It’s about time. Someone has finally written a biography on the real father of the animal liberation movement – Ronnie Lee. Lee’s lifelong work for animals spans five decades and counting. During this time, he has been involved in just about every form of animal advocacy imaginable — direct action, grassroots vegan outreach, public interest campaigns, animal fostering, and political activism, to name a few. Perhaps best known for founding the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) and being jailed numerous times for illegal direct actions, Ronnie Lee now focuses exclusively on above-ground animal advocacy, having retired from his extensive underground career.

Author Jon Hochschartner’s access to Lee (and some of his friends and family) provides us an intimate window into Lee’s life as a freedom fighter for animals. Lee’s childhood and early adult years are shockingly unremarkable in the sense that there is little to indicate he would go on to become a pioneer in the animal liberation movement. Although it is clear Lee grew up with a fondness for animals, an aversion to authority, and a keen sense of justice, the same can be said of many people who neither become vegan nor pursue animal liberation. What specifically led Lee to become The Animals’ Freedom Fighter, one can never know. But this unremarkable childhood makes Lee’s segue into full-fledged warrior all the more exhilarating.

Lee’s come to Jesus moment seems to have instead been a confluence of events – no single one having been definitive. One early turning though was Lee’s innocuous transition to veganism. As a teen, Lee, by then a vegetarian, was introduced to veganism by his older sister’s boyfriend — a healthy, robust, vegan athlete. As with many vegetarians, Lee came to understand the hypocrisy of abstaining from eating animal flesh while at the same time continuing to consume other animal byproducts. It only took a single vegan role model for Lee to connect the dots and realize veganism is both just and healthy.

Lee’s subsequent entry into the world of direct action not only gives shape to his ideology, it gives us an exciting new window into the early 70s-era radical animal advocacy scene in the United Kingdom. Lee’s involvement with the Hunt Saboteurs Association (HSA) began to blossom into more pointed forms of direct action as time went on. Always seeking to refine the efficacy of his hunt sabbing efforts, Lee eventually felt it more impactful to engage in covert, preemptive forms of hunt sabotage, such as disabling the hunters’ automobiles and ransacking hunt lodges. This way, the saboteurs wouldn’t be battling the hunters in the fields as the hunters would be prevented from getting out, to begin with. Lee and some of his more daring saboteur partners began leveraging their hunt sab experiences, directing similar attacks against other institutional exploiters like butchers, factory farmers, and vivisectors, whose labs Lee would heroically burn to the ground under the cover of darkness.

Lee’s shift to more aggressive tactics was a welcome one to the movement. If the war against animal exploiters is truly that – a war – no options can be taken off the table no matter what the law has to say about them. In the war for animal liberation, there is a role for everyone to play, from the underground saboteur to the aboveground political actor. Some of these tactics may seem at odds, and activists wedded to one or another tactic may accuse the other of setting the movement back. At various times in history, certain forms of activism may prove more beneficial and strategically sound than others. But in the grand scheme of things, any action for animals is an important brick in the wall, and they will all add up to achieve total liberation for animals in the long run. Lee’s life exemplifies the value of this veritable smorgasbord of tactics.

Lee’s willingness to serve hard time for his involvement in illegal direct actions has given way to his more systemic approach. Lee now prefers to focus his efforts on vegan tabling, leafletting, and taking part in Green Party politics. Having spent a considerable amount of his life behind bars, one cannot blame Lee for the shift. Nevertheless, it is hard not to look at Lee’s hard-edged ALF years nostalgically. Hochschartner paints a picture of a tireless Robinhood-for-animals who threw caution to the wind, never missing an opportunity to put a brick through an animal exploiter’s window, rescue an animal from captivity, or burn down a torture chamber. On more than one occasion, Lee tells Hochshartner that he knew his sprees would end in jail time, but that each time he simply sought to extend them for as long as he could before being apprehended. Animal exploitation would never survive if all vegans became this bold overnight.

Alas, Lee’s direct action did inspire many to become that bold. As with many social movements, the actions of one or two brave souls can serve as a greenprint for others to follow. The ALF continues to thrive to this day as an anonymous, leaderless movement, as the baton gets passed from one liberationist to the next through a series of direct actions and communiques describing them. Lee’s ALF actions in the UK quickly encouraged others, uncoordinated and unbeknownst to Lee, in all corners of the globe. These actions continue to flourish today even despite a conservative political climate which punishes them ever more harshly.

Any student of animal liberation is well-advised to read The Animals’ Freedom Fighter in order to help them determine their appropriate role. The book is a welcome addition, as both a tactical encyclopedia and an important historical account. Lee’s life as an animal advocate has been full and diverse, and one has to wonder what else Lee might have up his sleeve. Hopefully Hochschartner will have no choice but to update Lee’s biography in the coming years.

შელდონ რიჩმანი

კოსმოპოლიტიზმი განიცდის შეტევას პოლიტიკური სპექტრის ყველა ფლანგიდან, როგორც ა.შ.შ-ში ასევე სხვა ქვეყნებში. არც ისე დიდი ხნის უკან პრეზიდენტ ტრამპის მთავარმა სტრატეგმა, სტივ ბენონმა, რომელიც საკუთარ თავს უწოდებს “ეკონომიკურ ნაციონალისტ”, Conservative Political Action Conference-ზე განაცხადა: “ჩვენ პირველ რიგში გვჯერა, რომ ჩვენ ვართ ერირომელსაც აქვს ეკონომიკა და არა ეკონომიკა გლობალურ ბაზარზე რომელსაც არ გააჩნია საზღვრები” რა თქმა უნდა ეს მცდარია, მაგრამ ბენონის ტომური ნაციონალიზმი ბევრის მთქმელია.

