crimethinc kids / gutter punks etc
Jul 5 2007 09:04
are there actually that many in the states any more, or has there been a downturn in this sort of thing?
Jul 5 2007 14:27
#2
I think there has been a bit of a downturn in some places, but that kind of shit is still very present all over.....
Jul 5 2007 14:32
#3
Perhaps the initial wave of popularity has subsided, but it still feels like they are everywhere. Or maybe I think that because their propaganda says so... 
Jul 5 2007 14:39
#4
They've gone underground and are mostly converting "housewives" now right?
Jul 5 2007 14:42
#5
Maybe they've all died from their DIY "medical" care.
Jul 5 2007 14:45
#6
They had a gathering in Minnesota sometime in the past year or so. I have no idea how well attended it was. The only people I know who were interested were people new to all this kind of stuff and they didn't go cuz it was too far to drive.
Jul 5 2007 15:31
#7
This stuff used to be huge in Edmonton, there's still a few around, but for the time being the class struggle types seem to be in the majority.
Jul 5 2007 16:52
#8
Actually, I think a bunch of them are focused on green anarchy now. Maybe they can all move to the pacific northwest and get out of my home state. I am really over the fetishization of rural working class life on their part. Some of them seem to think they invented "back to the land."
Jul 6 2007 01:15
#9
crimethinc is having a shindig in Ohio at the end of the month.
interestingly, the local organizers are asking that it be a sober gathering, which should cut down on the convergence mooches.
http://www.crimethinc.com/convergence/
Jul 6 2007 01:26
#10
Maybe if you could get one of your young recruits to write a real critique of CrimethInc, instead of treating any discussion of culture or lifestyle as a "perceived breach of [class-struggle] purity" you'd have a bit more credibility here, yeah? Odd that platformists scream about "denunciation" when faced with any critique, and yet they dish it out so heavily...
Platformist claims to be the most theoretically coherent of all "class-struggle anarchists", our "leadership of ideas", would make a lot more sense if they weren't so busy trying to rehabilitate the Transitional Program.
In that sense, CrimethInc come out ahead, as at least they are trying to apply good ideas from 30 years ago, instead of bad ones from 70 years ago.
Jul 6 2007 01:31
#11
well that's not actually bad mj 
[imo like]
i say steal their girlfiriends.
Jul 6 2007 01:33
#12
Nah that actually wasn't me, it was an homage post
Jul 6 2007 01:41
#13
as far as i can tell, anarchists [at least the ones on bbs] are starting to embrace "conservative" ideas to beat the counter culture. isn't that ever so slightly stupid? just a thought...
Jul 6 2007 01:46
#14
what kills a counter culture? exposure? rationality? communism secretly "capitulating" to it?
eta: steal their girlfriends: and then burn their books i mean - did critical theory just never happen?
Jul 6 2007 05:03
#15
David in Atlanta wrote:
interestingly, the local organizers are asking that it be a sober gathering, which should cut down on the convergence mooches.
Quite a few of the CrimethInc, "movers and shakers" shall we say, are straight edge.
Jul 6 2007 05:21
#16
whoa! I had them pegged for crusty punk drunkards. do they have sXe tattoos?
Jul 6 2007 05:39
#17
Nope. A few of the folks I know (some of the original CrimethIncers) are actually relatively normal looking. They aren't all "sXe for life!!!!!!!" they just don't drink or do drugs.
Jul 6 2007 06:04
#18
I actually think some of their stuff, especially the recent stuff, is pretty decent.
They've promoted the 'Abolish Restaurants' pamphlet quite heavily.
Jul 6 2007 08:02
#19
OliverTwister wrote:
They've promoted the 'Abolish Restaurants' pamphlet quite heavily.
a cynic would say of course, it's aesthetically pleasing. but tbh i have no idea what crimethinc is/does these days, although barely 6 months ago there was a thread on the crimethinc site saying scamming tourists was revolutionary because they're like, imperialists man.
Jul 6 2007 14:06
#20
Joseph K. wrote:
OliverTwister wrote:
They've promoted the 'Abolish Restaurants' pamphlet quite heavily.a cynic would say of course, it's aesthetically pleasing. but tbh i have no idea what crimethinc is/does these days, although barely 6 months ago there was a thread on the crimethinc site saying scamming tourists was revolutionary because they're like, imperialists man.
Really? Wow, that is up there with their whole "find a girlfriend to mooch off of" strategy.
