Vivat Libertas

I think I already wrote about how the revolution would be snarky , but I want to expand on that a little. The stereotype of the humourless radical is pretty well-known, if very overblown and mostly bullshit; pretty much anyone could improvise wildly and claim that humour is a bourgeois tool used to control the proletariat, or something. (That said, at some point they'd then get corrected by someone who'd read all of this .) Actually, quite a lot of radicals have a pretty decent sense of humour; that said, I've known a lot of people who were, essentially, too angry to understand sarcasm and would start fighting if I breathed on them. That's not the greatest thing - not because I'm some kind of evil reactionary who wants to patronise people by telling them not to be angry, but for two reasons. Firstly, infighting that can be started just by waving your hand a little does not bode well for getting shit done. Secondly, humour is a very powerful tool. Yep, I went t...

I don't know about you, but I think we need to find new ways to get shit done. I don't know about this either, but I think a good way to get shit done involves snark. Lots and lots of snark. You might be wondering how exactly snark can help a revolution. They're not exactly two things you think of as going together, after all - and snark doesn't take anything seriously. Surely that's antithetical to effective revolt? Well...no, not really. Sometimes, taking things too seriously can be dangerous - both to your ideas and to your health. You get bogged down in discussing the finer points of this or that action, or you burn yourself out trying to be everything to everyone and feeling guilty that you're not doing enough. It's not reactionary or slavish to say that sometimes you need to step back and laugh. There can be no revolution if anyone who could be revolting is burnt out or paralysed by guilt and fear. Humour is also a very powerful way to discredi...

Yay for long titles! Right, I really must stop being so happy; it's a little disturbing considering I'm supposed to be a cynical, misanthropic sourpuss (who now has a spring in her step and a great big goofy smile on her face...). I must also really start being logical and practical and...ah fuck it, all this logic and practicality still works, just not quite as you'd expect it to. I must confess I have fallen into the habit of saying and thinking "When the revolution comes...", a habit that I once swore I'd never have. This has less to do with me being against revolution (I used to think it was going too far, but now I quite happily advocate that world revolution should hurry the fuck up and get here) and more to do with me thinking that the revolution was not certain to come. It is a view I still hold today. I have heard anti-capitalists talking about how capitalism must inevitably collapse - and logically, they'd be right. Capitalism eats itself. ...

I am a teenager; I am a teenager under sixteen, to be slightly more precise and to give you some insight into my life. According to my elders and my supposed betters, this means that I am hormonal, boy-crazy and reckless. I am supposedly incapable of not being dramatic; any unhappiness I may feel is me making a mountain out of a molehill, ruled by my hormones and in need of a big, strong adult to show the whiny bitch her place. Anything I'm passionate about is just a passing phase, unworthy of discussion. I have nothing resembling logic, and even if I did, how could it compare to the long years of experience that wore my parents down from fired-up people into passive consumers? In short, if I don't follow my parents' advice to the letter (and perhaps even if I do), I'm going to do something stupid, because a bint like me simply isn't capable of justified emotion, actually caring about something, or doing smart things. I used to get really offended by this line o...

I have a bit of a love-hate relationship with The Activists these days. Still, I can't resist going on their blog sometimes, and...well... ...Most of the articles are the usual left-wing stuff I've come to know. Some is good. Some is tolerable. Some is the illogical crap which made me quit in the first place. But I didn't want to write about that - it's ground I've covered before . What I wanted to write about today is the comments section - or rather, the lack of activity in it. I am of the opinion that a thriving comments section is a good thing. If your blog has 15,000 readers, as this tweet claims , it should have at least 1 comment on each article. I doubt whether there are 50 comments on all the articles combined. Those comments that are  published tend to be things like "yeah, I agree" and not much beyond that. Anything which is even slightly out of line is deleted during moderation. I know this from personal experience: I'm a...

The Activists now has its own tag. It's about time I got round to it. Those of you who followed the blog (hi, Mum) probably know about my affair with it, from my initial starry-eyed swooning over its tweets  to my growing doubts, then my cooling towards it...and finally our split. This article was the last straw. I'll wait while you read it - or attempt to. It's very short. As well you know , doubt is a central part of my being . I cannot go a day, an hour, a minute without thinking and doubting and reflecting on things...and, if you'll pardon my language, I'm bloody proud of it. I'm bloody proud of having to think to justify my beliefs, of having enough intellectual fibre not to take things at face value. Here is what the article says about doubt: " Those who doubt the revolution are liars, deceivers, charlatans. Those who doubt the revolution are nothing more than addicts to comforts and material indulgences. " I have a damn  good reaso...

Written for The Activists . As always, if they don't want it, I'll have it. The time has come when we can no longer afford to run on empty rhetoric. The time has come when we cannot - indeed we must not - lash out blindly at people for disagreeing with us. The time has come when we have to stop thinking about moving people by any means necessary and start thinking about where we want to move them. We have inflamed and inspired people's hearts, but that's not enough. Firstly, it has come at the cost of alienating others, particularly others who could be very useful to us - such as doubters and academics. Both of these groups are strong-minded and can think things through - essential for any successful movement - and now we've made potential opponents out of them. Secondly, we've moved people, but have we moved them to do things? Have there been any discussions of what we can or should do to further our goals? If not, we've stirred people up, but now they ...

Activists, left-wingers, revolutionaries and thinkers everywhere, I want you to read this. I don't care if you burn me up in a thousand flames, or if you decry me as being too soft. This is important - for you, for me, for all of us. In fact, it might be one of the most important things I've said to this day. Listen up. You, me, everyone who posts on websites like The Activists , we need to stop demonising everyone who doesn't agree with us - billionaires, Margaret Atwood, doubters, the powerful - basically, anyone Western and rich enough to not starve. I've done it myself, I admit. I'm not proud of that. I did it to score some cheap political points, to help drive my message home, and to help me get my submissions accepted . (Check them out if you have time. See what you think of them.) I regret having done that. I regret even thinking I needed to do it. And you know why I regretted it so much? Because demonising out-groups (people "not like us...

Written for The Activists  and can be found here . "The revolution" is a phrase I've often seen bandied about. It's as if the revolution is imminent, as if nothing anyone could say or do would stop it from hurtling towards us and giving us our long-deserved dues. That is a pack of lies. The revolution will not come unless we fight and toil and sweat blood for it to come; the revolution will not come if we simply sit here talking about it. The politicians and the media and the corporations who finance them all will make sure of that. No, the revolution will only come if we grasp it with two hands and nurture every little spark of resistance. The revolution will only come if we set aside our differences and reach out to others who share our agenda. As painful as it may be - some would prefer to pull out their own teeth without anaesthetic rather than thrash out a compromise - we must fight the establishment instead of quibbling amongst ourselves. The revolut...