Collective resistance has often taken a brutal turn, from the uprisings of nineteenth-century abolitionists, to the Los Angeles Watts Rebellion of 1965, to recent pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong. In cases like these, is violence defensible?
Today’s reading list considers different perspectives on this question, from a political scientist who thinks that “uncivil disobedience” is crucial to political success, to a former “terrorist” who thinks Antifa are harming their own cause.
And what happens when nation-states appropriate the language of necessary violence? A provocative personal essay from philosopher and former IDF crew commander Oded Na’aman picks apart the claims made by Israelis that “we never choose violence, violence chooses us.”
—Rosie Gillies
Self-defense is not merely an individual right; it is collective political resistance.
- February 1, 2018
The protests have been critiqued for their rejection of classic nonviolence—but that may help explain why they has been so successful.
- January 13, 2020
War is almost always a choice, a madness we go along with.
- August 15, 2016
Long before the Civil War, black abolitionists shared the consensus that violence would be necessary to end slavery.
- January 17, 2020
A debate with Mark Bray about Antifa and the use of violence as a political tool.
- November 29, 2017
Judith Butler talks with Brandon M. Terry about MLK, the grievability of black lives, and how to defend nonviolence today.
- January 7, 2020
Images of police violence against African Americans have a radical heritage.
- July 13, 2016
