatever target of opportunity avails, hence the McKinley assassination and anarchist outbursts of another century. One also envisions them fueling the excesses of the French Revolution with more torches and cries for the guillotine to answer any problem – real or perceived. This kind of phenomenon keeps the word bloodthirsty fresh in our lexicon.

Inept Response

Now for another parallel. As in the politics of the sandlot where a child may first meet a bully knocking smaller children off a see-saw or merry-go-round, appeasement continues to be reflexively tried no matter how ineffective it is at stopping mayhem. Thus the Greek government, in a blatant attempt to pander to the masses, hanged its police out in a political pillory with hasty and public charges of premeditated murder before any facts were in – and when even cursory examination of evidence would suggest the officers at least deserved the benefit of the doubt. Forget the issue of fairness for the moment, as the Greek government certainly did. From a management perspective alone, this move was pure folly. Why? First, it didn’t work. This move did nothing to curb rioting. Perhaps that in itself is ample indication that the riots were not really at all about the youth’s death as a result of police action. Second, and more importantly, it makes no sense at all to openly alienate and marginalize the very force one must then rely on for one’s own protection and for stemming the rising tide of violence as it is whipping itself into a sweeping crescendo. After being hanged out to dry, what police officer would risk life, job, or reputation by standing in the way of a rioter about to fire bomb a business or government office? The best he can hope for is to be ignored. But the worst is that he can be filmed, identified, second-guessed, and transformed into a scapegoat to be tried by his own employer as a jack-booted thug or human sacrifice to the mob. This is hardly a recipe for restoring order in the face of anarchy. Yet this was Greece. It couldn’t happen here.

Or could it? Back we turn to the Los Angeles riots. I recall listening to talk radio on a drive between Woodland Hills and East Los Angeles shortly before the riots. Los Angeles Police Department Chief Darryl Gates was being castigated for requesting $1 million in overtime in order to prepare for the contingency of widespread unrest he was forecasting, depending on what might happen at the flashpoint of a verdict being announced in the trial of LAPD officers accused of abusive treatment of Rodney King during his arrest. The negative media and political scrutiny that followed then extended to all law enforcement right before the riots broke out – hardly the kind of circumstances to encourage officers to put themselves at personal and professional risk when their customer base is villifying them and, to all appearances, arraying all the forces of government to publicly crucify the first officer caught on film doing anything that lends itself to the interpretation of interfering with a protester’s civil rights. Seem familiar?

Under the circumstances, whether in Greece or Los Angeles, why would any sane officer stand in the path of a rioter and a Molotov cocktail lobbed at, say, a small convenience store? Never mind that the store bears no relationship to the rioter’s stated grievance or that it represents the hopes, dreams, and livelihood of some hardworking citizen who is making a living, paying taxes, contributing to society, and playing by the rules. To the rioter, it’s a convenient target. It is a toy for an out-of-control child to smash. To the officer, it may be property that can be replaced, unlike human life. Depending on rules of engagement officially or unofficially imposed by the officer’s political leadership, and depending on the level of hostile media scrutiny present, the officer’s hands may be so thoroughly tied that intervening in such a case is impossible. So, here we have another parallel between Athens and Los Angeles. Yet there is one more left to note.

A Shopkeeper’s Alternative

Somewhere, in a virtual footnote lost in the greater media coverage, the notion of self-defense surfaces. In Greece, shopkeepers started fighting back to defend their own stores and livelihoods. They could no longer wait for a dithering government to decide to do anything for them. Nor could they wait for rioting anarchists to realize that the shopkeepers were unconnected to their stated grievances. They had their livings to defend. So they started physically confronting the rioters to defend their businesses. Perhaps in our society, which is more diverse and modern, such actions would strike us as unseemly. So it appeared to be during the L.A. riots. One group of immigrant Americans stood out from this crowd, however: Korean American shopkeepers. Just like the Greek merchants finding themselves with too much to lose, they mobilized in their own defense. Only the Koreans cranked it up a notch. They formed revetments and foxholes with bags of rice in front of their stores. And they stood guard with rifles on rooftops. Pretty soon, it became clear to social activist rioter and criminal looter alike that if you wanted to visit mayhem in real or stated sympathy for Rodney King, you better stay clear of Korean businesses. And there we see a cost-benefit analysis still taking place and guiding actions, even in times of crisis and unrest.

One wonders how much the basic tools of positive and negative reinforcement could be better applied to such riots than all the hand-wringing and apologizing and political spinning tend to accomplish. There comes a time when actions speak louder than words. Anarchists seem to have figured this out, but are counting on their targets being slow to realize the same.

- Nick Catrantzos