Now by The Invisible Committee – MP3 – Read– Print – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
Now (2017) is the phantom chapter to the Invisible Committee’s previous book, To Our Friends: a new critique from the anonymous collective that establishes their opposition to the world of capital and its law of labor, addresses current anti-terrorist rhetoric and the ferocious repression that comes with it, and clarifies the end of social democracy and the growing rumors of the need for a coming “civil war.”
The Olympia Communard: Dispatches from the Olympia Rail Blockade – By Various Authors – MP3 – PDF – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
For seven days during the winter of 2016, radicals, revolutionaries and ne’er-do-wells – inspired by the then unfolding revolt at Standing Rock – built a blockade encampment on the train tracks in downtown Olympia, Washington (Nisqually and Squaxin Land), in order to stop a train full of essential fracking supplies from reaching the Bakken oil fields in North Dakota. One year later the blockade reemerged and for another twelve days during the winter of 2017, participants took a stand against the industrial machinations of death.
This compilation of writing comes from the second year of the blockade and was intended to be record of sorts, of a special time and place affectionately referred to by its participants as the Olympia Commune. In the Olympia Communard’s own words:
“It is simply the perspective of some future possible world, glancing back at the collapse of this world and searching for those elements of redemption hidden therein”.
A Surrounding for Us to Live Within: notes on industrial society and it’s ecology – By a Friend of Ludd – MP3 – Read – Print – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
A Surrounding for Us to Live Within came out of the Italian anarchist scene in 2003, is signed by “a friend of Ludd,” and sets out to “bring to light some relationships between the progressive loss of individual and social autonomy, environmental devastation and the sharpening of repression.” This very brief and unexpectedly gorgeous, succinct, and intelligent text starts off from one child’s definition of the environment and touches on everything from the mass hermitude of contemporary city-dwellers to the artful mixing of the pleasures of solitude with the pleasures of meeting, from meditations on the interplay between forest and village to a critique of representation, from the domination of technology to the war in Iraq, nuclear waste, the COP9 summit, the solidarity with Marco Camenisch, globalization, the state’s ecology, the wildcat strike of Milanese streetcar drivers, the struggle against prisons, the Luddite uprising, utopianism, the oil economy.
“In the notes that follow, we will try to bring to light some relationships between the progressive loss of individual and social autonomy, environmental devastation and the sharpening of repression. Not in order to update the endless catalogue of horrors and complaints, but rather in order to reflect on some possibilities. Just this once, we will start from a “for” and not an “against”. What is a “surrounding for us to live within”? I would say a place in which the pleasure of solitude and the pleasure of meeting are artfully intertwined, whereas we know from experience that industrial society destroys both.”
Musical Interludes – This Other Place by Saltland
53:19 – People VS. The United States – By The Conspiracy to Incite a Riot – MP3 – PDF – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
Right now, the FBI is keeping an eye on what websites you browse, on what your neighbors are saying in chat rooms. Right now, folks are sitting in prison for talking about Illegal acts. Right now, the military is restructuring for domestic deployment. Right now, a million people are plotting the overthrow of the United States government, and these people may one day become your best friends and greatest allies.
We want to explain why.
Musical Interludes: Nirvana – Something In The Way, Imagine Dragons – Who We Are, Nirvana – Lounge Act, Rage Against The Machine – Bomb Track, Xiu Xiu – I Luv The Valley Oh!, Crystal Castles – Doe Deer, Bikini Kill – Double Dare Ya
26:59 – Bern Notice: Building A Material Force In The Age Of Trumpism – from Its Going Down – MP3 – Read – Print – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
Radio Edit – MP3
“If we strive to create a material force within the social landscape; an autonomous anti-capitalist and anti-colonial movement that builds counter-power and new forms of life, then we must take stock of the other emerging forces in the current terrain. We have to think about how we can fight—and win, against the growing rise of the autonomous far-right, especially after Trump’s presidential run ends. For after Trump returns to being a real estate billionaire baron full-time, the cadres that gathered their forces during his campaign will take further shape autonomously, as backlash will surely build against Hilary, assuming that she takes the Presidency. At the same time, as we take a position in this ‘three-way fight,’ we must make sure that our resistance to the far-right is also linked to our struggle against the state and capital; attacking white supremacy as a neo-colonial system and not simply a fight against white nationalist formations on the fringes.”
“For those that worked with Sanders’ campaign, we state plainly that nothing they have done has gotten us closer to this goal. With Sanders’ defeat now official in the eyes of many, the Democrats are now in a position to finally harness all the grassroots mobilization that the Bernie campaign has developed, and push people in the millions to pull the level for Clinton. ‘Anybody but Trump!,’ will be the new rallying cry, as millions will choose to either drag their feet or tow the party line. In this way, Sanders will have served his biggest role: playing revolutionary for the most counter-revolutionary party in history.”
