021: The North Star of Human Decency

The Future Is A Mixtape

Beyond Blade Runners and Replicants, there must be a place “Over the Rainbow” for us to exist in solidarity and equanimity. And certainly, the 21st Century hovering above us should be a cause for hope, not despair; yet even with this new century being no way near its quartermark, it’s already given us a planet wheezing from ecological crisis-to-crisis, where an untenable economic system of neo-feudalism ravages plants and animals, as well as the rights of those we love (or should love). In the Terror & Twilight of Our Broken Age, what ideology best speaks and acts from a place made from compassion and love? Instead of passively looking at the new century that hangs in the sky, blinking obliquely above us, we should instead reorganize our motions to The North Star of Human Decency, namely that of Anarchy. For this 21st episode of The Future Is A Mixtape, Matt & Jesse will finally come out of the “political closet” and show some raw & real skin: they are both Anarchists Without Adjectives, and they believe that this ideology of love is the only practical solution to the world’s byzantine disorders, fraught with confusion, warbling on without a just antidote. In their most personal and revealing podcast since the show’s first episode, Jesse & Matt explore their disparate journeys to humanity’s greatest romance, Anarchy; they will describe its origin story, its turbulent relationship with authoritarian communists and how this political philosophy is not only the most idealist of ideologies, but also why it’s the only one which can ride inside us--whispering out “hope” for a utopian future.

HELPFUL RESOURCE GUIDES ABOUT ANARCHY:

The Most Popularly Cited and Shared Introduction to Anarchy: David Graeber’s “Are You an Anarchist? The Answer Might Surprise You?!”

Thomas Giovanni in the Black Rose Anarchist Confederation: “Who Are the Anarchists and What Is Anarchism?”

Have More Specific Questions? Go to An Anarchist FAQ from The Anarchist FAQ Editorial Collective.

The Anarchist Library: A Deep Database and Archive of Out-of-Print & Hard-to-Find Articles, Books, Speeches and Interviews on Anarchy

America’s Legendary AK Press, Which Runs as a Worker-Cooperative Since 1990, and Publishes Important as well as Far Reaching Works of Political Theory, Journalism, Fiction and Non-Fiction Works.

Freedom: The Oldest (& Once Longest Running) Anarchist Newspaper in Print (1886-2014)

Get a ‘Memorial Copy’ of Freedom’s Last Print Issue for February/March 2014

KEY FIGURES & WORKS ON ANARCHISM:

Lao Tzu (604 BC - 501 BC) ? Most Important Work On Early Notions Anarchy: Tao Te Ching

Chuang Tzu (370 BC - 287 BC) ? Most Important Work On Early Notions Anarchy: The Book of Chuang TzuGerard Winstanley (1609-1676) ? Most Important Work On Early (Western Notions of) Anarchy: The New Law of Righteousness (1649)

William Godwin (1756-1836) ? Most Important Work On Early (Western Notions of) Anarchy: Enquiry Concerning Political Justice (1793)

Max Stirner (1806-1856) ? Most Important Work On Anarchy: The Ego and His Own: The Case of the Individual Against Authority (1844)

Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809-1865) ? Most Important Work On Anarchy: What Is Property? An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government (1840)

Mikhail Bakunin (1814-1876) ? Most Important Work On Anarchy: God and the State (1882)

Peter Kropotkin (1842-1921) ? Most Important Works On Anarchy:

The Conquest of Bread (1892) & Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution (1902)

Emma Goldman (1869-1940) ? Most Important Work On Anarchy: Living My Life (1931)

David Graeber (1961 & Still Kicking) ? Most Important Works On Anarchy: Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology (2004) & The Democracy Project: A History, A Crisis, A Movement (2013)

MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

Judy Garland’s “Over the Rainbow” & Where to Watch the Legendary Film in All of Its Proto-Camp Glory

The Legendary Theme Song for the Reading Rainbow & Where to Watch the Show in All of Its Kid-Camp Fury

Anarchists and Molotov Cocktails!

Why Do Black Lives Matter? Why Do Comrades Lives Matter? Because the Police Are Still Swinging Butcher-Batons and Gatling-Guns Against People’s Heads: Here, Here, Here, Here, Here and Lastly Sophia Wilansky--a Hero of the Dakota Pipeline Protest--Finally Speaks Out Here.

