printIn Defense of Sabotage: A response to George Monbiot
by johan
Monbiot worries that it would be hard to gain the support of people ‘if we simultaneously engage in violent conflict with those we seek to swing.’ Granted, this is one reason we should not jump on subway trains and kick commuters in the head. Probably we might also want to refrain from indiscriminately blocking working people on their way home or randomly throwing substances on paintings. If we elect to undertake violent action, it should be against sources of the most egregious emissions – say, SUVs, private jets or new pipelines. These dead things that cause people to die do not belong to those ‘we seek to swing.’ They belong to the class enemy. The art of property destruction in a rapidly warming world is the art of targeting things the destruction of which would not cause people at the bottom of the pile to cry.