Musical Interludes: YG & Nipsey Hussle – FDT (Fuck Donald Trump), Savage Fam – Rezizt, Rihanna – Take a Bow, AntLoc (from Savage Fam) – Hand of Vengeance, Sindicato Latino –“20 de abril” Fuck nazis, Tinashe – All Hands on Deck, Yung Joc – Its Going Down
2:13:21 – Illyria Street Commune – by Fredy Perlman – MP3 – Read – Print Part 1 – Print Part 2 – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
Radio Edit – MP3
Illyria Street Commune is a play originally written and performed in 1979 in Detroit. It follows the inhabitants of a house over the years as it goes from isolated tenants to anarchist commune then devolves into in fighting and recuperation. Be sure to check out Revolutionary Purity Showdown another take on collective living and conflict, as well as the interview with Robby and Sylvie. (Musical interludes: Chopin – Spring Waltz)
*Sorry for background noise and quality problems our recording set up is not great for recording multiple voices and some of the intended content of the play is lost without a visual component. That being said it was a blast to record and we hope that you enjoy it! For the full effect of the play gather together a bunch of people and put on a live performance of it. and if you feel so inspired videotape it and send it to us and we can link to it here 😉
36:46 – Revolutionary Purity Showdown – By Richard Ades – MP3 – Read – Print – Torrent– Archive – YouTube
This play was originally written by Richard Ades and performed in Detroit in 1979, in part, as a response to Illyria Street Commune, a play released that year by Fredy Perlman. Revolutionary Purity Showdown is a game show where contestants compete “By throwing critiques, insults, and otherwise maligning the character of [their] two fellow contestants.” “the show which says there’s no point in having a line if you don’t have the best line, and there’s no point in being right on, if you aren’t right on top.”
Judged by Emma Goldman, Harpo Marx and Leon Szolgocz this play is makes fun of an all to real dynamic in radical scenes. Be sure to check out the interview with Robby and Sylvie for more context. Theme song from “Password Plus”
*it should be noted that the character of Harpo Marx is almost entirely absent from this recording (only present in the honking horn) his character as you might imagine is all about physical comedy. So for the full effect of this play gather together you and 7 of your friends and put on your own performance of the revolutionary purity showdown.
You could even take a video we can post it on this site 🙂
2:27:26 – Robby Barnes and Sylvie Kashdan – MP3 – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
We sat down with Robby and Sylvie in their home in Seattle to get some of the context for the two plays we were planning on recording. The interview turned into a nearly 2 and a half hour conversation where we discussed Rojava, The 5th Estate, 1968, burnout, and the last 30+ years of anarchy in the United States and much more. It was such a pleasure to hear their stories and perspectives. Though we recorded it almost a year ago we are exited to share it with you now and hope that you find it as interesting as it was for us. The interview is intended to provide some context for Illyria Street Commune by Fredy Perlman and Revolutionary Purity Showdown by Richard Ades which are both well worth a listen.
31:30 – The Party’s Over: Beyond Politics Beyond Democracy – by CrimethInc – MP3 – Read – PDF – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
“Even if it was true that anyone could grow up to be President, that wouldn’t help the millions who inevitably don’t, who must still live in the shadow of that power. This imbalance is intrinsic to the structure of representative democracy, at the local level as much as at the top. The professional politicians of a town council discuss municipal affairs and pass ordinances all day without consulting the citizens of the town, who have to be at work; when one of those ordinances displeases citizens, they have to use what little leisure time they have to contest it, and then they’re back at work again the next time the town council meets. In theory, the citizens could elect a different town council from the available pool of politicians and would-be politicians, but the interests of politicians as a class always remain essentially at odds with their own—besides, voting fraud, gerrymandering, and inane party loyalty usually prevent them from going that far. Even in the unlikely scenario that a whole new government was elected consisting of firebrands intent on undoing the imbalance of power between politicians and citizens, they would inevitably perpetuate it simply by accepting roles in the system—for the political apparatus itself is the foundation of that imbalance. To succeed in their objective, they would have to dissolve the government and join the rest of the populace in restructuring society from the roots up.”
Musical into/outro – Hail To the Chief
7:24 – This Is A Call To End Slavery In America – by prisoners across the US – MP3 – PDF – Text – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
Prisoners from across the United States have released this call to
action for a nationally coordinated prisoner work stoppage against
prison slavery to take place on September 9th, 2016.
