ABSTRACT
I am at the European Union (EU) ‘counter-summit’ in Thessaloniki. Prior to the main protests on 21 June, the last day of the summit, I spend several hours in Thessaloniki’s Aristotle University campus, where squatting militant activists are taking advantage of the legal asylum granted on university premises. Here, in a philosophy department strewn with somewhat nihilistic graffiti (‘peace, love and petrol bombs’, ‘from pigs to bacon’, ‘middle class war’, ‘fuck the world, destroy everything’ (see, e.g. Figure 10.1), glass bottles are being transformed into molotovs, gas masks are being tried on, and ‘antiglobalisation’ protesters are calmly anticipating one of ‘the biggest riots Thessaloniki has ever seen’. I feel overwhelmed by a lack of humour, a swaggering machismo, a palpable hatred of the police – matched by an intention to do physical injury – and a welter of self-harm scars on the flesh of several protesters. This is hardcore. I leave the campus before the protest is due to begin, feeling confused and alienated by this calculated preparedness for violence and an obvious antipathy to intellectual reflection, as well as concerned for my friends there.
