Essay

people, People of Colour (POC)2, or members the fact that not all identity-related theories of other specifiablegroups are IPs; not all fe m­ or movements need to be treated as Identity inists, anti-racists, or even separatists are IPs. Politics does not mean that the influence of Racism, sexism and other oppressions along Identity Politicians is trivial. Thewriters and identity axes are sociologically real, and not activists discussed here not only exist, but every person involved in the struggle against their ideas and practices are often insidious such oppressions is an IP. and unfortunately widespread. Recognizing Intersectionality - the recognition of multi­ the importance and necessity of countering ple forms or axes of oppression, with complex that deleterious influence is my motivation for writing this essay. It should here be emphasised indigenous people were historically that this is not a critique of all forms exterminated of radicaltheory focused on racial or or assimilated because gender oppression. This critique of IPs they is by no means a critique of every posi­ fell outside the essence of tion which focuseson a particular type of oppression (such as gender or race). what colonisers defined as Indeed, aspects of this critique are already present in a number of theorists who having human value work with identity. For instance, the iconic anti-colonial writer Frantz Fanon argued that dualistic identities deform interpersonal interacting effects - is an effective theoretical relations and reproduce colonial power. While response to the problems of Identity Politics, the struggle against colonial power is in fact but there have clearly been difficulties putting an irreducible antagonism, and moves similar it into practice. In identity-linked movements, to those of IPs are strategically useful to fight some people use intersectionality as a way it, the ultimate goal is to overcome such bina­ to avoid the idea of principal contradiction, ries in a fu ture of the disalienated "whole [hu] although occasionally in practice, people who man" (Wretched of the Earth, 238-9). He even claim to be intersectional end up treating one articulates an almost Stirnerian· claim that "the or two oppressions as primary. Nevertheless, real leap consists in introducing invention into existence ... I am endlessly creating myself" (Black Skin, White Masks 204). Similarly, in her later works, Gloria Anzaldua argued that 2 POC Ed. note: There was a time when the term was we are citizens of the universe, sharing an inclusive of everyone who so self-identified (regard­ less of the term exacerbating certain unarticulated identity at a cosmic or subatomic level which and unavoidable tensions about homogenizing the is wider than any racial or social category distinct experiences of people from diverse ethnic (This Bridge We Call Home, 558). She came backgrounds, as well as the different ways those to criticise IPs forpu tting up walls and caus­ distinctions resulted in particular experiences of ing violence between groups (Interviews, 118). racism}; in the past few years, however, the analyti­ cal category of Blackness/Anti-Blackness has become Neither of these authors arrives at a Stirnerian more popular in post-colonial discourse, especially position: Fanon moves towards humanism, and among academics and activists. Michael P Jeffries Anzaldua towards spiritual holism. However, writes that Anti-Blackness is "not simply about hating their rejections of fixed identities overlap and or penalizing black people. It is about the debasement of black humanity, utter indifference to black suffer­ intersect with mine, and serve to counter any ing, and the denial of black people's right to exist." suspicion that the rej ection of Identity Politics The recent twisting of "Black Lives Matter" into "All entails a failureto take patriarchy, colonialism, Lives Matter" is a good example of how deeply the or racism seriously. threat of a recognized Black humanity runs in the US. Despite the increasingly problematic term POC, Some fe minists and Black radicals do not we have retained it out of respect for the many who deploy the reactive affects discussed below, continue to embrace it as a self-description. and instead seek to regenerate a fo rce of

ao Anarchy: A Journal of Desire Armed Essay

becoming to one degree or another (e.g. Mary IPs see one axis of oppression as primary

Daly, Germaine Greer, Audre Lorde, Edouard - the principal contradiction3• They demand Glissant). Others, notably dependency the­ that everyone focuson this axis. If someone orists and socialist-feminists, emphasise failsto do so, IPs label them racist, sexist, structural oppression, and struggle primar­ white supremacist, patriarchal, etc. Ditto if ily against macro-structures - destroying they refuseleadersh ip by the oppressed group capitalism, modernity, or the world-system (often meaning the IPs themselves), deviate - rather than focusing on the micro-politics from the IP's proposed political line, or crit­ of privilege. None of these approaches fa lls icise an IP. Such terms are deployed only by within what is being critiqued here. Academic a member of the correct group, and are used approaches that draw on poststructuralism to silence criticism - in the case of Patriarchy are also distinct fromIde ntity Politics, in that Haters, even the word violence is monopolised; they typically reject the primacy of any par­ those who oppose them "do not get to decide ticular position. Academic theories related to what counts as violence" (Voline). Theidea of oppression and identity - forexample, Queer a principal contradiction leads to contempt for Theory, Critical Race Theory, Postcolonial other issues and priorities. For instance, IPs in Theory, and poststructuralist feminism - gen­ APOC, who focuson race, argue that "bleat­ erally reject the idea of principal contradiction. ing about gender and class" is an instance of Thepopula rity of Identity Politics among rad­ "diversionary tactics" to deflect from race icals is partly due to the influence of academic (Anon, Open Letter). Early CWS wor work on identity, but, in academic spaces, most strategies of IPs would be rejected as essentialist (there are other issues of disagreement between post-left anarchy and poststructural­ ism, and between post-leftanar chy and leftistty pes of structuralism, but these issues will not be covered here). What is being criticised here is a partic­ ular political style, rather than a theoretical orientation - a style which labels as oppres­ sive any deviation froma particular political line, which resorts almost immediately to rea e issues ot er t an racism as "dis­ public denunciation and exclusion, and which tractions" (Dot Matrix), and Lorenzo Ervin entails analytical and categorical rigidity, with demands that "anti-racism/anti-colonialism" corresponding boundary-policing. Theycan be be made "the core concern" of every activist distinguished from those whose approaches group (315). He also dismisses anything out­ pursue open-ended becomings through the side his own agenda - fromclima te change to deconstruction of identity-categories (eg anti-fascism - as a "white rights" issue (133, Heckert), which are minoritarian becomings 290, 302). rather than minority identities. Thispoli tical style boundary-polices iden­ tities in a way which renders them rigid and authoritarian. In many cases, fightingalleged racism or sexism inside radical groups is seen 3 Ed. note: Thefundamental aspect of tension/destruc­ tiveness of class society; for traditional Marxists, it's as the most important issue in radical politics bourgeoisie-proletariat within the framework of - more important than fightingracism/sexism capitalism. When resolved through the teleological in the wider society. Ervin calls white radicals process of dialectical materialism (The RevolutionrM), the worst kinds of racists, worse than hard­ the resulting synthesis is supposed to make the sec­ ondary (and tertiary, etc) contradictions like sexism, core conservatives (240, 272-3). Usually, these racism, and other ostensibly trivial forms of institu­ attacks take the formof militant struggle from tionalized oppression, melt away. the Maoist milieu: public denunciation and/or

