Joseph A. Labadie was born on April 18, 1850 in Paw Paw, Michigan, the descendant of 17th century French immigrants. His boyhood was a frontier existence among Pottawatomi tribes in southern Michigan, where his father served as interpreter between the Jesuit missionaries and the Indians. His only schooling was a few months in a parochial school.
At the age of 17 he began roaming the country as a “tramp” printer. In 1872 he put down roots in Detroit, working as a printer at the Detroit Post and Tribune. In 1877, Labadie, an agnostic, married his cousin, Sophie Elizabeth Archambeau, a devout Catholic. During their long and happy life together, neither tried to change the other’s religious outlook.
Labadie ... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Power relations are played out on the stage of desire. A valued object is a desired object. Value is a means through which culture effects desire. Ideology and culture effect power relations through the medium of value, whereas raw coercion is the simple imposition of the desire of one body on another, against the grain of the latter’s desire.
Culture and capitalism have become interpenetrating value systems. For capitalism to function it must penetrate culture; it must overcome value systems that contradict it. Previously, the immaterial was outside the domain of capital, however as capital’s domain grows and technology changes, it inches further and further into the immaterial. Images and information are now valuable co... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
The Kurdish Uprising and Kurdistan’s Nationalist Shop Front and Its Negotiations with the Baathist/Fascist Regime
The following is an account of the uprising in Kurdistan in 1991 together with an historical critique of the Kurdish nationalist parties. It buries the lies of the western media which presented this proletarian uprising as the work of nationalist parties in the north or Shi’ite religious fanatics in the south.
* * *
The great popular uprising of the exploited of Iraq in March this year threatened the aims and interests of both contending sides in the Gulf war. From Kurdistan to southern Iraq the poor rose up against the Baathist/Fascist regime and against the consequences of the war creat... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
There's no right life in a wrong world.
– Theodor Adorno
Perform. Alarm clock. Shower, toast, coffee. The news. Crisis. Bus, subway. Emails, Facebook. Perform. Work. Lunch. Crisis. Coffee. Work. Subway, bus. Cook, eat. Emails, Facebook. Perform. TV series. Beer. TV series. Bed. Perform. Love.
L'amour.
Cohabitation, life as a couple.
Our world is a disgusting world – a thankless world. We spend life convincing ourselves of it, and it’s true; and we chat to each other about it, we study it. “Oh look, the world is now 5.6% crueler than last week!”
Civilization saves nothing. It advances, it consumes, it transforms everything it touches, and it touches everything. The proce... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
One day shall come of haughty Rome, a deserved blow from heaven. You will be plundered and destroyed and with wailing and gnashing of teeth you will pay.
- Cybeline Oracle
In these times I think it is important and inspiring to remember the fall of Rome, as parable and as analogy. Rome is remembered as the greatest of ancient civilizations. Its accomplishments are celebrated just as the so-called advancements of this civilization, at the expense of the world, are trumpeted. From the beginning, Rome had built its empire by conquest and force of arms. It was ruthless in its lust for power, and “insatiable in its ambition”, defining qualities characteristic of all civilization itself. Rome was an imperialist empir... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Comrades:
In a few days I will be called to suffer my fate, and then ,in a few months, to completely rot in the barracks.
Will I do this lacking awareness, with pleasure?
No, a thousand times no!
I am already disgusted, thinking about the barracks, about military life.
The hatred I feel grows when I think that tomorrow, in order to place myself at the disposal of some braided brutes, I have to leave my home, my work, and my loves at an age when one dreams of and hopes for love and pleasure.
And what will be done to me at the barracks?
They'll teach me how to load balls into a rifle and shells into a cannon.
They'll have me mount a horse, handle the lance and saber with as much furia francese as possible.
In a word, they're going to... (From: Marxists.org.)
