#The Revolutions issue

[introspect-la]

FASSBINDER’S FABRIC OF FREEDOM PHOTOGRAPHED BY STEVEN KLEIN STYLING BY DANNY REED FEATURING HARI NEF IN PURPLE MAGAZINE THE REVOLUTIONS ISSUE #40 FALL WINTER 2023

[cookthepenguin]

[dailyanarchistposts]

The way most people talk about climate change we are led to believe we all have an equal part in creating the capitalist nightmare we live in, but that’s a lie. The unsustainable and extractive nature of capitalism grew directly from the ideological and material foundations of European colonization. We cannot hold the entire human species responsible for that. It’s victim blaming.

The vast majority of waste is produced by the same people and institutions who hold power. Fighting for our planet, the health of our land, our food, our homes, our communities, is where the fight against capitalism and white supremacy collide. Any fight for environmental justice must also be a fight for racial justice because BI&POC are the ones who disproportionately bear the weight of climate change.

White Settler Colonialism Is Destroying the Planet, Not Poor BI&POC

Don’t believe the Malthusian and eco-fascist myth that there are too many people on the planet to care for. This is a lie peddled by capitalists, eugenicists, and people who advocate for genocide. We know that every landbase has its limit for how much life it can support (indigenous peoples have been saying this for hundreds of years), but “overpopulation” rhetoric is overwhelmingly used as a means to enforce colonial hierarchies where wealthy white people can maintain lives of access and privilege while poor BI&POC barely survive.

Instead of telling poor BI&POC to have less children or to stop wanting better lives, we should build a movement to fight climate change which centers racial justice, abolishes capitalism, and forces wealthy, predominately white populations to stop hoarding resources.

Here are some Earth Day facts for tomorrow so you don’t fall for the lies:

Just 100 companies are responsible for 71% of global emissions. (Source: the Guardian)

Black communities are exposed to 56% more pollution than is caused by their consumption. For Latinx communities, it is 63%. (Source: American Journal of Public Health)

97% of waste produced in the United States is corporate waste. 80% of businesses are owned & operated by white people. (Source: “The Story of Stuff” & US News)

Indigenous peoples make up less than 5% of the planet’s human population, yet they are protecting 80% of its biodiversity. (Source: National Geographic)

The world’s richest 10% produce half of carbon emissions while the poorest half contribute only 10%. (Source: Oxfam)

The world’s wealthiest 16% use 80% of the planet’s natural resources. (Source: CNN)

We are not all equally “responsible.” White settler colonialism and capitalism are destroying the planet, not poor BI&POC.

[elbiotipo]

There was a longer, better article about this, but it's interesting that virtually all fantasy is reactionary in the sense that the heroes are questing (almost, of course there are exceptions) to turn things back to what they were. Either stopping a great evil that is going to destroy the current world which is Fine As It Is, or living in a dystopian evil empire and try to return the Old Kingdom or the Old Republic which was good and nostalgic. It's always "the Old Days were better" or "we must preserve our current way of life", never "we will build a better future beyond our current society".

[whereserpentswalk]

Hey! Reminder that "people shouldn't feel joy or have things that make them happy when there is [bad thing] in the world" and "the common people are actually the ones at fault for this systemic issue for not doing more to stop it" are both inherently reactionary sentiments. They exist shield the ruling class from responsibility, as well as existing as an excuse to not give people rights, and to convince the common people they don't deserve to have rights. These sentiments have been the rallying cry of countless reactionary movements but zero liberatory movements. Stop spreading them.

[listen-to-the-inner-walrus]

Hey hi hello to any fellow Brits reading this.

You probably know we have a general election coming up, which by the way, make sure you're registered to vote and have the qualifying photo ID.

And hey maybe you're a fence-sitter who doesn't want to vote for Labour for whatever reason.

Well, this post is giving you a reason to vote for Labour (or any party other than Tory if the candidate actually has a chance to win the seat).

You might have noticed that a lot of local and city councils have either gone bankrupt recently or are teetering on the edge, and that officially, it's the councils themselves that have been blamed, and uh yeah, that's horseshit.

The majority of a local council's funding comes from core grants given out by Westminster.

There's actually a limit on funding that local councils can raise via taxes, and like a whole lot of issues in the UK, that comes down to Margaret fucking Thatcher. It's also thanks to her that local councils don't have as much power over the local area as you'd ideally want them to.