კოსმოპოლიტიზმის უარყოფა არის ცუდი თავისუფლებისთვის, მშვიდობისთვის და კეთილდღეობისთვის  რადგან   ისინი ერთმანეთზე არიან დამოკიდებული. კავშირი თავისუფლებასა დაკოსმოპოლიტიზმს შორის სერიოზულია და არ არის რაღაც კონცეპტუალური კავშირი. რა თქმა უნდა, თავისუფლებაში შედის ინდივიდის უფლება  დაიკავოს მშვიდობიანი ურთიერთობა, ნებისმიერ ადამიანთან, ჯგუფთან თუ ადგილთან, რაც შედეგად იწვევს მშვიდობიანი ურთიერთ კავშირს და კეთილდღეობას. მაგრამ ეს კავშირი მნიშვნელოვანია: ახალ თაობებს, იმისმიუხედავად რას მათ ასწავლიდნენ მათი  უფროსები, ბუნებრივად უჩნდებათ ინტერესი სხვა ერების და კულტურების მიმართ. მატ ბუნებრივად უჩნდება ეჭვის შეტანის სურვილი იმნასწავლი ხელშეუხებელი ტრადიციების (მათ შორის სეკულარული ტრადიციების) მიმართ. ეს კი  გარდაუვლად გამოიწვევს კულტურულ და მატერიალურ გაცვლას და შემდგომსოციალური ურთიერთობების ევოლუციას. კულტურის “იდეალი” რომელიც დაცულია ცვლილებებისგან და კრიტიკისგან არის “ურჩხული”, განსაკუთრებით დღეს; ამავე დროს მახინჯი“კულტურული” ტრადიციების დაცვა ცვლილებისგან შეუძლებელია, თუნდაც ამის სურვილი არსებობდეს. იგივე ტოტალიტარული სახელმწიფოებში, დიდი სირთულეებს განიცდიან “მავნე” საგარეო გავლენების ჩახშობისას, რაც კარგად გამოჩნდა სსრკ-ს მაგალითზე.

არ არის საჭირო, რომ არისტოფანისავით ვთქვათ “არ არსებობს ზევსი, მის ნაცვლად გრიგალი არის თურმე მეუფე”. მაგრამ დაუნახავი და მოულოდნელი ცვლილება გარდაუვალია, თუმცა  ექვემდებარება ასიმილაციას ნორმალურ პირობებში. განთავისუფლებულ საზოგადოებაში ცვლილებების უმეტესობა მცირედია – მსოფლიო არ იწყება თავიდან ყოველი ახალი დღით, რადგან არც ერთი ცენტრალიზირებულ ორგანოს/ხელისუფლებას არ აქვს ძალა მიიღოს გადაწყვეტილებები, რომლებიც მომენტალურად შეცვლიან მთელ საზოგადოებას. მაგრამ, ცვლილებები, რომლებიც თავისუფლებით მოდიან დრამატულია და უმეტეს შემთხვევაში  კეთილთვისებიანია ხალხისთვის.

ორიგინალური კოსმოპოლიტური ლიბერალიზმი, რასაც დღეს ლიბერტარიანიზმს ვუწოდებთ, განასახიერებს ამ ცხოვრების ფაქტს. ის ცვლილებას  ენთუზიაზმით აღიარებს. თავისუფლებადა კეთილდღეობა, რომელსაც ის ქმნის გვაძლევს საშუალებას შევეჭიდოთ გაურკვეველ მომავალს, რომელიც  ადამიანის მოქმედების შედეგია, მაგრამ არა ადამიანის განზრახვა, ისსპონტანურად იშლება ჩვენ წინ.  ჩვენ შეგვიძლია დავინახოთ ლიბერალიზმი (ლიბერტარიანიზმი), როგორც იდეოლოგია, რომელიც დგას კონსერვატიზმის/ ტრადიციონალიზმის დარაციონალიზმის/იაკობინელიზმის შორის.

როგორც ფ. ა. ჰაეკმა დაწერე “რატომ მე არ ვარ კონსერვატორი”: როგორც ბევრმა კონსერვატორმა მწერალმა აღნიშნა კონსერვატიზმის ერთ-ერთი ფუნდამენტური და დამახასიათებელინიშანია – ცვლილების შიში, სიახლის უნდობლობა, როდესაც ლიბერალური (ლიბერტარიანული) პოზიცია დაფუძნებული: სიმამაცეზე, მტკიცე  მზაობაზე თავისუფლებით მოსულმაცვლილებების მიმართ, იმ შემთხვევაშიც კი თუ ჩვენ არ ვიცით როგორ იქნება საბოლოო შედეგი.”