Against Identity Politics a 1

Essay

disruption, criticism/self-criticism, purging/ as a "unique one." All categories, words, con­ exclusion, and the policing of micro-oppres­ cepts, can become spectres if they are allowed sions within the movement or scene; activists to possess and dominate us - even those which refuseto draw distinctions between allies and referto our properties or attributes (59, 151). If sympathisers, active enemies, and anything people are defined as essentially and primarily in-between. Ostracism, "the ultimate form of something - whether it be humanity, white­ social control," "is very infrequently used" in ness, blackness, masculinity, femininity - this indigenous cultures (PeacefulSo cieties), but is is always alienating, because the category is used almost immediately by IPs forthe smallest always "his essence and not he himself," and perceived transgressions. therefore something alien (28), which requires Ervin's repeated tirades against white anar­ "my valuelessness" (145). As a real person, each chists provide a textbook case of this approach; his recent antics include labelling the entire Anarchist Black Cross racist are artificial because, at their recent convention in for Stirner, binaries Denver, someone - at the request ofBlack for Marxists, they political prisoner Jalil Muntaqim - read effects of spectres; aloud a racist letter by a prison guard. theoretical reflections Roger White's Post Colonial Anarchism are correct exemplifies this too, as do the faction of within APOC who disrupted the Crimethlnc con­ of binary structures vergence in Philadelphia in 2009, verbally realityitself abusing participants and damaging their belongings. Kill Whitey, one ofthe cheerleaders forthis attjlck, later extended the disruptors' accusations of"white supremacy" to Food Not of us is a processual being, an embodied self, Bombs and other anarchist groups, demand­ located in a fieldof becoming. ing that all such groups accept black leadership. From a Stirnerian perspective, systems of Theattack by activists fromthe Qilombo social oppression such as racism and patriarchy are centre on the CAL Press table at the Bay Area oppressive impositions of a particular spectre. Anarchist Book Fair in 2014 is another case; Systems of oppression based on gender, race, subsequent comments online by Qilombo and so on are sociologically real, but ultimately supporters clearly show the same rhetoric. rest on other people imposing a particular spec­ Patriarchy Haters, the group which emerged tre - treating another person not as a unique from the Patriarchy and the Movement event one, but as an instance of fe mininity, or "just in Portland, represent a feminist variant; their another X." Such systems entail valuing a par­ most notorious intervention was to shout down ticular category to the exclusion of others, Kristian Williams at an unrelated event for leading to violence against those excluded. criticising their political style in his article, The However, the subordination of one spectre Politics of Denunciation. to another is not the base level of the problem; the problem is that spectres do not liberate or empower those who belong to the category they Identity and Spectres value, because those belonging to the category FROM A STIRNERIAN ANARCHIST PERSPECTIVE, are valued only as instances of the category, not at the root of the problem with IPs is the spectre in their full, unrepresentable being. Hence, a

- the use of an identity-category as a transcend­ right of humanity or a white privilege is never ent, abstract category which possesses and my right or privilege, because my unique being definesval ues. In Stirner's theory, the problem is not identical with humanity or whiteness. of oppression is the problem that people value Even ifl qualify as human or white (by falling

spectres and the things which benefitspectres - within the extensional set of each category), instead of valuing the things which they desire there is some residue of uniqueness which is

Against IdentityPolitics 33 MARIO METHOT Essay

prohibited by the spectre. Stirner's concept of the the extensional set conformto the essence of the un-person expresses this clearly. An un-person spectre and are accorded value - who is "person" fallswi thin the category human, but is deemed to (qualifiedlif e) and who is "un-person" (bare life). deviate fromthe essence, forinstance by putting Thisleads to "abyssal thought," the devaluing of uniqueness beforehuman ity. Theun-pe rson is not those who fall outside dominant normativity (de liberated, but jailed or hospitalised. Indigenous Souza Santos). In Maoism and Leninism, sover­ people always fellwithin the extensional set of eignty operates in the form of vanguard ism or humans, but were historically exterminated or substitutionism. ThePa rty or leader definesthe assimilated because they fell outside the essence spectre and hence claims to speak forall those of what colonisers definedas having human value. covered by it - but such statements are really Thehierarchising of representational categories is political decisions rather than empirical claims. secondary to the initial oppressive gesture of sub­ TheIP, the leader, claims to speak as and forPOC, ordinating real becomings to abstract categories. Black people, women, and so on - but never forall By analogy, white or male privilege is the priv­ those covered by the category. In a sneaky seman­ ilege of the spectre, not of the extensional set. tic move, the moment the oppressed criticise the There is the spectre as a category, which usually vanguard, they are no longer the oppressed, but has a set of normatively definedcharacteristics objectively have become allied with the oppres­ (such as masculinity, whiteness, humanity). And sors. An enemy of the IP becomes an enemy of then there is the set of people who are classi­ the entire category - the spectre. fiedas part of the spectre, who may or may not have these characteristics. A male white person becomes un-white or un-male when he ceases to Identity Politics and Maoism conformto dominant ideas about the category. IPs IMAGINE SPECTRES TO BE MATERIALLY REAL. We might say that white privilege is not some­ Whereas Stirnerians insist that becoming is thing which is owned by a person defined as unrepresentable, IPs followMarx 's view that it white; it is owned by an alien spectre (112), the can be identified with an essence. For Stimer, category of whiteness. binaries are artificial effects of spectres; for Spectres are connected to sovereignty, as the­ Marxists, they are correct theoret�cal reflections orised by Agamben. In sovereignty, a political of binary structures within reality itself. TheIP's ruler has the power to decide which instances of style is descended from Maoism. Younger IPs

? • I Essay

are unlikely to have been directly influenced anything which aids the oppressed spectre is by Maoism, but important elements of Maoist good; anything which harms it is bad. The same political grammar were imported into ear­ action - silencing, violence, abuse, eviction - lier formsof Identity Politics and continue to is praised in the formercase and condemned operate. in the latter. A person's intent is irrelevant; Maoists and IPs are strong structural deter­ the real significance comes fromthe effect, as minists. This means that they work with a definedin the IP's frame.Duplicati ng the his­ model of social life in which macro-social toric role of the activist or militant (Vaneigem, structures determine people's identities and ll l; Anon, Give Up Activism), the IP makes political outcomes. For instance, Ervin says her/himself indispensable as an Expert on that any white radical has "middle class racial oppression, based on claimed knowledge of the privileges ... and it does not matter about their spectre and the correct response to it. personal beliefs" (268). IPs deny that people Such spectres are used to channel the anger exist as unique individuals at all; people are of the excluded into controlled political forms. simply instances of spectres. As an APOC Maoism is a power-politics of ruthless control, writer says, "It's completely arrogant and pre­ but it is seductively appealing to marginal­ tentious to think you are unique. You are just ised people because it contains a moment of another white person" (Anon, Open Letter). empowerment. Especially when out of power, People are taken to be effects of, and reducible Maoism encourages the expression of accu­ to, particular social structures: these struc­ mulated anger against real oppressors such as tures determine their material interests, which landlords and government functionaries. This determine their unconscious investments, which determine their beliefs and actions. People's cases of insensitive or real, unconscious desires are always occasional "racialized desires" stemming from comments or actions paint a "racialized, classed, and gendered prejudiced subjectivities" (comments on Anon, picture of a radical scene Smack a White Boy Part Two). In the misleading is case of privileged people, desires are not inwhich oppressive behaviour to be liberated, but purified.In the case of oppressed people, what they desire is auto­ pervasive and out of control matically, instinctively right - provided it follows fromthe spectre. Thisapproach depends on the conflation of practice is the origin of the culture of denun­ the spectre (eg whiteness, masculinity) and the ciation, and the reason why Black and feminist extensional set it covers (eg white people, men). groups in the '60s were attracted to Maoism. Roger White asserts that "white, Christian men Once in power, however, Maoists cannot have held power and privilege" - without dis­ continue to allow attacks on power-holders. tinguishing between the spectres, the elite, and Instead they channel anger onto folk-devils, all members of the categories. And the founder such as disempowered formeroppr essors, in of CWS writes of "the guilt that comes from carefully managed denunciation campaigns being who I am: a white person of conscience (Perry and Li, 7). In the Euro-American context in a white supremacist society" (Dot Matrix). this method takes the formof moral panics. All of these positions entail the view that This contradictory role is also channelled we are our spectres. As Williams argues, it theoretically. Maoists and IPs deploy a contra­ classifiespeople as "particular types of people dictory fusion of two incompatible ontologies: who are essentially those things," and reduces realism and perspectivism. Realists maintain oppressed as much as abuser/oppressor to that an external reality is knowable through "political symbols used by others to advance rational methods by anyone, whereas perspec­ some specific ideological line." Normatively, tivists maintain that everyone's standpoint is

