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Left Unity: A Discussion

‘Brian: We mustn’t fight each other. Surely, we should be united against the common enemy?

Mass of fighting lefties: The Judean Peaple’s Front!!!???

Brian: No, No. The Romans!

Mass of now peaceful lefties: Ohhh, yeah.’

-Monty Python’s Life of Brian

The subject of left unity was discussed at our last meeting, and as you might expect there was a great deal of skepticism expressed by those present. Since the split in the First International in the late 19th century Anarchists and Marxists have rarely seen eye-to-eye. To that extent nothing in this article is particularly new. It is interesting that while most of those that chose to comment are not paid-up members of any political grouping, let alone a party, that the concerns they express about working with Marxist groups could have come from George Orwell himself. This can either be viewed as evidence of our intellectual laziness or that the criticisms are cliche for one obvious reason, that they are true! I will leave it up to you to decide.

This article is a collection of opinions expressed by four individuals who attended that meeting. I have used fake (but humorous) names for the contributors just in case any far-right trolls come trundling by, and feel the need to track us down and harass us. I would encourage anyone interested in the subject of left unity to comment underneath.

Lobo: ‘Where to begin with the concept of Left Unity? Besides the historical precedent of the crushing of the Makhnovist movement in the Ukraine by the Red Army, or the tragic betrayal of the Spanish Revolution by the Commintern, there has been little evidence recently that the Marxist-Leninist parties (in the case of Ireland: the Socialist Party, the Workers Party and the Socialist Workers Party) have anything but contempt for Anarchists and Libertarian-Communist ideas. This is not particularly surprising to me. I was a member of the Socialist Party for several years in my late teens and early 20s, and remember well the derision expressed behind closed doors for Anarchists. We were dubbed ‘juvenile leftists’, ‘liberals’ and ‘a danger to the revolution’. The attitude of these cultists, because that’s truly what Marxist-Leninist groups are, has not changed one iota since the early 20th century. This is not to absolve Anarchists now or in the past of blame for the lack of Left Unity. I know plenty of hipster Anarchists that would rather read Bakunin and listen to Frank Zappa records from the safety of their cushy flats paid for by their parents than involve themselves in the class struggle. It’s dreadfully easy to be ironic in this day and age…Of course as we speak Anarchists and Marxist-Leninists cooperate in broad coalitions: whether it be for repeal of the 8th Amendment or campaigns for council housing. And should there ever be a threat from the Fascist far-right we would, of course, band together for protection, but this hardly equals Left Unity. In practice it’s more of an insurance policy against Fascist violence. I think fundamentally that Marxism-Leninism will inevitably lead to authoritarianism, as Bakunin first stated in 1870s: ‘“Either one destroys the State or one must accept the vilest and most fearful lie of our century: the red bureaucracy.” I think the evidence of multiple failed Stalinist states, from East Germany to North Korea, during the 20th century proves that point amply. Therefore, as Anarchists we should not seek anything but cordiality with Marxists, for fear of history repeating itself.’

Green Lantern: ‘Left Unity seems to be possible to a certain extent and under certain circumstances. History has proven that political parties and groups that lay on the left side of the political spectrum came very close to each other in several occasions mainly to fight for social rights or against a common enemy (i.e. fascism). However, when the prominent question was the seizure of power, the split was inevitable. Anarchists have to oppose any type of power/government, so they easily become an easy target to blame from leftists in such situations. So, what can we as Anarchists expect from any type of Left Unity? Well, nothing special in the long run, but let’s keep our eyes open for any positive actions that might assist us towards our goal for more democracy, freedom and end of hierarchy.’

Darkseid: ‘In general, although Left Unity’s presence becomes more and more dynamic, info necessary, due to social and political turbulences, which tend to destabilise and divide the people, it is my contention that it still lacks coordination and influential initiatives. Although their voices have begun to echo louder and a shift has been observed in people’s mindsets regarding left Unity’s ideas and principles, it is devoid of any substantial organisation and unity, which, in the long run, results in it being considered a form of minority. Its historically biased history, together with its suffocating internal conflicts, already predisposes a difficult path ahead; however, their members appear quite reluctant and hesitant to take substantially drastic actions, almost to the point of apathy. Which is disappointing, due to the fact that the pressing matters it addresses, such as environmental issues, anti-capitalist agenda, LGBT, gender equality, should have thrusted it to one of the “hottest” talk in town.’

