Experiencing Anarchism  	  PDF   	  Print   	  E-mail
Written by Sara Ramirez Galindo   
Sunday, 19 September 2004
 

It is difficult to write about a topic like anarchism, which is already controversial enough, to people who are familiar with its theory and practice without being intensely judged and questioned about what is written. Not that questioning is wrong. It is necessary, but in my opinion, it is unproductive if it lacks respect for someone's ideas, thorough thinking, reflection, and constructive feedback. That is why I ask that you, the reader, to please just read, think and reflect about what I am expressing here. It might not be a perfectly written composition but it is not meant to be one, it is simply my experience with anarchism.

 

I first learned of "Anarchism," the kind known to most activists in the United States, through literature given to me by a friend who had traveled to Washington State for the anti-World Trade Organization actions in Seattle of 1999. My curiosity about the subject led me to research more about it. I never read entire books by Proudhon, Bakunin or Emma Goldman for lack of time, so I read articles, zines and excerpts of books instead. Through this literature I learned of an anarchist conference.

 

This first anarchist conference I attended left me perplexed, for I had read about anarchism as the theory and practice towards the abolition of authority, hierarchies, practicing collectivity and active organizing. The feeling I got from that conference was uninviting, dry, alienating, extremely sub-cultural and life-stylish. I could not understand many of the things people were talking about in discussion circles. I could not understand why several of them had re-named themselves after plants and animals. I did not understand why they wore no deodorant; and it seemed weird to me that nobody bothered asking others how they were doing, if they needed anything, or even took the time to offer a greeting or a smile. I did not enjoy the conference but still remained interested in anarchism telling myself, "I'm sure this isn't all there's to it."

 

Once I got in contact with a self-defined anarchist group in my region that was holding weekly meetings, I decided to check them out. The way I was received by the people in the group was not any different from what I'd experienced at my first anarchist conference, except that after the conclusion of the meeting a couple of women in the group approached me to ask my name and how I was doing and invited me to their next meeting. I did not stay in that group long. I never spoke up because I was afraid of saying something wrong, something outside the "anarchist" terms they understood, and I did not want to be the center of attention if anything I asked became controversial, for I felt none of that "solidarity" and less of that "collectivity" that anarchism is supposed to generate. Though some people were very nice, others were very arrogant, unapproachable and plain intimidating, so I moved on.

 

While visiting "anarchist" groups every now and then, I was simultaneously involved in anti-sweatshop student activism, not because it was the "thing to do," but because my mother, uncles, aunts and myself had worked in clandestine garment sweatshops before. From this student activist work, I met a woman who introduced me to her collective, the Zapatista Committee of Los Angeles.

 

That day was the beginning of a life-changing experience.

 

Nobody in any activist or typical anarchist organization had greeted me with honest handshakes and looked at me in the eye with interest of knowing who I was or what I had to say like the people in this collective did. I was once again confused because this group was not self-defined as anarchist, but they based their practices on non-hierarchical, anti-authoritarian politics, they did practice collectivity, held weekly reading circles, and most importantly they were organizing events, not just shows -- these were based on accomplishing truly radical and practical goals. And I for the first time felt these actions were building a true sense of community.

 

As I became to know each and every one of the people in the collective, I was not surprised to know many of them were in fact self-defined anarchists who had simply felt the need to work with a group of people who could produce and provide what mainstream anarchist circles had not. Upon experiencing anarchism through those events, groups and people, I constructed this view about today's many types of anarchists: the self-defined image anarchists, the read-only anarchists, the underground and non-self-defined working anarchists, the anarchists who are a combination of all these, and others.

 

At this point I had understood that the anarchists I had initially met did not necessarily comprise what the theory and practice of anarchism was, as I understood it. It was like understanding that in the world there are nation-states and then there are the people living in them, two different entities. It was also at this point that I openly acknowledged that I was not wrong for being one of the few women and people of color walking into a predominantly-white anarchist book fair, but that is was in fact this homogenized "movement" of anarchists that had unfortunately allowed things to be structured this way.