ჰაეკის გახსნილობა ცვლილებისკენ შეიძლება კონფლიქტში შევიდეს მის “კონსერვატიზმსთან” წიგნებში როგორიცაა “Constitution of Liberty” (1960) და “The Fatal Conceit” (1988)  (ფატალურიქედმაღლობა მდგომარეობს იმ რწმენაში რომ ჩვენი მორალი ქცევის პრინციპები არიან წარმოქმნილი აზროვნებისგან და არა სპონტანური სოციალური ევოლუციისაგან, რომელიც გაჩნდა, რადგან კაცობრიობა ეძებს უკეთეს ცხოვრებას). რეალურად არანაირი კონფლიქტი არ არსებობს, რადგან  “რატომ არ ვარ კონსერვატორი” არის  “Constitution of Liberty”-ის ბოლო სიტყვა.  როდესაც არ არსებობს ტრადიციას ალტერნატივა,  ადმიანი თვლის რომ ამ ტრადიციის ფასეულობა მის დღეგრძელობაში გამოიხატება.  (თუმცა ტრადიციის ხანგრძლივობა სულაც არნიშნავს რომ ის აუცილებლობად კარგია ან რაციონალური, ეგეთ კოსნერვატორული დაცვის მეთოდი სულაც არ არის ახალი,  ის  ჯერ კიდევ მოდის არისტოტელეს დროიდან. ამაზეშეგიძლიათ წაიკითხოთ: Reason and Value: Aristotle versus Rand..  გარკვეული ტრადიციის ხანგრძლივობა   რამდენად ნდობის ღირსიც არ უნდა იყოს არ ამართლებს ტრადიციების “გაყინვას”, რადგან ეს იქნებოდა მედიდურობის გამოხატვა ჩვენი ახლანდელი არასრულყოფილი ცოდნის მიმართ. ყველაფერს თავი რომ დაანებო, როდესაც დღევანდელი ტრადიციები სიახლე იყო: საიდან უნდა ვიცოდეთ რომ  არ არსებობს უფრო უკეთესი მეთოდებით ჩვენი მთავარი მიზნების მისაღწევად რაც არის საზოგადოებაში ადამიანის  აყვავება?  რატომ უნდა შევზღუდოთ თავიამ ცოდნის ძებნისგან ტრადიციის გამო? და რატომ ვთვლით, რომ ყველაფერი რაც მნიშვნელოვანია ცოდნისთვის მოინახება ჩვენ ეროვნულ საზღვრებს შიგნით? აქედანაც მოდის ლიბერალიკოსმოპოლიტიზმი, რაც ბერძნულად ნიშნავს მსოფლიო მოქალაქეს, რაც აგრეთვე გავრცელებული იყო სტოიკოს ფილოსოფოსების შორის, როგორიცაა რომის იმპერატორი კეისარი მარკუსავრელიუსი და ეპიქტეტუსი. (ეს ასევე გვახსენებს ადამ სმიტის დაკვირვებას რომ შრომის გაყოფა შეზღუდული მხოლოდ ბაზრის საზღვრებით)

ბევრი მეთოდი, რომელიც მიზნად ისახავდა ტრადიციის რომანტიზაციას და კულტურის დაკონსერვებას  გვასწავლიან სულ სხვა გაკვეთილს. გავიხსენოთ მიუზიკლი “მევიოლინე სახურავზე”​  (Fiddler on the Roof), რომელიც შალომ-ალეიხემის “მერძევე ტევიეს”, მიხედვითაა დადგმული. ამ ამბის პროტაგონისტი ტევიე​ იწყებს  შოუს იმ ტრადიციის დალოცვით, რომელმაც შესძლო, მისი და მისი მეზობლების (და წინამორბედების),  ბალანსის შენარჩუნება მრავალი წლის განმავლობაში, როგორც ის ამბობს ჩვენი ტრადიციით ყველამ იცის ვინ ვინ არის და რა სურს ღმერთსმისგან (ამავე დროს ის კითხულობს თუ როგორ დაიწყო ტრადიცია და ასევე პასუხობს რომ არ იცის, მაგრამ ეს ტრადიცია არის). შაბათის დროს კი ტევიე  და მისი ცოლი ლოცულობენ, რომღმერთმა დაიცავს მათი ხუთი ქალიშვილი “უცხოელების” გზისგან.

მაგრამ, მალევე ტრადიციული სტრუქტურა, რომელიც   ტევიეს რწმენით მისი გადარჩენის საშუალებაა, ინგრევა, და მას არ გააჩნია არანაირი ძალა შეაჩეროს ეს. როდესაც ის თანხმდებაგაათხოვოს თავისი უფროსი ქალიშვილი ცეიტლი, ბევრად ასაკოვან, მაგრამ შეძლებულ ადამიანზე, ვინც შერჩეული არის სოფლის მაჭანკლის მიერ. მაგრამ მისი ქალიშვილი მას სთხოვს ესარ გააკეთოს, რადგან მას უკვე ყავს შეყვარებული რომელთანაც მას სურს შეუღლება, ტევიეს პირველადი რეაქცია უარყოფითია თუმცა ის მალევე დაინახავს სიყვარულს თავისი შვილისთვალებში, ის მიხვდება, რომ მისი ქალიშვილის ბედნიერება უფრო მნშვნელოვანია ვიდრე ტრადიცია.

