Today's Topics:
1. France, Alternative Libertaire AL #257 (Jan) - policy,
Terrorism: No reason, really? (fr, it, pt) [machine translation]
(a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
2. anarkismo.net: Address Of Enrique Flores Magon In The
Federal Court, Los Angeles, June (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
3. anarkismo.net: The Failure Of The Russian Revolution by Emma
Goldman (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
4. al bruxelles: Anarchy and the relationship between the sexes
- Anarchy and gender relations by Emma Goldman (Anarchy and the
Sex Question, Translation * Julien Clamence) (fr, it, pt)
[machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
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Message: 1
For the Prime Minister Manuel Valls "any social, sociological and cultural excuse" not to
be sought for terrorism. The implication is explained apologetically. A useful rhetoric to
put under the carpet the real issues and impose a leak warrior before. ---- Portraits of
terrorists or those party are trained in Syria in recent weeks in the press, show that
there is not a single factor in these courses. Some are and some ex-offenders or
offenders, past-es or not by the prison. Still others live in situations of precariousness
and social exclusion, so that there are also individuals considered "integrated" among
terrorists. ---- Despite these differences, which calls by reading the biographies of
these gangsters is first the chaotic course of most of them and they. So-called
"radicalization" trail mix often to crime course and marginalization, or enroll in
precarious paths favorable to the adventurism of any kind. A melting pot of all that
produced the French capitalist society as social fragilities or exclusions.
But the social conditions are not enough to explain the path that lead to terrorist
violence. They are only ground on which grow the seeds of terrorism, whose growth depends
on the concrete experiences in which individuals are immersed.
The experiences of dehumanization
What are the actual experiences leading individuals to commit such acts? This is first of
the wars waged by the French Government in a number of countries and the rhetoric of the
clash of civilizations that finds some resonance among vulnerable people, who leave and
are built into the experience of war.
It is then religious indoctrination in meeting which, like any cult phenomenon, promises
light in exchange for total submission. Religious ideology is a ferment in a powerful
stigma context. But while attention is focused on this dimension it is worth emphasizing
that religious radicalization does not necessarily lead to terrorism and that it can do
without. This radicalization is often a secondary pretext in terrorist course.
Finally, another important element, not least of which is the same product security
policies. Indeed, a significant part of radicalization courses were built in connection
with the prison experience, which is primarily a dehumanizing experience in which jihadism
becomes a way of upgrading. While it is relatively quiet, proselytization of radical
Islamism and warrior performs a social function in jail. People say "radicalized" in
prison are often those who find themselves in a prison environment disaffiliated organized
in a "professional" and hierarchy based on a scale of manhood. In this universe, the
prisoners who "radicalized" are often those who find themselves excluded from the prison
order, too timid, not part of good bands (for living outside major urban peripheries).
Therefore, you can expect that the "solutions" proposed by politicians, that is to say
more war and more prison are solutions firefighters and arsonists revert to reinforce the
vicious circle.
Tristan (AL Toulouse)
http://www.alternativelibertaire.org/?Terrorisme-Aucune-explication
------------------------------
Message: 2
Powerful address by the Mexican anarchist-communist revolutionary, Enrique Flores Magon,
brother to fellow anarchist-communist militants Jesus and Ricardo Flores Magon. This
address was given to a US court, defending the brothers' fight for "the emancipation of
the downtrodden, particularly of the Mexican proletarians, and of the disinherited all
over the world in general." It defends the then-ongoing Mexican Revolution against
imperialism and capitalism, argues for anarchist-communism, and makes an internationalist
appeal to the American working class for joint struggle against tyrants and exploiters,
stressing common class realities. ---- The brothers Enrique and Ricardo Flores Magon were
at the time in exile, in the USA, conducting revolutionary work. They were arrested
several times, this speech being given during the trial that followed their arrest in 1916
for distributing "indecent materials" (both were found guilty). Ricardo was again arrested
in 1918 for sedition, given 20 years, and died in a US prison in 1922. Enrique was
released in 1923 and returned to Mexico.
ADDRESS OF ENRIQUE FLORES MAGON IN THE FEDERAL COURT, LOS ANGELES, JUNE 22, 1916
SOURCE: "Mother Earth," volume 11, no. 6 (August 1916), pp. 570-578.
(Digitised by Leroy Maisiri, ZACF, South Africa).
On account of my brother's sickness, which prevents his addressing this Court, I shall
speak in his behalf as well as my own.
I am taking the opportunity given me of addressing the Court because I want to make clear
the causes behind our prosecution, for it appears that Court procedure was delighted to
conceal the facts underlying such cases as this. The records of this trial show that the
Magon brothers were tried and convicted, but the records do not show that the case at bar
here is the age-long fight of the downtrodden and the disinherited against the tyranny,
the superstition and the oppression which overburdens mankind.
It is not merely the Magons who are convicted in this Court, but all liberty and justice
loving people; for we, the Magon brothers, have been convicted by the technicalities of
man-made laws, for our activities in behalf of the emancipation of the downtrodden,
particularly of the Mexican proletarians, and of the disinherited all over the world in
general, as shown by our writings, which are a part of the record in this case.
