post-structural anarchy k

7/30/2019 Post-Structural Anarchy K

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Contention 1: Let's Get Wild

[Video]

Contention 1 is let's get wildShut them up, can't handle our styleDebate is not supposed to be this way!That's what all my haters sayhow are we supposed to deal with this systemsupporting a State-we don't need empain, suffering and exploitationis all I've ever seen, and it's my expectationI can't be the only one to think there's more to lifethen dealing with this worthless bullshit and strife

[Ghandi Mate, Ghandi]

Contention 2: Link

The discourse of the 1AC is not value-neutralit is rooted in the production, andlegitimation of State power wrapped around the way language structures the

biopoliticalHardt and Negri '00 (Philosophers and professors at the University of Paris VIII and the European Graduate School In Saas-Fee Empire [Biopolitical Reproduction])

One site where we should locate the biopolitical production of order is in the immaterialnexuses of the production of language, communication, and the symbolic that are developed by the communicationsindustries.24 The development of communications networks has an organic relationship to the emergence of the new world orderit is, in

other words, effect and cause, product and producer. Communication not onlyexpresses but also organizes themovement of globalization . It organizes the movementby multiplying and structuringinterconnections through networks. It expresses the movement and controls the sense anddirection of the imaginary that runs throughout these communicative connections; in otherwords, the imaginary is guided and channeled within the communicative machine. What thetheories ofpower ofmodernity were forced to consider transcendent, that is, external to productive and social relations, is here formed inside,

immanent to the productive and social relations. Mediation is absorbed within the productive machine. The political synthesisofsocial space is fixed in the space ofcommunication. This is why communications industries have assumed such acentral position.They not only organize production on a new scale and impose a new structureadequate to global space,but also make its justification immanent. Power , as it produces,organizes; as it organizes, it speaks and expresses itself as authority . Language, as itcommunicates, produces commodities but moreover creates subjectivities, puts them inrelation, and orders them. The communications industries integrate the imaginary and the symbolic within the biopoliticalfabric, not merely putting them at the service ofpower but actually integrating them into its very functioning.25 At this point we can begin toaddress the question of the legitimation ofthe new world order. Its legitimation is not born of the previously existing international accords

nor ofthe functioning ofthe first, embryonic supranational organizations, which were themselves created through treaties based on

international law. The legitimation ofthe imperial machine is born at least in part of thecommunications industries, that is, ofthe transformation of the new mode ofproduction into amachine. It is a subject that produces its own image ofauthority. This is a form oflegitimation that rests on nothing outside itself and isreproposed ceaselessly by developing its own languages of self validation. One further consequence should be treated on the basis of thesepremises. If communication is one of the hegemonic sectors of production and acts over the entire biopolitical field, then we must considercommunication and the biopolitical context coexistent. This takes us well beyond the old terrain as Jurgen Habermas described it, forexample. In fact, when Habermas developed the concept ofcommunicative action, demonstrating so powerfully its productive form and theontological consequences deriving from that, he still relied on a standpoint outside these effects of globalization, a standpoint of life and truththat could oppose the informational colonization ofbeing. 26 The imperial machine, however, demonstrates that this external standpoint nolonger exists. On the contrary, communicative production and the construction of imperial legitimation march hand in hand and can no

longer be separated.The machine is self-validating , autopoieticthat is, systemic. It constructs


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social fabrics that evacuate or render ineffective any contradiction; it creates situations inwhich, before coercively neutralizing difference , seem to absorb it in an insignificant play ofself-generating and self-regulating equilibria. As we have argued elsewhere, any juridical theory that addresses theconditions of postmodernity has to take into account this specifically communicative definition ofsocial production.27 The imperialmachine lives by producing a context of equilibria and/or reducing complexities, pretendingto put forward a project of universal citizenship and toward this end intensifying theeffectiveness of its intervention over every element of the communicative relationship, all thewhile dissolving identity and history in a completely postmodernist fashion. 28 Contrary to the waymany postmodernist accounts would have it, however, the imperial machine, far from eliminating master narratives, actually produces andreproduces them (ideological master narratives in particular) in order to validate and celebrate its own power.29 In this coincidenceofproduction through language, the linguistic production ofreality, and the language ofself - validation resides a fundamental key tounderstanding the effectiveness, validity, and legitimation ofimperial right.

