interesting, I just read that anarchist regions in spain during the civil war had prisons with dadaist murals inside them& Iam sure you would agree some people in prison deserve to be there. I was abused including sexually as child & know other activists who were, many of people that did that deserve to be in some kind of prison with some form of true rehab & conditioning to be humane.
CNT also voted largely for the Republican coalition government that helped us achieve a temporary revolutionary classless society. We must be better prepared tp defend democracy if we achieve with parties who use consensus & delegation.
We put a lot of people off with images of half baked insurrection, warfare sucks. Anarchism is a state with as little form of government as possible with power of hand of community. We live in a shit system, but its not really worse than anything else in the history of humanity, 10,000 years ago wasn't a nice picnic,we evolved from neanderthals who lived viciously.
Violent propaganda of the deed is often what the corporate states wants to crack down, many examples include the assasination of a US President by a Republican party member blamed on anarchists, to the Reichstag fire which is proven Hitler staged to become dictator blamed on anarchists also.
Most people are still conned to think we live in some form of democracy, we havent got through to most people about this but we are, lets not revert to violence except in self defence. The system is part of our evolution like it or not.
Ive been battered by thugs & some in the police & defended myself with comrades, though in coming struggles ahead, we have to make more solidarity & show that the sick corporate system is prepared to replace workers from printers at Wapping, to metal workers & the police-army with robots programmed for warfare. This idea is only seen by society as a movie film script, though we know & can prove its happening & we can offer a way out for planet earth,
Lets not revert to the chaos corporations want,
For revolution, insurrections are not enough

interesting& brave myspace, I just read that anarchist regions in spain during the civil war had prisons with dadaist murals inside them& Iam sure you would agree some people in prison deserve to be there. I was abused including sexually as child & know other activists who were, many of people that did that deserve to be in some kind of prison with some form of true rehab & conditioning to be humane.
CNT also voted largely for the Republican coalition government that helped us achieve a temporary revolutionary classless society. We must be better prepared tp defend democracy if we achieve with parties who use consensus & delegation.
We put a lot of people off with images of half baked insurrection, warfare sucks. Anarchism is a state with as little form of government as possible with power of hand of community. We live in a shit system, but its not really worse than anything else in the history of humanity, 10,000 years ago wasn't a nice picnic,we evolved from neanderthals who lived viciously.
Violent propaganda of the deed is often what the corporate states wants to crack down, many examples include the assasination of a US President by a Republican party member blamed on anarchists, to the Reichstag fire which is proven Hitler staged to become dictator blamed on anarchists also.
Most people are still conned to think we live in some form of democracy, we havent got through to most people about this but we are, lets not revert to violence except in self defence. The system is part of our evolution like it or not.
Ive been battered by thugs & some in the police & defended myself with comrades, though in coming struggles ahead, we have to make more solidarity & show that the sick corporate system is prepared to replace workers from printers at Wapping, to metal workers & the police-army with robots programmed for warfare. This idea is only seen by society as a movie film script, though we know & can prove its happening & we can offer a way out for planet earth,
Lets not revert to the chaos corporations want,
For revolution, insurrections are not enough

Anarchism in Spain was directly fighting fascism with treacherous Stalinist 'allies', and they were bound to their treatment of prisoners by a set of international guidelines that were drawn up by people who expected a war between states - states always had prisons. What they did on the world's most important battle is not what they would have done in peace in a civilised society. 400 years ago each wee village in the UK had a house to lock people up in. They became poorhouses, they became workhouses, they became prisons. Same thing really, just on a bigger scale.

We lock up more people than Turkey, and often in worse conditions for political reasons, to abuse freedom of speech. And there are people who pretend to be anarchists, like LibCom stalwarts, who want this to continue, who want anarchist prisons and therefore anarchist wardens and anarchist judges and judiciary and police and anarchist laws and anarchist bye-laws. If you are one of those people I have to say, you are no fucking anarchist calling for laws and for law enforcers, you're a fascist or a communist. Figure that out for your self.

And yet I meet some revolutionary communists who totally agree with my emphasis that it is implicit that anarchist oppose all laws.

I am often asked what do I call to be put in the place of prisons ? I would suggest wheatfields. I would ask in return, what do societys that don't or didn't have prisons do to tackle this problem of your perception that everyone dereves to be punished by a state ?

but what would you do with paedophiles and the like? If they are still a threat to society they need to be restrained until they cease to be so, also a large proportion of society likes to see that such people are never allowed back into society.

