I think a lot of people on this board would focus on class because the working class' position in society as producers and the fact that it constitutes a majority of the population means that for the working class to gain 'equality' with the ruling class would require the revolutionary destruction of capitalism, it could not be granted through reforms, rights, government legislation or changes in technology under capitalism as sexual equality or a lot of eco/animal stuff could. It also requires people to act for themselves, which is important if the revolution is to be truly liberatory, rather than acting for other causes as in eco/animal stuff. I'd say that's why a lot of people think class is more important, indeed qualitatively different from the other 'strands' you mention.
what strand are you?
I'd probably identify most with anarcho-communist, i also like other sections of anarchist thought such as anarcho-syndicalist, eco-anarchism, anarcha-feminism perhaps, though i am still uncertain of what anarcha feminism really is, i have heard they are dissenters, in the wikipedia article it has a link to radical feminism (If it is anywhere close to that i probably would say i am not into it, i see it a isolationist and misandric, but i'm not going to get myself sucked into any massive forum discussions/fights about radical feminism, i intentionally avoided that)
i'm in the living, working, hating my job and paying too much rent and tax strand i think
That is fantastic! What night of the week does this strand hold its meetings? I'm coming along!
Half, no a good deal more than half of our problem is all this strand stuff. I am an anarchist, that should be enough for now I reckon. Beyond that solidarity should carry us far enough to do slightly more than we're all managing to achieve now. How many centuries are we going to spend arguing about this and that? A few more I guess. 
I think peeps are giving this thread chance. Pluralism is important 
So here goes, Im influenced mainly by anarcho-syndicalism, I have much sympathy with marxism, but the way I see it, its too deterministic and I think anarchism can absorb bits of marxism but not necessarily the other way round. Class as to be central, but Im fond of forms of mutualism, and Im part of a group looking into starting a workers collective. Sprinkle that with veganism, anti-fascism, liberal baiting and you probably can understand where Im coming from.
All of them. See: http://libcom.org/forums/thought/in-reply-to-wayne-price
Devrim
There are important insights to be derived from both anarchism and marxism, but both are inadequate. I think Marx's idea of humans as "beings of practice" is a particularly important insight, in terms of understanding how structures of oppression sustain themselves, by shaping the consciousness of the oppressed.
I think class is central but I also think there are other structures of oppression, such as race and gender, not reducible to class, nor are they mere "ideology" but involve material advantages for some at the expense of others, which divides the working class. In the USA class unity can't be achieved without a struggle that also addresses these other forms of oppression, so that class unity would be developed as a multi-group alliance, which each strand recognizes the demands and concerns of the other.
I think there are three main classes in mature corporate capitalism, not just labor and capital. There is a third main class, the class of managers and top professionals -- some call it the "coordinator class" -- whose power is based on relative monopolization of empowering conditions, such as management jobs in a hierarchy, certain kinds of expertise important to management -- engineers designing equipment to control workers, lawyers breaking unions, etc. The size of this class varies within advanced capitalist countries due to differences in accumulation strategies of different capialist classes, e.g. it is a smaller class in countries pursuing a corporatist social-dem solution to gain greater worker cooperation. The "Communist" countries are not capitalist but coordinatorist modes of production with a coordinator ruling class.
Although I've been especially influenced by anarcho-syndicalism, and condider myself a libertarian syndicalist, and have so identified since the early '70s, I think the class struggle spills out into the community, is not limited to the workplaces. Thus i support the development of self-managed mass organization in the community, such as tenant organizations, public transit rider unions, and so on. We could call this "community syndicalism" -- an extension of traditional syndicalism.
Although an anarcho-syndicalist, i don't think it makes sense to try to form, in the USA, some highly ideologized type of " revolutionary union". I agree with the dual approach of my organization, Workers Solidarity Alliance, based on both independennt rank and file association where the bureaucratic business unions exist, and efforts to both change those unions and propel action from an independent position, and also the development of more grassroots controlled, more self-managed new forms of worker mass organization such as independent unions, and thus would give critical support to the workers center movement, despite its limitations. I think the development of the working class towards revolution is a protracted process, and that what is crucial to this is the development of collecteive power in practice, to encourage people to believe they have the power to change things. Mere propaganda is thus not adeqate to the task of change of working class consciousness. However, i do support the idea of a revolutionary political organization, of activists, organizers, publicists, to both put forward perspectives but also to be active within mass organizations. it is crucial to develop a mass sociaal base for our ideas and methods.
