💾 Archived View for library.inu.red › file › comrade-candle-propaganda-by-the-deed.gmi captured on 2023-01-29 at 08:25:53. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content
-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Title: Propaganda by the Deed Author: Comrade Candle Date: June 21, 2022 Language: en Topics: propaganda of the deed, illegalism, insurrectionary Source: Retrieved on September 23, 2022 from https://mongoosedistro.com/2022/06/21/propaganda-by-the-deed-a-zine-in-3-essays-by-comrade-candle/
The State is My Enemy
The Terror my deed has wrought
Shall forever stand on its own behalf
Through my cold disregard for morality
I have become a propagandist by the deed
I refuse to be ruled, by anyone or anything – fixed ideas. My own life
is mine to create. So I will. My anarchism is not idealistic,
unattainable – Anarchy is beautifully realistic. We must all dispose of
our rulers.
Where to even begin, when all manners of coercion surround us?
Government, religion, morals, and much more. All would hope to control
me, you. I see my best avenue for overcoming what exists as personally
usurping the constraints, physical and mental, imposed onto my person.
You are free to follow, though what would I gain by demanding so? One
must desire to lead their own life, lest they merely allow themselves to
be re-enslaved.
I am at war with what-is, the State. It is a war I refuse to lose. My
life, and this battle as well, are everchanging. I fight for my very
survival, my continued existence, my individuality.
What do you live for? Do you dare to create? I will not be subservient
to my humanity.
I have seen it grow common amongst so-called anarchists to disparage
illegalist praxis as heinous, evil, overall damaging to “the anarchist
cause”. I write to address what I have come to know as the attacks on
Propaganda by the Deed, and further yet to elucidate the motivations for
Propaganda by the Deed. I highlight my own deeds, known and unknown, as
my rationale for this writing – I speak from lived experience.
“Candle, you have a 140 IQ – We need you in academia, not smashing ATMs
and windows!” Well, I have formed my own opinions on academic
institutions. Prior to my recent enrollment at the University of Oregon,
I was a college dropout. I am certain I achieve more ‘good’, whatever
that word means, from preventing use of a store or ATM – What works,
works. Regardless of how sharp my pen, I will seldom ever convince a
beneficiary of a capitalist institution to the anarchist’s plight.
Could you have ever convinced a king that we need a rulerless existence?
I’d have burned down his church, his whole castle, or stabbed him on his
throne. Should I have disdain for the acts of comrade Czolgosz, the
Galleanists, or those whom took the lives of pigs during the Haymarket
affair? Orestes, even? These acts were not unfathomable or off-limits
due to legality or moralizing. Individuals have been defying authority
for millennia, taking life into their own hands rather than some hope
for an eventual revolution. The insurrection is now, comrade, and you
will not rule me.
What is the anarchist cause? I want to know of no rulers, and could
waste page-upon-page detailing all that exists to thwart this aim. I
would not be the first to, either. Let us do merely with this ‘vibe’ so
as to form a more concise argument.
As I see it, Propaganda by the Deed, in whatever manner said deed is
born, is an individual’s own defiance of those who would seek to rule
them – My actions will not be policed by morals nor Law. Born of this
beautiful act of defiance is something that is to now stand upon its own
two legs – Propaganda by the Deed. The deed’s undeniable reality speaks
all on its own. I smashed an ATM and walked away – my deed.
When I choose to rob a store, my insurrection is created in my current
moment. I create what I want to see, for myself and involving myself. I
have long since forsworn hope.
One individual can damage a lot of property, prevent thousands upon
thousands from utilizing key infrastructure in the capitalist mode of
production or influence the lives of millions via viral media – how many
have seen me smash open an ATM to not even take its contents? Smashing a
window? We need to throw a brick, smash a window, or stick someone up
sometimes. You should be the sole decider of your actions, not merely
that what is permissible be controlled by means of morality and Law.
Am I merely a terrorist, an evil bad-actor whose sole-desire appears to
be giving ‘the movement’ (a particular distinction from ‘our movement’
or ‘our cause’) a bad name? Anarchy is not moral policing. I will never
brush shoulders with those whom becry the acts of an antifascist as
terrorism, nor with those who uphold their morals as dogma, as absolute.
Morals are relative, and if we are to entrench ourselves in them once
more then let it be known my deeds are ‘good’ – value?
“You are violent, Candle, and I am happy you are in prison!” – So would
be the common opinion to be had of my drape-burning self. Proudhon says
‘property is robbery’, Stirner that ‘property precedes theft’. As
private property’s guarantee remains only through Law, one is threatened
with violence at every waking moment for not respecting this right.
