The Zeitgeist Movement is now ubiquitous. Everywhere I turn, I hear alienated youth having dialogue about this phenomenon, and I opened a local free newspaper recently to find an article about college dropouts who drive a bus around the country promoting the movement’s ideas.
There is a of course a great irony in this movement: “Zeitgeist” has all but replaced the fringe-groups discussing September 11th being an inside-job and other irrelevant “conspiracies” (of course the conspiracy industry is reluctant to acknowledge the two greatest public conspiracies: capital and the State). In other words, the anti-political fiction du-jor has had quite the metamorphosis. Alex Jones, one of the entrepreneurs of th... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Profession and Movement
The Aufheben Scandal
Three years ago a small scandal took place when the Greek group TGTP published in an open letter that the co-founder of Aufheben, John Drury 1 , lead workshops for the police and military and is known as a “provider of ideas” in these circles. These workshops took part within the framework of his academic career researching Crowd Control, mass panics and rescue operations. Together with his closest colleagues Stott and Reicher he has developed the Elaborated Social Identity Model (ESIM). The social psychologist Stott is renowned to be one of the globally leading experts for protests and violent uprisings. ESIM claims that a ‘mob’ acts according to certain pattern... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Tonight was the night we fought. Nothing could stop us. We are proles on our stroll. Fighting our conditions. we are workers-in-combat. Rent signs, kicked. Garbage, in the street. The moment we drank John Zerzans cum was the same moment-in-time that we became human again. We are the barbarians at the gates of capitalist hell. Destroying the world again and again.
The forms-of-life that make possible the transformation of everything took the streets once again tonight. Tonight was our night. The night we doing being like always. The totality of our existance became nothing more than a moneky on our collective backs as proles, which we threw off like bottles broken in front of the precinct. Tonight was a prole stroll. Its the new form ... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Promise Keepers (PK) puts forward a public relations image of bringing men together to support each other in taking on more responsibility for their families. In reality, however, PK is using religion to promote a “kinder, gentler” version of white male domination. Its leadership is fiercely homophobic, anti-choice, misogynistic and has close ties to far-right organizations and individuals.
PK is Anti-Woman
In the group’s founding text The Seven Promises of a Promise Keeper, Rev. Tony Evans advised men that, “The first thing you do is sit down with your wife and say something like this: ‘Honey, I’ve made a terrible mistake. I’ve given you my role. I gave up leading this family, and I force... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
We’d like to respond with our thoughts to a text Mize en Commun (Putting in Common) that has been circulated critiquing insurrectionary projects and perspectives in Montreal. We appreciate that the authors of Mize en Common want to elaborate similarities and clarify differences, and move past bad faith. We’re taking this as an occasion to respond and to clarify ideas that we’ve been reflecting on for a few years now. We’ll try to use points of difference with Mize en Commun as an opportunity to delve further into ideas and how they inform practices, rather than limiting the scope of our text to simply addressing the critiques. We recognize that the length of this text might not facilitate a simple back-and-forth with... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Where is Radical Anthropology?
Radical Anthropology was an individual attempt to create a new and important way of thinking within current anthropology and the radical milieu. It failed. While the attempt failed, it is important to recognize that there is a radical anthropology — one that is radical in theory and praxis. I have put together the following, as an introduction to radical/anarchist anthropology. It is by no means a static or solid view, and should be seen as personal ideas that need to be scrutinized closely. If you are skeptical of any of the statements I made, please browse this site, especially the writings section, for more information on this mode of though. Please feel free to email me [at wildresistanc... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
My first impression after reading Call was that it really did not say anything to me. Since the beginning of their booklet the authors use quite an abstract language, which is perhaps intended to go beyond the banal words that are employed in every day conversations and by the media, but which fails to achieve its purpose. So they talk about ‘evident’ and ‘worlds’ but me, quite a humble reader, do not catch what they mean nor do they further explain these exotic concepts.
Their Proposition I states: «Faced with the evidence of catastrophe there are those who get indignant and those who take note, those who denounce and those who get organized. We are among those who get organized».
They do n... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
The guerrilla struggle against Francoism actually arose in the days following the army revolt against the Spanish Republic on 18 July 1936. In areas which fell immediately to the mutinous army, a bloody repression was promptly set in motion and this obliged many anti-fascists to take to the hills to save their skins. This was repeated over nearly three years of civil war as areas were conquered, one after another, by the Francoist army and it extended to virtually the entirety of the Peninsula after the Republican troops surrendered in the Center-Levante zone on 31 March 1939.