Superman: ‘To me it is amazing to hear Anarchists complain about working with other left wing groups. The more histrionic seem to think that to work with other leftists will automatically lead to the a repeat of {famous historical event where we were stabbed in the back}. This seems unlikely, as…How to put this gently? It’s not the 1930s anymore! There are barely any Communists and Anarchists left for one thing…I mean we’re not like the immortals from Highlander, but if things keep going the way they’re going ‘there will only be one!’ In other words we can’t be so picky as to who are bedfellows in the class struggle are. Secondly, if we really are worried about Marxist-Leninist parties and their penchant for seizing power, well let’s not work with them, but you can’t label all left wing parties and groups Marxist-Leninist, because that’s lazy and sectarian thinking of the worst sort. There are great activists in even the most bureaucratic and toxic parties. We should be trying to talk to as many like minded people as we can, not demonise half the left because the leadership of some socialist groups are shit. There is a happy medium between blissful irrelevance and Kronstadt, it’s called using your commonsense to figure out objectively who you should ally with, and who you shouldn’t. To me that is left unity. And it’s also the only way our ideas will get off WordPress and into the real world.’

[anomiezine-blog]

Anarchism is female-gendered

“It is true that equality of the sexes is impossible under capitalism. If all women work as much as men, what will happen to those institutions on which capitalism depends, such institutions as churches, marriage, armies, and the millions of factories, shops, stores, etc.. which are dependent on piece work, part-time work. and cheap labor?”

Interview with Simone de Beauvoir (1976)

In theory, our (capitalist) society is governed under the principle that gender is different but equal. This principle, however, appears quite problematic from the beginning; why does sexism exist? The ‘pay gap’? Shocking numbers of sexual assaults and rapes against women? Cat-calling? Abortion-shaming? Transgender discrimination? The notion that society’s attitude towards women is unfair and oppressive is just a small fraction, or even better, a symptom of a deeply unequal and polarised society, that challenges and re-defines women’s existence and bodies, rendering unto them a state of constant war in order to defend and vindicate their rights.

Feminist scholar Simone de Beauvoir eloquently touched upon the issues of sexism and gender inequality under capitalism. For de Beauvoir, gender class is class struggle. And capitalist society is dependent on class exploitation. Looking back at what the struggle for women’s liberation has achieved in many societies throughout the world over the last 100 years, where radical improvements for women rights, as well as a deeper understanding of gender roles and social expectations have taken place, one can observe on the whole that, sexism and patriarchy have been crystallised into a Foucaultian dispositif. It is more invisible than before, but the power relations appear too rigid to collapse.

I was reading an article the other day on voidnetwork.gr about how women are more financially vulnerable than men. Under capitalism, childbearing is women’s responsibility. The biological role of women means that (provided they have children) they should abstain at least some time away from their paid employment. Their biological role also makes them ultimately responsible for any child they give birth to. Consequently, paid maternity leave, single parent allowance, parental leave, leave to care for sick children, free kindergarten and childcare facilities, etc., they will always be exclusively issues for women. Battles over custody, childcare services, single parenting, and so on, always affect women more than men. Yet, without full economic equality, it is difficult to put an end to the unequal power relation between women and men and the ideology of sexism associated with them. Thus, although capitalism could adjust equality between women and men, the reality is that full realisation of this equality is quite unlikely to be achieved under capitalism. This is simply because there is a financial penalty linked to women’s biology that makes the profitable capitalist society inherently biased against women.

The right to abortion is another soft spot. It isn’t arbitrary to say that, the biggest adversaries of abortions are men. Their tactics vary from merciless witch-hunting, where they target women who have undergone abortion by calling them murderers, that they will burn in hell, etc., to cyber-bullying, organising and coordinating protests outside planned parenthood clinics with the most horrendous graphic signs. Of course, governments only add insult to injury. In countries like Poland, where the government outlawed abortion after decades of liberal legislation or Argentina and its dashingly disappointing referendum on abortions. In other countries, like Greece for example, the voices of pro-life advocates are becoming more and more strong, it seems that despite the long history for women’s liberation, the progress is not linear and that liberation won’t be gained only “in time.”

There are still many lingering norms and stereotypes, even within the more liberated movements, that we need to uproot so that we can move towards a free, autonomous society, where each person respects the freedom and independence of the other. So far, gender inequality issues are buried with excuses such as “it’s not the time,” “there are more urgent issues to solve,” “they’re outdated, since things are better than before,” “they are exaggerations of feminists who want to cast off men” or “the feminist claims divide and break the movement.” Feminism is an intersectional, changing ideology which permeates many aspects of the social sphere, such as, political, philosophical, economic, psychoanalytic. But it has never been just a system of ideas. It is, more importantly, an invitation and a challenge for action. Without action, feminism would be simply a hollow, self-indulgent rhetoric. We have gender studies, feminist perspective, the female gaze, and post-feminism interpretations. This said, in addition to defending the liberation of women, feminism constitutes a different angle under which we can interpret and criticise society as whole. Doesn’t it all come down to women in the end?

[anomiezine-blog]

The Cult of the Proletariat

“Because the horror of Communism, Stalinism, is not that bad people do bad things — they always do. It’s that good people do horrible things thinking they are doing something great.”

