Anarchy Bang: Introducing Episode Ten - Communist (con)

yeah, probably!

"communism tries to solve a legitimate problem(exchange) on a general political economic level."

to me, exchange is secondary to the issue of production/consumption, and the inseparable issues of excess and profit-seeking. even leaving aside the primal issues of WHAT is being produced and HOW, the production of excess is what leads to exchange for profit.

I don't know why I even bother...

whether you think he was a bad man or not (I happen to think he was), basically everything Marx published during his lifetime, and the majority of his work, is a CRITIQUE of political economy in general, not another variety of it. So I don't even know what you're trying to say in your comment.

uh … it's not going so well for the commies either unless you're including china? Do you seriously believe that whoever ends up being lenin in your hypothetical future will permit the state to "wither away"? Thats some dangerous naiveté, if so.

If you sell enough newspapers the state will topple comrade.

Sho nuff, yes it would.

So i listened to this solecast, pen ready to write up some snark, but there was not much in it for me, at least nothing juicy/spicy. yet here are my notes/reportback:

Sole presents this podcast by saying "Commune" mag is about how "revolutionary, anti-state, cooperative, whatever, non-ideologically driven...[awkward pause]...revolutionary projects can look like in the 21st century". They make the caveat that this is their personal interpretation, not how the magazine describes itself.

Then Jasper self-deprecatingly briefly whines about the hardships of the rat race of being an academic and a poet. Sole complains about the lack of modern anti-state poetry and how it's hard to find.

After that, Jasper begins to talk in general terms about things like "Occupy" and "the Oakland commune", and communes, and of "revolutionary moments" that "collapse present, future and past", of "being there" and how those moments somehow carry the baggage of all the "struggles of human history". How in these moments "people feel different" to Jasper, how they all shared a "temporary insanity" and "crazy optimism". Then Jasper confesses that the prospects for or of revolution look bleak, that "I have to believe that there's a possibility that we can make it out of it. I can't imagine living without it. It'd be too bleak."

Jasper then admits to being influenced by communization theory, that their ideas are "complex and weird" and they they're interested in taking these "obscure marxist theories" and distill them or make them understandable for a wider audience. Sole then asks Jasper about the relationship between communization theory and tiqqun and the Invisible Committee. Jasper answers that although when these texts were beginning to be translated and circulated around the same time in US, a link was tried to be made between them, but they're actually different bodies of thought. Jasper says that the main difference is that tiqqun/I.C. believes that communism can be built in the present moment, in advance of any revolutionary moment, while communization theory says the opposite; that there's no hope of trying to do that, that communism can only emerge from these moments of rupture. Here is where I quote Jasper out of context "...chickens are two steps away from communism". Ok, I couldn't do it, the context is that Sole says he has some chickens, aspiring to Tarnac, Jasper then says this half sincerely commending him, half mocking him for it.

After Sole makes clear that he's team tiqqun / I.C. / Tarnac, Jasper makes clear though he shares a lot tactically and logistically with the I.C., he and the editing team in "Commune" mag are actually leftcoms and that "they publish all kinds of things they disagree with" and that they aim for a breadth of writers and readership, that includes anarchos.

Then both Jasper and Sole coincide in expressing the feeling that they are currently in a different moment from "occupy" or "BLM", and that they feel a generational disconnect. Something about millenials and memes, and that "Commune" mag does not wish to be directed towards that audience, Jasper says he sees some appeal in writing something his mom can understand.

Then they reflect about the meaning of the word "commune" about it being both an ideal place and a physical space. Jasper says the "Oakland commune" was as such partly descriptive and partly as an aspiration of what they wanted it to be. Then he speaks of the importance of "assembly", not as a formal process, but as a coming together to change how you relate to people around you, that keeps political groups from getting stuck in their habits. He says it takes patience, that riots move to quickly for that.

After that, they talk about agriculture. That bit was kinda interesting.

Uh...well, yeah. i wrote another comment on anews. im sippin on tea with rum.

Are you blaming anarchists for taking out the trash that you (supposed communist) should be doing?

yeah, i wouldn’t do it if it was hard. it’s good clean fun. also, they have a shiny magazine. i can’t let em have nice things.

Not a dichotomy. Capitalism is easily argued to be rooted in white supremacy in the American context. There's plenty of evidence around things like neighbourhood zoning, lending policies, disproportionate rates of poverty etc.

If you can't think of ways that banks and real estate can be racist, you're not thinking very hard.

okay so first abject is an adjective so that sentence doesn't really make sense.

Also maybe you should try reading the actual article:

"North American antifascism is an even more recent phenomenon, emerging within the last decade from the Anti-Racist Action networks that expelled Nazi skinheads from the punk and hardcore scenes in the 1980s. As time went on, many within the ARA network recognized that their practices were overly narrow and their conception of white supremacy too focused on individuals, as opposed to the economic and political institutions of white supremacy: police, courts, banks, employers, and realtors."

the author clearly states white supremacy emerges from these institutions, not that these institutions are caused by white supremacy.

I used to love this website but seriously there's nothing here anymore except the same five people writing actual gibberish to one another. IGD has no comments, and infoshop turned to trash ages ago. RIP talking to anarchists on the internet I guess.

Race, like gender, is a cultural construct.

Ok, Ill bite. If racism is profoundly connected to production, necessary for it in many cases, why insist that it isn't? To what end?

You're... sort of floating in a snowglobe of assertions there. No judgement tho, I do the same!

Where to start?

Every identity that's antagonistic to capitalism is still an identity so you must be talking about liberal forms of identity, which are willfully blind to the real problem, right?

Banks don't have to be racist but apparently they've been deployed very successfully that way for centuries, or maybe forever. Perhaps the tool can't escape the user, eh? Why bother insisting that I could theoretically use an assault rifle to hunt deer?

In general, I think you want clear Marxist definitions and to rant about IdPol but those are just your preferences for understanding that stuff.

I'm definitely not arguing for a "colourblind society" run by banks, only saying that if an institution is openly racist for centuries, we can safely say it's a racist institution, whether or not it could theoretically do something else.

managed to hallucinate on even 600 mcg. of LSD. What I have seen, almost always in the backwoods, is what is actually, physically right in front of me - so deeply, clearly, and finely that it makes 20-20 eyesight blindness by comparison. I have also seen incredibly fine visions with my eyes shut (some people refer to these, which are called eiedic visions - sp.?- as "hallucinations").

You talk like someone who has never done LSD, or has never done it with appropriate intent.

Was six afraid of seven because seven eight nine, or because seven was a registered six offender?

I messed up the link. Here you go
Talking with Sartre: Conversations and Debates.