 

This homogenization has unfortunately built boundaries that mark what kind of issues are of priority, what kind of actions are "revolutionary," the kind of workshops to be given at a conference and so on. It was difficult for me to feel connected to these anarchists; our realities and priorities had nothing in common. Anarchist literature circulating in the majority of anarchist groups today speaks mainly of European (and European descendants') anarchists' history and present. I'm sure that is not on purpose, yet the beginning of this trend led to the simplification of ideas, such as that of Europe being the "birthplace" of anarchism and this information was used to simplify another idea, that supposedly anarchism later "reached" Latin America in the mid-1800s. I saw how this was not questioned often or ever by mainstream anarchism. Was it never considered that other people, whose histories just never made it to books, could have been practicing anarchism?

 

Understanding the importance of rescuing other anarchist histories has led to the emergence of materials about Cuban anarchism, African anarchism, Argentine anarchism, etc. At the same time a growing number of anarchists -- including myself, a non-white person -- have started identifying as anarchists of color in order to rescue and expose (to everyone, not just to mainstream anarchists) our struggles and those fought by historic individuals like Luisa Capetillo from Puerto Rico, Lucy Parsons from the United States, Julia Arévalo from Chile, Maria Angelina Soares from Brazil and others.

Being part of this is my attempt to break up this standardization of anarchism's current Eurocentric tendencies that, in my opinion, could be causing some of the stagnation of its theory and practice; and to use it as a supplement to the gradual dismantling of racism and similar hierarchies of power that unfortunately exist in mainstream anarchism.

 

I keep mentioning, "mainstream anarchism" because in the United States, the only anarchism recognized is that which is externally visible, while it is in fact being "actively and seriously" taken into practice in other parts of the world through struggles that are simply not getting the amount of solidarity an all-white-boy black-block "action" gets. I am certain that the anarchist activity taking place right this minute in Magonista communities in the Mazateca Highlands in Oaxaca (Mexico), and in the Bolivian region are not the type of anarchist "scene," we are accustomed to see, for these movements include bloody confrontations, tears, death, mutual trust and hope, and most importantly constant struggle as a priority to survival. The realities for U.S. anarchism are others, and so the responses are going to be different, that is understood. Yet, this mainstream anarchist movement in the U.S. lacks understanding and consideration for the realities lived by non-privileged anarchists in the same region. Mainstream anarchism in this aspect lacks the solidarity, the convivial feeling needed to work with each other, to learn and unlearn from each other, and most importantly to build trust to back each other up.

 

I was fortunate enough to participate in an amazing event where these elements of respect, solidarity, inspiration and revitalization were experienced.

 

The Anarchist People of Color Conference in Detroit boosted up my hope for anarchism. This was an event that became controversial (to mainstream anarchists) from the very beginning, as many considered it exclusionary, "racist" and every other negative thing possible. I did not pay much attention to this drama, as I knew we were not gathering to plot a battle against white anarchists, we were simply in need to meet and share ideas with each other. It felt humiliating to have to explain to some white and non-white anarchists why we wanted to meet. We wanted to meet for the same reason anarchist women gather separate from anarchist men: to empower themselves; we gathered, with similar reasons to those anarchists break away from authoritarian nation-state governments: to change things that were going wrong, to change things in the system. To me this conference meant meeting people who had experienced the discrimination I had lived within mainstream anarchist circles. It also meant meeting individuals who were highly interested in developing and carrying out projects, not just for those in the "scene" or in their cliques, but mainly with those in their communities (community meaning neighbors, co-workers, families, etc.), projects that could truly exemplify the ideals of anarchism rather than simply spending time theorizing about them.

This conference did not produce a separate anarchist group, as that was not our purpose. We created a different understanding of its practice and theory.

 

To us, anarchism meant something diverse, since we all came from different communities and with different psychological, emotional and spiritual experiences. We stressed on the importance of having serious commitment on building relationships with our community rather than encircling ourselves in a subculture that unconsciously excludes others around us. We also planted that this anarchism we were talking was non-vanguardist, non-elitist, non-arrogant, respectful, humble, honest, loving, gentle and accountable to others. As revolutionary anarchist people of color, we understood our communities need non-traditional anarchist projects that could be constantly assessed to see if they are indeed creating solidarity, mutual-aid, self-determination, self-sufficiency and autonomy.

 

Experiencing anarchism to me has not been what books say it is. It has meant how my actions can in fact produce it effectively.