-Slavoj Zizek

‘But as in all cults, what’s central to the Communist Party is the belief system and the elimination of nuance. From there you’re very slowly led down the road to fanaticism and mass murder.’

– Alexei Sayle

I have found a way to tell apart Leninists (otherwise known as Communists or Bolsheviks in the common parlance) from what you might call the reasonable left. It is not the outfits, stained by take-away and Tippex, or their odour, because deodorant is a bourgeois affectation. Instead it is their answer to one rather simple question: ‘Do you trust people to make their own decisions?” I have never met a Leninist that didn’t say No. An addendum to that might be the question: “If you could have your revolution but it would make people poorer and less free, at least in the short term, would you still want it?” Once again I have never met one that didn’t answer in the affirmative. It is the same toxic combination of misanthrope and fanaticism that you can now see in Brexiteers in Britain, and amongst Fascists the world over. It is the belief that you and your tribe alone have received the revealed truth from on-high, and however you see fit to make that a reality is acceptable. It is the language of a cult.

It’s a word that is thrown around a lot and there are even multiple competing definitions, but it is essential to understand what a cult is if we are to understand the toxicity at the heart of Leninist parties of the past and present. What are the obvious signs of a cult? In my opinion, there are 10 unequivocal signs:

1. A small group of people united by a Utopian ideology (or religion) who stand outside normal society.

2. A dominant leader/s that hold complete power over the lives of its members.

3. An all-or-nothing worldview. “Either the Revolution comes or the world will end.”

4. A cadre or administrative class that directs the majority of members.

5. Gaslighting. The changing of facts and reality to suit the party.

6. Mental, physical or sexual abuses (see the SWP in the UK)

7. The policing of language, opinions and the effective creation of secular blasphemy.

8. The welding of the social and the political. The party becomes your only community, sometimes to the detriment to your family and older friends.

9. Those that leave the party become apostates and are to be shunned and demonised.

10. A uniform. In this case conformity of clothing is encouraged through bullying and mocking rather than an order from above.

It is hard to explain to those that have not experienced life in a cult why anyone would willingly join such a toxic entity. Left wing cults, like all cults, don’t look toxic from the outside. In fact, when you first join you are often showered with not only attention, but with a sense of purpose. You feel that finally you are with people that see the problems of the world as you do and are motivated by high ideals of humanism and solidarity. This is described by some psychologists as the lovebombing stage. It is a very powerful indoctrinating tool and often keeps individuals attached to the party long after the toxic nature of the party has become apparent.

In this I can at least speak from personal experience. I was a member of a Trotskyist party, that shall go unnamed, in my youth and I got a firsthand experience of cult tendencies within the left. All the cliches were there; the lovebombing; the close social circle; shadowy General Secretary; the strict hierarchy; the self-censorship of speech; the pandering to party leaders; the Gaslighting; the blasphemy; and the apostates. I have done a large amount of study of what are known as cluster B personality disorders (anti-social, narcissistic and Borderline) since, to try and understand what had happened to me, and I can attest to the presence of these toxic behaviours within all levels of the party structure. I am not the first to notice the cult tendencies within Leninist parties, in fact a cursory google search will present you with ample evidence of how commented upon this is. It really is one of the worst kept secrets on the left. Yet, these parties still persist and in the case of Ireland are the only real alternative to the parties of the Landlord class. As an Anarchist with a sense of history and responsibility this is exceedingly worrying.

This is not to suggest that Anarchist groups can’t become cult like. I spent time in a certain British anarchist group, that again shall not be named. In many ways it functioned along similar lines to the Leninist party I had formerly been part of . While there was a rotating leadership role, the same small group of people swapped the officer positions, and there was the same narrow mindedness to new ideas. Thankfully there is a great deal more individualism amongst Anarchists and this small toxic group were eventually expelled from the organisation. To some extent cult behaviour is a human failing. The legitimate and noble desire to make the world a better place can easily be perverted by disordered people for their own pleasures. You can see this in countless churches, sects, and organisations of every hue. In the case of political groupings, at least, anarchism has an answer and it is in our very DNA. A distrust of authority. Leninists parties can never be reformed from within given their very inspiration was taken from the mind of an authoritarian cult leader, Vladimir Lenin.