“Forty-five years after Attica, the waves of change are returning to
America’s prisons. This September we hope to coordinate and generalize
these protests, to build them into a single tidal shift that the
American prison system cannot ignore or withstand. We hope to end prison
slavery by making it impossible, by refusing to be slaves any longer.
To achieve this goal, we need support from people on the outside. A
prison is an easy-lockdown environment, a place of control and
confinement where repression is built into every stone wall and chain
link, every gesture and routine. When we stand up to these authorities,
they come down on us, and the only protection we have is solidarity from
the outside.”
Music: The Stand by The Coup
For further updates:
SupportPrisonerResistance.net
FreeAlabamaMovement.com
IWOC.noblogs.org
19:19 – Society Against The State – by Pierre Clastres – MP3 – Text – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
Can there be a society that is not divided into oppressors and oppressed, or that refuses coercive state apparatuses? In this landmark text in anthropology and political science, Pierre Clastres offers examples of South American Indigenous groups that, though without hierarchical leadership, were both affluent and complex. In so doing, he refutes the usual negative definition of tribal society and poses its order as a radical critique of our own Western state of power.
This audio zine is the last chapter of a full length book by the same name. Some of the ideas and terminology in this excerpt are quite dated and show an arrogance typical of western anthropology. This text is one of the first to argue, against the progressivist world view, that people living in hunter gatherer societies actually choose their lives and are not “underdeveloped” as modern society would label them.
Pierre Clastres (1934-1977) was a French anthropologist and ethnologist who in the wake of the events of May ’68, helped overturn anthropological orthodoxy in the 1970s.
13:44 – Some Notes on Insurrectionary Anarchism – By Sasha K. – MP3 – Read – Print – Print (Handout) – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
“The state will not merely wither away, thus anarchists must attack, for waiting is defeat.”
This short zine provides a brief introduction to insurrectionary anarchism. In a clear and concise manner it articulates the basic concepts of insurrectionary anarchism including, the necessity of attack, self-activity, uncontrollability, permanent conflictuality, and informal organization. The text originally appeared in 2001 in the now defunct anarchist publication “Killing King Abacus.” Despite its age, it is one of the clearest pieces on insurrectionary anarchy and largely avoids the cumbersome rhetoric and writing style that characterized many of the later attempts at explaining insurrectionary anarchism.
58:36 – The Criminal Child – By Jean Genet – Mp3 – PDF – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
A new translation of a previously censored and unavailable text by Jean Genet. “The Criminal Child” is a critical engagement with the French youth prisons, a reflection on Genet’s formative years within them, a document of hostility towards society and its benevolent reformers, and (as argued by the anonymous afterword) an initiatory magical system. *Music by CocoRosie*
“‘The Criminal Child’ has, until now, never appeared in its entirety in the English language. Such a remarkable oversight—remarkable because it concerns a writer as significant as Jean Genet—would be reason enough for us to render a translation and bring it to print. But, in reading it, reasons far beyond the bibliophilic impulse reveal them- selves and insist on the urgency, timeliness and import of this text.
Though never read on air, Genet intended ‘L’enfant criminel’ as a radio address. Fernand Pouey, the director of dramatic and literary broadcasts for French radio, solicited Genet to speak on his radio program, “Carte blanche”, in 1948 as a bit of commentary on proposed reforms to France’s youth prisons. (Around the same time Pouey also commissioned Antonin Artaud to broadcast ‘Pour en finir avec le jugement de Dieu’—both pieces were censored by the powers that be.) A small edition of Genet’s text was published the next year and was then all but forgotten.”
“Just as I am guarded by a prison door, so my heart guards your memory.”
-from the afterword
52:15 – On The Poverty of Student Life: considered in its economic, political, psychological, sexual, and particularly intellectual aspects, and a modest proposal for its remedy – by students and members of the Situationist International – MP3 – Text – Print – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
First published in 1966 at the University of Strasbourg by students of the university and members of the Internationale Situationniste. Attacking the subservience of university students and the strategies of student radicals, it caused significant uproar, led to the dissemination of Situationist ideas, and precipitated the events of May 1968 in France.
A few students elected to the student union printed 10,000 copies with university funds. The copies were distributed at the official ceremony marking the beginning of the academic year. The student union was promptly closed by court order, and the students responsible were expelled. The pamphlet was described by a local newspaper shortly after its release as, “the first concrete manifestation of a revolt aiming quite openly at the destruction of society.”