The Rectum & The Shithole of the State

Jesse Herring: “Anarchy is a dream . . . Anarchy is a beautiful dream. Anarchy is the North Star of Human Decency”

Ursula K. Le Guin’s Most Famous Quote: “What is an anarchist? One who, choosing, accepts the responsibility of choice.”

What Is Anarcho-Primitivism? A Working Primer (However, if you want a popular conception of the idea, you can watch this popular piece of “ManArchy.” If you want the documentary version, you can watch this instead. Or--fuck all--if you just want a visual sight-gag of Anarcho-Primitivism, you can watch this ode to pre-millennium dread.)

The Creators of Novara Radio, Aaron Bastani and James Butler, Discuss the Ideas of Anarchism in This Podcast: “What Is Libertarian Communism?”

Ursula K. Le Guin’s Official Website & Her Blog MusingsUrsula K. Le Guin’s Career-Defining Magnum Opus: The Dispossessed (1974)

The New Yorker: Julie Phillip’s “The Fantastic Ursula K. Le Guin”

Structo Magazine: Euan Monaghan’s Interview with Ursula K. Le Guin: “Ursula K. Le Guin on Racism, Anarchy and Hearing Her Characters Speak” (2015)

The Anarchist Library: “Anarchism and Taoism”

A Working Biography of Paul Goodman: an American Novelist, Playwright, Poet, Essayist, Psychotherapist and Anarchist Philosopher

A History of Revolutionary Catalonia in Libcom: “1936-1939: The Spanish Civil War and Revolution”

A Summary of The Dispossessed in Wikipedia

Ursula K. Le Guin’s Description of “The Wall” in in the opening paragraph of The Dispossessed:“There was a wall. It did not look important. It was built of uncut rocks roughly mortared. An adult could look right over it, and even a child could climb it. Where it crossed the roadway, instead of having a gate it degenerated into mere geometry, a line, an idea of boundary. But the idea was real. It was important. For seven generations there had been nothing in the world more important than that wall. Like all walls it was ambiguous, two-faced. What was inside it and what was outside it depended upon which side of it you were on.”

An Online Interview with Ursula K. Le Guin, Generated from Questions by Readers of The Guardian: “Chronicles of Earthsea”

The Rules of Being a Mormon in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (or Mormon Church)

In Ask Gramps: “Do I Need to Confess Masturbation to My [LDS] Baptist?”

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints: “Why and What Do I Need to Confess to My Bishop?” {Which Basically Avoids Mentioning All the Sex and Dirty Parts in Case Readers Become Too Inspired}

Catholic Online: “A Guide to Confession”

Terry Eagleton in The Chronicle of Higher Education: “In Praise of Marx”

Karl Marx’s Capital: Volume 1: A Critique of Political Economy (Originally Published in 1867; This Was Translated & Reprinted in 1992)

David Harvey: A Companion to Karl Marx’s Capital (2010)

Louis Menand in The New Yorker: “Karl Marx, Yesterday and Today”

Mary Gabriel’s Love and Capital: Karl and Jenny Marx and the Birth of a Revolution (2011)

Rachel Holmes’ Eleanor Marx: A Life (2015)

Ralph Nader’s Most Notable Works:

Breaking Through Power: It’s Easier Than We Think (2016)

The Seventeen Solutions: Bold Ideas for Our American Future (2012)

“Only the Super-Rich Can Save Us”: A Novel (2011)

A Fantastic Essay on Barack Obama’s Patina-Presidency: “The Gap Between Rhetoric and Action: The Failed Foreign Policy of Barack Obama”

Matthew Snyder’s Ph.D. Dissertation: Welcome to the Suck: The Film and Media Phantasm’s of The Gulf War (2008)

Noam Chomsky’s Most Notable Works on Politics & Anarchy:

On Anarchism (2013)

Who Rules the World? (2016)

Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of Mass Media (1988; 2002)

Requiem for the American Dream: The 10 Principles of Concentration and Power (2017)

On Language: Chomsky's Classic Works Language and Responsibility and Reflections on Language in One Volume (1998)

Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy (2007)

Understanding Power: The Indispensible Chomsky (2002)

The Anarchist Library: Workers’ Solidarity Federation’s “History of the Anarchist-Syndicalist Trade Union”

