Anews Podcast 217 – 6.25.21

From The Anews Podcast!

Welcome to the anews podcast. This podcast is on anarchist activity, ideas, and conversations from the previous week on anarchistnews.org.

Sound editing by Greg.

What’s New written by chisel and Greg.

TotW conversation, part 2 on religion, this week with Octox and Max Res.

One of the New Things in the Library (readings from new entries to theanarchistlibrary.org), Power in Anarchism by Ruth Kinna, read by Octox.

Music:
1. Kanye West – Power
2. Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared 2
3. Limp Bizkit – Faith (Three Dollar Bill Y’all $)

There are 4 Comments

I'm still looking for the "classical" anarchist who really believed that power (in some more or less Foucauldian sense) could be abolished. But I'm also sort of curious whether this particular emphasis on the ubiquity of power is in the service of "anarchist" constitutionalism.

I haven't read the issue of "Perspectives," so I can't comment usefully. But the disagreement with the postanarchists — as far back as "What's Wrong with Postanarchism?" — has always been about rejecting distinctions and oppositions that seem poorly supported by the facts. The "classical" anarchists often had very complex understandings of power. Stirner isn't the Glorious Exception. And so on...

This "Encyclopedia of Power" that Ruth Kinna's text was published on is from 2011, though I see that your text you link is from 2007.
These discussions have come up under different terms for centuries now, and often anarchists seem to be unaware of their precedents of even a few years prior. This is a recurring theme in your writing.

Not to mention people who are foreign to anarchist discussions, who merely timidly and shallowly venture into them like tourists. Often academics like in this post from a short while back: https://anarchistnews.org/content/real-anarchism-has-never-been-philosop...

An anarchism cursed to be forever young in an Eternal September, or preserved as an act of tokenism by institutions, to be deployed for novelty or provocation by the academics who recuperate it.

Anarchy resurges despite erasure and lack of long-lasting oral traditions.

Are there different strains of anarchy, some are annuals and some perennial?
Some easier to spread by growing from a root cutting than to try to germinate it from the seeds each time?
Or can it only grow like a wild weed, constantly being plucked and poisoned, eradicated, but always coming back?
Some that have roots that take a long time to grow deep? Some don't have roots but have rhizoids like moss that can grow on the top of any surface or crack?

A pointless musing? All I mean to say is if anarchy requires a root to grow, we're fucked. Maybe we can be happy with the smattering of weeds or moss that get plucked, whacked or pressured washed away, growing back, but never big like a sequoia or deep like I don't know. I marvel at how much you know , how few people will get to know what you know and how useless it all is, but still I very much appreciate it.

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