2:05:40 – Friendship as a Form of Life – Various – MP3 – Read – Print – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
For a Chaptarized Version Click Here
“friends, lets communize an idea: friendship as a form of life. When its use is common we can communicate,conversations occur and perhaps, if this pleases us, we will find each other; we will become powerful. If we succeed, all of this will become evident. The evident is what is held in common,or what sets apart. It is here that we begin:”
For more zines like this check out Friendship as a Form of Life website.
“I call upon you to investigate your nature as I have been compelled to confront mine. I challenge you to risk abjection and flourish as well as have I. Heed my words, and you may well discover the seams and sutures in yourself.”
3:01:27 – I Saw Fire: Reflections on Riots, Revolt, and the Black Bloc – By Doug Gilbert – Read – MP3 – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
Click here for a chapterized version
To read – Forward, Lies the Movement Told Me and Afterward – Phoenix – The Bricks We Throw at Police – Why I Support The Santa Cruz Rioters – ¡Riot, Sí Se Puede! – In Defense of the Revolutionary Politics and Actions of Occupy Oakland – You Are Not Durutti But We Are Uncontrollable – Beyond The Bus
In a period of global unrest that topples governments and calls into question the capitalist system, no one has been more demonized by both the State and the official Left than the anarchists and their use of the ‘black bloc.’ Yet, from the streets of Egypt to the plazas of Brazil, the tactic is growing in popularity. From behind the balaclava, Doug Gilbert discusses riots and revolt from the teargas filled streets of Oakland, California during the Occupy movement to Phoenix, Arizona facing down Neo-Nazi skinheads. Discussing violence, social change, and organization at length, Gilbert examines why many young people are turning away from the organizations which have historically sold-out the working class—and starting a riot of their own.
“When things do pop off, there will always be groups and individuals ready with a wet blanket to put out the fires before they spread. The State will always have one hand ready to smash and the other open to dialogue. There will always be those on the side-lines screaming “violence!” as a way of distraction. As we go through these events from the Student Movement, Occupy, and anti-fascist actions, hopefully we can learn from both ideological and practical clashes and prepare for the battles yet to arrive.”
*This AudioZine discusses Suicide* 1:01:58 – Joy Unto Death – Various – MP3 – Read – Print – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
Click Here for a chapterized version.
From Friendship as a Form of Life
“Life cannot simply be something to cling to. This thought skims through everyone at least once. We have a possibility that makes us freer than the gods: we can quit. This is an idea to be savoured to the end. Nothing and no one is obliging us to live. Not even death. For that reason our life is a tabula rasa, a slate on which nothing has been written, so contains all the words possible.”
*1 Materialism of Joy * 2 The Practice of Joy before Death – Bataille * 3 One’s Life on the Line – Bonanno *4 Paradoxes of Sovereignty – Tiqqun *5 Class Hatred – Dupont *6 Bartleby – Agamben *7 The Simplest of Pleasures – Foucault *8 Eternity Through the Stars – Blanqui
*9 To the Aspiring Suicides…
24:28 – Baba Yaga Burns Paris To The Ground – By Wren Awry – MP3 – Text – PDF – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
As the Paris Commune of 1871 fought desperately against its own suppression, much of the city was set ablaze.
Conservative journalists, desperate for a scapegoat, invented the pétroleuses—torch-wielding women desperate to burn everything. In this text, fairy-tale critic Wren Awry ties the pétroleuses into a long line of mythologized fire-wielding devil-women—women like Baba Yaga, the youngest sister in the Grimms’ “Fitcher’s Bird,” and the women burned during the great witch hunts of early Modern Europe—as a source of revolutionary inspiration.
“Furies glide through the rich quarters […] and fling their little vials of petrol, their devil’s matches, their burning rags.”
1:37:14 – A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in the 1980’s – by Donna Haraway – MP3 – PDF – Text – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
“It means both building and destroying machines, identities, categories, relationships, space stories. Though both are bound in the spiral dance, I would rather be a cyborg than a goddess.”
This prescient essay, while not written from a specifically anarchist perspective, remains unparalleled in its creative exploration of resistance predicated on a rejection of purity and “the natural.” Haraway’s cyborg transcends notions of intersectionality to trouble essentialism at its root. Her challenge to us–to imaginatively take up power in the course of its rejection–has been answered by many, but adequately refuted by none.
While we find this an intentionally anti-essentialist essay, and are aware of Haraway’s history of solidarity with trans women, we must note with regret her use of the term “Phallogocentrism.”
42:30 – Self As Other: Reflections on Self Care – By Crimethinc. – MP3: – Read – Print – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
In activist circles and elsewhere, it has become commonplace to speak of self-care, taking for granted that the meaning of this expression is self-evident. But “self” and “care” are not static or monolithic; nor is “health.” How has this discourse been colonized by capitalist values? How could we expand our notion of care to encompass a transformative practice?