But yeah, we lock up too many people, and we lock up the wrong people (if anyone should be facing a prison cell it should be Blair, Bush and their fellow war criminals, maybe have Brown and Mugabe sharing the same cell!)

"but what would you do with paedophiles and the like?"

You sign yourself 'someone in the real world'. In the UK that means someone in a dangerous and violent capitalist society, where the sudden removal of protective social measures such as the police and judiciary would inevitably make things worse. Gangsters would flourish, child abusers would roam unsupervised, people accused of serious offences would be lynched often unfairly.

Not a great argument for anarchism so far is it ? Except if all our police, prisons and judges disappeared overnight, the UK would not be an anarchist society. An anarchist society is not only free from state intervention, it consists of masss participation in every aspect of community. Hopefully, a true anarchist society would breed less damaged people, there would be fewer systems power to grind people down. Your example of paedophilia is most apt. I think most sexual crimes are crimes of power and control, mostly instigated by people who feel they have little control in their own lives ( including their own sexuality ) and so wish to tke their part in the heirarchy of abuse by abusing others in turn.

So it isn't for me to say what any anarchist society should do, any true anarchist society would ignore my advice anyway. In terms of the prsion argument all I have to do is point out that the prison system is the sharp end of the attack on our working class, it is immoral and unjust and unsustainable. In terms of prisons though, as in most aspects of community, we often make the mistake of trying to imagine a decent, innovative replacement for an obscene and damaging power structure *just because it currently exists* while we are often better off examining what do societies that don't or didn't have prisons do "with paedophiles and the like".

"An anarchist society is not only free from state intervention, it consists of masss participation in every aspect of community."

Herein lies the problem. At the moment there are about (conservative estimate) a few thousand activists in this country of varying convictions and commitments, of which some identify with anarchism in this country. Out of a population of 60 million, that isn't much. Now for there to be "mass participation in every aspect of community" then it will require the vast majority of society to become active. If that isn't a major enough obsticle, we also have to defeat the reactionary agenda of the mainstream press and politics which will try anything to prevent this mass participation from happening. It's a big task, and personally I don't see it happening in my lifetime, although thats no excuse to not try, and show support and solidarity with the small pockets of resistance that occur every now and then.

I forgot to say, the pdf download is brilliant and covers so much ground in a single issue that I'll be printing off lots of copies of it - does anyone have a link to the previous issue ?


"well anarchism is a pipe dream until apathy is defeated"

I realise that was a title and therefore abrupt but lots of people would disasgree with that. Even anarchists feel apathetic sometimes, and many are quite positive about indolence.

"Herein lies the problem. At the moment there are about (conservative estimate) a few thousand activists in this country of varying convictions and commitments, of which some identify with anarchism in this country. Out of a population of 60 million, that isn't much."

I agree that figure is conservative but anyway, by expanding or contracting your definition of the word activist would expand or contract that figure. I know anarchists who decry activism, and many more who believe in direct action but who aren't at a point in their life where they feel able to pursue it.

"Now for there to be "mass participation in every aspect of community" then it will require the vast majority of society to become active."

Well, we don't need to think of our community in terms of the state of the UK. My community is primarily for me my family and my neighbours which is perhaps more tribal than anarchic but when push goes to shove these are the people I rely on to combat fascism. Other people like to live in communes or squats or huddle up into collectives as their community. So in those terms, the vast majority of people in those societies are active, and I would say that covers millions of people not thousands. Most people break unfair or illogical laws if they think they can get away with it. That's anarchist, that is.

"If that isn't a major enough obsticle, we also have to defeat the reactionary agenda of the mainstream press and politics which will try anything to prevent this mass participation from happening. It's a big task, and personally I don't see it happening in my lifetime, although thats no excuse to not try, and show support and solidarity with the small pockets of resistance that occur every now and then."

I agree strongly, especially about encouraging small pockets of resistance. Our free press is the wizard of oz with the elite behind the curtain, and we are selected for obedience and punished for independence so often in our daily lives that most people begin to think of it as natural, and they treat others this way, even within independent media. It is unlikely that everyone in the UK will break that cycle anytime soon so I don't see it as my task to persuade a coward-slave to choose the risk of freedom.

Prisons are models of the state that created them. The few prisoners who withstand the bribery and the psychological and physical oppression and who still stand up for their rights are our societies bleeding edge.
Every prisoner and prison officer knows that the mandatory drugs testing designed to reduce drug use in prisons turned every dope head prisoner into junkies. That is either a prime example that 'the law is an ass' and even well-meaning legislation is damaging to society, or deliberately to manufacture a demand for British grown Afghan opium.