We should war with relentless efficiency not only against anarchists, but against all active and passive sympathizers with anarchists.
- Theodore Roosevelt (1901)

Solidarity is the integration shown by a society or group with people and their allies. It refers to the ties in a society that bind people to one another. In common language this means standing together with those who resist. Examples include the International Solidarity Movement, Workers Solidarity, and locally the Six Nations Solidarity campaign. The people united will never be defeated.

While there is a lower class, I am in it. While there is a criminal element, I am of it. While there is a soul in prison, I am not free.
- Eugene Debs

Austerity is when a government reduces its spending and/or increases user fees and taxes to pay back debt. Austerity is usually required when a government’s fiscal deficit spending is believed to be unsustainable. These measures are frequently controversial, as they tend to only impact the poorest segments of the population. Austerity programs generally attempt to pin the blame on capitalism’s victims by characterizing them as living beyond their means. After bailing out the world banking system with public taxpayers’ money, the coming global austerity program is an attempt to stick the public with the task of repaying these loans by committing a massive chunk of their present and future income streams as payments to international lending agencies.

Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase temporary safety deserve neither, and will lose both.
- Benjamin Franklin

The G-20 Summit was created as a response both to the financial crisis and to a growing recognition that key emerging countries were not adequately included in the core of global economic discussion and governance. The G-8 is increasingly seen as irrelevant.

The G-20 began as a group of finance ministers and central bank governors from 20 economies: 19 countries plus the European Union. Recently summits meeting at the level of heads of government have been introduced. Collectively, the G-20 economies comprise 85% of global GNP, 80% of world trade and two-thirds of the world population.

Since 1999, many G-20 meetings have faced large public protests. While the majority of the protests have been peaceful, the past decade has seen a rise in dramatic property destruction and confrontation with police. In response to these more militant protests, many new law enforcement tactics have been developed, some of which include the use of chemical agents, sonic weapons and force to disperse protesters. This has been criticized by protesters as a monopoly on violence that has been privileged to the state. The expressed reasons for protests can vary from meeting to meeting, but include the following common issues: blocking neoliberal efforts to undermine local democracy, workers’ rights, environmental protection, and resistance to globalization.

An oligarchy is a form of power, governmental or operational, where said power effectively rests within a small, elite group of inside individuals or influential economic entities or devices - such as banks or corporations - that act in complicity with, or at the whim of the oligarchy, often with little or no regard for constitutionally protected prerogatives.

“An oligarchy of private capital cannot be effectively checked even by a democratically organized political society because under existing conditions, private capitalists inevitably control, directly or indirectly, the main sources of information.”
Albert Einstein

Political repression is the persecution of an individual or group for political reasons, particularly for the purpose of restricting or preventing their ability to take part in the political life of society. Political repression may be represented by discriminatory policies, human rights violation, surveillance abuse, police brutality, imprisonment, involuntary settlement, stripping of citizen’s rights, or violent action such as the murder, summary execution, torture, disappearance or other extrajudicial punishment of political activists, dissidents, or other members of the general population.

If political repression is not carried out with the official approval of the state, a section of the government may still be responsible. An example is the FBI COINTELPRO operations that occurred in the US between 1956 and 1971.

There’s a mass without roofs, There’s a prison to fill,
There’s a country’s soul that reads post no bills,
There’s a strike and a line of cops outside of tha mill,
There’s a right to obey, And there’s a right to kill
-Rage Agaginst The Machine

Police brutality is the intentional use of excessive force, usually physical, but potentially also in the form of verbal attacks and psychological intimidation, by the police . It is in some instances triggered by “contempt of cop”, i.e., perceived disrespect towards police officers.

Widespread police brutality exists in many countries, even those that prosecute it. Police brutality is one of several forms of police misconduct, which include false arrest, intimidation, racial profiling, political repression, illegal surveillance, sexual abuse, and corruption.

Police state describes a state in which the government exercises rigid and repressive controls over the social, economic and political life of the population. A police state typically exhibits elements of totalitarianism and social control, and there is usually little or no distinction between the law and the exercise of political power by the executive.

Social revolution may have different connotations depending on the speaker. In social libertarian and anarchist parlance, a “social revolution” is a bottom-up (as opposed to a vanguard party-led or purely political) revolution aiming to reorganize all of society. More generally, the term “social revolution” may be used to refer to a massive change in society, for instance the French Revolution, the American Civil Rights Movement and the counterculture reformations of religious belief, personal identity, freedom of speech, music and decentralized media.

“Social revolution means the reorganization of the industrial, economic life of the country and consequently also of the entire structure of society.”
- Alexander Berkman

A revolutionary is a person who either actively participates in, or advocates revolution. Also, a revolutionary is someone who supports abrupt, rapid, and drastic change, while a reformist is someone who supports more gradual and incremental change. A conservative is someone who opposes all such changes. A reactionary is someone who wants things to go back to the way they were.

Expropriation is politically motivated and forceful confiscation and redistribution of private property generally aimed at furthering the cause of social justice.  Expropriation takes place outside the law and can refer to the socially-motivated confiscations of any property.

