Anarchism

Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/29111557

The Haymarket Affair (1886)

Tue May 04, 1886

Image: *A Harper’s Weekly illustration of the Haymarket Riot from May 15, 1886.

A Harper’s Weekly illustration of the Haymarket Riot from May 15, 1886.

A Harper’s Weekly illustration of the Haymarket Riot from May 15, 1886.

A Harper's Weekly Illustration of the Haymarket Affair, May 15th, 1886

The Haymarket Affair (also known as the Haymarket massacre) was the bloody aftermath of a bombing that took place on this day in 1886 during a radical labor demonstration demanding an 8 hour day in Chicago, Illinois.

The strike began as a peaceful rally in support of workers striking for an eight-hour work day. After police began trying to disperse a May 4th rally associated with the strike, an unknown person threw a dynamite bomb at the police. The bomb blast and ensuing gunfire resulted in the deaths of seven police officers, four to eight civilians, and wounded approximately one hundred people on either side.

In the internationally publicized legal proceedings that followed, eight anarchists were convicted of conspiracy. Seven were sentenced to death and one to a term of 15 years in prison. Illinois Governor Richard J. Oglesby commuted two of the sentences to terms of life in prison; another committed suicide in jail rather than face the gallows. The other four were hanged on November 11th, 1887.

The trial, widely believed to be a farce, was condemned internationally. The Haymarket Affair, and working class struggle more broadly, is commemorated annually on May 1st as "May Day" or "International Workers' Day".

• Date: 1886-05-04
• Learn More: en.wikipedia.org, libcom.org, theanarchistlibrary.org.
• Tags: #Labor, #Anarchism, #Riots, #Protests.
• Source: www.apeoplescalendar.org

I didn't think I could hate Facebook and the rich techbros any more than I already do, but holy shit, this book is making want to start learning how to build guillotines.

It also does a great job on showing how power and wealth just make people into sociopathic simulacra of humanity.

IT'S GOING DOWN: Tearing Into It: A Conversation with Dean Spade

Episode webpage: https://itsgoingdown.org/tearing-into-it-a-conversation-with-dean-spade/

Media file: https://media.blubrry.com/itsgoingdown/thebeautifulidea.show/content/media/2025/04/Discussion-with-Dean-Spade.mp3

cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/62560258

Hello dear fellow human beings!

Let me clarify a few things.

We are one, all of us, all stardust, right from the belly of an exploding star, right to our shared evolution, history, & current technological & societal progress. All humanity and all life is one and connected, and so are all of our problems.

Poverty, hunger, homelessness, climate change, fascism, war, and even the global epidemic of loneliness & depression aren’t distinct disconnected problems. They are a singular globally connected problem. And it requires a singular globally connected solution.

All of these are problems of a skewed economy, aka wealth inequality. Those who don't have enough face poverty, hunger, homelessness, and a lifetime of financial insecurity. Those who have plenty, want even more, which leads to them dividing the masses by propaganda, eventually leading to fascism & war. Our collective mismanaged consumption is pushing us all towards climate catastrophe. All of these global issues are making us very lonely & depressed, and the overall society prone to crime & violence.

So how can we fix this skewed economy and our collective social issues? And is it even solvable?

Some might find the answer as obvious, some might consider it incorrect or impossible to achieve. Well, let me tell you folks, I've done the math, I've double checked my work, there is one and only one way out - Collectively!

Welcome to Collective Cake, a secular democratic global economic engine powered by all, and created for all. If we are the producers and if we are also the consumers, then we can manage our economy however we collectively want. It’s our Collective Cake, let’s take ownership and enjoy it best we can.

Is it a business? Or is it an cooperative? Is it a think tank? Or is it an economic union? Is it a democratically controlled, sustainability led unified global economy? It is anything & everything we want it to be. We get to collectively decide it!

Is it capitalism? Is it communism? Is it market socialism? All I will say about this is that capitalism is what exists right now, and market socialism is also capitalism, but the better kind. However, I want us all to refrain from using such labels while problem solving. Labels might help identify a sub-group, but it invariably causes division and we pick sides, we blindly love ours, and blindly hate theirs. An emotional response is not a well reasoned response. Lastly, if even one man cannot understand ambiguous or technical jargon, we have all collectively lost.

