I wanted to address what I fear may be a tendency among some claiming to be anarchists. I’m speaking about a pair of actions, that targeted anarchist or anarchist-adjacent events, emerging from within the anarchist space. Both use the language of eugenics, are critical of events without mask requirements, and so far have only been carried out using paint.
These are the two actions I’m referring to:
- Eugenics ≠ Fun https://www.instagram.com/p/CxIpqgJPZmh/
- Anti-Eugenics Action Against Worker’s Tap https://rosecitycounterinfo.noblogs.org/2023/01/anti-eugenics-action-against-workers-tap/
I’m honestly put off by both actions. They feel mediated, misguided, moral, and un-anarchist. I would be disappointed to see these kinds of actions continue on the trajectory they have taken so far, and worry that they have the potential to hamper anarchist organizing. I want to challenge those who carried them out to consider their goals, and political stance. I also want to challenge everyone in the anarchist space to come up with more creative and solidaristic approaches to addressing issues of ableism, access, and living through climate change1 both within the anarchist space and outside of it.
At the heart of the matter for me is that the attacks come from a logic that to me is fundamentally un-anarchist. This wouldn’t be a problem if the authors called themselves public health advocates, disability rights activists, or something else that doesn’t carry within it an anti-authoritarian criticism of society. In both writings the authors obliquely call for more policing from event organizers toward event attendees. There’s a significant difference between asking everyone to do better and wear a mask or some other spread mitigating measure, it’s another to ask that event organizers impose and enforce mask requirements, check vaccination cards, bounce non-compliant individuals, or some other top down method of addressing viral spread. In this sense the actions feel like aggressive micro-lobbying. A fine tactic for militant liberals but a tool that mostly rubs me the wrong way. A top down approach to anti-ableism doesn’t align with my goals.
Free association is an integral part of how we navigate relations as anarchists. Part of that is risk assessment. Everyone will have a unique risk profile, weighing what feels worthwhile to them at each moment, and in each situation. If someone is taking different risks than I am in a way that makes me uncomfortable I choose how and if I want to engage with them. If an event feels more or less risky than I want to deal with, unless I am bound, I can decide to stay or leave. Of course I have preferences for how I’d like things to be, and I also have the option to create situations that are more pleasing to my sensibilities, alone or with others.
What feels misguided to me is that the actions both targeted events put on by people that could be considered in some sense “on the team,” when so many significantly more viable targets went untouched. Of all the institutions facilitating the spread of Covid-19, the ones targeted — a bar checking vaccine cards, and a rave where some people are masked and most windows had been smashed out — seem relatively benign when held beside the schools, airports, public transit systems, stadiums, workplaces, and other large crowded institutions that take far fewer, if any, covid precautions these days as others have already touched on2.
The author of Anti-Eugenics Action Against Worker’s Tap mentions that the endemicity of covid could be defeated by grassroots resistances, this may well be true. It may be too optimistic, but I expect that anarchists with our systemic analysis of oppression would take into account that large institutions and the economy that pushes us to de-prioritize our wellbeing are the most serious obstacle to tackling covid, not whether an anarchist event had enough rules and if they were enforced or not. Aiming at anarchist events and individuals choosing not to wear masks leaves those interested in confronting covid from an anarchist perspective on the defensive, always responding. A proactive stance, going after the institutions that have proven themselves most callous to the spread of covid, has actual revolutionary/insurrectionary potential too, if that’s something you’re into or whatever.
My concern about these kinds of actions effecting anarchist organizing is that, while I doubt many people agree with those who carried them out, many people will be intimidated out of organizing events. This phenomena already exists to some degree, anarchists concerned they will get cancelled or be disliked for opening space in a way that doesn’t meet certain unspoken guidelines. This feels like a problem that particularly affects those who spend time consuming the social justice discourse that is most prominent on social media websites. The discourse growing teeth (in the form of spray paint at least) could very well discourage anarchists for fear that they may face physical consequences for not organizing in ways that are decidedly not anarchist. This isn’t some boohoo plea to not scare online anarchists, it’s me cynically believing that too many anarchists are susceptible to shaming by people who’s political ideas they often don’t even agree with (I would also like these people to take less seriously what strangers online think of them, but that’s a whole other can of worms).
I think a lack of imagination is a serious obstacle on the part of anarchists (and our fellow travelers) in creatively relating to each other in the face of covid-19. The idea that everything should be outdoors, masked, and/or on jitsi, betrays a failing on all of our parts. What forms could autonomy for disabled people take? How can we take care of ourselves and each other without furthering our reliance on the moralities and technologies of an economy that is indifferent to our wellbeing? Can we imagine taking care of one another without offloading labor onto poorer, further away people? How do we account for both our access needs and our security needs? How can we best communicate our individual and collective approaches to risk?
Submitted Anonymously over Email
- What does climate change have to do with all this? As industrial development pushes further and further into non-human animal habitats, humans find ourselves more and more often alongside wild animals, increasing the chances of viral mutations jumping across species. ↩︎
- A Brief Response to Worker’s Tap Vandalism https://rosecitycounterinfo.noblogs.org/2023/02/a-brief-response-to-workers-tap-vandalism/ ↩︎