ცეიტლის განქორწინება ტრადიციისგან მხოლოდ დასაწყისია, ტევიეს მეორე ქალიშვილს, ჰოდლს, შეუყვარდება პერჩიკი, ღარიბი სტუდენტი კიევიდან, რომელიც სოფელში მიჩნეულირადიკილად, რადგან მას ჯერა რომ გოგოებმა უნდა მიიღონ განათლება, ასევე მისი ცეკვის გამო ჰოდლთან, ცეიტლის ქორწილზე. შეტევა ტრადიციაზე მხოლოდ მძაფრდება, როდესაცჰოდლი და პერჩიკი გადაწყვეტენ დაქორწინებას: ისინი არც კითხულობენ ნებართვას ტევიესგან, მხოლოდ და­ლოც­ვას, რაც არი დიდ დარტყმა ტრადიციაზე, თუმცა ღმერთთან დიალოგისასტევიე ამბობს რომ  “ოდესღაც ჩვენი ტრადიციები სიახლე იყვნენ” რაც არის გამანადგურებელი აზრის იმ ადამიანისთვის რომელსაც უნდა შვილების “უცხოელებისგან”  დაცვა. ტევიე თანხმდებადა აძლევს ნებართვას და დალოცვას მათ, როგორც ტევიე უხსნის თავის ცოლს: “ეს არის ახალი სამყარო, სადაც ხალხი ქორწინდება სიყვარულის გამო.” ამის შემდეგ ის კითხულობს თავისცოლს, რომელიც მან პირველად გაიცნო ქორწინების დღეს, “გოლდე გიყვარვარ?”. აშკარად  ტევიე უფრო დადებითად არის გაწყობილი ახალი სამყაროს მიმართ.

თუმცა მერძევე ტევიე  საბოლოოდ ხაზს უსვამს თავისი მესამე შვილის შემთხვევაში: ჩავა, რომელიც ცოლად გაჰყვება ახალგაზრდა რუსს. როდესაც ის ოჯახთან ერთად ტოვებს ანატევკას, ტევიე დალოცავს თავის მესამე შვილს და მის ქმარს, ტევიე ოჯახთან ერთად გადადის ნიუ-იორკში (როგორც ნაწარმოების ავტორი) და არა ტრადიციულ პალესტინაში. ეს ნაწარმოებიგვაჩვენებს რომ არც იზოლორებულ, ჰომონოგემურ  და ტრადიციულ საზოგადოებას შეუძლია გარესამყაროს ცვლილებისგან “თავდაცვა”. რა უნდოდა ამით ეთქვა შოლომ-ალეიხემს?  როგორ შეიძლება ადიდო ტრადიციონალიზმი და ამავე დროს აჩვენო მისი  გარადაუვალი დაშლა თავისუფლი ახლაგზრდების მიერ, რომლებსაც, მხოლოდ ბედნიერება სურთ? ამაში არისგაკვეთილი ყველა ჩვენგანისთვის განსაკუთრებით იმ ადმინებისთვის ვისაც უნდა “გახადონ ამერიკა ისევ დიდებული”.

გრიგალი მეფობს, იმის მიუხედავად ვის რა ოცნებები აქვს ან მცდელობები, რა თქმა უნდა, ეს არ ნიშნავს, რომ ყველა ცვლილება კარგია, მაგრამ ყველა ცვლილების აღმოფხვრა, მხოლოდიმიტომ რომ  აღმოფხვრა ცუდი ცვლილება უბრალოდ ამაო და გამოუსადეგარია. ასევე, ცვლილება, რომელიც ერთისთვის ცუდია შეიძლება სხვა ადამიანისთვის დადებითიც კი იყოს. ადამიანებს უნდა ჰქონდეთ სრული უფლება დაიცვან საკუთარი თავი ცვლილებისგან, რომელიც მათ არ მოსწონთ, მაგრამ სურათში არ უნდა  მოხდეს ადამიანის იძულება.

თავდაპირველი ლიბერალიზმის ისტორია სავსეა იდეებით რომელიც გულისხმობს გახსნილობას ცვლილების მიმართ, რაც არის კოსმოპოლიტიზმის შინაარსი, არის სასიცოცხლოდმნიშვნელოვანი კეთილდღეობისთვის. იდეების თავისუფალი და კონკურენტული გარემო ასევე, როგორც პროდუქტების და სერვისების, თავისუფალი ბაზარი იყო უმთავრესიღირებულება  თავდაპირველი  ლიბერალებისთვის, რადგან მათ იცოდნენ, რომ ეს გახსნილობა იყო აუცილებელი, რათა დაეშალათ უცოდინარობა, არა მხოლოდ იმაში თუ როგორც ჩვენვფიქრობთ, არამედ იმაშიც თუ როგორ ვცხოვრობთ ჩვენ.  ამით მათ აჩვენეს თავმდაბლობა – იმის გააზრება, რომ ჩვენ ცოდნას გააჩნია საზღვარი და ზუსტად ამიტომ საჭიროა იდეებისთავისუფალი ბაზარი.

ლეგენდარული ჯონ სტიუარტ მილი ზუსტად ამით არის ცნობილი, მოვიყვანოთ მისი ციტატას: “როგორც განსხვავებული შეხედულებების არსებობაა სასარგებლო იქამდე, ვიდრეადამიანების მოდგმა არასრულყოფილია, ისევე სასარგებლოა ცხოვ- რების განსხვავებული ექსპერიმენტების არსებობა; ისევე საჭიროა, რომ თავისუფალი სარბიელი მიეცეს ხასიათისსხვებისთვის არასაზი- ანო ტიპებს; და რომ ცხოვრების სხვადასხვა ფორმების ღირებულე- ბა პრაქტიკულად დამტკიცდეს, როცა ვინმე მათ მოსინჯვას მოინდო- მებს. მოკლედ, სასურველია, რომ საქმეებში, რომლებიც უმთავრესად სხვებს არ ეხება, ინდივიდუალურობამ თავისი სიტყვა თქვას. სადაც ქცევის წარმმართველია არა ადამიანის საკუთარი ხასიათი, არამედ სხვაადამიანების ტრადიციები და ჩვეულებები, იქ არასაკმარისად არის ადამიანის ბედნიერების ერთ-ერთი პრინციპული შემადგენე- ლი ნაწილი, რომელიც ინდივიდუალური და სოციალურიპროგრე- სის თითქმის მთავარი ინგრედიენტიცაა.”