With the Magons you have convicted the world's red-blooded men and women who are striving
to halt the piracy and the oppression of the rapacious plutocracy and its natural allies,
Authority and the Church. With us you have condemned all of the men and women who think
and who feel the anguish and the sorrows of the dispossessed, the tortures of the
oppressed, the wailing and the tears of the millions of human beings who have the
misfortune of being born at a time when all of the means of life have been appropriated by
the land-sharks and the money-grabbers; of the millions of proletarians who are condemned
at birth to a life of incessant toil and actual chattel slavery, without hope of any
reward other than slow death from starvation and exposure.
After studying these conditions many men and women have come to the conclusion that the
only way out of this slavery is the way we pointed out in our Manifesto of September 23rd,
1911. As we set forth in that document, we aim to establish the common ownership of the
land, of the machinery and the means of production and distribution, for the common use
and benefit of all human beings, so as to enable them to work and earn their own living
and to enjoy the honest pleasures which nature intended for them.
These ideals are destructive to the present institutions, as properly remarked here by the
prosecution and this Court, and are, therefore, antagonistic to man-made laws that uphold
Capitalism, but this does not mean that they are not founded on sound principles of
Justice and Freedom. We are asked what we have to say why sentence should not be passed on
us. This Court should not pass sentence on us, for it would mean to deny to us Mexican
people the perfect right we have to revolt against the unbearable conditions that have
kept us in slavery through long, long years; conditions under which we found ourselves
stripped of all our belongings, our lands, our forests, our rivers, our mines and
everything else that we once owned in common or individually since time immemorial.
We saw all our belongings being taken from us by Porfirio Diaz by means of violence
through his soldiery and legal machinery. Diaz robbed the Mexican people in order that he
might grant concessions to the Otises, Hearsts, Rockefellers, Morgans, Guggenheims,
Pearsons and other foreign interests. And these concessions were granted for a mere song
in order to perpetuate the Diaz regime.
After we were dispossessed of our natural heritage, we found ourselves held in bondage, in
real chattel-slavery, forced to work our own Iands, lands that were now no longer ours; we
were forced to work 16 and 18 hours a day for from 18 to 37 cents Mexican money, that is
equal to from 9 to 18 cents American money. We were compelled to trade with the "tiende de
rava," which is the same as the commissaries of your mining and lumber camps, where
everything was sold to us at exorbitant prices. Under such conditions we gradually found
ourselves in perpetual debt to our masters and without the liberty of moving from their
domain. In case we succeeded in evading the vigilance of the hacienda bosses and escaped
from our bondage, we were caught by the authorities and once more returned to slavery.
Whenever we went on strike for better conditions and wages, as in Rio Blanco and Cananca,
we were shot down en masse by the trained murderers of Diaz, his soldiers, his policeman
and rangers. If we still held a small piece of land that excited the greed of the
authorities, the rich or the clergy, it was taken from us by hook or crook. They even
resorted to cold blooded murder.
Our freedom was trampled upon. 0ur speakers were arrested and shot in the dark of the
night. Our papers were suppressed and the writers imprisoned, often vanishing from the
face of the earth. Many of our brothers were sold for $200 per head to the slave drivers
of Yucatan and the Valle Nacional. They were sold into actual slavery and there forced to
work under such horrible conditions that their health was soon broken, and when they no
longer could stand on their feet they were often buried alive in order to save brother and
medical expenses. It was a common sight to see our brothers beaten to death for the
slightest provocation.
We endured those conditions for thirty-six years, which proves that we are peace-loving
people. But we found ourselves so cornered and driven against the wall, that we finally
had to revolt against damnable conditions in order to save ourselves and gain Bread, Land
and Liberty for All.
This was the cause and the source of the Social and Economic Revolution which has for over
five years shaken Mexico; the revolution of the down-trodden masses against their
oppressors and exploiters; the revolution that chiefly aims to get control in common of
the land and, thereby, aims to free the Mexican people. These purposes and aspirations are
set forth in condensed form in our battle cry of "Land and Liberty!"
We Mexicans are striving to get back the land, because we know that the land is the source
of all social wealth and, therefore, that he who owns the land owns all and, hence,
becomes economically free. A people who enjoy economic freedom are free socially and
politically as well; that is to say, economic freedom is the mother of all freedom.
Against the outrageous conditions that I have here roughly outlined, we Mexicans revolted;
and now two of us, Ricardo and myself, are facing sentence here for our activity in that
rebellion and for striking to gain our political, social and economic emancipation.
We therefore think that, as a principle of Justice, this Court should not impose a
sentence on us, for such a sentence would mean a flat denial that the Mexican people have
'a right to fight their own battles and to fight them in their own way. Our revolutionary
methods may not meet with the approval of the "peace-at-any-price" gentlemen, but they
have the sanction of Thomas Jefferson, who said: "We cannot expect to pass from Despotism
to Liberty on a feather bed."
The institutions springing from Private Property are the source and cause of all slavery,
vice and crime. It is on account of Private Property that a large majority of human beings
are slaves; producing all the wealth, they go destitute. It is on account of Private
Property, which deprives men and women of the just reward of their labor, that our women
prostitute themselves, our children grow weak and consumptive in the mills of Capitalism,
our men become drunkards, dope-fiends, thieves, suicides, insane and murderers.
That is why we hate Private Property and fight for its abolition, and strive to implant
Communist Anarchism wherein the land, the machinery and all the means of production and
transportation shall be owned in common, so that all may have an equal chance for life,
liberty and the pursuit of happiness; so that all being supplied in their needs and on an
equal social, political and economic standing, ignorance, vice and crime shall vanish,
naturally and automatically, for their source, Private Property, will have been abolished
forever. We are opposed to the Church for the reason heretofore given; for it upholds the
evil called Private Property and keeps submerged in ignorance and superstition the human mind.