The affirmative separate themselves from the plan action and those who areaffected by itthis usage of power is ultimately suppressive and destructiveMay 94 (Todd, The Political Philosophy of Post-Structural Anarchism)

Power , as we have seen, constitutes for the anarchists a suppressive force. The image of powerwith which anarchism operates is that of a weight, pressing down --and at times destroying--

the actions, events, and desires with which it comes in contact. This image is common not only to Proudhon,Bakunin, Kropotkin, and the nineteenth-century anarchists generally, but to contemporary anarchists as well. It is an assumption aboutpower that anarchism shares with liberal social theory, which sees power as a set of restraints-upon-action, prescribed primarily by the stateand whose justice depends upon the democratic status of that state. Marxism, too, is oriented for the most part by the assumption that poweris suppressive, although the work of Antonio Gramsci on hegemony and of contemporary Marxists like Nicos Poulantzas suggest thatMarxism is compatible with an interpretation of power that sees it as productive as well as suppressive." 35 Once this assumption about

power is made, however, it suffuses the entire domain of political philosophy. If power is suppressive, then the centralpolitical question to be asked is:When is the exercise of power legitimate , and when is it not?For liberalism, the answer lies in the ways in which those with power came to acquire it and the rules by which they exercise it. Marxism

answers the question in a similar way; its rules, however, differ from those of liberalism. Anarchists are suspicious of allpower, even the kind that we have called "administrative." Sbastien Faure identified the common characteristicof anarchists as "the negation of the principle of Authority in social organizations and the hatred of all constraints that originate in

institutions founded on this principle." 36 Bakunin claimed that "it is the characteristic of privilege and of everyprivileged position to kill the mind and heart of men." 37 More recently, David Wieck has written:"Anarchism can be understood as the generic social and political idea that expresses negationof all power, sovereignty, domination, and hierarchical division, and a will to their dissolution;and expresses rejection of all dichotomizing concepts that on the grounds of nature, reason,history, God divide people into those dominant and those justly subordinated." 38 For theanarchist, it is in the nature of power to oppress by suppression . Using Hegelian terminology, power is anegation that must itself be negated. This negation cannot perhaps be fully accomplished. Nevertheless, it is the goal to which anarchism

aspires. Thus, when it is said that power must remain in the hands of those who are affected by it ,we must understand that the goal of keeping power there is to separate power from thenegative effects of which it is capable. Decisionmaking involves power; the way to negate theeffects of such power are to ensure that those who make the decisions and those who areaffected by them are the same people .

Contention 2: ImpactsThe resolution is prime paradoxical pathological pacifisma system whereby weseek to oppose all violence thereby generalizing and systemizing all violence,

while committing violent acts of repression on the Self. The real impact of the1AC isn't a violent war it's the UNDIRECTED violence that the ideology ofpacifism makes innevitableplayful violent war on society is what is needed tosuccessfully solve the harms of the status quoFeral Faun '92 (Published in Anarchy: A Journal of Desire Armed, Elephant Editions' Feral Revolution, and The IconoclastsHammer Insurgent Ferocity: The Playful Violence of the Rebellion)


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Social control is impossible without violence. Society produces systems of rationalizedviolence to socialize individuals to make them into useful resources for society, while someof these systems, such as the military, the police and the penal system can still be viewedseparately due to the blatant harshness of their violence, for the most part these systems havebecome so interconnected and so pervasive that they act as a single totality the totalitywhich is the society in which we live. This systemic violence exists mostlyas a constantunderlying threat a subtle, even boring, everyday terrorism which incuces a fear of steppingout of line. The signs and orders from superiors which threaten us with punishment orpoverty, the armed, uniformed thugs who are there to protect and serve(huh!?!), the barrage ofheadlines about wars, torture, serial killers and streeet gangs, all immerse us in an atmosphere of subtle, underlying,rationalizedsocial violence which causes us to fear and repress our own violent passions . In light of thesystematic social violence that surrounds us, its no surprise that people are fooled intoviewing all violence as a single , monolithicentity rather than as specific acts or ways ofrelating. The system of violence produced by society does become a monolith which acts to perpetuate itself. In reaction to thismonolithic system of violence, the pathology of pacifism develops. Unable to see beyond social catagories, the pacifist creates afalse dichotomy, limiting the question of violence to the ethical/intellectual choice between asacceptance of violence as a monolithic system or the total rejection of violence. But this choice