Against Identity Politics 35 Essay

culturally unique, and there is no way to estab­ Cultural Revolution, different Maoist factions lish any standpoint as more true than others. began denouncing each other as "objectively Maoists/IPs are ontological realists in identify­ counter-revolutionary," as part of a competi­ ing the principal contradiction and depicting tion forresour ces. Elements of both of these the actions of the privileged (which can be approaches can be seen in the actions of IPs, reduced to externally knowable structures), the former as an insistence on leadership by but perspectivist in their treatment of the members of a particular group (Black, women, standpoint of the oppressed: if a Black person etc), the latter in the distribution of prestige to says something is racist, it is racist (comments allies based on conspicuous self-abasement and on Jarach et al); if a woman alleges abuse, the political performance. allegation is self-evidently true (comments on Ultimately, denunciation, exclusion, bor­ Black Orchid Collective). This turns women der-policing, promoting us/them binaries and Black people into Experts, to be unques­ among the oppressed, and harping on prin­ tioningly listened to and obeyed - a position cipal contradictions are the methods through dehumanising forthem as well as others. In which IPs/Maoists mould autonomy into polit­ contrast, the real meaning of a white person's ical power. Anarchism is a threat to Maoism, or a man's actions is externally knowable, and not because it denies oppression or comes from intent is irrelevant. privileged groups, but because it carries the There is method in this madness. In Maoist self-expression of the oppressed further. theory, knowledge is a fusion of experience, References to liberation, autonomy, decolo­ which comes from the masses, and rational nisation, and so on notwithstanding, in such theory, which comes from the vanguard (Mao, perspectives, liberation necessarily means On Practice). In practice, this meant that liberation of a spectre, not of concrete people knowledge emerging from mass meetings, - not even of concrete people categorised by a denunciation campaigns, speak-bitterness spectre (as women, Black people, POC, etc). By campaigns, and so on was systematised and implication, leadership or authoritarian rule reprocessed by the Party into the Mass Line, by a member of the spectre is unproblematic.

which was presented as the unmediated expe­ It is still self-determination by the spectre - the rience of the masses. Disagreements within spectre itself remains autonomous, even if its the movement are "resolved by the method members do not. Thisis clear in Ribeiro's essay of criticism and self-criticism" (Mao, On Senzala or Quilombo: "[the quilombo] was no Contradiction). In practice this meant denun­ communist society" but had a king; "this is ciation and self-denunciation. During the neither here nor [there] ... [it had] freedom and

I WHITE SUPRFMAc1sr1 DfSTROYfRl / s�•� " "'\ / Wh�+? I "tri99er wo.rnan.9· ./ Essay

self-determination." It does not matter if an and purging which are greater than the risks autonomous zone is hierarchically structured, of micro-oppression (Anonymous Refused). as long as the leaders are POC. Mixed movements are labelled not as inci­ To enforce this primacy of the spectre, IPs dentally white/male, but as deliberately white encourage massive si mplifications, reproduc­ supremacist and patriarchal. The illusion is ing the wider equivalence between stereotypes that exclusion creates inclusion; this rests on and roles (Vaneigem, 134). Members of entire the implication that the power to exclude is groups (white, male, straight, middle-class) are unproblematic, provided it is vested in or exer­ deemed privileged. Privilege is often alleged cised by the in-group. For anarchists, the best despite being a result of the actions of a third way to help people feelsaf er is to recreate auton­ party (the police, forexample), rather than omous formsof self-organized control over the one's own. But it carries implications that basic economic and social conditions oflife, and the privileged individual is somehow a direct oppressor of the oppressed individual (Kill t \1\lal Whitey, in True Colors, refers to "white people" b.e bes \sts. t to as the oppressor), that they are part of a small, anarcb. r \S isolated elite (Ervin, 309), and that they've "got tor \ sate o\l\e tee ot se\f:- it good" in an absolute sense (Anon, Open b.e\\l \le tonns Letter). Strategically, the focusis on the priv­ to mous autono asic ileged person, rather than the person who create er tb.e b actually discriminates against or oppresses the re o\ ov ed contt t\OUS oppressed person. Such a person is to admit, rgan\7. \ cond\ identify with, unlearn, or give up their privi­ o soc\a mic and e and lege, as if it were an attribute they controlled, econo vide car . rather than an attribute of a spectre, assigned d to \lro atftl\lt'Y and reinforced by others. e, an 'kSo t ot \\t net\1\lor In terms of political strategy, IPs declare that t \111\tb.\ll people should do what the Expert defines as su\l\lor structurally responsible, rather than following their desires. Thisenc ourages people to focus on their weaknesses or internal conditioning, to provide care and support within networks of rather than their strengths or outer struggles affinity. Without roots in material scarcity, spec­ (Gelderloos), situating oppression mainly in tres would lose their power to wound. individual activists' psyches rather than the To create a politics of sacrifice,people have to dominant social system. IPs insist movements be taught they have no inherent value, so they must have leaders, and these leaders must come believe in and support the systems of compen­ from the oppressed group (Dot Matrix, CWS; sation associated with roles (Vaneigem,1 39). Ervin, 291). Spaces must implement extensive IPs conveys this message by definingpr ivilege policies of normative regulation and enclosure as an ineliminable attribute of identity and to meet criteria of safe space, reflecting a "need encouraging guilt. Experiences of different for protection and security that eclipses the groups - separated by social categories - are desire forfr eedom" (Landstreicher, 12). Any taken to be incommensurable and incompara­ refusal to do so is taken to be an instance of ble, whereas those of individuals in the same racism/sexism within the radical movement - group are taken to be equivalent or identical: an instance which is tied to occasional cases of incidents ofalleged anarchist racism are likened insensitive or prejudiced comments or actions to slavery and genocide, but instances of police to paint a misleading picture of a radical brutality against black people and white pro­ scene in which oppressive behaviour is per­ testers are absolutely incomparable (Ribeiro). vasive and out of control. Normative policing Objecting to IPs' abuse is "entitlement," which is through safe space policies oftenmak es spaces always a bad thing, since privileged people need less safe,by creating risks of denunciation to "know their place" as docile subordinates

