Retiring An Old Anarchist Slogan

From Ignited In Dark

One should not have to be a religious anarchist to understand why the adage “No Gods No Masters” is antiquated and ought be retired. This would certainly not be to defend the existence of any deity, pantheon or religious practice pertaining to anarchy (which has no mind for any faith whatsoever,) but to recognize redundancies that, intentionally or not, marginalize those who seek complete emancipation through the lens of their own spiritual modus.

Why “No Gods” – How To Avoid Atheist Zealotry

From C4SS

With consideration to its present use by anarchists and special attention to context, “No Gods, No Masters” is a statement against authority – whether divine or secular – from which follows firm advocacy of total autonomy for all, the end of the state, and liberation from systems of domination. It does not follow that all religion is therefore authoritarian. Given the choice between secular -archy and religious -archy, the anarchist sees no meaningful difference beyond the language with which the rulers justify their position. Neither one is being honest about its intentions, it’s all about power.

Afghanarchism

from Counterpunch by Nicky Reid

What American Radicals Can Learn From the Pashtuns

There is a narrative commonly held by observers in the west that the Afghans are a people defined by perpetual warfare. Like many stereotypes, this one comes with a cornel [sic] of truth. After all, the people of Afghanistan just got done throttling the bare hind quarters of the greatest empire Satan ever devised for the last twenty years with little more than rusty Soviet junk and raw grit. The rural highlands of southern Afghanistan have certainly fostered a distinctly martial culture that has aided its people in resisting generations of conquest, but to simply sum these people up by the wars they’ve fought completely misses the context of why they fight and what they were fighting for.

Subscribe to no gods no masters