“The best way to sell people on a normative program is to frame it in terms of health. Who doesn’t want to be healthy? But like “self” and “care,” health is not one thing. In itself, health is not intrinsically good—it’s simply the condition that enables a system to continue to function. You can speak about the health of an economy, or the health of an ecosystem: these often have an inverse relationship.”
Zine Artwork by Corina Dross
![reproductiondailylife200pic[1]](https://resonanceaudiodistro.files.wordpress.com/2015/11/reproductiondailylife200pic1.jpeg?w=676)
53:51 – The Reproduction of Daily Life – By Fredy Perlman – MP3 – PDF – Text – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
Originally published 1969 – What sustains Capitalism? Our acceptance of everyday activities. The text offers a clear introduction to basic Marxist concepts like commodity fetishism, and surplus value; it also traces the transformation of human activity into capital.
38:22 – Life Without Law: An Introduction to Anarchist Politics – By Strangers In a Tangled Wilderness – MP3 – Read – PDF – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
“An anarchist is someone who rejects the domination of one person or class of people over another. Anarchism is a very broad umbrella term for a group of political philosophies that are based on the idea that we can live as anarchists. We anarchists want a world without nations, governments, capitalism, racism, sexism, homophobia… without any of the numerous, intersecting systems of domination the world bears the weight of today.”
40:30 – We Are All Very Anxious: Six Theses on Anxiety and Why It is Effectively Preventing Militancy, and One Possible Strategy for Overcoming It.
With an Afterword by Crimethinc – By Institute for Precarious Consciousness – MP3 – PDF – Text – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
“What could actually counter anxiety? Do we have to beat security guards, insurance policies, religious communities, and antidepressants at their own game, somehow making people feel safe in a hostile and hazardous world? Trying to allay anxiety as a separate project from abolishing the conditions that create it is surely doomed. Should we accept the worst-case scenario as a foregone conclusion and hurry forth to meet it, transforming our anxiety into a weapon? If anxiety is the omnipresent guardian of the prevailing order, it presents the perfect point of departure for resistance—but this does not answer how those already immobilized by it could perform such alchemy. Perhaps, in the course of taking on the ruling order, we could create something together that inspires confidence, grounding ourselves in a shared sense of reality that no market or military could take from us.”
1:38:37 – Armed Joy – By Alfredo M. Bonanno – MP3 – Read – PDF – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
Recorded by Birds Of Fire
1:23:44 – n’Drea: One Woman’s Fight to Die Her Own Way – By Andrea Dorea – MP3 – PDF – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
“Andrea (N’Drea) was involved with Os Cangaceiros, a group of social rebels who refused the slavery of work and mercilessly attacked the prison system of France in the 1980’s and 90’s. In 1985, she learned that she had cancer.
She underwent surgery, chemotherapy and radiation treatment. Then in 1990, she walked out of the medical world for good to grasp her life and her death as her own.
This work explains that decision with intelligence, anger and joy. It is at
the same time a powerful condemnation of the medical industry, a passionate theoretical analysis of the society of the commodity and its destruction of the human individual on all levels—emotional, intellectual, social and physical—and the personal expression of one woman’s decision to live her life fully and to die on her own terms among those she loved in defiance of a society that steals both our lives and deaths away.”
—Wolfi Landstreicher
1:03:24 – From Riot to Insurrection: Analysis for an Anarchist Perspective Against Post-Industrial Capitalism – By Alfredo M. Bonanno – MP3 –PDF – Text – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
“What should our task be? To continue arguing with the methods of the past? Or to try moving these spontaneous riot situations in an effective insurrectional direction capable of attacking not just the included, who remain within their Teutonic castle, but also the actual mechanism that is cutting out language. In future we shall have to work towards instruments in a revolutionary and insurrectional vein that can be read by the excluded.”
2:26:48 – Incognito: Experiences That Defy Identification – By Anonymous – MP3 – PDF – Read – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
Click Here for a chapterized version
Ever wondered what it would be like to be underground? Here is a series of real-life tales of what it is like, how people made the decision, what is hardest about it, and, perhaps surprisingly, how it is awesome.
A lesser-known title from Elephant Editions.
“How much luck will you have in the race against time.
How many moves do you have left to play.
You ask yourself this and
the answer reveals that the various paths
are all but exhausted.
The next step,
a crossroads,
unexpected slopes
and your road shows itself
with all the evidence and certainty
that allows you to go ahead.”
