By Cake Boy
Keith Preston recently issued a response to a short letter we wrote a while back asking him to stop calling himself an anarchist because of his racism, misogyny, and support for libertarian variants.
Yes, so the thing is, Preston is an intelligent person. But I think he isn’t very good at communicating his views. There has been miscommunication between him and the broader anarchist milieu.
We now know what is the idea behind the anarchist pluralist project. In the end, anarchism is just a word—a word with a specific emotional meaning- for many of us. We use the word because it means something to us. Sometimes, our identities are based on this word. But what is a word? We could also call the anarchist pluralist idea ‘federalism’ or ‘pluralist liberalism’, which would be the same. Do we want to change the world, do we want some political impact, or do we want to be part of a specific interesting ingroup?
What I mean by anarchism is an individualist/existentialist way of relating to the world.
What these Antifa kids mean by anarchism is cultural Marxism/humanism.
What Preston means by anarchism is a pluralist, decentralist political system.
So, we see, we all use this word differently. And this is insurmountable but also very frustrating.
As Wittgenstein said, language is the problem. And here we see again: there are many problems we now have because of language and the way we all use it.
I suggest that we call pluralist anarchism federalism in the future—a new, fresh word for the concept. When we explain the theory to people, we might use the word ‘federalism’ for tactical reasons.
I haven’t noticed any racism or misogyny in Preston’s work, and when I talked to him, I never heard it either. He never talks about ‘races’ or about women with me. People accuse him of antisemitism. But he told me that he is against Zionism and Israeli aggression. This isn’t the same as antisemitism, of course.
But, it was not a smart/tactical thing to call himself a ‘fellow traveler’ of national anarchism. When you call yourself a ‘fellow traveler’ of national anarchism, people might think you are connected to white power movements. National anarchists pose with white power symbols. Technically speaking, Preston is a fellow traveler of many political theories because they can all fit into a pluralist framework.
Nationalist anarchism could exist in a pluralist framework, but it would be a small cult, not an actual social/cultural/political force.
And associating us with totalitarian elements of the left.
Yes, when I was in this Antifa milieu for a very short period of time, I saw that they were associated with Maoism. It’s indeed connected to state communism. They call communists their ‘comrades’. Some Antifa person even told me that ‘Mao was an anarchist.’
A pan-secessionist movement that Preston advocates means empowering movements that seek to crystalize the elements of the State and general social system that motivate anarchism’s revolutionary potential.
The pluralist system consists of small sub-states, you could say. A system based on different political zones, combined with full autonomous zones, would be a system in which ‘all social relationships would be voluntary.’ So, a system based on (American) anarchist hardware.
Plainly put: Anarchism is founded on the desire to smash capitalism, racism, sexism, and the like, so you cannot make friends out of movements that seek to celebrate those tyrannies.
The American/Boston anarchism was about individual autonomy. It didn’t really have an opinion about what people do with that autonomy. Pluralist anarchism is based on this tradition, an outcome of that theory. Again, there is not really a problem with something like capitalism in itself, as long as you CHOOSE to be part of it. The American/Boston tradition was about ‘non-invasion’. It wasn’t about cultural change or radical egalitarianism. I will clarify this later on.
The question comes up of exactly what totalitarianism is as it is the “totalitarian humanism” that Preston talks about is a problem of the left and distracts the left’s claims of liberation. Preston’s critique is especially precious given his belief that completely deregulated capitalism is acceptable in his “liberated” society.
The pluralist idea is that you have a system in which different systems consist next to each other. So, if there could be deregulated capitalism in one zone, and if people don’t like it, they go to the socialist zone.
We should also not forget that libertarians often think their politics are good for the working class. They say their form of capitalism will be better for working-class and middle-class people. I doubt that this will be the case, but many of them have the same goal as socialists. They think they can reach that goal by deregulating markets to improve supply and demand. To them, the problem is a state that corrupts capitalism but not capitalism itself.
What Preston means by ‘totalitarian humanism’ is the aggressive forms of PC culture and woke.
The problem is not being very progressive, or having woke opinions as a person, it’s about the cancel culture and intimidation connected to the woke culture. I have nothing against radical feminists/woke activists, but I do have a problem with them when they start to silence people.
Even Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, a person who shared some of Preston’s bigotries and was more of a proto-anarchist than the anarchism we would call today said that “property is theft.” We could really go down the line on this, but what we would find is not just that these anarchists have a different opinion about capitalism, they find anti-capitalism foundational.
Yes, Proudhon means landlordism. Landlordism leads to theft, and I agree with him. When there is no alternative to landlordism or paying rent, it is theft.
In this pluralist system, a central state does not own the land. And it’s not owned by a landlord. Different political and ideological parties and sects own it. So, the people own it, you could say. It’s against communist and capitalist monopolies and wants social and economic plurality.
He seems to know nothing about the fundamental values and motivating factors of the revolutionary anarchist movement.
Anarchism isn’t revolutionary by definition. Many branches of anarchism are not revolutionary, like mutualism, individualism, agorism, and Boston anarchism. These branches see revolutions as something that always leads to new bosses/despots.
For Attack the System, and Preston personally, the real issue is of this new concept of National Anarchism. When stripped of its pseudo-mystical tracts and overly jargon filled double speak, the notion here is almost identical to Preston’s idea of pan-secessionism. Groups, known as tribes, would create separate enclave based either on identity, such as race, or on social choice, such as economic system. The NA’s themselves focus on racial identity as they are essentially anti-State nationalists, who maintain the same violent racism and misogyny that most neo-Nazis do. Troy Southgate, former organizer with the National Front and some even more unsavory and violent white nationalist groups, is the ideological frontrunner of the NA theory, and has written most of their few works of theory. Spencer Sunshine outlines this beautifully as you can see where their true allegiances are.
I also strongly dislike national anarchism.
But they are not violent. This is what makes them different than white nationalists, etc. This is an important thing to mention. They look more dangerous than they actually are.
Preston himself now has zero connection to larger anarchist movements and seems to have been deemed persona non grata from all political arenas except the far-right.
There was a pretty woke leftist anarchist activist in this country who became persona non grata recently. So, this doesn’t mean that much, the Antifa cult kicks people out all the time, for no specific reason. Say a wrong word by accident, and you get kicked out.
You may want to criticize Antifa organizers for what you see as censorship (Angry white men always scream censorship when their bullshit is disallowed by the community, usually because they have never been told “no” before in their lives.), but we are out in the streets and fighting in solidarity with movements across the world to bring together a liberated society.
No, you are not in the streets. You don’t bring anything to anyone. You’re just a stupid little cult full of confused adolescents. Don’t act as if you have any political meaning. It’s time to wake up out of your dream world. My texts are meant as a cold shower to wake you up.
I’m also not a ‘angry white man’. I’m a white man, but I’m not angry. And what is ‘the community’? Do you mean ‘the cult’?
And what does my skin color have to do with it? I thought you were anti-racist?
Yes, Antifa and leftist anarchists use censorship all the time. They are open about their anti-free speech ideas. Because free speech leads to ‘fascism’ in their view. So, you have to silence people all the time, otherwise they become fascists, seemingly.
So, what have we seen in this brainstorm session? Pluralism is a good idea, but it has been presented in a non-tactical way.
We have seen that Antifa anarchists who have sites and write articles are ideologically weak and do not have the right amount of knowledge/development to be an actual political force in the world.
We have also seen that the word ‘anarchism’ might be avoided when discussing the pluralist concept with people.
