Prince Pyotr Alexeyevich Kropotkin was born in 1842 and breathed his last in 1921. Kropotkin was a Russian noble. He was educated for army and at the age of twenty he became a military officer in Siberia.

Kropotkin’s great interest in science developed from his military training which he received to get a job. This moulded his life in future. He had a scientific mind and devoted his time and energy to the study of books on science.

As a military officer in Siberia Kropotkin got ample opportunity for geographical survey and expedition. Thus his shift from military service to geo­graphical survey and expeditions enriched the subject profoundly. He contributed many articles to different journals.

Peter Kropotkin was a man of different mentality and attitude. His stay in military service could not satisfy his academic and intellectual requirements and desires and after serving several years he relinquished the job, and entered the University of St. Petersburg in 1867. His vast knowledge in geography brought for him the post of secretary of Geographical Society.

Even this vital administrative post could not detain him for long time. He moved to radical political movements. In 1872, Peter Kropotkin joined the International Workingmen’s Association. Later on he was deeply involved in subversive and anarchical activities. This led him to imprisonment in 1874.

He escaped from prison in 1876 and went to England. The England of the second half of eighteenth century was the centre of revolutionary activities, although she never experienced any revolution.

He also travelled to Switzerland and Paris. While in Paris he was again arrested by the French government in 1883. Released from prison in 1886 he went to England and settled there. While in exile, Kropotkin gave lectures and published widely on anarchism and geography. He returned to Russia after the Russian Revolution in 1917 but was disappointed by the Bolshevik state. The rest of his life was spent without political activity.

Peter Kropotkin was an evolutionist anarchist. But his evolutionism was more scien­tific than that of his predecessors. He wrote several books on anarchism such as ‘The Place of Anarchy in Socialist Evolution (1886), The Conquest of Bread (1888), Its Philosophy and Ideal (1896)’, ‘The State – Its Part in History (1898)’ and ‘Modern Science and Anarchism (1903)’. His deep interest in science, particularly biology and anthro­pology, opened before him new and enchanting vistas of knowledge and all these inspired him to study biological science with added interest.

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  • iie [they/them, he/him]
    ·
    11 days ago

    https://hexbear.net/comment/5719925

    The thread got deleted while I was responding to that comment so I’ll post my response below:

    @WhatDoYouMeanPodcast@hexbear.net hey comrade I don’t mean to sound hostile but I’m going to push back a bit on what you wrote

    What does leftism have to offer young men? [I’m kinda taking this quote out of context, so read the original comment]

    The appeal seems pretty immediate to me:

    • Fighting for economic emancipation
    • Class consciousness and solidarity
    • Revolutionary optimism
    • A worldview that makes sense and can explain current events
    • Accurate criticism of neoliberalism, which is cathartic when you finally hear it
    • Insight into alienation, atomization, and other psychic ills of capitalist society
    • A systemic perspective on racism, which affects millions of young men in the west
    • Media literacy, awareness of propaganda
    • Feminism helps men understand and relate to women, if men actually internalize it, which helps with dating and reduces toxicity
    • Solidarity with other people makes for a better and more attractive personality in general. Alt-righters have toxic personalities

    why would he be a Chapo-listening leftist?

    Lots of dudes were and are, for the reasons above

    there was a prominent wave of anti-men feminism

    Modern feminism is not anti-men, because it’s not bioessentialist, it doesn’t ascribe inherent qualities to men. It’s anti-sexism, not anti-men. I think the left is actually pretty clear about this, the ones muddying the waters are rightwing grifters who lie about the left. Then once you actually meet the left you realize the grifters lied about a lot of things, not just feminism.

    The problem isn’t that the left offers nothing to young men, it’s that capitalists and reactionaries have much larger platforms than we do and they can mislead people about the left

    • WhatDoYouMeanPodcast [comrade/them]
      ·
      11 days ago
      men

      I would like to start with the idea that I do, in fact, see the upside of communism and feminism. That's why I'm here. I'm here for more than the funny emotes. I read Beyond Blue and Pink, I read the Gender Accelerationist Manifesto, I'm reading Will to Change. I like Chapo and Citations Needed. I don't think modern feminism is anti-men. I think the main thrust of my argument has more to do with agreeing with you about capitalists and reactionaries hogging the airways. Even if you screamed and shouted about how modern feminism is not anti-man, the opposition has a giga platform that is talking to him and his friends and they would love to remind those men about the anti-man wave of feminism.

