This person deserves many dunks, yes. But whenever we dunk on these bad takes from "anarchists", I also want to go out of my way to say that I love all my anarchist comrades here, you all are great :left-unity-3:
It’s also worth pointing out that there are indeed “ML” counterparts to this on Reddit who are sectarian and antagonistic towards anarchists as if they were fight turf wars or something. These attitudes perpetuate each other. We complain about these “anarchists” for good reasons and it’s easy to assume that all self-proclaimed ML’s are having an experience similar to your own if they’re complaining about the same people, but I think a small number of Very Online people make up the bulk of this feuding.
In reality it’s two groups of liberals yelling at each other about fake internet points, but they use our labels, so guess we gotta deal with that baggage
Rememering the time the 16 year old head mod of r/genzanarchy "became an ml overnight" and decided to destroy the entire subreddit. very mature slapfight and filling their respective subreddits with sectarianism ensues. Very revolutionary to turn the attention and anger of two leftist factions away from capitalism and toward one another.
I've got nothing but love and respect for all ML comrades here. At the end of the day in real situations I'll gleefully jump in and help whoever is pulling things left, that benefits us all.
:duck-dance:
Yep I'd join a vanguard party if one materialized in the US (sorry tankies I really don't think that will happen before the US implodes), in the meantime there's so much work you can do within an anarchist framework to prepare communities in the imperial core for its inevitable collapse.
The biggest priority should be creating a safety net of mutual aid networks to respond to people's material needs during the many crises ahead, this way we can demonstrate our ideology in practice while hopefully educating people on why we do what we do.
I like Graeber's take on anarchism, it's not something you are it's something you do. Food Not Bombs for example is one of the most prominent anarchist groups in the US, but tons of people of all sorts of ideologies participate and work with them. So, is the dedicated FNB volunteer who also attends a Marxist-Leninist reading group an anarchist or an ML? Fred Hampton and the Black Panthers were largely Maoists, but where is the line between mutual aid and Mass Line?
sorry tankies I really don’t think that will happen before the US implodes
That's OK, honestly I'd take the US imploding at this point. At least it would cut down on imperialism.
I tried to explain third worldist thought to a Redditor over there once and they called it "reactionary".
It's beyond parody
Just admit that you have a nice job in the imperial core and aren't prepared to go though the rationale of why that is, and what global equity would mean.
Okay holy shit this person admits to being hired by the military industrial complex in their country. Imperial core "leftists":
Every. Single. Fucking. Time
Hi. I’m effervescent and I would likely have my
quality of lifeaccess to luxury goods reduced under global communism. Worth. Very worth.Doubly so considering global warming is about to fuck up this whole “fresh bananas in February” horse shit. Also, leave it to sectarian redditors to ruin something as cool as theory earnings.
Yeah, as much as I dislike Mark Fisher's essay "Exiting the Vampires Castle", a lot of the western/imperial core left have essentially constructed themselves in one. That is to say, making themselves look like the biggest victims of global capitalism, despite being quite privileged when compared to those in the global south, while at the same time refusing to extend solidarity to those in the global south, dismissing all our movements as "opportunistic" or "tankiesm".
That is not to say that capitalists don't exploit people to an absurd degree within the core, they absolutely do, but two things can be true at the same time without being contradictory.
two things can be true at the same time without being contradictory
This, but also those contradictions can be blamed on things other than the individuals experiencing them. Like it is genuinely a contradiction that capitalist exploitation is supposed to maximized, but is also unevenly distributed amongst the workers. It would be great to just say “solidarity” and then follow through without that being contingent on an assumed hierarchy of oppression. I’ve actually been trying to get my mutual aid group to donate to the Zapatistas and various water protector groups, but people are worried about getting slammed with charges of these groups every get classified by the feds.
Living in a yurt would be a quality of life improvement if that yurt didn't have a landlord.
For real. I originally wrote “quality of life” and then realized how depressed and alienated I am under capitalism. Like nah, I’m just not gonna be able to get coffee all the time. I can live with that
I tried to explain third worldist thought to a Redditor over there once and they called it “reactionary”.
Reactionaries come from outside the Imperial Core, and the farther outside the Core you live, the more Reactionary you become.
Just admit that you have a nice job in the imperial core and aren’t prepared to go though the rationale of why that is, and what global equity would mean.
What's been so incredibly about the last 40 years is that we've seen Maoism play out on a global stage. The region of China transforms from a fractured patchwork of colonies into a single industrialized super-state. And what is the result? Extraordinarily cheap consumer goods, a surge in global GDP, staggering leaps in technological progress, and a global tide of human development that has lifted virtually every single ship touching the Pacific Rim.
