Post Platformism Please!
For Post-Left Anarchism and Green Anarchy
Post-left anarchism is the only essential hyphenated anarchism I can see the need for at the moment in the West. ( Even though I'm partial to the tag ' Pan-anarchist'. ) Post-left anarchism appears necessary in the Anglosphere imho especially because some anarchists are ignorant about their principles.
Let's be very clear about why we are not Leftists no matter how much DNA we share - for the same reason we are not Chimpanzee's...or slime mould.
The term 'Left' arose during the French Revolution. During one of the earliest representational political chambers those who sat on the right generally represented the ' Ancien regime' or reactionaries and conservatives. The forward looking, the progressive and the radical reformists sat on the Left.
Now as anarchists have consistantly opposed representational politics in favour of direct action and where meetings and decisions are required anarchists call for revocable, recallable rotatable delegates WITHOUT VOTING POWERS to report back to smaller constituent assemblies and individual's. This is far closer to direct democracy and consensus and is ( or should be ) the default anarchist ' political' position.
Clearly it is neither ' left' nor ' right' as it is NON REPRESENTATIONAL.
' No God - No Master '
The great Mahknovista movement of South Central Ukraine was not ' Left'.
Most of the Left back then was bourgeois and urban. ( Still is )
The great Spanish peoples revolution was not left from the July 1936 battle for Barcelona to November when a some of the most prominent anarchists felt the need to ally with the Left ( and the state ) Most anarchists continued to aquit themselves well in spite of the mistakes made by some ' leader's' , some of whom were bourgeois and urban.
The point needs to be made again and again that the task of liberating and emancipating the peasant's is the task for the peasant's themselves.
The Left has invariably been urban and bourgeois ( middle class ) from the start and so also been representational as far as the vast majority of the population is concerned.
A quick word on the terms ' Socialist' and ' Communist'. It has long been mantained that the term ' Anarcho-socialist' was a stupid redundancy - ALL anarchists being socialists ( Libertarian - socialists )
You might think the same logic applies to the redundancy that is ' Anarcho-communist' , however this is contested by some of the Neo-Marxists splitters, wreckers and entryists in the movement today.
Suffice to note for now that a great debate raged between the Wars about the differences between ' socialism' and ' communism'. In the end it was agreed that there were NO substantative differences worth spit.
Following WW2 it was noted that ANY class could be revolutionary in its time and place...and also that trad anarcho-syndicalism had it's work cut out for it in a booming Anglo and Eurosphere.
Post-left anarchism was given it's modern boost by the bankrupt and banal activities of ' Municipalists' in the seventies and eighties who wanted to run for local elections and ' Workerists' who wanted to revive anarcho-syndicalism ( using a violent electric storm presumably ).
These dead end's and cul-de-sac's were clearly not progressing anarchist theory and praxis in the Anglosphere.
Post-left anarchism did because it worked in with Green anarchy, then taking off from the fag end of the Hippie era.
Green anarchy brings insights from biology, anthropology, Sociology, molecular physic's, ecology, ergonomics, indigenous studies, appropriate technology studies and many other varied specialized fields all networked and interacting and all given massive impetus by, first PUNK ROCK; DYI PUNK and then much later the by the first internet.
Post-left anarchism that is based on science is no easy strawman for leftists to push over. Post-left anarchism is revolutionary not just against the god and the state but also the entire rationale for clapped out and staggering bankrupt, stale and flat Leftism.
The biggest most sustained leftist challenge to post-left anarchism is a sour resentful and throuroughly Leninist sort of neo-marxism called ' Anarchist-communism' also known as ' Platformism'. It's critiques buy into the right wing strawman image of ' Primitivism' and also attack revolutionary anarchism in other ways. By pouring scorn on all the great Propaganda of the deed anarchists for example. These dogmatic, leftist, workerist purists owe more than a little to the Trotskyist roots many of them share.
The original Leninists were pretty good at entryism too!
Still anarchism has survived the worst red-fascist Leninism and brown-fascist Hitlerism could throw at it. A few ' dead-enders' won't hold us back now. Post-left anarchists are pragmatist's and practical and inventive in the finest inventive Yankee, Aussi, Irish sense.
They want to know what will work to take out god and the state tomorrow. And not just make that ' work' in their revolution of everyday life but also they want to play without retraint and live without dead time.
Now we have the Freenet's and Wildnet's the sky's the limit for an unhyphented inclusive BIG BROTHEL, sorry, BIG TENT anarchism that can, not only regain the great peak's we achieved in 1936 but go on to scale even greater heights. The world anarchist revolution eluded us then but thats no matter...tomorrow we'll run faster...stretch out our arms farther.
