[Sat 28th Oct 2017] London Anarchist Bookfair (London)

[gamerunknown]

Yeah but the thing is it's not as simple as an oppressed group of people demanding equal rights and freedoms in society as it was with the examples that people give re: black/POC and gay rights struggles.

It's a group of people demanding access to an oppressed group's (cis-women's) spaces and hard fought autonomy. Some understanding by trans-activists that this is controversial and should be at least open to discussion is the least I think that should be expected.

Maybe humility is a bad choice of word, but can you see how people are feeling attacked by this, especially in the context of a wider anti-feminist and growing men's rights/alt-right backlash? And I'm excluding the worst of the radfems, but plenty of left-wing feminist and anarchist cis-women want this debate to happen, and you have trans-women saying no, to even discuss it is transphobic.

There are plenty of historical examples of the exact same thing happening - the working class as a whole are exploited, queer people struggled to get recognition and access to working class spaces. Black women wanted to have their experiences of sexism recognised. Oppression or exploitation do not inoculate oneself from further exploitation or oppression.

Statement from Helen Steel.

I don't know of any trans people who call themselves "trans identifying". That term is exclusively used by "gender critical" feminists to my knowledge. As for whether we think people shouldn't be able to question our ideology, sure. How dare we not welcome Police Liaison Officers to the Anarchist Bookfair to debate the relative merit of anarchism with us?

 

[bimble]

Although, the one comment by the author discussing "transracial" identity is incendiary. I can't think of any reason for embracing trans people for while stigmatising cultural appropriation. I know it's a position to be excoriated for, but I'm tortured by the thought of a logically consistent approach.

Have you come up with any answer to this quandry yet ?

 

[Magnus McGinty]

How dare we not welcome Police Liaison Officers to the Anarchist Bookfair to debate the relative merit of anarchism with us?

Are they barred then? Because nobody questioned if I was one or not.

 

[gamerunknown]

Are they barred then? Because nobody questioned if I was one or not.

Didn't say they were barred, but the respect policy is as follows:

However, saying that, we will do our best to deal with situations arising at the bookfair and we reserve the right to ask anybody to leave the event. This may be cops, fascists or certain journalists but it could also be any individual acting in what we consider to be an excessively inappropriate manner.

Would it be authoritarian of us to request that the police not monitor the anarchist bookfair?

Have you come up with any answer to this quandry yet ?

Nope.

 

[Fozzie Bear]

A statement in solidarity with the London Anarchist Bookfair Collective. From some friends of the Bookfair

 

[redsquirrel]

We are left to wonder whether anarchist practice has become so inculcated by ‘customer service’ culture that even the Bookfair is attended by consumers forgetting the fundamental essence of DIY, self-organisation and self-regulation of events.

The Bookfair Collective operates on the principle that it is not for the small collective that organises it to take on defining and enforcing a rigid policy on safety and behaviour; it is for the wider movement that takes part in the Bookfair to do so, along anarchist principles of opposing centralized authority with dispersed and grassroots responsibility.

Points raised in the open letter call for a radically different event, with a much more centralized program, organized or tightly overseen by the collective. If we as a movement, decide that this is what we want, many more of us will need to commit time and energy to organising and supporting this annual event.

Good statement, and this part needs to be read again and again by a few people

 

[LDC]

Yeah, the other thing I like about the statement is it gives a kick up the arse to people (including me) that have been going for years and leaving it all to the collective. Totally going to help out setting up/taking down or doing some other stuff on the day next year.

 

[Rob Ray]

Well, if people want to have a 2018 bookfair it'll require more than helping out - the collective just put out a statement saying they won't be doing it next year.

 

[Athos]

This is why we can't have nice things.

 

[redsquirrel]

Well, if people want to have a 2018 bookfair it'll require more than helping out - the collective just put out a statement saying they won't be doing it next year.

Shit, but can't blame them

 

[ska invita]

Well, if people want to have a 2018 bookfair it'll require more than helping out - the collective just put out a statement saying they won't be doing it next year.

have you a link please Rob?

 

[Pickman's model]

Well, if people want to have a 2018 bookfair it'll require more than helping out - the collective just put out a statement saying they won't be doing it next year.

Yeh. Have you a link?

 

[Rob Ray]

As many people know there was an incident towards the end of the 2017 London Anarchist Bookfair. Many statements have been written both supporting and condemning the organisers of the event.

At first, as in previous years, we were inclined to not respond to these statements. However, because of the claims being made, and our views about future bookfairs we feel, unfortunately, that we need to respond. We have produced two statements. The first is a statement about the events on the day. The second is a response to a statement being circulated and signed by a number of groups critical of the Bookfair and its organisers.

We are responding because people have made it clear to us that we need to. Others may want to continue the discussion. We won’t be making any further comments.

Our statement on the incidents on the day.

Our statement in reply to the “Response to the London Anarchist Bookfair 2017.

 

[ska invita]

Anarchist Bookfair

two statements there in fact

 

[killer b]

Their response to the open letter is eviscerating.

 

[ska invita]

Definition of EVISCERATE
(im sure i wasnt the only one)

 

[ska invita]

"AFem 2014 was an attempt to make an event similar to the Bookfair without cis-men and with a safer spaces policy. Having seen the result, does anyone wonder why the organisers of that event (many more than we are) didn’t feel they had the energy to do another one?"