1:50:40 – No We Can’t All Just Get Along: hip hop, gang unity and the LA rebellion – By Jeff Chang – MP3 – Article – PDF – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
Excerpts focusing on the lead-up and aftermath of the LA riots from Jeff Chang’s Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation. This Zine offers valuable insight into how armed proletarian street organizations, united against the police, and did so in the context of a modern urban insurrection. In a post-Ferguson america, these lessons are as relevant as ever.
“…Jeff has captured the spirit of actual people living in LA that signed peace treaties and fought the police better than any other observer. The reason this section is so good is because Chang is less of an outsider than most who have looked at the riots, he grew up within the west coast hip hop community and he is a Korean American; both of which play a pivotal role in his analysis of the historic events of April 1992.”
– From The Introduction by the Institute for Experimental Freedom
1:01:05 – At Daggers Drawn: With The Existent, It’s Defenders and It’s False Critics – By Anonymous – MP3 – Read – Print – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
Click here for a chapterized version
“We can choose not to live. That is the most beautiful reason for opening oneself up to life with joy. ‘There is always time to put an end to things; one might as well rebel and play’ — is how the materialism of joy talks.
We can choose not to act, and that is the most beautiful reason for acting. We bear within ourselves the potency of all the acts we are capable of, and no boss will ever be able to deprive us of the possibility of saying no. What we are and what we want begins with a no. From it is born the only reason for getting up in the morning. From it is born the only reason for going armed to the assault of an order that is suffocating us.
On the one hand there is the existent, with its habits and certainties. And of certainty, that social poison, one can die. On the other hand there is insurrection, the unknown bursting into the life of all. The possible beginning of an exaggerated practice of freedom.”
Another reading of At Daggers Drawn from Friendship as a Form of Life is available Here
2:07:20 – Introduction To The Apocalypse – by Anonymous – MP3 – PDF – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
“The apocalypse is not happening in the future, it is happening now. It is not the result of our personal sins and it is not the “collective responsibility of humanity”. Climate change (or God, or whatever) will not bring about the apocalypse. The apocalypse began with the advent of our current form of life based on industrial production.”
“Climate change is just symptomatic of capitalism reaching the limits of its expansion in the world of natural resources that evolved before capitalism. It is then fitting that a totalising crisis like climate change accompanies a totalising system of production like capitalism. Carbon emissions are the by-product of capitalism just as defecation is the by-product of humans eating…”
There is a short film, “In the Middle of the Desert,” by Bulgarian anarchist filmmaker Hristina Vardeva, composed as a companion piece to “Introduction to the Apocalypse.”
27:02 – An Anarchist Response to The Nihilists: Two essays – By Anonymous – MP3 – PDF – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
Two Essays from Barcelona Spain. 1) Communiqué for Anarchist Actions in Barcelona and Response to the Nihilist Comrades 2) The Nihilist Recuperation
“For us, the attacks against the system are essential to our struggle. But we’ve fooled ourselves. A struggle does not consist only in attacks. The attacks are not more important than the need to care for ourselves, to preserve and spread our collective history, to create relations based in the gift, solidarity, and reciprocity, to imagine new worlds and new struggles…”
1:01:40 – We Demand Nothing – By Johann Kaspar – MP3 – Text – PDF – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
Originally published in ‘Fire to the Prisons’ (Issue 7), Autumn 2009.
“The refusal to demand allows for the abstraction of capital to reveal itself, no longer covered up in the mysticism of word-games, i.e., we are fighting for right x because of need y based on condition z. That structure will never challenge the basis of the needs and conditions themselves. The undemanding struggle is not for anything, it is a position, a stance, a risk to become a subject of one’s own activity; until then, we are nothing but objects of capital, things moved around to work, vote, and reproduce. Capital is personified in our actions (work, consume, repeat), and the state is personified in our words (rights, justice, freedom). To refuse both personifications means to destroy the form of Man which capital and state need for their reality, that form is the proletariat and the citizen, the worker and the activist, the entrepreneur and the poet.”
33:28 – Passion for Freedom : An Interview with Jean Weir – MP3 – Read – Imposed – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
Originally published in issue 8 of the magazine 325. , this interview with Jean Weir (of Insurrection magazine and Elephant Editions) features a critical and humble reflection on prison, insurrection, and anarchist publishing.
“We must never forget that — beyond the anecdotes and reminiscences, prison consists of so many reinforced boxes that millions of people all over the world are locked up in day and night. The latter are hostages of the State and live at the mercy of a hierarchy of vile cowards 24 hours a day.”
