void-shouting

Every single day, I realise that anarchists in Europe suck ass even more than any other region. And that's because too many of them want the aesthetics but think they're too edgy to call themselves what they really are: useless liberals.

Anarchism has values and beliefs, even if we're not all the same. It never includes capitalism, hierarchies, or oppression. It doesn't enable abuse or support bigotry. Anyone propping up their love for any of that via the path of anarchism is not an anarchist; that's simple.

They're using the aesthetics. They're pretending.

But anarchists in Europe? Patriarchal as shit. Nationalist as shit. Racist as shit. Queerphobic as shit. Colonialist and imperialist as shit. They never even explore their own values, and they never question what they've grown up learning. They just slap the word 'anarchist' on their views and go about as usual.

It is unsurprising to me that, even within anarchist circles which are full of cis men who claim to want liberation for all people, they simply cannot stop themselves from treating all feminine people around them as replacement mothers and caretakers.

Demanding so much and returning so little, always invading our space no matter what we say or how we say it... They perpetually ignore everything and claim that they've been wronged when they don't get what they want.

If we truly want liberation, these (among others) behaviours need to be revisited and dismantled.

“I don't want to ask on every post.”

Then feel free to not respond to me. Reconsider the way that social media and the internet is used. You do not have to engage with me all the time just because you follow me.

I have very often started drafting a response to someone only to delete it because it felt inadequate and potentially invasive. I have changed an entire response to something that asks for permission or grants access. I have prefaced statements with “This is tangential, but I also noticed...”

And with every consideration and change, I have had productive conversations and came up with new considerations and ideas that I hadn't thought of prior to that moment or wouldn't have recognised.

You do not need to simply respond to a complaint with a way to individually fix a problem that someone is pointing out as being infrastructural or systemic. You can just... commiserate.

You can also see it as a time to reflect upon the world around you. If this is an area you're interested in, what does it look like for you? And how do you fix it? And are there more people around you like me who have the same worries and frustrations and needs? Are there others beyond people like me who are being neglected and ignored?

You don't need to respond. Reading can be, and often is, enough.

“What kinds of responses do you want when you're complaining?”

1. Don't respond at all. Sit and reflect upon your current situation and how you could possibly change it for the better to meet the need of people like me around you. I'm not complaining purely for my own benefit. Recognise that not everything needs a response. Just because you can respond doesn't mean you fucking should.

2. If you're unaware if I want a solution or help, ask. Do that first and always. I don't know why this is never something that people don't do. If something doesn't start with a clear call for assistance, it might be a good idea to ask if someone wants help... Especially if what they're doing seems like venting frustrations. Your “assistance” is only going to make that person more upset, and you're more likely to get a more receptive person if you ask “Do you need help?” or “Do you want help?” or something than if you just blaze on in and solve their problem without consider what the purpose of their complaint is.

3. Solutions that involve “just go buy this thing” aren't useful and don't take into consideration a person's financial situation. If part of your solution includes “just go buy this thing,” especially when that thing is quite expensive, it's only going to make someone angry.

4. Stop individualising everything. Start reading things to see if it's an infrastructural or systemic problem before you go telling someone what they, on their own, can do. Otherwise, you're contributing to the same things they're already complaining about.

I have written numerous posts about how it feels overwhelming to want to make a change but to have no secure way of doing so, only for people to provide useless individualist solutions to a problem that is honestly far larger.

When I say I want to switch from Windows to Linux but that I don't know the best way of doing so because I do not know which is the best Linux variant for me and that I would feel more confident in trying them out within a community, it does not help me to say “You can put it on a USB and boot different ones up.” It still leaves me without having a secure space to try these things, and it still puts the onus on trying to find something more secure... on myself. Which is nonsensical.

When I say I want to de-Google my phone, it does not help to tell me to buy another one. Do you think I'm made of money? Do you think I can just go out and buy a new phone? Especially when certain phones make it easier than others? Do you think I can just figure all this out for myself? Should I even have to? Why aren't the tech spaces who claim to care so much about privacy doing anything for the average person?

Why is it when I say that I want a community of people who can help make it easier and possible to remove Microsoft and Google from my life, I get fucking individualist solutions? That's absurd.

If I feel that way, maybe a lot of people feel the same. You cannot tell me everyone wants to solve every problem on their own! I would never believe it!

And stop giving people advice they never asked for! Stop responding with “help” and reflect upon whether or not the person you're talking to even wants it in the first fucking place. It shouldn't be hard to recognise when they do! In fact, they'll probably ask for it when they need it.

And if you can't figure that out, fucking ask before offering it.

I know I've had people in the past tell me that 'taught' helplessness is a better term, but I still think 'learned' helplessness has a function within certain conditions.

For example, the 'learned' helplessness of a cis man who may not have had their cis father directly teaching them the ways to rely upon their (perceived) feminine partner. They watched what was done, and they learned from it.

It was not something they were taught but something they recognised as possible.

I try to be really patient with my friends when we work on projects together, but some of them honestly need to calm the entire fuck down with the importance they put on the things we're doing.

While I love writing, I view it as a predominantly supportive structure in any movement. It provides people with a form of expression to open up new pathways and connections; it creates a discursive space to have open disagreements or open acknowledgements.

It's a space to record what will later be viewed as history.

But so often, it feels like one friend in particular wants to take a “write and publish immediately” tactic. And I hate that. Very few things need to be published immediately, and those are pieces that stand in solidarity with a movement happening now.

Standing with Palestinians against genocide, standing with Ukrainians against imperialism... Fighting against mass surveillance projects disguised as “child protection” (while also providing exceptions for the people who abuse children the most) that has an expiration date set... Challenging our anarcho-syndicalist unions bringing in transphobes and calling the cops against members who challenge those views... These are all urgent.

But I feel like something that is a persistent problem within movement spaces can have time to breathe, to grow, to expand into a better critique than just “throwing shit at the wall.” We have short-form communications to critique these problems in a fast-paced way; a long-form should be more considered.

It feels irresponsible, especially if we want it to stand as a document that makes it clear that this is a problem that we've had for a century or more that we collectively refuse to solve. Publishing it tomorrow will not solve those problems. Publishing in in a week will not solve those problems.

We have the time and space to get it out when it's good, when it properly supports people. It doesn't have to be perfect, but it has to be considerate and cognizant of the current moment and climate.

If anything, it feels like this friend just wants to publish because they want to feel like they “did something.” I know they feel powerless to do much; I often do, too, especially as an alienated migrant.

But I know that writing projects can take time and incubate longer. It does not make me feel good to release something I can't stand behind.

Some people will complain about the lack of principles on the “we need numbers” side of politics, but they will absolutely force through actions that do the same thing.

Numbers are good, but principles are better. If you're working with people who have no ethics or principles, then you're on your way nowhere fast. Maybe a nicer version of the path to hell.

Allosexual people really need to find other relationships to sex, especially when they choose to date or remain with (for example) ace people.

They tell ace people that we need to be the ones to “meet them in the middle,” but then they find ways to ensure that sex is put into things where it doesn't need to be. Constantly making jokes about sex when it's not necessary, being snide about how 'frigid' or 'prude' their partner is (again, 'jokingly')... It feels overwhelming.

But when you ask them to try to stop overstepping boundaries and let you get comfortable with things, they won't.

For the record, I'm not bothered by people being against the United States government. I just expect that someone has coherent principles. “US bad only” thought is nonsensical.