American anarchists meaninglessly devour themselves at Portland Conference

[Nigel Irritable]

Here's a pastebin version of some of the facebook "Shut down Kristian Williams!" campaign leading up to the conference incident: http://pastebin.com/LsmM3N4t

I had a somewhat forlorn hope that this would contain an argument that Williams should be censored rather than an argument that he's a dick who is wrong about a local row and wrong more generally. Instead the former is assumed on the basis of a claim of the latter.

 

[cesare]

I had a somewhat forlorn hope that this would contain an argument that Williams should be censored rather than an argument that he's a dick who is wrong about a local row and wrong more generally. Instead the former is assumed on the basis of a claim of the latter.

I'm not sure if that pastebin is representative of the facebook campaign. Maybe it's still on facebook somewhere ...

 

[Nigel Irritable]

On a wider note, "gas lighting" is one of the more interesting concepts from the "new identity politics" package. It describes a real phenomenon, borrowing from clinical psychology, but it can also be very effectively deployed as an all purpose defence of irrationality. Indeed skilfully wielded it can turn any attempt to point out unreasonableness into a disastrous misstep.

That sort of use fits very well with a general privileging of the subjective.

(This is not meant as a direct reference to the pastebin piece which discusses events and arguments I know nothing about)

 

[J Ed]

Ironically, these sorts of accusations of gaslighting can be a form of actual gaslighting.

 

[caleb]

Who said there's a good guy. The event organisers invited him. These dopes decided that they get to police who other people - nominally on their side - get to invite to speak. His knowing these dicks would act like dicks changes nothing. Explaining the 'background' doesn't help either.

I think the background is important if you're going to present this as Kristian Williams simply writing an article with political conclusions they didn't like and them deciding to shut him down, as people have done in this thread (ie what I sensed in Nigel Irritable's post which I responded to). Actually it's an on-going thing which has seen a bunch of people fall out, and they're opposing him as much because of who he sided with as the article he wrote. That's it, doesn't mean they were right or this shit isn't laughable.

 

[butchersapron]

I think the background is important if you're going to present this as Kristian Williams simply writing an article with political conclusions they didn't like and them deciding to shut him down, as people have done in this thread (ie what I sensed in Nigel Irritable's post which I responded to). Actually it's an on-going thing which has seen a bunch of people fall out, and they're opposing him as much because of who he sided with as the article he wrote. That's it, doesn't mean they were right or this shit isn't laughable.

Why is it important unless you're taking a side? Taking a side on the content? What does it help to know the dicks hated him before this?

 

[DotCommunist]

the left is a subculture now, look at "okcomrade" (yeh im not joking)

maybe so, but that doesn't mean views we could consider 'of the left' have become niche interests. Far from it, since 2008-9 I've seen far more ordinary non-politico obsessive types questioning the very structure of capitalist society. From 'nationalise this' to such simple ones as 'how come we are paying so much in tax and getting robbed of what its meant to be for?'

 

[frogwoman]

maybe so, but that doesn't mean views we could consider 'of the left' have become niche interests. Far from it, since 2008-9 I've seen far more ordinary non-politico obsessive types questioning the very structure of capitalist society. From 'nationalise this' to such simple ones as 'how come we are paying so much in tax and getting robbed of what its meant to be for?'

Agreed, that's what makes this so tragic

 

[butchersapron]

Questions that a lot of the privilege boosters are uncomfortable with. The default start point for their politics is cultural and social equality - not a wider understanding and critique of how things actually work. Something Cameron etc are very happy with as well, something they can all get behind the wheel together.

 

[belboid]

On a wider note, "gas lighting" is one of the more interesting concepts from the "new identity politics" package. It describes a real phenomenon, borrowing from clinical psychology, but it can also be very effectively deployed as an all purpose defence of irrationality. Indeed skilfully wielded it can turn any attempt to point out unreasonableness into a disastrous misstep.

That sort of use fits very well with a general privileging of the subjective.

(This is not meant as a direct reference to the pastebin piece which discusses events and arguments I know nothing about)

On an oblique note, it's a bit odd that these yanks use the term 'gaslighting' - as it comes from the film Gaslight, which wasn't actually called that in the States, twas Angel Street over there.

 

[caleb]

Why is it important unless you're taking a side? Taking a side on the content? What does it help to know the dicks hated him before this?

What side can I possibly be taking when I think both sides are part of the same swamp and that this shit inevitably arises from the scene-based, isolated and detached politics they're peddling?

 

[butchersapron]

What side can I possibly be taking when I think both sides are part of the same swamp and that this shit inevitably arises from the scene-based, isolated and detached politics they're peddling?

Indeed - so why the importance you're placing on situating it within an ongoing argument~?

