Comments Elsewhere

Crispy: “the very fact that a group would have ‘diffuse, locally based structures’ is extremely troubling to the naacp. i suppose now they will be attacking … the civil rights movement of the 1960s, for being too local and diffuse.”

Well, hell, why not? That basically was their criticism of the civil rights movement of the 1960s back during the 1960s — when the NAACP was constantly ragging on sit-in groups and then SNCC for not having “structure” (meaning unitary centralized chain of command) and for being too locally-driven, which supposedly led to adventurism and getting local movements into all kinds of messes that NAACP chapters and the Legal Defense Fund would then have to clean up after. (Hence, e.g., the recriminations over the fizzle-out in Albany, efforts to shut SNCC reps out of civil rights “unified leadership” summits and fundraising events, etc.) To abandon this proud tradition of pissing and moaning about diffuse, locally based movements, and those factions of the civil rights movement of the 1960s that actually got some shit done here and there, would mean abandoning all kinds of time-honored NAACP traditions. (Of course I refer here to the NAACP central command. NAACP local chapters did all kinds of courageous work alongside the direct-action movement, and generally didn’t waste time wagging fingers at SNCC’s lack of “structure.”)