Anarchism in 'Murica has a long and storied history.
If you are not aware of it, that is no surprise.
Why would a gov't skool educate you in things opposed to its enslavement of you with your ignorance?
I mean, you do understand that we have been dumbed down systematically, yes?
If not, then you are in for a totally life altering shock when you figure it out, imo.
I know I had to take a minute to think about it, myself.
And, I was looking for it.
PHOTO: SCOTT EELLS/BLOOMBERG VIA GETTY IMAGES.
“What Trump Doesn’t Understand About Anarchists”
At the peak intensity of nationwide protests against police violence, social media was flooded with videos of officers beating and driving cars into protesters.
News outlets questioned whether “outside agitators” had infiltrated the demonstrations and circulated images of defaced and looted storefronts, sparking debate about what was deemed “acceptable” protest behavior.
In the midst of all of this, there seemed to be one word on many pundits' and politicians' lips: anarchy.
President Donald Trump and his administration, in particular, have been preoccupied with labeling protesters as “anarchists.”
“These are anarchists. These are not protesters,” Trump said in July amid the ongoing protests in Portland.
During a June 29 press conference, White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany proclaimed, “Law and order are the building blocks to the American Dream, but if anarchy prevails, this dream comes crumbling down,” before proudly announcing that the administration had arrested “over 100 anarchists for rioting and destruction of federal property.”
At the peak intensity of nationwide protests against police violence, social media was flooded with videos of officers beating and driving cars into protesters.
News outlets questioned whether “outside agitators” had infiltrated the demonstrations and circulated images of defaced and looted storefronts, sparking debate about what was deemed “acceptable” protest behavior.
In the midst of all of this, there seemed to be one word on many pundits' and politicians' lips: anarchy.
President Donald Trump and his administration, in particular, have been preoccupied with labeling protesters as “anarchists.”
“These are anarchists. These are not protesters,” Trump said in July amid the ongoing protests in Portland.
During a June 29 press conference, White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany proclaimed, “Law and order are the building blocks to the American Dream, but if anarchy prevails, this dream comes crumbling down,” before proudly announcing that the administration had arrested “over 100 anarchists for rioting and destruction of federal property.”
The portrayal of anarchists by the president and right-wing media outlets as Molotov cocktail-throwing, black-clad agitators, is not only incorrect, but dangerous.
It allows Trump to seize on false narratives like “Portland is burning,” depicting the city as full of violence and engulfed in chaos, giving himself an excuse to do things like send federal agents to use tear gas against peaceful protesters.
He then uses these narratives to commend himself as the “law and order” president and try to boost his reelection chances.
“On the national scale, anarchism has become this scapegoat for a way to talk about violence in a way that obscures the violence of the state,” Theresa Warburton, associate professor of English and affiliate faculty of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Western Washington University, told Refinery29.
“That threat is so real to the legitimacy of the state that they need to create this narrative of violent anarchists that are dangerous to the community that then the state can protect everyday citizens from.
In reality, what we’re seeing with the defund police movement is that when people aren’t stuck in that threat that the state is manufacturing and hear the ideas, a lot of people are like, ‘Oh yeah, that makes sense.’”
Trump & co.’s vilification of anarchists also completely misses the point of what anarchism actually is: a philosophy that is deeply concerned with oppression, its origins, and how to best achieve liberation, and that envisions a society based on cooperation as opposed to competition.
With the multiple tragedies of the past year, which have highlighted the ways in which the U.S. government and capitalist economy privilege the powerful, anarchism has arguably never been more necessary than at the current moment.
Trump’s woeful mishandling of the coronavirus pandemic; the many police killings of Black people including George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Tony McDade; police violence against protesters — all of these stories draw attention to the staggering scope of the state’s power and call into question what the purpose of this power is.All of this is to say: Anarchism is deeply relevant right now.
I know I've been hard on you, dear reader, but it is only to help you improve.
There are good reasons I ask you not to use the term anarchist unless you are sure that that is what you mean.
If you only mean the superficialness of teenagers with circled (A)'s on their skateboards, well, please read a little of the history of the people that brought that term through the centuries.
Please show respect for the ones that gave their lives, and those that gave thier lives on the installment plan.