(That's been eased a little since, but if a local council ain't got the money, they can't exercise that power.)

Suffice to say, local councils are very much dependent on funding from the central government.

And as you might imagine, 14 years of Tory government has just made it worse. From 2010 to 2020, that funding was cut by 40%.

Wanna know why hundreds of libraries have closed down? Or why public services like bin collections are almost entirely ran by corporations? Or why bin collections are now once a fortnight rather than once a week? Or why council houses haven't been built? Or why public toilets are being closed? Or why you have to Tokyo Drift on the drive to work because it's been 2 years and no one's done shit about that goddamn pothole? Or why parks seem to now be maintained by Big Foot and by the way Big Foot has also declared bankruptcy? Or why local arts have had their budget of 17 paperclips and a whistle reduced down to 10 paperclips and no whistle? Or why your local museum is effectively a mausoleum?

It is all down to this.

Your local council runs on a shoestring budget because Tory rule has deprived local councils of the funding that they need.

If the Tories win in July, this problem is just gonna get worse and worse and worse.

More councils are going to go bankrupt; more public services are going to be cut or underfunded; more vulnerable kids are going to fall through the cracks; more local services will be privatised; more pressing issues will be ignored because there's no money left over to fix it.

You might not like the current Labour party, but hi hello welcome to harm reduction politics. Maybe a Labour government won't fix this, but another 5 years of Tory rule is going to break this country.

So for god's sake, get over yourself and your leftist purity bullshit, and just fucking vote for Labour as a vote against the Tories.

[Information for this post comes from this video by Tom Nicholas]

[enlitment]

Camille Desmoulins and Maximilien Robespierre – doomed by the Revolution?

a second part of the answer to the ask kindly sent by @iron--and--blood - first part can be found here

Okay, so I tried to follow the sources and I ended up missing what is arguably the key question. I think that there is enough evidence that warrants seeing Camille and Maximilien’s relationship as a ‘friendship torn apart but the revolution’, but could it in fact be something more that the chain of events of the mid-1790s ended up destroying?

(aka the good old “were they gay?” question)

It’s probably not surprising to anyone that there is no conclusive evidence that would suggest that either of them was definitely queer or that they were involved in some kind of a relationship. For context, the French Constitutional Assembly did decriminalise homosexuality, since there was simply no mention of private same-sex relationships it in the penal code of 1791.

Of course, there would still be a stigma surrounding queerness, seeing how France was a Catholic country – well, up to that point. On the other hand, it is also important to remember that anyone who received a higher education at that time would be well versed in classical authors (Greek and Roman that is), so they would have a framework for a positively viewed queer attraction/relationship (I'm mostly thinking of a kind of Alcibiades/Socrates vibes here. I think it sort of fits? Well it does in my headcanon anyway...). Camille especially seemed to be really into classics, making references to classical authors, history or mythology in approximately every other sentence.

CAMILLE – VICES HONTEUX AND A POSSIBILE BICON

If we consider Camille, I think it is clear that he was attracted to women. I think that the historical sources show that he genuinely did love his wife - Lucile - although it may also be true he was bit of a cad. There is a whole deal with him and Lucile’s mother with whom he apparently exchanged some flirty letters? I honestly need to look into it more at some point.

That said, attraction to women of course doesn’t exclude attraction to men. The one thing that would suggest Camille might have pursued a same-sex relationships is the reference to “vices honteux“ (shameful vices), which Saint-Just claims were attributed to Camille by Danton. We also learn from Robespierre’s note that this refered to something that was ‘totally unrelated to the revolution’.

So we know it’s something that would be seen as ‘shameful’ behaviour, but nonetheless a private matter. Could it be interest in same-sex relationships? It’s of course hard to say, but the theory is not completely implausible. For a discussion about this, I recommend this article.

MAXIMILIEN – A CONFIRMED BACHELOR?

With Maximilien Robespierre, it gets a little more complicated. He was essentially a confirmed bachelor, living with a family that adored him but that was not his own (and also a dog. He had a dog.) Talk about a found family trope!

Some sources claim that he was engaged to Éléonore Duplay, but Robespierre’s sister for one vehemently denies this. It’s true that he could probably easily have married her – I can’t imagine her family being opposed to it, far from it probably – but the fact is that for one reason or another, he did not.