I've never considered myself a "communist" but I'm against the market and against private ownership of the means of production. I advocate a mode of production where all of the economy is owned in common by everyone, and a horizontal, participatory process of generalized self-management is used to ensure effectiveness of social production to meet people's desires, in a society without class division or other structures of oppression.
One of the ways in which I think traditional anarchism was confused was in the rhetoric about "abolishing all government" or "abolishing power." Power can't be abolished any more than gravity can (to quote Murray Bookchin). Political governance functions will be required in any future society we can build -- making and enforcing basic rules, defending the revolutionary society against external attack etc. It's better to talk about creating a governance structure to replace the state, one rooted in the participatory democracy of the base assemblies, a structure of popular power. Instead of the Leninist concept of the party taking state power, there should be a concept of the whole working class taking power collectively. The state, as Engels pointed out, is characterized by its separation from control by the mass of the people. This is how it can serve its basic function of protecting the interests of the dominating classes. What replaces the state is a governance structure where separation from the mass of the people is minimized, by rooting it in the base assemblies -- a structure of self-governance.
t.
due to lack of action i ought to call myself nothing.
as far as my ideals go, i'm inclined to say that i'm an Anarchist-Without-Adjectives... unless those Adjectives are along the lines of "individualist," and i typically desire to punch those who try to squish together "anarcho" with "primitivist" or "capitalist." 
i verily hope you're joking, nihilist!
I would most closely identify with platformism.
I think it draws from the best class struggle tradition within the anarchist movement, from Bakunin to contemporary times. I also believe that it has the best analysis of not only how society functions and how to analyze that, but also has the best internal understanding of how revolutionary organizations work, their internal dynamics, and their relationship to the rest of society as a whole.
I also believe that, contemporarily, platformism presents the leading edge of revolutionary communist theory.
I also believe that, contemporarily, platformism presents the leading edge of revolutionary communist theory.
Really, what great theoretical advances have platformists made?
If you're anything to go by platformism is merely the trailing edge of recuperation futilely competing with the Trots to line people up behind the Venezuelan state.
Anarcho (slash Libertarian)-Communist, with an appreciation for some aspects of post-structuralist and anarcha-feminist theories on power and heirarchy and some aspects of insurrectionism's theories on tactics. And vegan/animal liberationist, although thats more a result of my anarchism rather than part of my strand, I guess.
edit: But that takes far too long to say, so when people ask I say anarchist, then if they ask for more info I expand from there. Easier that way
edit again: Re-reading the first post in this thread, it seems to be asking what my focus as an anarchist is on, rather than where my anarchist beliefs come from. In that case, I'm currently focussing on alternative institutions that both serve a practical purpose and exist in opposition to the state, anti-Zionist stuff within my local Jewish community and a bit of enviro stuff.
Really, what great theoretical advances have platformists made?
I've been politically active in the anarchist movement for 5 or 6 years now. Not so veritable as some, but enough to make some observations based on Glasgow groups. The statement in the platform that anarchist groups rarely have a programmatic approach, rarely last any amount of time and even more rarely have an actual impact on social movements is as relevant today as it was in the 20s.
What platformism does is call for a unified political approach, and what more directly Especifismo has done and is doing now as the most organisationally ascendant anarchist tendency is to state the explicit need for anarchists to have an empirical analysis for their tactics and strategy and to 'measure' the class struggle so as to make sound political judgements for involvement in popular movements as an organised political tendency within the ranks of the working class. It represents a fundamental growing up of the movement.
What I like about platformism is that it doesn't project an ideology onto the world and insist that the world conform to it; platformism calls for honest appraisal. It is not so much a political ideology or tendency as an organisational methodology. That is its strength.
Now to go back to my real world example I have never been involved in an anarchist group before that wasn't voluntarist. As much as I hate it comrades seem obsessed with doing things because they represent something that 'can be done', rather than something that conforms to some kind of decent strategy for how we can move forwards both as communists and as the working class. Platformism, and more especially Especifismo rules out such kind of voluntarist activity.
