Something Boring

[Walter and Theodor]

I get the point about a kind of dialectic between youthful exuberance and aged pragmatism. I am not sure if one needs therapy to come to terms with certain aspects of tedium and drudgery in politics (if I follow you correctly). And while I agree with your points I guess I am suspicious about building a politics on anti-boredom in that it suggests a kind youthful politics and then isn’t this the catch with anarchism? One meets very few anarchists who are still anarchists after they are thirty. For those of us who are we might necessarily wonder about a politic that seems to have a limitless supply of suburban punk rock teenagers and college students but then pretty much dries up when people find themselves with a little less time on their hands. Obviously its not true for everyone but I think ‘Nadia’ sounds like a child and is proposing a political rebranding…

Notice there are no politics in that rant – no proposals, nothing concrete, nothing realizable in any programmatic or strategic sense. Its just rhetoric. once the surface packaging is torn away, won’t we be back to the same boring substantive issues?

[claptonpond]

Wow, this thread's getting huge and I'm a bit short of time, so I'll just reply to this one point:

Michelaccio said:

Sometimes I think that the traditional types get a little reactionary against the primitivists because they're afraid that maybe the primmies are more anarchist than they are and they don't like being caught up in an anarchist critique of anarch-ism.

In my experience it's the exact opposite - primitivism has certain implications that are profoundly un-anarchist, and that's what leads to reaction - particularly when the traditional types are intuitively aware of primitivism's anti-liberatory tendencies but can't articulate them well (or just can't be bothered to), which seems to happen quite often.

Good to see you back here, W&T. Nice points about the marketing of the activist subculture.

[theyellowspot]

Clapton said:

In my experience it's the exact opposite - primitivism has certain implications that are profoundly un-anarchist, and that's what leads to reaction - particularly when the traditional types are intuitively aware of primitivism's anti-liberatory tendencies but can't articulate them well (or just can't be bothered to), which seems to happen quite often.

just to play devil's advocate here:

In my experience it's the exact opposite - anarcho-communism has certain implications that are profoundly un-anarchist, and that's what leads to reaction - particularly when the green types are intuitively aware of anarcho-communism's anti-liberatory tendencies but can't articulate them well (or just can't be bothered to), which seems to happen quite often.

[claptonpond]

I guess it all depends on whether you put more emphasis on personal autonomy or social freedom.