Anarchists and their friends responded to the call by Palestinians to not stay silent about the ongoing genocide in Gaza by disrupting the obscene spectacle that is Peacock Lane in so-called Portland, OR on Friday, 12/22. For the unfamiliar, Peacock Lane is a single street in an upscale neighborhood where neighbors have been coercing each other into setting up half-hearted holiday displays for decades for the enjoyment of yuppies, many of whom travel in from the suburbs.
We refuse to indulge those who wish to just enjoy their holiday delusions without the harsh reminders that Christmas has been cancelled in Bethlehem, the town at the center of the “birth of Christ” myth which Christians purportedly celebrate on Christmas. Instead, we decided to replicate the Evangelical Lutheran Christmas Church’s depiction of the baby Jesus wrapped in a keffiyeh on top of a pile of rubble to symbolize the ongoing horrors in Gaza.
The action was organized autonomously, without any one organization taking charge or giving orders. Instead, a general plan was laid out, which included building the display and dropping a banner, and participants were invited to contribute however they saw fit. This structure gave people the option of coming up with their own complementary ideas or just assisting with the existing plan. Leading up to the event, it was made clear that this was a space for autonomous actions without fear of the kind of peace policing that has plagued many Palestinian solidarity actions in so-called Portland.
On the night of the disruption, we gathered a short distance away from Peacock Lane to talk about the general plan and to give people time to converse with each other about their goals. This allowed folks to find accomplices for their specific goals, whether that was collaborating on specific pieces of the existing plan or something else altogether. After people felt confident with their roles in the evening’s events and a general agreement had been made to be nimble and limit the duration of our disruption (we were not interested in symbolic arrests merely for the sake of getting arrested — a losing strategy that taxes community support and resources), we marched to Peacock Lane as a group.
While one group set to work preparing to drop a banner from the roof of a nearby Walgreens, others descended upon rubble found around the corner from Peacock Lane. We moved quickly and in a matter of minutes the rubble had been relocated to the middle of the road, blocking vehicle traffic and catching the eyes of the throngs of yuppies waiting their turn to look at some generic holiday displays. One comrade waved a Palestinian flag while the group began chanting. Candles and a road flare were lit while various traditional nativity characters were set around the pile of rubble. Flyers were also made for distributing to onlookers to provide context to our actions.
Almost as soon as the candles were lit, two Portland cops walked up to intervene. They were quickly followed by another two pigs, and in short order nearly 15 cops had assembled in the area — some even wearing riot helmets. Although there is a police substation not to far from Peacock Lane, it is our belief that the pigs were staged in the area given the pattern of disruptions at holiday events that have been occurring across Turtle Island. The pigs — and a couple of eager neighbors — quickly dismantled the display and moved it to the sidewalk, but no comrades were arrested. While all of this went down, comrades at the other end of the street lit some fireworks in an effort to further disrupt the evening.
The group that was working on the display left the area as it became clear that the pigs were not going to leave. The rest of the participants met up with them shortly after and we were able to debrief on the event. We were all admittedly surprised with how quickly the cops responded, but we were also grateful that nobody was needlessly arrested. While we obviously would have loved our display to stay around a bit longer, the coordination of the action was a largely successful display of what happens when people trust themselves to organize autonomously.
We hope this action serves as future inspiration for more autonomous actions. We don’t need organizers telling us what to do, and we don’t always need hundreds of participants to be heard. Our strength lies in our ability to be nimble and to trust each other.
submitted anonymously