      My second point is that if the man needs to roll a gender check to be persuaded, it can feel like we need a nat 20 to stand a chance. What do I mean? Let's look at the purported manifesto from the other thread.

      Nelson Mandela says no form of viooence can be excused. Camus says it’s all the same, whether you live or die or have a cup of coffee. MLK says violence never brings permanent peace. Gandhi says that non-violence is the mightiest power available to mankind.

      That’s who they tell you are heroes. That’s who our revolutionaries are.

      Yet is that not capitalistic? Non-violence keeps the system working at full speed ahead.

      Clearly he's upset.

      In Gladiator 1 Maximus cuts into the military tattoo that identifies him as part of the roman legion. His friend asks “Is that the sign of your god?” As Maximus carves deeper into his own flesh, as his own blood drips down his skin, Maximus smiles and nods yes.

      Then suddenly, bam! Traditional, stoic masculinity like an unconscious reflex before an outburst of violence. And it's celebrated by me and everyone else. It's celebrated so hard it makes the elites scared. As if the superstructure is an oroboros that can deal with a wound to the economic tail to feed the patriarchal head. At that hinge point where he was at a critical mass of righteous indignation leftist theory lost out to an outburst of vigilante justice informed by masculinity as we've ever known it.

      It seems like, if ever a man wants to subconsciously/reflexively reach for the tradition of the smiling gladiator, it's a really really hard sell to get him to want to show solidarity instead (not to mention if women are the subject of his ire). I think you need the personal touch and support of a flesh and blood leftist to meet him where he is, consult him, and lead him to a more cogent understanding of society to stand a chance. It's a specialized skill set coupled with a rare belief system that needs to be in the hands of someone who would even want to help him on a day he'd even be open to help. Alternatively, because it's already baked into the super structure, you can just put Gladiator 1 on YouTube and then recommend a Jordan Peterson edit titled "Stop Fucking Around" over suspenseful music and call it a day for right wing grifting.

      Attracting feminist women, fighting for economic emancipation, and motivation for solidarity rock if and only if you already understand the value of these things. I don't think there's a will intrinsic to the left (as opposed to a pragmatic will like developing a recruitment tool) to construct a competing model of masculinity. I think this is what I wanted to point at in fewer words. It would have to sate male-gendered pain, highlight the benefits of leftism, and avoid clashing with a more sensitive audience. Meanwhile archetypes like clan leader, stoic farmer, playboy, MGTOW, looksmaxxer, and violence enactor bend over backwards and bend the truth to try and appeal to that disaffected male. Each and every one absolutely toxic and irreconcilable to ideals of autonomy for and emotional connection with women. For this reason I think the proportion of men who give a shit when they're given a chance to interact with theory is lessened.

      • iie [they/them, he/him]
        ·
        11 days ago
        my long response, hopefully this thread hasn't closed too

        Attracting feminist women, fighting for economic emancipation, and motivation for solidarity rock if and only if you already understand the value of these things.

        The first one, "attracting feminist women," I don't want to get sidetracked but that's not quite what I'm saying, although I might be misunderstanding you. What I'm saying is, dudes who internalize feminism, who work on their brainworms and try to imagine what it's like to be women, are more able to relate to women as fellow people similar to themselves, and that basic humanity and understanding helps with dating. I'm not talking about bonding over feminism as a political ideology, although that's also a good thing. I just mean being able to hold a conversation and connect to someone.

        The second two—economic emancipation and solidarity—most people do already understand the value of those things. Most people understand, on some level, that the economy mistreats them. They might not have a clear political perspective about it, but the emotion is there. Same with solidarity, we all want community, we all want to be "in this together," before politics even comes into it. Individualist brainworms can never totally stamp that out. Most people support unions. Most people, when they hear about a small town banding together to fight a polluting corporation, see themselves in the small town.

        Then suddenly, bam! Traditional, stoic masculinity like an unconscious reflex before an outburst of violence. And it's celebrated by me and everyone else. It's celebrated so hard it makes the elites scared. As if the superstructure is an oroboros that can deal with a wound to the economic tail to feed the patriarchal head. At that hinge point where he was at a critical mass of righteous indignation leftist theory lost out to an outburst of vigilante justice informed by masculinity as we've ever known it.

