I was more leaning towards socdem in high school, though didn’t fully know the name of such; just knew that we have millions of homeless folks and even more empty homes, thought healthcare should be free, thought college should be free, all that jazz. It wasn’t until right after I graduated that I called myself an Anarchist. It was a vague understanding of no rulers, no fascism, etc. etc. Very radical queer shit without fully understanding the concept.
I started slowly creeping more towards communist colors around 2016 (kind of a giveaway as to why, I live in the US) and called myself anarcho-communist. It started getting irritating; so many communists and an-coms were calling for left unity but I often times found myself in conversations with these absolutely hard lined Anarchists that would just go red in the damn face talking how anyone aligning themselves with ML/communists/An-Coms were red fascists and how their revolutions failed, etc. etc. (a recent interaction with the mods of r/antiwork pretty much solidified my position as a Communist lmao) and whenever I talked to Communists they’re…painfully patient lol. Like, whenever I interact with these dudes I can tell they’ve got that Ben Aflek smoking on the balcony look on their face, but most of the time, they’re gracious. It was definitely helpful in their patience, theory isn’t my strong suit as I have cognitive disorders that make it very difficult to process information like that. I’m slowly getting at it; accessible options are becoming more available and they’re helpful as hell.
Those political tests that go around in heaps have helped me tldr my views; VanguardValues (not tooting my own horn here but I reclaimed it if you wanna take it lol because the dude who made it is a Canadian nationalist whose Atheism veers into Islamaphobic territory, and his creative commons license says it’s okay to distribute and modify as long as I’m not selling it) labels me a Guevarist, and I’ve seen some documentaries on Cuba and its revolution. I don’t agree with Che’s obvious complete disregard and bigotry towards black people and queer people when he was alive. As a queer person and someone who views the movement for black liberation in the highest regard, I agree with his views and utilization of guerilla warfare against the US-backed Imperialist dictator, Batista. While I want to believe that, since even Castro himself agreed much later that his misaligned views towards POC and queer people were unacceptable, he too would change his views, we’ll never truly know because he died suddenly and before a time where he could, in fact, renounce his views. I’m currently exploring the territory of Mao, and thus far I’m starting to see some correlation between my views and his theories.
Also just to note; why the fuck are so many hard lined Anarchists so against the idea of Anarcho-Communist? I see them very often fling spittle about them then somehow also preach to high heaven about the IWW. Have they seen the Sabo Cat flag they sell on their own website? Dawg.
Anarchists hating Anarcho-Communists is hilarious to me, because AnCom is nothing more than a bastardization of Marxism to make it palatable to Anarcho-kiddies, without them having to accept that our revolutions have succeeded, or that Marxist-Leninists tend to be right about a lot of stuff. It’s in the most honest sense, their greatest ally in their misaligned social war against MLs. But, no, Anarchists are so sectarian online that even the mention of “communism” in any form gets them red in the face.
Also, we have a similar progression, both radicalized closer to ML in 2016 - likely both because of the Trump presidency and what it brought.
Pretty much, yeah. Trump was the second thing that thrust me so far left, the first one was 2013 with the murder of MIchael Brown. From the standpoint of privilege I sit at as a white person, I wasn’t FULLY aware of police brutality, but MAN I joined a party where the founder is a second generation Black Panther and one of the requirements is to do some reading. He taught me a lot. Learning what I do, being the Prime Minister of my chapter and trying to do my part for my community (can’t do much without my car rn and since I just moved it’s a little difficult) and also learning while I have some down time.
I was more leaning towards socdem in high school, though didn’t fully know the name of such; just knew that we have millions of homeless folks and even more empty homes, thought healthcare should be free, thought college should be free, all that jazz. It wasn’t until right after I graduated that I called myself an Anarchist. It was a vague understanding of no rulers, no fascism, etc. etc. Very radical queer shit without fully understanding the concept.
I started slowly creeping more towards communist colors around 2016 (kind of a giveaway as to why, I live in the US) and called myself anarcho-communist. It started getting irritating; so many communists and an-coms were calling for left unity but I often times found myself in conversations with these absolutely hard lined Anarchists that would just go red in the damn face talking how anyone aligning themselves with ML/communists/An-Coms were red fascists and how their revolutions failed, etc. etc. (a recent interaction with the mods of r/antiwork pretty much solidified my position as a Communist lmao) and whenever I talked to Communists they’re…painfully patient lol. Like, whenever I interact with these dudes I can tell they’ve got that Ben Aflek smoking on the balcony look on their face, but most of the time, they’re gracious. It was definitely helpful in their patience, theory isn’t my strong suit as I have cognitive disorders that make it very difficult to process information like that. I’m slowly getting at it; accessible options are becoming more available and they’re helpful as hell.
Those political tests that go around in heaps have helped me tldr my views; VanguardValues (not tooting my own horn here but I reclaimed it if you wanna take it lol because the dude who made it is a Canadian nationalist whose Atheism veers into Islamaphobic territory, and his creative commons license says it’s okay to distribute and modify as long as I’m not selling it) labels me a Guevarist, and I’ve seen some documentaries on Cuba and its revolution. I don’t agree with Che’s obvious complete disregard and bigotry towards black people and queer people when he was alive. As a queer person and someone who views the movement for black liberation in the highest regard, I agree with his views and utilization of guerilla warfare against the US-backed Imperialist dictator, Batista. While I want to believe that, since even Castro himself agreed much later that his misaligned views towards POC and queer people were unacceptable, he too would change his views, we’ll never truly know because he died suddenly and before a time where he could, in fact, renounce his views. I’m currently exploring the territory of Mao, and thus far I’m starting to see some correlation between my views and his theories.
Also just to note; why the fuck are so many hard lined Anarchists so against the idea of Anarcho-Communist? I see them very often fling spittle about them then somehow also preach to high heaven about the IWW. Have they seen the Sabo Cat flag they sell on their own website? Dawg.
Anarchists hating Anarcho-Communists is hilarious to me, because AnCom is nothing more than a bastardization of Marxism to make it palatable to Anarcho-kiddies, without them having to accept that our revolutions have succeeded, or that Marxist-Leninists tend to be right about a lot of stuff. It’s in the most honest sense, their greatest ally in their misaligned social war against MLs. But, no, Anarchists are so sectarian online that even the mention of “communism” in any form gets them red in the face.
Also, we have a similar progression, both radicalized closer to ML in 2016 - likely both because of the Trump presidency and what it brought.
Pretty much, yeah. Trump was the second thing that thrust me so far left, the first one was 2013 with the murder of MIchael Brown. From the standpoint of privilege I sit at as a white person, I wasn’t FULLY aware of police brutality, but MAN I joined a party where the founder is a second generation Black Panther and one of the requirements is to do some reading. He taught me a lot. Learning what I do, being the Prime Minister of my chapter and trying to do my part for my community (can’t do much without my car rn and since I just moved it’s a little difficult) and also learning while I have some down time.