Against Identity Politics 37 Essay

of the new rulers-to-be. In some cases they For anarchists such as Stirner, normative are also expected to fu nnel resources to IPs' thought, or statism, is a deeper structure of groups, without anything in return, all the oppression which generates the various other while respecting the group's "autonomy" to bad­ axes. Binary thinking is itself closely tied to mouth and exclude them (Ervin, 291; Qilombo). European thought and the underpinnings Despite their rhetorical radicalism, IPs, like of patriarchy and colonisation. Eurocentric all good Maoists, do not challenge capitalism. statism and capitalism are bound-up with colo­ On the contrary, Perlman argues that national nialism, modern thought, rationalism, and the liberation movements - the inspiration forIPs - modern world-system, but at a deeper level, are actually means of capitalist nation-building. Europe was also self-colonised first (Clastres, Why is a supermarket packer not a manager, or Perlman). While European countries became a security guard not the chief of police? Because the global imperial powers, the problem of of racism. "There's no eart the imperialism and ethnocide are inherent to all . The irony is that IPs are in fact mg on European concepts ts and strong binary oppositions gorn!, Non-European Anarchism, 10). On a deeper level, to be anti-Eurocentric and anti-ethnocidal requires a rejection of the state. With their inversions of binaries, IPs seek to reproduce institutions of hierarchical power. ersecuted to remain per­ Thealterna tive here is affinity: the attempt to ecuted when nationalism offers form connections, informalgroups, and unions em the prospect of becoming perse­ of egoists without these groups being mediated tors" (Perlman). Thepoint, however, is that by spectres. Creating unmediated intercourse they become persecutors and not free beings. across socially operative hierarchies (race, Theov erall system remains intact, dominant, gender, etc) is complicated, but by no means with the spectres reshuffled. impossible - nor necessarily more difficult than creating unmediated intercourse between members of the same category. Where radical­ Between anarchy and ism works well, it manages to construct such identity politics direct connections. As Landstreicher argues, THERE IS A COM MON MISUNDERSTANDING, "[t]he awareness each has of the others' individ­ going back to Marx's critique of Stirner and uality creates a basis where decision and action exhibited in Roger White's critique of Lawrence need not be separate" (21). Relating to others Jarach, that anarchists believe that spectres are as unique beings, as non-disposable creatures simply figments of the imagination - "pre­ valuable in themselves, makes possible commu­ tending [racist/sexist] discourse doesn't exist nication even in contexts of radical difference. just because you didn't create it" (White). This Anarchic affinity is undermined by the inabil­ means we can wish away spectres. Stop believ­ ity to challenge others' views, the construction ing in them, and they lose any power to oppress. of oppressed people as Experts, and the idea of Thisis a mischaracterisation. While it is true incommensurability (Dot Matrix, CWS). This that Stimer believes that spectres lose their nor­ actually reinforces binary thinking and rela­ mative force when we disbelieve them, we can tions of domination. also be oppressed by other people who continue IPs start from a standpoint within the dom­ to believe in and act on spectres. Structural inant system of spectres, and encourage us oppressions are sociologically real but are not to identify with our position within systems material in the Marxist sense. This simply of oppression (Gelderloos, 13). They require means that one's own will is pitted against the that "any person interested in radical trans­ wills and beliefs of others - most of whom con­ formation relinquish the ability to defineher / tinue to be possessed by spectres. himself" (Jarach, 5). Instead, people are to

as Anarchy: A Journal of DesireArmed Essay

dissolve themselves into the pre-existing social categories into which they are classified, both by the dominant system and by IPs. As Jarach argues, "they can't conceive of the possibility that the elevation of any particular culturally constructed marker into a significant val­ ue-laden category could lead to oppression" (3). Indeed, they define the possibility out of exist­ ence: we really are our categories; to oppress is to oppress a category; to liberate is to liberate a category. And leadership of Experts is neces­ sary, if the extensional set are to be reduced to the spectre. From a Stirnerian point of view, instead of starting from a subject-position assigned by the regime of spectres and categories, anar­ chists should start from a standpoint of being a unique individual irreducible to any spectre or category (including those of uniqueness and individuality). A Stirnerian recognises racism or sexism, not as one's own privilege separating one from the other, but as an act of normative repression against other unique ones, and an insult against one's own uniqueness. Thein ten­ sity of internal and external barriers to free Rather than expressing white male priv­ expression vary with context, but there is a ilege, anarchy should be seen as a formof basis fornetworking together in the rejection of ethnogenesis: the emergence of a subculture or alienation and spectres. This is recognised from counterculture which, if able to continue on its non-Eurocentric perspectives; some indigenous line of flight (or detournement ), would become scholars argue that modern alienation is a kind a different culture entirely (New Travellers and, of sickness, a icting colonisers as well as colo­ ffl historically, Irish Travellers are good examples). nised - indeed, that the colonisers infectedthe Theemer gence of new cultures through ethno­ colonised because they were already sick (Duran genesis is well-documented, and often stems and Duran, Burman). This position meshes from flightfrom state power (Scott), a process with the Stirnerian view that oppressor as well which begins with a choice to differfrom the as oppressed is possessed by spectres. Anarchy does not necessarily stem from majority of an existing group. In other words, forminga counterculture is the first step in any identity at all. More often,it comes from a becoming non-white. Ethnogenesis is a prob­ standpoint outside the field of available identi­ lem foresse ntialists because it entails fluidity ties - as in Stirner's idea of a standpoint unique in the very formation of the structural basis; it to each person (190-1). Gelderloos argues that frustrates border-policing. IPs denounce both his own experience is that "(a]ll the identi­ dropping-out and cultural hybridity, dismiss­ ties that society tried to stitch me into don' t fit, and the fabric is coarse" (6), offering "an ing the latter as cultural appropriation. inheritance stripped of anything I value" (7). Similarly, foran other anonymous anarchist, The Politics of Affect "Our task is not to give up some phantom priv­ ilege that has never really been our own, but If oppression is the imposition of a structure to expose and move beyond the artificial iden­ in which people are assigned to spectres - of tities that smother our individuality" (Willful which both privileged and oppressed spectre Disobedience). are largely effects - then IPs actually entrench

Against IdentityPolitics 39 MARIO METHOT

oppression by locking-in the spectres and Affectively, the orientation of anarchy is intensifying normativity. If one assumes that to unmediated, active joy. There is a level of hierarchical power is wrong because it prevents immediate, free becoming which is deeper (non-white) people from living joyously, in the than the hierarchy of spectres. Stimer theorises flow of becoming of their own desires, then the a kind of intense, joyous exercise of capacities subordination of autonomy to the primary "without reservations" (171), giving "free play" contradiction is not an appropriate response. to one's capabilities (167), and playing "as freely Anarchy goes further, because it opposes the as possible" (130). Bonanno argues that capi­ underlying structure of domination of unique talism denies us an experience of active (rather ones and flows of becoming by the order of than passive) joy, and counsels a "search for spectres. IPs seek to abolish the privilege of joy.. . through the search forpl ay," driven by a particular spectre; ideally, anarchists seeks a "vital impulse that is always new, always in to abolish the normative power of spectres in movement." In the excitement of play "lies the general - which necessarily also abolishes every possibility to break with the old world and iden­ spectre's privilege. Stirnerian anarchy goes tify with new aims and other values and needs" beyond unlearning privilege - the favouring (15-16). Hakim Bey argues that insurrections of one spectre over another - to unlearning and autonomous zones should create peak

spectres - learning not to be subordinate to experiences of extraordinary consciousness spectres. and intensity (TAZ). Such peak experiences