“You say you want a revolution, Well, you know
We all want to change the world.” - the Beatles

Anarchist communism is a political theory that advocates the abolition of the state, private property, and capitalism in favor of common ownership of the means of production, direct democracy and a horizontal network of voluntary associations and workers’ councils with production and consumption based on the guiding principle:“from each according to ability, to each according to need”.

By The Fool on the Hill

I am responding to a couple of items in the March Iconoclast -Issue 20. These items reflect a perception of the Left that I can’t agree with. Anarchists especially have identified with non-authoritarian, highly democratic structures.

First in the editor’s note (pg 1) is stated that one problem compounding the inability of the anarchists to “get behind a common platform” has been “the historical predisposition of the so-called ‘leftist’ governments towards totalitarianism.” This might be forgiven if the term ‘so-called’ were emphasized. Instead this image is then reinforced by Neon Trotsky by saying that “the majority of states that have proclaimed … leftist governance have been heavily state-controlled and state-centralized.” (pg 4-Rethinking the Left)

If ‘the Left’ is understood to include ‘Bolshevism’, then I would dissociate with that Left. In my opinion, Lenin was one of the greatest enemies of socialism. Even long before Lenin, Bakunin warned about the ‘Red Bureaucracy’ that would institute “the worst of all despotic governments.” The brutal and tyrannical Bolshevik system was as much ‘socialist’ as it was ‘democratic’. It claimed to be both. The latter claim was ridiculed in the West, while the former was eagerly accepted, as a weapon against socialism.

Murray Bookchin identifies social anarchism with the “left”, by which he refers to the “great tradition of human solidarity and a belief in the potentiality for humanness,” internationalism and confederalism, anti-militarism, and rational secularism. Social anarchism aims for “free association of people living together and cooperating in free communities.”

The question of conquest or destruction of state power is what Bakunin regarded as the primary issue dividing him from Marx. In one form or another, this has persisted ever since, dividing ‘libertarian’ from ‘authoritarian’ socialists.

Editor:
Bakunin’s dire warning of a “Red Bureaucracy” emerged from his criticism of MARX during the First International. The fact that his warnings were validated by the emergence of the Bolsheviks suggests that the Soviet government had its roots in classical Marxism (hence, the Left). there is nothing inherent in socialism that says it has to be democratic.

By E.B.

The article “Stephen Harper is Not Evil” (Iconoclast 20) caught my eye because it’s a perfect example of the “Liberal Complaint.” Michael Parenti identifies a scale of political activity pertaining to injustice:

Conservative Celebration (ex. the Alberta tar sands)
Liberal Complaint (it’s harming the environment)

Anything to the left of a Liberal Complaint (such as stopping structural profit in general) is seen as hysterical, controversial or a “conspiracy theory.”

Shaft celebrates the ability to criticize Harper or “those that behave wrongly”, yet he or she does not believe that a person is or should be identified as evil. What good is criticism if that is as far as it goes? A public forum for airing grief is not a solution to the problems created by people like Stephen Harper.

The writer’s logic states that although people do evil they are not evil. I see no problem with identifying a person who does evil as evil, as there is no excuse for repeatedly seizing power and controlling others for one’s own purposes. Shaft states that although Saddam Hussein did evil he was not evil.

It doesn’t matter much if we state that Harper does or is evil. What matters is that we are able to know he is doing things that are against the interest of the people who inhabit this land. He is for the world’s most destructive project, petroleum harvesting in Alberta’s Tar Sands. He has shut down parliament twice, and this is just the tip of the iceberg. Do you think Stephen Harper went into politics to be a person who is “not entirely good or evil”? Stephen Harper fits the definition of evil as someone who causes harm.

The rich and powerful are using sophisticated means (Obama campaign) to keep us emotionally invested in the politics that serve their interests. Seeing the evil that someone represents or supports does not have to be the same thing as hating that person. As someone who prefers politicians to serve the interests of the people and the environment, logically I can identify that Harper is evil, as he seeks to do harm. This in turn makes people want him out of power as he is not serving their interests or doing good things. It’s not about hating Harper. He’s a businessman, serving his own interests; therefore he is an untrustworthy manipulator and needs to be taken out of office. What is important and relevant is knowing how the country is being run, how people and the environment are being treated.

I believe in knowing the enemy. I believe many people are actually good people and some, hopefully less, are bad or even evil. I don’t believe in making excuses. Harper has no excuse; he’s an adult doing damage to other people’s lives all over the globe (50 million spent on war per day). He also has no right to run the country and should be stopped. Until we as a group of Canadians and First Nations people see the truth and identify evil where is it, we won’t be doing much but complaining.

The New Left was a term applied to activists, educators, and others in the 1960s and 1970s who sought to implement a broad range of reforms, in contrast to earlier leftist or Marxist movements that had focused mostly on labour unionization and questions of social class. The”New Left” was associated with the hippies and college campus protest movements. At the core of this was the Students for a Democratic Society, or SDS. They sought to correct the perceived errors of “Old Left” parties in the post-WWII period.

