**Welcome! Say hello and introduce yourself on this thread**

Hey Libcommies,

I like candle-lit dinners and long walks on the beach.

I'm also a long-time lurker who finally decided to chip in my two cents from time to time. I'm from across the pond and then some. I never know what to put in these introductions so I'll leave it at that, but I look forward to having good discussions with all of you and theory-ing and all that jazz.

Oh yes I almost forgot, "proletarian", "use-value", "commodity-form". Am I doin it rite? ;)

Hello. 24 year old from India (you may not find too many people coming over here from the country). I did have a job till last year, but I got disillusioned by petty politics and decided to take a break from work, even though I was barely two years into it. I was lurking here for quite some time and decided to register today and say howdy to fellow 'comrades' (if I am allowed to use that term). Actually, I was quite surprised to see an Indian organization -- Faridabad Mazdoor Samachar -- posting its content here. It gave me belief that some of my countrymen do see the evils of consumerist culture.

I will admit that I have been reading quite a lot of anarchist text ever since late last year and that is what gave me the belief to quit my job in order to contemplate my future. At least now I know that I could not accept being a corporate lackey and would therefore look for a more fulfilling job, which might see me never to be working for big business. Another thing I have pondering over is to travel over to either North America or Western Europe, only if I had the means to do so, but that's another story for another post.

Glad to be here!

Hi Everyone

Olive Plaid

Oh yes I almost forgot, "proletarian", "use-value", "commodity-form". Am I doin it rite? ;)

You forgot to use trot as a derogatory term :P

cheers for that excellent Gilles Dauvé piece, Steven.

Hi all! I’ve been thinking about joining a forum for a while to share my thoughts with other like minded people and to find out more about what more I can do to help change this obviously dire situation that Capitalism has thrown us into. I went to University and studied Politics and quickly realised through my own research how corrupt and bullshit the education system is. I watched a documentary called The Corporation which really opened my eyes to how the world is a nepotism that subjugates the creative subconscious in order to dumb people down and keep the world on the hedonic treadmill Has anyone seen it?. I’m still getting to grips which Anarchist concepts but have read Rudolf Rocker's Anarcho-syndicalism and some Chomsky. If anyone can give me more information as where to find interesting works and demonstration dates that would be much appreciated.

I really like this post and i know exactly what you mean apathy is the death of soul! i love Amelie :) have you seen the unbearable lightness of being?? absolute quality watch it!

Greetings, I welcome you all to be egalitarian with me in your dialogue, this is required, otherwise why have any equality.
To briefly describe myself, I am abnormal,,,and very honest, because if I was like the majority (normal), I would be a liar. This is the world we live in, and I hope most of those registered are abnormal, because we are the last hope this planet has to pull itself out of the anthropocentric problems created by conformity that have society spiralling downwards. No? Then you are normal,,and boring. Let's all make this a pleasant verbal exchange of ideas, love and a kick in the ass if someone gets 'normal' on me!
Cheers

Hi everyone, I'm from Alberta, Canada. I'm new to this whole libertarian communist thing, looking forward to learning as much as I can!

young

Where are you from in Alberta, young? Lots of good groups in Edmonton that you might want to look into.

Hi, I'm Dunk.

I'm a 26 year old working class student and veteran.

My Dad is a gym teacher, my Mom a nurse. Mom's been in and out of the hospital most of my life due to MS and Lupus. Joined the military out high school. Was super gung ho; effectively a kind of Neocon. Things changed, I changed. Over the course of the 5 years I was in the Navy I had a huge shift in consciousness. By the time I got out, I had confronted the class struggle.

Initially I simply tried to distance myself from Stalinism and was considering myself a "Democratic Socialist." Even joined SPUSA and RevLeft.

Things changed further. Got some bad jobs, not a lot of money, learned more. Kept refining my understanding. Now the best I can tell I'm some kind of LeftCom today. Currently find myself agreeing with some of what's written on/in Nihilist Communism, but these are very recent developments for me and I'm not ready to discuss them.

I'm joining this forum because it's an opportunity to learn and stay in touch with a portion of what is left of the radical left. I'm falling asleep as I type this so good night.

Pleased to meet you.

Near Edmonton, Khawaga! That's great to hear, I've been poking around but not finding much. Can you point me to some?

I sent you a PM, young.

Young, you're in luck. There's a fantastic IWW branch in Edmonton with some really great organisers in it.

Hi Dunk (When I first ready your post I read it as "Hi, I'm Drunk..."), welcome to the site. I think it's really important as a class that we reach out to ex-military people and I'd be really curious to hear about your experience in the military as they relate to the forum discussions.

Hello everyone,

I'm relatively new here. Previously I just lurked. Actually, I'm new to communism in general. Unfortunately, I don't live in my home country and my language skills in the country I now live in are not yet sufficient to participate meaningfully in political efforts. So at the moment I'm a lonely armchair revolutionary.

I'm also a member over at revleft, but I get tired of Stalinists from time to time.

welcome pluckedflowers i also gave up on revleft because of the stalinists

Hullo libfolks.

I'm a student-slash-retail worker living in Dundee. Been lurking for a while, finally getting round to signing up. (Some of you may have seen me on RevLeft, and you can probably guess that I share Pluckedflowers' sentiments.) Fairly new to this stuff, so I'll try not to go yakking beyond my understanding. Not politically active, and I'll be frank that I have bugger all experience in that regard, but that's something I'm currently trying to change.

Hey Tim, fellow roosterist, good to see you on board. I remember you from Revleft and I must say you're among the users I agree with the most on that site.

Hey, I'm Haust. I'm also a RevLefter. I kinda joined because a certain user was banned yesterday, and I know he's on here. So, hi, Railyon.

Anyway, I might lurk about and read your stuff, maybe more posts will come after a while.

I guess I could add some more on my political views and stuff: I don't know really what I am, but I have a certain interest in Left-Communism, and ultra-leftist stances, although I'm not sure whether I agree on everything. My main interest within the left is Marxism, but I'm not sure yet where to take it from there.

Hi there. I am new to the world of the far left. I have only been studying it for about the past nine months as while finishing up my Associates degree and being between stable employment (thank god for my cheap lifestyle and scholarships or I wouldn't be able to pay the rent). I enjoy being out in the boondocks (hence the username) and have just recently taken an interest in politics after years of teenage apathy. I've mostly have been reading about it from what I can scour from the used book stores around Seattle. I identify somewhat with Trotsky but I hope to develop a more informed stance.

Hi all.

I already check your website for years and while I feel ideologically at home here, learned a lot and shared many an article from libcom with others, I have mostly been lurking.
I am an anarchist from the Netherlands, living in the city of Rotterdam and wageslaving in a bookstore. I studied philosophy at the university (after starting several other studies), but didn't finish it: already since early secondary school it appeared I couldn't function within the education-system as they wanted me to. I don't have a degree, but am still studying philosophy in own capacity/time/way.
I'm member of several anarchist organisations in the Netherlands, as well as manoeuvring within anti-austerity networks, incl. with comrades from Greece, Spain etc. Also, trying to find ways to get people at my workplace to organize; almost noone is unionized (which is the case for many in the Netherlands). Apathy, fatalist thinking, acceptance (of 'necessity' of cuts, layoffs etc), absence of solidarity with co-workers/workers in other sectors doesn't make this easy though...

In solidarity,

Smoke
@SmokeRH

Haust, BackwoodsCommie, Tim Finnegan, and all the other newbies: Welcome on LibCom! Good to see that we're growing!

Allo…

Way up north in the grim, grim “Cald” is a place made from oil & granite called Aberdeen.

From the grim up north Aberdeen Anarchists would like to extend warmth and light to you all…

We are a diverse group with some regular/ non-regular agitators who work with other active groups in town on various, diverse projects and events.

We like to keep busy and warm with our gorilla art collective - Aberdeen City Arts Board.

Run our skill share schools and work closely with anti cuts groups and other good folk from town.

Fro more info and for regular updates of our goings on -
https://network23.org/aberdeenanarchists/

On a more personal note I’ve tried to join Lib Forum several times, I feel quite blessed now! :D

Looking forward to getting to know ya’ll…

Lots of love -

Bleep on behalf of Aberdeen Anarchists

Hi,

I'm secondcreed, my name doesn't have any special revolutionary significance. I was raised in a fundamentalist christian conservative home in Oklahoma. My full name is C@1eb P@ul El1sh@ Creed to give you an idea of how important religion is to my family. Over the last three years I've taught music at a public school during the day, and studied philosophy and politics in the evenings at home.
Over the course of those years I went from being a Christian conservative to an agnostic anarchist. Since I'm surrounded by conservatives, I wanted to find like minded people to discuss things I believe in.

Welcome secondcreed!

Hello all,

Been following libcom for years and refering to articles on here, finaly decided to join.

I am an anarchist communist worker from Finland, a country that doesn't have much of an anarchist scene going on, apart from some extreme lifestylists in the punk scene. Not to deny that I got into anarchism through that scene myself, but quickly found myself attrackted to the more "socialist" side of things.

I tried posting up an article I translated on anarchism in the finnish civil war, you should find it here: http://libcom.org/history/russian-anarchists-finland-1917-1918-ari-vakkilainen

I have some interest in translating stuff and might be trying to do it more in the future if time permits (I can handle swedish, finnish and english) so this one is kind of a practise for me in that way, so any critics are welcome. And no, it is not signed with my real name ;)

Thanks Steven, and you're welcome. I just noticed that despite all the proofreading there was a couple of typos in the translation, I corrected them and also added some footnotes, they now seem to be awaiting moderation ;)

And yes, I could translate the about section into Finnish, and maybe Swedish too, but I won't promise any deadline for having it done!

Hi everyone, another RevLefter here who has grown disillusioned with the site due to what I perceive as the extreme lack of substance in the conversation, and the attitude towards learning.

On this last point, I'm a young leftist in the New York area who considers himself on a journey of political learning. I've been politicized for a while; I started considering myself a socialist (of an admittedly reformist, social-democratic variety) in middle school, and over the years have continued to evolve. I eventually abandoned this nebulous reformist socialism for Marxism, starting off in Trotskyism. However, I grew to be extremely dissatisfied both Trotskyist theory and with my experience working in the orbit of Trotskyist organizations (IMT, ISO, CWI).

For a while I moved towards "Maoism" in the losest sense of the term, not from a so-called "anti-revisionist"/Stalinist vector but primarily out of being attracted to its relevance to struggles in the developing world, the idea of class struggle continuing after "the revolution" (which had become painfully clear in my studies of the USSR) and what I saw as improvements on areas where Trotskyism had failed, though in the same general spirit. However, from the get-go this was again only a "Maoism" in the loosest sense, more akin to the French Maoism of the GP or the UCFML than the cultists in the RCP.

However, fairly recently I began to find this approach unsustainable as well, for multiple reasons. I read works by left communists like Pannekoek, began drawing upon anarchism as a resource (Bakunin et al.), and looked into some contemporary stuff on post-party organization and the like. In a nutshell, I became dissatisfied with "orthodox" Leninism, party form, etc., and have become much more interested in more "libertarian" and theoretically rich strains of communism. Right now my politics could be described as a sort of amorphous generally "anti-authoritarian" and strongly revolutionary communism, with Marxism as easily the dominant theoretical resource, but I'm heterodox and interested in updating communism for the 21st century.

Most importantly, I consider myself a learner, because I'm still really young and therefore relatively new to this.

Edit: Upped myself by accident, instinctually thought I could click and see who upped me *facepalm*

Hey people. I've recently decided to try and establish my political view points, and, as you can guess, this is the best one, and I'd like to see how the other people who think this way are like. So yeah...