We are opposed to Government because it is the staunch upholder of Private Property and
because Government means imposition, tyranny, oppression and violence. We agree with
Thomas Jefferson when he says: "History in general informs us how bad Government is."
While quoting Jefferson, I should like to remark that he was twice President of the United
States, and, therefore, he knew what he was talking about. And on the 12th of this month,
this Court agreed with us when it said. "It is the duty of Government to preserve itself."
That means that Government is not "of the people, by the people and for the people," but
that it is in fact an institution alien to the people, and against whose interests it
shall preserve itself. And we are duly grateful to this Court for that acknowledgment.
Striving as we are through our revolutionary activities to gain Justice, Freedom, Plenty
and Happiness for all Human Beings, we believe that, as a matter of Justice, this Court
has no right to impose a sentence on us. You may have the power, but you have not the
right to do so. The prosecution charged us with inciting to revolution in this country.
The charge is baseless as well as illogical. Revolutions cannot be incited.
I have often compared the present conditions in this country with the conditions which
confronted the Mexican people under the Diaz regime, and I have found them very similar in
many instances. The American workingmen, as a whole, are often forced to work at wages on
which no man can decently live, just as the Mexican peons were forced to do.
The lumber camps of Louisiana, the mines of Colorado and West Virginia and other places
are practically the same as the hell-holes of Yucatan and the Valle Nacional. Here also
you have the "commissary" which is the counterpart of our "tienda de raya." Our massacres
of Rio Blanco and Cananea have their parallel in Ludlow, Coeur D'Alene and West Virginia.
The suppression of our papers by Diaz is similar to the suppression here of "The Woman
Rebel," "Revolt," "The Alarm," Voluntad," "The Blast,'' and finally, our "Regeneracion."
Free speech, free assemblage and free press, as well as freedom of thought, are dealt with
in this country *ala* Porfirio Diaz.
On the other hand, you have here, as reported by the Commission on Industrial Relations, 5
per cent, of the population owning 65 per cent, of the wealth, just as we had in Mexico.
And as in Mexico, the multitude of producers are living either in pauperism or very close
to actual want.
Here, too, you have your large land owners, and the number of your tenant farmers is ever
increasing. American people, as the Mexican, are learning that the very earth under their
feet has been taken away by the land-sharks and by huge land grants to special interests.
Your mines and your forests are going the same way into the same hands that the mines and
forests of Mexico went. The liberties of the American people have gradually been
encroached upon just as they were in Mexico.
As like causes produce like results; it does not require a great deal of wisdom to see the
trend of events of this country. Revolution is breeding, but it is coming from "above" and
not from the workers, for it is only when the conditions of the proletariat become
unbearable that they rise in revolt. Unless present conditions change, you American people
of the present generations will have to face the bloodiest revolution in the annals of
history.
Jefferson, who was the Anarchist of his time, and who is acknowledged a great patriot and
thinker, saw the necessity of revolution and justified its drastic measures. He said, "I
hold that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the
political world as storms in the physical." At another time he said, "The spirit of
resistance is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it always to be kept alive.''
And once more hear what Jefferson said: "Let these (the people) take arms. What signify a
few lives in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time
with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure."
In answer to the able argument for a new trial, made on the 12th of this month by our
honest and courageous counsel, Mr. Ryckman, the Court said: "These men have no right to
seek refuge in this country." We hold that we do have such right, not only as a principle
of justice and civilization, but your Constitution specifically grants us the right of
asylum as political refugees.
Jefferson, Paine and Franklin, during the American Revolution, not only acted as agents of
the American rebels in France, but they actually secured the assistance of France in their
revolt against England. From this we can see that one hundred and fifty years ago the
French people recognized a principle of humanity which this Court now denies us.
The Court has spoken of us as aliens to this country and its people. The Court is in
error. We are aliens to no country, nor are we aliens to any people on earth. The world is
our country and all men are our countrymen. It is true that, by birth, we are Mexicans,
but our minds are not so narrow, our vision not so pitifully small as to regard as aliens
or enemies those who have been born under other skies.
The Court suggested that it would be more becoming for us to go to Mexico to shoulder a
musket and fight for our rights. If the Mexican revolution were an attempt of one set of
politicians to oust or overthrow another set of office-holders, then the Court's
suggestion would be very apt. The revolution in Mexico is, however, not a political but a
Social and Economic Revolution and it is necessary to educate the people, to teach them
the real causes of their misery and slavery, and to point out to them the way to Freedom,
Fraternity and Equality.
That is why our hands, instead of being armed with muskets are armed with pens; a weapon
more formidable and far more feared by tyrants and exploiters. I believe that it was
Emerson who said that "Whenever a thinker is turned loose, tyrants tremble." And it is
because it is acknowledged that we are thinkers as well as fighters, that we have spent
over seven years out of the twelve that we have been here in the jails and prisons of this
land of the "free."
We are not asking this Court for Mercy; we are demanding Justice. If, however, this Court
is to be actuated by man-made laws instead of fundamental Justice and, therefore, insists
on sending us to the penitentiary, you may do so without hesitation.
A penitentiary sentence to us will likely mean our graves, for we are both sick men. We
alone know how our health has been undermined. We know that another penitentiary sentence,
no matter how light it may be, will be a death sentence. We feel that we shaI1 not come
out of the penitentiary alive.
