The Matrix vs Ghostbusters
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- certified pussyhound clang swords dickless over here fat cenobite luka i didn't write this one i know kung fu i show you how deep the rabbit hole goes inexhaustible source material jar jar's taint millions of dead platypus pinhead craner sophia loren stop trying to hit me and hit me sweet sweet slaughter terrified beyond the capacity for rational thought that spring we lived on bowls of risotto the gestapo's last orgy the roast of oliver craner there is no spoon tree chunks which is bio-mechanoid woah
Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
This is the Sp!ked schtick, isn't it?
"Who needs ice caps anyway?"
"Why inequality is good for us."
Etc.
luka
Well-known member
i dont know what spiked is
john eden
male pale and stale
Oh ok. There's a fairly standard anarchist critique of the liberal left in there I suppose. The bit that he misses is that the horizontalism of Occupy stems precisely from this sort of critique. And yes of course this means it takes longer to make decisions than a brutal dictatorship, but that is kind of the point.
There is also a failure to understand the balance of forces there. Occupy understood the balance of forces and if they tried to out-gun the police they would have lost very quickly. The point is to build up power from below by bringing people with you. Otherwise you might get a small group of very militant armed people who can engage in spectacular terror against the state - and the outcomes of that are fairly well known now.
padraig (u.s.)
a monkey that will go ape
that's not a new critique of antiauthoritarian leftism. if anything it's surprising how crude Curtis's version of it is. tho I guess shouldn't be - he's not a leftist himself, isn't familiar with the culture or history the way he is with, say, neoliberalism.
it was a massive - probably the defining - issue for the Spanish anarchist movement up during the Civil War (undoubtedly the high-water mark for formal anarchism in a Western country). the anarchists refused to seize top-down power when they could have because it was completely antithetical to their principles, and to the limited extent that they did it bitterly divided them and the left them in a weakened state for the communist - who had no qualms about brutally seizing power, of course - betrayal shortly thereafter.
it's always going to be a problem for anyone rejecting power, whether they call themselves anarchists or whatever else.
I would point again to the Zapatistas, who have been by revolutionary standards both very successful and always very careful ,through their mouthpiece Marcos to reject the idea of seizing power in a vanguardist sense. not that their organization or society is free of hierarchy, but they've largely escaped that trap of rejecting power/failing to seize it.
john eden
male pale and stale
I think that gets you into a conversation about authenticity. I mean yes we can all find anime dudes on twitter who post up a load of Mao memes. I think a lot of those people are dicks, if not all of them.
And her who is "literally" a communist is increasingly drawn to the orbit of centrism.
There are a few things going on there though - one is that people can access all this stuff now. Another is that mainstream political ideologies are not delivering on their promises.
padraig (u.s.)
a monkey that will go ape
I see John beat me to it, no surprise there
one frustrating thing - going both ways - is the idea of purity, like any hierarchy or power means a failure or that you don't really believe what you say
you can reject the idea of power without being completely unrealistic about the world as is
this is why anarchists tend to reject the idea of storm the palace revolutionary moment. it's an endless struggle toward ideals you don't actually reach.
as praxis it's the kinds of things John often mentions - building horizontal, inclusionary structures
like all real-life things, it tends to be messy and irritating, cos people are imperfect
one frustrating thing - going both ways - is the idea of purity, like any hierarchy or power means a failure or that you don't really believe what you say
you can reject the idea of power without being completely unrealistic about the world as is
this is why anarchists tend to reject the idea of storm the palace revolutionary moment. it's an endless struggle toward ideals you don't actually reach.
as praxis it's the kinds of things John often mentions - building horizontal, inclusionary structures
like all real-life things, it tends to be messy and irritating, cos people are imperfect
john eden
male pale and stale
Yeah and some good examples from @padraig (u.s.) there with the Zaps and the Spanish civil war.
Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
In this case I'm tempted to say "ignorance is bliss."
john eden
male pale and stale
The long tail coming into its own.
I think there was always a bit of one upmanship going on there - both with the extreme music and extreme ideologies. But I think if you have someone who still likes a bit of Merzbow in his 50s then they are basically a Merzbow fan and there is no pretence there...
padraig (u.s.)
a monkey that will go ape
that's certainly true. it's always been a fringe tendency but it's hugely increased in the last 15-20 years and shows no signs of abating.
it's not surprising. people reach for extremes in unsettled times, especially when they're not used to thinking about "politics" as something beyond occasionally voting. and as John, says mainstream politics have repeatedly and visibly failed to deliver.
it's very reminiscent of the interwar period in Europe - massive economic dislocation, the failure of mainstream politics, people casting about for solutions. the same weird mixups of left and right. violence in the streets.