Property is no right, it is violence – violence done unto any and every
individual whom dare defy the will of Law.
Is your objection to my callous disregard for the moralism you tout as
absolute, my willingness to do unto violence as is done unto myself, or
for my utter rejection of what-is?
Regardless, I hardly see myself as violent – militancy. No one should be
in prison, so I fail to see anything really worth addressing here.
It is no problem of mine if your dogmatic moralism is so terribly
riddled with presuppositions a priori as to damn my beautiful creation.
You wish to enslave your being forever to these spectres of
self-alienation, so I will help you to it – “That window had a family!”
or maybe “I would’ve taken the ATM’s money”?
I have taken control of my life.
As to the matter of the store clerk, the root of most left-wing critique
of Candle as I perceive it, I will be blunt – a gun to the head is how
one opens a cash register. There is no other means, the everyday
capitalist slave will not ‘risk their livelihood’ to satisfy my egoistic
desire. Rather, one would so choose to use their entire person to
satisfy the egoistic desires of the capitalist, to prevent individuals
from possessing property in an overt manner, to threaten the violence of
Law unto any-and-all who choose to defy the sacred nature of property.
Most of the overall argumentation of this essay, my attack on morals,
can be reiterated as to the matter of opening a cash register utilizing
a loaded firearm. If I were to employ the Nietzschean moral relativism,
then I could quite possibly see myself as evil… from the store owner’s
perspective. As to myself, my act of Propaganda by the Deed was ‘good’ –
“And we are entrenched in morals once more.”
The acts of a capitalist are evil. My anarchistic Propaganda by the Deed
is noble, virtuous.
No one can deny the reality that I rid a store of its capital through
armed robbery – what one is far more capable of is applying
presuppositions and moral dogma to my deed, done so as to damn all ‘like
me’ to infamy. This tradition, custom, of having an outright aversion to
robbery, more deeply theft in its entirety, is laughable and I foresee I
may need a separate essay to address these attacks. It is typically what
gives rise to the idea I am doing The Cause a disservice, with many
choosing to distance themselves from my deeds and person.
The purpose of my deed is that, in a multitude of ways and however it is
viewed, my deed will serve as its own propaganda for my anarchist cause.
Should that cause not be yours, then you are no anarchist, or comrade,
to me. You would impose your will unto mine as right, as just and
absolute. You would seek to be my ruler, so you may instead fuck off.
I will see anarchy birthed from my insurrectionary flame. As I know it,
I am its creator – No one is ever going to gift me with anarchism. Our
world is icy, my being too. A moment in the cold is a worthwhile taste
of the bitter harshness; How much of my life have I truly led? A moment.
The chills and thrills, gallant acts. I will never have power over how
my history is recorded. So away with it! The moral pandering, the
posturing – I’m the real deal, sweetie. I care only for myself, and you
aught to as well. No one else will ever be you, you might find it to
your own benefit to give life, as you alone experience, your full
attention. Or not, I truthfully don’t care.
Label me what you will, a terrorist or a radical – I am an anarchist!
Brought to life by my own two hands, my grisly deed of terror. Suffering
wrought, or has it always been? Not my beauty! My beloved! You might
find me hideous, though will I ever truly care? I know of my own beauty,
even as I am reduced to my grisly deed.
What is good to a lion’s prey will forever remain evil to the lion. What
am I? My queenly deed? I am beautiful, lest you ever get it twisted – I
have transgressed morals. It may remain terrible to some, the beauty
then need not be lost; My beauty will not be lost on me.
I will never find your pious facade of Law, Order, Peace to be
beautiful. It is gross, that you wish to rule me. The great reality I
reside in is paltry. Ugly and just, upheld with all manner of force and
violence – Your rule will never be more, despite your carefully chosen
wordage.
Beauty remains subjective, so for what do you ultimately stand? I will
know merely from how I am perceived, my defiance of the State’s will.
Certainly you will be evermore governed by moralistic dogma. I choose
to, instead, behold my own beauty.
I will meet your perspective, as mine will never be – My terror is
terrible; for you.
That ATM, that store, that church – and a million more! My anarchy is
beautiful, you terribly pious minister. As you will never be, I am
always. Understand me right, filth – I have made no excuse for my
terror. I will not be the only beautiful anarchist. Most of us are, if
you ever manage to witness us through your shattered windows; anarchy is
beautiful.
To bring about anarchy, I will do so beautifully; My deed will exist.