exists only in the realm of worthless abstactions, because in the world in which we actuallylive, pacifism and systematic violence depend upon each other . Pacifism is an ideaology whichdemands total social peace as its ultimate goal. But total social peace would require thecomplete suppression of the individual passions that create individual incidences of violence and that would require total social control . Total social control is only possible through theuse of the constant threat of the police, prison, therapy, social censure, scarcity or war. So thepacifist ideal requires a monolithic system of violence and reflects the social contradictioninherent in the necessity that authority strive to maintain peace in order to maintain asmoothly running social system, but can only do so by maintaining a rationalized system ofviolence. The rational system of violence not only perpetuates itself, but also evokesresponses, often in the form of blind lashings out by enraged individuals, which the system

then manipulates into justifications for its own continual existence, and occasionally in theform of consciously rebellious violence. The passionate violence that is suppressed turns in on the one feeling it, becomingthe the slow-killing, underlying violence of stress and anxiety. It is evident in the millions of little pinpricks of humiliation that pass betweenpeople on the streets and in the public places of every city looks of disgust and hostility between strangers, and the verbal battle of wits

exchanging guilt and blame between supposed friends. This is the subtlest and most total form of rationalisedviolence; everyone conforms out of fear of each others disgust. This is the subtle form ofviolence practiced by pacifists. I do not dream of a gentle revolution.My passion runs to theviolence of supersession, the ferocity of a life that renounces nothing. Raoul Vaneigem Those of us whoare fighting for the freedom to create our lives for ourselves need to reject both sides of the choice society offers between pacifism andsystematic violence, because this choice is an attempt to socialize our rebellion. Instead we can create our own options, developing a playfuland passionate chaos of action and relating which may express itself at times with intense and ferocious violence, at times with the gentlest

tenderness, or whatever way our passions and whims move us in the particular moment. Both the rejection of violence andthe systemization of violence are an attack on our passions and uniqueness.Violence is an

aspect of animal interaction and observation of violence among animals belies severalgeneralizations. Violence among animals does not fit into the formula of social darwinism ;there is no perpetual war of all against all. Rather at specific moments under particularcircumstances, individual acts of violence flare up and then fade when the moments pass.There is no systematic violence in the wild, but, instead, momentary expressions of specificpassions. This exposes one of the major fallacies of pacifist ideology.Violence , in itself, doesnot perpetuate violence. The social system of rationalized violence, of which pacifism is anintegral part, perpetuates itself as a system . Against the system of violence, a non-systematized, passionate, playful violence is the appropriate response . Violent play is very


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common among animals and children. Chasing, wrestling and pouncing upon a playmate,breaking, smashing and tearing apart things are all aspects of play that is free of rules. Theconscious insurgent plays this way as well, but with real targets and with the intention ofcausing real damage. The targets of this ferocious play in the present society would mainly beinstitutions, commodities, social roles and cultural icons , but the human representatives ofthese institutions can also be targets especially where they present an immediate threat toanyones freedom to create their life as they desire. Rebellion has never been merely a matterof self-defense. In itself, self-defense is probably best achieved by accepting the status quo ofits reform. Rebellion is the aggressive, dangerous, playful attack by free-spirited individualsagainst society. Refusing a system of violence, refusing an organized, militarized form ofarmed struggle, allows the violence of insurgents to retain a high level of invisibility . It cannotbe readily understood by the authorities and brought under their control. Its insurgent naturemay even go undetected by the authorities as it eats away at the foundations of social control.From the rationalized perspective of authority, this playful violence will often appear utterly random, but actually is in harmony with thedesires of the insurgent. This playful violence of rebellion kills inadvertently as (one) strides out happily without looking back.The playful violence of insurgence has no room for regret. Regret weakens the force of blows and makes us cautious and timid. But regretonly comes in when violence is dealt with as a moral question, and for insurgents who are fighting for the freedom to live their desires;

