Teaching Rebellion

[sabotabby]

I would encourage you all to read Teaching Rebellion: Stories from the Grassroots Mobilization in Oaxaca, edited by Diana Denham and the CASA Collective. It's about the massive uprising—uprising isn't quite the word for it, actually—that happened in Oaxaca, Mexico, in 2006. Beginning as a teachers' strike and largely in reaction to the brutality and corruption of state governor Ulises Ruiz, the protests and occupations quickly grew into an all-encompassing social movement, with its own media, schools, art, police force, and democratic government. The book is a collection of first-hand accounts by people directly involved, ranging from a nine-year-old child to a grandmother.

Probably the most inspiring—to my mind at least—is the March of Pots and Pans, where 2000 women seized the state television station and ran it for three weeks. There's a good movie about that, A Little Bit of So Much Truth, which is one of my favourite documentaries.

But there's another section that I'd like to share with you, because it's pertinent to current events in North America. I'm amazed that in all the coverage, mainstream and alternative, of Occupy, I haven't seen a single mention of what happened in Oaxaca. It's very similar in many ways—the Oaxaca uprising represented broad swathes of the population, united in, as the book puts it, "one NO and many YESes," and attempted to create out of them an alternative society. It succeeded even in the face of brutal state repression. One thing that it had, that I see coming out of some but not most Occupy sites, is a vision of a functional alternative society—not just the removal of an unpopular governor, but an entirely different way of living. For me, this is shown most vividly when they talk about how they dealt with crime.

Even in a more just society than ours, people do bad things. One would hope that an egalitarian, rational society would remove much of the impetus for crime, but what do you do in the meantime? The Oaxacans had an interesting solution:

The topiles, the people's police force that served the entire social movement, was formed as part of the APPO's [People's Assembly of Oaxaca, the umbrella group that formed a substitute government during the uprising] Security Commission. Traditionally, topiles are responsible for security in indigenous communities; it's a job that rotates among community members. In these communities, every man has to be a topil for at least a couple of years as part of his duty to the community. If there's a drunk or someone who's causing a lot of problems or bothering people, it's the topil who has to take care of the problem. It's part of the usos y costumbres, which are indigenous systems of governance. So the APPO decided to re-claim that tradition and form our own security system, based in the customs of Oaxaca's pueblos.

The government had withdrawn all state police, and they were training them to attack the social movement. We were basically like police, but police who served the people and replaced state police. As topiles, we were in charge of dealing with both common criminals as well as the thugs sent by Ulises Ruiz to attack the movement.

...

When we detained people, or when the neighborhood self-defense committees turned people over to us, we tied their hands behind their backs and took them to the gazebo in the center of the zócalo. They had to stay there for a couple hours or else overnight if it was late, and the next day they had to do some kind of community service. Usually, they had to sweep the plantón [occupation site] or pick up garbage. It didn't really matter what they did, just that they did something.

...

At one point, we had considered creating a people's prison, because we didn't have anywhere to send common criminals. [...] The idea was that it would emphasize rehabilitation. We would give workshops and prioritize the education of prisoners. People rot in the state prisons; they only focus on punishment and don't do any rehabilitation.

Anyway, I think there's some important stuff here, so if you can get a hold of this book, you should. As awesome and exciting as Occupy is, it is by no means the first movement of this sort (well, neither was Oaxaca, obviously) and there are lessons to be learned about how to create a state of permanent revolt.

Comments

[nihilistic-kid.livejournal.com]

A great book. I strongly recommend buying it directly from the movement publisher, who also does ebooks.

[symbioid.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the recommend. I remember the "Lacondon(sp?) Declaration" from around that time. It was interesting, and I think I remember that episode with the flower sellers being attacked by the police, and something with the governor... Man, that's great there's a book. :)

I was thinking that while there's a lot of potential here, I'm so worried it's just gonna end up with some hippie dippie business as usual, and I want to see an honest to goddamned movement with social structures and organization and cross-networking across the nation (and ideally - internationally).

I was thinking what would be sweet was public displays of exercise and defense classes. That would scare the FUCK out of the powers that be, I think. Doing it in a way that showed integration, cohesion and unity would be way more terrifying than anything I think. Black bloc doesn't scare them, they relish black bloc (christ, I can't believe that a decade ago I had such boner for black bloc)... A few punks smashing windows isn't a threat - but to see unity and cohesion to the point of people doing cross town marching or jogging (is marching too militant? too soon? never? I dunno - then again the creeping fascism of the imagery is a bit scary as well, so I don't know what to do)...

Blah Tired and rambly -- but thanks again for the link, looks fascinating.

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

Thank you. I will check out.

[springheel-jack.livejournal.com]

MACHETE

[lienne.livejournal.com]

wow, that is awesome and exciting.