Thank you for articulating this. I was also raised Catholic and have accumulated a lot of meaning-making stories and over the years, but never stray far from this fundamentally anchoring belief that our human flaws are not, like, mystical or noble, but actual flaws that make us kind of annoying and unreliable and super wrong about a lot -- and that our path is to know that fully and still try hard every day to greet each other with "I got you." Sometimes the way I think about it is this -- if you were sitting next to someone on an airplane that was going down, and you knew it was going down and you both were going to die, would you hold their hand? We're all gonna die someday, we might as well hold hands (unless you're trying to kill me before we hit the ground, I guess). "An army of fuckups" sounds so much more fun and badass than that though.
It's exhausting watching us be so much worse at compassion and acceptance than them. I staunchly believe that ICE would be half it's miniscule (relatively) size if we were giving these guys healthier places to be. I don't think all marginalized people should have to personally forgive anyone or anything like that, but we're not even backing them into a corner anymore. It's more like off a cliff. And it's exhausting being sure of how much better things would be going if we weren't. But hey, fuck ups gonna fuck up, right? Something something, serenity something. (I actually love that prayer but that's funnier.)
Yeah, it's messy and complicated, and also I find myself coming back again and again to the paraphrased words of Viktor Frankl: "Of course I'd do psychoanalysis with Hitler, because at the end he wouldn't be Hitler anymore."
Creating off-ramps & exit doors for fascists is genuinely life-saving work for them and us, and I'm glad there are people doing it, even if that's not my specific lane atm.
For better or for worse, your writing is what gives me the most hope. I would love to be able to find a local community of people with similar mindsets. I will have to try harder.
Sign me up, the army of fuckups shall stand together. And I have been an anarchist all my life, since I recall arguing over empty houses, and homeless folks, at the ripe age of 5 or 6!
I'm going through what feels like a mid-2010s whisper-network "cancel"/isolation kerfuffle right now and I really needed to read something like this to reground into stuff I thought we'd all spent the last decade or more learning (but of course it's never that simple, we're all coming to organizing & community at different points and from different places). grateful that the universe always seems to put the writing I need in front of me at the exact right moments, whether that's because of some benevolent winds or my own mind finding what I need wherever it can.
I was asked to make a list of my 6 favourite words. I couldn't do it. I tried half a dozen times - each time they were different, all but one word. Each list had the word CHAOS. It's my favourite word, I use it a lot. When I'm talking. When I write. And when I read it out, everyone said, "YES, that is your favourite word!".
I think this probably brings me into your post above........
Thanks for this from Sweden, where we watch the socialists and leftists scramble to tear each other down over minutiae while the center-right and fascist minotrity join elbows to muscle their will over the top of the rest of us. Imperfect progress is incremental and hard, but it's the Work.
Beautiful and much needed and appreciated piece! I, too, was raised Catholic. Was alienated by the gross hypocrisy and narrow-mindedness and had nothing to do with the church for nearly half a century, then obliquely returned by attending an interdenominational seminary in Vancouver, BC, and becoming the first openly queer-identified trans priest ordained in the Anglican Church of Canada in the Diocese of New Westminster, BC.
Early formation in the Catholic tradition, I’ve found, frequently imparts an indelible foundation in some pretty powerful values, including love for and solidarity with others and with creation, a willingness to risk and sacrifice for what we believe in, and—as you say—the conviction that we are all flawed, but that forgiveness is not only possible, but imperative. Too bad that the faith’s great values so often get buried in petty intolerance, dogmatism, guilt, literalism, and fear.
Thanks for the article! On the memorial plaque at Waldheim Cemetery in Chicago, where Lingg, Spies, Fischer, Engel, and Parsons are buried, someone wrote in marker: “First they took your life. Now they're erasing your memory.”
I would have written it differently: “First they took your life. Now they're erasing the memory of you.”
Because who wants to co-opt anarchists today? In Germany, the history of the Free Workers' Union (FAUD), which was first sabotaged by social democratic and communist trade union organizations and then destroyed by fascism, has been almost forgotten. The anarchist movement in Germany has not recovered from this to this day. Today, anarcho-syndicalist union work is a tough nut to crack.
Haymarket was also a turning point in many ways, claiming the lives of many people who were important and irreplaceable to anarchism. The judge who sent our comrades to the gallows at that time did not need any evidence of a connection between the defendants and the bombing. Rather, Joseph Gary argued that the bomber had acted on the basis of the men's ideas and that they were therefore just as guilty as if they had carried out the attack themselves.
But every rupture also brings something new. In this case, Haymarket brought worldwide attention to the labor movement and initiated the tradition of May Day with its labor rallies in many cities.
It is important to remember the origins and character of May Day again and again. Then it will not be possible to erase the memory of our martyrs. No matter how “perfect” they were.
Your background reminds me of one of my favorite radicals, Paolo Freire. I’m convinced that there is an affinity between Christianity and anarchism. I’m trying to find it.
Before you know it dawn is breaking and the hobbit you were planning to eat is long gone!
fuck this is my new favorite Tolkien metaphor i'm going to use it daily. thank you!
