I will just comment that it seems paradoxical to me, because anarchy
means no one should have any rule over anyone else, which
is basically the core principle of laissez-faire capitalism.
Premise 1:
Capitalism is bad science.
Capitalism is a system based on deception and exploitation, with a justice system that is NOT at all well-rooted in empirical truth. If you find this claim dubious, google "the new jim crow". Read the book.
Then check out books like Zinn's "A People's History of the United States", or "Shock Doctrine", or "Earth in Mind", or "The Underground history of American Education", or anything by Slavoj Zizek...
Turn off the TV and stop watching the fucking news, instead read as many books as you can. Never stop reading. No matter what your politics or philosophy, please, I beg you, never stop reading.
Anarchism is about eliminating all unjust authority, this includes authority based on gods, violence, force, coercion, deception, gender, age, race, creed, nationality, etc.
The most important thing we can do to bring this world into reality is forget about charity and move towards a world of
solidarity, kindness, and compassion.
A true anarchist society would be a place of great equality, based on (social)
justice rooted strongly in reasoned observation, empiricism, and
truth.
Hell, read more books generally. I had a professor once say to me, "look, if you're going to be an anarchist, please at least be a
reasonable anarchist."
To which I replied, "But professor, it is reason that brought me to anarchism in the first place..."
---
Some food for thought:
"Hello, babies. Welcome to Earth. It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It's round and wet and crowded. At the outside, babies, you've got about a hundred years here. There's only one rule that I know of, babies—God damn it, you've got to be kind."
-Kurt Vonnegut
---
"As to whether Marcos is gay: Yes, Marcos is gay in San Francisco, black in South Africa, an Asian in Europe, a Chicano in San Ysidro, an anarchist in Spain, a Palestinian in Israel, a Mayan Indian in the streets of San Cristobal,… a Jew in Germany, a Gypsy in Poland, a Kurd in Turkey, a Mohawk in Quebec, a pacifist in Bosnia, a single woman on the Metro at 10pm, a peasant without land, a gang member in the slums, an unemployed worker, an unhappy student and, of course, a Zapatista in the mountains."
-Social Justice E-Zine #27
---
"Antonio dreams of owning the land he works on, he dreams that his sweat is paid for with justice and truth, he dreams that there is a school to cure ignorance and medicine to scare away death, he dreams of having electricity in his home and that his table is full, he dreams that his country is free and that this is the result of its people governing themselves, and he dreams that he is at peace with himself and with the world. He dreams that he must fight to obtain this dream, he dreams that there must be death in order to gain life. Antonio dreams and then he awakens…. Now he knows what to do and he sees his wife crouching by the fire, hears his son crying. He looks at the sun rising in the East, and, smiling, grabs his machete. The wind picks up, he rises and walks to meet others. Something has told him that his dream is that of many and he goes to find them."
-
Chiapas: The Southeast in Two Winds A Storm and a Prophecy [
documentary-movie here, for the reading averse]
---
"Then I'll be all around in the dark - I'll be ever'where—wherever you look. Wherever they's a fight so hungry people can eat, I'll be there. Wherever they's a cop beatin' up a guy, I'll be there... I'll be in the way guys yell when they're mad an'—I'll be in the way kids laugh when they're hungry and they know supper's ready. An' when our folk eat the stuff they raise an' live in the houses they build—why, I'll be there."
-The Grapes of Wrath
---
There are hidden stories all around us,
growing in abandoned villages in the mountains
or vacant lots in the city,
petrifying beneath our feet in the remains
of societies like nothing we’ve known,
whispering to us that things could be different.
But the politician you know is lying to you,
the manager who hires and fires you,
the landlord who evicts you,
the president of the bank that owns your house,
the professor who grades your papers,
the cop who rolls your street,
the reporter who informs you,
the doctor who medicates you,
the husband who beats you,
the mother who spanks you,
the soldier who kills for you,
and the social worker who fits your past and future into a folder in a filing cabinet
all ask
“WHAT WOULD YOU DO WITHOUT US?
It would be anarchy.”
---
"And the daughter who runs away from home,
the bus driver on the picket line,
the veteran who threw back his medal but holds on to his rifle,
the boy saved from suicide by the love of his friends,
the maid who must bow to those who can’t even cook for themselves,
the immigrant hiking across a desert to find her family on the other side,
the kid on his way to prison because he burned down a shopping mall they were building over his childhood dreams,
the neighbor who cleans up the syringes from the vacant lot, hoping someone will turn it into a garden,
the hitchhiker on the open road,
the college dropout who gave up on career and health insurance and sometimes even food so he could write revolutionary poetry for the world,
maybe all of us can feel it:
our bosses and tormentors are afraid of what they would do without us,
and their threat is a promise —
the best parts of our lives are anarchy already."
-Peter Gelderloos
There is
hope. Today it is only a tiny, flickering ember, but we anarchists keep this new world alive in our hearts... and this hope in turn keeps us alive in this cold, dark world.