If you have the time or inclination to read about the father of 20th century Communism, you will learn many things, none particularly endearing, whether it be his: accepting German Imperial help in 1917; crushing the Soviets, snuffing out workers’ democracy; the invasion of Poland in 1920; the founding of the vile gulags; the rejection of a democratic vote in 1917 that the Bolsheviks lost; the creation of the brutal Checka, etc. The figures vary, but Lenin’s Red Terror is believed to have killed anywhere between 100,000 and 1.3 million people. The fanatic view of the Lenin towards any challenge to the new regime was published within the organs of the party: ‘anyone who dares to spread the slightest rumor against the Soviet regime will be arrested immediately and sent to concentration camp”. By 1921 70,000 were imprisoned in the brutal gulag system. The authoritarian and genocidal views of the Leninists were apparent quite early with Grigory Zinoviev declaring in 1917: ‘To overcome our enemies we must have our own socialist militarism. We must carry along with us 90 million out of the 100 million of Soviet Russia’s population. As for the rest, we have nothing to say to them. They must be annihilated”. The fact that so many within the left still celebrate this man is stunning to behold, but then again he had the good fortune to die before the experiment of Leninism reached its apex under his protege Stalin. He would order the deaths of tens of millions of his own people, whether through the repression of the secret police or through man made famines, and after World War II enslave the population of Eastern Europe for half a century. And yet, the failure of the Left to ever really exorcise the ghost of the USSR and Leninism is one of our greatest failings. The supposed unique evil of Josef Stalin is a lazy way to avoid the truth, that the Bolsheviks were totalitarians in their very DNA, due to the teachings of Lenin. The USSR was in its origins a cult of Leninism extended to the entire Russian Empire. The Left need to except that the USSR is ours to own much like the right must accept Fascism as the logical extension of their own ideology. There is little to salvage in this experiment and the left should have long ago acknowledged Leninism as the twin evil of Fascism in the 20th Century. Unfortunately, it has not and we are left in a situation where anarchism remains at the fringes and the Leninist parties remain the only likely alternative to what must soon follow another violent collapse of Capitalism.

Any reasonable look at the enormous debt bubble forming around the world can not help, but lead you to the conclusion that a major global depression is looming. The conservative estimate is that there is 420 trillion dollars of debt worldwide. In Ireland we are one of the most indebted countries in the western world. Our debt to GDP ratio is 170% of GDP with some estimates as high as 210% of GDP. Each Irish citizen owes 42,000 Euro of debt. We will never be able to pay that off. This global debt can be combined with the huge wealth now centred in the hands of a very small cabal of oligarchs. Less than 100 persons now own over half the wealth of the entire globe. A vampiric ruling class long ago tore up the post-war social democratic settlement and could give a shit about the long term cost of their greed. As a result, the middle class’s spending power has shrunk to a fraction of what it once was. (Economics 101: the middle class buy the products of the ruling elite. If they have no money, and cannot borrow anymore, a crisis of capitalism ensues. It is that simple!) This makes a major depression almost inevitable, with some recent estimates saying it will arrive by as early as 2021. A collapse of capitalism will in rather short order unleash not only the demons of Fascism, but also the demons of Leninism. If, as I fear is likely, we are in the midst of another era of capitalist crisis similar to the 1920s and 30s, the corrupt parties of the centre across Europe will fall, and the masses will look for answers and alternatives to croney capitalism. At the moment the working class is bearing the brunt of neoliberalism and are looking to Trump, Brexit and the European Fascist right, the Orban’s and Le Pen’s. In the future there is no reason to suppose that some of remaining middle class will not make the same choice. In such a situation, it will seem wise to align ourselves with the Leninists in hopes of preventing another epoch of Fascist authoritarianism, but I would ask all anarchists to consider the old Bakunin quote: ‘When the people are being beaten with a stick, they are not much happier if it is called the People’s Stick’. We have been here before and we know what the Leninists will do if they get a whiff of power, therefore ‘What is to be done?’

Well, surprise, surprise, I recommend anarchism, but not in its current form. These days anarchists are a scattered and clicky sect within the left, rightly mocked for both the black block and its disinterested hipster membership alike. We must accept some of the blame for failing to take advantage of the post-Leninist era of the 90s-today. There were even some signs of anarchist ideas permeating the general left in the Seattle demonstrations of 1999, the occupy movement of 2011, the Arab Spring, and the yellow jackets, but these were to come to nothing. Clearly we have not learned from our own mistakes of the 20th century. Here I will perhaps lose some of my audience when I say that our principles held us back in the past. We were firm believers that ‘the Great is not enemy of the Good’. That ‘pragmatism was defeatism’. We, too, believed in an ‘all or nothing revolution’. Either it was complete eradication of the state and class system or it was not worth fighting for. This did us no favours in the past and it will do us little favours in the future. The world is not as we hope it to be, but rather as it is. Who will our allies be in the times to come? Unless we want to repeat our ancestors mistakes in Russia and Spain, it can’t be the Leninists. Rather I suggest the reasonable left I mentioned at the start of this article: Socialists, Left-Communists, Social Democrats, Republicans and even Liberals have all proved in the past to be determined enemies of the cults of Bolshevism and Fascism and capable of pluralism, though not always willing. It is possible to imagine a society of differing political structures coexisting, and of this being a truer reflection of the will of most people than any monolithic authoritarian Leftism can provide. These are our logical allies, some more than others, but to ensure history does not repeat itself we will have to find a way to both defend ourselves and inspire hope for a better future. For such a pluralist society of state socialists, anarchists, and even liberals, must not sap the hope and idealism of a genuinely Libertarian Socialist Revolution. We will have to walk a tightrope between reactionaries, both left wing and liberal. For without going down another rabbit hole, it was not just the Leninists that betrayed the Anarchists of Spain, it was also their republican and liberal allies. It will not be easy and much like our ancestors we will probably fail, but the difference between fighting for a society that allows differing political ideals the chance to bloom and the totalitarian cult of Leninism, seems a worthy trade off.