Uninvited, we are forcing ourselves on a debate that is not ours. And which never will be, as it is set on a terrain that remains sterile for the development of insurrectional perspectives and the anarchist ideas and activities that focus on such a development. So, you might ask, why write a letter? Because nothing is closer to our hearts than liberatory and destructive revolt, than the struggle for the subversion of the existent, because we will never stop recognizing ourselves in all comrades who decide to attack the structures and people of power out of a desire for freedom; because there are few things we cherish more than individual will, the striving for coherence and the courage of lighting the fuze, above everything. Don’t thi... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Preface to the first edition
This pamphlet is a response to Azione Rivoluzionaria’s document ‘Notes for an internal and external discussion’ that appeared in no. 13-14 of ‘Countrainformazione’. The articles “Parafulmini e controfigure” and “L.A.xC.=Nihil” are the immediate response of two comrades to AR’s document. Having been refused by two reviews of the movement, it became necessary to spread their publication autonomously. We are reporting the passages of the review ‘Insurrezione’ that deal directly with the question of ‘armed struggle’, and two articles that appeared in ‘Anarchismo’ n. 21 and n. 23-24, interventions that the text of A... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Dear friends, and those we’ve yet to meet,
Over the past months, we, the workers, students, and faculty of this campus, have shown the world that we can shut this university down.
Now, we show that we can run our public university the way it should be — by the public.
Starting Monday, December 7 on the steps of Wheeler Hall at 2:30 p.m., we will transform Wheeler Hall into a 24-hour open university. We will open the space for anyone in the community to come and go as they please, to organize study sessions, teach-ins, concerts, forums, club meetings, dance parties, and anything else our creative minds dream up.
Live Week is a time for us to open this university to all people and to all forms of expre... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Preface
Five years ago today, police officer Darren Wilson murdered Michael Brown, a black teenager, in Ferguson, Missouri. Police officers kill young black men every day in the United States, but that day, people rose up to police and white supremacy. It’s important to revisit the Ferguson uprising today, to try to distinguish between the events as they occurred and the ways they were mythologized afterwards, and to inquire about what they still have to teach us.
To observe this anniversary, we are publishing the complete diary of an anarchist from St. Louis who participated in most of the major events of the uprising. This is a valuable historical document illustrating the contradictions and tensions within the movemen... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
The Malleus Maleficarum — The Hammer of Witches: a review of the book by Heinrich Kramer and Jacobus Sprenger as translated by Rev. Montague Summers
Witch-hunt: an investigation of or campaign against dissenters (as political opponents) conducted on the pretext of protecting the public welfare.
Heretic: From the Greek, “able to choose”, characterized by departure from accepted beliefs or standards It was the time when European men enslaved 11 to 15 million Africans and caused 70 million deaths of Indians in the so-called New World.
The “Burning Times” here in Europe when millions of their own inhabitants were tortured and killed, and the last vestiges of our wild ancestry wiped out.... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Let men have their fun blabbering on and on about the Revolution—They’re free to do it! The nihilist women are tired of all this procrastination and are determined to act. Thinking about annihilating the bourgeoisie, they are ready to sacrifice everything to hasten the realization of this undertaking. In the inextinguishable hatred that is devouring us, they will call up whatever strength is necessary to overcome all obstacles.
But since this grandiose project cannot be carried out in one day, they will take their time, preferring for now to use poison and once in a while, to achieve their goal more easily, with a few bad seeds.
The nihilist women will make up for their lack of scientific knowledge and laborator... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
The Congress of Capolago.
To the Socialists and the people of Italy.
Old and yet new is the story of the popular miseries. Slave, servant or wage-earner, the people has always worked for others, has always been the beast of burden or slaughter of a privileged few. The uprisings have succeeded the uprisings, the social institutions have changed, the form of denomination has changed, some minimal fractions of the people have succeeded in emancipating themselves and being welcomed among the ruling classes; but the conditions of the mass have always remained essentially the same. Made tool of production to the advantage of others, it always remained subject to the conditions of production; and its position in the material and the ... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Introduction
Those who rebel consciously against the ruling order, those who attack it without respite in however small a manner, are a real threat to the system of domination and exploitation. When these individuals are also those for whom anarchy and revolution are not just fine words, but reflect their decision to face life and struggle in a particular manner, the state recognizes that their revolt will be ongoing and needs to be suppressed. Therefore, it develops various strategies for repression, using the legal, police, judiciary and prison systems to keep those who rebel occupied with defending themselves,
The Marini trial against anarchists in Italy, which has been going on for several years (the investigation beginnin... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
MayDay 2000’s hype may be a bit wonky, but it’s already as unavoidable as that of its predecessors — multiple glossy leaflets through the post, listings in all the movement press, stickers all round the Tube, the carefully tricked-up ‘must go’ ambiance, though no-one you know can really think why. You should trust your own instincts a little more and the anarcho-herd’s a little less — this one’s a con, always has been.
