This section discusses what anarchists get up to. There is little point thinking about the world unless you also want to change it for the better. And by trying to change it, you change yourself and others, making radical change more of a possibility. Therefore anarchists give their whole-hearted support to attempts by ordinary people to improve their lives by their own actions. As Max Stirner pointed out, "[t]he true man does not lie in the future, an object of longing, but lies, existent and real, in the present." [The Ego and Its Own, p. 327]
For anarchists, the future is already appearing in the present and is expressed by the autonomy of working class self-activity. Anarchy is not some-day-to-be-achieved utopia, it is a living reality whose growth only needs to be freed from constraint. As such anarchist activity is about discovering and aiding emerging trends of mutual aid which work against capitalist domination (i.e. what is actually developing), so the Anarchist "studies society and tries to discover its tendencies , past and present, its growing needs, intellectual and economic, and in his [or her] ideal he merely points out in which direction evolution goes." [Peter Kropotkin, Kropotkin's Revolutionary Pamphlets, p. 47]
The kinds of activity outlined in this section are a general overview of anarchist work. It is by no means exclusive as we are sure to have left something out. However, the key aspect of *real* anarchist activity is direct action - self-activity, self-help, self-liberation and solidarity. Such activity may be done by individuals (for example, propaganda work), but usually anarchists emphasis collective activity. This is because most of our problems are of a social nature, meaning that their solutions can only be worked on collectively. Individual solutions to social problems are doomed to failure (for example green consumerism).
In addition, collective action gets us used to working together, promoting the experience of self-management and building organisations that will allow us to activity manage our own affairs. Also, and we would like to emphasis this, it's fun to get together with other people and work with them, it's fulfilling and empowering.
Anarchists do not ask those in power to give up that power. No, they promote forms of activity and organisation by which all the oppressed can liberate themselves by their own hands. In other words, we do not think that those in power will altruistically give up that power or their privileges. Instead, the oppressed must take the power back into their own hands by their own actions. We must free ourselves, no one else can do it for use.
As we have noted before, anarchism is more than just a critique of statism and capitalism or a vision of a freer, better way of life. It is first and foremost a movement, the movement of working class people attempting to change the world. Therefore the kind of activity we discuss in this section of the FAQ forms the bridge between capitalism and anarchy. By self-activity and direct action, people can change both themselves and their surroundings. They develop within themselves the mental, ethical and spiritual qualities which can make an anarchist society a viable option.
As Noam Chomsky argues:
"Only through their own struggle for liberation will ordinary people come to comprehend their true nature, suppressed and distorted within institutional structures designed to assure obedience and subordination. Only in this way will people develop more humane ethical standards, 'a new sense of right', 'the consciousness of their strength and their importance as a social factor in the life of their time' and their capacity to realise the strivings of their 'inmost nature.' Such direct engagement in the work of social reconstruction is a prerequisite for coming to perceive this 'inmost nature' and is the indispensable foundations upon which it can flourish" [preface to Rudolf Rocker's Anarcho-Syndicalism, p. viii]
In other words, anarchism is not primarily a vision of a better future, but the actual social movement which is fighting within the current unjust and unfree society for that better future and to improve things in the here and now. Without standing up for yourself and what you believe is right, nothing will change. Therefore anarchists would agree whole-heartedly with Frederick Douglass (an Abolitionist) who stated that:
"If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom and yet deprecate agitation are people who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. That struggle might be a moral one; it might be a physical one; it might be both moral and physical, but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and never will. People might not get all that they work for in this world, but they must certainly work for all they get."
In this section of the FAQ we will discuss anarchist ideas on struggle, what anarchists actually (and, almost as importantly, do not) do in the here and now and the sort of alternatives anarchists try to build within statism and capitalism in order to destroy them. As well as a struggle against oppression, anarchist activity is also struggle for freedom. As well as fighting against material poverty, anarchists combat spiritual poverty. By resisting hierarchy we emphasis the importance of living and of life as art. By proclaiming "Neither Master nor Slave" we urge an ethical transformation, a transformation that will help create the possibility of a truly free society.
This point was argued by Emma Goldman after she saw the defeat of the Russian Revolution by a combination of Leninist politics and capitalist armed intervention:
"the ethical values which the revolution is to establish must be initiated with the revolutionary activities. . . The latter can only serve as a real and dependable bridge to the better life if built of the same material as the life to be achieved." [Red Emma Speaks, p. 358]In other words, anarchist activity is more than creating libertarian alternatives and resisting hierarchy, it is about building the new world in the shell of the old not only with regards to organisations and self-activity, but also within the individual. It is about transforming yourself while transforming the world - both processes obviously interacting and supporting each other -- "the first aim of Anarchism is to assert and make the dignity of the individual human being." [Charlotte Wilson, Three Essays on Anarchism, p. 17]
And by direct action, self-management and self-activity we can make the words first heard in Paris, 1968 a living reality:
Words, we are sure, the classic anarchists would have whole-heartedly agreed with. There is a power in humans, a creative power, a power to alter what is into what should be. Anarchists try to create alternatives that will allow that power to be expressed, the power of imagination.