Hey hello guys whats up :p

my name is Kevin i dont know why im a little nervous writing here xDis just that english is not my native language so i hope u can understand what i say cause im doing all my efforts xD..(i know my grammar is awful i just want u to understand the message)

well im from chile,south america, i found this website cause i was watching the web of the anarchist federation of uruguay and this was in the "friend websites"... so i entered and i read a lot... i can understand almost everything asking some words on the dicctionary but i dont speak(or write) to well(or good? or nice? xD) i read a lot about u... the things that u talk about and its really interesting,i think that i dont have to say that i am anarchist too xd..well so is first time that i see a community so active, i like a lot what i see here

and about me.. im just a kid xD but i like to see watch read observe... i have 17 years old im going to enter the university next year i like astronomy.. and well thats me.. i have a question for u guys like british citizens..what u people from the "old" continent think about us... i mean here in south america every day in the news or the politics compare us with the industrialised countrys(germany, uk, france etc..) and every1 here wants to travel "around the world" and see paris and the evolved society and what the fuck u know the story... please answer me :P i really want to know what u think what u talk about americans...( not those assholes in northamerica)

and finally sorry for write this testament... xD i'll wait for ur answer :p

Hi everyone

I've been registered on this site for quite a while, and been a bit of a lurker on here for over a year, but I thought it was finally time to get involved a bit more actively.

I'm something of a newcomer to radical politics, in fact, having been mostly apolitical all my life, I'm a newcomer to politics altogether. After reading around for a while I found a lot of sympathy with anarchist beliefs and ideals, but as someone with no background whatsoever in social science, I found a lot of the abstract theory and concepts somewhat daunting and offputting (especially the Marxist stuff). Having said that I would like to develop my knowledge and understanding of the more theoretical side of things.

I've read 'What is Anarchism?' by Alexander Berkman and 'An Anarchist FAQ' on infoshop.org and found both more practical and more easily accessible, and that was what first made me realise my own beliefs were quite in tune with those of an anarcho-communist/libertarian communist nature. I've also read 'Homage to Catalonia' by George Orwell, but I'm afraid my acquaintance with revolutionary literature stops there. With that in mind, I was wondering if anyone could point me in the direction of some good introductory texts, especially more accessible stuff for the lay person, bearing in mind I am new to all of this :)

Cheers

Greetings, everyone. Like many of the other new posters, I have been following this site for quite awhile, but didn't decide to join until now, as I work two jobs and go to college full-time (and hence have not had much time for for political activism until the past year so). Although I do not consider myself to be a communist (in fact, I don't really ascribe to a particular economic outlook), I am (or rather have been) an anarchist for roughly the last five years. I really like this website and look forward to meeting and engaging my fellow comrades here.

Hi everyone!

I'm Nia from Iran. I've some questions, but as I don't know where I should ask them, I have to write here, sorry for that.
I'm looking for some texts in English about how to organize in workplace and for workers, especially those in large factories. I've seen that Libcom.org has a distinct section for the issue and there some useful texts can be found, but as they are mostly based on workers' experiences in the first world, they aren't that useful here, in Iran. So, I'm more interested in texts describing the process of organizing in the circumstance of hard dictatorship. Preferably, the texts should put more emphasis on informal and casual relationships between workers, as here laws are strongly against any organizing.
I want to translate them into Persian and distribute them among workers.
Can anyone please help me?
Please let me know whether I should describe something more.

Nia

niafar

So, I'm more interested in texts describing the process of organizing in the circumstance of hard dictatorship.

Some of the historical stuff might be useful, e.g. Spain was a dictatorship on and off in the 1920s and 1930s and some very effective organising was done despite harsh repression (I don't know how similar it was to modern Iran though). This is an account of a general strike under martial law, although that happened when the CNT union was already very strong, so not so much the informal side (I don't think there's anything comparable in Iran?). This book on organising in Barcelona which might be relevant as it discusses the importance of the 'working class public sphere' and the informal culture of resistance as well as the organised movement. It might also be worth looking at stuff about Brazil and South Korea under the military dictatorships in the 1980s, both had very militant workers movements in the factories which I think were quite informal, but I can't think of any texts off the top of my head. The stuff on Italy in the Hot Autumn is also very inspiring (Italy wasn't a dictatorship, but it was a time of harsh repression, including state murder of worker-activists, fake 'terrorist' attacks by the state and tanks deployed against rioting students).

Welcome to libcom! And that goes to the other new people too :rb:

Edit: the textile workers strikes in Mahalla, Egypt under Mubarak might also be relevant.

Thanks a lot. Surely Spain's experience has been and still is insightful for all of us. Actually, I've translated some texts about CNT and Spain revolution. I'll also see your links (thanks about them), but as there is no union here now, workers' struggle in Brazil, South Korea, Turkey (our neighbor) and so on may be more useful for Iranian workers, however, workers' movement in these countries are still much more stronger and organized than in here.

niafar you might want to check out Kamunist Kranti and Guragon Workers' News. Although India is not a dictatorship like Iran, I think their approach to organizing is very much about informal and casual relationships, and a resistance they dub "faceless" (the Swedish group Kampa Tilsammans! (Struggle Together) has also written on that). The reason why they focus on the informal stuff comes from a strong critique of large-scale and 'official' union actions.

Hi, everyone. I've been a member of this site for several months, and I'm enjoying my stay very much.

I don't know where my politics would lie exactly-I find myself torn between Libertarian Communism and/or Anarchism, and Leninism.

I'm a big history nerd-I've studied the Russian Revolution, 20th century Communism, etc. and right now I'm studying the Communist revolution/revolutionary civil war in China.

I've read Marx, Lenin, Trotsky, Mao, Bakunin, etc. etc. over the two years since I've become a radical leftist.

I try to keep an open mind. I don't want to end up coming off as biased towards one ideological tendency.

Thanks very much Khawaga!

Another question? Is there a more suitable place to ask the question or is here OK?

Thanks very much Khawaga!

Another question? Is there a more suitable place to ask the question or is here OK?

Hi niafar, probably a better place to post would be in the organise forum (the forum especially for stuff related to organising) or possibly the history forum.. either the way, don't worry too much about it as its always great to hear news from workers across the world no matter where they post on the forums!

Oh yeah, and welcome!

Hi everyone,

after lurking around for a while, I thought it was about time to finally join the discussion. I'm from Luxembourg and currently studying IT in the native town of Marx.

Many years ago I was a typical victim of media propaganda. Thinking that it's human nature to fight each other, that the west is bringing peace to the world, that you will only work hard if you're lured by money. But then I started reading wikipedia articles. Many of them. About history. About politics. I discovered Emma Goldman, Bakunin, Kropotkin, the Spanish Civil War, read Homage to Catalonia and slowly started to realize what's actually going on in this world. And thus I became an anarchist.

Hey.Long time lurker/recent poster etc. Unemployed, live in Dunfermline, Fife. Hopefully joining Afed soon in Edinburgh.Need to put my politics into practice again.Haven't been on a protest in years.

Anyway.Hi.

Hello,

Been reading the site for a good while without registering, while I was trying to read and learn more. After years of classing myself as an 'anarchist/anarchist communist' it is only this year that I feel that I have had the chance, due to circumstances, to really learn and clarify things more and am starting to become more active - and this site has been a real help.

I haven't posted much yet, mainly as I generally don't like to post/talk unless I feel I have something to say, but I will look to contribute more. (I am a web developer by the way so if I can be of any help with the site in a small way, then just let me know).

So anyway hello everyone, finally.

Hello everybody. I am an anarcho-syndicalist. I have posted on RevLeft before but gave up because the site was full of authoritarian idiots. Good to see people on here who don't support Stalin, Mao or FARC.

Hello folks. My name's Ewan, and I live in Glasgow. Like Canis, I did a brief stint at RevLeft, but found their blanket ban on fascists whilst allowing cretins that sing borderline sensual praise for Mao, Hoxha and the DPRK to be baffling and repugnant.

welcome Ewan!

Hey, Ewan. Revleft is the cludgie of the internet leftist forums. Almost as bad as the marxist-leninist proboards.

Hi, my name is Mat :) I've lived in many places in this world and led a pretty hectic life so far. Because of my experiences I have come to accept the necessity of anarchism (whether communistic or not) and finally decided to go public with my sentiments. I'm currently living in England and educating myself in the history of the labor movement as well as economics (I studied, and hope to continue studying, philosophy at university so my interest are all focused around that).

If anyone is living around Cambridge and enjoys long afternoons/evenings spent talking about life and philosophy, I'm more than happy to hang out!

I am sure if your pro-active you will find SF or AF comrades nearby.

hey folks,
been coming to this site for years, finally created an account. as the user name indicates, i'm an anarchist in Atlanta, GA.
working together with some folks here to put together an anarchist blog and perhaps soon, if all goes well, a new anarchist-communist group here.
lookin forward to some good conversations!

Long-time lurker, first time poster. I registered about a year ago but started posting just a day or two ago.

I'm a 16 year-old black anarchist-communist in South Florida. My mom's a working class nurse, dad's a working class insurance salesmen and part-time douchebag. I'm homeschooled and, I guess, generally introverted.

What I want to do is go to community college, join my sister's crazy photography business venture in Boston and become a community organizer. Life seems to be doing mostly OK, I guess. I'd like to happen upon something interesting and write a book about it or something.

I was a socialist, but anarchism was an infinitely more robust critique of the problems in society, and anarchist communism was an infinitely more moral way of re-organizing it.

Hey there, Nanner, ATL. Welcome to the site. :) Hope you both find your stay a useful one!

Hi,

I have been lurking for a long, long time so I guess I'll introduce myself here. Some of you may know me from Revleft (where I post as Ravachol) or Facebook. I'm an anarcho-communist from the Netherlands. I'd say I'm politically most close to the 'communization milieu' and the broad ultra-left. I'm active in an anarcho-syndicalist organization (which functions like a political minority group though) even though I don't identify as a syndicalist anymore for quite some time.

welcome cerclenoir, to the forum of awesome

Good to see dutch posters on here. Hope it's a sign of change in the milieu there. :)

Hi guys! Been reading a hell of a long time before finally getting round to making an account here. I'm studying anthropology in London and I'm an anarcho-syndicalist with a fair leaning towards green anarchism. Been active in the past amongst small groups in Camden which have grown as quickly as they vanished. Fell out of the loop somewhat after that but looking to get back and being more active (away from the petit-bourgeois rhetoric I get from many at my uni, although not all). Glad to join you all!

Hello. I'm a young black woman isolated in the suburbs of GA. Currently living at home with my parents because I could not find steady employment though I have been working on and off online. I guess I've always had skepticism and hatred of hierachies from childhood, but I figured for years that I couldn't be a socialist because of my background until I started reading up on anarchy and anarchists. I am disgusted by how people around me constantly defend capitalism to no end no matter how much damage it causes and lives it ruins from the family all the way to the entire planet. So I would like to do my little part to help bring it down. This site is informative and I enjoy going here. Props to all who run it.

Hi folks,

my name is Sergio. I' from Spain. I have found this web almost by chance. I was looking for some anarchist group near Hull, where I live with my partner, to talk (or try it because my English...) about libertarian communism and exchange views on what is happening in our environment. Sorry to the mistakes and thank you in advance.

Salud!

Sergio_36

Hi folks,

my name is Sergio. I' from Spain. I have found this web almost by chance. I was looking for some anarchist group near Hull, where I live with my partner, to talk (or try it because my English...) about libertarian communism and exchange views on what is happening in our environment. Sorry to the mistakes and thank you in advance.

Salud!

welcome :-) there's a branch of SolFed in Hull you might want to get in touch with: http://www.solfed.org.uk/?q=local/hull

Thank you Jonthom I'll tried to contact them!
Salud!

Hi there,
I'm a student based in London learning graphic design. We just finished a lecture module entitled 'graphic agitation' and found it massively interesting. Our tutor recommended these forums as a place to speak with like-minded (or otherwise) people, so here I am. I'm particularly interested in models of anarchism and means of organisation.

That's really interesting, tcm. Can I ask which uni you attend?

Hello,

I'm Bertie, anarchist in my 30's, work in the private sector. I'm bullshit free, here for honest debate and I'm not into flaming.

I'm curious too, but online security Chilli...

Hello,

I have heard about Libcom for years, of how terrible it is, of how awesome it is... I've seen people more upset about what happened "on libcom" than about anything life under capitalism ever did to them, so I got curious.