Very little has been written about the scale of the armed struggle against Franco following the civil war. It was and still is known to few. A thick blanket of... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
I don’t like permaculture. I can practically hear the gasps of shock. I can almost see the looks of both perplex and anger. How could I not like permaculture? Is that even allowed? Isn’t liking permaculture mandated by some great god of environmentalism?
I never quite liked permaculture. I wanted to like it. I did my best to like permaculture. I read the books. I listened to the groovy talk. I just couldn’t get excited about it. Something about permaculture just rubbed me the wrong way. I decided to puzzle out what it is that I don’t like about permaculture, and that is what this post is about.
Permaculture, for those who don’t know, is a field of study, a set of practices, a way of life, and very... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
When I was a very young child, my life was filled with intense pleasure and a vital energy that caused me to feel what I experienced to the full. I was the center of this marvelous, playful existence and felt no need to rely on anything but my own living experience to fulfill me. I felt intensely, I experienced intensely, my life was a festival of passion and pleasure. My disappointments and sorrows were also intense. I was born a free, wild being in the midst of a society based upon domestication.
There was no way that I could escape being domesticated myself. Civilization will not tolerate what is wild in its midst. But I never forgot the intensity that life could be. I never forgot the vital energy that has surged through me. My e... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Introduction to “Reclaim Your Mind”
We are pleased to publish this anonymous text which appeared on the old website of the 325 Collective in 2003 and which was re-edited and published online in 2011. We don’t agree with this text entirely and are pessimistic about the prospect of a wide-spread ‘healing’ of Earth or the masses of society – as has always been the case, minorities will throw off the chains of social obligations, will seize their own life trajectory and willfully define themselves, finding each other and creating unique moments of beauty, life and freedom. Maybe in the ruins of techno-industrial mass society a widespread healing will occur. For the time being, we aim to liberate oursel... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
So called Vancouver BC has in its most recent years been a place of
relative social peace – anarchist intervention in local politics has
been pushed into the shadows. After decades of insurrectionary agitation
and action, things slowed down – folks left, faced repression, struggled
with the daily onslaught of capitalism, or for their owns reasons took a
step back. Yet in the shadows is where we thrive, and more recently
anarchist action and analysis has been occurring on a semipublic stage
in so called Vancouver.
One such initiative is Rent Strike Vancouver (rentstrikevan.ca), it is a
decentralized effort to provide those interested in striking resources
while agitating the fires of class war. It emerges as a res... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Editorial
Why and for whom is “Regresión”?
Regresión is a publication consisting of content critical of the values and the material basis of the techno-industrial system. We propagate these ideas (by means of the Internet and in print) not so that others may adopt our positions. We aren’t looking for sympathizers, nor for the approval of those who call themselves “radicals” and “revolutionaries.” We publish these texts because we have something to say, because in the context of so much hypocrisy and so many lies, we must shout the TRUTH. It is important to point out that, even though these texts are available to all, they aren’t intended for the society at large. This i... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
“We will not budge and are willing to die... Everything has been taken. This is the last.”
— Silvia Burley, CVMT chairperson
“Don’t talk about it, be about it.”
— Mos Def
Anarchists and indigenous activists from the Bay, Central Valley, Santa Cruz and Canada have gathered at a foreclosed house in Stockton which is the only property belonging to the California Valley Miwok Tribe. It’s an hour and a half into the second announced eviction date (the first was in June and sheriffs were held off by a lawsuit). The contest over the house is part of a struggle over the legal identity of the CVMT. It is also one of the first eviction resistances attempted in the... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
During the night of Wednesday October 19th we took part, alongside many other groups and individualities, in the street clashes around the Polytechnic in Exarchia, that lasted for several hours with constant attacks with molotovs, stones and fireworks against antiriot police squads.
Street clashes, in any of their forms (exiting university premises through incendiary means, rioting in demonstrations, etc.), are part of the multiform anarchic attack against Power and the imposed normality. Because of their characteristics, this is one of the most effective ways to demonstrate the conflict between anarchy and the world of Power. This is why we support the diffusion of this and other forms of struggle that aim to destabilize and spread ... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Anarchism, Marxism and the Future of the Left: Interviews and Essays 1993–1998
by Murray Bookchin
AK Press, Edinburgh and San Francisco, 1999
As Murray Bookchin’s latest testament to himself as one of the great thinkers of the 20th Century, this book could be more accurately entitled ‘Anachronism, Marxism and the Suture of what’s Left’. It is also his latest apoplectic rejoinder to the plentiful and vociferous critics who are apparently trying to secure our illustrious author an early grave.
