Zapatistas, Libertarian Socialism/Anarchism, Nationalism and Ethnicity/Identity - continuing some off-topic politics shit that happened in the contrapoints thread.

[Feline Darkmage]

(Since this was off-topic another mod rightfully deleted it, however I've retrieved the quotes and want to continue this line of discussion here instead. Additional context: this was started by some sperg ranting about JOOOZ ruining anarchism by removing the nationalism and me being slightly inarticulate ok. context done.)

You realize there's plenty of types of anarchism that isn't LARPing "SMASH THE STATE" commie level shit, right? Specifically the 19th century proto-Anarchism writers and early American "anarchists". The Zapatista are probably the only successful example of a somewhat anarchistic/libertarian-socialist society today and they are heavily built on protecting ethnic identity and are absolutely big on community organization and consensus instead of running around smashing shit and ranting on twitter.

This type of society would not work in a metropolitan and multi-ethnic society, Zapatista territory is almost all one ethnicity and rural.

The Zapatistas were also an indigenous ethnic minority that got the short end of the stick of capitalism and colonialism. They want to govern themselves and be equal, not keep the races separate (until DA JOOOOOOZ took it over) or some autistic shit like the guy I was responding to seemed to think anarchy had to do with somehow.

edit: apologies for not being clear in my first post though, i probably should have said "you can't be that kind of nationalist and an anarchist" because it takes a strong state apparatus to keep whatever you consider degenerate at and shit.

I'm pretty sure they've taken the stance that they want to be completely separate from Mexico. Ethnic minority or not, like the Irish they've defined themselves by an ethnic identity and see no reason to "abolish it", and are fiercely protective of their language and culture, as they should be. Many anarchist movements in eastern Europe during the USSR's rule were also strongly based on ethnic identity and a sort of "nationalism".

He's snorting that JOOOOOZ shit hard but somewhere in that autism he did have a point about early/actually functional anarchism being completely different from how bourgie commie students seem to think it is. I have a lot of respect for the Zapatistas for not going the absolutely autistic statist routes of other Latin American countries. Subcomandante Marcos is a sperg though and kind of a real life example of "going native".

Yes, separate from Mexico as in the government. Their beef isn't with any individual ethnic Mexican (unless that Mexican contributes to oppressing them, like say the president or a Mexican corporate leader. You can easily protect an identity and not be some kind of xenophobe. I contend that it's not impossible to achieve in a multi-ethnic region at all, but like a lot of libsoc/anarchist theorists I say it definitely needs to be a more localized area and with less centralized and hierarchical structures.

 

[ICametoLurk]

They only exploit indigenous people on coffee sweatshops and then they put them to sell coffee at universities, so hippies can buy 'zapatista-coffee' in order to 'support the cause'. Also marco´s little sister is a senator of the most corrupt-narco-party (PRI). Also the CISEN (mexican paramilitar intelligence) destroy all "bad guerrillas" and let the EZLN continue scamming hippies, this is just a well thought business...don't be retarded, seriously...

 

[Slap47]

They're a vestige of a past age, when socialists and libertarian leftists actually viewed large global organizations as just another way for corporations to acquire more power and subvert democracy.

You realize there's plenty of types of anarchism that isn't LARPing "SMASH THE STATE" commie level shit, right? Specifically the 19th century proto-Anarchism writers and early American "anarchists". The Zapatista are probably the only successful example of a somewhat anarchistic/libertarian-socialist society today and they are heavily built on protecting ethnic identity and are absolutely big on community organization and consensus instead of running around smashing shit and ranting on twitter.

This type of society would not work in a metropolitan and multi-ethnic society, Zapatista territory is almost all one ethnicity and rural.

EZLN is more than just hating the Mexican government, they reject the very idea of the global system. For example, they go as far as to reject GMO corn because they want to continue the traditional way of farming and reject any global organizations existing within their borders.

They don't have anything against Mexicans, they're against the idea of being powerless in their own ancient lands. Since the late 19th century the Mexican government has been dominated by a liberal white Criollo minority who as usually been all for land privatization and a centrally governed state. It is from this that we get the anarchist movements - the Natives and other cowboy-like communities wanting near full autonomy.

