💾 Archived View for tilde.town › ~vidak › anarchist-philosophy › what-is-anarchism.gmi captured on 2024-08-24 at 23:53:40. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content
⬅️ Previous capture (2022-01-08)
-=-=-=-=-=-=-
___
\ / |_| /\ |
\/\/ | | /--\ |
___ __
| (_
_|_ __)
_ _ ___ __ _
/\ |\ | /\ |_) / |_| | (_ |\/| )
/--\ | \| /--\ | \ \_ | | _|_ __) | | o
2021-10-22
Anarchism is the social movement for the advocacy for and creation of
a non-coercive and non-hierarchical society.
We anarchists distinguish ourselves from other movements and political
organisations by holding to a concept of social and political freedom
that is radically different--and for that reason far more
authentic--than any other. Where virtually every other political
tendency seeks to capture or win power through the state--be it merely
some rung or portion of it, or its entire structure--anarchists argue
that we should do away with it.
We seek the formation of a society where there are no large masses of
people, such as ourselves, who are Governed and coerced by small
numbers of rulers--be they in Parliaments, Centrelink offices, Courts,
or law firms. Our picture of the future imagines a Western Australia
where people are, both individually and through our communities, the
deciders of their own fates. We anarchists have good reason to say
that States and Governments are the places where culture and
creativity go to die.
Even at the height of their popularity, and definitely despite it,
Governments and political parties are there to control and coerce.
They may come for you in the form of fines, police officers or
disciplinarian teachers. They may be mortgagors or landlords. Whatever
form social and political domination takes, anarchists call it out as
what it is: unnatural, and unhappy.
We would much rather the construction of society along the lines of
Democracy in practice--rather than in name only, as is the case here
in Perth and Western Australia.
Every kind of social power and social domination of a minority over a
majority comes with its own type of slavery. The boss over the
worker. The principal of the State school over a student. The landlord
over the renter. The Centrelink bureaucrat over the unemployed and
impoverished, and so on. We say that when you look at social
organisation this way, you see life in our communities for what it
is--the suffering of the commanded by those who wield command.
Society should be, so we say, directly democratic. That is, the people
who are affected by decisions should be the ones making them. People
in houses should be the ones controlling them. People who work should
should be the ones who decide how and why that work is done.
Anarchists stand resolutely against any and all kinds of slavery.
Would you like to join us?