The Anarchist Library: Rudolph Rocker on Anarchism and Anarcho-Syndicalism in “The Reproduction of Daily Life”

Mikhail Bakunin, The Founder of Modern Anarchism: Mark Leier’s Bakunin: The Creative Passion (2009)

America’s Most Famous Anarchist & Greatest Dissident; as Seen in Candace Falk’s Love, Anarchy & Emma Goldman (1990), and Also in Kevin and Paul Avrich’s Sasha and Emma: The Anarchist Odyssey of Alexander Berkman and Emma Goldman (2012)

Michael Albert, the co-founder of Participatory Economics (Parecon): as Seen in the Graphic Novel-ization Parecon: Sean Michael Wilson and Carl Thomspon’s Parecomic: Michael Albert and the Story of Participatory Economics (2013)

The Big Think: “Do Scientists Have a Special Responsibility to Engage in Political Advocacy?”

Michael Albert’s Parecon: Life After Capitalism (2003) & Practical Utopia: Strategies for a Desirable Society (KAIROS) (2017)

Andrew Anthony in The Guardian: “Ex-diplomat Carne Ross: The Case for Anarchism”

IMDb: John Archer and Clara Glynn’s The Accidental Anarchist (About Carne Ross’ Epiphany Toward Anarchy After Becoming Disillusioned of Serving State Power)

Biola Magazine: “What Are the Key Difference Between Mormonism and Christianity?”

Jehovah’s Witnesses (JW.org): “What Happens at a Kingdom Hall?”

Reddit: “How to Make Molotov Cocktails” (!!!)

David Graeber’s Most Famous Essay on Anarchism: “Are You an Anarchist? The Answer Might Surprise You?!”

The Anarchist Library: “An Anarchist FAQ”

Bakunin on Karl Marx’s Idea of Socialism Within the State: “A dictatorship of the proletariat is still a dictatorship.”

The Anarchist Library: Wayne Price’s “In Defense of Bakunin and Anarchism” (Responses to Herb Gamberg’s Attacks on Anarchism)

The First International (AKA the International Workingmen’s Association)

The Socialist International

David Harvey’s Most Recent Work: Marx, Capital, and the Madness of Economic Reason (2017)

David Graeber’s Idea of Baseline Communism Is Fully Explored in His Most Important Work: Debt: The First 5,000 Years.

Lord of the Rings & Gandalf’s Anxiety & Terror of the Rings Corrupting Powers: “Don’t Tempt Me Frodo!”

Jonathan Franzen About Those Facebook “likes” in The New York Times: “Liking is for Cowards. Go for What Hurts.”

Jim Dwyer’s Article on Marina Abramovic’s Art Project to Stare at People, Eye-to-Eye, Twenty Minutes Each for Hours and Hours; As Explored in The New York Times: “Confronting a Stranger, for Art”

Buzzfeed: “Watch Six Pairs Stare Into Each Others’ Eyes as a Love Experiment”

The Guardian: “Literary Fiction Readers Understand Others’ Emotions Better, Study Finds”

Annie Murphy Paul in Time Magazine: “Reading Literature Makes Us Smarter and Nicer”

Adam Gopnik Explores the Paris Commune in The New Yorker: “The Fires of Paris”

The Anarchist Library: Murray Bookchin’s “To Remember Spain: The Anarchist and Syndicalist Revolution of 1936”

Noted Correction: Matthew incorrectly stated that members of Congress receive lifetime pension after only being in office one term (two years); In actuality, members of congress receive pension after five years (but Senators do get pensions after just one term of six years). For more information on this, go to FactCheck.org’s article on the subject.

Margaret Atwood’s Interview on Canada’s Q TV Where She Discusses Her Creation of God’s Gardeners in The Year of the Flood (2009) & How Environmental Activists Must Make Friends with the Religious for a Truly Big Tent Movement to Save the Planet; Also Talks About the Split Between Christian Fundamentalists & Environmental Christians Who View Humans as Stewards of the Earth.

Jessica Alexander in The Atlantic: “America’s Insensitive Children?” {How Schools in Denmark Teach Students Empathy From a Young Age}

Kevin Carson in Center for a Stateless Society: “Libertarian-splaining to the Poor”

Learning About Worker Cooperatives: A Working Definition from the Canadian Worker Co-Op Federation

Alana Semuels in The Atlantic: “Worker-Owned Cooperatives: What Are They?”