Of course, separating fact from fiction is difficult. Mexican neoliberals and conservatives demonize them and Noam Chomsky types glorify them. You can't really rely on Academia or journalists for good information and you almost certainly can't rely on any government organization.

I haven't read that much about them but they're even an enigma to the experts. Perhaps they're just as a bunch of coffee drinking larpers from a few universities who treat the local people as slaves but I suspect their ideology is more than just rhetoric.

Leftists

It should really be emphasized that their core ideology is a rejection of liberal positivism or "order and progress" via oligarchic rule and a strong central state. Latin American leaders have longed believed that they could bulldoze the past and overcome everything through sheer productivity and wise central leadership. You basically see very little Native uprisings until the 1850s when this idea replaced traditional hispanic values of respecting the Natives as long as they paid tribute/taxes. The only exception being the period after the initial Spanish Conquest, the Bourbon period in the 18th century and the Latin-American wars for Independence.

Even the Mexican left pretty much rejects the traditional idea of leaving them alone. They want to integrate natives rather than let them do their own thing.

 

[break these cuffs]

I like Zapatistas because Rage Against the Machine talked about them.

 

[Lemmingwise]

I don't know much about this topic so I'll at most ask a question or two.

You can easily protect an identity and not be some kind of xenophobe

Do you think it's possible to openly protect white identity without being regarded as a xenophobe by a significant part of the population?

 

[Superman93]

Do you think it's possible to openly protect white identity without being regarded as a xenophobe by a significant part of the population?

Sorry in advance if this is going off-topic

In a perfect world yes. But if you look back at it's history Racism, Xenophobia and all that other gay shit has been attached to white nationalism. It's going to take a lot to break that stigma. This is one my legitmate gripes with the Alt-Right White Nat types. They either try to downplay it or disregard it.

 

[Tasty Tatty]

Talking about Latin American politics is pretty much putting yourself backwards. Most (if not all) leftist movemetns are based on nationalism, something that is highly associated with the Right. The Latin American right, overall, ain't very fond of patriotism.

The most patriot groups happen to be the indigenous communities that lean to the left, which aren't many. The ones who dislike nationalism happen to be the progressive left (mostly mestizo urbanites). Libertarianism there is practically nonexistent. The normal indigenous people are patriotic and like money. Whenever you see an indigenous group making a scandal, you can bet there is a 99% chance there is some white-ish leftist involved. About two years ago, an Argentinian activist was missing when he was with some Mapuche community (they're Chilean): the whole progressive left of the country was histerically claiming that their government was killing indigenous, calling them racist, abusive, authoritarian, and DEMANDED the government to tell them where the guy was. The guy had been in fact part of a protest along with the Mapuches and the police went after them: he fell into some deep water and drowned. Also, this is the guy.

About integration, it depends. Most of the left still treat them as kids and are patronising. The Right don't care much about them. Either way, both sides engage highly in culture and traditions, even those who don't belong to a community. For what I've found out myself, they want to be part of the economy and have properties and money and have the same services everybodye lse has (eletricity, water, etc). The good thing is that turism is boosting their communities and money is entering. Those communities are still quite behind, but it's mostly the left that is responsible because they see "progress" as something that will "tarnish" their cultures. .

 

[Lemmingwise]

I always think of this copypasta when I read about this topic:

I was shooting heroin and reading “The Fountainhead” in the front seat of my privately owned police cruiser when a call came in. I put a quarter in the radio to activate it. It was the chief.

“Bad news, detective. We got a situation.”

“What? Is the mayor trying to ban trans fats again?”

“Worse. Somebody just stole four hundred and forty-seven million dollars’ worth of bitcoins.”

The heroin needle practically fell out of my arm. “What kind of monster would do something like that? Bitcoins are the ultimate currency: virtual, anonymous, stateless. They represent true economic freedom, not subject to arbitrary manipulation by any government. Do we have any leads?”

“Not yet. But mark my words: we’re going to figure out who did this and we’re going to take them down … provided someone pays us a fair market rate to do so.”

“Easy, chief,” I said. “Any rate the market offers is, by definition, fair.”

