decentralized/direct action now!

[PsychedelicSocialist]

As far as I am concerned, anything but symbolic (and this is just a compromise) participation in the capitalist political charade is useless, backwards, and ultimately self-defeating. And, supposing that by some strange miracle the revolution were allowed to occur entirely within the capitalist political theater, it is my position that that would be a defeat! If we conform to their political/social machine, then we will have conformed to that thing which we oppose entirely! There can be no conforming of our movement with their pretend decisionmaking process; we are their antithesis. Participation in their political charade is the prime stultifying factor in our movement, it makes us open to "reformism" and turns the lion that this movement should be into a sickly old cat! Most of us can grasp that reform is impossible, that this system is so inhuman that a human face cannot be stamped on it; so we should therefore reject everything - every facet - of their system, first and foremost their pretend democracy!

What I am calling for is individual direct action. We need a million squatters squatting every place abandoned by capitalists - to show them, and more importantly ourselves and those who are like-minded, that we through cooperation and voluntary association we can create viable living areas. These squats are going to be the most volitile of our projects, as they are largely urban, seeds of cooperative-partnership society within the hellscape of capitalist urban sprawl. There must be community gardens, community stores (stores in the sense that these are places where usable things are stored, not where things are sold), community everything! We have to create here and now at least the most skeletal of prototypes for the economic nexus' of the future. We need cooperatives that cater to poor people, workers, homeless- to replace the multinational discount chains like wal-mart. We need more communes, voluntary associations of people who want to live in balance with the planet... these must be set up in every viable place! We need self-sufficiency for these projects (communes) but we also need a network of gifts between these cooperative communities! The ones in the cities will have things that the ones in the country will need/want, and vice-versa!

I don't know exactly how Unions fit into this. Obviously not the capitalist-dominated unions we all know, but new unions that will fight for a better position for workers... I don't know that that is what the fight is about anymore, I think the time has come for us to be making plans and decisions and proceeding with actions that will push us into the cooperation/partnership society.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

I'm not sure that I agree with you.

We look for means as a tool for reaching an end goal. The end goal is revolution. I don't care how that comes. I'm not a politician - i'm more concerned about the emancipation of the working class than about the symbolism behind revolution.

Workers co-operatives and individual voluntary co-operative action (which is what you seem to be hinting at) is all good and well; indeed, it has a place in any fair, Socialist-orientated society. However, you cannot simply hope in vain for people to mutually volunteer themselves to the cause. We need leadership. United leadership, not divided leadership.

In any case, the not-existing-in-Capitalist-society argument is a bit old. It is a waste of energy to establish non-Capitalist communes, enclaves and separate-lifestyle 'Socialist' areas. These invariably fail to get mass support, as they fail to educate the working class. Without educating the working class, we will never win the argument.

[PsychedelicSocialist]

You say the goal is revolution, well, I'm afraid I'm going to have to parse your words to make my meaning clear... I am positing that the end goal isn't revolution at all, at least how I am assuming you are thinking of it. The end goal is the cooperative-partnership society, and I am discussing action that leads us closer to that society. These actions can collectively be called "the revolution" if one wishes; I just don't want to call up imagery of romanticized guerrilla warfare or anything.
As well, I am far more concerned with the substance of the action, not the symbolism associated with it. I think that's what I was trying to say. That, and this change in social relations will most likely not come about due to parliamentarianism of any sort; and that reformism and their pretend-democracy need to be opposed at all junctions.

If not through voluntary effort, how do you plan to organize this revolution? Conscription? No, such a thing would disqualify us as people really seeking a freer world. And the last thing I am doing is hoping in vain! Precisely what I am saying is that the more people carry out voluntary cooperative actions, set up collectives and squats and start putting in models of cooperative partnership society, the more will see it as possible and desirable, and the more will participate. The only way to show people that it is possible to change the world is to make viable examples of the kind of world we want. I am talking about sweeping projects, as many as we can pull off!
Collectives for making and distributing goods or services... ultimately we can start running the more heavy industries through syndicates and utilize the worker's self-management model where it fits (those industries that are deemed socially useful- this decision needs to be made not by a central committee or central planners, but by the people who may want such industry to remain in society's arsenal of productive forces, and voluntarily opt to keep them running) If they need more than their individual hands to keep something going, which will likely be the case for many heavy industries and industry in general, then they will have to take it upon themselves to collect enough like-minded people who also want a certain industry or service to be around, and are willing to help with its maintenance and do some work. There could be councils and services to help expedite such a process, to help coordinate activity and all.

You say we need a united leadership to get ourselves into the cooperative society we all want. This is fine, I suppose, but it rings a bit close to leninism for me... vanguards lead to nothing but self-perpetuating power that cripples social equity and requires more liberty to be take from people... I think that people will lead themselves into liberation, supposing that we all do our part, putting forth a concerted effort to liberate ourselves and to make more of our social relations anarchistic or free.

You want to "educate the working class"... what does the working class need to be educated about? Don't they already know who is in charge of their lives? They know that they are regimented, uniformed, and must give a part of themselves and their personal freedom to live. It doesn't really matter that they don't use the antiquated marxist jargon that we all love to spout, they understand their conditions at least as well as the most piercing dialectic philosophical discourse.

As for living outside of capitalism... I don't think it's possible to live outside of capitalism as long as it is still so dominant over the earth, but it is possible to make some or many of our relationships non-capitalist and cooperative. We need a framework for after the revolution. Man, I hate saying "after the revolution".



I know that you probably have a different way of thinking about these things, and so I say you should try as hard as you can to fulfill the things you think will help us to get the world we want... we need a plethora of tactics, people trying everything under the sun, and someone will find what works.