May 28th, 2024
This collection starts with a biography on Emma Goldman, which I read half of. It’s from 1910 and biographies from older periods are written in a very different style. I feel modern biographies don’t assume the reader already knows everything and provides some background information when something is brought up. No so here. There are lots of names and events dropped with no background. Emma was a Russian Jew in Prussia and from a German culture. Her family moved to St. Petersburg in the wake of the assassination of Alexander II, a highly politicized and revolutionary environment. She worked in some factory and eventually moved to the US with her sister. She found America at the end of the 19th century to be a land of worker oppression and abuse. This is the America of the Haymarket murders and active fighting with police and militia. Anarchists soon assassinate the president. It hasn’t really discussed why she fell in with anarchism. Not too informative so far.
May 29th, 2024
The biography was not the most interesting. She ran in a lot of circles and was the target of police. It would be better if it were post Russian Revolution. It’s funny that the author refers to the 1905 revolution as THE revolution. Little did he know. But it seems Emma did some good work and only got arrested and went to prison for 1 year, at the age of 25 in 1893, under some garbage charges of inciting a riot. But she gained a lot of fame. She may not be a household name today, but she is definitely remembered. Now to the meat of the matter. What is anarchism?
May 30th, 2024
There’s a little preface by Emma where she defends the written word over the spoken word, saying that any buffoon will go to a speech, but only people with interest will seek out a book on the topic. She then cuts it off saying the works will speak for themselves. She already let the cat out of the bag that her essay Anarchism doesn’t actually explain how anarchism would work in reality. The justification is that it is not up to the people of the present to tell the people of the future how to live. This is very disappointing. I don’t need fiery rhetoric about how things are oppressive. What’s the alternative and how will it work? Socialists of different varieties provide an answer to both. To her first point, I don’t agree that the people of the present shouldn’t listen to the people of the past. Improvements are built on knowledge of the past, and much of that gets forgotten as things get more complicated. It seems anarchism is exactly what everyone thinks it is: a complete lack of law and order. Without state and property, what is there other than a base existence? If there is now law to protect my home, or even my life, then that is the life of an animal. Yes, she is right that laws CAN be oppressive. But the struggle should be for a system that does not oppress, not no system at all. I only got through half, so maybe she will win me over, but I doubt it.
May 31st, 2024
Yeah I’m not sold on the anarchism thing. There’s probably better introductions, but it comes down to what a lot of other ideals want: individual liberty. The difference I guess is what is the incubator of liberty. For anarchists, it is nothing. All structures are in the way of individual liberty. I don’t agree and don’t see how a stateless society can be anything other than despotism and might-makes-right. I have a low opinion on human nature. The next essay is Minorites versus Majorities is more interesting, but takes a much more negative view of the populace than you’d expect from the idealistic previous essay. This one says that it is individuals and non-conformists who improve and change the world, while the majority despise them and change and desire to be passive and led. I agree with this line of thought. The masses are generally ignorant and allergic to critical thinking, and the powers that be like it that way. Emma ends say she sympathizes with the plight of the masses, but does not count on them for political action. The Anarchism essay extolled direct action as a tool to improvement, not waiting for the government or by voting it in. Amen to that. And yet Emma cannot count on the majority to join this, as they blindly follow laws, become cops and lawyers, and criticize the minority. Not sure if there was a call to action or any silver lining in this one. Maybe better education, but many people are inherently limited in intellectual ability. Who will care for them in an anarchist society? They would be taken advantage of.
June 3rd, 2024
The Psychology of Political Violence is the next essay. It is a response to people who condemn a political act of violence without asking the question: why? Something must have motivated this person. Emma says it is an intense feeling of sympathy for one’s fellow humans and outrage at the conditions being perpetuated. I can see and agree with this. If conditions were to improve, if people were not being abused, then there would be no incentive. There would be crazies every now and then, like the guy who shot Reagan. Hard for me to say how I’d really feel. The US at this time is not a big country for political violence. Lots of other violence, but not so much political. You have mass shooters and cops killing people, both who should be considered terrorists. This should be a point Emma makes but so far hasn’t: violence against innocent people should have no sympathy. Lynchings are political statements, too. She then says a lot of things are attributed to her and anarchists which have nothing to do with either. Apparently the guy who killed McKinley was not an anarchist. News to me. She spends a lot of time talking and quoting a Frenchman named Vaillant, who bombed some building, but I don’t think he killed anyone. He was an anarchist and he was executed. There’s still a few pages left.
June 4th, 2024
The political violence essay is good. It seeks to get an emotional response from you and it succeeds. You sympathize with the people killing politicians and kings who let people suffer or cause their suffering, or even kill them. All that said, I don’t recall much of this type of violence in my lifetime. Maybe in some countries I haven’t paid attention to. Social democracy may have saved the politicians. The next essay is Prisons and must have been shocking back then, but today is standard affair for the left. Prisons are not good for society but are a social evil. They do not reform criminals but destroy them with starvation, torture, and inhumane conditions. They do not deter crime but have frequent repeat inmates. Most crime stems from social conditions and the way to prevent crime is to improve the conditions that lead people to crime. The rich and powerful get away with their crimes while the poor are punished in cruel and excessive ways. This is all good and and I agree, but Emma always seems to leave out the answer to the obvious questions. What would you do with violent criminals if there were no jails? Should a murderer be allowed on the streets because he has no money? I don’t have an answer either, but I’m not the one writing the essay.