        I think you're reacting to heroism, not masculinity. What made this story so electric was that, for once, we had a hero. And in our culture, in the stories we grow up on, yeah, the heroes are usually dudes. We see John Wayne ride into town. It's hammered home again and again. Heroism: masculinity. But swap the shooter's gender and nothing changes. The story is no less electric. A reviled CEO still dies at the hands of a regular person. The capitalists' impunity is still shattered. We still get payback for all we've suffered.

        I mean imagine it: a masked woman in a black coat avenges her sick relative. She rolls up on a bike, ventilates this guy, drops the DDD bullet casings, and bounces, melts back into the city like a ghost. It would have the same energy. People would go nuts. Some would try to trivialize her but most people would just be stoked that a CEO got dropped.

        I don't think there's a will intrinsic to the left (as opposed to a pragmatic will like developing a recruitment tool) to construct a competing model of masculinity. I think this is what I wanted to point at in fewer words. It would have to sate male-gendered pain, highlight the benefits of leftism, and avoid clashing with a more sensitive audience. Meanwhile archetypes like clan leader, stoic farmer, playboy, MGTOW, looksmaxxer, and violence enactor bend over backwards and bend the truth to try and appeal to that disaffected male. Each and every one absolutely toxic and irreconcilable to ideals of autonomy for and emotional connection with women. For this reason I think the proportion of men who give a shit when they're given a chance to interact with theory is lessened.

        You don't even need to drastically change masculine archetypes to imagine them as leftists. If we're talking about archetypes, the clan leader can be a leftist, the stoic farmer, the playboy—flirtation and charisma are not inherently misogynistic—the looksmaxxer, and the violence enactor, all of these except MGTOW can be leftist figures. Communist history already has examples of all these archetypes. Even right now, one of the most well-known communists in America is Hasan Piker, who presents as a stereotypically masculine dude.

        But also, I don't think these archetypes all need to be categorized as masculine, either. The clan leader—women can lead clans, I'm sure you agree. The stoic farmer, women can do that. The charismatic playboy, my god, have I seen women who can do that. Violence enactor, female hitmen in Latin American show what this archetype can look like. I'm not saying you're disagreeing with any of that, just saying that not only can women do these things but the associated archetypes don't have to belong to men either.

        We don't need to invent a new type of guy. We just need to de-brainworm the existing guys, and also not gender things that don't need to be gendered.

        • WhatDoYouMeanPodcast [comrade/them]
          ·
          10 days ago
          explosions, monster trucks, and big guns

          I think you make some good an enlightening points which serves to remind me that we agree more than we disagree. I agree that a woman shooting the CEO would have been celebrated - the degree to which is suspect and likely less than him. A strategy of imaging what would happen if the genders are swapped has saved me from treading into dark places.

          Same with solidarity, we all want community, we all want to be "in this together," before politics even comes into it.

          I disagree. I think you can run into a lot of people who relish in how much they don't give a fuck about things that don't directly affect them. Someone told me I haven't spent enough on Palestine to have actually gave a fuck about it. They asked for dollar amount directly, received a non-answer, and used that as justification. I think being grillpilled or going on your winter arc (not in these words, but the same way just wanting to grill is to rugged individualism what the purple flavor of vitamin water is to the Coca Cola Company) beats out solidarity in a lot of people's hearts and minds. And it's hearts and minds informed by this individualism that enter into gendered issues of which some are relevant to choosing leftist philosophy. I seldom hear people espousing the importance of focusing on your locus of control also telling you to use it to help others unless you're already in a leftist space. The exception is suggesting volunteering as a line item in a list of things you can do to bring yourself out of a bad headspace.

          I think you're reacting to heroism, not masculinity.

          I'm not sure what I believe about it or that I even have a worldview that's going to withstand the pressure test of talking through it, honestly. Let's find out, shall we? The October Revolution was an instance of gun violence but it was still generally a good thing and an act of heroism that I celebrate. The violent outburst and act of heroism in the case of United Healthcare isn't necessarily gendered, but the philosophy informing it seems at least male-coded if we grant that Luigi is the guy and the manifesto is real. Otherwise I feel like male gendered philosophy is reduced to when someone wants to use their penis to reproduce and they must oust someone else's penis for access to reproductive resources.

          That’s where UnitedHealthcare went wrong. They violated their contract with my mother, with me, and tens of millions of other Americans. This threat to my own health, my family’s health, and the health of our country’s people requires me to respond with an act of war.

