TotW: Dissolving Power, Not Replacing It

Power structures persist because power itself becomes the game. Even attempts to redistribute power often reinforce its logic rather than dismantling it. Can anarchism go beyond shifting power and instead make it something that naturally dissipates?

TOTW: Gardens, part II

Here in this part of the world, spring has almost arrived. Outside, the sun is hiding behind some clouds as it has for most of the winter and the snow on the ground continues to accumulate. This week we’re digging up the earth to talk about growing plants and hear about your upcoming plans or how the garden was over the year.

TOTW: Hostility

Anarchists are anti many things. Anti-state, anti-capital, anti-racism, anti-race, anti-patriarchy, anti-monarchy, anti-tech, anti-left, anti-fa. An onlooker could be forgiven for thinking anarchists are operating on hostility alone and define ourselves by the things we hate. Don’t worry, this isn’t one of those “So what are we FOR?” kinds of talks. I want to focus entirely on the animosity. 

TOTW: Conservatism in Disguise

When I hear phrases like "fuck around, find out" it feels like jail/prison culture has busted out and is taking over popular culture...

The "fuck around, find out" mindset operates as a shorthand for harsh justice. Prison justice. That phrase and others of its kind reinforce the idea that actions have clear, brutal consequences. A way of signaling a no-nonsense, retributive worldview where power is respected and transgressions are punished without mercy. They are phrases that tend towards a form of conservatism... a law-and-order morality that maintains rigid social relations.

TOTW: Resiliency and growing stronger

As I’m sitting down to write this Topic of the Week, I’m confronted with an array of ideas and thoughts of where to go with the topic after years of writing them. I’m writing from the season of winter or four months of cold, snow, wind, and grey overcast skies which can certainly present challenges of finding the bright spots.

TOTW: RIGHTS, or So This Is How Cassandra Felt

(ALL EXTERNAL LINKS ANONYMIZED) 

Many of us define rights as a negative - the act of officially naming them is enough to bind our potential and creativity within them, thus reducing the liberty we would exercise otherwise.
Just as many rely heavily on rights as a foundational principle, sowing discord throughout communities by educating each other with labor rights readers in one hand and "If An Agent Knocks" in the other. 

TOTW: Forever Young

All that lives will inevitably die, but getting old is optional.

Anarchists take this challenge literally at times, joining the lineage of bombastic figures who meet an early grave, while most combat the aging process by staying “young at heart” despite their aching joints. To those who resist it, “growing up” often means trading away whimsy, delight, and Romantic notions of infinity for stress, alarm clocks, and tax forms. Anarchists have long made enemies with linear time—the type that makes you old—to escape its deleterious and conformist effects.

TOTW: Aliens

This week, we're talking about ALIENS!

But what does that even mean? What kind of "aliens"? Real ones? Fake ones? Imaginary ones? Illegal ones?

We're talking E.T. 

We're talking beings from places beyond the terrestrial zone

We're talking about UFOs, UAPs, Space Invaders, Xenomorphs, and such otherworldly creatures of the beyond!

Does that have something to do with anarchy? 

Well... does it?

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