!A for Anarchy
---
agk's phlog
6 Apr 2021 @ 1559
---
started on paper scrap at work
finished on X61 at kitchen table
while roommate plays The Binding of Isaac
---
In my mid-teens I didn't know anybody into
anarchy. Sometimes the word was used in files
on the Temple of the Screaming Electron bulletin
board about making lineman handsets, stealing
long-distance calls, and exploring the phone
network. It was probably in RE/Search and Feral
House books I stole from Borders.
When I was 17, Quakers came to the place in my
small town where homeless kids hung out. They
invited us to watch a movie about sweatshops. At
the showing an anarchist woman invited me to the
next meeting of a regional antiglobalization
network.
I didn't know she was anarchist til a low-key
party of anarchists from the network at her
little house in the woods. Her and another
anarchist woman reported back from the women's
caucus of a Zapatista encuentro they attended in
Mexico. The men did dishes and gabbed in the
kitchen. I'd never before seen the gendered
division of labor reversed. I loved it.
She taught me to facilitate meetings. I learned
how to read highly technical whitepapers and
trade agreements. I helped do popular education
in local schools. Before I turned 18, we were
gassed and beaten with 200 thousand other people,
and helped stop a bad trade agreement.
After 11 Sep 2001, I took a medic class, learned
to ride freight trains, and met more anarchists
at the North American Anarchist Gathering in
Kansas and through anti-mountaintop removal,
anti-prison, indigenous sovereignty, and anti-
war campaigns. I helped do injury and illness
care under the watchful eye of nurses and
clinical herbalists.
I loved the anarchists I met in my early 20s.
They had practical skills and practiced
hospitality. They were internationalists who
cared about working conditions and everyday
life. Mostly non-dogmatic, very earnest, they
practiced joyous, generous living in grim
places. What I didn't like was I thought they
spent too much time with only each other.
In my late 20s, I called a conservative AM radio
talk show early one morning in the lead-up to a
protest at a G20 summit. Some protesters were
veterans and active-duty military mad about the
wars. Others were victims of the foreclosure
crisis. The talk-show host trash-talked
anarchists. He said they were probably all
asleep, that they're from out of town and none
of them work.
Many called from their jobs. When I called, I
said, "You believe in small government. They
believe in no government. They want to associate
voluntarily and freely, decide together about
things that matter in their lives, and meet
their needs by giving freely within meaningful
relationships."
"Voluntary association, direct action, and
mutual aid are normal in families, churches,
AA meetings, and volunteer fire departments.
Libertarians want to smash the state to hoard
power. Anarchists want to smash the state and
all concentrated power. No one should have too
little because someone greedy has too much."
The host played a clip of me at commercial
breaks for the rest of the show. The National
Guard deployed with police from five states.
Helicopters hovered. Combat veterans were
arrested for returning their medals and spit on
in jail. The SWAT team tried to raid our
protest medic clinic.
Popular opinion in the city briefly turned
against the state's capricious repression. The
summit ended. Everyday life continued with a
few more friendships and shared memories.
I still don't know if I'm an anarchist, but I
hold dear the ethics I learned from them.