58:05 – The Prison Letters of Luciano “Tortuga” – By Luciano “Tortuga” Pitronello – MP3 – PDF – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
On the morning of June 1st, 2011, two individuals pulled up on a motorcycle in front of a bank in Santiago, Chile. One got off carrying a homemade explosive device, which detonated accidentally in his hands, blinding him, setting him on fire, and injuring his hands severely. In the hospital, where he was placed under armed guard, he was identified as Luciano Pitronello Schuffeneger, better known by his nickname “Tortuga,” Spanish for turtle. Demonized by the sensational mass media, condemned as a terrorist by his own sister, and abandoned by some former comrades fearful of repression, he faced the certainty of prison while saddled with horrifying injuries. Yet against all conceivable odds, he turned around his unbearable situation, persisting in his physical therapy to recover beyond expectation, overcoming suicidal depression, and defeating legal efforts to prosecute him under an anti-terrorist law. He was sentenced to six years of house arrest, and remains unrepentant and committed to anarchist struggle.
“and in the greatest darkness there appeared small gestures that pushed me to not give up. How could I betray those who risk their lives to give me encouragement? And I learned to conquer life anew; I know that you will never know how important you have been.”
For more context and information check out these Ex-Worker Podcast episodes: – Interview With Tortuga – Review of his prison letters – Anarchism In Chile – There are several compilations of Tortuga’s prison letters including actions done in solidarity with him we only recorded his first three letters but you should check out War On Society for more info on Tortuga and news from around the world
29:32 – A Day Mournful and Overcast – by an Uncontrollable of the Iron Column – MP3 – Read – PDF – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
Written by a member of the Iron Column, an Anarchist militia unit made up entirely of liberated ex-prisoners, which fought with great distinction in defence of the Spanish Civil War and Revolution of 1936-1939. More than a discussion of the politics of militarisation and control, it’s a hymn to freedom and a tribute to those who fight for it.
“I am an escaped convict from San Miguel de los Reyes, that sinister prison, which the monarchy set up in order to bury alive those who, because they weren’t cowards, would never submit to the infamous laws dictated by the powerful against the oppressed.”
1:21:25 – Against Innocence: Race, Gender, and the Politics of Safety by Jackie Wang – MP3 – PDF – Torrent – Archive – YouTube
First published 2012 in LIES: A Journal of Materialist Feminism Vol. 1
“Ultimately, our appeals to innocence demarcate who is killable and rapable, even if we are trying to strategically use such appeals to protest violence committed against one of our comrades. […] When we rely on appeals to innocence, we foreclose a form of resistance that is outside the limits of law, and instead ally ourselves with the State.”
1:02:11 – How Do We Fight Gentrification? – From Rolling Thunder #11 – MP3 –Text – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
“There are fights it is impossible to win and impossible to avoid. Gentrification is one of these. It is a ceaseless earthquake, breaking up communities, shaking us from one neighborhood to another or into outright homelessness. The ones who take our place face the same fate in our wake.
We have to reimagine these defensive struggles as offensive initiatives–that’s the only way they could turn out to our advantage. What could we gain in fighting, even as the ground is snatched from beneath our feet? How could these losing battles position us to take on the structures that produce gentrification?”
19:25 – The Witch’s Child – From Unsettling America – MP3 – PDF – Article – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
You’re probably thinking “A MayDay hype piece now?!” but we say… “Why Wait?!”
“This is how they destroyed our roots. And this is why, on May Day, we tell stories. Stories of our lives, of our struggles, of the future we want, of a past we invent because we no longer remember it.”
5:09:51 – To Our Friends – By The Invisible Committee – MP3 –Read – Print – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
Click Here for a chapterized version
From The Invisible Committee:
“In 2007 we published The Coming Insurrection in France. It must be acknowledged that a number of assertions by the Invisible Committee have since been confirmed, starting with the first and most essential: the sensational return of the insurrectionary phenomenon. Who would have bet a kopeck, seven years ago, on the overthrow of Ben Ali or Mubarak through street action, on the revolt of young people in Quebec, on the political awakening of Brazil, on the fires set French-style in the English or Swedish banlieues, on the creation of an insurrectionary commune in the very heart of Istanbul, on a movement of plaza occupations in the United States, or on the rebellion that spread throughout Greece in December of 2008?
During the seven years that separate The Coming Insurrection from To Our Friends, the agents of the Invisible Committee have continued to fight, to organize, to transport themselves to the four corners of the world, to wherever the fires were lit, and to debate with comrades of every tendency and every country. Thus To Our Friends is written at the experiential level, in connection with that general movement. Its words issue from the turmoil and are addressed to those who still believe sufficiently in life to fight as a consequence.
To Our Friends is a report on the state of the world and of the movement, a piece of writing that’s essentially strategic and openly partisan. Its political ambition is immodest: to produce a shared understanding of the epoch, in spite of the extreme confusion of the present.”