However, it does not matter to us personally; from the beginning of our struggle,
twenty-four years ago, we dedicated our lives to the cause of Freedom. Since that time we
have suffered a long chain of persecution and conspiracy, of which this case is but
another link, but we still hoId to our original purpose of doing our duty to our
fellow-men, no matter what the result to us personally.
History is watching us from her throne, and she is registering in her annals the Social
Drama that is now being enacted in this court. We appeal to her with a clean conscience
and with our hearts normally beating and with our brains dreaming of a Future Society,
wherein there will be Happiness, Freedom and Justice for all Mankind. The Court may choose
between Law and Justice. If you send us to our graves and brand us once more with the
stigma of felons, we are sure that History will reverse the sentence. She will mark
indelibly the forehead of the Cain.
Let the Court speak! History watches!
http://www.anarkismo.net/article/29033
------------------------------
Message: 3
Extracts from anarchist-communist Emma Goldman's classic analysis, as presented in her
1924 "My Further Disillusionment with Russia." Goldman argued clearly that the Russian
Revolution's end, in a new one-party dictatorship and new elite ruling a highly unequal
society, could not be excused as a simple degeneration caused by external pressures of
imperialist intervention and economic crisis (the view of defenders of the Communist
Party). It also could not be explained as the inevitable result of class-based revolution
that overthrew parliament and private property (the view of liberals). The programme and
actions of the Communist Party, based on building a centralised state run by a single
centralised party and repression, crushed democratic bottom-up proletarian and peasant
initiative and self-management, worsened the economic situation, and destroyed the
revolution from within. The revolution itself was actually very democratic and
egalitarian, not by its nature dictatorial, and this placed it in a fatal struggle with
Bolshevik / Communist rule. Revolution, to succeed, needs a total "transvaluation" of
values to a "libertarian spirit" that rejects authoritarianism, and bottom-up "economic"
mobilisation of the masses through steps like anarcho-syndicalism and co-operatives, that
place decisions in the hands of the grassroots masses. "Means" must match "ends," and
ethics and action must always be consistently based on libertarian, just principles:
"Today is the parent of tomorrow. "
(Extracts from "My Further Disillusionment with Russia," 1924, as presented in George
Woodcock (ed), "The Anarchist Reader," 1977, pp. 153-162)
(Digitised by Leroy Maisiri, ZACF, South Africa).
It is now clear why the Russian Revolution, as conducted by the Communist Party, was a
failure. The political power of the party, organized and centralized in the State, sought
to maintain itself by all means at hand. The central authorities attempted to force the
activities of the people into forms corresponding with the purposes of the party. The sole
aim of the latter was to strengthen the State and monopolize all economical, political and
social activities - even all cultural manifestations. The revolution had an entirely
different object, and in its very character it was the negation of authority and
centralization. It strove to open ever-larger fields for proletarian expression and to
multiply the phases of individual and collective effort. The aims and tendencies of the
Revolution were diametrically opposed to those of the ruling political party.
Just as diametrically opposed were the methods of the Revolution and of the State. Those
of the former were inspired by the spirit of the Revolution itself: that is to say, by
emancipating from all oppressive and limiting forces; in short by libertarian principles.
The methods of the State, on the contrary- of the Bolshevik State as of every government
were based on coercion, which in the course of things necessarily developed into
systematic violence, oppression and terrorism. Thus two opposing tendencies struggled for
supremacy: the Bolshevik State against the Revolution. That struggle was a life-and-death
struggle. The two tendencies, contradictory in aims and methods, could not work
harmoniously; the triumph of the State meant the defeat of the Revolution.
It would be an error to assume that the failure of the Revolution was due entirely to the
character of the Bolshevik. Fundamentally, it was the result of the principles and methods
of Bolshevism. It was the authoritarian spirit and principles of the State which stifled
the libertarian and liberating aspirations. Were any other political party in control of
the government in Russia the result would have been essentially the same. It is not so
much the Bolsheviki who killed the Russian Revolution as the Bolshevik idea. It was
Marxism, however modified; in short, fanatical governmentalism … The Russian Revolution
reflects on a small scale the century-old struggle of the libertarian principle against
the authoritarian. For what is progress if not the more general acceptance of the
principles of the principles of liberty as against those of coercion?
The Russian Revolution was a libertarian step defeated by the Bolshevik Party, by the
temporary victory of the reactionary, the governmental idea …
The Libertarian principle was strong in the initial days of the Revolution, the need for
free expression all-absorbing. But when the first wave of enthusiasm receded into the ebb
of everyday prosaic life, a firm conviction was needed to keep the fires of liberty
burning. There was only a comparative handful in the great vastness of Russian to keep
those fires lit- the Anarchists, whose number was small and whose efforts, absolutely
suppressed under the Tsar, had had no time to bear fruit. The Russian people, to some
extent instinctive Anarchists, were yet too unfamiliar with true liberation principles and
methods to apply them effectively to life. Most of the Russian Anarchist were
unfortunately still in the meshes of limited group activities and of individual endeavour
as against the more important social and collective efforts …
But the failure of the Anarchists in the Russian Revolution – in the sense just indicated
– does by no means argue the defeat of the libertarian idea. On the contrary, the Russian
Revolution has demonstrated beyond doubt that the State idea, State Socialism, in all its
manifestations (economic, political, social, educational) is entirely and hopelessly
bankrupt. Never before in all history has authority, government the State, proved so
inherently static, revolutionary and even counter-revolutionary in effect. In short, the
very antithesis of revolution.