Post-left anarchy is a recent current in anarchist thought that promotes a critique of anarchism’s relationship to traditional leftism. Some post-leftists seek to escape the confines of ideology in general, also presenting a critique of organizations and morality. The contemporary network of collectives CrimethInc. is an exponent of general post-left anarchist views.

Primitivism is a particularly extreme class of post-leftist anarchism that believes that civilization is the root cause of oppression. Some notable primitvists, such as John Zerzan, advocate humanity’s return to more close-knit, tribalistic hunter-gatherer societies as a means of reclaiming our lost humanity. Others, such as Derrick Jensen, argue that destruction of civilization is the only way that we can prevent the complete destruction of our planet, and begin to rebuild society along a more sustainable framework.

Insurrectionalist Anarchism is the belief that insurrectionary tactics will provide a catalyst for social change, by motivating disillusioned citizens to rise up and destroy the existing social order. Insurrectionalists believe that tactics of building mass movements necessarily require working with discredited or outdated organizations, such as unions, and that struggles for reforms are at best useless, or at worst, simply opportunities for the ruling class to prolong its own existence through the placation of large segments of the population - thereby sapping their desire for revolution.

Mass Anarchism is based on the argument that without a popular base of support, revolution is impossible. Mass anarchists struggle towards winning people over to the ideals of anarchism by participating in a wide variety of existing social struggles and emphasizing anarchism’s historical values of decentralization, class struggle, secular anti-statism and direct democracy.

Manarkid is a play on words described as: Man + Anarchist + Kid. ‘Manarchism’ is a huge problem on the left. Patriarchy is often viewed as a side issue, rather than one of the most integrated systemic causes of oppression. Manarchism typically manifests in young males who have not made the connection between all forms of oppression. It is especially the case for those wearing the badge of Anarchy as if it meant people should be free from all restraints ( including personal responsibility, and recognizing how individual actions will affect the greater community at large) - which is clearly a mistaken interpretation of the origins and true meaning of the word.

Hipster is a slang term that is often used to describe types of young, recently-settled urban middle class adults and older teenagers with interests in non -mainstream fashion and culture, particularly alternative music, indie rock, independent film and magazines. Some say that the subculture’s original menace has long been abandoned and has been replaced with the form of not-quite-passive aggression called snark.

“Hipsters manage to attract a loathing unique in its intensity. Critics have described the loosely defined group as smug, full of contradictions and, ultimately, the dead end of Western civilization”
Dan Fletcher, Time Magazine

“In recent years, there has been an upsurge in class struggle anarchism or social anarchism. In these circumstances, there is a need for a clear and more force¬ful theoretical statement of principles, and Black Flame serves as an excellent opening statement of the relevance of class struggles anarchism in a twenty-first century context…this book is an impressive introduction to the history of anarchist theory and anarchist movements.” - Sean Benjamin, Upping the Anti no. 9, Novem¬ber 2009.

“The virtues of Black Flame are without question: it is an outstanding study, and highly recommended to all anarchists! Those who agree with the authors’ defini¬tion of anarchism will rejoice. Those who don’t will be challenged to assess their understanding of anarchism in relation to the syndicalist, anarcho-communist, and platformist traditions.” - Direkte Aktion (no. 196)

“…an important contribution to labour radicalism and the potential for building global worker movements bottom up … a great book!” - International Encyclopedia of Revolution and Protest

“A well-thought out and nuanced study of the intellectual, political, and social his¬tory of anarchism.” - Steven Hirsch, University of Pittsburgh

Iconoclast’s douchebag of the month is the leather clad poster boy of conscientious capitalism and self-proclaimed saviour of Africa – Bono.

Through his tireless promotion of feel-good consumer choices and celebration of bogus green-washing endeavors, Sir Bono single-handedly personifies everything that is wrong with liberals: He makes platitudes to so-called “progressive” causes, while pimping capitalism as the solution to its own problems. From his line of “red” con¬sumer products parroted as a convenient solution to the sub-Saharan AIDS epidemic to his Live-8 concerts aimed at “ending poverty in Africa,” Bono teaches us that all the ills of the world can be solved if we only open our hearts (and wallets).

Well we call bullshit.

According to Dr Loretta Napoleoni, an author who has done extensive research into the effects of economic globalization on Africa, the money raised by Bono’s Live-8 concert “has ended up making Africa poorer and more violent, because the money has been diverted towards warlords, weapons and armed invasions.”

Ooops….looks like you really shit the bed there, Bono.

The problems of the world cannot be solved by simply throwing money at them, you tool. “Partial proceeds” from cell phone sales won’t help the AIDS epidemic in Africa, either. Getting rid of pharmaceutical patents and demanding the Vatican stop harp¬ing on about the evils of condoms, on the other hand, might.

For helping millions of well-meaning middle-class white liberals feel like they’re im¬proving the world, when really they’re just perpetuating the problem, congratulations Bono – YOU ARE THE DOUCHEBAG OF THE MONTH!!

You suck bud. And Bono is a stupid name.

Perfect for anti-prorogation rallies, this flier asks some probing questions about the nature of our so-called “democracy.” Click on image to download printable PDF. Feel free to print and distribute widely.