Nah, I mean it’s just a little silly. “Every clock is a cop?”
I get the sentiment, and I agree. But you have to be pretty deep in the anarchist “lore” (for lack of a better word) to see what they’re saying. For normal people walking by, seeing this (the ones who most need to be swayed), it just comes across as fully unserious. Incredibly silly.
I think this kind of leftist silliness-taken-seriously stems from the yippies. When serious socialist and leftist factions were rising up and spreading in popularity, the yippies came along and turned the entire movement into something utterly silly—now, do I believe that anarchism should be based on joy? Of course. Do I actually like the yippies? Of course. Because I do believe in whimsy, humor, and joy as the basis for life. But I truly do think that, again, you need to be rooted in the “lore” of true leftism to see what they were doing and take it seriously while you also try to levitate the pentagon.
I do firmly believe that this forward facing silliness (joy-forward, instead of misery-in/joy-out, if you will) turned the entire leftist movement in the US into a self-defeating trend. And it shaped the entire perception and almost all of its antics for the rest of time. It just plays right into the fascist counterpoints: “they’re incredibly weak and incredibly dangerous.” Because on both sides of the coin, the crunchy sit-in at Zucotti park to…end capitalism(?) and the capturing, occupying, and torching of city blocks and police stations in 2020, they have the perfect footage to show. Both of those cases in point were true action—the two biggest examples of true action I’ve seen in my lifetime in the US. But one had cops and news anchors trembling in fear and clutching their pearls while the other started out as a true action then sort of fizzled and flopped about in its own unseriousness. The latter turned from a focused demonstration borne out of true anger and then just languished in this weird all-encompassing crunchy hang sesh complete with jugglers and all carnival sights.
The US left is just terminally stuck between its two identities, never fully realizing it’s potential as a result. Maybe we’re seeing less of that as time goes on, but that’s in response to a fully serious uprising of fascists. We’ll see what the next few years bring.
It is exactly this. Anarchists are generally really bad at explaining their ideas in a digestible way for the average person. I myself struggle at doing it. I think most of it is what you say, and I think part of it is that phenomenon where experts in a field have a hard time dumbing things down for people cause they overestimate the amount of knowledge the average person has in whatever field. I know what this poster is saying cause I have the needed historical context and ideological knowledge to understand what they are really saying. Most people don’t and read this and think we are fucking stupid, insane, delusional, and utopian idealists. Anarchists are horrible at conveying our ideals cause too many of us are dedicated to conveying our beliefs through inside jokes.
The only thing that anarchists hate more than authoritarians is other anarchists!
Nah, I mean it’s just a little silly. “Every clock is a cop?”
I get the sentiment, and I agree. But you have to be pretty deep in the anarchist “lore” (for lack of a better word) to see what they’re saying. For normal people walking by, seeing this (the ones who most need to be swayed), it just comes across as fully unserious. Incredibly silly.
I think this kind of leftist silliness-taken-seriously stems from the yippies. When serious socialist and leftist factions were rising up and spreading in popularity, the yippies came along and turned the entire movement into something utterly silly—now, do I believe that anarchism should be based on joy? Of course. Do I actually like the yippies? Of course. Because I do believe in whimsy, humor, and joy as the basis for life. But I truly do think that, again, you need to be rooted in the “lore” of true leftism to see what they were doing and take it seriously while you also try to levitate the pentagon.
I do firmly believe that this forward facing silliness (joy-forward, instead of misery-in/joy-out, if you will) turned the entire leftist movement in the US into a self-defeating trend. And it shaped the entire perception and almost all of its antics for the rest of time. It just plays right into the fascist counterpoints: “they’re incredibly weak and incredibly dangerous.” Because on both sides of the coin, the crunchy sit-in at Zucotti park to…end capitalism(?) and the capturing, occupying, and torching of city blocks and police stations in 2020, they have the perfect footage to show. Both of those cases in point were true action—the two biggest examples of true action I’ve seen in my lifetime in the US. But one had cops and news anchors trembling in fear and clutching their pearls while the other started out as a true action then sort of fizzled and flopped about in its own unseriousness. The latter turned from a focused demonstration borne out of true anger and then just languished in this weird all-encompassing crunchy hang sesh complete with jugglers and all carnival sights.
The US left is just terminally stuck between its two identities, never fully realizing it’s potential as a result. Maybe we’re seeing less of that as time goes on, but that’s in response to a fully serious uprising of fascists. We’ll see what the next few years bring.
It is exactly this. Anarchists are generally really bad at explaining their ideas in a digestible way for the average person. I myself struggle at doing it. I think most of it is what you say, and I think part of it is that phenomenon where experts in a field have a hard time dumbing things down for people cause they overestimate the amount of knowledge the average person has in whatever field. I know what this poster is saying cause I have the needed historical context and ideological knowledge to understand what they are really saying. Most people don’t and read this and think we are fucking stupid, insane, delusional, and utopian idealists. Anarchists are horrible at conveying our ideals cause too many of us are dedicated to conveying our beliefs through inside jokes.