It remains true, as it has through all progress, that only libertarian spirit and method
can bring man a step further in his eternal striving for the better, finer and freer life
… all political tenets and parties notwithstanding, no revolution can be truly and
permanently successful unless it puts its emphatic veto upon all tyranny and
centralization, and determinedly strives to make the revolution a real revaluation of all
economic, social and cultural values.
Not mere substitution of one political party for another in control of the Government, not
the making of autocracy by proletarian slogans, not political scene shifting of any kind,
but the complete reversal of all these authoritarian principles will alone serve the
revolution.
In the economic field this transformation must be in the hands of the industrial masses:
the latter have the choice between an industrial State and anarcho-syndicalism. In the
case of the former the menace to the constructive development of the new social structure
would be as great as from the political State. It would become a dead weight upon the
growth of the new forms of life.
For that very reason syndicalism (or industrialism) alone is not, as its exponents claim,
sufficient unto itself. It is only when the libertarian spirit permeates the economic
organizations of the workers that the manifold creative energies of the people can
manifest themselves and the revolution be safeguarded and defended. Only free initiative
and popular participation in the affairs of the revolution can prevent the terrible
blunders committed in Russia. For instance, with fuel only a hundred versts from Petrograd
there would have been no necessity for that city to suffer from cold had the workers’
economic organizations of Petrograd been free to exercise their initiative for the common
good. The peasants of the Ukraine would not have been hampered in the cultivation of their
land had they had access to the farm implements stacked up in the warehouses of Kharkov
and other industrial centres awaiting orders from Moscow for their distribution. These are
characteristic examples of Bolshevik governmentalism and centralization, which should
serve as a warning to the workers of Europe and America of the destructive effects of Statism.
The industrial power of the masses, expressed through their libertarian associations -
anarcho-syndicalism- is alone able to organize successfully the economic life and carry on
production. On the other hand, the co-operatives, working in harmony with the industrial
bodies, serve as the distributing and exchange media between city and country and at the
same time link in fraternal bond the industrial and agrarian masses. A common tie of
mutual service and aid is created which is the strongest bulwark of the revolution – far
more effective than compulsory labour, the Red Army, or terrorism. In that way alone can
revolution act as a leaven to quicken the development of new social forms and inspire the
masses to greater achievements.
But libertarian industrial organizations and the co-operatives are not the only media in
the interplay of the complex phases of social life. There are the cultural forces which,
thought closely related to the economic, actives have yet their own functions to perform …
In Russian this was impossible almost from the beginning of the October Revolution, by the
violent separation of the intelligentsia and the masses. It is true that the original
offender in this case was the intelligentsia, which in Russia tenaciously clung- as it
does in other countries – to the coat-tails of the bourgeoisie. This element, unable to
comprehend the significance of revolutionary events, strove to stem the tide by wholesale
sabotage.
But in Russian there was also another kind of intelligentsia – one with a glorious
revolutionary past of a hundred years. That part of the intelligentsia kept faith with the
people, though it could not unreservedly accept the new dictatorship. The fatal error of
the Bolsheviki was that they made no distinction between the two elements. They met
sabotage with whole sale terror against the intelligentsia as a class, and inaugurated a
campaign of hatred more intensive that the persecution of the bourgeoisie itself – a
method which created an abyss between the intelligentsia and the proletariat and reared a
barrier against constructive work.
Lenin was the first to realize that criminal blunder. He pointed out that it was a grave
error to lead the workers to believe that they could build up the industries and engage in
cultural work without the aid and co-operation of the intelligentsia. The proletariat had
neither the knowledge nor the training for the task, and the intelligentsia had to be
restored in the direction of industrial life. But the recognition of one error never
safeguarded Lenin and his party from immediately committing another. The technical
intelligentsia was called back on terms which added disintegration to the antagonism
against the regime.
While the workers continued to starve, engineers, industrial experts and technicians
received high salaries, special privileges, and the best rations. They become the pampered
employees of the State and the new slave drivers of the masses. The latter, fed for years
on the fallacious teachings that muscle alone is necessary for a successful revolution and
that only physical labour is productive, and incited by the campaign of hatred which
stamped very intellectual a counter revolutionist and speculator could not make peace with
those they had been taught to scorn and distrust.
Unfortunately Russian is not the only country where this proletarian attitude against the
intelligentsia prevails. Everywhere political demagogues play upon the ignorance of the
masses, teach them that education and culture are bourgeois prejudices, that the workers
can do without them, and that they alone are able to rebuild society. The Russian
Revolution has made it very clear that both brain and muscle are indispensable to the work
of social regeneration. Intellectual and physical labour are closely related in the social
body as brain and hand in the human organism. One cannot function without the other …
In previous pages I have tried to point out why Bolshevik principles, methods, and tactics
failed, and that similar principles and methods applied in any other country, even of the
highest industrial development, must fail. I have further show that it is not only
Bolshevism that failed, but Marxism itself. That is to say, STATE IDEA, the *authoritarian
principle, has been proven bankrupt by the experience of the Russian Revolution. If I were
to sum up my whole argument in one sentence I should say: the inherent tendency of the
State is to concentrate, to narrow, and monopolize all social activities, the nature of
revolution is, on the contrary, to grow, to broaden, and disseminate itself in ever wider
circles in other words, the state is institutional and static, revolution is fluent,
dynamic. These two tendencies are incompatible and mutually destructive. The State idea
same result in all other revolutions, unless *the libertarian idea prevails.