There's a lot for us talk about. Not a debate to be won, but a problem to be solved. Not using violence, but by strategy and collective action. Before we talk about the what or the how, we must talk more about the why. I have some thoughts that I'll share, but it doesn't matter for we can collectively decide and do anything we want. The matchstick has been lit.

Next week, I'll share my thoughts on our collective ethos or "our water".

Stay tuned!

Love, fakir

PS: enjoy this lovely animation that was released over 50 years ago!

Cross-posted from "Up to 4 Anarchist instances and 9 ACAB instances!" by @[email protected] in [email protected]

Let's go for 5 and 10 at least!

by Colin Denny Donoghue

While it’s true many people are wrapped up in a consumer-corporate lifestyle and think trying to change the world is a naïve or impossible task not worth even trying, many other people are more actively compassionate and are giving a lot of time and effort to try and make this world a better place. Some of those engaged in this productive work, like The School of Living, have a better vision than others on how to achieve the goal of a healthier and more just society; from its founder Ralph Borsodi’s book Flight From the City, along with the later Decentralism by Mildred J. Loomis, to current vegan homesteading projects like Ahimsa Village, I find the ideas and praxis of philosophy toward achieving a sustainable society to be very on-target. Unfortunately many others do not yet see how crucial it is for people to be connected to the Earth in a more direct, natural and free way in order for there to be global social-justice, and in order to restore our environment, health, and sanity.

In “close-but-no-cigar” fashion (i.e. missing the crucial point), modern conservationists, scientists, sociologists and radical activists give key ideas for stopping and reversing the destructive ecological & health crisis we face, namely: we need much more decentralization of power, localization of organic food production, and we need much less environmental destruction, pollution, waste and radiation. As good as these ideas are, the critical problem with them is that their version of decentralization, localization and sustainability only go to a certain limited extent (limited within corporate/statist/monetary systemic restraints), and are alternatives accessible only to a relatively narrow segment of the world population. Here I will argue that the decentralist/localization/sustainability movement absolutely needs to go further, i.e. all the way to the universal individual level, in order for us to achieve the significant positive change the world needs. This “extreme” decentralization, localization and sustainable living would not only be more effective, but is in fact the only way to a globalization of equality and personal/environmental health. And it leads to a clear and specific destination: communities of sovereign zero-waste veganic homesteads. That way of life produces none of the environmental/health/life-destruction that is dominant now, and also fosters human equality, well-being and flourishing; more on why this is the real solution will be explained shortly.

The difference in perspective between what most people are offering as solutions and what’s offered here is fundamentally a difference between inside & outside-the-box thinking; the former is limited within the socioeconomic box (the box that is actually the main source of the problems), looking for within-the-system top-down solutions from State policies and programs (or the International Monetary Fund, etc.), rather than bottom-up solutions from autonomous individuals & the Earth’s ecology. This can also be looked at as a collectivist versus individualist way of thinking, though the former is often mistakenly equated with community, and the latter with a selfish isolationist perspective. In reality, collectivism means forced assimilation into a social-system while individualism has the ethical superiority of valuing individual sovereignty, self-responsibility, and voluntary relations.

archived (Wayback Machine)

To embrace veganism and forgo the consumption and utilization of animal products is not an end, but a beginning; a new start affording the practitioner an opportunity to see everyday realities in a different light.

However, to speak of the suffering of non-human animals and the benefits of a vegan lifestyle is often a disheartening situation to the vegan, for typically the first reaction of her audience is to disagree. Opponents of veganism say that the way vegans view human-animal relationships (i.e. radically) is wrong, and that, looming on the horizon, is a severe cost for such blatant societal insubordination. Ultimately, they prophesize, the error of veganism will become obvious and, eventually, the idea thrown away.

In a strange way, however, veganisms’s critics are correct.

Not until one realizes what makes veganism “unreasonable,” will the individual realize the true reasoning behind what it means to be vegan. Not until one questions what it is that depicts veganism as “wrong,” in the eyes of non-vegans will one gain the ability to adequately address the wrongs driving their refusal to accept humanity’s violent and unwarranted treatment of non-human animals. Not until the principles of veganism are applied to the rubric of injustice as a whole will one understand the need for veganism at all.