He laughed. “That’s why you’re the best I got, Lisowski. Now you get out there and find those bitcoins.”

“Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m on it.”

I put a quarter in the siren. Ten minutes later, I was on the scene. It was a normal office building, strangled on all sides by public sidewalks. I hopped over them and went inside.

“Home Depot™ Presents the Police!®” I said, flashing my badge and my gun and a small picture of Ron Paul. “Nobody move unless you want to!” They didn’t.

“Now, which one of you punks is going to pay me to investigate this crime?” No one spoke up.

“Come on,” I said. “Don’t you all understand that the protection of private property is the foundation of all personal liberty?”

It didn’t seem like they did.

“Seriously, guys. Without a strong economic motivator, I’m just going to stand here and not solve this case. Cash is fine, but I prefer being paid in gold bullion or autographed Penn Jillette posters.”

Nothing. These people were stonewalling me. It almost seemed like they didn’t care that a fortune in computer money invented to buy drugs was missing.

I figured I could wait them out. I lit several cigarettes indoors. A pregnant lady coughed, and I told her that secondhand smoke is a myth. Just then, a man in glasses made a break for it.

“Subway™ Eat Fresh and Freeze, Scumbag!®” I yelled.

Too late. He was already out the front door. I went after him.

“Stop right there!” I yelled as I ran. He was faster than me because I always try to avoid stepping on public sidewalks. Our country needs a private-sidewalk voucher system, but, thanks to the incestuous interplay between our corrupt federal government and the public-sidewalk lobby, it will never happen.

I was losing him. “Listen, I’ll pay you to stop!” I yelled. “What would you consider an appropriate price point for stopping? I’ll offer you a thirteenth of an ounce of gold and a gently worn ‘Bob Barr ‘08’ extra-large long-sleeved men’s T-shirt!”

He turned. In his hand was a revolver that the Constitution said he had every right to own. He fired at me and missed. I pulled my own gun, put a quarter in it, and fired back. The bullet lodged in a U.S.P.S. mailbox less than a foot from his head. I shot the mailbox again, on purpose.

“All right, all right!” the man yelled, throwing down his weapon. “I give up, cop! I confess: I took the bitcoins.”

“Why’d you do it?” I asked, as I slapped a pair of Oikos™ Greek Yogurt Presents Handcuffs® on the guy.

“Because I was afraid.”

“Afraid?”

“Afraid of an economic future free from the pernicious meddling of central bankers,” he said. “I’m a central banker.”

I wanted to coldcock the guy. Years ago, a central banker killed my partner. Instead, I shook my head.

“Let this be a message to all your central-banker friends out on the street,” I said. “No matter how many bitcoins you steal, you’ll never take away the dream of an open society based on the principles of personal and economic freedom.”

He nodded, because he knew I was right. Then he swiped his credit card to pay me for arresting him.

Anyways on a more serious deep thought note:

I contend that it's not impossible to achieve in a multi-ethnic region at all

Why? Is that because you look at it idealistically or do you have a more structured reasoning why you think that? Not looking for a gotcha, just curious about your thoughts.

 

[Feline Darkmage]

Do you think it's possible to openly protect white identity without being regarded as a xenophobe by a significant part of the population?

White is too vague to base any actual identity off of and is directly tied to being xenophobic and is so malleable it has only ever been defined as whatever "not white" is. It has no consistent definition. When racism was enshrined in law they couldn't even agree if one drop, one eight, or one sixteenth African ancestry would legally constitute a person being black or white.

People even tried to box in the obviously light-skinned European Irish people as "not white" because they were considered dirty, poor, and genetically inferior. Being referred to as "white niggers" even.

White Nationalism is retarded. It's not a specific identity like the Mayans, Irish, Italians, Serbs, Kosovans, Igbo, Han Chinese, Shanghainese, etc.

Sorry in advance if this is going off-topic

In a perfect world yes. But if you look back at it's history Racism, Xenophobia and all that other gay shit has been attached to white nationalism. It's going to take a lot to break that stigma. This is one my legitmate gripes with the Alt-Right White Nat types. They either try to downplay it or disregard it.