Yet I go much further. It is only Bolshevism, Marxism, and Governmentalism which are fatal
to revolution as well as to all vital human progress. The main cause of the defeat of the
Russian Revolution lies much deeper. It is to be found in the whole Socialist conception
of revolution itself.
The dominant, almost general, idea of revolution – particularly the Socialist idea – is
that revolution is a violent change of social conditions through which one social class
the working class, becomes dominant over another class, the capitalist class. It is the
conception of a purely physical change, and as such it involves only political scene
shifting and institutional rearrangements. Bourgeois dictatorship is replaced by the
‘dictatorship of the proletariat’- or by that of its ‘advance guard’, the Communist Party;
Lenin takes the seat of the Romanovs, the Imperial Cabinet is rechristened Soviet of
People’s Commissars, Trotsky is appointed Minister of War, and a labourer becomes the
Military Governor General of Moscow. That is, in essence, the Bolshevik conception of
revolution, as translated into actual practice. And with a few minor alterations it is
also the idea of revolution held by all other Socialist parties.
This conception is inherently and fatally false. Revolution is indeed a violent process.
But if it is to result in a change of dictatorship, in a shifting of names and political
personalities, then it is hardly worthwhile. It is surely not worth all the struggle and
sacrifice, the stupendous loss in human life and cultural values that result from every
revolution. If such a revolution were to even to bring social well-being (which has not
been the case in Russia) then it would also not be worth the terrific price paid: mere
improvement can be brought about without bloody revolution. It is not palliatives or
reforms that are the real aim and purpose of revolution, as I conceive it.
In my opinion a thousand fold strengthened by the Russian experience – the great mission
of revolution, of the SOCIAL REVOLUTION, is a *fundamental transvaluation of values*. A
transvaluation is not only of social, but also of human values. The latter are even
pre-eminent, for they are the basis of all social values. Our institutions and conditions
rest upon deep-seated ideas. To change those conditions and at the same time leave the
underlying ideas and values intact means only a superficial transformation, one that
cannot be permanent or bring real betterment. It is a change of form only, not of
substance, as so tragically proved by Russia.
It is at once the great failure and the great tragedy of the Russian Revolution that it
attempted (in the leadership of the ruling political party) to change only institutions
and conditions while ignoring entirely the human and social values involved in the
Revolution. Worse yet, in its mad passion for power, the Communist State even sought to
strengthen and deepen the very ideas and conceptions which the revolution had come to
destroy. It supported and encouraged all the worst antisocial qualities and systematically
destroyed the already awakened conception of the new revolutionary values.
The sense of justice and equality, the love of liberty and of human brotherhood- these
fundamentals of the real regeneration of society – the Communist State suppressed to the
point of the extermination. Man’s instinctive sense of equity was branded as weak
sentimentality; human dignity and liberty became a bourgeois superstition; the sanctity of
life, which is the very essence of Social reconstruction, was condemned as
unrevolutionary, almost counter-revolutionary. This fearful perversion of fundamental
values bore within itself the seed of destruction. With the conception that the Revolution
was only a means of securing political power, it was inevitable that all revolutionary
values should be subordinate to the needs of the Socialist State; indeed, exploited to
further the security of the newly acquired governmental power. ‘Reasons of State’, masked
as the ‘interests of the Revolution and of the People’, became the sole criterion of
action, even of feeling. Violence, the tragic inevitability of revolutionary upheavals,
become an established custom, a habit, and was presently enthroned as the most powerful
and ‘ideal’ institution. Did not Zinoviev himself canonize Dzerzhinsky, the head of the
bloody Tcheka, as the ‘saint of the Revolution’? Were not the greatest public honours paid
by the State to Uritsky, the founder and sadistic chief of the Petrograd Tcheka?
This perversion of the ethical values soon crystallized into the all dominating slogan of
the communist Party: THE END JUSTIFIES ALL MEANS. Similarly in the past Inquisition and
Jesuits adopted this motto and subordinated to it all morality. It avenged itself upon the
Jesuits as it did upon the Russian Revolution. In the wake of this slogan followed lying,
deceit, hypocrisy and treachery, murder, open and secret. It should be of utmost interest
to students of social psychology that two movements as widely separated in time and ideas
as Jesuitism and Bolshevism *reached exactly similar results* in the evolution of the
principle that the end justifies all means. The historic parallel, almost entirely ignored
so far, contains a most important lesson for all coming revolutions and for the whole
future of mankind.
There is no greater fallacy that the belief that aims and purposes are one thing, while
methods and tactics are another. This conception is a potent menace to social
regeneration. All human experience teaches that methods and means cannot be trough
individual habit an social practice, part and parcel of the final purpose; they influence
it, modify it, and presently the aims and menas become identical. From the day of my
arrival in Russian I felt it, at first vaguely, then ever more consciously and clearly.
The great and inspiring aims of the Revolution became so clouded with and obscured by the
methods used by the ruling political power that is was hard to distinguish what was
temporary means and what final purpose. Psychologically and socially the means necessarily
influence and alter the aims. The whole history of man is continuous proof of the maxim
that to divest one’s methods of ethical concepts means to sink into the depths of utter
demoralization. In that lies the real tragedy of the Bolshevik philosophy as applied to
the Russian Revolution. May this lesson not be in vain.