They are correct because veganism in isolation defeats the purpose for which it is intended.

And so it goes, for the alienation experienced as an effect of breaking social conventions is often enough to make one “question” her commitment to veganism.

As a philosophy, veganism stands in defiance to ideologies touching the core of Western thought. Opposed to the irrational belief systems which establishment institutions socialize people to “accept,” the principles of veganism challenge individuals to confront the dogma they are issued and to construct new ethics and values based on the premises of compassion and justice.

Confronting the existing belief systems, however, is a frightening concept to a society that has voluntarily conscripted itself to the dominant social paradigms of the state. However, as Brian Dominick so skillfully illustrates in the following essay, it is precisely this confrontation that we must agree to make if we are honest in seeking a true assessment of what social liberation has to offer. In the totality of this process, veganism is but one element in the compound structure of social revolution. It is in this light that Brian’s essay shines its brightest. Animal Liberation and Social Revolution is a compact framework designed to assist us as we embark on the endeavor of recognizing what roles compassion, critical thinking, and rationality (ought to) play in our simultaneous deconstruction and transformation of society. Relentless in his quest to set the proverbial wheels of this transformation in motion, Brian presses us to confront the oppressive ideologies we harbor within ourselves and to uncover their linkages to the injustice that pervades every sphere of our existence.

It is Brian’s belief that each of us has been given the tools to draw these necessary conclusions. It makes no difference if you are an anarchist approaching veganism, a vegan approaching anarchism, or neither of the two. All that is required is the willingness to roll up your sleeves, sharpen those tools and start drawing, in a concerted effort, to challenge humanity’s myopic vision of what constitutes a just society.

—Joseph M. Smith

November, 1995

archived (Wayback Machine)

Interesting... Also cool illustration

Hey everyone came here after reddit started censoring everyone and anything.

I'll put down some suggestions and whatever folks are interested in I'll do weekly/bi-weekly posts talking about the chapter with folks.

Please comment if you are interested and/or have a suggestion

these are all a bit longer and I've read 2/3 (Conquest of Bread by Kropotkin and Anarchism by Goldman) the third is a fascinating one but I'm also open to other suggestions for what to read together.

https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/murray-bookchin-post-scarcity-anarchism-book

https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/emma-goldman-anarchism-and-other-essays

https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/petr-kropotkin-the-conquest-of-bread

I'll also include a really short essay in the comments and short story for personal reading here.

https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/david-graeber-are-you-an-anarchist-the-answer-may-surprise-you

https://files.libcom.org/files/ursula-k-le-guin-the-ones-who-walk-away-from-omelas.pdf

I have attempted to read Anarchist books before. I found it difficult to read, boring, laborious, dated, and frankly the entire notion of Anarchist literature felt like it was missing the point of it’s subject matter. I will say that I am also someone who struggles to read a lot or at all, just for a point of comparison.

Then I stumbled into this book. It was a fucking amazing read, I could not put it away. Now it’s a biography, and that to me kind of sucked, as I had thought that biographies were what old people read in their infinite spare time, once they had finished every other book in the universe. That said, the guy’s life could just be fiction book. So does it really matter?

The book admittedly romanticizes a lot of nuance of Ben’s life away. The portrayal of street life, is made out be excited freedom balanced with the hardship of the road. Where that balance definitely feels further towards the freedom end of the spectrum. But it also leans into other challenges Ben faces latter in life, such as being deemed less important to the abortion rights movement by the very women he is fighting for, because he’s male. Unlike fiction and like real life the book doesn’t exactly have a happy ending. In large part because of Reitman’s relationship with Emma Goldman, but also because real life sucks.

What I am really saying is that for someone who always thought of themselves as an Anarchist, this book was the first one that I was truly able to sit down and read to completion without feeling like a lullaby was playing over my head. So I highly recommend it to anyone who read the first paragraph of this, and went – “yeah that’s me”.

For a slightly more broad point, this book is a really good example of actions speaking louder than words. I personally feel that the actions discussed here present a far more compelling argument against the state and capital than any theoretical guide ever could.