Thank you for articulating this. I was also raised Catholic and have accumulated a lot of meaning-making stories and over the years, but never stray far from this fundamentally anchoring belief that our human flaws are not, like, mystical or noble, but actual flaws that make us kind of annoying and unreliable and super wrong about a lot -- and that our path is to know that fully and still try hard every day to greet each other with "I got you." Sometimes the way I think about it is this -- if you were sitting next to someone on an airplane that was going down, and you knew it was going down and you both were going to die, would you hold their hand? We're all gonna die someday, we might as well hold hands (unless you're trying to kill me before we hit the ground, I guess). "An army of fuckups" sounds so much more fun and badass than that though.
Becoming more tolerant of the leftists who won't shut up at meetings is the work of a lifetime.
I anticipate I will become that good of a person approximately 10 seconds before reaching enlightenment.
It's exhausting watching us be so much worse at compassion and acceptance than them. I staunchly believe that ICE would be half it's miniscule (relatively) size if we were giving these guys healthier places to be. I don't think all marginalized people should have to personally forgive anyone or anything like that, but we're not even backing them into a corner anymore. It's more like off a cliff. And it's exhausting being sure of how much better things would be going if we weren't. But hey, fuck ups gonna fuck up, right? Something something, serenity something. (I actually love that prayer but that's funnier.)
I'm just gonna keep trying.
Yeah, it's messy and complicated, and also I find myself coming back again and again to the paraphrased words of Viktor Frankl: "Of course I'd do psychoanalysis with Hitler, because at the end he wouldn't be Hitler anymore."
Creating off-ramps & exit doors for fascists is genuinely life-saving work for them and us, and I'm glad there are people doing it, even if that's not my specific lane atm.
For better or for worse, your writing is what gives me the most hope. I would love to be able to find a local community of people with similar mindsets. I will have to try harder.
Same. <3
Sign me up, the army of fuckups shall stand together. And I have been an anarchist all my life, since I recall arguing over empty houses, and homeless folks, at the ripe age of 5 or 6!
I'm going through what feels like a mid-2010s whisper-network "cancel"/isolation kerfuffle right now and I really needed to read something like this to reground into stuff I thought we'd all spent the last decade or more learning (but of course it's never that simple, we're all coming to organizing & community at different points and from different places). grateful that the universe always seems to put the writing I need in front of me at the exact right moments, whether that's because of some benevolent winds or my own mind finding what I need wherever it can.
I was asked to make a list of my 6 favourite words. I couldn't do it. I tried half a dozen times - each time they were different, all but one word. Each list had the word CHAOS. It's my favourite word, I use it a lot. When I'm talking. When I write. And when I read it out, everyone said, "YES, that is your favourite word!".
I think this probably brings me into your post above........
thank you.
Thanks for this from Sweden, where we watch the socialists and leftists scramble to tear each other down over minutiae while the center-right and fascist minotrity join elbows to muscle their will over the top of the rest of us. Imperfect progress is incremental and hard, but it's the Work.
Beautiful and much needed and appreciated piece! I, too, was raised Catholic. Was alienated by the gross hypocrisy and narrow-mindedness and had nothing to do with the church for nearly half a century, then obliquely returned by attending an interdenominational seminary in Vancouver, BC, and becoming the first openly queer-identified trans priest ordained in the Anglican Church of Canada in the Diocese of New Westminster, BC.
Early formation in the Catholic tradition, I’ve found, frequently imparts an indelible foundation in some pretty powerful values, including love for and solidarity with others and with creation, a willingness to risk and sacrifice for what we believe in, and—as you say—the conviction that we are all flawed, but that forgiveness is not only possible, but imperative. Too bad that the faith’s great values so often get buried in petty intolerance, dogmatism, guilt, literalism, and fear.
Thanks for the article! On the memorial plaque at Waldheim Cemetery in Chicago, where Lingg, Spies, Fischer, Engel, and Parsons are buried, someone wrote in marker: “First they took your life. Now they're erasing your memory.”
I would have written it differently: “First they took your life. Now they're erasing the memory of you.”
Because who wants to co-opt anarchists today? In Germany, the history of the Free Workers' Union (FAUD), which was first sabotaged by social democratic and communist trade union organizations and then destroyed by fascism, has been almost forgotten. The anarchist movement in Germany has not recovered from this to this day. Today, anarcho-syndicalist union work is a tough nut to crack.
Haymarket was also a turning point in many ways, claiming the lives of many people who were important and irreplaceable to anarchism. The judge who sent our comrades to the gallows at that time did not need any evidence of a connection between the defendants and the bombing. Rather, Joseph Gary argued that the bomber had acted on the basis of the men's ideas and that they were therefore just as guilty as if they had carried out the attack themselves.
But every rupture also brings something new. In this case, Haymarket brought worldwide attention to the labor movement and initiated the tradition of May Day with its labor rallies in many cities.
It is important to remember the origins and character of May Day again and again. Then it will not be possible to erase the memory of our martyrs. No matter how “perfect” they were.
In this sense, I am grateful to Margaret for the text, which I have translated into German as usual: https://www.trueten.de/archives/13876-Jeder-von-uns-ist-ein-unvollkommener-Genosse-oder-Eine-Armee-von-Versagern-kann-nicht-verlieren.html
Your background reminds me of one of my favorite radicals, Paolo Freire. I’m convinced that there is an affinity between Christianity and anarchism. I’m trying to find it.
💖💖💖