Eh the NSA already tracks everyone who reads BoingBoing and probs the BBS so… I forgot where I was going but anyways:
“Whats up Joe? How are your wife and kids? Anyways, I hope my boring internet shizzle is keeping you entertained!”
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It has been working fine in the UK for the past… well… thousand odd years; and continues to blight our society even now. Those with the gold make the rules.
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once the grievous things are “fixed”, eventually most people will relax and go about their lives and stop paying attention. that is when big wealth begins moving into politics again, and quietly, subtly, almost invisibly, things start changing in favor of big wealth. again.
if we want to train those with big money, we need to stop buying products or services from those who offend us. yes it is hard sometimes to keep track, but when you stop giving them your money, they change their offensive behavior.
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But are you an Engineer … of Jihad?
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I’d like to just stress that using the word “anarchy” as the moniker for all things disorderly and chaotic (as some have done so far) is just not credible.
Opponents of anarchy have long argued that their idea of “order” (authoritarian models of government) is the way to guarantee liberty–in that succession.
To paraphrase anarchist philosopher Joseph Proudhoun’s response to this frame of mind, “Liberty is the mother, not the daughter, of order.”
This famous line led to the popular refrain, “Anarchy is the mother of order.” This is the source of the “circle” in the anarchist circle a: it’s actually an “o.”
This is also why one of the most popular versions of the anarchist flag is red and black–red for socialism and organized labor, black for anarchy and never surrendering. (The CNT flies this flag.)
I’m just saying, there are literally centuries’ worth of anarchist philosophy and mass organization that defy the use of “anarchy” to denote disorder and total chaos.
Hundreds of millions of people in developed countries all over the world owe their relatively high standards of pay, child labor laws, limitations on the workday, vacations, benefits, etc. to labor movements that were spearheaded by anarchists (in a milieu with communists and socialists) who literally fought and died for their rights and the generations that would follow them.
It’s symptomatic that, in developed countries where labor movements are the most dead (the US especially), millions of people who are indebted to the achievements of anarchism don’t seem keen on acknowledging it.
That said, while I agree with the general consensus thus far that this video has a lot of buzz words and no practical platform (if that’s what you want to call it…I’m not necessarily advocating platformism), its strength lies in the images.
Some here have disparaged the supposed displays of disorganization, etc. in the video. I see food kitchens, people building houses, street medics, film crews, and organized resistance to shield walls of police. (That looked like the Chilean student movement, which was brutally attacked by police and subsequently defended itself, as all serious movements have to do at some point; of course the media at the time used the tired old phrase, “Protestors clash with police,” which is an ideologically motivated way to whitewash the fact that police attacked demonstrators, which they always do.)
The video references global movements since 2011, although it includes footage from the Arab Spring in 2010, which enjoyed some mixed success in overthrowing dictators (a powerful and worthy achievement). Some of these movements were Occupy and the Indignados.
In light of such movements, it’s worth pausing to take stock of the considerable logistics that it takes to support the ongoing occupation of a public square by hundreds or thousands of people. Anyone who says that these massively underfunded, ad hoc formations that faced immediate and brutal state repression lacked any and all organization is glossing over the details, which is easy to do if you have no practical experience in such things.
Here are a few of the things that you need for even a modest occupation: decision-making bodies, demands committees, security committees, street medics, journalism and media committees, child care, food, transportation, sanitation crews, in many cases extra housing, IT support, jail support, legal support (lawyers!), and skills training committees dedicated to filling needed roles for all of the above.
The fact that thousands of strangers with loosely affiliated goals, disparate backgrounds, and in many cases little or no prior experience all over the world came together in 2010-2011 to occupy public places in a serious way says a lot about the tremendous effort that went into organizing these spaces.
And they did it without the hundreds of millions of dollars that went into to wiping them off the map.
Looking at it this way, such movements for positive change are far more organized than one has any right to expect.
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Great suggestion. Now, how to convince enough people so you significantly inconvenience the vendor, and not just yourself?