No revolution can ever succeed as a factor of liberation unless the MEANS used to further
it be identical in spirit and tendency with the PURPOSES to be achieved. Revolution is the
negation of the existing, a violent protest against man’s inhumanity to man with all the
thousand and one slaveries it involves. It is the destroyer of dominant values upon which
a complex system of injustice, oppression, and wrong has been built up by ignorance and
brutality. It is the herald of NEW VALUES, ushering in a transformation of the basic
relations of man to man, and of man to society. It is not a mere reformer, patching up
some social evils; not a mere changer of forms and institutions, not only a re-distributor
of social well- being. It is all that, yet more, much more. It is first and foremost, the
TRANSVALUATOR, the bearer of *new* values. It is the great TEACHER of the NEW ETHICS,
inspiring man with a new concept of life, and its manifestations in social relationships.
It is the mental and spiritual regenerator.
Its first ethical percept is the identity of means used and aims sought. The ultimate end
of all revolutionary social change is to establish the sanctity of human life, the dignity
of man the right human being to liberty and well- being. Unless this be the essential aim
of revolution, violent social changes would have no justification. For *external* social
alteration can be, and have been, accomplished by the normal processes of evolution.
Revolution, on the contrary, signifies not merely *external* change, but *internal*,
basic, fundamental change. That internal change of concepts and ideas, permeating
ever-larger social strata, finally culminates in the violent upheaval known as revolution.
Shall climax reverse the process of transvaluation, turn against it, betray it? That is
what happened in Russian. On the country, the revolution itself must quicken and further
the process of which it is the cumulative expression; its main mission is to inspire it,
to carry it to greater heights, give it fullest scope for expression. Only thus is
revolution true itself.
Applied in practice it means that the period of the actual revolution, the so-called
transitory stage, must be the introduction, the prelude to the new social conditions. It
is the threshold to the NEW LIFE, the new HOUSE OF MAN AND HUMANITY. As such it must be of
the spirit of the new life, harmonious with the construction of the new edifice.
Today is the parent of tomorrow. The present casts its shadow far into the future. That is
the law of life, individual and social. Revolution that divests itself of ethical values
thereby lays the foundation of injustice, deceit and oppression for the future society.
The means used to prepare the future become its *cornerstone*. Witness the tragic
condition of Russia. The methods of State centralization have paralysed individual
initiative and effort; the tyranny of the dictatorship has cowed the people into slavish
submission and all but extinguished the fires of liberty; organized terrorism has depraved
and brutalized the masses and stifled every idealistic life, and all sense of dignity of
man and the value of life has been eliminated; coercion at every step has made effort
bitter, labour a punishment, has turned the whole of existence into a scheme of mutual
deceit, and has revived the lowest and most brutal instincts of man. A sorry heritage to
begin a new life of freedom and brotherhood.
It cannot be sufficiently emphasized that revolution is in vain unless inspired by its
ultimate ideal. Revolutionary methods must be in tune with revolutionary aims. The means
used to further the revolution must harmonize with its purposes. In short, the ethical
values which the revolution is to establish in the new society must be *initiated with the
revolutionary activities of the so-called transitional period. The latter can serves as a
real and dependable bridge to the better life only if built of the same material as the
life to be achieved. Revolution is the mirror of the coming day …
http://www.anarkismo.net/article/29032
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Message: 4
I) Historical Introduction by Feminism Libertarian Brussels: ---- We publish a translation
of an article written by Emma Goldman (1869-1940), Anarchism and the sexual question,
published in The Alarm in 1896. ---- Emma Goldman is a figure of anarchism and feminism.
Deeply anti-authoritarian, it is particularly known for her speech on free love, sexuality
and birth control, the class struggle and his denunciation of the institution of marriage.
"I am the servant nor god, nor the state, nor a husband." ---- She was born on the
territory of the Russian Empire, to a family that emigrated penniless in Rochester, United
States. It will face very early to class alienation and patriarchy. It will work as a
seamstress at the factory since its 14 years and will experience divorce before his 18th
birthday. Haymarket Square events leads her to join New York and the radical movement,
where she met Alexander Berkman, her lover and friend libertarian. Emma Goldman will be
imprisoned several times during her long activist career.
II) Text:
The male worker, whose strength and muscles are much admired by the pale and sickly
offspring of the rich but whose work just enough to keep the wolf of hunger outside the
home, married only to have a wife and a housewife which is to serve as a slave from
morning to night while toiling alone to reduce household expenses. His nerves were so
strained by continual effort necessary to sustain the home of her husband's meager salary
she becomes irritable and no longer able to hide his lack of affection for her lord and
master. This unfortunately happens in quickly to the conclusion that his hopes and plans
have gone astray, and he begins to think about her marriage is failing.
The string becomes heavier, more and more heavy
With expenses that are growing, the wife quickly loses everything she had force at the
time of his marriage, she feels betrayed and more constant difficulties and fears of
hunger quickly devoured his beauty. It depresses neglects her household duties. As there
is no love and sympathy link to unite the couple and give them the courage to face the
misery and poverty of their lives, they become more and more strangers to the Another and
less patient with the faults of the other, instead of helping each other in the race of
their lives.