MayDay 2000 doesn’t come out of Reclaim the Streets (RTS), Earth First! or anywhere else in the direct action / DiY milieu. It’s prime movers are the Anarchist (Communist) Federation, old guard anarcho-Lefties more into promoting themselves and their ideology ... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
“The psychiatrist concluded her evaluation: “I would consider this individual incorrigible. He has much hostility in him for being poor and seems to have an unending resevoir of energy. This type of habitual criminal neither profits from experience nor punishment. He can only work against society and thereby derive power, and he will always be able to find followers whom he can impress with his intelligence and destructive drives. He will never be able to work within society. Diagnosis: sociopathic personality, antisocial type.” ” – Joseph Wambaugh,
'The Onion Field'
It's already here, under the carpet, behind the sofa; the pedo, the boogeyman, those outlaws out there... Not in our home! Not in ou... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
We’re watching the RSS feeds and news sites like we watched Al Jazeera during the Egyptian Uprising. We’re looking for a sign. Hoping that the rage we share cuts through our daily routine. We’re hoping that what’s transpiring in Wisconsin is an internal error in their system, and that it’s irreparable. We’re praying at our grandparents graves that they, who fought for dignity or who bowed shamefully, will give us all the strength and resolve to push ourselves beyond our limits of politeness. Wisconsin, we’re looking to you like we looked to Egypt, like we looked to all the places that have recently flared up. We want you to say it’s on. To say we don’t have to be afraid anymore, and we d... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
The following text was written to help people discover, remind themselves or popularize the various syndicalist methods of struggle because in any battle, one must start from a few key ideas:
Hitting the enemy harder than they can hit you: or better yet — hitting them so they can’t hit back.
Analyzing the power balance:
How great are our numbers.
How much other workers and the general population will sympathize with or reject our struggle.
What are our financial constraints, ie. financial and material resources available to continue the fight.
Avoiding exhaustion: fighting too arduously from the start can be a weakness — the employers are prepared to overcome short term difficulties by t... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Militarism & Anti-Militarism
Green Anarchist originated in the 1980s protest milieu dominated by CND (the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament), a reformist anti-militarist umbrella group that numbered millions of members. At my last meeting with the late John Moore, he suggested GA run anti-militarism as a core theme. Given the economy’s domination by military production and the current bellicose international situation, I think it therefore only appropriate GA72’s core should be ‘Militarism & Anti-Militarism’.
As there has recently been too little contribution from readers to past such themes, I think it appropriate to say something about GA’s ethos here. We are not here to write propaganda ... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
1
Amid fields there stands an iron foundry, surrounded by a wall, with incessantly smoking chimneys, clattering chains, furnaces, a railway siding, and the scattered little houses of the managers and laborers. The working people swarm like ants in this foundry and in the mines belonging to it. Some of them are at work from morning until night, or from night until morning, mining the ore in passages two hundred feet underground, which are dark, narrow, close, damp, and constantly threaten with death. Others in the darkness, bending over, take this ore or clay to the shaft and take back empty cars, and again fill them, and so work for twelve or fourteen hours a day throughout the week.
Thus they work in the mines. In the foundry itself, som... (From: EarthlyFireFlies.org.)
I got a Signal message. It’s a link to John Prine’s obituary in Rolling Stone. My lover’s favorite musician. I call him. He yells in rage at the president, “You killed him, you shit head! He was a legend, and you’re a shit head.”
I chime in unhelpfully, “It looks like he actually caught it on tour in Europe.”
Silence.
“But yeah. A lot of people are going to die because of Trump though. A lot of people.”
“Yeah.”
I know his thoughts go to all the unhoused folks he has gotten close to over the years serving in the park, some of whom are leaning on him more heavily than ever, some of whom will likely fall off the edge. I feel like an idiot... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
A split between the rational and irrational is constructed by every rational system; each rationality creates a corresponding irrationality, that which does not fit inside of it. Therefore each rational system has inherent limits. To break out of a dominant rationality one must also be capable of conceiving of that which lies beyond the limits of that system. Rational systems can be useful tools but they can also become mental prisons.