Although I'm already confused and intimidated by the supposedly "friendly" section, so I am not sure how long this experiment will be.

Tom de Cleyre

Hello,

I have heard about Libcom for years, of how terrible it is, of how awesome it is... I've seen people more upset about what happened "on libcom" than about anything life under capitalism ever did to them, so I got curious.

Although I'm already confused and intimidated by the supposedly "friendly" section, so I am not sure how long this experiment will be.

Friendly section?

As in, this supposedly newbie-friendly sub-forum. Am I already mistaken? It said "Try and keep complex crap, in-jokes, flames and arguments off this thread and lets let newcomers feel at home smile" on the door...

hi everybody. leftcom here with luxemburgist sympathies. I enjoy reading your articles and maybe I'll even post something in the forums once in a while. anyways this looks like a great site!

tcmspark

Hi there,
I'm a student based in London learning graphic design. We just finished a lecture module entitled 'graphic agitation' and found it massively interesting. Our tutor recommended these forums as a place to speak with like-minded (or otherwise) people, so here I am. I'm particularly interested in models of anarchism and means of organisation.

what a brilliant tutor.

i guess your module referred to this bloke:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerd_Arntz
http://libcom.org/tags/gerd-arntz

also, welcome

Sithsaber has come. Sithsaber has come! Bow before the leader of the funny brigades!!! Death to revleft, all HAIL LIBCOM!!!!!

Phew! Thank god you have come Sithsaber! Things were getting hairy!

Hello from the UK!

I'm 24, Vegan and I live with two slightly mad cats.

I attended my first big demo outside of my home city last year on Oct 20th at the TUC march, where I swiftly merged with a Black Bloc(also my first), which included some fun Spainish guys, and we narked the unionists off by going through them doing the conga,I dearrested three people that day and danced on Oxford Street with some people to a portible sound system.Oh and after a swift deblocing after finding myself alone, two guys I talked to asked me if I saw those guys in black running around, I just nodded and said "Yeah,Yeah, I saw them)

And I'm going to the Greece Solidarty with Greek anti-fascists demo(not on my own) on the 19th, where some Nazi types want to come to so they can "Oppose the red scum". And they promise it'll be a "lively day".

We'll see.

That's me, don't know what the heck I plan on doing here (both on the fourm and in lfe), But here I am! ;)

I'm from Tampa Florida, and I'm here to fuck shit up and get nasty.

Yeah, I've been away long enough living with this bunch of hunter-gatherers, umm, almost 2 years, not that time means anything if their 'mind-set' rubbed off on me, but I've changed enough to ,,,,re-introduce a,,,,changed person. But still, fuck capitalism and loath yuppies for their narcissistic dantiness and meakness.

Hi guys! I'm Yazman. I am a non-sectarian communist with a technocracy (the economic system, not the political term) preference. However, I try not to categorise myself.

I registered here since, I used to be a regular user and a moderator at Revleft until very recently. I heard a lot about this site over the years but never really felt an urge to come here until now. So, here's hoping this place is better than the last one I went to!

Hello

I like reading libcom as an alternative to the Daily Mail.

I'm disillusioned about main stream polictics and want to find new ways to improve my own small bit of the world.

I live with one mad cat (ditto for him) I stole his name for my logon. He is always leaping up on the keyboard so if I've ever posted any unwise things in the past (or future) that'll be the reason.

Truly sorry to hear about the fire at the bookshop - I'll be ordering some books soon.

The history and theory sections on here are great.

I live a long way from home in the Balkans, having finally sickened of the UK a while back

don't think I'll post so much on the forums mind, mainly here to read the articles.

grim news about Freedom books which I read about over on U75, will also send on some cash when I have it to help you get up and running again

:)

Hi, I'm Alex.

I'm a leftist who wants to communicate with fellow leftists so as to stave off the feeling of isolation and lonelieness that has been creeping into my psyche as of late, whilst also feeling that my opinions are somewhat justified.

I promise to try and not erode the community from the inside or something :3

Hello everyone!
You can call me Boba. Full disclosure, I am a statist.
I got interested in communism in high school primarily through reading the works of the classical economists and the more radical of the French revolutionaries like Gracchus Babeuf. I am not a Marxist but, generally belonging to the 'Ricardian' school of economics, I have some sympathy with Marxism. I tend to hold a more lenient view of the Soviet state and democratic centralism than many of you probably do, but I am more dubious on anarchism than opposed to it.
My exposure to anarchism comes from three primary sources:
1) Reading 19th-20th century AnComs like Makhno and Syndicalists like Rudolf Rocker.
2) Reading AnCom blogs and news sites (like LibCom).
3) My brother, who is into Max Stirner.

Hey all,

My name is Nicole and I am starting to get back into the online forum thing. I was at Revleft, but got banned when they did their purge of leftcoms last year. Since then, I haven't done much online except for Facebook, but want to again because I learned a lot from debates. I am from Vegas and don't have people to organize here so I like to connect with others from around the country and the world. Hopefully this place is good to do that.

Hello,

I'm from Montevideo, Uruguay, now living in the United States. I got involved with anarchism after dropping out of high school - I've been working since - and became self-educated through works of Noam Chomsky (he has a statist approach to anarchism, apparently) and Mikhail Bakunin.

I love grass-fed beef, vintage bikes, and reading articles/books on Libcom.

This site is gold.

Peace and love to all.

hello

im from australia and am very interested in anarchism and have a few questions:
why is it that people are generally ignorant/ apathetic , and whats a good way of 'converting' them?
why are there so many trotskyists but not much else in oz?
do the zapatistas have an anarchist economy , and can i live with them and help them in any non symbolic / real way?

thanks !

Welcome vicent!

I don't know if the intro thread is the best place to get answers for those sorts of questions, but feel free to start some forum topics!

Hi everyone! I'm an American student (for another month, anyway) on the east coast. I was initially drawn to socialism around that impressionable young age of 13 after trying to research this mysterious subject that I'd only heard of in derisive comments (e.g. "damn commies!"). This led me to Marx and The Communist Manifesto and I didn't really understand much beyond the premise that history is the history of class struggle, which nonetheless resonated with me. After moving back to liberal Democratic politics, canvassing for Obama, etc., I began taking an interest in the Israel/Palestinian issue midway through my university years due to the realization that I knew virtually nothing about despite hearing of it a great deal (I'm of a Jewish background and often heard of Palestinians at my synagogue during the Second Intifada, but only in the context of suicide bombings and such), which led me to Chomsky and "anti-imperialism."

Though much of his writing isn't as interesting to me now, I really can't understate old man Noam's impact on me in 1) demolishing US propaganda and the credibility of the mainstream media and 2) massively changing my conception of anarchism and anarchists, both in the more superficial sense (don't think Chomsky masks up in black and smashes windows too often!) and in the more important sense of realizing the link between anarchism and communism. Ironically, prior to all this, my understanding of anarchists was that they're either individualist survivalist types or "anarcho"-capitalists.

Fortunately, the drift toward third-world nationalism was discouraged by the appearance of the Occupy movement and a shift in focus back the society I actually live in, albeit in a very social democratic sense though less so as time went on. The visible presence of anarchists in my city's encampment also got me more interested in their ideas, and reading Orwell's Homage to Catalonia left me less convinced the sort of the "human nature" rubbish that most others here have probably encountered when anarchism comes up in conversation.

Reading more about these seemingly noble national liberation movements left me feeling pretty jaded about "revolutionary" statist forces as a whole (Robert Fisk's The Great War for Civilization was one of the more influential books I read in that regard) and I wasn't really clear what the necessity of the state was in the first place in the project of building socialism. Reading Berkman's ABCs of Anarchism, I realized I didn't object at all to anarchist views, and I've consciously identified as such since. This site has been an enormously useful source of information for me, and I hope for lots of fruitful discussion in the future!

Hello all.

I have been interested in Anarchism for a long time but until recently i was a out and out Marxist-Leninist. I got turned off by the snotty attitude of many Marxists and their often unwavering faith in whatever tendency they follow that borders on orthodoxy. That and their attitude that they know what's best for the workers while themselves often being completely devoid of any experience with the working class.

I identify most with Anarchist Communism though when it comes to talking to most people i just call myself a Communist while explaining that i am not a Stalinist or Maoist nor do i think the USSR was anything close to being Socialist. I am influenced by many Marxist writers such as Marx and Engels of course, Lenin, Rosa Luxemburg, Connolly and Fannon to name a few and i do have sympathies with left Communists.

I have spent a fair bit of time lurking on this site and reading many of the articles from it. I am fairly new to Anarchist thought so please take it easy on me lol. Anyway i hope to add something to this forum and also learn alot from it as well.

Hi guys!

What to say about me? I'm a sociology graduate student from the American Midwest, an ethical vegan, a pacifist, an activist for LGBT rights, an anti-consumerist, and a staunch anti-postmodernist. I care quite a bit about living an "authentic life," counteracting the alienating forces (as described by Marx) within myself and society, and fostering an atmosphere of peace. I consciously shun the postmodern bourgeois "virtues" of selfishness, greed, competition, and consumption, and instead prefer the classic virtues of contentment, patience, courage, community, and love. Kindness is my central ethos (and the source of my Internet moniker, obviously :)), and I strive to foster it in all aspects of my life, though I often fall short.

Politically, I'm a libertarian socialist, with my current position being closest to Bookchin's Communalism; I was previously an anarcho-syndicalist. Still, I'm skeptical of ideology "as such," as I realize that no system is perfect and that all have some degrees of weakness and points of failure. I'm non-dogmatic in that I'm always open to new ideas and new approaches. Although I'm now non-religious (atheist), I was raised in a fundamentalist evangelical Christian home, and because of this I've had to think long and hard about my views on ethics, politics, and values. I think this has led me to be more thoughtful about the positions I hold and more respectful toward those who think differently.

Outside of politics, my main interests are my friends / family (I love them to death), reading (especially non-fiction or fantasy), music (independent, non-mainstream music of all kinds), and outdoor activities (including hiking, biking, running, skiing, and swimming). After obtaining my PhD (some day in the far future), I plan to become a university professor in the field of sociology.

Anyway, that's all I have. It's great to be here, and I look forward to many interesting discussions.

Hello,

I have been reading libcom articles for a long time. I have always found them, diverse, interesting and well written.

I was involved with anarchist activism (for want of a better phrase), back in the UK. But awhile ago I moved to East Asia and have had to be content with just reading about what is going on, rather than being a part of it.

So, as I have been missing my physical political community, I thought that becoming a member/contributor of this virtual one, might help, on some level, to quench my thirst for political engagement.

I look forward to getting to know you

Welcome! :)

Hello there!

I am an American in the Midwest. I came across this website when I was researching Proudhon. I come from an extreme right wing. I am glad I've found a place to look into ideas and theories more closely aligned with mine. I have only been looking into libertarian ideas for about a year and a half now. I am extremely new to this whole idea of online communities and it is very weird to express my politics in front of people because of where I was raised. I am extremely excited to read through everything. I was a wrestler in high school and was involved in BSA. I have been studying various foreign languages and am always eager to learn.

Many Thanks,

Joshua

Hello there!

I am an American in the Midwest. I came across this website when I was researching Proudhon. I come from an extreme right wing. I am glad I've found a place to look into ideas and theories more closely aligned with mine. I have only been looking into libertarian ideas for about a year and a half now. I am extremely new to this whole idea of online communities and it is very weird to express my politics in front of people because of where I was raised. I am extremely excited to read through everything. I was a wrestler in high school and was involved in BSA. I have been studying various foreign languages and am always eager to learn.

Many Thanks,

Joshua

Welcome Joshua. I used to wrestle in high school, too!

My name is Brennan from London. Hope everyone is having great time here.

New to anarchism. First exposure was Orwell's "Homage to Catalonia". I like the ideals. Fan of Chomsky. Trying to immerse myself in some of his books, books about him, books by and about Marx, books by Rousseau, Proudhon, Berkman. Continually expanding my library. Every book I read changes my overall opinion to some degree. An absolute believer in freedom of thought, but shared responsibility and economic fairness. I have a business degree and work in the investment industry so am not likely a typical person to like or agree with libertarian socialism, or any other form of socialism, but my background does give me a good understanding of how capitalism works. I am not rich. I can't stand conservative thinking. I shop at co-ops when and where I can. I cycle.I have belonged to unions in the past, and I still agree with unionism. I care about the environment. I ramble at times.