Global Equity means Global Prosperity. We are far better off living in a world in which every nation enjoys the benefits provided within an imperial nation. Not only does it fail to cost us anything but our pride, it yields enormous dividends inside a single generation.
The real price of global equity is imperial hegemony. No single world-spanning currency printed out of the US Mint. English no longer being the lingua franca on a World Stage. American CEOs no longer operating impudently as both global taskmasters and cultural evangelicals. No more imprinting Americanism upon the world as a condition for accessing networks of international trade and travel.
That's all we're giving up. And the vast majority of us never see the benefits this hegemony provides.
If global wealth were equally divided, the median American would be nearly twice as wealthy as they are now. That mostly shows just how bad wealth inequality is in the US itself. The only countries that would actually be worse off are Klanada and a few countries in E*rope.
This the post you're talking about?
Work made me suicidal
I'm a trans woman working in cybersec for a big actor of the military industrial complex.
It's my first job. I was desperate for a job. I couldn't go back to university because of the rampant transphobia, and I couldn't do sex work anymore because of my deteriorating mental health.
I was lured in with open source and medical projects. Then I was sent to work for those missile selling tucks. I was promised a new assignment, again and again.
7 months in and I want to kill myself.
My life was good. I finally got the body I wanted. I'm in a loving relationship. I got fun hobbies and caring friends. But 7 months of this shit just ruined it all.
Benzos and antidepressants didn't work. Therapy didn't work. Sick leaves didn't work. I don't know what will. I'm so ready to give up on it all.
haven't worked in a week. I'm on sick leave for depression. I'm going to run out of money. I have loans to pay back and rent to pay. I can't afford to live. I literally cannot afford life.
How do you survive this shit.
Or this one?
CW: CSA
I'm 21. I did everything I was told. I did everything right. Yet where's my fucking future?
Graduated from high school with honours. Studied chemistry at uni. At 19 I was already working in a government lab developing molecular dynamics software. At 21 I was hired as a cybersec engineer for the military industrial complex. I DID EVERYTHING RIGHT
Yet where's my fucking future?
I barely earn enough to make ends meet. I'm underpaid and overworked. I'm suicidal because of my bullshit job and have to choose between quitting and saving my mental health or working and losing my fucking home.
I just got halfway through the month and my account is already in the red. I'm in debt, I can't afford therapy, ADHD is killing me and so is benzo withdrawal.
The world's on fire and the kids are starving. And meanwhile I'm paid like shit by those missile making tucks expected to smile when I'm granted my fucking scoop.
I hate everything about capitalism. My job made me suicidal.
I will not know happiness until the last bureaucrat will be strangled with the bowels of the last capitalist.
Poverty is artificial.
Famine is artificial.
Homelessness is artificial.
Misery is artificial.
Work is slavery
Landlords are parasites
All cops are fucking bastards
I'm so tired of this shit. The 9 to 5. I've been a devout anarchist for over a year now. And I feel hopeless.
edit: she/her please
Edit2: Just so we're clear and all you privileged fucks stop shitting on me for my job:
I'm a trans woman.
I have crippling ADHD.
I am autistic.
I grew up in a slum on an island near Madagascar running away with my family from a cult trying to get us back in.
Me and my sister got raped by pedophile neighbors from age 8-10.
My tran got kicked out at 18.
I got kicked out of uni and it's dorm because of transphobia.
I had to couch hop and suck dick to afford basic necessities.
So before you tell me I'm part of the fucking problem, check your privilege. And fuck off. I'd rather keep this trash job than go back to the streets. YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT IT'S LIKE OUT THERE FOR A DISABLED TRANS GIRL.
Have a little empathy.
This type of "anarchism" is just an aesthetic expression of liberalism.
Most online sectarianism is. Consumer identities as applied to revolutionary theory. We are very close to capitalists figuring out how to recuperate revolutionary sentiment right up to the point of action. They’ve already effectively monetized and weaponized right wing terrorism, so non-terrorism on our part is certainly on the table.
Anarchism in North America is not a political movement anymore, it's been a subculture for decades.