[anomiezine-blog]

Immigrants, the easy target...

Just a few weeks before Christmas, we read the following at The New York Times: “Denmark plans to house the country’s most unwelcome foreigners in a most unwelcoming place: a tiny, hard-to-reach island that now holds the laboratories, stables and crematory of a center for researching contagious animal diseases. As if to make the message clearer, one of the two ferries that serve the island is called the Virus. “They are unwanted in Denmark, and they will feel that,” the immigration minister, Inger Stojberg.”[1]

For those having a closer look at Mrs. Stojberg’s political career and more specifically, the time she has served as Minister of Immigration, Integration and Housing, this is not something new. However, on December 20 we heard that the government moved a step further and approved the Minister’s plan as part of their recently approved Budget 2019.

How ironic does this sound? Denmark, a country that has been compared to socialist ones because of its strong welfare system and strong unions, has now a government that decides to adopt one more hideous measure to prevent immigrants from reaching the country. Of course, we are sure this has some kind of backing support from parts of the society, even though we can’t say if it’s strong or not. Needless to say, this has already raised concerns from the UN Human Rights Council. Going a bit further, a spokesperson (i.e. Martin Henriksen) of the government zealously added that they plan to “minimize the number of ferry departures as much as at all possible”.

A few years ago, Golden Dawn became a buzzword in Greece’s political life as it succeeded to be one of the parliamentary parties in the General Election 2012. For the first time in history, a neonazi party takes seats in the Greek Parliament. Apart from the power that the far-right gained after the election, it was someone else who used far-right speech in order to win the election; the next Prime Minister, Antonis Samaras. A strong conservative, a macho man, a person that poisoned the political life of his country many times with references to immigrants, calling them “smuggler immigrants”, deliberately avoiding saying anything about those people that were seeking asylum. In one of his pre-election speeches, he said “we will reoccupy our cities!” A catchy phrase to point out who is the problem for all your problems, don’t you think? Well, that could have been a honest statement from a far-right plonker, however Samaras, as a Prime Minister then, in his visit to Paris for the celebration of 125 years of Herald Tribune whispered that refugees are like hostages in Greece, as they want to move to wealthier countries (and Greece could not forward them, because of the agreement with EU). But, the poison had already been cleverly injected to the society previously…

And, let’s finish with Ireland. Direct provision still exists in EU’s and IMF’s good child… It seems that the IT and Pharmaceutical multinationals that the recent years’ governments have attracted with their strategic plans is only the bright side of the moon, huh? The rental market has skyrocket, the homelessness is not a strange word in dictionaries, but a cruel reality in the streets of Dublin; however, a few days ago some people wearing yellow vests expressed some not very anti-government views, but anti-immigration nonsense. Also direct provision places were set on fire. Ireland First!

What concerns me most is not what is mentioned above. Ok, far-right politicians have always been around and misanthropists wearing the masks of ‘angry’ citizens will never disappear from our lives. It is the fact that more and more you can now hear, even from governments, not only random fools, that we must make immigrants’ lives difficult. To make it clear to them that they are not welcome here. The Enlightenment spirit is not something that Europe can be proud of anymore. It seems though that this is not the end of the story and the hatred will escalate in the next coming years. Refugees have always been the easy target. We must defend and support them by all means, but let’s keep a closer eye to where all this is going. A century since Europe was reshaped by nationalisms, we are again talking about superior nations and we see enemies everywhere. The fight for more democracy and human rights will be more intense in the years to come…

[anomiezine-blog]

What Is Wrong with Democracy

In memory of Alan MacSimoin

“For two decades the supporters of Bolshevism have been hammering it into the masses that dictatorship is a vital necessity for the defence of the so-called proletarian interests against the assaults of counter-revolution and for paving the way for Socialism. They have not advanced the cause of Socialism by this propaganda, but have merely smoothed the way for Fascism in Italy, Germany and Austria by causing millions of people to forget that dictatorship, the most extreme form of tyranny, can never lead to social liberation. In Russia, the so-called dictatorship of the proletariat has not led to Socialism, but to the domination of a new bureaucracy over the proletariat and the whole people. …”

Rudolf Rocker

The nativist strains of populism currently strangling the world today have been heralded as no more than a throwback to the 1930’s. However, like in the 1930’s, the markets love a pro-business autocrat as he rides roughshod over the planet. It remains to be seen whether he starts a World War but, before that should happen, let’s look at the alternatives anarchism offers, before the mutually assured destruction of democratically elected bullies visits us again.