Welcome to the site George. Another one of a very well respected libcom posters studied business as an undergrad before discovering Marx and then moving to anarchism. So I don't think it's actually the uncommon. Also, rambling at times is basically a prerequisite to posting on libcom!

A final note, if George Zinn is your real names, I'd probably change your username. Pseudonyms can save you a lot of trouble in the long run.

Thanks Chili Sauce for the advice. My name is a pseudonym of George Orwell and Howard Zinn.

I hope you are enjoying the journey. So much to read and learn about, lots of good resources around, like libcom.org. I would like to recommend "Outrage, An Anarchist Memoir of the Penal Colony", by Clement Duval. Published by PM Press. Very interesting. Condemned in 1887 to hard labour for life. Eventually escaped.

Hi everyone. My name's Aaliyah (the 'Aa' is pronounced as a long 'a', in case you find my name difficult to pronounce).

I tend to call myself an anarcha-feminist since I identify with that label the most, but I'm also an anarcho-communist. My interest in intersectional feminism arose two years ago when I left Islam (I didn't find it to be true as a way of life and I found nearly every aspect of the religion morally bankrupt), and then my interest in anarchism came later.

I found originally found this place when I was looking for a PDF for Free Women of Spain. Eventually I decided that I wanted to frequent somewhere I could discuss anarchism. Normally I spend time in liberal social justice spaces, and while I agree with liberals for the most part in regards to social views, it'll be nice to spend time in an online space that is anarchist-friendly.

So far I really like this place, and the discussions are very insightful for someone new to anarchism like me. The people seem nice as well, even though I've only been here for a few days. ^_^

Hey all. I am quite new to the formal idea of anarchism, and am currently trying to learn as much as I can. I did a couple quick Google searches trying to figure out where to start, and several sites linked me to the libcom site, so I figured I would say hello, and perhaps get to know some of you all. I currently have almost zero knowledge of the seemingly important writings and history of anarchism, but from what I have gathered, both through forum postings, as well as listening to a couple lectures here and there, it seems like it has a lot ideas and theories that I can get behind.

I am currently working my way through "An Anarchist FAQ" in my free time, as that seems to have quite a lot of the theories and ideas in one spot.

A bit about me. My name's Dave, and I'm from the Ohio area in the states. I currently am starting back in school with a focus on business/economics. 29 years of age. Have a job, have a kid. Life is alright, but it seems as if it needs a lot more to be fulfilling. I have been interested in intentional communities, and everytime I am around a community run facility or co-op, I have felt a little more hopeful for mankind. Recently I realized that anarchism is not necessarily the violence and chaos that I, for completely unfounded reasons, had once thought it was. So, I am hoping to learn a lot, to be better able to improve the lives of those around me.

Anyways, hello! Hope you all have a fantastic day.

Hello, my name is Nick. I live in central Scotland. I'm not formally involved in any radical group (there aren't really any going where I live, unfortunately).

I used to be a Marxist, but I've been gravitating more towards anarchism and libertarian socialism recently. I think this is mainly due to libcom - I used to use it for news before I had any interest in anarchism, but then I started reading more and more articles and stuff from the library. Before that I was a plain old left-liberal (I voted Lib Dem in 2010, oh the shame!) but moved further to the left after the Millbank occupation and the student movement as a whole.

The only anarchist writer I've read at length is Murray Bookchin - specifically Post-Scarcity Anarchism, and his stuff on the Spanish Civil War. Any suggestions on similar reading would be much appreciated

New to the site, but I am a libertarian socialist, and I'm really interested in connecting with others in my area. I do a bit of traveling in my work (OTR driver), so hopefully I will meet some of you possibly in the future. I'm still a little unsure of this community as far as being tolerant of others; especially since any differing opinions are sometimes met with a "fuck off". I know the libcom/soc community is passionate but god damn. Can we act a little more fucking mature ffs?

Sorry, had to rant ;) Still great to be here and I know that you guys don't know me and I've got to earn respect. I just think some people need to show some common decency to their fellow comrades.

Hi folks

It's good to be back in the fold, years ago I used to live in Aberystwyth in Mid Wales and used to know and old anarchist by the name of Bob Mander, he was a great chap and I learnt a lot from him. Years of wandering around, marriage, kid, divorce and moving to Scotland with a very socially political woman and my anarchism has awoken again.

I am active on Twitter as @theGinger_Rich and I am a part of the Anarchist Memes group on Facebook.

Hope to meet you all either virtually or face to face.

Solidarity.

Ginger Rich

I'm an old geezer who's struggling with cynicism, chronic heartburn and occasional bouts of unexplained diarrhea which I can only assume is guilt in the face of my recent flirtations with Marxism.

I am a EuroAsianisedAmerAfrican. I have all but the more verbal forms of diarrhoea under control atm. Although I believe that thoughts occur as wholes and the object of every thought is neither more nor less than all that the thought thinks, every day I live with the feeling that I can't quite square my desire to direct all my attention to the ontology of the natural world with my deeper desire for wholesale social revolutionary change. Although I've been carrying out routine investigations into various forms of anarchist living and thinking for over a decade I remain as I was at the beginning of those experiences a convinced anarchist communist.

you probably shouldn't post links to you facebook profile here

Hi all, as my screen name might suggest, I mostly identify my politics as left communist (but no worries, I'm not an ICC member :D ) but it would be more than accurate to say that I'm interested in the historical legacy and current viability of currents such as operaismo and autonomia, communization theory, and of course internationalist class struggle anarchism.

I've no intention of engaging in mud slinging contests based on a dispute between two men who are long dead and supposed implications drawn out of it. Also, I tend to avoid mostly empty big words and dichotomies based on them, such as Authoritarianism/Libertarianism, Centralization/Federalization, though these might be useful if they are given a coherent, concrete content

And in a manner similar to another poster, I got drawn into revolutionary class politics mostly due to the experience of student occupations of the faculties here in Croatia (still a student - majoring in English - though that should change in the immediate future, hopefully).

Steven.

Welcome! We are a similar page to you, politically it seems.

Yeah, I've been frequenting the site for quite some time know, and the forums as well without registering, so the conclusion comes like on its own.

Steven.

And by the way your English is excellent!

Thanks :) It would be a shame if some 15 years of studying it, from elementary school to college, didn't do that :lol:

Hello
I have been reading libcom for years and finally joined the forums.

I am on disability benefits and particularly interested in how people with disabilities would function with anarchism. I am also interested in the fight against workfare in the UK and elsewhere.

I haven't read much anarchist theory because of dyslexia problems, does anyone have any suggestions what would be easy to start with. I feel bad for not asking before now.

Welcome to the forums Cap. I know there are at least a couple regular libcom posters with dyslexia - although I can't remember anyone writing about it specifically. I also know that Steven, one of the admins, has written publicly about having a disability. So he might be a good person to PM to send you in the right direction.

Hey,

another long-time listener, first time caller here. I'm originally from London but about 5 years ago fled to Scotland. In that time I've been in Aberdeenshire (and I'm never going back), Dundee (where I trained as a mental health nurse), and just recently moved to Glasgow.

I'm not new to anarchism but I am one of those who haven't been much involved in organisations and activism, except as a lone individual (due to anxiety, not ideology). I'm interested in anarcho-communism, anarcho-syndicalism and autonomous forms of Marxism. I'm also interested in the problem of nihilism, the body, and ecology.

I'm something of a pretender to being a philosopher/theorist but really all I want to do is destroy work.

Finally decided to join the forums to get a bit more involved in online discussion with others and hopefully to make contact with folk in Glasgow.

Great to have you on the forums Arran. There are definitely a few other health workers on libcom and a while back a couple of libcom posters - including a couple of mental health professionals - did some writing on class struggle and depression:

http://libcom.org/blog/callout-submissions-depression-class-struggle-07042013

The writing's done, but we've been held up at the layout stage. Anyway, keep an eye out for it.

hii everyone....hope to have nice discussions with you guys.

hii everyone

Chilli Sauce

Welcome to the forums Cap. I know there are at least a couple regular libcom posters with dyslexia - although I can't remember anyone writing about it specifically. I also know that Steven, one of the admins, has written publicly about having a disability. So he might be a good person to PM to send you in the right direction.

Hey Cap, if you're still around, I thought this might be of interest:

http://libcom.org/library/communism-real-movement-abolish-disability

Hi everybody,
new to this site but not to anarchism/libertarian communism - I've been around the block a bit and got grey hairs and wrinkles to prove it! I did post a question about the NHS and how it would work in a anarchist society but cant seem to find it in the list of threads. Maybe I posted it in a defunct thread, I dont know, it was an old one, from 2007. Still learning the workings of this forum, I guess. Whats peoples views on the attacks on the NHS and as anarchists how would we see a free health service work in an autonomous libertarian society? Nice easy question to start with! Lol!
PS I use and will use the words libertarian/libertarianism in the way they were formulated for ie the ideas of anarcho communism, NOT this right wing bollocks thats imported from the US!

Hey :) Glad to finally find a place that shares my opinions. I'm Alex - I believe its acceptable to share my first name... I've always been left with my politics, starting out as a silly clone of my dad's 'liberalism', moving to communism, and now anarcho-communism. I'm in college, studying my a levels. I suffer from extreme allergic reactions to capitalism. And - this isn't something I usually share with people, but I figure if I can't be accepted here, then whats the point of it - I am transgender. If you want to ask me about that, go ahead. I came here now because I'm feeling incredibly isolated, and also because being part of a community is a prerequisite for taking part in action etc.

I feel I've done a poor job of explaining myself, but whatever. There's my intro.

Hello, my name is Eric and I am autistic. I believe in an Anarchism along the lines of Libertarian Communism. I used to be a liberal three years ago, and I got drawn to Socialism. I got curious one day and wondered what Marx had to say about Capitalism and a lot of what he said made sense, and from there I eventually discovered Anarchism.

The first time I remember hearing the term Anarchist was when had a friend a while back when I was fourteen, who liked marijuana and made napalm. I remember when we made up crazy fantasies like riding a bicycle with potato cannons strapped on to it (backwards) and firing them while cops are chasing. We were living in a Christian academy, and we were trouble makers. I didn't know what the word meant at the time, but years later in an english class (In a community college); I was taking a test and it was true or false whether or not anarchy meant chaos. When we were correcting and the teacher was giving the answers the teacher said Anarchism meant chaos but deep down in side I didn't believe it. I thought how can we believe it's not possible for people to be peaceful without a state, but there was a time after when I did thought it meant chaos.

I also stopped believing in Christianity about three years ago, and I think if the biblical god was real than he would be a horrible person.

Hi there new people!

Hexagon, I don't know how many transgender users frequent this place, but I'm a transgender woman and I really like this place. Granted, I haven't seen this place in a while, but I feel accepted here and so far I haven't run into any cissexist jerks. Hope you like it here! =]

Hi Ally

Could you explain, as simply as possible, what cissexism is? I've googled and wikied but didn't really understand what I was reading. Whether that's because I'm a dumbfuck or the info is badly written I'm not sure, but it's probably the former!
Cheers.

Thanks Chilli Sauce, I also will have a look at some of the recent anti-psychiatry articles when I have time.

I have been a bit busy recently because ATOS have taken an interest in me despite having doctors say I am too ill to work without significant ajustment to any workplace. I'm hoping that I get out of that, otherwise I will be working out how to cause as much disruption as I can before I collapse from overexertion.