I vaguely remember hearing about this, but does anyone recall it clearly/have a link for what happened? Id appreciate it.

 

[killer b]

there's some chat about it on the 2014 anarchist bookfair thread (although it's not always clear whats chat about afem and what's chat about the bookfair)

London Anarchist Bookfair Saturday 18th October 2014

 

[Rob Ray]

There's differing takes, the AFEM collective's is here:

On the TERFs in our midst

 

[crossthebreeze]

There's differing takes, the AFEM collective's is here:

On the TERFs in our midst

I didn't go to AFEM2014 in the end (or the bookfair that year) for various reasons, but I was peripherally involved in some of the initial organising for it, and basically got bored with the seemingly endless bad-tempered arguments about who should be included (ie other anarchafeminist events i had been to until then had always been all women and all trans people, but some people did not want trans men involved (even trans men who had not yet transitioned), saying this undermined trans women, but there was pretty much every permutation of identity being argued for and against) that I decided to focus on other things instead, and in the lead-up I thought the resulting gender inclusion policy was pretty meaningless and illogical, and I could well see that someone on one side or another was going to kick off in some way.

 

[crossthebreeze]

Anyway, those are very good statements, and I don't blame them for not wanting to do another event. I hope it pushes everyone to just take a bit of thought on this.

 

[ska invita]

Anyway, those are very good statements, and I don't blame them for not wanting to do another event. I hope it pushes everyone to just take a bit of thought on this.

you would think so, but some of the arrogance Ive read in attacks on the bookfair makes me doubt it. There are a lot of self-assured posturers out there these days.

Theres been a mushrooming of bookfairs in the UK in recent years - mainly anarchist, but not all. I think this has big implications for all of them. The massive irony is that the London Anarchist Bookfair is so well organised, works so hard to be inclusive, and on such an impressive scale, and yet it is they that are packing it in. Really hope its for one year only as the knowledge the collective have in putting this on cant be easily replicated - years and years in the making.

The London A Bookfair is an insittution now I guess, but its (clearly) such a fragile one. Like so much of left organisations. I think I said it earlier in the thread but people have attacked the fair as if it were the state. Zero understanding of the reality of the work. As mentioned in the solidarity letter too many are "inculcated by ‘customer service’ culture that even the Bookfair is attended by consumers ".

From the response to the open letter this stands out to me

What hurts us most is we know a lot of you. A number of the signatories to the open letter are groups we know and have worked with over the years; sometimes many, many years. Yet not one of you has tried to contact us as individuals or as the Bookfair collective to ask our views before you signed the open letter, even though some people appear not to have read all of it before signing. We thought of many of you as friends. We were obviously wrong. We guess it’s easy to sign a statement. It’s a lot harder to actually talk to people and try to work things out.

the lack of solidarity, baseline mutual respect is one thing, but the inability to even attempt an interpersonal dialogue on something so important, but rather drop bombs from social media...

There's differing takes, the AFEM collective's is here:

On the TERFs in our midst

thanks. well I guess it really was an ‘introduction to anarchafeminism’. Introduction by fire

 

[chilango]

The London A Bookfair is an insittution now I guess, but its (clearly) such a fragile one. Like so much of left organisations. I think I said it earlier in the thread but people have attacked the fair as if it where the state. Zero understanding of the reality of the work. As mentioned in the solidarity letter too many are "inculcated by ‘customer service’ culture that even the Bookfair is attended by consumers ".

...and if the bookfair can be wrecked, then other components of the movement can be too.

 

[ska invita]

...and if the bookfair can be wrecked, then other components of the movement can be too.

a couple of agent provacateurs could run riot.

 

[chilango]

a couple of agent provacateurs could run riot.

The two responses that spring to mind are equally worrying:

Maybe they already have.

Or maybe they don't need to.

 

[ska invita]

The two responses that spring to mind are equally worrying:

Maybe they already have.

Or maybe they don't need to.

yeah was just thinking the same
I think Dont Need To is by far the bigger threat though

 

[Magnus McGinty]

So that unresolved argument from AFem basically surfaced at the book fair and killed it. Can the argument even be resolved? I recommend it occurs away from civilisation.

 

[Red Sky]

So that unresolved argument from AFem basically surfaced at the book fair and killed it. Can the argument even be resolved? I recommend it occurs away from civilisation.

Leave the primmos out of this.

 

[Fozzie Bear]

you would think so, but some of the arrogance Ive read in attacks on the bookfair makes me doubt it. There are a lot of self-assured posturers out there these days.

I think the truly terrifying thing is that some people will think this is a victory. There were a bunch of comments from young shouty types on twitter along the lines of "the bookfair's politics have always been trash" after this year.

If you do all your politics on social media (or conversely are a green party member who came to the Bookfair to dish out provocative leaflets) then I doubt the Bookfair closing will matter to you very much at all.

Both statements from the collective are great.

 

[ska invita]

I think the truly terrifying thing is that some people will think this is a victory. There were a bunch of comments from young shouty types on twitter along the lines of "the bookfair's politics have always been trash" after this year.

some of those people are now online say stuff like "sigh" , "quitters" " cant take a bit of cirticism" etc. "we'll make our own fair" lol. I actually dont think most of these people give a shit about anarchism, and just see it as a vague liberal/lefty space.

Both statements from the collective are great.

i agree