Post-left anarchism is the only essential hyphenated anarchism I can see the need for at the moment in the West. ( Even though I'm partial to the tag ' Pan-anarchist'. ) Post-left anarchism appears necessary in the Anglosphere imho especially because some anarchists are ignorant about their principles.
Let's be very clear about why we are not Leftists no matter how much DNA we share - for the same reason we are not Chimpanzee's...or slime mould.
The term 'Left' arose during the French Revolution. During one of the earliest representational political chambers those who sat on the right generally represented the ' Ancien regime' or reactionaries and conservatives. The forward looking, the progressive and the radical reformists sat on the Left.
Now as anarchists have consistantly opposed representational politics in favour of direct action and where meetings and decisions are required anarchists call for revocable, recallable rotatable delegates WITHOUT VOTING POWERS to report back to smaller constituent assemblies and individual's. This is far closer to direct democracy and consensus and is ( or should be ) the default anarchist ' political' position.
Clearly it is neither ' left' nor ' right' as it is NON REPRESENTATIONAL.
' No God - No Master '
The great Mahknovista movement of South Central Ukraine was not ' Left'.
Most of the Left back then was bourgeois and urban. ( Still is )
The great Spanish peoples revolution was not left from the July 1936 battle for Barcelona to November when a some of the most prominent anarchists felt the need to ally with the Left ( and the state ) Most anarchists continued to aquit themselves well in spite of the mistakes made by some ' leader's' , some of whom were bourgeois and urban.
The point needs to be made again and again that the task of liberating and emancipating the peasant's is the task for the peasant's themselves.
The Left has invariably been urban and bourgeois ( middle class ) from the start and so also been representational as far as the vast majority of the population is concerned.
A quick word on the terms ' Socialist' and ' Communist'. It has long been mantained that the term ' Anarcho-socialist' was a stupid redundancy - ALL anarchists being socialists ( Libertarian - socialists )
You might think the same logic applies to the redundancy that is ' Anarcho-communist' , however this is contested by some of the Neo-Marxists splitters, wreckers and entryists in the movement today.
Suffice to note for now that a great debate raged between the Wars about the differences between ' socialism' and ' communism'. In the end it was agreed that there were NO substantative differences worth spit.
Following WW2 it was noted that ANY class could be revolutionary in its time and place...and also that trad anarcho-syndicalism had it's work cut out for it in a booming Anglo and Eurosphere.
Post-left anarchism was given it's modern boost by the bankrupt and banal activities of ' Municipalists' in the seventies and eighties who wanted to run for local elections and ' Workerists' who wanted to revive anarcho-syndicalism ( using a violent electric storm presumably ).
These dead end's and cul-de-sac's were clearly not progressing anarchist theory and praxis in the Anglosphere.
Post-left anarchism did because it worked in with Green anarchy, then taking off from the fag end of the Hippie era.
Green anarchy brings insights from biology, anthropology, Sociology, molecular physic's, ecology, ergonomics, indigenous studies, appropriate technology studies and many other varied specialized fields all networked and interacting and all given massive impetus by, first PUNK ROCK; DYI PUNK and then much later the by the first internet.
Post-left anarchism that is based on science is no easy strawman for leftists to push over. Post-left anarchism is revolutionary not just against the god and the state but also the entire rationale for clapped out and staggering bankrupt, stale and flat Leftism.
The biggest most sustained leftist challenge to post-left anarchism is a sour resentful and throuroughly Leninist sort of neo-marxism called ' Anarchist-communism' also known as ' Platformism'. It's critiques buy into the right wing strawman image of ' Primitivism' and also attack revolutionary anarchism in other ways. By pouring scorn on all the great Propaganda of the deed anarchists for example. These dogmatic, leftist, workerist purists owe more than a little to the Trotskyist roots many of them share.
The original Leninists were pretty good at entryism too!
Still anarchism has survived the worst red-fascist Leninism and brown-fascist Hitlerism could throw at it. A few ' dead-enders' won't hold us back now. Post-left anarchists are pragmatist's and practical and inventive in the finest inventive Yankee, Aussi, Irish sense.
They want to know what will work to take out god and the state tomorrow. And not just make that ' work' in their revolution of everyday life but also they want to play without retraint and live without dead time.
Now we have the Freenet's and Wildnet's the sky's the limit for an unhyphented inclusive BIG BROTHEL, sorry, BIG TENT anarchism that can, not only regain the great peak's we achieved in 1936 but go on to scale even greater heights. The world anarchist revolution eluded us then but thats no matter...tomorrow we'll run faster...stretch out our arms farther.
posted by professor rat at 6:39 PM
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