I will firstly say hello,,,, 'Hello' .... But why I'm returning to your prestigious site is because I have been banned from 'anarchistnews.com' because I declared that their anarchism resembled a neo-primitivist association of malcontents and trolls, and that I thought libertarian communism was the most pragmatic method of providing this world with an integrated and socially workable and sustainable system for existence. I have matured and evolved over the years. I must admit that I did fall back on the proverbial rubric of "the enemy of my enemy is my friend," ,,,umm, I am loyal up to the point of betrayal, and let me just say that those who run anarchistnews.org vehemently hate you, and I will do everything I can do to defend your site from their scurrilous attacks. My apologies for making such a dramatic egotistical entrance upon your unselfish forum.

Newbie here. How can I enjoy the site?

Greetings, all. I'm a leftist neophyte. I've traveled the political gamut, trying out different political philosophies and parties throughout a large chunk of my life with an open mind, figuring out where I naturally stand. The far left has come to feel like home, to me. It's the only humane position, it seems.

I'm a Zen Buddhist monk, Hospice volunteer, stay at home dad, and student in Oregon, USA.

This site is a great resource, and I'm happy to have found it. I stumbled across it while researching anarcho-communism. I look forward to learning from everyone here, and thank you.

Hello. I'm a libertarian communist from Italy. I'm in my twenties, I'm a student and I've had a brief experience with RevLeft some years ago. I've been following Libcom for quite some time and I'm looking forward to learn something new from more experienced users :) .

Red Monk, where are you in Oregon? I live in Portland.

Hello All,
I'm poor on computers and seem to have lost my first introduction.
"Libertarian communist" describes me well. My focus is on developing a red-green organizing theory that unites human and natural ecology. I employ Marxism and other left tendencies (red) and the new sciences of the organizational relations of life, thus healthy human societies (deep green) to do this.
I also come to libcom to learn. I need a good education in council communism, the many Italian anarchisms, etc.
I look forward to many discussions with the rest of you as we pursue a human future. My re-green best, Mr. Natural

Welcome to Libcom Mr. Natural! Check your pm's.

Steven, Thanks for the welcome. I'm looking forward to hearing from you on the Italian left and anarchist doings.
Red Dog, What an unusual background you bring to the left, alltho I have several shelves of books on Eastern spiritual philosophies, myself. Have you read Fritjof Capra's Tao of Physics? Capra is my main man--he brings the new sciences to the understanding of we earthlings in his masterwork, Web of Life (1996). Capra shifted to the life sciences after Tao of Physics, his first work, and I have read and read and re-read all his works. Capra has such a fertile, far-reaching mind, and his project has always been to bring a popular understanding of life to us all ....
I live in Crescent City. There seems to be a northwestern presence at libcom that I find to be potentially quite interesting. My red-green best, Mr. Natural

How do you do that 'A'? :)

Hello!

I'm a 24 year-old anarchist communist from Britain. First thing I'd like to mention is that I'm quite shocked that this username wasn't taken already! I decided to join LibCom because I'm looking to fill a need for intellectual discussion that I've been craving for quite a while now, hopefully this will be the place to find it!

Now for a bit about myself: I'm a member of the Anarchist Federation, as well as being involved in prison support work through the Anarchist Black Cross. I'm currently learning more about and aligning myself with Platformism though I still don't know enough about it to consider calling myself one yet. I also have a keen interest in green anarchism (social ecology/green syndicalism, not primitivist/anti-civilization) and am looking to discover more about left-com, council communist and communisation theories.

I'm straight edge and vegan. Animal liberation plays an important part in my politics as was what brought me to anarchism in the first place. I also love punk rock. I put on shows in my city, mostly as benefits for various anarchist causes.

That's all I can be bothered to say for now! See you in the forums comrades!

Classless,
Well, you obviously aren't clueless. You have lots of interesting Pursuits and much commitment to boot. You punk rock!
With your animal lib and veganism, I wonder if you have run across deep ecology, which has its lacks (political economy, for one), but which works with humanity's place in the natural world. Deep ecology has been defined as "The philosophical, scientific, and spiritual practice of life-centeredness, as outlined by the 8 Points." The first three points of Deep Ecology's 161-word 8 Point Program best express humanity's place in and relation to the natural world for me. They are: "1) The well-being and flourishing of human and non-human life on Earth have value in themselves (synonyms: intrinsic value, inherent worth). These values are independent of the usefulness of the non-human world for human purposes.
"2) Richness and diversity of life forms contribute to the realization of these values and are also values in themselves.
"3) Humans have no right to reduce this richness and diversity except to satisfy vital needs."

Welcome! My red-green best, Mr. Natural

hello

London Enfield male 29, direct action, web counterintelligence, political science degree, experience in AFA action in Poland.

Hello! I'm an 18 year old trans girl from Kentucky, USA. Still in high school, currently looking for employment but planning on attending university this fall. I'm just coming off a phase of Social Justice/Identity Politics thought that was more than a little stifling intellectually.

Politically I find myself gravitating towards Anarcho-Syndicalism at the moment, but I'm still working things out and I expect to develop my positions considerably on this site. Cheers, comrades!

Hi everyone. New guy here.

I've been reading some articles here for a couple of years. Now I think I can join the discussion (and learn something in the process).

Cheers!

Hi everybody.

I was somewhat active on Libcom years ago, but alas too young and to poorly versed in theory to contribute much (not sure much has changed about the latter!). Turning 30 soon, vegan, straight edge, IWW member and based in the Midlands. Please be patient with me.

Hi all,

Actually been registered 31 weeks, but only just got around to posting.

As the name suggests I'm an anarchist, but without the patience or smarts to read up on theory or etch out my own ideas fully. All I know is we'd be much better off without capitalism and the state.

Allo

I'm Kov, 20, currently studying Product Design Engineering in Melbourne, Australia.
I became interested in Anarchism during my first year of TAFE, and it certainly lifted my spirit after the horrible mood i sunk into after high school. Actually ended that year as a novice monk.

Use to be not that sociable then managed to mostly get over that after I found a decent
group of friends that are supportive.

Now that i'm at Uni i'm hoping to get involved in the local anarchist community.

PS. I think my old account from '12, which I hadn't made a single post on, was deleted a while back.

erm, so yeah i'm the new guy around here!

i'm 17 year old student from up t' north in Huddersfield (UK).
i'm something of an anarchist newbie, despite being a serious lefty for
as long as i could read, i became interested in anarchism recently and
really identified with it as an ideology!
i like reading, music, art, poetry and being pretentious...

oh and i don't bite... much.

; )

edit:

shite i forgot!
feel free to follow me on twitter:
@jrschoolar

erikathered

Hello! I'm an 18 year old trans girl from Kentucky, USA. Still in high school, currently looking for employment but planning on attending university this fall. I'm just coming off a phase of Social Justice/Identity Politics thought that was more than a little stifling intellectually.

Politically I find myself gravitating towards Anarcho-Syndicalism at the moment, but I'm still working things out and I expect to develop my positions considerably on this site. Cheers, comrades!

This is bizarrely similar to my story... are you sure you're not me? Haha. Anyway...

Hi everyone! I'm Kinsey, a 17-year-old trans girl from Texas, also still in high school. I too am starting to come off an identity politics mindset... I've run the gamut all the way from center-right politics (long ago) to some sort of vague socialism and now anarchism (I'm leaning towards anarcho-syndicalism as well), a relatively recent development. Having pretty much mastered at least a general outline of the theory behind it all, I've been spending a lot of time on libcom lately to read about what modern anarchist organizing might look like and as I get a clearer picture of what works and doesn't, it's making me think a lot about my politics and the political movements American leftists are so enamored of... anyway. I dunno how active I'm gonna be on here but I figured I might as well make an account since I'm getting on here so much as of late.

Anarchist bookworm and audiophile, most happy walking in the wilderness. :)

Howdy.

I'm Murican, white, cis, male, heterosexual. That's several strikes against me as far as membership to oppressor groups. I address this by, at the very least, staying out of the way of members of oppressed groups as they fight for liberation; better yet, if people like myself want to actively help, we should shut up and take orders, not paternalistically presume to lead.

I just call myself an advocate of socialism, which I define (in part) as the direct democratic management of productive resources by the producers themselves, with production for use not profit (obviously), and distribution according to contribution (until distribution by need becomes feasible) not ability to pay.

It's possible that I don't belong here, strictly speaking, since I don't oppose voting. I'm under no illusions about it, I know socialism can't be achieved by reforms (power will have to be seized by the revolutionary working class), but I do believe it matters which arm of the ruling class holds office: better "liberal" (conservative) than "conservative" (reactionary), in my judgment.

Anyway, if that's a problem, just tell me to buzz off and I will.

GeorgeZinn

New to anarchism. First exposure was Orwell's "Homage to Catalonia". I like the ideals. Fan of Chomsky. Trying to immerse myself in some of his books, books about him, books by and about Marx, books by Rousseau, Proudhon, Berkman. Continually expanding my library. Every book I read changes my overall opinion to some degree. An absolute believer in freedom of thought, but shared responsibility and economic fairness. I have a business degree and work in the investment industry so am not likely a typical person to like or agree with libertarian socialism, or any other form of socialism, but my background does give me a good understanding of how capitalism works. I am not rich. I can't stand conservative thinking. I shop at co-ops when and where I can. I cycle.I have belonged to unions in the past, and I still agree with unionism. I care about the environment. I ramble at times.

I'm not american, i'm italian...but yuor political pathway is the same as mine :) But it was almost 15 years ago, then it came platformism/especifismo.....
bye!

Hello to the human herd hereabouts.

Wandered in. Curious.

Convinced the USA is in the throes of class warfare and the masses are losing that war.

Also convinced that all within the USA are immersed within the most effective propaganda systems ever created their entire lives. The elites controlling those systems have convinced too many that as things are is correct and proper.

Thus, I am disgruntled.

Hi.

I arrived at this site via searching for info about the Spanish Civil War. I want to learn more about it and anarchism/libertarian socialism.

Hey! I live in New Zealand and I'm a vegan anarchist and a communist. I'm definitely not a primitivist. There are lots of them here in NZ though, so I have to come online to talk with people who aren't primitivists.

I have to come online to talk with people who aren't primitivists.

Ironically, of course, you could just as easily go online and talk to primmos.

To be honest, I'm surprised primmos are still around anywhere. Even in the States, the recession seems to have wiped them aside.

Good to have you in here in any case.

This is a high-quality web site, so I should acknowledge the effort and cost put into it. Best wishes.

(I'm retired and not politically active anymore.)

Greetings!

I'm an anarcho-Marxo-commie-Buddhist punker labor leftist!

Hahah. I don't know what to call myself. I've since stopped trying to put a name on it. I just know that I like, among other things, the following:

1) Labor unions of all stripes
2) Reading Karl Marx
3) The idea of being free, even though I'm a worker
4) Meditating
5) Philosophy
6) Radical politics

And so this place looked like a good place to post things. I had read many articles before, but I have not participated in the community until today, when I commented on an article, and then I saw one of my favorite internet addictions -- forums! :D

Glad to be around.

Hi. Anarchist without adjectives here, or at least that's the best way to describe my viewpoint which differs from that common here though has points of intersection as well. Unsure how to introduce myself exactly so*...shrugs* Long live freedom? That's my whole ethical system in a single word actually(freedom).
I hope this finds you all well and freedom from politicos and capitalists comes to all soon.

Good evening Anarchists everywhere...

as a seasoned one returning to the movement after a decade-long hiatus - and holy fuck does the world come crashing in once you reopen that door - I'm finding it very disturbing that so many Anarchist and activist groups are relying on Facebook as their main online focus of communication. I understand that it's free, but given what we now know of the extent of the international surveillance programme, I'm really hoping that there is movement to get away from the structures that are directly associated with it, namely, Facebook and Google. The Anarchist Federation groups of different areas in the United(?!?) Kingdom(?!?) as listed on the AF website all have a Facebook page; this isn't the only means of contact, but look at many of their independent websites or blogs and you'll find many of them untouched for months, if not years. Email the contact address on the site and see how quick you get a response, if one comes at all. I am speaking very generally, and about more than just the AF, so please don't get offended if you do keep a tight site / email address.