I mean, taking sacrifices and annoying yourself for Some Cause is all noble and feel-good, but some of us are too old for that if it will not have some actual impact.
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Paging Dr @popobawa4u, paging Dr @popobawa4u.
#sorrynotsorry
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Did you really want to do that? I am going to need to go make popcorn now. 
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And thus, IMO, is an illustration of the problem, not the solution.
Too much action in the public sphere is based upon emotions.
Don’t get me wrong; emotions are good – you could almost say they are the currency of life – but I’d like to see actions in the public sphere based more on reason than knee-jerk reaction. Knee-jerks are knee-jerks (reflexive), regardless if the reaction it to something reprehensible or just some unfounded fear.
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And you’ve been conditioned by your peer-group to judge people you don’t even know based upon a random internet post.
Not sure which is worse, as they both involve turning the brain off.
Unless, of course, you’re just being silly for fun (or looking for an excuse to post xkcd).
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True.
But in a redistribution-based economy, power ends up out of the hands of the wealthy and into the hands of the redistributors, so everything ends up as shit in the end anyway.
I don’t think there is a solution, at least not one that can be easily articulated in casual conversation.
Oh shit! It’s Howie the Hamburger Dude!
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A large group of people CAN make a difference and we have a responsibility to stand up and work for change on the things we know are wrong.
We pretend it can’t be done, but increasing CAFE standards are an example where Americans agreed to a concept and implemented it through their elected leaders.
For my part, I would like to have a sincere discussion about gas taxes and transportation infrastructure.
I would be willing to double the current tax if half went to upgrade existing bridges/roads/rail and the other half went to mass transportation & urbanization solutions.
This seems like a more actionable discussion.
Pick something and act on it. Really investigate the core issues on both sides using your passion AND your brain.
Remember, the tents in Zuccotti park didn’t have any effect because there was no follow-through, no end game, no call to replace the current system with something else. Just a lot of crying in the streets. Don’t do that again, nobody will be impressed with your more organized version of hippies camping in the city park.
Loud and boisterous demonstrations with a clear, actionable agenda based on a philosophy aligned with human nature…now we are getting somewhere. Now you have my attention.
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A majority of people will not care until it appears that a majority of people care.
Then, everyone will have always cared.
Then, maybe.
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LOL you are an evil little ducky!!!
I watched the video and feel unclear about what day-to-day community work they’re doing. Was there a website … schedule of events? A sign-up list to staff the community kitchen? …
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as long as the redistributors are ME, all is well.
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Well, there’s communism.
I’m feeling pretty old myself these days, and I don’t think it’s merely the cold winter weather. I hear you. I agree that seeing real (desired/intended) results and having a positive impact is just about the only way I’m going to remain engaged for the long haul. That said… my partner and I have been part of this community (starting a few decades ago, back when it was still called “Co-op America”):
http://www.greenamerica.org/programs/fairtrade/
(this link to their Fair Trade action is but one example… there are organized boycotts and shareholder actions if you own stock, the “break up with megabanks” action etc. etc.; many apologies to all who are already doing what they can and for whom this is all old news)
Don’t mourn, organize… on whatever level, with however much bandwidth you have to spare. No judging. [quote=“el_don_almighty, post:34, topic:71424”]
Pick something and act on it. Really investigate the core issues on both sides using your passion AND your brain.
[/quote]
Pitching in, where you can, when you can, even if you think you’re not making a huge amount of traction, can be its own reward. I find comfort in spending time with people who are like-minded and still give a damn about getting important things right. I suppose that’s part of the attraction to a decent BBS like this one (much of the time) with a lot of smart and frankly hilarious people on it.
I try to avoid stirring calls in favor of focusing my scarce free time and energy to a few things that I believe are important, things that feed me on as many levels as possible. For me, planting trees seems to reliably top my list every year. I’ve been doing it since age ten. The watering’s getting a little harder these days because it takes so long for some trees to establish during droughts… and central Texas hole-digging can take hours to dig in a single tree.
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