“Look. Here’s our problem, see, we’re trying to get some sleep and people keep throwing crap on us. Now we want somebody to throw them right in the craphouse. And I’m delegated to do the hiring here, and, ah, here’s what the job is.

“You see, they won’t go in the craphouse by themselves. And we all agreed on the rule, now, and we firmed it up, so there’s nobody gets out of it, everybody’s vulnerable, we’re gonna throw them right in the craphouse.

“But ya see, I can’t do it cause I do business with these assholes, and it looks bad for me, you know, ah . . . so I want somebody to do it for me, you know? So I tell you what: Here’s a stick and a gun and you do it — but wait till I’m out of the room. And, wherever it happens, see, I’ll wait back here and I’ll watch, you know, and you make sure you kick ‘em in the ass and throw ‘em in there.

“Now you’ll hear me say alotta times that it takes a certain kind of mentality to do that work, you know, and all that bullshit, you know, but you understand, it’s all horseshit and you just kick em in the ass and make sure it’s done.”

So what happens? Now comes the riot, or the marches — everybody’s wailing, screaming. And you got a guy there, who’s standing with a short-sleeved shirt on and a stick in his hand, and the people are yelling, “Gestapo! Gestapo!” at him:

“Gestapo? You asshole, I’m the mailman!”

Full transcript posted here

And the answer to your question is simple.

Q: “So maybe it’s worth asking: Why is Oakland so different? Why are these kids throwing things at police when they know they might end up in jail?”

A: Because the Black Bloc are, for the most part, very comfortable middle- or upper-middle-class white boys who have enjoyed a truly staggering amount of social and financial privilege their entire lives. And it is precisely that privilege that fuels their behavior — as well as their thoughtlessness about how their behavior affects people who aren’t as privileged as they are.

Let’s face it: they just don’t much care that they’re shitting where other people have to eat, and they don’t much care if Occupy Oakland, or Oakland itself, goes down in flames. If it does, they’ve got generations of white privilege and financial cushioning that they can peel back into at the drop of a hat. They may be slightly inconvenienced if things get unpleasant, but at the end of the day they’re not going to sink. And they know that quite well.

There’s a reason you don’t see low-income kids of color among the ranks of the Black Bloc.

http://www.kpfa.org/archive/id/77663

All of this is extremely messy and dispersed, and that’s what it needs to be to expand – and I think we need to keep in this in mind, and be wary of any terms we use that can constrict our understanding into something simplistic. This includes the words “front lines”, “violence” and even “good” in addition to “group”