Many people now using Facebook to connect with other Anarchists may have been on there a while and might not realise that it's not as easy to create an account anymore, if you don't want to give your real name or connect the account to a phone. They know what they're doing. We do too so I'm really hoping there's going to be a shift. Independent websites, Forums, blogs and decentralised social networks should be being used and updated often. Having made contact with a political collective in my area the message has been that I'm shooting myself in the foot by refusing to be on Facebook. That's sad.

I do understand that anything on the internet is up for grabs by those that like to keep an eye, but maintaining usage of this nefarious website to the exclusion of much more positive-at-the-root internet communication tools is wrong.

I'm not here just to espouse this but as someone making a re-entry to the scene in a different geographical location to that in which I was active previously, the Facebook wall is a massive thing to confront. I think it'll need moving.

Happy to help!

hello all. i am new to this blog

Hello everyone,

Long time lurker here, thought I'd finally register for an account! I'm a 22 year old student based in the UK. I've always been against capitalism for as long as I can remember, even as a young child. Despite this though, for most of my life I was mainly apolitical and apathetic. Only in the last 3 years or so have I really come around to anarchism. Started off by reading the Anarchist FAQ, and then stuff like Homage to Catalonia, the ABC of Anarchism, The Conquest of Bread, the Dispossessed etc, and I've gradually come to identify as an anarchist myself.

I have never really been 'politically active' myself though, I've barely even talked to anyone about my views, so it's good to find a community of like minded people. I'd love to become more active and maybe join the AF or some other group, although I'm not naive, I realise anarchism is a tiny movement these days and achieves very little.

Anyway hello to you all and I hope I can become an active contributor here. Cheers :)

Hi. I found this website looking for anarchist lightbulb jokes. You're all very funny.

I'm not that great at introductions.

That's the best intro on the thread, mate.

Hi, I 'm new here . Anarco syndicalist from south Louisiana.

Hello comrades! I decided to make an account after lurking for a long time. I look forward to conversing with you all.

BakuninistDialectics

Hello comrades! I decided to make an account after lurking for a long time. I look forward to conversing with you all.

Top of the morning to you Sir/Madam!

Hi, I have lurked for a while and just started posting this week. This site is an amazing resource, and I hope that my interacting with it in greater depth will be mutually beneficial.

Hello fellow worker!

I feel more home here then any finnish anarchist web site, communism is thing in finland what soviet has but so much negative emotion on it, they dont see it way to anarchy, ekoanarchist are more active here. I dont dear to speak about anarchocommunism it would be too much ...then since 1994 more or less active at anarchist movement in finland and my work as an artist is thing where can express my ideology, so i dont do art for money but for thought.

www.sariannatamminen.org

Official me : ) Text is in finnis but curriculum vitae is in english at end of page.

Hi,

I'm new here and probably out of my depth, but joined as an alternative to watching BBC - Question Time debate with Nigel Farage on Immigration, BBC 2 - Debate on benefit cheats, ITV - Fat people claiming benefits because they are too fat to work, Channel 4 - Benefits Street, Channel 5 - The big immigration debate with Katie Hopkins, and other associated, Are we getting all the fat people from Europe coming over here to steal out benefits and eat out chips... programmes.

Forgive me if I've got the channels and their associated programmes the wrong way round, there are so many these days its hard to keep up.

Nipa
18/01/2015

Hi,
I am new here. Nipamoni from Bangladesh.

nipa

Nipa
18/01/2015

Hi,
I am new here. Nipamoni from Bangladesh.

Wicked. I know libcom host loads of articles on Bangladesh in case you're interested: http://libcom.org/tags/bangladesh

Welcome!

Hello everyone,
I discovered this site when it was referenced in a text about war and political changes happening in Rojava, so i thought i'd check it out.

Hi everyone, I’m new to the forum and have been interested in anarchism for about a year now.

Hey AG, I'm in Oxford. :)

There's a few anarchists in Oxford. I'm in Thames Valley SolFed (which covers Oxford) we meet in town every fortnight. There's also a number of other Anarchists who don't belong to any specific group.

Feel free to send me a PM if you want to find out any more. :)

Hi Auto, that’s great! I messaged you to find out more, but I’m not sure if it worked.

OK, thanks. I'll try again :)

Hello, I'm Conall and this is the first anarcho type group I have joined online, so I'm still not entirely sure what I'm doing. I'm sure I'll get the hang of it eventually... Though, if anyone has any tips on how to create blogs etc, it would be greatly appreciated :P

Hello everyone!
I just recently made this account, I have been lurking on this site for a few years but never really ever got that much into debth with it.

A little about me and my experience with anarchism:

I am from Denmark,Europe and I am in my mid-teens.
I play video games and when I am not busy with my school, sometimes read political litterature(Laziness always wins over me)
I started reading about anarchism two years ago which would also be the same span of years when I started becoming politically active. I wouldn't say I know alot about anarchism but I have read a few essays and have a broad knowledge of most of the writers and organisations and theory of social hiearchy that exists in Europe and in the United States. I realize in order for me to convince anyone that Anarchism in order to work, I would need to read up upon previous experiments, which I unfortunately haven't done so in detail. That has always been the turning points in debates where I suddenly run out of arguments when I critisize capitalism and the state, that I have a hard time explaining fully successful experiments. I of course always bring out The Spanish Revolution 1936-1939 or The Free Territory of Ukraine. But I would love to get some more details about their ways of organizing and some accomplishments that the anarchist movement has contributed to the world. Looking forward to read and learn more from this site and meet a bunch of you.
Being this young also still has barrier of things I yet not understand when I read things, which I try to overcome, so anything that is simple and easy to understand would be helpful!
Thank you for reading this and I hope you would love to help me :)

Thank you :).

Hi everyone, I'm a 26 year-old female, new to politics but interested in the social and economical problems humanity are facing in today's society. I am very much opposed to certain "gaps" that exist in the world today and I think a lot of things have to change in order for us to grow as a society, but I won't get into that now. Thanks for reading!

Peace!

I have been reading articles on this site for a couple years and I suppose I should introduce myself: hello everyone.

I'm not sure if I posted here previously - I joined this forum about a year ago when I knew pretty much nothing about anarchism and communism and just remembered that I had an account which I haven't used.

Anyway, I'm 13 years old, live in the UK and would most accurately be described as a Luxemburgist, but since that isn't really a distinct political tendency within the socialist movement I usually align myself with German-Dutch left communism. Although I am a Marxist and do advocate a dictatorship of the proletariat, I'm strongly against Leninist vanguardism and favour a revolution brought about through workers' self-organisation and a subsequent state managed from the bottom up by directly democratic workers' councils. I'm also a feminist and think that integrating into the struggles of women, racial minorities, LGBTs and disabled/mentally ill people as well as of workers should be a priority of the socialist movement. So...yeah. I look forward to participating in discussion on this site!

Hello. I'm from the UK, New to the site. Always been on the far left but can't really ever seem to settle on a tendency/ideology. Bit Anarchisty, bit Marxisty, bit Leninisty, bit Council Communisty. I'm basically an ambivalent revolutionary torn between the seductions of authoritarian practicalism and ethical-purist libertarianism.

I'm mostly here to learn and to test out my ideas and thoughts and what not.

Vlad The Inhaler

Hello. I'm from the UK, New to the site. Always been on the far left but can't really ever seem to settle on a tendency/ideology. Bit Anarchisty, bit Marxisty, bit Leninisty, bit Council Communisty. I'm basically an ambivalent revolutionary torn between the seductions of authoritarian practicalism and ethical-purist libertarianism.

I'm mostly here to learn and to test out my ideas and thoughts and what not.

And the user name of the century award goes to...

StegoSaurus wrote:

I would love to get some more details about their ways of organizing and some accomplishments that the anarchist movement has contributed to the world. Looking forward to read and learn more from this site and meet a bunch of you.
Being this young also still has barrier of things I yet not understand when I read things, which I try to overcome, so anything that is simple and easy to understand would be helpful!

A book that inspires me is 'In Dubious Battle' by John Steinbeck. It deals with the real life of communists and the struggles faced in the field. It only describes the practical aspect of communism and ignores the theoretical. Most importantly it is a good read.

I don't know if the book is translated into Danish. Skol

What's good pals? I'm an insurrecto from San Jose, Cali, U$A. Heard good things about this place, I'm hoping to meet some cool kats. As you can see by my name and pic I am very into Latino culture, being Latino myself. Despite my tendency towards mostly agitating, I've been trying to think of how to launch a freestore/survival program in this city. Also despite being the 3rd most populous city, in the most populous state in the United $nakes, San Jose doesn't have much of a rebellious scene but the potential is definitely here. So in my developing and practicing my project I hope to organize a few people, enough to at least have a common crew with which to speak and hold demos with. At least enough people to hold up a decent banner. Anyways I should go to sleep soon. Goodnight for now. Good luck to you all, and wish me some luck back in this direction. Thanks!

I've been lurking for a long time, but now I'm delurking. Hello there.

Danielle_Ni_Dhighe

I've been lurking for a long time, but now I'm delurking. Hello there.

If I may say so, that's a very well executed bit of delurking. Good work comrade!

Hello, and sorry I did not see this thread right away.

Firstly I should probably explain my name. I am a genuine anarchist mental paitaint, and the name is supposed to be a little sarcastic, about this condition.

I have been reading about anarchism for some years now, on and off, and although I am yet to meet someone with the same views as me in the flesh, I would like to make some inquiries about this that the anarchist FAQ cannot answer. I'm pretty radical, but my personal circumstances have thus far prevented me from participating in anything.

I am especially interested in anti psychiatry from an abolitionist perspective and would like to talk to some people about this and its relationship to anarchism. Apart from one very good blog a few things here and there I have not seen much antipsychiatry on here.

Apologies for not writing more, I am presently on my mobile device. Also I am a bit of a newbie when comes to even forums but I gather the basics, I think. Don't troll, post on existing threads unless you absolutely have to start a new one ect...

Thank you for you time.

Hello all!

I am an anarcho-communist in my early 20s who attends school in Morgantown, West Virginia USA. I have been reading articles on libcom on and off for a few years now, but only recently made an account. I have been lucky enough to be one of the founding/core members of the leftist collective on campus. Our group is broadly leftist with most members being anarchist or marxist-leninist, though we also have many members who identify politically as green or democratic socialist. Recently we organized a successful conference for leftists in the mid-atlantic region and formed a coalition with other student groups that eventually forced the university president to sign with the Workers Rights Consortium. If anyone is in the region and would be interested working together, feel free to shoot me a PM.

I first radicalized in middle school where I began to identify as a Maoist (I am still VERY unsure why I adopted that label). In high school I liberalized once more but by senior year was wholeheartedly disenchanted. After a few years of reading and discussing, I now identify as a anarcho-communist (but I also ID as an autonomous-marxist, anarcho-syndaclist, eco-socialist, etc. since these terms and movements have so much overlap). I probably read too much philosophy, mostly post structuralist political and feminist stuff. However, I have become more and more interested in ontology lately. I also love to read militant ethnographic and political ecology literature.

Excited to be more active in this community! Again, feel free to send a PM if you are in the Mid-Atlantic area and want to work together or want details on upcoming events in the area.

Thanks!

Hi! I'm an Anarcho-communist from the UK, just finishing my first year of A-levels. I developed lots of my ideas with the schools sociology teacher and he suggested libcom to me. I've been using libcom for a few months now and have finally got round to making an account.
Looking forward to discusion and developing my ideas further.

Cheers!

Welcome Pod. Sounds like you've got a pretty cool teacher! Hope you enjoy the site.

Hello all. I'm a primitivist-leaning anarcho-communist living in the UK. Student, soon to be of politics. I'm not that new to anarchism, but new to doing something about it. Particularly interested in ecological stuff. Here to make friends and connections, and talk about anarchism.

Hello,

I've been following this site for about 5-10 years. I probably first came across it searching for a particular text. Comrades later told me they were following discussions so, on that basis, I took a keaner interest.

At first, I was a little taken aback by the camaraderie but now I am enjoying the site.

If I may be allowed one criticism, when posting a text, I think it better not to express ones opinion of the text being submitted for publication when introducing it. We are all intelligent beings and will form our own opinions if we take the time to read the text. Then anyone (including those submittong the article) can express their opinions in the comments sections.