          Which to say he didn't feel like they represent a ethically reprehensible institution, but that they violated a contract and threatened his family. And I think that is a distinction informed by the ideals of masculinity he references in the manifesto and imbibes his actions.

          You don't even need to drastically change masculine archetypes to imagine them as leftists.

          And this disagreement ties it together for me. I don't need to do much to think of a stoic farmer having a copy of the communist manifesto instead of a bible in his nightstand. I think I represent a minority belief with that. Let's start with Hasan Piker - I think he presents masculine, but not stereotypically so.

          Show

          Hasan Piker (courtesy of NBC)

          Show

          CEO of Black Rifle Coffee

          He's a good influence and uses his platform well (I don't like his streams personally, I think it's boring when he gets stunlocked), but I don't think he's defining the meta of masculinity. He's going to get blocked out of hearts and minds by accusations of "just be attractive (or worse)" and he'd admit the same when he does segments like "giving Chadvice." If you can't tap into that disillusionment, you can't tap into the lines that get to the kids who grows up to think the military is cool or the entrepreneur who winds up peddling supplements and dropshipping courses.

          I don't think these archetypes have a clean split from misogyny. I think there's a lot of fun and even some enlightenment to be had in genderswapping, but if you're going to tap into/confront/interact with gendered ideals, you're going to have to answer questions like "Why was Tywin Lannister wrong?" or "What was Patrick Bateman's facade and how was it meant to be torn down (I'm sure I can dig up some irl examples, but I'm a little treat goblin and these idols are expedient to my point)?" And I think those answers have to be palatable, succinct, and resonant. I think it's the same dynamic as the Epicurean paradox. It means that God has to be beyond understanding or you need a new paradigm of how you come to understand God. You either need to untie the Gordian knot of blame and anger or you need a shiny, new sword. And I'm not saying untying the Gordian knot is impossible either, just that it's rare and takes a craftsman's touch[1].

          And God forbid the blame and anger involves romantic connection with women. Mewing, Chad/virgin, and rizz have become children's playthings. 10 years from now, when someone wants to tell a frustrated young man that women will respond better to you if you embody traditional gender roles, that marketing job is going to be as easy as when Coca Cola still had cocaine in it. "I heard you should seek to understand women and they'll recognize the upside of your personality." He'll say. "Oh, did a blue haired feminist tell you that?" The recruiter will respond, "Here's a chart about how your looks strongly correlate to your positively perceived personality. What you need is... aura... masculine aura." You could sell them anything at that point. Women's nature is X. Women's nature is Y. Z people are poisoning the culture. If they threaten you it's an act of war. You are on your own. Look how much they want to take from you with nothing in return. You should join the army.

          And for that man to join a leftist space instead, he'd need to do self-crit because nobody else would feel safe engaging with him. For him to join the army, they'd pay for his college and give him a bunch of friends who agree with him. Hell, if he went to a looksmaxxing forum instead they'd validate his anger with scathing indictment of the other and they'd drown him in information about what to do about it. Everyone else has an easy to swallow poison pill. These places don't have to belong to men, but they do in ways that inseparable from gendered ideology. And I question whether, given a fair playing field (if it were as simple as choosing between pokemon red and pokemon blue), men at a hinge point would commonly choose leftist ideology as it stands compared to the quick, resonant, pointed anger of the individualist when questions of cishet gender expression are involved.

          [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOCY7JN-Zec

          Ethan Becker, digital artist, after having rolled his nat 20 to open his eyes about racism

          • iie [they/them, he/him]
            ·
            8 days ago
            sorry to necro the thread, this response was kinda hard to write and I’ve had a lot going on, and then I stepped into the whirlwind of the struggle session yesterday and that took some time

            I think you can run into a lot of people who relish in how much they don't give a fuck about things that don't directly affect them.

            Absolutely, I’ve met them too, but I think people like that are a minority, and probably not worth trying to reach when there are easier targets.

            And its hearts and minds informed by this individualism that enter into gendered issues of which some are relevant to choosing leftist philosophy. I seldom hear people espousing the importance of focusing on your locus of control also telling you to use it to help others unless you're already in a leftist space.

            I do think individualism is a spectrum and some of these folks are reachable. “People who want more autonomy” is a broader category than “people who relish not giving a fuck about things that don’t directly affect them.” People feel helpless, work is a desperate grind to go nowhere. I understand the impulse.

