When I suggested that violence could be a possible outcome of that meeting, some SRR volunteers got really pissed off. But they did not react that way because on June 28 they had given any thought to the violent implications of their decision to take over SRR's offices. Instead, they were upset because I implied that they might have been acting recklessly in the service of the abstract principles behind their 'training' and 'mission' of non-violence. The point of their meeting was indeed to turn anger into something constructive. But that does not lessen the possibility that their mission of non-violence could easily dip into a destructive mode anyway.
Violence is always a possibility, precisely because it's so unpredictable.
Serious self-reflection would have taken that into account. Instead, the SRR volunteer leadership got caught up in the silky web of their own principles, and assumed that whatever they said or did on June 28, the benign ideals of their mission statement would necessarily triumph over the real possibilities of political conflict. In any event, the former volunteers at SRR have moved on. And it is fortunate that in planning CARA, the former volunteers at SRR are ensuring that the kinds of internal problems with SRR that led to its demise won't happen again. For instance, the agency's volunteers will require the board members to learn about the agency's mission.