Now, I am going to read the article by the Anarchist Federation on the divinity of Emperor Haile Selassie and Empress Menen. Mi cyan believe it!

My name is Julien i am from Norwood, i am a fan of crossplay (i called the crossplay to [color=#000000]crossdress[/color] ),and sometimes i also play with [color=#000000]bodysuit[/color](if you know what i mean)

HI! I am the pigeon!

New. Live in Texas and have been part of various union efforts, anti-police brutality organizing, and anti-war organizing. The anarchist movement here isn't too strong. Anarchists exist all throughout various parts of left organizing here, but don't seem to want to articulate any of their own ideas or organizing separately for them. Food Not Bombs was probably one of the only things back in the day that any of the anarchists had a major foot hold in. That's no longer around.

Hi guys,
I'm new to marxist theory and am interested in learning more! I consider myself a socialist but am as of yet still unsure of my strand of ideology.

However I'm moving more towards a libertarian ideology, however still believe there should be some form of state yet am willing to be convinced otherwise!

So I hope I'm welcome here!

I'm anarcho-communist living in the US who has syndicalist and insurrectionist tendencies.

After I read 1984 in school, I started questioning the role of the state and organized religion. On youtube, I found and subscribed to "libertarian socialist rants," who explained that anarchists are not only anti-state, but also against all forms of oppression. The Anarchist FAQ also helped me discover what left libertarianism was about.

I'm a senior in the factory of indoctrination they call "high school" and have first hand experience of the failures of the american educational system. Suprisingly, I've met teachers and students sympathetic to my views. The only activism I've done is volunteering at a local soup kitchen.

I'm looking forward to contributing to discussions in this forum, and I hope I will learn something new. Ⓐ

I'm sure I've done this before but can't remember when exactly.

Oh jolly good then. Male, the latter half of my 20s, still a student (planning on having this done asap which is in "mypersonalspeak" - December to January 2016). Working irregularly and part time, mostly translations and proofreading. I'm a huge nerd for metal and challenge anyone thinking they're the most metal around here to a duel of any sorts. Except for duels involving physical stuff.

Concerning politics, the watershed moment was the students' occupation of unis around here (Croatia) in 2009. Learnt at the very start all I need to know about unions actually. From then on I've tilted to the left of the historical communist movements and found much joy in left communism. And some sadness too, just for the balance (though this has more to do with contemporary left comm organizations). I also think the Italian operaismo and autonomia, along with contemporary forms of syndicalism, communization theory (I once wrote a love letter for Gilles Dauve but never got to send it) and class struggle anarchism are "traditions" which are definitely worth to investigate.

I advocate bottom level political-analytical organizing, the latter primarily in the form of a tiny writing collective here I'm part of and a Balkans' discussion platform for communists. The purpose should be political organizing in the future.

I've no problem with telling people they're not communists (which means that what I wrote above actually excludes Stalinoids and people like that).

See ya.

Steven.

Welcome! Actually I have a question for comrades from your part of the world, which is what should we call our Serbo-Croat language section? Would "Srpskohrvatski" be okay, or is there a better term to use which maybe doesn't exclude Bosnian/Montenegrin?

Depends on who you ask.

For internationalists, it's srpsko-hrvatski, hrvatsko-srpski, or "I-don't-give-a-fuck-which-language-is-it". To clarify a bit, Croatian and Serbian (along with other ex-Yu languages, with the possible exception of Montenegrin, but hey it seems they teach strictly Montenegrin in China) have been classified as languages proper by the UN. Many speakers consider it specific and distinct languages, though there are of course clear linguistic similarities (so that I can communicate in any register with Serbian people without any problem - apart from some Turkish influenced lexical items).

There isn't any term of the kind you're asking about which would include all of the new national standards. That means some vague connotations of both Croat and Serbian supremacy (of whatever kind) can't be avoided by recourse to established terms in these languages. I'd suggest something along the lines of "Ex-YU Slavic languages" but...this doesn't sound so good, does it? And more importantly, there are significant linguistic differences between speeches in Macedonia and Croatia and Serbia; Macedonian is pretty much closest linguistically to Bulgarian in fact. So "ex-YU Slavic" containing mostly articles in Serbian and Croatian or Serbocroatian (the official standard in Yugoslavia, distinct from both official standard varieties of today) would also leave the wrong impression. Slovenian? Macedonian?

I don't know really, leave it as it is - the best option probably.

Steven.

Thanks! Although that's pretty confusing. Basically I think I'm going to have to send your message asking you what particular language different articles on our site are in, to tag them properly!

It's confusing alright but when you live around here...nothing could suprise you language-wise no more :D

I suppose most written stuff that gets submitted here is in either combination of Croatian and Serbian. Or in distinct varieties (for instance, I write in post-1990 Croatian standard 'cause I've been thouroughly acculturated to it). Bosnian...is a very, very peculiar issue. Most of the time Serbocroatian, but in some varieties with heavy Turkish (Ottoman, really) lexical background. Macedonian and Slovenian are distinct enough. Montenegrin? Honestly, I've no idea how it departs from standard Serbian (since we all can communicate perfectly well - except for regional dialects' speakers of course).

(EDIT) And just for the sake of illustration, there was this guy from an island along the Adriatic coast I...well, tried to talk to. He either didn't want to try and speak in standard or didn't know it. Point is, both nominally and passport-wise - Croats. I've got no bloody idea what he's uttering, right in front of me.

Feel free to send me a message, by all means.

Greets. Don't remember offhand how I found this site. Radical feminist, dialectical materialist, and student of social anthropology/sociology, although the latter's been slow going due to my disability. Have been sympathetic to anarchist thought generally since early teens, but it was only until uni., where I learned about Marx's work as a sociologist, and from there started taking economics classes [and read the first book of "Das Kapital" on my own], that I got past ultra-right economics [von Mises, Hayek, et al.] and became a marxist/communist.

Looking at the various radial left parties in my country [u.s.] made it smack-in-the-face obvious how dead the left is here, which has been pretty depressing. So I've hit pretty much a dead end. Guess I'm mainly here to try to find out if there are ways I can contribute to the cause, or even if there are possibly people of similar minds in my general area, etc. I toyed with joining the Wobblies, but decided against it [in part for reasons discussed here]. So, in short, I'm at a loss as to how to continue.

Anyway, hello, comrades.
Vive L'Internationale!, etc.

Hi Kir, good to have you on the site. If you don't mind me asking, where in the States are you from? There might be things going on locally that folks on the site could link you to.

Also, just for what it's worth, I'm not sure I'd based my assessment of the IWW based on something written that long ago. There are lots of reasons to be critical of the modern Wobs, but it's probably worth digging into their more current activities to decide if they might be the right organisation for you.

'Sup. Thanks for the response, comrade. I'm in VA, atm.

hi all,

Long time reader of the site, and I think I've joined before, but not sure.

From Amsterdam the Netherlands, I'm a translator with an interest in Marx, communist politics and antipolitics, autonomia, and other such currents, as well as Spinoza and more philosophical stuff.
I am currently working on improving my Italian and trying to get my hands on Italian texts of Mario Tronti, and get them into the underground commons, so that more of them may be translated into English.

Besides that I'm an illustrator/printmaker producing petty artistic commodities for the postfordist broke-and-working-class and working a part-time job as a mail man (just for fun, natch).

Vive la commune, then. Have a nice day!

Steven.

Welcome! Great to have you here, please feel free to post any of your translations to our library (we have a Dutch language section here: https://libcom.org/tags/nederlands)

Great, thanks, I'll do that. I also translate to English. I might have some texts in Dutch from a while ago, I lost a bunch through the combined impact of a crashed hard drive and a burglary, but I'll dig around a bit later on.

Cheers for the welcome.

Everyone! I am y'all!

Hi,

Been lurking/reading/getting-stuff-from-the-library for a while, but now I've decided that I should join.
I'm by no means any sort of activist, although it's been brought to my attention that I have influence on the general atmosphere and ways that things are organized at my job. At my work I'm a kind of IT-guy, doing all kinds of stuff (writing scripts, testing software, doing things in and with databases etc.).
I'm interested in free/libre software, music, reading, and I try to look for things and tendencies that are either explicitly or implicitly compatible with anarchist/communist principles. In this regard I think there's a lot that we can learn from the writings of people like Kropotkin and Colin Ward. I tend to read way too much serious books (good for the mind), and spend not enough time on things I really love doing (good for the heart and soul, if one believes there's such a thing).

Hello,

I tend to try and keep my real name a secret, so just calling me by my nickname is what I prefer online. I am a college student, I study computer games development and I am currently thinking about what to do once I finish college. I have plenty of questions to all you ancoms out there, however I am not sure whether this is is the place to ask them and I should instead make a topic listing down my questions if I cannot find answers from previous topics and articles. Also, I should mention that I'm pretty thick-skinned in terms of language and, like George Carlin, I have a very low tolerance of stupid bullshit :p though I doubt I'll get into any ginormous flaming since people here are very much like-minded.

X, I love the optimism of that last sentence...

. I have plenty of questions to all you ancoms out there, however I am not sure whether this is is the place to ask them and I should instead make a topic listing down my questions if I cannot find answers from previous topics and articles.

Definitively make a new thread for questions, if you can't find answer to them elsewhere here and the Anarchist FAQ.

spacious

I am currently working on improving my Italian and trying to get my hands on Italian texts of Mario Tronti, and get them into the underground commons, so that more of them may be translated into English.

Welcome! That's a great idea. Here are the complete issues of Classe Operaia which contain a few texts by Tronti. I can send you the PDF if you're interested, although it's a rather big file (200 MB).

I am currently working on improving my Italian and trying to get my hands on Italian texts of Mario Tronti, and get them into the underground commons, so that more of them may be translated into English.

If you could translate what Sergio Blogna wrote about logistics in the 1970s, that would be great. Been trying to find an english translation for some time, but only even find snippets.

Howdy do, long time lurker, first time commenter. I tried (and might've) set up other accounts before when I wanted to discuss but had IP blocked or something, made passwords while drunk, and/or assumed that I registered a common anarchist nom de guerre that someone else already took. Anyway, I finally made it.

Hello, I live in the UK. Been unemployed most of my life and consequently drifted from mainstream thinking (anyway you might define that) and toward what I view as a better way of living. I don't know if I'd identify right now as an anarchist or a communist or a libertarian. I am a member of the Socialist Party in the Uk, which I joined to express solidarity as I live in the sticks and hopefully gain supprot if I should need it dealing with the system.

I despise the system, I despise our politicians and find the whole of our culture (for the most part) alieanating baffling and trite. Unfortunately for me that makes me sound arrogant. But it's hard not to sound that way I find.

Unfortuntely I find the few friends I have in the real world are not politically minded and are turning toward right wing thinking; one of whom is now using the N word and seems happy calling muslims 'ragheads' for example.

Hi everyone, another de-lurker here, hopefully been reading things here long enough that I've got to a point when I can contribute something :) Really appreciate the site, its been a great help and id love to be able to help with the archiving list if I get any free time over Christmas.

Cheers

Hi, I came across this site as its the only place I found a link to this magazine of my brothers'
'Radio is my Bomb' by Hooligan press 1987. Unfortunately I cannot post a reply on that page.

Is anyone interested in having it, I don't want to just throw it away.
Thanks

Hi naisy, welcome to the site.

Were you sure you were logged in when you tried to post a comment? I just had a look myself and the comment box seemed to be working alright.

If you're still having trouble, try PMing one of the admins. You could try Steven, who left the post above you on this thread.

Good luck!

EDIT: It occurred to me you might have just found the .pdf hosted on libcom and, in that case, you wouldn't be able to post any comments. Try here: https://libcom.org/library/radio-my-bomb-diy-manual-pirates

Hello. I'm Marxist.

XirmiX

Hello,

...I doubt I'll get into any ginormous flaming since people here are very much like-minded.

Holy shit, I just realized who posted this introduction!

Chilli Sauce

XirmiX

Hello,

...I doubt I'll get into any ginormous flaming since people here are very much like-minded.