Curating autobiographies, the Modernist movement, and the false promise of social media in the Trump era

This essay was written during the days following the events in Charlottesville, Virginia. As a means of sorting through the benefits of social media in establishing a political stance in the Trump era, I found myself at an impasse. With the worst of our collective dystopian nightmares unfolding before us, many dissenters (myself included) have turned to social media as a form of resistance. Yet upon further consideration, I noted a perhaps more chillingly dystopian consequence of the Trump era taking shape—that of a totalitarian narrative gradually beginning to write itself via social media. As we consider the use of social media platforms as tools of the resistance, we must also consider their role in the hands of the oppressors. This essay revisits a 1927 article by Virginia Woolf as a means of grappling with the notion of “truth” in the Trump era.

In the opening paragraph of her 1927 article “The New Biography,” Virginia Woolf articulates the problematic nature of life writing: the difficulty the biographer faces in uniting two opposing forces: truth and personality. Truth, Woolf notes, we deem as “something of granite-like solidity,” whereas personality encompasses a “rainbow-like intangibility.” For Woolf, writing in 1927, the art of biography presented its own challenges—yet today, with social media endowing anyone access to as many social apps as they please, the art of life writing—of wresting a consistent and truthful narrative from the ever-protean whims of personality, has become further problematized. If we actively curate, through texts, Facebook posts, Instagrams, and tweets, our own autobiographical narratives for our friends and family—public access to our profiles are effectively writing their own biographies of us. Just as Woolf presents an argument for the “new biography,” this essay argues that the promise of digital autobiographies is a false notion—that even in 2017 we wrestle to unite the “granite-like” truth with the “rainbow-like” personality.

 In the age of Donald Trump’s “fake news” and the terrifyingly Orwellian “alternative facts,” the notion of a “granite-like” truth prevailing in the splintered media is not a hopeful one. Woolf writes of the “truth biography demands…truth in its hardest, most obdurate form.” This is a vision of truth which she likens to the vast collections of the British Museum—“truth out of which all vapor of falsehood has been pressed by the weight of research.” Woolf’s allusion to a notion of a consistent, archival truth-behind-glass is, of course, in and of itself a reflection on the inconsistencies of truth—even when supposedly curated, archived, and preserved for the ages. Perhaps the most truly terrifying possibility the Trump era has provoked is that perhaps all facts are “alternative,” and all news, to some degree, “fake.”

However, Woolf’s article, carefully poised eight years following the end of World War I, and thirteen years before World War II, was published during a cautiously hopeful time for Europe. For the moment, it seemed, good had triumphed. The “Great War” was in the past, and the possibility of truth could prevail once again. For Woolf, perhaps there was “a virtue” in the concept of truth—perhaps, indeed, “an almost mystical power” inherent to the idea that if truth exists, so, perhaps can goodness or hope. That said, if 1926 was indeed an optimistic time for Europe—it was simultaneously an unprecedently prolific time for fiction. With the birth of the Modernist movement and the publication of James Joyce’s Ulysses in 1922, the idea of truth quickly took a backseat to what the melancholic Stephen Dedalus deemed “the ineluctable modality of the visible” (Joyce 37).

Whether Joyce’s A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, or Ulysses, or Woolf’s own Mrs. Dalloway should be read autobiographically is a question that has long plagued critics. Yet perhaps this question evades the issue at hand—that the very “British Museum” Truth-with-a-capital-T concept of truth never existed in the first place—that such a notion was bred, born, and raised only within the covers of history books, or behind the glass of a museum display. As Woolf remarks, it is largely nineteenth-century biography which sought to move past the idea that “life consists in actions only or in works” (Woolf 1). Indeed, Woolf affirms, life “consists in personality.” Stephen Dedalus, gazing into the darkness of his own eyelids, sees “all time without [him]” (Joyce 37). Mrs. Dalloway can’t remember how many years she’s lived in Westminster but is content with rounding up to “over twenty” (Mrs. Dalloway 4). Literary critics point to the Modernist period as the age of a revolution in style, yet such a distinction might be better articulated as a revolution of truth.

Indeed, it is this very stylistic revolution in the conception of truth which has culminated in what many consider today’s Cult of Personality. Narcissism, the most pathological by-product of this literary and cultural move inward, represents the ultimate subjugation of truth to personality. For Woolf, this movement inward owes its inception to the nineteenth-century trend within the genre of biography, as it “sought painstakingly and devotedly to express not only the outer life of work and activity but the inner life of emotion and thought” (Woolf 1). Such an emphasis on “the inner life of emotion” is exactly what the behemoth of social media feeds upon—and since, through social media, we are allowed to act as the authors of our own “inner life of emotion and thought,” we “painstakingly and devotedly” set ourselves to the task. Further, we do so without any fear of judgment. If writing an autobiography smacks of vanity—curating a social media account is mere de rigueur.