It is authentically revolutionary, and represents a fundamental progression for the anarchist movement because it doesn't fuck about. It isn't a philosophy. It's not a 'theory'. It doesn't propose a hegemony of one tactic over another. It says we will do what is most practical in whatever the current situation that we find ourselves in is. It doesn't go to people where we want them to be, because it calls for, demands, a thorough realistic appraisal of where we are it keeps us grounded in reality, it keeps us communicating with the working class, it keeps us with our feet on the ground, which is the only way our dreams can made real. The sooner we have a powerful platformist organisation in every country and region of the world, the sooner we'll see human emancipation.
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Really, what great theoretical advances have platformists made?I've been politically active in the anarchist movement for 5 or 6 years now. Not so veritable as some, but enough to make some observations based on Glasgow groups. The statement in the platform that anarchist groups rarely have a programmatic approach, rarely last any amount of time and even more rarely have an actual impact on social movements is as relevant today as it was in the 20s.
What platformism does is call for a unified political approach, and what more directly Especifismo has done and is doing now as the most organisationally ascendant anarchist tendency is to state the explicit need for anarchists to have an empirical analysis for their tactics and strategy and to 'measure' the class struggle so as to make sound political judgements for involvement in popular movements as an organised political tendency within the ranks of the working class. It represents a fundamental growing up of the movement.
What I like about platformism is that it doesn't project an ideology onto the world and insist that the world conform to it; platformism calls for honest appraisal. It is not so much a political ideology or tendency as an organisational methodology. That is its strength.
Now to go back to my real world example I have never been involved in an anarchist group before that wasn't voluntarist. As much as I hate it comrades seem obsessed with doing things because they represent something that 'can be done', rather than something that conforms to some kind of decent strategy for how we can move forwards both as communists and as the working class. Platformism, and more especially Especifismo rules out such kind of voluntarist activity.
It is authentically revolutionary, and represents a fundamental progression for the anarchist movement because it doesn't fuck about. It isn't a philosophy. It's not a 'theory'. It doesn't propose a hegemony of one tactic over another. It says we will do what is most practical in whatever the current situation that we find ourselves in is. It doesn't go to people where we want them to be, because it calls for, demands, a thorough realistic appraisal of where we are it keeps us grounded in reality, it keeps us communicating with the working class, it keeps us with our feet on the ground, which is the only way our dreams can made real. The sooner we have a powerful platformist organisation in every country and region of the world, the sooner we'll see human emancipation.
what utter twaddle! your post says absolutely nothing, it's just idiotic hyperbole. You sound like some dipshit leninist whittering on about marxist leninism.
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what utter twaddle! your post says absolutely nothing, it's just idiotic hyperbole. You sound like some dipshit leninist whittering on about marxist leninism.You couldn't help yourself, could you? Down boy! This is no flaming forum.
it's not flaming it's an honest assesment of the hot air you just posted, it says nothing whatsoever!
this may very well not be a thought topic but i didnt know where else to put it, and besides, liberate from labels.....feel free to move it somewhere more appropriate.
what emphasis do you put on your politics and why? what i mean is, ive worked with, participated with, or known a lot of different types of anarchist and socialist so far, and it interests me why people decide to focus on one element of anarchism rather than others, why they think certain issues are more worthy of their time, or why they decide that certain issues just arent worthy of anyones time.
for example, im from a very 'class' background, but am interested in many types of liberation; vegan issues, mental health and anti-medical establishment stuff, ethnic/national lib, gender/sexual lib etc etc. however a lot of people i work with seem to focus solely on one strand, where i think theyre all quite integral and important. i know people who only do eco/animal stuff, or who only do sexuality stuff. and i know people who really dont seem interested in educating themselves about other peoples struggles for liberation - even if these struggles relate to them directly. they would rather focus on things on the other side of the world which relate to their chosen cause, than try to change things in their own locality, or even working group which they dont see as equally important.
so why do you put the emphasis you do on your own strand, and do you make the effort to educate yourself about things which arent as obviously related? how can we talk to people who maybe dont understand other peoples struggles and dont value them?
thankyou!