He also didn’t really seem to capitalise on his massive popularity among the Parisian women. (Though, to be fair, neither did Rousseau and he was… well I guess he was his own version of heterosexual.)

Sure, one can interpret that as Robespierre being a workaholic or putting the revolution above everything else, but I personally think it is very possible that he would be considered to be on the asexual spectrum by today’s standards.

That said, although France was moving away from institutionalised religion at that point, Catholic guilt could certainly play a role, especially in someone who prided himself in his moral conduct and was told to be rigid about the rules. So the possibility of him being closeted as an explanation for his lack of interest in women would also not be completely off the table.

As to Camille and Maximilien being together in some way? I think there is certainly a precedence for this type of relationship in adolescence. Seeing that they have studied together (and shared enthusiasm for classics probably), it is not impossible, though of course, it is highly speculative.

I think it is also fair to say that Robespierre went above and beyond for Camille until the last few months. That is something he probably would have not done for many other people. He actually said as much himself:

“Learn, Camille, that if you were not Camille, one could not have so much indulgence for you.“

Was it because Camille was universally liked by the revolutionaries for all the good he has done? Possibly, but I think one can also read more into it. It certainly suggests that Camille was special in some way, and the fact that Robespierre uses ‚one‘ instead of ‚I‘ does not necessarily mean he is not speaking about himself here.

CAMILLE AND MAXIMILIEN IN THE MEDIA

When it comes to media portrayal, the relationship often comes across as queer-coded - to an extent.

In La Révolution française, this aspect is more prominent between Robespierre and Saint-Just, but with some well-timed smiles and glances, it almost reads as a tragic love triangle between the three. There are some unfortunate implications however, mainly that the hints of Robespierre's queerness in the movie are implicitly associated with his descent to tyrany. Ugh. (And let's face it, a kind of effeminacy linked to villainy as well. Honestly, who thought that kind of portrayal would be a good idea? Kudos for making a historical movie about the French Revolution come across as homophobic I guess.)

Hilary Mantel straight-up makes Camille Desmoulins bisexual (ish?) in A Place of Greater Safety, though there are <a lot of> issues with that portrayal, as discussed here (watch me linking another mutual's great post! Frevblr is truly the best). Not sure how the relationship with Robespierre is presented here since it’s one of the books I’ve been in the middle of for months.

And then there’s Stanisława Przybyszewska of course. She would honestly warrant a separate post, but long story short: in her works, there is no doubt about the fact that she portrays the relationship between them as queer. She invokes the Erastes/eromenos dynamic between them (quite explicitly, referring to Camille as an ephebe at one point) and makes the attraction between the two seem palpable. There is plenty of queer (under)tones to be found in The Danton Case, but in Last Nights of Ventôse , she straight up interprets the fall of the Dantonists as Camille running into Danton’s arms to spite Robespierre for snubbing him and rejecting his devotion (romantic advances?). And it gets quite physical – not in a way that would warrant an E rating, but it would certainly deserve one for the sheer emotional intensity.

[greenhorizonblog]

Classism in the Left

This has to be said because this is honestly the the left's biggest problem right now. The problem is classism.

So many proud leftists are still disgusted with the very people they claim to want to help and liberate. They sneer and roll their eyes at people in poverty who don't have the same access to education and are therefore not as informed and are therefore more easily seduced by the right because the right at least pretends to care about them. They are shun homeless people who have been through so much trauma and therefore have the mental scars and behaviour that come from that.

They still believe the illusion of free will, which is a christian holdover. Much of the left's framework and perspective is actually quite similar to evangelicals outlook on morality, just applied to socialism and marxism etc. This is something that really needs to be deconstructed asap.

Hold space, grasp nuance and patience. Be kind, let people grow and learn. And yes it is actually your job to educate. Because if we don't give people answers, the alt right will. I would go as far as saying it's our responsibility to educate. Kindly and leading with love. Understand where people are coming from instead of holding them to impossible standards and making them feel stupid which will only further radicalise them. People in poverty are humans, they want and need community like everyone else. We should not gatekeep that. Especially when we claim to champion their rights.

We need to have more patience and empathy with traumatised vulnerable people. We are all in fact products of our circumstances, genetics and conditioning.

