For those wishing to delve into “crowd psychology”, the people’s songs and anthems are a rich field to study. In the whirlwind of history in which we find ourselves, revolt shows itself in the people’s poetry and song. This is a symptom that carries a certain value. Among the best known subversive songs of late,...
ABSTRACT Anarchism is a philosophy opposed to hierarchy and authority, and is used as a critical lens to analyze the whole of human society. As with members of all social groupings, anarchists differ from each other in many ways, one of which is their political ideology. At least two visibly distinct ideological variants of anarchism...
A Letter of Solidarity with Anarchists of the World For over two centuries, anarchists have fought—not for themselves, but for all of humanity. We have spilled blood and sweat and surrendered our freedom, not for hatred of the state alone, but because we carry the unbearable truth that a world of justice and peace cannot...
For years, I’ve wallowed in the mire of criminology—a discipline taught as if it were God’s own truth: neutral, sterile, objective. They speak of victims with false empathy, as if crime were an anomaly born of a vacuum. It makes me puke. Science that pretends to be impartial is the most despicable intellectual whore. Criminality,...
Europe in a blaze, twelve million men engaged in the most frightful butchery that history has ever recorded; millions of women and children in tears; the economic, intellectual, and moral life of seven great peoples brutally suspended, and the menace becoming every day more pregnant with new military complications – such is, for seven months,...
Means Vs Ends No character in the Star Wars universe ever seems to question the good intentions of Saw Gerrera (at least not on the rebel side). They agree that his end goal of being free from the Empire is a worthy one. Where he becomes a controversial character is in how far he will...
Although Cassian Andor is called an Anarchist in the ‘Rogue One Visual Guide’, only one character has actually been called that on screen, and that is the rebel Saw Gerrera. Gerrara is a resistance fighter who will stop at almost nothing to make the galaxy free again, even if sometimes his methods come at a...
In the sixth episode of the Andor, the time for the heist of the Empire base which the Rebel team has been planning has finally come, as the ‘The Eye’ of Aldhani phenomenon they hope to use as cover for their escape is only hours away. We return to see Cassian Andor sitting outside in...
Star Wars was originally inspired by the pro-Communist Viet-Cong’s fight against the Capitalist American Empire, and its prequel Rogue One, featured a major Anarchist character, Cassian Jeron Andor. From the first to the third episodes of Andor, Cassian is avoiding both the Empire and the Rebellion. He doesn’t want the trouble that comes with the...
I have no love for Disney. I have soured on most big franchise properties, including the juggernaut space fantasy that is Star Wars. I am exhausted, like many, by stories that mirror and revolve around US-based discourse and history, by US cultural imperialism lording over popular culture, and by its most overt operative, The Mouse....
Star Wars has always been political. George Lucas’ 1977 masterpiece and its sequels, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, were all saturated with political allegory and overt themes of rebellion, anti-fascism, and warnings about the dangers of authoritarianism. Lucas ascended the film industry alongside a generation of filmmakers deeply influenced by two...
If I am nothing but what I am, I am indestructible. —Jean Genet, The Criminal Child For Genet, crime cuts the marginalized subject from bourgeois society. Repressive prisons, juvenile homes and other penal institutions, Genet argues, create a barrier, protecting the criminal subject from society and its values. Attempts to rehabilitate only make entry into...
1. Building the Future Society There is an allegory about friends who were lost in the desert, hungry and thirsty. One of them had found a settlement filled abundantly with every delight. He remembered his poor brothers, but he had already drawn far off from them and did not know their place. What did he...
What is “revolutionary defeatism,” where does it come from, and what is its current relevance for anarchists and other social rebels? As a slogan and stance, revolutionary defeatism was devised by the Russian statist socialist Vladimir Lenin and, to a lesser extent, the Ukrainian statist socialist Grigory Zinoviev, in the context of the First World...
In this survey of some biblical themes looked at from an anarchistic angle, I will not be real precise in my use of “anarchistic.” I’ll be talking about a sensibility more than a full-fledged political philosophy. The key “anarchistic” motifs I will focus on will be a strong suspicion toward centralized social power, especially kingdoms...