Anarchism is not always pacifist, but it is less aggressive than ideologies built around a messianic leader. It is also less gun-ready than most democracies, where the will of preservation of wealth (of both the political class, and their sponsors) leads to repression, curtailment or suspension of civil liberties, as well as the violent impoverishment of all but a select few. What is incredibly duplicitous about democracy, is the veneer of respectability the offices of the judiciary (institutions professing justice) and the legislature (institutions professing the ‘will of the people’) lend the executive. The Castle upon a hill, so to speak. Even to question its legitimacy is to question the very essence of ‘justice, humanity and the values of mankind’.

The judiciary doles out exorbitant punishments for those guilty of crimes borne out of necessity or dictated by a life of poverty certain citizens are borne into (larceny, drug dealing and drunk & disorderly conduct). However, for securities fraud or insider trading, as evidenced by the bankers, property developers and sundry before the last recession, the punishments did not fit the crime (Seán Fitzpatrick, chairman of Anglo Irish Bank, was acquitted of all charges brought against him and was allowed to keep a €22m pension after defrauding the State of millions). Capitalism could not exist without the state, which enforces property rights, and democracy is the most streamlined perversion of a capitalist state.

Democracy also isn’t as free as its champions claim, nor does it perpetuate itself. Democracies have supported autocrats (in the Middle-East, say) until they have outlasted their use, before being ousted by democracies military-industrial complex. Democracies entrench privilege in much the same way monarchies did during the age of exploration. They are a cosseted virtue for the rich, nominally just for their citizens, and entirely rapacious of lesser citizens. It is a more effective means of control, as subjects believe their autonomy (“I have a vote”).

Anarchism takes the notion of inherited power, evidenced by both democracies ruling élite, and monarchy’s regal court, and aims to subvert it by diffusing it throughout a society, on a voluntary, cooperative basis. Voluntary, as coercion is against its cause and would lead to tyranny of the few believers over an agnostic many (think Soviet-era Russia), and cooperative as anarchy, as any system, requires a majority of people living under it, to work to further its means. However, the cooperation under anarchism aims at sharing power, not amassing it.

There is a terrific irony in democrats piling the failures of democratic governance to curb neoliberal greed and capitalistic excess on those same neoliberal capitalists. Democracy is nurtured by capital, its offices oiled by dollars and its politicians weaned on the whiff of money. And it has always been this way, Adam Smith wrote that “Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defense of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all.”

‘Democracy’ in the 21st century doesn’t even resemble the democracy that Smith was fearing. The capitalists can cheat and steal under democracy simply because capital is king, not the body politic. We, as products of participatory democracy are enthralled by the vague promises that a better day will come, even after being simultaneously abused by a system that holds us in contempt and exploited by those whose interests in keeping the illusion of democracy alive are very real. We are victims of the age of democracy and yet, we feel we owe it a debt of gratitude.

However, before we lose the run of ourselves, let us not despair. Anarchism offers simple solutions. Now I will focus on what anarchism brings to the table, that we all may sleep more peacefully. The main strength of anarchism for the 21stCentury is this: Anarchism is anti-authoritarian. This means not only will it fight against the Trumps, Dutertes and Xinpings of the world to make the world safer, more environmentally-friendly and less hierarchical but, it will set the stage for true freedom for all people. The great thing about anarchism is its endless malleability. There are as many theories of anarchism, as there are thinkers but, I think Bookchin summarized it correctly. Anarchism is “a confederation of decentralized municipalities; an unwavering opposition to statism; a belief in direct democracy; and a vision of a libertarian communist society”.

[anomiezine-blog]

If we can consider the zine or tumblr account a form of media, you are fighting what you are. And since you have the power of editing the possibility of the reader's response is annulled. In the end you are just another power structure with a different agenda. The preference for female or LGBT writers embeds your propaganda goals with discrimination.

Hello anon. I thought you got the whole thing wrong. We are not here as media Messiahs or to propagate something ‘original’ or ‘revolutionary’. We only want to provide alternative ways of thinking, through the prism of anarchism and today’s society. If you want to view Anomie as another power structure, well, you have the power as well to ignore it and move forward. Lastly, it’s not a ‘preference’, it is a way of enforcing and giving voice to suppressed communities and protected categories, which struggle way more under capitalism. Have a great day.