40 Anarchy: A Journal of DesireArmed Essa

are "value-formative on the individual level," groups (Gelderloos, 12), reflectingthe broader allowing a "transformation of everyday life" dynamic by which "skill in playing and han­ (Occult Assault). Various anarchist practices, dling roles determines rank in the spectacular from the TAZ to rewilding, from joyous insur­ hierarchy" (Vaneigem, 131). For the former rectionary struggle to dropping-out and living out-group, anger and fr ustration with the differently, are means of recovering this level of dominant system are channelled onto other becoming and immediacy. radicals, which sustains continued submer­ In contrast, the dominant affects forIP s are sion in systems of oppression by providing a wallowing in the loss of immediacy and the safety-valve for frustration, creating a substi­ inevitability of alienation (guilt, melancholy, tute fora less reliable substantive rebellion. It inadequacy), a kind of joyless anger. They also renders the oppressed dependent on the reproduce a style of politics which focuses on oppressors as either docile allies or targets of telling people "how to behave" (Dot Matrix, anger, and often leads to a politics focused on CWS), conditioning people into roles which demands forrecog nition from those one also reproduce the power of the spectacle. IPs seeks autonomy from. Thebinary nature of the reproduce conventional morality and its structures of ressentiment - negative affect (often including irrational, even if they self-destructive, verbal or physical want dense, mutually lashing out) towards others as an supportive, expression of one's own powerless­ socially meaningful ness, in contrast to celebration communities, of one's power. I have lost my then they - like the capacity to enjoy; you have rest of us - will stolen it; you must be punished. have to build these On the side of the supposedly communities empowered, Ervin encourages , often from scratch, ruthlessness and "cold-blooded on efficiency" as key virtues (245), the basis of affinity reproducing the affective structure a of managers, soldiers, and police. The nd living-otherwise practice of calling-out frames white- ness, white supremacy, and patriarchy as personal moral failures, even though the underlying theory fr ames them as structural spectres adopted by IPs preclude ever becom­ realities. Thecu ltivation of individual guilt and ing autonomous from the supposed oppressor, blame actually reproduces dominant Calvinist whom they paradoxically need to remain in normativity (Gelderloos, 13), and the develop­ place in order to ground their own role as ment of elaborate group norms reinforces white Experts. Hence the irony when Ribeiro says of middle-class status orientations and etiquette. APOC "it is not about white people at all" - at For IPs, neither (those assigned as) privileged the end of an entire article which is all about nor oppressed are able to escape ressentiment white people. and become empowered. The latter become The structure of impotent anger, dis­ angry, rigid, and dependent on the spectre for placed aggression, and policing of etiquette their sense of power; the former become docile, is most notable in the practice of calling-out submissive, and incapable of autonomous or denouncing other radicals - either for action. With intense joy forbidden, people micro-oppressions (small comments or actions become vulnerable to the mundane manipu­ which are insensitive or latently racist/sexist), lation of transitory pleasure and prestige. IPs or forpo litical disagreement categorised as create a "system of rewards.. . to encourage racist/sexist. For instance, the Crimethinc dis­ compliance" with leaders from marginalised ruptors call fora "culture of calling people out

AgainstIdentity Politics 41 Essay

on their shit" (Anon, Smack a White Boy Part suitable aftercare, leads to guilt, despair, and Two). In general, calling-out involves a crude, apathy. Alternatives to calling-out include aggressive style; it carries a tone of I get to tell rational debate, parody, ignoring provoca­ you what to do, and you have to obey. tions, trying to channel anger onto the wider Negative effects of anti-oppression normativ­ system, and discussing the incident one-to­ ity are paradoxically felt most strongly by the one outside the conflictual setting - also oppressed - poor whites, Black people, young known as "calling-in." Some anarchists advo­ people, people with psychological problems, cate using nonviolent communicatron in such and newcomers to a movement - who are less contexts (Heckert). In classical indigenous accustomed to self-policing their social appear­ cultures, harmfuldeviance is taken as a kind ance, less able to do so, or less aware of the of imbalance or sickness. Theywould seek to operative norms. IPs thus close down radical understand how a person has come into imbal­ groups into tightly bordered sects. Gelderloos ance, and to gently guide them back to the right deems the emphasis on micro-oppressions a path (which is also the flourishing or becoming kind of purism which seeks to banish deviance of their own personality). Most anarchists are so as to create a monolithic personality-type very reasonable if they are told precisely why (18). In practice, what is being challenged is not something is problematic. IPs tend to react aggres­ sively to any response to irrelevant to the being called-out which does anarchy seems not amount to uncondi­ because most people tional apology. Usually, the community responses are not inherently been conditioned to live objectionable. Theydeploy who've strategies of argumentative such system-constructed rebuttal, mitigation by con­ within text or motive, etc, which communities have internalized are standard in many con­ versational contexts. It is repressive, statist beliefs, and never entirely clear why these predictable responses accept capitalist common sense are deemed intolerable by IPs (the claim that they seem to deny the other's the person's degree of complicity in regimes of perspective [Tekanji) seems spurious), but it oppression, but the extent of their knowledge seems to be because they entail the absence of of the appropriate anti-oppressive terminology the desired affective response of submission. and related normative codes. Landstreicher suggests that IPs turns us into Conceived as a struggle against the enact­ "a bunch of shy, yet inquisitorial mice tip-toeing ment of structural oppression, calling-out around each other forfe ar of being judged, and confuses the individual with the spectre they just as incapable of attacking the foundationsof are taken to represent. It is understandable this society as they are of relating to each other" that oppressed people have a low tolerance (16). Instead, he urges us to become "a certain threshold forpre judice and insensitivity, but sort of being ... capable of acting on our own it is unhelpful to glorify and encourage such terms to realize our own desires and dreams," reactions as politically valuable. Aragorn! says in struggle against domination (3). The point that "I tend only to 'criticize' when I am willing is "to transform ourselves into strong, daring, to take responsibility forthe caring of the criti­ self-willed, passionate rebels" (6). Thisstrength cized" (Toward a Non-European Anarchism, 6). and passion is impeded by affectssuch as guilt, This position is more attentive to the affective pity, and regret. We are aiming, remember, for consequences of calling-out, which, without a state of full life without reservations.

42 Anarchy: A Journal of DesireArmed WUOMETttOT

IPs conceive of their angry, disruptive style guess in advance what common action or object of politics as a way to express the authentic might be personally unbearable, does not mean experience of being traumatised. But their they are oppressing someone. distribution of commensurability (absolute within a spectre, but utterly absent outside it) entails downplaying the degree of specific Exodus versus submersion traumas sufferedby concrete people. And while One of the biggest disagreements between it is true that listening to and believing a sur­ Stirnerian anarchists and IPs is on the ques­ vivor's story is crucial to healing, the sources tion of exodus. IPs (and most leftanar chists) and symptoms of trauma are too diverse to be generally condemn exodus as a privileged, mid­ dealt with through homogenised identities and dle-class strategy, instead favouring submersion prescriptive restrictions. Furthermore, the tac­ in existing communities of the oppressed. For tics of calling-out and excluding deviants can instance, the APOC disruptors claim that themselves be traumatic or triggering. Crimethinc "encourage the culture of dropping IPs oftenturn trauma into a source of power out of society, �hich makes the assumption that and identity, but marking trauma as an iden­ the reader/attendee has that privilege" (Anon, tity is also a barrier to autonomy. It prevents Smack a White Boy Part Two). An anonymous us reaching the level of immediacy and joy, Qilombo supporter terms the anarchist scene a keeping us in a fieldof scarcity thinking. It's "subcultural playpen" and an "all-white fantasy no coincidence that the most extreme regimes world" (comments on Jarach et al). Kill Whitey of oppression (such as Gitmo, supermax segre­ labels dumpster-diving as privileged, condemn­ gation, concentration camps, Native residential ing "white college kids and middle-class punks schools, and the "seasoning" of slaves) are hiding in drop-out culture" (Kill Whitey, Food designed to cause as much post-traumatic stress Not Bombs), while Ervin classifiescriticism of as possible. Trauma is also a block on active the "state's ability to hold back a freelif estyle" becoming and on living life to the fullest. In as middle class (110). IPs allege that the entire indigenous cultures, it is conceived as a sickness tactical repertoire of horizontalism is privi­ of the soul, in which part of the self retreats leged, in contrast with their preferred focus from the world or loses its life-energy (Burman; on community organising or intra-movement Duran and Duran). struggle. Being open to people as unique individuals Thegrain of truth in this position is that tac­ is the best way to respond to these kinds of tics of escape, exodus, and physical resistance problems. Thefact that someone else has needs carry different levels of difficulty and risk for incompatible with one's own, or that they can't diffe rent people. It's easier to quit a job than