            [Hasan Piker] is a good influence and uses his platform well [but] he's going to get blocked out of hearts and minds by accusations of "just be attractive (or worse)" […] If you can't tap into that disillusionment, you can't tap into the lines that get to the kids who grows up to think the military is cool or the entrepreneur who winds up peddling supplements and dropshipping courses.

            It depends on what they want. If they want respect, both patriarchy and leftism have answers. If they specifically want to get better at dating, the good advice is more compatible with leftism. But if our question is not, “who can help disillusioned, individualistic young men frustrated with dating,” but rather, “who appeals to them,” yeah, manosphere grifters have the edge. But I think leftists could compete with them, we could use their own weirdness and toxicity against them.

            Earlier you talked about impulses that are intrinsic to the left, vs pragmatic recruiting tactics. The impulse to bash manosphere grifters is intrinsic to the left; maybe one outlet for that impulse would be to give better daring advice than them. I can imagine a trend of “non-toxic dating advice for dudes: how to develop an actually attractive personality and not turn into a weird Andrew Tate-watching incel”-type videos, where some central figures in that ecosystem are leftists who help set the tone.

            Manosphere grifters don’t actually help their viewers, they trap them in a cycle of bitterness and outrage. Sooner or later that bubble has to pop, there’s gonna be a cultural swing back in the other direction, no matter how much the capitalists prop this stuff up with their algorithms. The truth on the ground will win out.

            If you ask me, the actually helpful advice boils down to politically neutral but leaning-toward-kindness advice like “confidence is attractive, learn to hold a conversation, learn to listen and build rapport, empathize, have a sense of humor, have friends and be well-liked, know yourself and be genuine, know your worth, and don’t send contradictory signals with your words and body language.”

            Reactionary politics gets in the way of that! All the male chauvinism and pressure to “be a man” makes these dudes toxic and insecure. They end up with fragile egos, they don’t know how to handle rejection, they can’t empathize, they’re emotionally stunted, they hate themselves for not meeting every exaggerated standard of masculinity, and because they hate themselves they can’t develop the self-knowledge to be genuine with other people. They’re angry, bitter manchildren. None of that is attractive!

            Outrage and bitterness do sell. Manosphere chauvinism is “baked into the superstructure” as you said earlier, it’s easy to pitch. But it has a weakness, which is that it sucks, the people selling it suck, the people buying it suck, the advice sucks. It’s so bad. “Stare at the mirror and tell yourself you’re an alpha male” is a fucking weird thing to do, and that weirdness dooms its staying power.

            You want an attractive male stereotype to sell? If we’re talking stereotypes, how about the affable working class chad who sticks up for his coworkers and doesn’t brownnose to the boss like a hall monitor. He’s popular at the after-work bar, he gets along with the staff there. Everyone knows he’s a standup guy. He might tease you in a goodnatured way but he’d also give you the shirt off his back if you were in a pinch. He respects women. His ego’s not fragile. He can handle rejection. And he’s a socialist, he thinks big, he has a dream for the future that he would risk his life for. This guy is hot, and so are the female and enby versions of him.

            he didn't feel like they represent a ethically reprehensible institution, but that they violated a contract and threatened his family. And I think that is a distinction informed by the ideals of masculinity he references in the manifesto and imbibes his actions.

            I don’t want to psychoanalyze Luigi, but the reasons people give are not always the reasons deep down. People are good at rationalizing why they do things, and if he’s bought into the masculine scripts of our culture he might reach for those, but human behavior is deeper than the logic we use to explain it.

            He watched the hell of his mother’s ever-worsening chronic pain, and then he developed chronic pain of his own. That’s a nightmare. I think in some ways this assassination was a form of suicide for a guy staring down the barrel of the same pain and indignity his mother suffered.

            It’s also compensation for his stolen future. He’s an Ivy League grad, class valedictorian, he’s athletic and attractive, he has all this promise, but chronic pain rips that promise away. With this high-profile assassination I think he takes back some of what he’s lost, he gets to leave his mark on the world.

            He must feel some solidarity with other victims of the health insurance industry. How could he not? He knows their pain firsthand, and secondhand through his mother. Maybe he explains his actions using masculine scripts, but I don’t think those scripts conjured his actions. Pain did.

            Patriarchy might have added a little extra sting when he lost his future, and a little extra social reward for committing an act of violence, but I don’t think that’s enough justification for masculinity to claim the entire act. The situation is already intrinsically motivating.