June 5th, 2024
Patriotism: A Menace to Liberty is another hit and definitely still relevant today. It’s slightly outdated, since the GI bill gave an incentive to join that will not leave the soldier skill-less and empty handed after their term, but many parts stand today. Patriotism is no different than nationalism; both are the belief that one’s own circumstance and location of birth is superior to another, and this is defendable to the death. It is a religion perpetuated by the government to control people and justify its own actions. The patriotic adult starts as a brainwashed child memorizing star spangled songs and learning revised history where his country is never the bad guy. The soldier today is still, generally, the country rube, the uneducated, or the without options, just as he was 100 years ago. The American soldier of today, though, is not sent to kill the protester or the striker or the innocent; that is now the job of the police, armed like the soldier. The soldier of today is sent far away to murder women and children who can’t protest in his language. Actually, that is very similar to Emma’s day. Back then it was Cuba and the Philippines. In my day it is Iraq and Afghanistan. Patriotism is causing genocide in Gaza, it is causing war crimes in Ukraine. It must be written out of human DNA.
June 6th, 2024
The next essay is on Francisco Ferrer and the Modern School. To be honest, it is not very interesting. We are pretty far removed from the church-run schools and education has changed significantly. What is tragic is that the Spanish government accused Ferrer of crimes he did not commit in order to execute him, which they did. Spain truly is a despotic place and is responsible for countless deaths. But he was an anarchist and promoted secular schools, thus the powers that be needed him dead. Obviously it did not work because their power is dwindled or gone. The liberal school has prevailed, though we still have the problem of religion trying to enforce its nonsense and lies in education.
June 10th, 2024
Friday I read the essay on Puritanism. I don’t remember it, but I figure I agreed with most of it. Nothing too shocking, Puritans are dicks and lunatics. Then I started The Traffic of Women, or white slavery. Emma mocks the shock that people have at the idea of women being trafficked for prostitution and blames the system they promote for creating the traffic. The conditions that force women to work in horrible conditions for a fraction of what men make, poor home conditions, leads to vulnerable conditions. They also are treated as sex objects while at work, anyway, and are punished for resisting. Good points by Emma, attacking the system, the sexual double standards, and the trap that is marriage. Today I read Women’s Suffrage which has a very interesting take. It brushes past the idea that it is important for women to have equal rights as men and calls suffrage and voting a complete waste of time. Places that have women’s suffrage got no better through women voting, and in fact women often are behind some of the “moral” laws that invade people’s privacy. No, women have not improved the situation anywhere they can vote. It’s more of the same, oppressive laws, government intrusion, anti-labor. The vote accomplishes nothing and only direct action gets results. Maybe that’s true, I don’t know. I never really thought about it. I am a bit optimistic towards voting, if there were a fair voting system, like ranked-choice proportional representation. But would that help? Would you the majority oppress the minority? Silence the different? Maybe. Probably.
June 11th, 2024
The Emancipation of Women is kind of boring. Maybe I was just tired, but it didn’t really capture me like some of the other essays. The gist of it is that women are celebrating “emancipation” and getting out of the house, having careers, etc. I think Emma says, that ‘s good and all, but that’s a step not a goal. Women are still more or less slaves in marriage, while many women who become professionals suppress their human feelings of wanting love and family more or less to prove a point. A women is not really free until she can truly express herself like any man can, without becoming his subject and secondary in marriage. It was okay.
June 12th, 2024
Marriage and Love, in my opinion, is outdated, but I believe it was a pretty hot take in 1910. Like many people believe today, marriage is irrelevant to love. Many people get married who are not really in love, or they fall out of love and get divorced. Back then marriage was really a trap for women and mainly a legal agreement of economics. Now, not everywhere, women have an equal or stronger say in couples. But many people choose not to get married. People still do weird traditional things like ask the father for permission (disgusting) and refusing to live “in sin”. I would never get married (that is, sign a contract) to someone I never lived with. I don’t think anyone should get married. It’s archaic and inconvenient. Tradition is a bitch to break.
June 14th, 2024
The last essay is Modern Drama and comes off as Emma just discussing novels and plays she enjoys, which I though was nice. The point she is trying to make is that the dramatic piece has a power of changing public opinion that essays and speeches do not. They have the power to show, the pathos, that makes people see what they do not want to see. She goes through many different examples from different countries. I haven’t heard of most of the books or plays, but I agree with the core concept. It’s unfortunate, but reading terrible things happening to imaginary characters you have grown attached to is more powerful than reading the news about strangers. Human nature, I guess. A story sticks with you, possibly for life. It’s a good essay to end on.