 

[Das Uberdog]

I think the background is important if you're going to present this as Kristian Williams simply writing an article with political conclusions they didn't like and them deciding to shut him down, as people have done in this thread (ie what I sensed in Nigel Irritable's post which I responded to). Actually it's an on-going thing which has seen a bunch of people fall out, and they're opposing him as much because of who he sided with as the article he wrote. That's it, doesn't mean they were right or this shit isn't laughable.

i've seen a defender of Kristian explicitly state that he never sided with the Chad dude - whoever he is. unless you've seen something to the contrary. it seems that he has been 'presumed' to have sided 'against victims' because his position in the fall-out of the debacle was to criticise the manner in which 'call out culture' is performed, and was presumably being performed in the aftermath.

 

[DaveCinzano]

On an oblique note, it's a bit odd that these yanks use the term 'gaslighting' - as it comes from the film Gaslight, which wasn't actually called that in the States, twas Angel Street over there.

So, are you gaslighting right there? What's going on? Where am I? Who are you? Muuuummmyyy!!!!

 

[caleb]

Indeed - so why the importance you're placing on situating it within an ongoing argument~?

Well, why is it not important that this is part of an ongoing argument? Why does acknowledging that = taking a side for you? Does it change the idiocy of the video? I don't think so.

 

[butchersapron]

Well, why is it not important that this is part of an ongoing argument? Why does acknowledging that = taking a side for you? Does it change the idiocy of the video? I don't think so.

As i said, it's only relevant if you're taking a side on the content of the dispute. The behaviour needs only laughing at - it doesn't require anything else, least of all suggestions that people laughing are painting one side as the good guy (which is where you came in on this one) whilst offering suggestions that he should probably have stayed away. That's an intervention on one side isn't it?

 

[caleb]

As i said, it's only relevant if you're taking a side on the content of the dispute. The behaviour needs only laughing at - it doesn't require anything else, least of all suggestions that people laughing are painting one side as the good guy (which is where you came in on this one) whilst offering suggestions that he should probably have stayed away. That's an intervention on one side isn't it?

I'm fucking laughing, for fucks sake. Probably laughing a lot more than people hinting at agent provocateur tactics or trying to elucidate some wider critique of intersectionality. Never had a problem laughing at this, cos laughter is the only response. And where did I say he should have stayed away? I suggested he probably should have known better than to write that particular piece when he did (and I didn't even really say that, and not in those words).

You picked up on a 'but' in my post and turned it into 'wah wah wah stop laughing and listen'. Just a 'but'. It wasn't that at all.

 

[DaveCinzano]

Here's a pastebin version of some of the facebook "Shut down Kristian Williams!" campaign leading up to the conference incident: http://pastebin.com/LsmM3N4t

I feel even more confuzzulated than previously - Williams is “invisibilizing the violence”, seriously?

However, I read this:

Kristian is the intrepid man of reason vs. the howling irrational maw of blood-thirsty totalitarian feminism

...And immediately thought of this:

I guess this puts me on The List.

 

[butchersapron]

I'm fucking laughing, for fucks sake. Probably laughing a lot more than people hinting at agent provocateur tactics or trying to elucidate some wider critique of intersectionality. Never had a problem laughing at this, cos laughter is the only response. And where did I say he should have stayed away? I suggested he probably should have known better than to write that particular piece when he did (and I didn't even really say that, and not in those words).

You picked up on a 'but' in my post and turned it into 'wah wah wah stop laughing and listen'. Just a 'but'. It wasn't that at all.

I picked up on what followed the but - that's what the but was there for wasn't it? To indicate some sort of following view/opinion?

Basic point has been fuck those guys, but Kristian Williams isn't the 'good guy' here either and probably should have known better, given the fall-out that had already occurred at the point he published his piece.

To me this is pretty clearly not talking about publishing the piece, given its reference to it being in the past, but to his attendance at the event.

 

[caleb]

I picked up on what followed the but - that's what the but was there for wasn't it? To indicate some sort of following view/opinion?



To me this is pretty clearly not talking about publishing the piece, given its reference to it being in the past, but to his attendance at the event.

Well you misread it, sorry. It had nothing to do with him "knowing better" than to attend the event, I meant people felt he might have "known better" than to publish the piece he did when he did, given what had occurred. Fuck all to do with him not attending the event unless this happened.

 

[butchersapron]

Well you misread it, sorry. It had nothing to do with him "knowing better" than to attend the event, I meant people felt he might have "known better" than to publish the piece he did when he did, given what had occurred. Fuck all to do with him not attending the event unless this happened.

So he should have know better than to publish the piece due to the kerfuffle that publishing the piece had already caused. Okey dokey.

Seriously, can you not see how the way you wrote that could lead to someone reading it as i did?

 

[DotCommunist]

fanny by the gaslight

 

[caleb]

So he should have know better than to publish the piece due to the kerfuffle that publishing the piece had already cause. Okey dokey.