[anomiezine-blog]

The Tyranny of the Narrative

“The receptivity of the masses is very limited, their intelligence is small, but their power of forgetting is enormous. In consequence of these facts, all effective propaganda must be limited to a very few points and must harp on these in slogans until the last member of the public understands what you want him to understand by your slogan.” ― Adolf Hitler

“Journalism is not a profession or a trade. It is a cheap catch-all for fuckoffs and misfits—a false doorway to the backside of life, a filthy piss-ridden little hole nailed off by the building inspector, but just deep enough for a wino to curl up from the sidewalk and masturbate like a chimp in a zoo-cage.” ― Hunter S. Thompson

You clicked on the article because of the cool image, right? And you’re still reading because I quoted Hitler, right? In a nutshell I’ve just demonstrated my core point without having to write a complete paragraph. I should quit while I’m ahead!

I’m not quite the nihilist that Hitler was, but like all true Psychopaths, he picked up on an unpleasant weakness in human psychology. For most people, slogans and soundbites have always been the main conveyance of ideology, if you can even call it that. In reality, most people don’t have an ideology (sorry left wing nerds). They form their opinions and prejudices through day-to-day lived experience. How something or someone makes them feel is the prime motivator of mankind not whether rationality is present. Nothing exists in a vacuum however, and I’m not implying that the world is devoid of ideology. Quite the opposite! Forever and always, there has been a ministry of propaganda, and rarely has it been titled as such. For most of history it was the media, whether state or corporate controlled, that provided the majority with their emotive slogans. As long as there has been newspapers and journalists there has been fake news and manipulation. They understood long ago that to appeal to emotion, to employ slogans and soundbites was all they needed to do to see the results they desired.

We must also share some of the blame, we are the product of our evolution and a celebrity obsessed culture. I mention evolution not to imply permanence. There was a time when strict hierarchies, fearless leaders or messiahs might have been useful, clearly that’s no longer the case. It is also clearly true that we have a penchant to idolise celebrities and move with them like a shoal of fish. The fact that 20% more young Americans registered to vote after Taylor Swift told them to, speaks for itself. This has allowed the media to ignore complicated issues like the reality of poverty or direct provision, and instead faun over Ariana Grande’s love life. To ignore our lemming-like desire to follow celebrities, or even worse demagogues, and their self-help slogans doesn’t help us one jot to come up with a response.

If that sounds like a relentlessly cynical view of human society, congratulations you’re beginning to understand what it’s like being a historian. To step back from the precipice for a second, I’m not trying to imply you can’t find unbiased news or that people can’t become informed citizens. You can, but it is exceedingly rare and time consuming. A good rule of thumb for me is, if I’m looking for information on Brexit, I don’t go looking for it from the BBC or Channel 4 News. I might, however, try Al-jazeera English or even Euro News. At least in the case of the former they don’t have, as the Americans would say, skin in the game. Most people simply don’t go to those lengths, they believe the BBC or Fox News in America and therein lies the problem. But to avoid going down a rabbit hole of what media can ever be truly honest or for that matter a philosophical discussion on the nature of truth or bias, I want to focus on why I am writing this article: what are we as Anarchists meant to do about this unpleasant reality?

The simple fact is if you don’t have a media imprint, you have very little chance of convincing anyone that your ideas aren’t the insane ramblings of a pseudo-cult leader (the frequent use of the label comrade doesn’t help). The internet has helped open up the discourse to new ideas, the importance of Breitbart News and Infowars to the Fascist movement in the US is a clear sign of that, but no such platform has emerged from the Anarchist movement (I love Libcom but it’s not being name checked by major news outlets as an imminent treat to capitalism). In any case the google algorithms are beginning to filter out even the limited alternatives that do exist. So what should we do?

In every sense this article is what we shouldn’t be doing, analysing to death something that is rather simple: how do we convey our propaganda effectively through emotive soundbites? Personally I think the only way to do this is to accept two inevitables: The first that we have to fundamentally reconsider the language we use to talk to people, and if that means embracing slogans and simple emotive narratives, then so be it. And secondly either upping our internet game at a time when the state and global capital is shutting off this avenue as an option, or embrace the style of door-to-door decades-long campaigning that no one with an ironically named cat is currently willing to do. Sounds horrible, huh? Do you feel grimy? Need a quick shower to rinse off the cynical slime I’ve coated you with? I understand how you feel, but I also know that part of the reason you’ll stay in the shower an extra few minutes is because I’m right.

[anomiezine-blog]

Jean Baudrillard on Response and Revolution

The mass media are anti-mediatory and intransitive. They fabricate non-communication—this is what characterizes them, if one agrees to define communication as an exchange, as a reciprocal space of a speech and a response, and thus of a responsibility (not a psychological or moral responsibility, but a personal, mutual correlation in exchange). We must understand communication as something other than the simple transmission-reception of a message, whether or not the latter is considered reversible through feedback. Now, the totality of the existing architecture of the media founds itself on this latter definition: they are what always prevents response, making all processes of exchange impossible (except in the various forms of response simulation, themselves integrated in the transmission process, thus leaving the unilateral nature of the communication intact). This is the real abstraction of the media. And the system of social control and power is rooted in it.