Whether logged into a Facebook account or live-tweeting our approval (or outrage) at any given moment, we are taking an active hand in shaping our autobiography—presenting the world with a written or visual account of our opinions, views, and personal histories. However, the account itself, regarded from an outside (public) perspective, is presenting a biography of its own, independent from our authorial voice. By taking an active role in curating our social media presence we are participating in the false notion that we can control the “truth” of our narrative. In commenting on biography in the early twentieth century, Woolf presciently notes that “the life which is increasingly real to us is the fictitious life,” as it “dwells in the personality rather than in the act.” Social media represents the pinnacle of this notion, as it exists within the duality of personality and truth.

The current political climate being as it is, Woolf’s argument that fiction, even in the early twentieth century, was gradually melding with the active experience of life, seems eerily prophetic. Donald Trump cannot wrest himself away from Twitter because he finds solace in the idea that he is the author of his own reality. For a man whose entire career has been built solely on his pugnacious personality, the granite colossus of truth is a difficult barrier to come up against. However, Trump’s frenetic Tweeting has betrayed him. As his approval rating continues to plummet, he takes to Twitter with more and more to prove—evidence be damned! “All news but my news is fake news”, he shrieks into the void. Yet, for most of the country, his protestations are empty. The shadow narrative of Donald Trump’s attempted autobiography-in-140-characters-or-less is the biography of a man desperate for approval. In an attempt to control his own narrative, Trump’s narrative has controlled him.

Not all examples are as extreme as that of Donald Trump—and most of us are guilty of abusing social media in this manner. In seeking to shape the narrative of our lives, we have created a complex online meta-narrative—an automated autobiography which writes itself for the public even as we curate private posts for family and friends. If, for Woolf, the work of the biographer is marked by difficulty because “truth of fact and truth of fiction are incompatible,” yet the modern biographer is “urged to combine them”, for the digital autobiographer the task is nearly impossible. That we are being written by our social media accounts is perhaps not so frightening a concept as “alternative facts,” yet each time we return to our online platforms with the hope that we might assert our own autobiographical truth we are participating in a similar rhetorical game. The action of asserting your own truth against all others contains the admission that other narratives are fiction—that ‘all news but my news is fake news.’

For Woolf, in 1927, the ultimate union of “granite and rainbow” remained elusive. “Consider one’s own life,” she urges, “pass under review a few years that one has actually lived. Conceive how Lord Morely would have expounded them; how Sir Sidney Lee would have documented them; how strangely all that has been the most real in them would have slipped through their fingers.” Biographers aside, consider your own representation of the previous year on Facebook or Twitter and you may see that all that was “the most real” has also somehow “slipped through” your own fingers. Indeed, as Woolf claims, we cannot “name the biographer whose art is subtle and bold enough to present that queer amalgamation of dream and reality, that perpetual marriage of granite and rainbow”; nor can we hope to attempt such an “art” ourselves. Social media has made a false promise—the truth of personality or the truth of experience are fundamentally ephemeral experiences; we are all still walking into the darkness grappling with the “ineluctable modality of the visible.”

Works Cited

Woolf, Virginia. Mrs. Dalloway. San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1990. Print.

— “The New Biography.” New York Herald Tribune. 30 October 1927. Print.

Joyce, James, and Hans W. Gabler. Ulysses. London: Vintage Classic, 2008. Print.

My chapter on “Anarchism and Libertarianism” is forthcoming in Nathan Jun, ed., Brill’s Companion to Anarchism and Philosophy (Leiden: Brill, 2017), at the usual insane Brill price. In the chapter I explore the relationship between libertarianism (in the free-market sense) and the anarchist movement, including the question whether anarcho-capitalism counts as a genuine form of anarchism. (My C4SS colleague Kevin Carson has a chapter in the book as well.)

According to the publisher, I’m only allowed to make 25 hard copies of the chapter – but I’m also allowed to post a copy online, so long as it’s on my personal website. That seems to me a bit like saying “No smoking allowed in this room, but it’s okay to set the bed on fire.” But okay, here’s a link to the chapter.

(My reference to capitalist labour markets as “oligopolistic” was supposed to be “oligopsonistic.” The editors changed it to “oligopolistic,” which of course has the opposite meaning; I changed it back in galleys, but it ended up “oligopolistic” in the final published text nonetheless. Sigh.)

I also have a chapter on “Minarchism on Seasteads” in Victor Tiberius, ed., Seasteads: Opportunities and Challenges for Small New Societies (Zurich: VDF, 2017). I explore options for constraining a seastead minarchy (essentially by incorporating as many anarchist features as possible; those who remember my articles from the FNF/LNF days will find my proposals familiar). Here’s the link.

(The version I’ve posted is the galley proofs with my corrections. No, of course the corrections did not make it into the final published text. Sigh again.)

Emmi Bevensee & Logan Yershov’s “Free Speech Dreams and Fascist Memes” is probably the single most thoughtful and nuanced defense of violently disrupting fascist assembly. Of particular note is the way that it draws out something lingering implicit in most other defenses of that tactic. This is what I will call the “disease theory of fascism.” For that reason, their essay deserves special attention.

Can You Catch the Fash?

Emmi & Logan’s post relies heavily on the highly controversial idea of memetics. I am personally strongly inclined to agree with critiques of memetics like the one Charles W. Johnson lays out here. Rather than reiterating those points, I want to focus specifically on its application in constructing a disease theory of fascism.

Throughout their discussion, Emmi & Logan talk about fascism like catching a cold, where it just jumps from one person to another, independent of the reasons and interpretations of either person. After contact, Emmi & Logan refer to fascists as “hosts” – the implication being that it’s more a case of the idea holding the fascist, rather than the fascist holding the idea.