Against Identity Politics 43

Essay

to escape from prison. It's easier to run from and becoming. Hence the need to enforce a the police if one is physically fit. But anyone prohibition on exodus - a prohibition which can adopt a perspective of escape, and attempt reveals their similarities with states and other to create lines of flight from the system. While hierarchical systems, which similarly prohibit it may be easier forsome than others, nobody the withdrawal of participation and restrict should be under a moral obligation to remain mobility. It is easy to see how the fear of the oppressed just to avoid being diffe rent from uncontrollable and unknowable - and the par­ others; any such obligation only reinforces allel desire to order all of reality into a fixed oppression. schema - lies beneath these discursive strategies. Thereare farmore people who squat, shop­ A lot of the objection to exodus comes down lift,or dumpster dive who are from poor and to a hatred of play. Drop-outs are accused of marginal backgrounds; in the global South turning poverty into a game, of saying some­ there are entire strata living in squatted shan­ one can be poor and have fun (Anon, Smack tytowns, abstracting electricity, and scavenging and White Boy Part Two). Thismay just as well in rubbish tips. Historical practices such as the celebrated quilombos show that dropping-out is a serious, and oftensuc­ cessful,st rategy forthe most oppressed. with inte James Scott's work shows that peasants, nse joy forbidden, pe slaves, and marginal groups use vari­ ople ous tactics of exodus to minimise their become vulner able to the mundane subservience to elite power. Similarly, manip when highly oppressed groups become ulation of transitory sufficiently angry, they often use the plea most militant formsof protest - as sure and prestige we have seen in cases like Paris 2005, London 2011, Los Angeles 1992, and so on. Poor people also use all kinds of high-risk survival strategies, fromundocu­ be said of important strands of peasant resist­ mented border-crossing to involvement in the ance such as carnivalesque and folkculture. IPs drug trade. There is also evidence that drop­ flourishon a culture of deadly seriousness and ping-out worked to defeat aspects of capitalism urgency, tied up with a celebration of trauma. in the 1970s (Shukaitis). Real activism, afterall, is hard work, sacrifice: Why, then, do IPs oppose exodus? I would I can't have fun, so you shouldn't either. This hazard a guess that the real underlying objec­ entails denying pleasure to others whenever tion is not that poor people cannot drop out, but possible. Of course, dropping out does lead to a that they should not: dropping-out contradicts kind of privilege - the person who has escaped the IP's political agenda, resting on strong spec­ clearly has a better life than the person still tres and identities within the existing frame. trapped in the system. Thisis equally true of Structural determinism precludes escape on quilombos, maroon communities, pirate uto­ principle. IPs celebrate their current blockages, pias, and so on. But is this really a case against internalise their cage, and insist that the cage is dropping-out? both inescapable and revolutionary. Thisis not a perspective of escape - it is a perspective of entrapment in the guise of solidarity. IPs' emphasis on community really comes Common sense and the down to a fearof placelessness. Theirideolog­ community ical vision of society requires that everyone INSTEAD OF SEE KING TO ESCAPE THE SYSTEM, have definable positionalities: a conservative IPs place great emphasis on serving the vision, but inverted. This requires that catego­ community, the people, the oppressed, or a ries remain dominant over lines of flight, escape, particular oppressed group. Ervin insists that

Against Identity Politics 45 Essay

the usefulnessof revolutionaries depends on Boy; Kurukshetra). Ervin suggests anarchists whether they serve the community (136), as have no "right to be" in a Black area (282), Kill opposed to "Declasse punks with red Mohawks" Whitey tells white radicals to "get the fuckout (276). White suggests that the "firstpriority of of POC communities" (True Colors); in effect, resistance" is community consciousness rais­ white radicals are banned from Black areas in ing. Ribeiro argues that the "people" are failing an inverted reproduction of segregation. This to flock to existing anarchist groups because is a double-bind, since anarchist events in rural they represent "a white, petty-bourgeois locations are declared inaccessible to poor people Anarchism that cannot relate to the people," an (Ervin, Racism in ABC; Veranasi, comments on anarchism which is "individualistic, self-serv- Smack a White Boy Part Two). This reflects a broader irresolvable predicament: radicals are both told to be part of the people, and told they joy, share cannot (since their perspective is incommensu­ starta lways from rable and their privilege is ineliminable). The let us glorificationof ghettos as autonomous zones we can, and it witho thers when runs up against the reality of imposed to break down racial segregation. use lt as a weapon There is a strong tone of ressen­ fine timent in the position: I can't drop rebuild andr ede mmon sense, to out so you mustn't. If I was jailed and co unable to escape from power, I would r ace the graveyard mmunity, to epl take courage and hope fromthe factthat co others are still able to do so. The objection orld of life pectres witha w to separation tries to forceradicals back into . ofs avoidable systems of authoritarian domination, such as work and schooling, thus reinforcing these institutions. IPs glorify escape fromcon­ ing, [and] selfish." A Qilombo supporter goes trolled spaces, such as fleeingthe senzala (slave as faras to argue that "involving oneself in the quarters) to the quilombo (autonomous zone). school system" is an "excellent ... investment," Yet in practice, they tell us never to flee the far superior to drop-out anarchism, while senzala, but instead to work within it as over­ another posits a "need to emphasize commu­ seers, conditioning children into conformity, or nity norms and practices" (Kurukshetra), and as exploited, joyless workers. There is nothing Veranasi tells anarchists to get a job so as not radical and empowering about getting a job. In to separate from the oppressed (comments on a context of generalised entrapment, to separate Smack a White Boy Part Two). Thereis also a is not to alienate, but rather to escape, to slip wider accusation, particularly in Ervin's work, out of place, to flee dominant categories and that the allegedly bad race, gender, or class poli­ those who impose them. tics of radical movements is the reason fortheir Community politics is hamstrung by a major continued failure (303, 310). Thisis the Maoist problem: the community are not especially rad­ view that a tide oflatent energy is always wait­ ical. The IP assumption that "the people" or ing to be released, which is currently fe ttered "the community" has revolutionary instincts by the principal contradiction and inadequate is an effect of its construction as a spectre, not leadership (Mao, On Contradiction; Bouc, 137; a result of observation of actual people. It also Howe and Walker, 176; Gurley). embeds vanguardist assumptions that the role A collective proprietary attitude to geograph­ of radicals is to locate, lead, and imbue these ical areas corresponds to this political bias. communities with revolutionary interests. The White anarchists active in poor communities orientation to liberate a spectre rather than are accused of failingto get community consent, concrete people is the source ofIPs' hostility to disrespecting locals, and gentrifying areas by individualism, personal freedom,and supposed inserting whiteness (Kill Whitey, Smack a White selfishnessamong radicals.

