Violence in Struggles Against Oppression

[The Feral Underclass]

For those groups of people who suffer structures of social oppression and privilege, such as women, disabled people, queer people and people of colour, is violence a legitimate tactic to be employed against individuals and institutions that perpetuate those structures?

[helot]

The oppressed are always in a position of legitimate self-defence in regards to their oppressors so ofc my answer is yes, the use of violence by the oppressed against their oppressors is legitimate.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Difficult to answer that exact question. And I guess i'm not in a position to say.

I'd not advise saying 'yes, violence against individuals who perpetuate oppressive structures is OK', since that would effectively create a society in which women can legitimately be violent to men, non-white people can be legitimately violent to white people, homosexual people could attack heterosexual people and so on and so on. It's the sort of thing that could be very easily mis-interpreted and lead to acts of violence against people who are only perpetuating such structures by the fact they are men, or white, or heterosexual etc.

I think the idea of legitimate self-defence is pretty much spot on, though. I think that's always been a suitable tactic for the oppressed and exploited in society alike.

[Landsharks eat metal]

Am I the only one who thinks it's useful to differentiate between privileged and oppressor? I feel like people often automatically jump to use the word oppressor, and I'm not sure if it's always a valid point. Just because someone happens to be heterosexual or cisgender while I'm bisexual and trans doesn't mean they are oppressing me by their existing and being who they are.

[The Feral Underclass]

Am I the only one who thinks it's useful to differentiate between privileged and oppressor? I feel like people often automatically jump to use the word oppressor, and I'm not sure if it's always a valid point. Just because someone happens to be heterosexual or cisgender while I'm bisexual and trans doesn't mean they are oppressing me by their existing and being who they are.

That's not really the distinction that's being made though...

[The Feral Underclass]

The oppressed are always in a position of legitimate self-defence in regards to their oppressors so ofc my answer is yes, the use of violence by the oppressed against their oppressors is legitimate.

I guess the question I'm asking is whether it is legitimate in an offensive sense, rather than defensive. Or can offensive tactics be justified as defensive?

[helot]

I guess the question I'm asking is whether it is legitimate in an offensive sense, rather than defensive. Or can offensive tactics be justified as defensive?

I think offensive tactics can be justified as defensive.

[Quail]

Before I respond I'd just like to clarify that what I understood by TAT's question is whether it's legitimate to use violence against people who are actively taking part in oppressive structures, which is completely different to asking if it's legitimate to use violence against all people in a privileged group.

I think it depends on the situation. Self-defence is a given, of course. For example, if a man I don't know grabs my arse, I don't think I'd be unjustified in using violence to get the fuck away from him. It also would be justified to use physical force to prevent someone else from getting hurt. I don't think it's always that simple though. If I am alone and there is a man making me feel unsafe, is it still okay to use violence? I am likely to want to remove myself from the situation, which tbh is unlikely to involve me being violent, but let's suppose it did. I'd be acting on the possibility of him harming me based upon past experience of living within a world where I cannot guarantee that I will be treated as a human being based on my gender. It might not be safe to wait for them to make the first move, in which case, yeah, I think the violence would be justified.

Another side of this is, how helpful are acts of violence in struggles against oppression? On an individual level and on a small scale, they keep us safe, which is important. I imagine there are a fair few ways in which violence (or property damage/sabotage) could be used to good effect on a larger scale but I'm writing this quickly and nothing sensible immediately springs to mind. One of the important things (imo) about unpicking discrimination is encouraging solidarity and understanding between the privileged and disadvantaged groups, so I think if violence as a tactic is inappropriately used we could end up shooting ourselves in the foot.

tl:dr there is a time and a place for violence.

[BIXX]

I would say yes.
As long as it is ethical violence I think it's fine. If it is unethical, then I wouldn't support it.

[Ethics Gradient, Traitor For All Ages]

Who's ethics will be used to judge that?

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

I'd say generally there's nothing unethical about it. Whether or not it's strategic or useful in a given situation varies wildly - ie organized violence is generally more effective than isolated attacks, etc. That said, there are certainly immediate situations where someone shit-kicking an individual rapist, homophobe, or bonehead makes absolute sense.
Where shit gets more complicated is in situations within which the dynamics of perpetrator/survivor, oppressor/oppressed, whatever are shaped by a whole bunch of interrelated structures of oppression/repression/exploitation. Is it fucked up for a striking worker man to put a pipe through a woman cop's teeth? What if he calls her a "B**** c***!" first, and singles her out among the police? What about when a scene of predominantly white anarchists shitkicks a POC accused of sexual assault? What if? What if? What if?
Which isn't to say that every instance is this complicated - sometimes shit is relatively cut-and-dry - and, anyway, it's up to those who are involved to make the decisions.

[The Feral Underclass]

Who's ethics will be used to judge that?

What do ethics have to do with it?

[Ethics Gradient, Traitor For All Ages]

I'm asking echoshock since it was her/his criteria for support. Imo violence on the part of the oppressed is always defensive at a systemic level, violence can only be offensive on the part of the oppressor under current conditions. That doesn't mean that violence on the part of the oppressed is always justified or useful because as pointed out earlier, members of our society can be privileged without taking an 'active' role in oppression.