To understand the term response properly, we must take it in an emphatic sense, by referring to an equivalent in “primitive” societies: power belongs to the one who can give and cannot be repaid. To give, and to do it in such a way that one is unable to repay, is to disrupt the exchange to your profit and to institute a monopoly. The social process is thus thrown out of equilibrium, whereas repaying disrupts this power relationship and institutes (or reinstitutes), on the basis of an antagonistic reciprocity, the circuit of symbolic exchange. The same goes for the media: they speak, or something is spoken there, but in such a way as to exclude any response anywhere. This is why the only revolution in this domain—indeed, the revolution everywhere: the revolution tout court—lies in restoring this possibility of response. But such a simple possibility presupposes an upheaval in the entire existing structure of the media.

No other theory or strategy is possible. All vague impulses to democratize content, subvert it, restore the “transparency of the code,” control the information process, contrive a reversibility of circuits, or take power over media are hopeless—unless the monopoly of speech is broken; and one cannot break the monopoly of speech if one’s goal is simply to distribute it equally to everyone. Speech must be able to exchange, give, and repay itself as is occasionally the case with looks and smiles. It cannot simply be interrupted, congealed, stockpiled, and redistributed in some corner of the social process.

For the time being, we live in the era of non-response—of irresponsibility. “Minimal autonomous activity on the part of the spectator and voter,” says Enzensberger. The mass medium par excellence, and the most beautiful of them all, is the electoral system: its crowning achievement is the referendum, where the response is implied in the question itself, as in the polls. It is a speech that answers itself via the simulated detour of a response, and here as well, the absolutization of speech under the formal guise of exchange is the definition of power. Roland Barthes has made note of the same non-reciprocity in literature: “Our literature is characterized by the pitiless divorce which the literary institution maintains between the producer of the text and its user, between its owner and customer, between its author and its reader. This reader is thereby plunged into a kind of idleness—he is intransitive; he is, in short, serious: instead of functioning himself, instead of gaining access to the magic of the signifier, to the pleasure of writing, he is left with no more than the poor freedom either to accept or reject the text: reading is nothing more than a referendum.”

Today, the status of the consumer defines this banishment. The generalized order of consumption is nothing other than that sphere where it is no longer permitted to give, to reimburse, or to exchange, but only to take and to make use of (appropriation, individualized use value). In this case, consumption goods also constitute a mass medium: they answer to the general state of affairs we have described. Their specific function is of little import: the consumption of products and messages is the abstract social relation that they establish, the ban raised against all forms of response and reciprocity.

Thus, it is far from true that, as Enzensberger affirms, “for the first time in history, the media make possible a mass participation in a productive social process”; nor that “the practical means of this participation are in the hands of the masses themselves.” As if owning a TV set or a camera inaugurated a new possibility of relationship and exchange. Strictly speaking, such cases are no more significant than the possession of a refrigerator or a toaster. There is no response to a functional object: its function is already there, an integrated speech to which it has already responded, leaving no room for play, or reciprocal putting in play (unless one destroys the object, or turns its function inside out). So the functionalized object, like all messages functionalized by the media, like the operation of a referendum, controls rupture the emergence of meaning, and censorship. As an extreme case, authority would provide every citizen with a TV set without preoccupying itself with programming (assuming an authority that was not also obsessed by content and convinced of the ideological force of media “persuasion,” and thus of the need to control the message). It is useless to fantasize about the state projection of police control through TV (as Enzensberger has remarked of Orwell’s 1984): TV, by virtue of its mere presence, is a social control in itself. There is no need to imagine it as a state periscope spying on everyone’s private life—the situation as it stands is more efficient than that: it is the certainty that people are no longer speaking to each other, that they are definitively isolated in the fact of a speech without response.

From this perspective, McLuhan, whom Enzensberger scorns as a kind of ventriloquist, is much closer to a theory when he declares that “the medium is the message” (save that, in his total blindness to the social forms discussed here, he exalts the media and their global message with a delirious tribal optimism). The medium is the message is not a critical proposition. But in its paradoxical form, it has analytic value, whereas the ingenuity of Enzensberger with regard to the “structural properties of the media” such that “no power can permit the liberation of their potentiality” turns out to be mysticism, although it wants to be revolutionary. The mystique of the socialist predestination of the media is opposite but complementary to the Orwellian myth of their terrorist manipulation by authority. Even God would approve of socialism: Christians say it all the time.

—Jean Baudrillard’s “Speech Without Response” from his essay Requiem for the Media