morality is just another form of social control. Wherever rebel violence has manifested playfully, regret seemsabsurd. In riots (other than police riots) and spontaneous uprisings as well as in small-scale vandalism a festive attitude seems to be

evident. There is an intense joy, even euphoria, in the release of violent passions that have been pent up for so long. Bashing in the skull ofsociety as we experience it on a daily basis is an intense pleasure, and one to be savored, not repudiated in shame, guilt or regret. Some mayobject that such an attitude could cause our violence to get out of hand, but an excess of insurgent violence is not something that we need to

fear. As we break down our repression and begin to free our passions, certainly our gestures,our actions and our entire way of being are bound to become increasingly expansive and allwe do we will seem to do to excess. ourgenerosity will seem excessive and our violence willseem excessive. Unrepressed, expansive individuals squander in all things. Riots andinsurrections have failed to get beyond temporary release, not because of excess, but becausepeople hold themselves back. People have not trusted their passions. They have feared theexpansiveness, the squandering excess of their own dreams and desires. So they have given upor turned their fight over to new authorities, new systemizers of violence . But how caninsurgent violence ever be truly excessive when there is no institution of social control, no

aspect of authority, no icon of culture that should not be smashed to powder and thatgeefully? If what we want is a world in which each of us can create our own lives free of constraints, relating with each other as we desirerather than in accordance with socially defined roles, we have to recognize that, at times, violence will flare and that there is nothing wrong

with that. Fullness of the passions includes full and expansive expressions of hatred and rage and these are violent emotions. Thoughthisviolence can be used tactically it will not be systematic. Though it can be intelligent, it willnot be rationalized. And under no circumstances is it self-perpetuating, because it isindividual and temporary, spending itself fully in its free, passionate expression. Neithermoralistic non-violence nor the systematic violence of military struggle can break downauthority since both require some form of authority. Only the expansive and passionateviolence of insurgent individuals playing alone or with each other has any chance ofdestroying this society... Forward everyone! And with arms and hearts, Speech and pen, Dagger and rifle, Irony and blasphemy,Theft, poisoning and fire, Let us make...war on society. Dejaque

The logic of victimization is firmly entrenched in the affirmative planconstruction and perception of outside threats cause social paralysis that allowthe social elite to dictate the direction in which Society moves and killsindividual pleasuresFeral Faun '92 (Published in Anarchy: A Journal of Desire Armed, Elephant Editions' Feral Revolution, and The IconoclastsHammer Insurgent Ferocity: The Playful Violence of the Rebellion)

As a means of social control,social institutions reinforce the feeling of victimization in each ofus while focusing these feelings in directions that reinforce dependence on social institutions .


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The media bombards us with tales of crime, political and corporate corruption, racial andgender strife, scarcity and war . While these tales often have a basis in reality, theyarepresented quite clearlyto reinforce fear. But many of us doubt the media, and so are served upa whole slew of radical ideologiesall containing a grain of real perception, but all blind towhatever does not fit into their ideological structure. Each one of these ideologies reinforcesthe ideology of victimization and focuses the energy of individuals away from an examinationof society in its totality and of their role in reproducing it. Both the media and all versions ofideological radicalism reinforce the idea that we are victimized by that which is outside, bythe Other , and that social structuresthe family, the cops, the law, therapy and supportgroups, education, radical organizations or anything else that can reinforce a sense ofdependenceare there to protect us. If society did not produce these mechanisms including the structures of false,ideological, partial opposition to protect itself, we might just examine society in its totality and come to recognize its dependence upon our

activity to reproduce it. Then, every chance we get, we might refuse our roles as dependent/victim of society. But the emotions,attitudes, and modes of thought evoked by the ideology of victimization make such a reversalof perspective very difficult. In accepting the ideology ofvictimization in any form,we chooseto live in fear. The person who painted the Men Rape graffiti was most likely a feminist, a woman who saw her act as a radicaldefiance of patriarchal oppression. But such proclamations, in fact, merely add to a climate of fear that already exists. Instead of givingwomen, as individuals a feeling of strength, it reinforces the idea that women are essentially victims, and women who read this graffiti, evenif they consciously reject the dogma behind it, probably walk the streets more fearfully. The ideology of victimization that permeates so much