As I said above, I’ll avoid making a full-scale critique of memetics here. However, this near-literal disease theory of fascism strikes me as particularly difficult to believe. So much so that I doubt Emmi & Logan would take it to its logical conclusions.

Those aware of antifa’s actual activities beyond the highly-publicized violence know that they spend a good deal of time researching fascist movements – listening to their podcasts, reading their articles, so on and so forth. This is also true of other anti-fascists. I know that I myself have spent far too much time these past few years consuming far-right material to understand the threat they pose. However, despite this close contact, there is no documented phenomenon of antifa activists or other anti-fascists becoming white supremacists en masse.[1] Apparently, it’s possible to digest the fash in pretty large quantities, over and over, for a long period of time without contracting it.

This might look like a strawman, implying something much stronger than was intended by the disease analogy. Yet it is this implausibly strong sense of fascism as a “disease” that Emmi & Logan implicitly operate under in their defense of “quarantining” that disease through violence, on the premise that “throwing facts at zombies does not work.”

When we move away from the near-literal infection framing, to a more metaphorical one, the disease metaphor is no longer sufficient to clearly get us their conclusions. Instead, we are left with the simpler observation that certain ideas fit better with certain personalities and methods of argumentation based on those ideas’ internal structure. The incentive structures given by those ideas, though, must still pass through the reasons and interpretations of those encountering them. Those features of fit are not buttons and levers that mechanically control our rejection or acceptance of ideas. We hold ideas, they do not hold us.

What is important about this difference is that it changes the way we see the surrounding circumstances in which ideas spread. The primary distinction between an idea and a germ is that the former has no power independent of human interpretation. This further means that the relevant circumstances to consider in controlling the spread of an idea are the social circumstances which frame our experience and influence interpretations. These circumstances are not physically given, they are products of human interaction.  

Therefore, figuring out how to best combat fascism can’t just be about looking at fascism’s features. It also has to involve evaluating what background conditions will make the appeals of fascism more plausible to those receiving those appeals.

Fascist Methods in the Context of Political Violence

Emmi & Logan do an excellent job outlining the sorts of biases, heuristics, and fallacies that fascists exploit. They also correctly identify the reason fascists rely on them so heavily. Fascism’s total inversion of liberalism gives it a disrespect for reason, mirroring liberalism’s reverence for it. It is a kind of anti-thought, and is therefore incentivized towards strategies that “appeal… not through reason, but by routing around reason.”

It is worth asking, then, whether these tactics fare better or worse against a background of violent conflict. We should closely consider how our tactics might affect the perspective of the marginal potential fascist, and therefore influence their interpretations of fascist appeals.[2]

Fascists, note Emmi & Logan, rely on a narrative that productive dialogue with non-whites – and realistically, with non-fascists – is impossible. This attempts to inflame already-pervasive in-group tendencies so that counter-arguments will be ignored.

It is difficult to imagine what we, as anti-fascists, could do to better help that narrative than to explicitly affirm the idea that dialogue is impossible and any engagement must be one of physical force. Similarly, their teamspeak and anti-intellectualism have higher salience against the backdrop of events like “the Battle of Berkeley” where all that we see are two “sides” facing off with violence. Richard Spencer himself seems to take particular glee when clashes break out. There he can appeal to listeners that if you are a white person on the right, it does not matter if you actually are a white nationalist – you will be targeted as if you are. For the purposes of his propaganda, it does not matter whether or not the people attacked in any given case actually were non-fascists. It just matters that he has been given a context with which he can make the claim.

Fascist attempts to control the narrative, either by promulgating falsehoods or labeling truth as falsehood, also have more uptake when political violence becomes normalized. When you are worried – rightly or wrongly – about your physical safety, you grasp onto any information you can get your hands on. When a group has explicitly affirmed the use of political violence, it is especially easy to concoct fictional stories of political violence about them. When a group becomes associated with political violence, it also becomes easier to argue that the information they’re giving you is false. After all, it is normally plausible to suggest that a person comfortable with assault and battery is comfortable with libel and slander.

Fascism’s pretense of forbidden knowledge is also amplified in a context where fascists are being physically attacked. Combined with the lie that their opposition is just a bunch of Marxists and progressives, they can claim to be the most serious opponents of the totalitarian and authoritarian left.

This feeds into the fact that fascists, as Emmi & Logan note, regularly claim that aggression and domination are inevitable. This appeal is meant to provoke the listener into ignoring ethical concerns and choosing to “defend themselves” by becoming a fascist. A context of political violence draped in WWII memes can make some more receptive to that argument. That context can also instill a sense of nihilism – that what matters is not abstract values, what matters is being on the winning side of an inevitable war.

Finding the Cure

I also want to note that there is much I agree with in Emmi & Logan’s article. In my last post, I said that we needed something more sustainable than “No Platform” but more quickly available than “civilization” to deal with this sudden surge of fascists. Much of what they say in the section titled “Part 3: Winning the Meme War” gives us an idea of those tools that lie between “No Platform” and “civilization.”

That discussion is also couched in a memetics framework, but the basic ideas do not require it. We ought to both help those susceptible to fascism’s appeals realize the seriousness of what they’re getting into and provide a space for them to exit. We ought to familiarize ourselves with fascist ideas so that we can better spot and combat them. We ought to expose fascist misinformation and promulgate easily digestible corrections. So on and so forth.