Man can not, as the millionaire, go to his private club, but it goes to the bar and tried
to drown his misery in a glass of beer or whiskey. His partner wretched misery, which is
too honest to seek forgetfulness in the arms of a lover and too poor to afford
distractions or however many legitimate amusements, rest in the middle of sordid scene and
barely maintained that she calls his "home" and laments bitterly over the madness that has
made her the wife of a poor man.
Despite this, they have no way to separate.
They must bear all
Also irritating is that the chain was put around their necks by law, and sometimes the
Church, it can not be broken only if both spouses agree.
If the law is lenient enough to give them freedom, every detail of their private lives
exposed in full light. The woman is condemned by public opinion and his entire life is
ruined. The fear of this disgrace often causes its collapse under the tremendous weight of
life as a wife, without her speaking one dares protest against this system which has
broken her, and both of his sisters.
The rich endure this test to avoid scandal - poor for the sake of her children and the
fear of public opinion. Their lives are a long succession of hypocrisy and deceit.
The woman who sells her favors is free to leave at any time the man who buys, while
"respectable wife" can not break free of a union that humiliates.
All unions against nature that are not sanctioned by love are prostitution, whether
sanctioned by the Church and society or not. Such unions can only have a degrading
influence on the moral and well-being of society.
This is the system to blame
The system that forces women to sell their femininity and independence to the highest
bidder is a branch of the same monstrous system which grants the right to a handful of
living of the wealth produced by their peers. 99% of these have to toil and serve as
slaves all day for just achieving ends meet, while the fruits of their labor is swallowed
by a few idle vampires surrounded by all the luxuries that wealth may fill .
Look at some point these two sides of the social system of the XIX th century.
Look wealthy homes, these magnificent palaces where some sumptuous supplies could put
hundreds of men and women in need from want. Look at the gala dinners held by girls and
wealthy son, where a single service could feed hundreds of hungry people for whom a simple
meal of bread washed down with water is a luxury. See these fervent admirers of fashion
spend their days inventing new means of selfish enjoyment - theaters, dances, concerts,
cruises, running from one corner of the earth to another in their mad search for gaiety
and pleasure. And turn for a moment to look at those who produce wealth paying these
excesses, these pleasures against nature.
The other side
Watch them massaged in a dark, damp cellar, where, clothed in rags, they never enjoy a
breath of fresh air. They carry the burden of their misery cradle to grave, their children
running the streets naked, hungry, no one to give them a love note or a tender caress,
growing up in ignorance and superstition, cursed since the day of their birth.
Watch these two striking contrasts, you moralists and philanthropists, and tell me who is
to blame! Those who are led to prostitution, legal or underground, or those who drive
their victims in such loss of moral sense?
The cause is not in prostitution but in society itself; in the unequal system of private
property and the State and the Church. In the system that legalizes theft, murder and rape
of innocent women and helpless children.
The remedy against evil
As long as this monster will not be destroyed we will not be free of this disease raging
in the Senate and all public administrations, in the house of the rich as in the miserable
huts of the poor. Humanity must become aware of its strength and capabilities, she should
feel free to start a new life, a better life and noble.
Prostitution will never be removed by the methods Rev. Dr. Parkhurst and other reformers.
It will exist as long as the system is there to provide a breeding ground.
When all these reformists will work together with those who struggle to abolish this
system generates crime in all its forms, another company will emerge, based on perfect
equality - a company that will guarantee to all its members, men, women and children, full
compensation for their work and a perfectly equal right to enjoy the gifts of nature and
achieve a higher know - the woman there will be autonomous and independent. His health
will not be crushed by work and endless slavery, it will cease to be the human victim, who
will not be possessed by passions and vices unhealthy and against nature.
An anarchist dream
Each will enter the stage of marriage in top physical and moral confidence in the other.
Everyone will love each other and estimate and will help to work not for his own well
being but for their common happiness, and they will desire the universal happiness of
mankind. The children of such unions will be strong and healthy in body and mind. They
will honor and respect their parents, not out of duty, but because they deserve. They will
be educated and cherished by the whole community and will be free to follow their own
inclinations, it will not be necessary to teach sycophancy and the basics of the art of
tormenting their fellow men. Their purpose in life is, not to get power over their
brethren, but to win the esteem and respect of all members of the community.
Anarchist divorce
If the marriage between man and woman proves unsatisfying and unpleasant, they will
separate quietly, amicably, not to demean the various wedlock in the antipathy of their union.
If, instead of persecuting the victims, the reformist daily unite their efforts to
eradicate the cause, prostitution would not be a disgrace to humanity.
Delete a class and protect another is worse than folly. This is criminal. Do not look
away, you men and women moral.
Do not let your prejudices to influence you, look at this from a neutral standpoint.
Rather than spending your strength unnecessarily, unite your efforts and help abolish the
corrupt and sick system.
If married life has not robbed you your honor and respect your own person, if you have
love for those you call your children, you must, for your own sake and theirs, seek
emancipation and establish freedom. Then, and only then, the wedding horrors disappear.
Emma Goldman
(Originally published in The Alarm, September 27, 1896).
* This translation attempts to preserve the spirit and tone of the original text of Emma
Goldman. However, several syntactic and stylistic changes have been made to facilitate its
reading and to better adapt it to the French. The original version is available here:
http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/goldman/sexquestion.html.
https://albruxelles.wordpress.com/2016/01/27/lanarchie-et-le-rapport-entre-les-sexes/
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