You're half right, see above. The reason they downplay or disregard that history because they still believe in all of that shit and want to remove the stigma from their terrible beliefs, that stigma is baked into white nationalism because of how it formed. That's the reason it's so hard to get out, it's the entire basis for that reactionary right form of nationalism.

Why? Is that because you look at it idealistically or do you have a more structured reasoning why you think that? Not looking for a gotcha, just curious about your thoughts.

About half idealism, half realistically speaking. I'd hope that we can build something that works and truly is democratic and it can't be that if it involves kicking anybody out, which it would if you wanted to "homogenize" a place like the United States. Structurally though this is not unprecedented as it is the goal of Rojava in Syria: http://news.infoshop.org/middle-east/resolution-in-solidarity-with-the-struggle-in-rojava/

multi-ethnic is distinctly mentioned. They are aligned largely with Kurdish national forces forces (as both are against the Turkish gov, Syrian gov, and also Islamic-based terrorist groups like ISIS and Al Qaeda.

Also see the Spanish civil war with socialists and anarchists against Franco, with those forces opposition having come from all over the place. You may remember George Orwell went and fought in that war.

I always think of this copypasta when I read about this topic:

Why do you think of an AnCapistan copypasta when we're talking about actual anarchism here?

 

[Superman93]

the exact same pplies to any other population on the planet
singling out white people as uniquely evil and malicious on the basis of cherry picked history and leftist propaganda is textbook racism

Let me make this more general then.
In the history and in the context of the United States of America's 242 years of existence can White Identity politics be look on in a positive light without the negative stigma attached to it?
No. What's even worse is simply writing off history for just being an "leftist" interpretation of it makes it even worst. The first step to change is acceptance and if the alt-right can't get passed that than there is no hope for the White Idenitarian movement.

You're half right, see above. The reason they downplay or disregard that history because they still believe in all of that shit and want to remove the stigma from their terrible beliefs, that stigma is baked into white nationalism because of how it formed. That's the reason it's so hard to get out, it's the entire basis for that reactionary right form of nationalism.

I genuinely do believe there are some people in the White Idenitarian movement just wanna care about white culture or White American culture or whatever but their blatant disregard for the massive amount of sinister beliefs, actions and figures that has come out of that movement will make people not join them. You can't have someone like the former Grand Wizard of the KKK be one of your talking heads. It's just not gonna work, I'm sorry.

 

[Lemmingwise]

White is too vague to base any actual identity off of and is directly tied to being xenophobic and is so malleable it has only ever been defined as whatever "not white" is. It has no consistent definition. When racism was enshrined in law they couldn't even agree if one drop, one eight, or one sixteenth African ancestry would legally constitute a person being black or white.

If the fact that the edges are malleable or sometimes hard to define, does that mean that intersex people prove that gender is too vague a concept? Should we get rid of colors because it's too hard to differentiate mauve from purple? These were rhetorical questions. I don't think the fact that there are edge cases is sufficient evidence that there is no use for such category or identity.

It's not like the other types of identities you mentioned never have edge cases either.

But I don't want to drag this thread off-topic and we probably won't see eye to eye on this subject anyways.

About half idealism, half realistically speaking. I'd hope that we can build something that works and truly is democratic and it can't be that if it involves kicking anybody out, which it would if you wanted to "homogenize" a place like the United States.

There's also the India/pakistan or Israel/palestine solution types, essentially partitioning. Or heck the US/native american solution. They each might have their issues and I'm not advocating to emulate them exactly, but I think we can agree that it's not the same as kicking out.

Also see the Spanish civil war with socialists and anarchists against Franco, with those forces opposition having come from all over the place. You may remember George Orwell went and fought in that war.

Yes, and I remember reading his book homage to catalonia as well and all the infighting between the various factions on the socialist / anarchist /stalinist side. It doesn't exactly paint a picture of harmony for such a mixed alliance, had they won, but rather one of these dominating over the others (eventually). Did you have a different take on that?

Why do you think of an AnCapistan copypasta when we're talking about actual anarchism here?

Why is ancap not actual anarchism? Which types of anarchism are "actual anarchism"? This is not a rherotical question.

 

[Milk Mage]

Why is ancap not actual anarchism? Which types of anarchism are "actual anarchism"? This is not a rherotical question.