National Community Land Trust Network: An FAQ About Community Land Trusts

Mikhail Bakunin: “To revolt is a natural tendency of life. Even a worm turns against the foot that crushes it. In general, the vitality and relative dignity of an animal can be measured by the intensity of its instinct to revolt.” {For More Quotes by Bakunin, Hit Up His Wikiquote}

The Future Is A Mixtape’s First Three Episodes Exploring The Poison Pyramid: What Jesse Calls An Unconsciously Inspired Anarchist Idea-Shape:

Episode 001: The Desire For Certainty: On the Terrifying Costs of Religious Tyranny Upon Humanity

Episode 002: The Invisible Hand: Explores the Death-Dealing Nature of Capitalism

Episode 003: Star-Fuckers: Concerns Our Toxic Relationship to the Cult of Celebrity-Worship

Mikhail Bakunin’s Quote on God as a Bad Boss: "A Boss in Heaven is the best excuse for a boss on earth, therefore If God did exist, he would have to be abolished.”

Vivir la utopía: Juan A. Gamera’s Documentary on the Anarchist Revolution in Catalonia: Living Utopia (1997)

Peter Kropotkin’s The Conquest of Bread (1892: 2017 Edition Translated by Jonathan-David Jackson)

Utopia As Seen George Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia Where He Describes How Everyday Workers Were in the Saddle of the 1936 Revolution: "The Anarchists were still in virtual control of Catalonia and the revolution was still in full swing. To anyone who had been there since the beginning it probably seemed even in December or January that the revolutionary period was ending; but when one came straight from England the aspect of Barcelona was something startling and overwhelming. It was the first time that I had ever been in a town where the working class was in the saddle."

Rebecca Solnit’s A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster (2009)

Why is it that the German Air-Bombings during WWII (The Blitz) caused suicide rates to plummet so dramatically? British scientists discover the reason as seen in The Telegraph’s article: “Terror Attacks Cause Drop in Suicide Rates as They Invoke Blitz Spirit”

PBS NewsHour: “Sebastian Junger’s Tribe Examines Loyalty, Belonging and the Quest for Meaning”

How Spending $25 on Others (Instead of Keeping It for Yourself) Creates More Happiness; as Seen in The New Republic Interview with Scientists: “Want to Be Happy? Stop Being Cheap!”

Time Magazine: “Do We Need $75,000 a Year to Be Happy?”

The US Military-Industrial-Complex: $700 Billion on Murder and Machinery: Alex Emmons in The Intercept: “The Senate’s Military Spending Increase Alone Is Enough to Make Public College Free”

Armistead Maupin: “There is your biological family and then your logical family.” As Seen in His Autobiography, Logical Family: A Memoir

Is Kamala Harris America’s Future President or Just Another Transactional Politician Buried in Corporate Money?

Universal Basic Income (UBI) or Universal Basic Dividend (UBD)? Matthew Bruenig’s Essay-Report: “How Norway’s State Manages Its Ownership Of Companies” (From the People’s Policy Project)

Michael Zannettis in The People’s Policy Project: “Why Americans Are Going to Love Single Payer”

Alan Moore’s Most Important Works, Both Past and Present:

Watchman (Released in 1986-87; Reprinted 2014)

V for Vendetta (Released in 1989; Reprinted in 2008

Jerusalem: A Novel (Hardback Release: 2016 & It’s 1280 Pages!)

From Hell (2004)

When V for Vendetta was published it was seen as an SF allegory for Margaret Thatcher’s World Gone Mad; As Seen in George Monbiot’s Excellent Essay in The Guardian: “Neoliberalism -- the Ideology at the Root of All Our Problems”

But There’s A World We Can Have from the Anarchist Principles of Mutual Aid, Solidarity and Community Wealth:

Marcin Jakubowski’s Open Source Ecology Project & It’s Philosophy

The Making of “America’s Most Radical City” as Explored with the Founding of Cooperation Jackson; Jackson’s History of This Struggle Is Also Explored in Ajamu Nangwaya & Kali Akuno’s Book Jackson Rising (2017)

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