46 Anarchy: A Journal of DesireArmed Essay

IPs also run up against the realities of con­ are not some middle-class elite, hovering over temporary capitalism. Today, most of us do the authentic poor. Theprecar iat make up only not belong to real, substantive communities. 15% of the population according to the survey. As Landstreicher argues, "the dominant forms ESWs are well below halfway. And the moment of relating are economic, based on the domina­ a precarian becomes politicised, they tend to tion of survival over life ... Today, neither the gain education and networks, and become daily interactions of one's 'communities' (these ESWs. So, realistically, anarchy is not a move­ strange, disconnected 'communities' of family, ment of middle-class kids. It is a movement of school, work) nor the chance encounters (at the politically conscious, socially networked poor market, on the bus, at some public event) have people. much chance of sparking a real and intense IPs believe that anarchy is irrelevant to the interest in another, an impassioned curiosity community because anarchists are privileged, to discover who they are and what we might be and separate from the community. In fact, able to create with them" (7). Bey argues that anarchy seems irrelevant to the community simply coming together is already a victory because most people who've been conditioned over capitalism (Immediatism vs Capitalism), to live within such system-constructed com­ and the Situationists exposed the emptiness munities have internalised repressive, statist of everyday life and the role of urban residen­ beliefs, and accept capitalist common sense tial areas as state-controlled warehouses for (the Gramscian notion of an incoherent every­ workers (Debord, sections 169-76). Even where day philosophy or ideology prevalent among some kind of community life persists, it rarely entails a unitary set of beliefs, demands, and interests, or even (outside of certain subaltern social movements and indigenous groups) any kind of collective power. In looking to "the community," IPs are seeking a source of strength which is at once a product of the system, and thereby constituted as weak. If they want dense, mutually supportive, socially meaningful communi­ ties, then they - like the rest of us - will have to build these commu­ nities, often from scratch, on the basis of affinity and living-otherwise. When IPs speak forthe community, they typically do so as a subaltern people, which embeds uncritical, vanguard, a representative, who substitutes for hegemonic, and reactionary beliefs). Theidea a community which is absent in practice. that the oppressed are just waiting for the A short time ago, the new BBC class survey right activist leadership, which is blocked by (Heyden) became a fad among those activ­ the allegedly inherent racism/sexism in social ists who use social media. Nearly everyone movements, is a delusion. Working in wider who completed it came out in a category communities entails putting up with (and even called "emergent service workers" (ESWs). glorifying) a lot of common-sense ideologies, The survey has eight categories, and ESWs prejudices, and bigotry on a scale fargreater are the second-bottom category, defined by than anything within radical scenes. The real low income and precarious work. They differ problem is not organisation, or the correct line, fromthe worse-offprecariat in only two ways or the right leadership. Theproblem is whether - "social and cultural capital." In other words, people actually desire revolution/insurrec­ the average anarchist is in the same position tion. In fact,no revolutionary "people" exists, as the poorest group, except that we have more because of what Stimer terms the police senti­ education and stronger social networks. ESWs ments of actually existing people (116).

Against IdentityPolitics 47 Essay

Thehy pothesis that the community is more as having no particular expertise, except "a radical than so-called privileged anarchists is decent supply of good common sense and street simply false. Most anarchists already oppose knowledge" (10), and urges us to "trust the best work, police, prisons, government, and so on instincts of the people" (119). Patriarchy Haters - whereas most community members do not. condemn political debate as contrasting with It is not uncommon foranarchists fighting real, life-or-death stakes forthem: "We do not gentrification, CCTV and other formsof the agree with people having a 'political argument' surveillance state, or morality-policing to be at our expense" (Statement). Theysuggest that pitted against other local residents. It might be their positions come fromtheir "BODIES," which in poor people's material interests to oppose are not "to be politicized, theorized, speculated dominant institutions, but forthe most part they upon" (Weaver). don't. People who lack formal or informalpol it­ IPs advance a framework ii1 which theory ical education tend not to become anarchists distracts from reality. The historical origin - because they tend to remain stuck in capital­ of this framework is the Maoist emphasis on ist common sense, dependent on the discourses "experience" {suitably processed by the party) made available by the mainstream, and caught as superior to "book learning," and the corre­ up in the pursuit ofvalues of individual advance­ sponding "Red versus expert" struggles of the ment. Their supposed interests have little effect Cultural Revolution. The basic gesture is to influences. Any anarchist split issues between the real reality posited by IPs and associated with experience and the nc ipal contradiction, and a fielddeemed ondary or tertiary, and thereforetri vial. is grounds apparently obvious, self-evi­ nt claims and is used to create a sense of ency: IPs are doing real, life-or-death pol­ s, and everyone else is just messing around otice once again the prejudice against play). e functionof this gesture is to "declare cer­ m questions off-limits" because "the answer is ready known" (Williams). Arguments against s' claims are often displaced onto the issue of ho has the right to decide, which is returned to project directe the question of spectres - Black radicals don't fromsome kind of political education o have to listen to white critics, male experts have cal de/resocialisation of the poor (not primarily no right to expound on survivors' experiences, of ourselves, though most critical pedagogy is etc. Thisis a category-error, to which the appro­ also reflexive and dialogical). Otherwise, anar­ priate answer is: I've not exposed your mistake chists pursuing such projects will simply be because I think you need my permission - I've overwhelmed by the unreflexive common sense exposed your mistake because it leads to oppres­ of those whose perspectives they idealise. sion, bad politics, or ineffectiveness. This strategy The theme of urgency is closely connected gives power to those who definewhich issues are to the community orientation. IPs often posit urgent. In fact, none of the cases discussed here immediately apparent realities, which are were anywhere near to being life-or-death situ­ deemed extra-theoretical and extra-politi­ ations. And paradoxically, to heal from trauma, cal. Disagreement with the IP's perspective or one needs to theorise and intellectualise it. actions is belittled as a "topic ripe fora drunk In fact, the idea of obvious experiences is PhD" (White) or "some intellectual's grad thesis" fallacious.Ther e is no simple divide between (Weaver) . The oppressed are said to "know reality/experience and thought/theory. Humans oppression" fromexp erience: "we lost the need process experiences through conceptual cat­ to understand pain philosophically when we egories, and in many cases, these categories learned it physically" (Ribeiro). Ervin postures affect the impact of an experience - or what,

48 Anarchy: A Journal of DesireArmed Essay

subjectively, is experienced. People don't lack of the oppressed. IPs are seductive in the ways theories simply because they are not formally they have of identifying and channelling the educated or academically trained. Rather, anger of the oppressed, the guilt of the (rela­ everyone has their own stock of theories and tively) privileged, experiences of trauma, and concepts through which they unconsciously awareness of the possibility of unintended process the world, and without which the oppression. But they channel these affects into world would simply be an incomprehensible political power, using them to entrench the role mess of sense-impressions. Whenever some­ of IPs as Experts. This role requires that privi­ body claims that their own conceptions are lege/oppression be theorised as an ineliminable real, or are unmediated experience in contrast original sin. to others' mere ideas or opinions, they are Against this prevalent form of disguised actually reifying and naturalising their own vanguardism, let us hold forththe beacon of a socially constructed beliefs - usually beliefs world without spectres. Structural oppressions based on capitalist common sense. There is no are sociologically real, but their such thing as direct, unmediated knowledge fromexperience (as distinct from unmediated experience, which is felt as unrepresentable any case, IPs create a regime of roles, whic Vaneigem's terms, "express lived experience, at the same time they reify it" (131). This does not mean that academic theori are always best. Academic thought is ofte tied-up with corporate and state power (D Matrix, Science As Capital). Everyday, loca knowledges can also be effective ways of the­ orising the world. But it is a mistake to reify them into unmediated experiences which are somehow directly (and therefore more objectively) true. It shuts down dialogue and reinforces the enclosure of common sense. e aeeper, to the structures of statism and And in many cases, everyday common sense representation. If we must theorise a primary is also extremely oppressive, accepting and contradiction, then let it be the contradiction imposing normativities complicit with, and between ourselves - as unique ones, forces directly reinforcing, institutionalized forms of becoming, irreducible and unrepresenta­ of power. In addition, many key terms in IPs' ble beings - and the entire regime of spectres discourse - structural oppression, privilege, and alienation. Let us dispense with boundary patriarchy, trauma, framing,suprema cy, sen­ policing, and instead nurture affinities across zala, quilombo and so on - are not everyday social categories. It is in rediscovering the level common sense terms, but imports fromuniver­ of immanent, abundant becoming, the joy of sity cultural studies texts or historical reading. life, the flow of desire and direct connection, Anti-intellectualism handily insulates IPs from that we destroy the power which spectres exer­ rebuttal, but does not make their poorly based cise over us. Let us start always fromthis joy, strategies any more effective. share it with others when we can, and use it as a weapon to break down common sense, to rebuild and redefinecommun ity, to replace the graveyard of spectres with a world of life. May For a World Without Spectres! the alien privileges of spectres and the alien fROM ALL OF THIS, WE MUST CONCLUDE THAT oppressions they engender never come between IPs are just another type of leftist,promot ing a unique one, a freebeing, and its immanent sacrificeand renunciation, posing as liberators becoming. �

