Well, you seem to have a point here. It’s a blind spot I should look more into. But I already have a long reading list since there are many things I’d like to know more about. Tbh after your first comment I hesitated to react at all because I have enough of communists claiming that anarchists don’t read books. It’s so stupid and I can’t hear it anymore and you don’t make friends with such claims. But your quote that did not really contradict my point triggered me enough to answer.
That out of the way: “authoritarian” is a very loose term and you can make it mean anything to justify those that fit the term. Sure, establishing a new system is somehow authoritarian and so is keeping the old one. Everything is authoritarian so it doesn’t matter to have a dictator.
Authoritarianism is about hierarchy and centralism. When Bolsheviks wanted to create a centralized state that follows Moscow, sure it’s an anarchist thing to prevent that. And since they didn’t want to expend outside Ukraine, I still say they were no threat except to the Bolsheviks’ wish to expend. Also: The USSR was much more centralized (and therefore a stronger state) than the Tsar Empire before them.
I could add a thing or two more but I really wonder would arrive with your critics at a place like communism. I mean there were a lot of genocide going on in the USSR and they weren’t nice to different minded people either. From my experience, anarchists have a much easier time to kill their heroes. Tell an anarchist that Bakunin was an antisemite and they will say “yes I know but his ideas are still valid since he didn’t develop them alone and they don’t contain his antisemitism”. Tell a Marxist that Marx falsely accused Bakunin to be a Tsar spy and they will say “but Bakunin was an antisemite”. You get the idea. But maybe you just got to the wrong people.
Maybe we can at least agree that the meme is BS? Or did I misunderstand it?
Well, you seem to have a point here. It’s a blind spot I should look more into. But I already have a long reading list since there are many things I’d like to know more about. Tbh after your first comment I hesitated to react at all because I have enough of communists claiming that anarchists don’t read books. It’s so stupid and I can’t hear it anymore and you don’t make friends with such claims. But your quote that did not really contradict my point triggered me enough to answer.
That out of the way: “authoritarian” is a very loose term and you can make it mean anything to justify those that fit the term. Sure, establishing a new system is somehow authoritarian and so is keeping the old one. Everything is authoritarian so it doesn’t matter to have a dictator.
Authoritarianism is about hierarchy and centralism. When Bolsheviks wanted to create a centralized state that follows Moscow, sure it’s an anarchist thing to prevent that. And since they didn’t want to expend outside Ukraine, I still say they were no threat except to the Bolsheviks’ wish to expend. Also: The USSR was much more centralized (and therefore a stronger state) than the Tsar Empire before them.
I could add a thing or two more but I really wonder would arrive with your critics at a place like communism. I mean there were a lot of genocide going on in the USSR and they weren’t nice to different minded people either. From my experience, anarchists have a much easier time to kill their heroes. Tell an anarchist that Bakunin was an antisemite and they will say “yes I know but his ideas are still valid since he didn’t develop them alone and they don’t contain his antisemitism”. Tell a Marxist that Marx falsely accused Bakunin to be a Tsar spy and they will say “but Bakunin was an antisemite”. You get the idea. But maybe you just got to the wrong people.
Maybe we can at least agree that the meme is BS? Or did I misunderstand it?