Jul 6 2007 15:35
#21
yep, there was a thread on it here - the crimethinc site has been reorganised since so the link doesn't work, but it's available at the internet archive
it was nearly a year ago though, not 6 months. how time flies.
Jul 6 2007 15:47
#22
God yeh, I got nearly 2000 words for anarkismo out of that idiotic plan. Crimethinc.net has restarted but for the most part crimethinc has fizzled out and is promoting bands and releasing records rather than reprinting their stuff. They appeal to northern european anarchist/squatter/punks and US dropouts mostly.
Jul 6 2007 16:57
#23
OliverTwister wrote:
I actually think some of their stuff, especially the recent stuff, is pretty decent.They've promoted the 'Abolish Restaurants' pamphlet quite heavily.
I thought that excerpt from 'Abolish Restaurants' pamphlet in the last issue of Northeastern Anarchist was the worst thing in it. My boring as fuck anarchist-communist reading group thought so too.
I think I prefer the praxis of one brother, to the theory of another.
Jul 6 2007 20:16
#24
I haven't read AR all the way through, and am holding off comment.
I was only pointing out that the notion that they simply encourage everyone to become train-hopping traveler kids is a strawman (and as such would actually weaken an interesting critique); it is certainly true that they do discuss how one can benefit from avoiding waged work, finding free food, etc. This includes train-hopping, which I've never done and don't contemplate ever doing, and dumpstering, which I've never done but would be interested in doing.
I think workers will certainly be hard-pressed to fight capitalism if they don't think about ways of living outside of the work-buy mindset. And let's be honest, most people try to scam 'the system'/break the rules as much as possible (file-sharing, speeding while driving, smoking pot), even if they aren't always conscious of the implications. There's nothing wrong with encouraging a general attitude of trying to get as much from Capital as you can (or as it was put in a Crimethinc mah I read recently, "taking possession of as much of the means of production as you can get your hands on').
Jul 6 2007 22:23
#25
To be honest with you, when Nights of Rage or whatever the book is called came out, I thought it was the best recent anarchist publication id seen at that point. It captured alot of peoples imagination and it was "something new". Having said that i think that was a reflection on the horrid state of affairs anarchism was in when I was walking away from trotskyism.
The fact that those folks havnt "grown out of" that politic by now is... well just sad.
Sure we have to think outside the box a bit more, but glorifying poverty and ignoring the nessesity of most of the tactics of the left is just steriotypical "middle class american" behavior.
Let the Canadian hate fest begin.
Jul 6 2007 22:31
#26
i've bacpacked before, and it is an experience. i suppose one could try and find a niche for them, but it would have to be one where they are contested effectively if.when they try and sell anti-communist ideas. yeah...
Jul 6 2007 22:38
#27
rebelworker wrote:
To be honest with you, when Nights of Rage or whatever the book is called came out, I thought it was the best recent anarchist publication id seen at that point. It captured alot of peoples imagination and it was "something new". Having said that i think that was a reflection on the horrid state of affairs anarchism was in when I was walking away from trotskyism.The fact that those folks havnt "grown out of" that politic by now is... well just sad.
Sure we have to think outside the box a bit more, but glorifying poverty and ignoring the nessesity of most of the tactics of the left is just steriotypical "middle class american" behavior.
Let the Canadian hate fest begin.
You don't think that their politics are a good deal better these days?
Jul 6 2007 23:42
#28
I think their politics are better these days. Not exceptional, but they seem to be moving towards strategic thinking. "Rolling Thunder" is a probably one of the better American anarchist theory journals and Crimethinc publishes the damn thing. Last issue had stuff about a free market's victory over a town government, stuff on the CPE, south central LA Farm eviction, Oaxaca, Lucy Parsons, etc. There still was a good deal of subcultural stuff, but that was in the minority.
Jul 7 2007 02:29
#29
ftony wrote:
are there actually that many in the states any more, or has there been a downturn in this sort of thing?
There still seems to be a whole lot of them out west.
Jul 7 2007 05:08
#30
bozemananarchy wrote:
ftony wrote:
are there actually that many in the states any more, or has there been a downturn in this sort of thing?There still seems to be a whole lot of them out west.
Best way to get rid of them is to tell them that you must eat them in order to avoid eating animals. If they're good vegans they should give themselves up to be cannibalistically devoured.
Their books have touched our shores too...
I admit I was swallowed by their ideology - which was ironic since they devoted an entire chapter to trying to prove that they didn't have an ideology.
Luckily I've read enough sane, level-headed books on class, and talked to enough people who know better to discard their lifestyle wankery.