However, notice again how stepping away from the overly literal disease theory of fascism repositions these points. We must take stock of the way that surrounding circumstances will impact people’s interpretive frameworks. This is what I meant in my first post by saying that the decision to use aggressive violence as a tactic is necessarily a decision to use aggressive violence as your primary tactic. Because it creates a new context around which all other tactics must adjust. For the reasons I have given here and previously, the fundamentally liberal tactics of discursive warfare lose their force when shoved into a context of political violence.  

[1] There are of course assorted cases – see the Atlantic profile on Andrew Anglin, which notes that in high school he had a “FUCK RACISM” patch on his backpack, and well into his 20s bemoaned the effects of white influence on the globe. However, as that profile shows, there are several unique things about Anglin’s personality that make him an exception. Furthermore, his lapse into ideological racism does not appear to have initially come from contact with racist ideas.

[2] This is obviously not to say that the perspective the marginal potential fascist is the one that most morally matters. In fact, if someone is already in the position of being a marginal potential fascist, there’s probably something very blameworthy about the way they’ve cultivated themselves that’s gotten them there. The ultimate blame for them becoming fascists, if they do, is on them. My purpose here, though, is to talk frankly about strategy and tactics. The stakes are too high for us to ignore what works due to misplaced and misused moralizing.

Di T. J. Scholl. Originale pubblicato il 26 febbraio 2016 con il titolo Drug Users Do Not Require State Supervision. Traduzione di Enrico Sanna.

I centri per il consumo controllato non sono un fenomeno nuovo. Sono luoghi designati dallo stato, diffusi in Europa da oltre vent’anni, in cui i tossicodipendenti possono iniettarsi sostanze stupefacenti legalmente e sotto il controllo di personale medico. Il concetto suscitò attenzione diffusa negli Stati Uniti nel 2003, quando aprì il primissimo centro, Insite, a Vancouver. Tredici anni dopo, questo è ancora l’unico luogo in tutto il continente in cui il possesso e l’uso di sostanze ricreative controllate dal governo federale (con l’eccezione della marijuana) non è un reato punibile con il carcere. Svante Myrick, sindaco di Ithaca, cerca di cambiare la situazione con l’istituzione di un centro a New York. Purtroppo per lui, però, ai guardiani antidroga non interessa la salute dei tossicodipendenti. Per loro, l’uso della droga deve essere sradicato. Al diavolo la riduzione del danno.

Tanto per essere chiaro, l’abolizione di tutte le leggi che delimitano i termini del possesso, l’uso e la vendita di sostanze psicoattive è di importanza primaria se si vuole diffondere la libertà chimica in America. Negli Stati Uniti, il discorso attorno alle droghe è immensamente problematico; anche i sedicenti contrari alla criminalizzazione su vasta scala notano che l’antidroga è sterile. Sia i liberal democratici che i repubblicani di tendenza “libertaria”, che teoricamente sarebbero a favore di misure che permettano l’apertura di centri per il consumo controllato, citano spesso il fatto che una tattica basata sul carcere non influisce sull’uso delle droghe e sulla dipendenza. Questo è vero. Ma, e se non fosse così? E se il carcere funzionasse? Cosa direbbero questi politici cosiddetti socialmente progressisti se criminalizzare la dipendenza, rinchiudere i tossicodipendenti e rovinare famiglie dimostrasse l’efficacia della crociata antidroga?

Offrire a chi ne ha bisogno un posto in cui poter usare legalmente le droghe è indubbiamente una buona cosa, ma non dovrebbe essere necessario. Il fatto che questi centri si stiano diffondendo non significa che lo stato cambia atteggiamento davanti all’uso della droga, ma solo che cambia il modo di controllare. Quando, ad esempio, i ficcanaso dell’epoca, di orientamento politico o medico, arrivarono alla conclusione che l’abuso di oppiacei richiedeva qualcosa più dell’arresto di spacciatori e del controllo di false ricette, si optò per terapie sostitutive basate sul metadone, obbligando i tossicodipendenti consenzienti a seguire un regime farmacologico fortemente restrittivo e completamente impersonale, pensato apposta per tenere a bada le loro abitudini degenerate mentre lo stato monitorava da vicino il loro comportamento; tutto nel nome del bene collettivo. Secondo il filosofo postmoderno Michel Foucault, il trattamento psichiatrico obbligatorio è una semplice applicazione pratica dell’obbedienza, per quanto molto più sottile e dall’apparenza meno violenta. Quest’opinione particolare è illuminante in un’epoca in cui tossicodipendenti e altri disgraziati vengono privati della loro capacità d’agire e costretti ad accettare “trattamenti” disumanizzanti per non finire in galera.

La medicalizzazione della droga e della dipendenza in assenza della libertà non è altro che una dittatura clinica, e l’istituzione di centri per il consumo controllato sotto l’egida dello stato non cambia la sostanza. È un bene che si cerchi di ampliare le possibilità degli individui di fare uso delle droghe senza incorrere in criminalizzazioni, ma è anche bene non solo mettere fine alla distruttiva guerra alla droga, ma anche all’approccio paternalistico riabilitativo. Sottoporre a controllo la vita dei tossicodipendenti ricorrendo al carcere o al trattamento obbligatorio serve solo a privarli del diritto di scegliere liberamente e a stigmatizzare ulteriormente la loro esistenza. Un tossicodipendente non è né un dipendente senza speranze né un mostro degenere, e soprattutto non ha bisogno del controllo statale.