That sub stinks, I remember one of the mods is also a mod of neoliberal and another one defended the coup in Bolivia. We have the best anarchists here, right on hexbear. :reddit-logo:
Robert Evans, known anarchist, defended US intervention in Syria and Libya. Said Maduro “has to go.” And basically took no sides on the Bolivian coup. Wouldn’t even admit that it was a coup. Works at bellingcat, the CIA cutout. I’m convinced dude is an op
So what are the ramifications of that? I like a lot of the stuff from his podcasts
Well first of all, owning machetes is only a personality trait if you're Puerto Rican
Second of all, it's okay to like a thing as long as your aware of it's biases and intent
Like, so I think Robert Evans is a fed? Probably not
Does he get taken advantage of by the feds to push a particular narrative of the world? Most likely
Just enjoy the episodes about doctors giving people extra testicles and be very wary about the rest
Well first of all, owning machetes is only a personality trait if you’re Puerto Rican
I grew up in the mountains in California and machetes are very much a part of my identity, and Robert is from Texas and now lives in the PNW. What I'm saying is I understand the fascination with machetes.
It's cooler than being a sword guy at least.
True
I mean, I own my family's ancestral machete though
Probably has some magic powers or something seeing as how it's over a hundred years old and was present when those Puerto Rican nationalists tried to kill Truman
I have a bayonet from the civil war that has confederate blood rust stains.
Yeah he seems like more or less a standard radlib in his takes on foreign policy, AES, etc. I see him as mostly an entertainer and a decent writer and not much more. I mean he worked at Cracked for god's sake lmao
So did our boy Cody though. I hold out hope that Cody will turn into a Maoist or something cool and drag Robert and Katy left with him
they both seemed like they were drifting leftward to the point where it was making the other hosts on Worst Year Ever uncomfortable
this was like during the height of unrest last year
I think they both have a somewhat comfortable position and don't have that impetus to go further, Rob makes $250,000 a YEAR
This is basically all true, but he did eventually come around on Bolivia iirc
God why can't Reddit "anarchists" be like hexbear anarchists instead of just like, edgy liberals who like reciting state departments propaganda about AES and get really mad when you point out that putting "opposing states" before "opposing imperialism" means you're siding with the Great Satan against the global south
C@ is (or at least was, I haven't checked lately) run by the top mod from r/neoliberal, and there was at least one other mod who was literally just some socdem who constantly made sectarian bait posts and carried out aggressive purges of anyone who opposed the coup in Bolivia, only to get removed because they were also sexually harassing people on Discord. The whole subreddit is explicitly curated to stir up sectarian hatred. A lot of reddit is astroturfed to shit in order to whip as many people as possible into anti-communist frenzies.
Fortunately I know of at least one person who snapped out of that, someone I knew from an unrelated discord server whose reddit account was all sectarian anti-ML shit on C@ who wound up deleting that account and identifying as an ML within a year of that.
We have some successful Reddit ops running where subs are salted with anti-imperial and revolutionary communist mods. No doubt that’s happening in the opposite direction. We for sure know Nazis do that shit for fun and r/neoliberal has always been an astroturfed shithole
Our anarchists are so cool, i always feel bad for them when i see posts like that :/
Some large percent of people only interact with politics on an aesthetic level, and anarchist aesthetics are cooler than Mao suits (fite me), so we get more of those folks.
get really mad when you point out that putting “opposing states” before “opposing imperialism” means you’re siding with the Great Satan against the global south
I think it's okay to put opposing states higher on your priority list than opposing imperialism, but supporting a more powerful state intervening against another state in the name of opposing states is a particularly confused stance. And unfortunately common.
I think it’s okay to put opposing states higher on your priority list than opposing imperialism
Out of curiosity, why? Imperialism operates at a larger and more destructive scale than individual states, and states cannot be dismantled while the machinery of imperialism exists. Imperialistic hierarchy encompasses the hierarchy of the state.
States are a precondition for imperialism. Dismantling imperialist states means an end to both imperialism and the state.
states cannot be dismantled while the machinery of imperialism exists
Why? I legitimately can't think of any reason for this.
anarchist aesthetics are cooler than Mao suits
Objectively false
I just assume people online like this are all like 16 because the older I've gotten the less interested I am in online slapfights
I mean I'm still interested because keeping someone baited during a work day, it's a good way to pass the time. But yeah, I haven't fantasized about irl owning someone that annoyed me online since I was like 17.
As secretarian something like moretankiechapo or genzedong could/can be towards anarchists ,50%+ of the posts on completeanarchy can legit be tankie/ML hysteria at times . If its not fed infested ,its insanity
Broader social media leftism is inevitably taken over by feds and all pressure is turned in on itself in the form of sectarianism to prevent anything from being achieved and to ward off growth of the movement
Sectarian hostility is fed shit and if you assume all sectarians are feds, you'll be right 90% of the time. The other 10% are doing work for feds for free.
