In a speech last month about proposed gun control legislation, President Obama decried opponents’ attempts to encourage “suspicion about government.” “The government’s us,” he responded. “These officials are elected by you. They are constrained as I am constrained, by a system that our founders put in place.” But if government were “us,” why would we…

C4SS Media presents Voltairine de Cleyre‘s “The Gates of Freedom“, read and edited by Nick Ford. The Gates of Freedom is probably one of Voltairine’s least known essays even though it’s probably one of her longer and more important ones. This essay is in much the same spirit of her classic essay, Sex Slavery but instead of talking about…

The Gates of Freedom is probably one of Voltairine’s least known essays even though it’s probably one of her longer and more important ones. This essay is in much the same spirit of her classic essay, Sex Slavery but instead of talking about the general phenomenon, here Voltairine mostly focuses on arguments that justify this…

I recently translated a chronicle of the recent violent crackdown on the Alberdi Hall artists collective in Buenos Aires, Argentina. It’s a perfect case study of statist attack on public property, on an autonomous initiative that produced a highly valued cultural offering for the community with a clear potential of standing on its own financial…

In the final speech Avrich collected in The First Mayday, Voltairine explains why August Spies and the martyrs all alike held the traits of the common-man and why this is an admirable trait. She goes at length admitting many so-called “faults” of the common-man but then reversing the dialogue and conversation and showing it as…

“I don’t try to make you believe something you don’t believe, but to make you do something you won’t do.” — Ludwig Wittgenstein “Over and over, you’re falling, and then catching yourself from falling. And this is how you can be walking and falling at the same time.” — Laurie Anderson I’ve written before about the importance of Thomas Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions for left-libertarians. Here’s another…

Throughout most of this speech Voltairine recounts a recent article on the subject of the Haymarket Affair and both gives it limited amounts of praise and a lot more harsh critique where she thinks it deserves it. She points out that she didn’t believe Lingg’s lover at the time gave him the bomb and it’s…

The University of Oklahoma chapter of Students for a Stateless Society hosted a lecture on direct action by OU Philosophy Professor Stephen Ellis on May 1. The lecture begins at about 2:15. http://youtu.be/wkysvpKvKMY

Here, Voltairine recounts why the act that the martyrs did was noble and uses several biblical verses and references throughout to (ironically) prove or add to her points (this was a favorite rhetorical device of Voltairine’s throughout her writings). The end of this speech and the notation of “the judgement” reflects Voltairine’s continuing belief of…

C4SS Technology Coordinator and Stateless Ex-American, Mike Gogulski, was recently interviewed for an RT segment covering former US Citizens that have renounced their citizenship for tax reason or, in the case of Mike, moral reasons. http://youtu.be/-R4aodLwB54 “RT segment from April 15, 2013 in “honor” of US income tax day. Features noted figures Jet Li and Eduardo Saverin, who recently…

This speech is notable for quite a few things. The beginning part in which Voltairine admits that she had, at first, openly dismissed the martyrs and cheered for their death to be had. This gives us the whole reason (or at least one of the major ones) for why Voltairine did these speeches: a matter…

In a new paper in the Cato Institute’s Policy Analysis, K. William Watson and Sallie James contend that American companies have increasingly used domestic “regulation as a way to disguise protectionist policy,” a growing problem that advantages U.S. companies at the expense of consumers. The authors counsel a skepticism toward “regulatory proposals backed by the…

Os governos francês, britântico e israelense, todos eles, acusaram o regime da Síria de usar armas químicas em sua luta em andamento com rebeldes apoiados pelo estrangeiro. O Secretário-Geral das Nações Unidas Ban Ki-Moon está urgindo Assad para que permita inspetores das Nações Unidas no país para confirmar ou refutar as alegações. E o presidente dos Estados Unidos, Barack…

In the time after the Haymarket Affair it was most likely pretty common to have many big questions in the anarchist “scene” at the time about the incident. One of which was probably, “was the sacrifice worth it?” “how should we feel about it?” and in the first speech in this compilation de Cleyre tries…

Today is May Day, or International Worker’s Day: an international day for celebrating the achievements of workers and the struggle for organized labor. You might have thought that the proper day was Labor Day, as traditionally celebrated on the first Monday in September. Not so; the federal holiday known as Labor Day is actually a Gilded Age bait-and-switch from 1894. It was crafted…

Carson: A imposição de linhas imaginárias traçadas num mapa resulta em condição “illegal” para muitos seres humanos que, a despeito de ser puramente imaginária em sua base moral, é muitíssimo real em seus efeitos.

The French, British and Israeli governments have all accused Syria’s regime of using chemical weapons in its ongoing struggle with foreign-backed rebels. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon is urging Assad to allow UN inspectors into the country to verify or disprove the claims. And US president Barack Obama, while carefully avoiding a direct accusation, has…

Jay: The term excessive use of force underplays the issue. Assault and battery is a crime. It’s not simply a matter for an internal disciplinary process.

Knapp: The only thing “libertarian” I can find in it is Levy’s claim to be one.

Carson: Capitalism may have many varieties, types or flavors, but they all have one thing in common – they have nothing to do with a free market.