Against IdentityPolitics 49 Essay

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Aragorn! (2009), "Toward a non European Fanon, F. (1963/2004), TheWre tched Anarchism or Why a movement is the last of the Earth, New York: Grove. thing that people of color need" https://warriorpublications.files.wordpress.com/ http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/ 2013/01/wretched-of-the-earth-frantz-fanon.pdf aragorn-toward-a-non-european-anarchism-or-why-a­ movement-is-the-last-thing-that-people-of-colo.pdf Fanon, F. (1952/2007), Black Skin, White Masks, New York: Grove. Bey, Hakim (1991), T.A.Z. Part 3 http://hermetic.com/bey/taz3.html Faun, Feral (no date), Feral Revolution and Other Essays http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/feral-faun­ Bey, Hakim (1992), "Immediatism versus Capitalism" essays.pdf http://hermetic.com/bey/radio_se.html Gelderloos, Peter (2010), Lines in the Sand" Bey, Hakim (no date), "TheOccult Assault http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/peter­ on Institutions" gelderloos-lines-in-sand.pdf http://hermetic.com/bey/occultassault.html Gurley, John G. (1970), "Capitalist and Maoist Black Orchid Collective (2014), "Building Economic Development," Bulletin of Concerned Capacity for Complexity" Asian Scholars 2 https://blackorchidcollective.wordpress.com/ http://www.arkibongbayan.org/2011/ 2011-05May20- 2013/03/14/building-capacity-for-complexity/ KaBel3rdAniv/sosguidedoc/Capitalist%20and%20 Maoist%20Economic%20Development.doc Bonanno, Alfredo (1977), Armed Joy. http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/alfredo-m­ Heckert, Jamie (2013), "Anarchy without Opposition" bonanno-armed-joy.pdf http://www.occupywallstreet.net/story/ anarchy-without-opposition Bouc, Alain (1977), Mao Ts e-Tung: A Guide to his Thought, New York: St Martin's Press Herman, Judith (1997), Tra uma and Recovery: The Aft ermath of Violence, New York: Basic Burman, Anders (2009), "Colonialism in Context: An Aymara Reassessment of 'Colonialism,' 'Coloniality' Heyden, Tom (2013), "Class calculator: Can I have no and the 'Postcolonial World,"' Kult 6, 117-29 job and money and still be middle class?" http://postkolonial.dk/artikler/kult_6/BURMAN.pdf http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-21953364

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so Anarchy: A Journal of DesireArmed Essay

Jarach, Lawrence (2004), "Preliminary Thesesfor a Petersen, Abby (2001), Contemporary Political Protest: Longer Discussion on Essentialism and the Problem Essays on Political Militancy, Aldershot: Ashgate. of ldentity Politics," Anarchy: Jo urnal of Desire Armed 58 (Fall) Qilombo (2014), "Keep Qilombo Open" http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/ http://qilombo.org/ lawrence-jarach-essentialism-and-the­ emergency-fundraiser-keep-qilombo-open/ problem-of-identity-politics.pdf Perlman, Fredy (1984), TheCo ntinuing Jarach, Lawrence et al. (2014), "An Open Appeal of Na tionalism Letter to Bay Area Anarchists" https://libcom.org/library/ www.anarchistnews.org/ continuing-appeal-nationalism-fredy-perlman node?page=48&%3Bpage=l99 Ribeiro, Pedro (2005), "Senzala or Quilombo: Kill Whitey (2009), "SAWB2 [Smack a White Reflections on APOC and the Fate of Black Anarchism" Boy Part 2]: 15 Points of Clarification" http://www.anarkismo.net/newswire.php?story_id=460 http://kilwaii.blogspot.nl/2009/08/ Scott, James C (2009), The Art of Not Being Governed: sawb2-l 5-points-factsquestionsclarifica.html An Anarchist History of Up land Southeast Asia, New Kill Whitey (2009), "True Colors: An Open Reply Haven: Yale University Press to Food Not Bombs and ThoseWho Defend It" Shukaitis, S. (2006), "Whose Precarity is it Anyway?" http://kilwaii.blogspot.nl/2009/08/true-colors-open­ Fifth Estate,vol. 41, no. 3 reply-to-food-not.html Stimer, Max (1845), TheEgo and his Own Kill Whitey (2009), "Open Letter to Food Not Bombs" http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/max-stimer-the­ http://kilwaii.blogspot.nl/2009/07/open-letter-to-food­ ego-and-his-own.pdf not-bombscfood-not.html Sullivan, Sian (2004), "We are Heartbroken and Kurukshetra (2014), "Reflectionson the Furious! (#2) Violence and the (anti-)globalisation 'Decolonization and Anarchism' Panel at the 2014 Bay movement(s)," CSGR Working Paper No. 133/04 Area Anarchist Bookfair" http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/1981/l/ http://kurukshetral.wordpress.com/2014/04/03/ WRAP_Sull ivan_wpl3304.pdf reflections-on-the-decolonization-and-anarchism­ panel-at-the-2014-bay-area-anarchist-bookfair/ Tekanji (2006), "'Check My What?' On privilege and what we can do about it" Landstreicher, Wolfi (2005), "Against the Logic http://blog.shrub.com/archives/tekanji/2006-03-08_146 of Submission" http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/wolfi­ Vaneigem, Raoul (1994/1967), The Revolution landstreicher-against-the-logic-of-submission.pdf of Everyday Life, London: Rebel Press

Mao Zedong (1937), On Contradiction Voline (2014), "Radical Irrationality https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/ and Authoritarianism" selected-works/volume-1/mswvl_l 7. htm http://anarchistnews.org/content/ radical-irrationality-and-authoritarianism Mao Zedong (1937), On Practice [currently inaccessible] https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/ selected-works/volume-l/mswvl_16.htm Weaver, Rebecca (2014), "The Cult of the Male Expert" http://patriarchyhaters.wordpress.com/2014/05/23/the­ Marx, Karl (1845-6), TheGerman Ideology, cult-of-the-male-expert-becca-weaver-explains-why­ Chapter 3: Saint Max [Stimer) she-participated-in-the-protest-of-kristian-williams/ https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/ german-ideology/ch03.htm White, Roger (2005), "Identity Politics and Essentialism, in Post Colonial Anarchism: Essays on Naparstek, Belleruth (2006), Invisible Heroes: Survivors Race, Repression and Culture in Communities of Color, of Tra uma and How they Heal, London: Piatkus. 1999-2004

Patriarchy Haters/Patriarchy and the Movement http://www.coloursofresistance.org/326/ Organizers (2013), "Statement on Patriarchy and identity-politics-and-essentialism/ the Movement" WillfulDi sobedience (Anon.) (2001), "A Question of http://patriarchyandthemovement.wordpress:' Privilege," Willful Disobedience 2 (8), 7-8 com/2013/03/07/statement-on-the-patriarchy-and-the­ http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/various-au­ movement-event-portland-2282013/ thors-willful-disobedience-volume-2-number-8.pdf Peaceful Societies (no date), "Ladakhi" Williams, Kristian (2014), "ThePol itics of http://www.peacefulsocieties.org/Society/ Denunciation" Ladakhis.html http://towardfreedom.com/29-archives/ Perry, Elizabeth and Li Xun (1997), Proletarian activism/3455-the-politics-of-denunciation Power: Shanghai in the Cultural Revolution, New York: Westview.

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