We have to take a step back and try to see the bigger picture, be a bit more pragmatic and start playing the long game. Start a messaging group for your apartment building or local area. Lend out things you can spare. Volunteer at a soup kitchen. Build benches. Learn communication skills. Talk an build bridges with people you wouldn't otherwise agree with. Let your actions (within your ability) demonstrate your beliefs. And please ffs stop the endless bickering and infighting online. Stand together for once.

I know it's hard but this has to be done. It is possible. And you can do it

(follow @ revpoppopandfriends on tiktok, he's a trans minister in Appalachia who talks in a lot more detail about all this)

[corvidkusnos]

I am genuinely sick of people being like "well britain is racist so why should we care?" how about you stop ignoring the fact that we have a lot of poc here and actually care about them for once in your fucking lives

[queerism1969]

[bumpscosity]

Objectum/POSIC loss

[lord-squiggletits]

Part of why I hate this fandom's take on Autobots vs Decepticons is ppl (mainly 'con fans honestly) who can't have any nuance of the situation whatsoever and love to write plots like "oh the humans are racist and abusive towards Cybertronians so this is how Megatron is right" no actually I don't think colonialism/imperialism and racism are justified so long as you can point the finger and say "they were the aggressors first" or "their hands are no cleaner than ours bc their society sucks too" sorry. Please come up with better sociopolitical narratives in your war story.

[dailyanarchistposts]

A.2.4 Are anarchists in favour of “absolute” liberty?

No. Anarchists do not believe that everyone should be able to “do whatever they like,” because some actions invariably involve the denial of the liberty of others.

For example, anarchists do not support the “freedom” to rape, to exploit, or to coerce others. Neither do we tolerate authority. On the contrary, since authority is a threat to liberty, equality, and solidarity (not to mention human dignity), anarchists recognise the need to resist and overthrow it.

The exercise of authority is not freedom. No one has a “right” to rule others. As Malatesta points out, anarchism supports “freedom for everybody … with the only limit of the equal freedom for others; which does not mean … that we recognise, and wish to respect, the ‘freedom’ to exploit, to oppress, to command, which is oppression and certainly not freedom.” [Errico Malatesta: His Life and Ideas, p. 53]

In a capitalist society, resistance to all forms of hierarchical authority is the mark of a free person — be it private (the boss) or public (the state). As Henry David Thoreau pointed out in his essay on “Civil Disobedience” (1847)

“Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty. The obedient must be slaves.”

[k-i-l-l-e-r-b-e-e-6-9]

[whereserpentswalk]

How the fuck can you consider yourself leftist if your belief is that a leftist society is the ideal but that you believe that for practicality we need to only fight for an implement centrist policies due to "practicality". Like, you do realize that "communism works on paper but it's not possible in practice" is a standard conservative talking point meant to dissmiss leftism?

This appeal to practicality, calling leftist advocates naive, and telling them to change the system from within, used to be the realm of boomer conservatives who used to be leftists, now it's the line of millennial conservatives who used to be leftists and they don't even have the politeness to call themselves conservatives. It's gotten past the point where that's even only being used agaisnt the really radical stuff, you now have people who don't want any advocacy for trans people because they see it as bad optics.

I don't remember who said it, but I once heard someone quote something to the tune of "the only way we've ever gotten any progress to happen in any span of time, is by demanding everything right now."

[licorice-and-rum]

Whenever I'm studying Marxism (and that's quite a lot of times actually) I remember Marx's idea that Revolution can only take form through hate.

Of course, I know now it's a very specific form of hate and that it's pointed to a specific community of people but when I started learning about it, I often found myself rebelling at the notion of hatred as a conductive to Revolution.

I thought hate was too volatile, too savage to be trustworthy but as I grow older and see the world as it is I see myself tasting that hate — and it's hard to actually put into words but this hatred is not ugly and unpredictable.

This hatred is actually quite beautiful, it's not a firing blaze scorching down the earth but a burning fire cleansing a wound, it's born out of indignation and love for humankind. It's there because I love humanity so much I can't help but feel the indignation for what happens to us to my very core and I can't help but turn this into anger, into hatred against those I know are responsible for this.

I really think Marx was onto something with this besides the whole political and economic points he usually made.