Holy shit, I just realized who posted this introduction!

He was probably feeling chilled when he posted this after one of his keepers wanked him off.

Hello. I'm Marxist.

I'm located in the Netherlands. I don't belong to any particular current of Marxism, but I'm to the left of Leninism. I previously was an anarchist.

Nonostante sia ancora inverno, con cappotti, sciarpe e cappelli, non possiamo fare a meno di pensare alle vacanze, all’estate, al mare e alle serate di festa che lidi e organizzatori di eventi ci regalano sotto un cielo stellato e il mare all’orizzonte.
La pelle abbronzata, le risate tra amici un mojito in mano e proprio non possono mancare i classici oggetti starlight che decorano e illuminano le notti d’estate.
Sarà che siamo tutti più rilassati o sarà la brezza marina, ma proprio non riesco ad immaginare una festa senza questi gadget fluorescenti.
Occhiali in varie forme, bastoncini o bastoni, braccialetti starlight fluo, orecchini, collane, anelli, miscelatori, pins, trottole, palloncini led, e tantissimi altri oggetti che rendono le nostre serate indimenticabili e magiche.
Tra i fornitori di fiducia di questi simpatici oggetti vi consiglio: http://www.braccialettistarlightfluo.com/
Hanno i migliori gadget a prezzi davvero economici, inoltre se ordini online ricevi la merce in meno di 72 ore dal lunedì al venerdì.
Ma ritornando all’estate, i gadget fluo non possono che essere associati con la musica e con le attività (ludiche, lavorative e anche di intrattenimento sportivo).
Recentemente ho scoperto che questi gadget vengono usati anche per il nuoto sincronizzato, infatti le squadre si servono dei gadget fluorescenti per creare coreografie suggestive in acqua. Dato che sono oggetti che non necessitano batterie o elettricità possono essere usati benissimo anche sott’acqua, non solo per il nuoto sincronizzato ma anche per le immersioni subacquee per illuminare il fondo del mare.
Inoltre, indagando un po’ su questi oggetti, ho scoperti che vanno a ruba in discoteche ma anche in spettacoli teatrali e di danza che, come nel caso del nuoto sincronizzato, si servono dei gadget starlight per dare alla coreografia un tocco magico che ne aumenta l’effetto suggestivo e quindi le emozioni che si trasmettono al pubblico che osserva.
Davvero geniali vero? Per essere così semplici ed economici hanno un sacco di modi d’utilizzo che si scoprono solo indagando oppure se stai nel settore. Infatti non sapevo assolutamente dell’esistenza di una vera e propria gamma di cosmetici e vernici starlight fluo che possono essere usate sia per feste come carnevale, serate in discoteca, feste a tema, halloween, ecc. ma anche per eventi e feste per bambini, dato che la casa madre inglese ne garantisce la non tossicità.
Comunque, tutto questo per dire che ho sempre associato i braccialetti starlight fluo all’estate, ma scopro che invece sono usatissimi anche nei mesi più freddi, infatti gli organizzatori di eventi che lavorano per locali o discoteche fanno grandi scorte dei gadget starlight in modo da poter pianificare serate e feste per tutto l’anno.

Hello everyone.

I'm an anarchocommunist. I also like other, similar schools of thought like council communism and anarcho-syndicalism, but I call myself an anarchocommunist because I feel it succinctly makes clear to people who aren't familiar with this kind of politics that I neither mean anarchism in the sense of orderlessness nor communism in the sense of tyranny.

I'm interested in disability politics such as the Black Triangle Campaign, cypherpunk and pirate politics.

On the subject of cypherpunk, it seems like libcom.org has chosen to make life difficult for Tor users. How disappointing. I hope this is corrected at some point.

Steven, thank you for your response. I'm glad to hear it's not done deliberately. I'll open a thread and describe my experiences, thank you.

Howdy there Altarego. Hope you enjoy the site. Get stuck in!

Just dropping in to say hello. Capitalism is the bane of my existence. I used to be a Marxist, but now I'm an Anarchist Communist. In addition, Animal liberation/Veganism is something that I find to be very important.

Morphemic

Just dropping in to say hello. Capitalism is the bane of my existence. I used to be a Marxist, but now I'm an Anarchist Communist. In addition, Animal liberation/Veganism is something that I find to be very important.

Welcome! , animal lib is not generally considered very important on Libcom but there are a few of us that feel it is very important indeed and that it has significance in relation to revolutionary politics.
Hope you enjoy the site!

Hello,

I found this page after typing "Primitivism" into a search bar. After realizing that it was an actual thing and not just a made up word, I dug deeper. I found this site, along with many other that peak my interest. I had never expected to find such a level of organization and common thinking on the internet.

-LDS

Hello everyone, I'm new here please be nice :)

Harmonie Forrest

Hello everyone, I'm new here please be nice :)

I'll be nice to you but my friend Hamony is not best pleased at someone having (almost) the same name as her! To win her over you're gonna have to post some good shit!

Hi.

Hail!

Sindelar

Hail!

Well hail back to you! Welcome.

In order to secure remission of its sins, mankind has only to declare them for what they actually are. Karl Marx, September 1843

"Hello"

Was a member of revleft before being banned in the 2011 purge. They let me rejoin but the site has been driven into the ground so I signed up here.

apoi_viitor

Was a member of revleft before being banned in the 2011 purge. They let me rejoin but the site has been driven into the ground so I signed up here.

Hi, you.

Welcome to Libcom. It is mostly occupied by either libertarian communists or authoritarian librarians, with the occasional cross-over.

Revleft is a bit of a mess now, they don't even have a special user group for Welsh people. They probably think that the only person ever in an occupied or obscure country was Che Guevara.

Hopefully you'll like it here, then. There's been a recent trend towards discussing Zionism, Europe, and similar subjects, which has generally been quite different in tone to how it would have been when Libcom was also more relevant and so on, but it's still doing decently in a way. Other than that, topics of discussion can be quite varied, and there's a bit on more local things, events, etc., which you may or may not want to discuss. People here are slightly more reluctant to be labelled, which can mean that they are at least not posturing as Bordigists, but can also mean that they can enter discussions under a guise of neutrality which can be misleading. Still, you'll probably find it alright. Good luck.

thank you for that.

-

What is the point in being rich, when the most beautifull mountain valley in Slovakia is now filled with big ugly hotels and snoby tourists? It's not even beautiful anymore, so why do the tourists even come?

I enjoyed reading your little biography with the exception of the concessions to liberalism, such as:

...you could devote your time to making the world a better place?

I think rich kids that go into business are just conforming to parental and pier pressures.

I'd rather be a straight edge carless vegan and spend my days thinking how to get us out of this mess

Sounds like an admirable ambition – go for it!

Tim, I can appreciate your dillema but if you've ever lived in poverty or even if, like most people, you've always had to work to make ends meet, your 'difficulties are going be pretty hard to swallow' and you are going to have serious trouble understanding the pressures on the working class. That said, I appreciate your honesty and well, Kropotkin was a prince, right.
Stick around mate but go easy on the liberalism. Many, including myself see liberalism as a major obstacle to real change and that includes the more radical left of that particular spectrum. Liberal sensibilities will rightly get very short shrift around these here parts.

.

Hello, everyone!

New user here. I'm a libertarian communist from Southern Europe (Spanish state). CNT card-carrying member for a few months now.
Interested in the content of communist to articulate it with an anarchist praxis, which implies that I'm kinda interested in what we can find useful in Marx's and left-com theories.

Been checking out on the site pretty often for a few years now, and finally decided to join the forums.

Salud!

Hello,

I am a young radical in the northeastern United States. I was radicalized in college through my involvement in climate change activism and seeing the failings of the liberal environmental movement. A major eye-opening moment for me was when I was venting to an anarchist friend about how angry I was during the Copenhagen climate talks, and how none of the political leaders negotiating these deals were going to be hurt by this at all. My friend just said "Well, that's class warfare for you," which really got me thinking. I didn't start to really delve deeply into Marxist, anarchist, and other radical thinking until Occupy Wall Street. I visited the encampments and became very active in the Occupy group at my college. It was around then that I started to really think of revolutionary change as something that could actually happen, rather than just a nice idea.

Around Occupy and for a few years after, I strongly identified as an anarcho-communist specifically, greatly influenced by David Graeber's writings. Lately, I've started to more broadly identify as "libertarian socialist." I'm fairly inspired by the news I've seen coming out of Rojava, but I feel I need to learn more. I've used Libcom as a resource to read lots of radical books and articles, but never bothered taking a look at the forum. I thought more actively participating in discussions would be a good way to continue learning and meet some likeminded folks.

Zeronowhere

...

OMG ZeroNowhere is here. It's been ages since we talked last time :D (formerly Menocchio at revleft)

Zeronowhere was banned quite recently for pretty much being a racist.

Or possibly even fash... unless his/her account was hacked, it was all very weird.

Khawaga

Zeronowhere was banned quite recently for pretty much being a racist.

Fuck me blind, really?

The DeLeonist person? No signs of anything like it were known to me.

I think it came as a surprise on everyone. And around the same time another long time poster also revealed himself to be a raging racist. It's been fucking weird here lately.

The fuck.
I mean, I've seen people tangentially related to me (as in fb friends wholly of past political provenance) totally flip out given the recent news about France/Bavaria killings, and it was a sight to behold. A gruesome one.

It's just that I was really fond of that stupid site (revleft) as a gateway community for discussion with likeminded folks. It's been more than a few years since that, but it's always weird to see someone from there banned as fash.

Though people can and do change.

The sentiment you're expressing was pretty much the reaction here as well.

Pretty strange. I really can't see how Zero is a fascist, but then again, as his account has been closed it's not possible to track his posts so maybe the evidence is just floating about on the boards somewhere.

Anyway on reading this on signing in today:

Slothjabber
History
Member for
10 years 10 hours

I thought I might post in the welcome thread.

Hi I'm Slothjabber, I'm a Left Communist, and have been for pretty much the whole time I've been here. I used to be an Anarchist-Communist, and called myself one for about 16 years (and just an Anarchist before that), though to be fair my political practice has been all over the place, especially in the 1990s.

I'm involved with the Midlands Discussion Forum, which is an open-tendency discussion forum based in the English midlands (currently people identifying with or at least influenced by strands of Anarchist, Left Communist, Council Communist and Communisation currents are attending regularly). At the moment we tend t meet in Birmingham or Sheffield, though we'ev also organised meetings in Leicester in the past, and we've talked about going elsewhere (eg Oxford) if there are people who want to discuss with us.

What else? I try to be nice to the SPGB because I don't think they're completely wrong. My main preoccupation at the moment is how the working class can re-discover the idea of struggle and the means (mass assemblies and workers' councils, in my estimation) when... well, when what we have is very little struggle and increasing atomisation and horror. Or maybe I'm just glum this morning.

My ten years are coming up next week.

I'm pretty sure I made an introduction but since I keep on forgetting that LibCom has forums, I haven't posted much (really, the way I saw the site was as a huge and rich database with tons of good articles and even books).

I'm from Croatia, part-time working in translations (btw. if anyone needs some Serbocroatian to English translation done, feel free to get in touch) and trying to get an MA in English. Politics, eh kind of left communist, pretty similar to sloth's all-over-the-place in 90s though anchored in that thing actually.

Steven.

Welcome! And hey, if you have any spare time, it would be great to get any of our introductory guides translated into Serbo-Croat! https://libcom.org/library/libcom-introductory-guide

No problem, I'll get in touch once I have some time to do that as I'm swamped right now.

Hi, I'm Sea from Revleft. I joined this forum because I like discussion.

Are you a Stalinist? Or am I getting you confused with someone else?

I'm not a Stalinist.

Hello!

I'm a 20 year old libertarian communist from Ashford (near Heathrow, not the one in Kent) in the UK. I've been reading the articles and forums on LibCom for a while now, but I'm looking forward to participating in the forums.

Not currently involved with any organisations, although I'm in contact with my local Anarchist Federation.

I don't know what else to add, so I'll leave it at that!