Review by anarchist prisoner Sean Swain
Zines for the first five chapters are available here: 1 2 3 4 5 from Ruine des Kapitals
Full text available at The Anarchist Library
*08/08/15 Sound Quality Improved
36:04 – Fire At Midnight, Destruction at Dawn: Sabotage and Social War – By Kasimere Bran – MP3 – Text – PDF – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
Originally published in the first issue of A Murder of Crows, this pamphlet is a good explanation about how individual acts can fit into collective revolt and not become isolated in specialized armed struggle
“Sabotage can be used in all situations, in all terrains, and by anyone who wishes to use it. It requires no specialization or skill, just initiative. While news of sabotage is difficult to find, obscured and negated as it is by those in power, there are some notable examples of its use that we would like to examine. This list is by no means comprehensive but rather a sampling of relevant examples.”
23:21 – 10 Points On The Black Bloc – By Harsha Walia – MP3 – PDF – Archive – Torrent – Text – YouTube
A talk by No One is Illegal’s Harsha Walia speaking about the diversity of tactics strategy and the black bloc tactic (10 Quick Points!) and experiences of the tactic in the context of 2010 Olympics resistance, Heart Attack March.
(This is not our own recording unlike the rest of the audio on our site. We ripped this off of YouTube and cleaned up the audio a bit to make it available in audio as it is already available as video and text.)
27:46 – Industrial Domestication – By Leopold Roc – MP3 – PDF – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
With the sub-title “Industry as the Origins of Modern Domination,” this zine analyzes the industrial revolution happening roughly between 1750 and 1850 in the West. In it, the author argues that industrialization was part of domestication process that was built on discipline, control, and surveillance. The essay originally appeared in the anarchist magazine Fifth Estate.
10:40 – “ETERNAL WAR ON THE HITLER YOUTH” (THE EDELWEISS PIRATES, 1938-1945) – From Outlaw History and Theory – MP3 – Text – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
What drew me to this article was not any sort of knee-jerk liberal antifascism, that gets all warm inside at any talk of resistance to fascism no matter what the source, but rather the description of resistance by youth largely from the exploited classes attacking the domination under which they lived with audacity even when it took the form of a genocidal totalitarian police state of the most extreme form. The actions these youth took were direct action, and in the case of the Edelweiss Pirates, seem to have been largely autonomous. The Meuten were apparently connected with communist groups, and I wish the article had gone into differences between the practice of the Pirates and the Meuten, since this could have been a fruitful area for practical analysis, but of course an article like this is just a beginning.
18:08 – Manifesto of the Committee to Abolish Outer Space – By Sam Kriss – MP3 – Read – Print –Text – Archive– Torrent – YouTube (Performed in front of a live audience)
We have been lied to, subjected to a cruel and chilly lie, one so vast and total it’s no longer fully perceivable but has turned into the unseen substrate of everyday life. It’s a political lie. They told us that outer space is beautiful.
1:12:36 – The Continuing Appeal Of Nationalism – Fredy Perlman – MP3 – Text – PDF – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
Why do the ideas of nation and race still have such an influence even after the lessons of fascism have been so widely drawn? An excellent analysis by the late Fredy Perlman that answers this question and reveals the enduring appeal of nationalism to statist rulers of both left and right.
29:31 – 3 Positions Against Prison – August O’Clairre – MP3 – PDF – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
This zine offers an excellent critique of prisons, arguing that prison is not just a physical site but also a condition that exists within society. Specifically, it offers a solid analysis of prison abolition, arguing that in seeking to “shrink” the prison industrial complex, abolitionists often end up replacing prison with other less brutal institutions. Consequently, prison doesn’t disappear but rather its mechanisms – surveillance, militarization of the police, etc – spread throughout society.
1:45:15 – Revolutionary Solidarity: A Critical Reader for Accomplices – Various – MP3 – PDF – Archive – Torrent – YouTube
Click Here for a chapterized version
Check out this new reader that compiles some of the best texts that critique “ally” politics as well as the closely linked, ‘non-profit industrial complex.’ As the text, ‘Accomplices not Allies” writes: “The ally industrial complex has been established by activists whose careers depend on the “issues” they work to address…Ally has also become an identity, disembodied from any real mutual understanding of support. The term ally has been rendered ineffective and meaningless…But we need to know who has our backs, or more appropriately: who is with us, at our sides?” As the riots and moments of youthful rebellion often give way to more reformist efforts, this collection of texts will hopefully be a tool to begin and continue conversations with everyone who rejects the Left’s managers of revolt.
Resonance: An Anarchist Audio Distro 