The Great Debate is one of a number of things that make this book incredibly hard going. At every turn, potentially serious theoretical analysis of the role of technology, the apparent demise... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Livewire Publications 2011.
ISBN 978-0-9567240-0-7 UK £8.00
Contents; Introduction — Phil Meyler Abyss — Jaime Semprun And Yet It Moves — Boy Igor No to Electronic Watchtowers: elements of reflection on video surveillance — The Collective How to Defend Society Against Science (extracts) — Paul Feyeraband Science & Authority — Mikhail Bakunin
The Dublin based Livewire Publications has produced a new collection of radical essays titled Science & Capital — Radical Essays on Science & Technology, with the intention to;
“bring together some of the more radical essays on science and technology written over the years — so as to highlight some of ... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Introduction
The discussion below reflects an overview of the conditions experienced by individuals who are trying to liberate themselves from the system of social hypocrisy and the mentality of subordination. Our experience is still fragile, a newborn.
During the revolution and even now the difficulty lies in our inability to observe clearly the inherent authoritarian power within the society and the state. Consequently this prevented - and still prevents - us from stripping the layers they hide behind and fighting them raw and bare.
Many individuals were launching a double war: one against a totalitarian regime. Another against their own forced affiliations: be it ethnic, religious or sectarian. When futility and frus... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
If we examine much of the current debate in anarchist circles surrounding civilization, technology, progress, green anarchy versus red anarchy and so on, we are left with the impression that criticism of civilization has only recently arisen within anarchist and revolutionary thinking. But this impression is false, and harmful for those of us with a revolutionary anti-civilization perspective.
In fact, a revolutionary questioning of civilization, of technology and of progress can be found throughout the history of modern revolutionary thinking. Charles Fourier posed his utopian socialist “Harmony” against the disharmony of “Civilization”. A number of the most radical of the Romantics (Blake, Byron and Shelly a... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Introduction
We started to write this text last December, just after the general
election in England, as a response to the huge number of anarchists
who voted (and some who went canvasing). We didn’t realize what we
were embarking on, it started out as an article, then became a zine. We
really wanted to finish it before the new Labor leader was announced at
the beginning of April 2020, then COVID-19 hit.
Struggling to make sense of the new context we are in, we
wondered if our critique of “democracy” (and the surge of Labor voting
anarchists) in the UK was appropriate. However, there are unfortunately
many important similarities and related issues running through the huge
popularity of Corbyn and the... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
I’ve been in Rojava since half a year working in various areas of society which has given me the unique opportunity to get a good overview of the system in action. My libertarian philosophy and practical experience puts me very close to the revolutionaries of Rojava, and they like to hear my ideas or criticism.
I’m writing this article after seeing the article titled:
“We should not let Kobane and the rest of Rojava to be defeated by the big corporations and the international financial institutions”
To which my response is: then what are you doing in the west? Rojava is better than the west. When you stay in the west, you are helping capitalism. You are part of the machine. If you live in the cit... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
Over the years the government has helpfully financed many campaigns and actions against itself. Lots of people in the direct action movement rely on dole money from the state in order to survive. However, over the last few years there has been a big shake up of the welfare state. What has our response been to this? How will it affect us? And has the supply of free money finally run dry?
Throughout the past two decades, the dole has provided the basis for a number of creative projects and movements, some of which have been overtly political. In the 1980s, the relaxed benefit regime allowed many to drop out of work and form new types of antagonistic lifestyles and tendencies, for example around the anarcho-punk scene. This was carried ... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
This article is translated to English from its original Italian, this article appeared in Machete #1.
“They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.” — Benjamin Franklin
It’s a problem that gets talked about a lot, but whose diagnosis is terse. On the right and on the left, the verdict is the same: we live in an “unsafe climate”.
Everyday the news showers us with gallons of blood gathered at the scenes of ambushes, rapes, murders. Bloody events described and filmed with a maniacal wealth of details, making horrible shivers run up our spines that are already weakened by daily genuflections.
Watching the mi... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)