Other anarchists don't consider AnCaps real anarchists because capitalism = hierarchies or something

 

[Magnus did Nothing Wrong]

Other anarchists don't consider AnCaps real anarchists because capitalism = hierarchies or something

Pretty much. Their reasoning is that capitalism will always have unequal economic power and that will translate into unequal social power. As the society goes on, the difference in wealth between individuals will widen and eventually just create a new set of class groups. The richest of these groups will essentially control the society and thus you're trading state control for an oligarchic hierarchy without the possibility of government to curtail it.

The thing that makes anarchism in any form retarded to me is that without a central authority to prevent the forming of a central authority how do you maintain anarchism? It's the central paradox of communism and anarchism that makes them so untenable and the reason why every supposedly communist states in fact all have a massive governmental apparatus. There will always be people who want to be richer or more powerful. In a truly stateless society these ambitious people would individually or in groups conspire to increase their own power to the point of essentially becoming the new ruling elite. Anarchism would require every single person to be purely ideologically motivated to prevent individuals from using the freedom that anarchism grants them to create a new power-structure. That can't be accomplished without a Soviet or NatSoc style society that ruthlessly enforces ideology and of course, that wouldn't be anarchism.

 

[Lemmingwise]

The thing that makes anarchism in any form retarded to me is that without a central authority to prevent the forming of a central authority how do you maintain anarchism?

Reminds of a line in a terry pratchett book, where a coven of witches is explaining to a new witch that witches are all equal and have equal say.... and that the main character is noticing that one witch does all the talking like she's the leader.

I've seen communes that try to organize themselves somewhat akin to anarchist socialism and it's the same; either the most disagreeable or most charismatic end up dominating the choices. But I'm sure that's not actual anarchism either, few things ever seem to be.

 

[Slap47]

The thing that makes anarchism in any form retarded to me is that without a central authority to prevent the forming of a central authority how do you maintain anarchism?

Most anarchist non-states had revolutionary councils with a monopoly on non-state force. Eg, Catalan, Ukraine, Paris, etc.

 

[Magnus did Nothing Wrong]

Most anarchist non-states had revolutionary councils with a monopoly on non-state force. Eg, Catalan, Ukraine, Paris, etc.

The flaw in a council based society is the reliance on direct democracy. In any system reliant on democracy there is always the possibility that individuals opposed to the status quo will rise through the ranks to gain power. All it would take to change an anarchistic society into another form of government is a change in attitude. Furthermore, many facets of society require enforceable central authority. Engels used the example of a train service. Without a recognized schedule and co-operation between disparate stations all across a country a train service cannot function. Such organization is virtually impossible without a central railway authority which is able to enforce rules and regulations upon workers. Workers in recognizing that functioning railways are a desirable utility will likely support the creation of this authority and thus elect individuals who support its creation. And if it is not railways to begin this change then it would be some other element of society such as education or the military. At that point you begin to lose the root of Anarchism as a greater and more organized system is desired for the advantages it would bring. This is not even considering that a populist in favor of a move away from Anarchism could also rise to power through their popularity. In any case, when a society is founded on democracy it can only remain in its present state so long as the attitude of the electorate remains rigid. This where the necessity for ideological purity I mentioned comes in as without strict adherence to anarchism individuals will, eventually, desire change.

 

[Slap47]

Those councils weren't elected and two of them weren't councils but run by what were basically warlords peacelords.

 

[Lemmingwise]

RIP original conversation.

 

[Feline Darkmage]

RIP original conversation.

Yeah this sucks. I'm going to try and remember what I said and maybe summarize it here. however it'll be difficult to recall all of it without the other posts.

However off the top of my head I remember saying that white, black, asian, etc were helpful in an example you gave about filing a report with the police but not \particularly for nationalism. And that was because it was a general thing and general things aren't useful for exact in-depth conversations.

I also remember a user called Reisen something posting in here.

And I remember paging @HeyYou to ask him of what he thought of the thread so far since it was in part his posts that led my to make this thread in the first place. Outside of those three things the rest of that shit is fuzzy.

 

[ICametoLurk]