“Something that critics of nonviolence have long said is that nonviolence hides structural violence or the violence of the State, yet it is this kind of violence, and not riots or liberation struggles, that harms far more people around the world. It was no surprise, then, that many people, especially outside the United States, thought it was violent for someone to carry a gun in public, whereas hardly anyone considered working as a cop to be a violent act, even though being a cop means, among other things, carrying a gun in public. In other words, the category of violence makes the legal force of the police invisible, whereas it highlights anyone who fights back against this commonplace. This is why we say that nonviolence privileges and protects the violence of the State. This will prohibit people from coming armed to their demonstrations (even armed with things as innocuous as sticks or helmets) but will make no move to disarm the police, whom they often invite to oversee their protests. And this is why the police, in turn, try to urge protesters and protest organizations to be nonviolent, to publish nonviolent codes of conduct, and to expel or help arrest any ‘bad protester’ who doesn’t follow the law.”

—Peter Gelderloos, The Failure of Nonviolence

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