What's the problem with that, then?

 

[Das Uberdog]

i don't particularly see why he shouldn't have published the piece - other than that he knew that the self-important tossers running the 'scene' would do their predictable thing and use it to try and run him out. bad things happen in movements and abstracted theoretical comment shouldn't be taken personally. cowing to a culture which does so is taking sides... it's allowing them to continue setting the tone of conversation

 

[butchersapron]

What's the problem with that, then?

Well first off, it makes no sense. He shouldn't have published something now because of the problems publishing it had caused in the past. Whereas if you read the stuff he shouldn't have done as attending the event it makes perfect sense.

 

[caleb]

Well first off, it makes no sense. He shouldn't have published something now because of the problems publishing it had caused in the past. Whereas if you read the stuff he shouldn't have done as attending the event it makes perfect sense.

Makes perfect sense really: fallout over the way an abusive relationship was handled through scene "accountability processes", ends messily with a bunch of people being "blacklisted", lots of people angry about the situation, events blow over and then Williams publishes his piece. No reason he shouldnt have published it, as Das Uberdog says, but pretty obvious that people are going to take umbrage.

What's nonsensical about that?

 

[Coolfonz]

despite all the real problems that i have had with Leninist type groups, whenever i have got involved with anarchist/semi-anarchist ones, they seem to have even more problems. the odd thing i have found with anarchist groups in my flirting with them ( and not more, i do not pretend to be an expert, and i realise there are diffferences between groups and tendencies ) is that they are really far more authoritarian than any Leninists, but in a different way. ie where you can shop, what you can eat, what words you can use, what you can wear etc. together with a whole set of words to shoot people down who are a bit different. i was called a 'speciesist' once or twice, for eating greggs sausage rolls near the wrong people. i read an article on occupy a while ago, and, to paraphrase the conclusion, the article said that many people left the occupy movement with a strong desire to see an authoritarian heirarchal leadership. i had the same experience, as the attempts of being horizontal etc, also wasted a lot of time and allowed for a lot of plain stupidity. i do not want to start a marxist vs anarchist thead, i realise the problems on the other side too. but just saying, the anarchist horizontal supposedly libertarian type of organisation doesn't seem to really work.

I'm like a straight kinda bloke. Own a house, a car, all that shit. Half decent job. And I've found green groups, lefty socialist groups and anarchist groups are all generally hostile to people like me who aren't in the game, you know, part of the groovy gang. Egos, lifestyling, small cliques, being a big fish in a small pond...I've seen so many examples.

An anarchist group came up with a really good poster/leaflet thing some years back. From that one leaflet they had 50+ interesting people (and me )in a room a week later. After the groovy gang spoke - squats, hunt sab, fuck the "yuppies" (apparently anyone really who wasn't one of them) - at the next meeting there were ten people. My money was good enough for them though. (Some good kids were in it which is why i hung about a bit).

I don't think it's just anarchists, they all seem to do it. I can't really put my finger on it. They don't want a broad mass movement - including people who drive cars, eat big macs, wear the wrong clothes - they want to be the ones everyone listens to. They want to be kind of heroes or something, pure. They need to define themselves via politics and if they meet people who don't fit in - and listen to them without much debate - those people must be cast asunder, denounced.

It's daft because as people on this thread say there is a receptive audience out there and the left has all the best ideas...

 

[butchersapron]

Makes perfect sense really: fallout over the way an abusive relationship was handled through scene "accountability processes", ends messily with a bunch of people being "blacklisted", lots of people angry about the situation, events blow over and then Williams publishes his piece. No reason he shouldnt have published it, as Das Uberdog says, but pretty obvious that people are going to take umbrage.

What's nonsensical about that?

The sentence says that saying that the 'known better' in this post makes no sense unless it refers to attending the event, not writing the article:

Basic point has been fuck those guys, but Kristian Williams isn't the 'good guy' here either and probably should have known better, given the fall-out that had already occurred at the point he published his piece.

You say that you didn't intend ti to mean that - fine, no worries. Denying it could be read that way - crazy.

 

[butchersapron]

This stuff is now more embedded in this country in the trot swp-fallout groups than anarchism btw.

 

[Coolfonz]

I guess in an existing structure like the Conservative Party or Labour there already is power. It is like working your way up in a business. You compromise, sweet talk people you can't stand, grab someone's job/position when they leave.

In lefty groups there is no power, its a vacuum. Even more established parties, with some money, with some MEPs, members, votes, it can fall apart, look at the BNP.

In UKIP now it seems, from what I've read, that everything goes via Nigel. He is now a (benevolent he hopes to UKIP) dictator.

Maybe just make Butchersapron the big leader - his/her heart is in the right place it seems - and the motherfucker can talk, no doubt about that.