I think it's more likely that there's a lot of people that are sectarian because all we know is culture war now and even if those people are a huge minority, all the feds have to do is boost the shit out of their voices and silence everyone else.
did they read the anarchist literature or did they just wear it as a charm and hope the knowledge bleeds through somehow
Wait that's a red and black mask, not a South Park Canadian cat?
Dark theme, why have you betrayed me?
:sadness:
nah you could fit alotta books in a gig, just on hand ive got 300pgs for 10mb pdf
"People keep begging me to read, so I soaked these books in resin and turned them into shoes instead of reading them, out of spite."
Reasonable reaction to reddit debate bros shouting read theory at anyone who disagrees with them. Only dunkable aspect is using burned instead of flashed but that might have been intentional bait for said redditors.
The state of Reddit anarchists: liberals who believe everything the US state department says and just want to nationalize Walmart will somehow result in a stateless solarpunk utopia, something that deeeeefinitely is possible and makes sense.
The state of Reddit MLs: armchairs who tell everyone to read theory instead of answering questions because they haven't actually read the theory, either. If they do cite a specific author or work, the point of that work is invariably arguing the exact opposite of what they're trying to say.
I love to cite Pedagogy of the Oppressed because I’ve seen Reddit ML’s use it to justify why anarchists are bad communists. There’s literally a whole section railing against sectarianism in the first couple pages.
C'mon The People's Republic of Walmart is definitely a worthy read - and of course it's no panacea, but it's definitely something to strive for imo. Read theory, adaptively planned economies are the future anyway; let's not leave the planning up to capital
Planned economies work, but nationalizing Walmart does not a planned economy make, nor is a government-owned company operated as part of a socialist aligned state capitalist planned economy an example of a stateless anti-capitalist and anti-materialistic global commune in unity with nature.
It's "free treats" economics, and it necessitates the continued brutal exploitation of the global south in order to function at all.
Yeah, sure. Especially when it comes to companies like amazon and other multi-national corps, nationalization seems infeasible from the get-go and inadequate even if accomplished. Socialization of these corps, liberation of that tech needs to be embedded in a wider, internationalist struggle - and is, for sure, a rather distant possibility at this point. Still, I think it's worthwhile to think and theorize about. Adaptive planning is just so much better at allocating resources than markets or the central planning of old.
If TPRoW is too shallow a text for you, may I suggest this piece - it's specifically centered on the calculation debate, that holy grail of bourgeois ideology.
I have added it to the top of my reading list and will likely report back tonight.
Sectarianism, but you think all leftists other than yourself are awful.
Real Ultra Hours
:arm-L: 🪑 :arm-R:
Leftcoms are also inferior to me, the one true follower of piss thought
Reasonable reaction to reddit debate bros
You already lost me multiple times through these first 6 words
Sometimes you must suffer for art and what more pure form of suffering is there than reddit?
This is like when Space Marines stick those scrolls of religious text on their armour
Nobody on /r/CompleteAnarchy is even remotely as cool as a Space Marine.
Yeah but those scrolls actually have a chance of doing something.
Hexbear anarchists, can I kick Reddit nerds out of the anarchist club please? :owl-pissed:
Anarchist club is horizontal and membership/non-membership is entirely voluntary. As they are mostly feds, the most effective method of removal is to haze them via repetitive and boring tasks. Allow them to organize large and unwieldy working groups made up exclusively of other feds to waste each other’s time. Enjoy their time away during government shutdowns
Enjoy their time away during government shutdowns
Remembering how the Austin Red Guard disappears during every government shutdown. An ML fed group, but still funny how that happens
I think ML’s are much more likely to be infiltrated, but are as a result much less common
I think ML’s are much more likely to be infiltrated
probably leftover fear of them from the cold war
The funniest thing I ever read was cops trying to infiltrate anarchist groups but were foiled by "too much reading" and not being able to find out where our funding came from.
Also just letting them waste time trying to find out who funds us is funny
Start with the dork I got into an argument with because they thought that co-ops works be improved by putting voting to a Blockchain and was arguing that crypto was good.
Then again, there's a lot of ancaps on the anarchism sub and they deserve to be pushed into lockers
Oh look at me, I'm so owned by your stubborn aesthetic. Is this really any different than anti-maskers not wanting to wear a mask just so they can be contrarian?
This is more like when they wore masks made of thin pantyhose material as a protest
That sounds impressive, until you download something from Library Genesis and realize that a Zapatista book takes up 140 MBs for some reason...there aren't even any pictures! Comrades please encode more efficiently, thank you