Some wish to reject all rational systems because they detest specific types of rationality, such as capitalist rationality. We live in a highly mechanized society where nearly everything has been ascribed a monetary value, where urban and rural spaces are ravaged by the needs of capital while human bei... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
“It seems more satisfactory, for me, seeing that it is about men who have been distinguished for their actions, than to honor them only with actions.”
Thucydides, History of the Peloponesian War, 411 BC
It is dangerous to declare war against the State and this world, because the State only knows how to do two things: progress, and combat everyone who would destroy it, weaken it, or impede its progress. As such, anarchists, by which we mean revolutionaries, are conscious of our decisions and of the responsibilities that derive from them. When we say revolutionaries, we are not speaking of any belief in a perfect and peaceful world, nor in the chimeric belief in the possibility of seeing the arrival of some total... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
The first red scare in the United States happened during the years leading up to Haymarket in 1886, through the McKinley assassination in 1901, and culminated in the anti-alien, anti-radical federal Immigration Act of 1903. During this period, anarchists and other radicals throughout the country were systematically demonized in popular thought as a threat to public order and stability. One major arena in which this was accomplished was through the press, both in newspapers and periodical literature.
In Western Washington, Home Colony, an anarchist intentional community near Tacoma, was the local focus of anti-anarchist hostilities. During the hysteria surrounding the McKinley assassination, Home was portrayed in the Tacoma news daili... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
An invitation and a challenge
The Next Eclipse is an invitation to shift our perspective on southern Illinois. Rather than seeing it as a dying region waiting for outside interests to save it, we propose that what makes it special is rooted in its status of being economically overlooked. A better future for this region will be built not by the wealthy or their politicians, and certainly not by more polluting industries, but by everyday people organizing ourselves to build a unique way of living and sustaining the life, history, and struggle of this region.
The Next Eclipse is a challenge to build the capacity for regional autonomy in this time between the eclipses. By “autonomy,” we mean the possibility of a life o... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
1. Freedom of movement is not a right; it is a real living force. Despite all the obstacles that states put in people’s way — all the barriers of barbed wire, money, laws, ID cards, surveillance and so on — millions cross borders every day. For every migrant stopped or deported, many more get through and stay, whether legally or clandestinely. Don’t overestimate the strength of the state and its borders. Don’t underestimate the strength of everyday resistance.
2. In the 19th century, militants fighting against slavery in the US created an ‘underground railroad’ that smuggled many thousand runaway slaves to safety, as well as enabling acts of sabotage and rebellion. In the 20th century, the te... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
“We’re building a mass movement!” I heard Jason shouting as we were being dragged off some bridge in London. That happened years ago, around the time of Twyford Down. It was the first I’d heard of the mass movement thing. My first thought was “No, we’re getting dragged off a bridge by the cops!” How wrong I was. Looking back, it seems we were building a mass movement, though many of us had not the slightest intention of doing so. But now it seems we have such a movement, and it expresses itself through such organizations as Globalize Resistance (GR).
No Analysis
It’s not the intention of this article to go much into who is behind it all, such as the SWP; that has been well covered el... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Everything is going as per usual. Every morning millions of people drag themselves towards their working place where they will get humiliated, numbed, exploited for the most part of the day. The media blare the words of the bosses, the politicians and specialists through their screens and loudspeakers. People without papers are locked up in asylum camps and deported; others reach their hands out to the places where there is an abundance of money and are promptly convicted for it and locked up in prison.
Everything is as usual. More and more people’s existence is being reduced to calculations: calculating whether there will be enough money to pay the rent; counting down how many hours and days they will still be locked up in the... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
“Despite the radical roots of organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union that advocate for state protection of free expression, this form of civil liberties empties the defense of free speech of any radical content, implying that only the state can properly guarantee our ability to express ourselves freely and thus reinforcing the power of the state above the right to free speech itself.”
Across the years, anarchists have defended freedom of speech. This is important in principle: in an anarchist vision of society, neither the state or any other entity should be able to determine what we can and cannot say. It’s also important in practice: as a revolutionary minority frequently targeted for repression,... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)