Dear another point of view,

By the way, just like not everyone involved in a left group is white, which I acknowledge, not all women who wear head scarves are Arab. In fact, this woman that you’re talking about, the one who got arrested, is South Asian, not Arab. But we all probably look alike to you.

There is nothing in my report that claims that caaelii folks wanted to “control things.” If you had read my post clearly, you would’ve realized that the very first thing I said was that I support confronting racists at every turn. And if you had been at the rally and heard what caaelii folks had said very clearly, on the microphone, you would know that we also placed the blame for the arrests and violence on the cops, not on the anarchists or anyone else.

Planning and communication could’ve been better, I agree, and since you all were organizing for this protest “before caaelii ever signed on,” I guess the onus should’ve been only on us to try and communicate with you, even though your folks knew that caaelii was bringing immigrants from all across the city. And we probably should have just kept all the Mexican and Cambodian and Korean and Chilean and South Asian and Arab and other immigrants, along with our black and white allies, at home.

Oh, one last thing, by the way. I have it on pretty good authority, from someone who is a very, very close ally to the anarchists who decided, with others, to blockade the entrance to the church, that this “advanced action” was totally spontaneous. Which is fine, again, but please know that “advanced actions” are gonna get some kind of police response, and if you tell people that the action is “green” and it ends up not being “green,” remember that there may be others there that are more at-risk than you. That’s the bottom line, and it would be nice if one of you would acknowledge that in the same way that we at caaelii have acknowledged that WE DON’T BLAME YOU FOR THE ARRESTS. But we do blame you for the arrogance of not understanding why some, maybe most, of the immigrants at the rally were frightened, confused, and upset.