In the sections that follow we will discuss the forms of self-activity and self-organisation (collective and individual) which anarchists think will stimulate and develop the imagination of those oppressed by hierarchy, build anarchy in action and help create a free society.
“That’s a big honor,” commented Larry. “The passenger, while they were high up, threw something and hit the pilot, the seaplane went out of control, the man jumped—and then cut free his parachute, cut the sack holding the emeralds, and hid in the swamp.” “I see a light,” Sandy said as the airplane swung far out over the dark water. “A green light, but the hydroplane wouldn’t carry lights.” "No, no; it's a good deal, but it ain't too much. Not that it could be more, very well," he added, and he glanced furtively at the woman within, who had stretched out on the lounge with her face to the wall. Mrs. Taylor was fanning her. But though the 21st of January was to be the day of the grand attack on the Ministry, the battle was not deferred till then. Every day was a field-day, and the sinking Minister was dogged step by step, his influence weakened by repeated divisions, and his strength worn out by the display of the inevitable approach of the catastrophe. The first decided defeat that he suffered was in the election of the Chairman of Committees. The Ministerial candidate, Giles Earle, was thrown out by a majority of two hundred and forty-two to two hundred and thirty-eight, and the Opposition candidate, Dr. Lee, was hailed by a shout that rent the House. Other close divisions followed. The fall of Walpole was now certain, and he would have consulted both his dignity and comfort in resigning at once. This was the earnest advice of his friends, but he had been too long accustomed to power to yield willingly. He was oppressed with a sense of his defeats, and the insolence of enemies whom he had so long calmly looked down upon without fear. He was growing old and wanted repose, but he still clung convulsively to his authority, though he had ceased to enjoy it. "Should think they was bride and groom, if they wasn't so old." "March them right over to that shed there," said the Major, "and the Quartermaster will issue them muskets and equipments, which you can turn over again when you reach Chattanooga. Good-by. I hope you'll have a pleasant trip. Remember me to the boys of the old brigade and tell them I'll be with them before they start out for Atlanta." The train finally halted on a side-track in the outskirts of Chattanooga, under the gigantic shadow of Lookout Mountain, and in the midst of an ocean of turmoiling activity that made the eyes ache to look upon it, and awed every one, even Si and Shorty, with a sense of incomprehensible immensity. As far as they could see, in every direction, were camps, forts, intrenchments, flags, hordes of men, trains of wagons, herds of cattle, innumerable horses, countless mules, mountains of boxes, barrels and bales. Immediately around them was a wilderness of trains, with noisy locomotives and shouting men. Regiments returning from veteran furlough, or entirely new ones, were disembarking with loud cheering, which was answered from the camps on the hillsides. On the river front steamboats were whistling and clanging their bells. "Go out and git you a rebel for yourself, if you want to know about 'em," Shorty had snapped at the Orderly. "There's plenty more up there on the hill. It's full of 'em." "Drat 'em! durn 'em!" "He's dead," said Realf. Should you leave me too, O my faithless ladie!" The odds were generally on Reuben. It was felt that a certain unscrupulousness was necessary to the job, and in that Backfield had the advantage. "Young Realf wudn't hurt a fly," his champions had to acknowledge. Though the money was with Reuben, the sympathy was mostly with Realf, for the former's dealings had scarcely made him popular. He was a hard man to his customers, he never let them owe him for grain or roots or fodder; his farm-hands, when drunk, spoke of him as a monster, and a not very tender-hearted peasantry worked itself sentimental over his treatment of his children. Caro was frightened, horrified—she broke free, and scrambled to her feet. She nearly wept, and it was clear even to his muddled brain that her invitation had been merely the result of innocence more profound than that which had stimulated her shyness. Rough seaman though he was, he was touched, and managed to soothe her, for she was too bashful and frightened to be really indignant. They walked a few yards further along the path, then at her request turned back towards Odiam. Calverley reluctantly departed on his mission, cursing the interruption that prevented his enjoying the degradation of his rival, and the baron now inquired whether Holgrave had confessed himself his villein. HoME国家产免费一级毛卡片
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