I know you desire that I succumb to the traditional narrative – I am to
see myself as wrong, troubled, in need of change. I refuse to conform,
to turn my Deed sour (I think of Gerlach and Meyerhoff). What I have
made will not be taken from me and turned on its head. I am not a crazy,
trouble youth – like you, I am a human robbed of my birthright through
property, the State, Law. Oh, to be free. Defiance is brave, bold,
daring. Of doing as you are commanded?
Morals impose restrictions upon what the militant may or may not do.
Hard lines are drawn in the sand by morals, the ‘moral police’. Why? Do
you feel guilt destroying an ATM to deny its exploitation? I can assure
you it is indifferent to your ‘carnage’. The ATM won’t call you ugly,
that task appears reserved for those who own property and their
defenders. Ugly, terrible, without reason – No! Cold, rational,
beautifully terrible.
There is a terrible beauty, a beautiful terribleness, to one’s deed;
criminal. I will always see it. The beauty is tantalizing, almost – Are
not all capable of their own deed?
Woe unto the store, the window, the ATM. Ha! They had far worse coming,
for what meaning ‘worse’ has. The terror sown by property, endlessly,
seems far too normalized to be called so – the earth was mine before
‘property’ defined this ownership as ‘theft’. Property – it is ugly.
What is terrible? Is my defiance, to my rulers, to not always be seen as
so? “Death to the Anarchist who defies my rule, my Law!” – And I am to
find your spineless bending-of-ones-knee to be beautiful? Not a chance.
Criminals, of which anarchists are many, and their deeds remain
beautiful.
Terrible is any who dare defy the State, who call in to question its
rule or Law. I am terrible – terribly bored.
Perhaps you see my beauty, too.
I have always known of my own subjugation. The life I merely see, not
live. Choice. Coercion. Violence. Order.
What is Order? Is it to always demand I be lesser, another to be
greater? Is ‘Order’ to always mean ‘the many individuals are
controlled’? Our ‘order’ we know of is no more than threats of violence.
It is not in my interest to be threatened, to be placed beneath another;
controlled. I want control over my own life. Instead, my life has been
one ruled by the State. Instead, I am governed.
I have always known Law and its threatening grip on my being, or
Property and what its definition prevents of me.
There has always been someone ruling over me.
My life has never truly been my own.
I demand my own freedom, not merely ask. You will not ever find freedom
from begging – I will take my desire into my own hands. I will be free.
My deed will always be. It shall always exist. My deed will only ever be
mine, and it stands to become far more than myself.
It is propaganda.
I am constantly creating during my brief wake, my lapse from the
comfortable bliss of non-existence. I consume my very person, eternally,
to do so. What will I create?
Anarchism – I will create anarchy.
What is being? Being is. Being as one’s present, as one has been or will
be. Being is the forever present – it is.
Nothing is sacred, lest it rule me – Law. I will defy any who wish to
impose their rule on me. My life is to be made by my own design, born
from the creative nothing and coerced by no one or thing.
When will you take control of your own life?
My life began, my self-designed insurrection, with my defiance of Law.
What is illegal? Law damns as illegal all that the State demands
individuals not create – illegality, comprises a vast range of
activities which the State has attempted to coerce individuals into not
performing by threats of violence, activities such as squatting, theft,
possession of particular plants, and disregarding national borders.
Illegal is noble.
What could amount to more virtuous than to defy the State’s will, tos
challenge its icy wrath?
Illegal acts, freed from the presuppositions that denounce them as evil
or heinous (and need I remind any of moral relativism), are merely acts.
I can desire one be robbed, another not – the act of robbery itself need
not forever be renounced by myself as reproachable. I will not have Law
impose its moralism unto my mind, the very Law that would, with no
question, imprison countless of my comrades.
Perhaps you ought analyze your conceptions of Law, Order, Just, Right –
how often these spectres demand you subjugate the ‘criminal’, the
‘disorderly’, the ‘unjust’, the ‘wrong’! Your authority does not go
unnoticed, moralist. Not yet a millennium has passed since the outright
possession of human beings was upheld as ‘good’, a person’s freedom
‘bad’, and mind you there are strong arguments that our ‘justice system’
amounts to a reinvention of slavery – and I am to, with no question,
subvert my own desires to your moral dogma, your code of Law?
I’d rather take your lunch money.
Write to Comrade Candle at:
Sofia Johnson 23976151
CCCF
24499 SW Grahams Ferry Rd.
Wilsonville, OR 97070