feminist discourse can also be found in some form in gay liberation, racial/national liberation, class war and damn near every other radicalideology. Fear of an actual, immediate, readily identified threat to an individual can motivateintelligent action to eradicate the threat, but the fear created by the ideology of victimization isa fear of forces both too large and too abstract for the individual to deal with. It ends upbecoming a climate of fear, suspicion and paranoia which makes the mediations which are thenetwork of social control seem necessary and even good. It is this seemingly overwhelmingclimate of fear that creates the sense of weakness , the sense of essential victimhood, inindividuals. While it is true that various ideological liberationists often bluster with militant rage, it rarely gets beyond to that point ofreally threatening anything. Instead, they demand (read militantly beg) that those they define as their oppressors grant them theirliberation. An example of this occurred at the 1989 Without Borders anarchist gathering in San Francisco. There is no question that atmost workshops I went to, men tended to talk more than women. But no one was stopping women from speaking, and I didnt notice any lackof respect being show for women who did speak. Yet, at the public microphone in the courtyard of the building where the gathering was held,a speech was made in which it proclaimed that men were dominating the discussions and keeping women from speaking. The oratordemanded (again, read militantly begged) that men make sure that they gave women space to speak. In other words, to grant the rights ofthe oppressedan attitude which, by implication, accepts the role of man as oppressor and woman as victim. There were workshops wherecertain individuals did dominate the discussions, but a person who is acting from the strength of their individuality will deal with such asituation by immediately confronting it as it occurs and will deal with the people involved as individuals. The need to put such situations intoan ideological context and to rent the individuals involved as social roles, turning the real, immediate experience into abstract categories is asign that one has chosen to be weak, to be a victim. And embracing weakness puts one in the absurd position of having to beg ones oppressorto grant ones liberationguaranteeing that one will never be free to be anything but a victim. Like all ideologies, the varieties of the ideology

of victimization are forms of fake consciousness. Accepting the social role of victimin whatever one of itsmany formsis choosing to not even create ones life for oneself or to explore ones realrelationships to the social structures. All of the partial liberation movementsfeminism, gayliberation, racial liberation, workers movements and so ondefine individuals in terms oftheir social roles. Because of this, these movements not only do not include a reversal ofperspectives which breaks down social roles and allows individuals to create a praxis built ontheir own passions and desires; they actually work against such a reversal of perspective. The

liberation of a social role to which the individual remains subject. But the essence of thesesocial roles within the framework of these liberation ideologies is victimhood. So the litanies ofwrongs suffered must be sung over and over to guarantee the victims never forget that is what they are. These radical liberation movementshelp to guarantee that the climate of fear never disappears, and that individuals continue to see themselves weak and to see their strength aslying in the social roles which are, in fact, the source of their victimization. In this way, these movements and ideologies act to prevent the

possibility of a potent revolt against all authority and all social roles. True revolt is never safe. Those who choose todefine themselves in terms of their role as a victim do not dare to try total revolt, because itwould threaten the safety of their roles. But, as Nietzsche said: The secret of the greatestfruitfulness and the greatest enjoyment of existence is to live dangerously!Only a consciousrejection of the ideology of victimization, a refusal to live in fear and weakness, and an


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acceptance of the strength of our own passions and desires, of ourselves as individuals whoare greater than, and so capable of living beyond, all social roles, can provide a basis for totalrebellion against society. Such a rebellion is certainly fueled, in part, by rage, but not the strident, resentful, frustrated rage of thevictim which motivates feminists, racial liberationists, gay liberationists and the like to demand their rights from the authorities. Rather itis the rage of our desires unchained, the return of the repressed in full force and undisguised. But more essentially, total revolt is fueled by aspirit of free play and of joy in adventureby a desire to explore every possibility for intense life which society tries to deny us. For all of us

who want to live fully and without constraint, the time is past when we can tolerate living like shy mice inside the walls. Every form ofthe ideology of victimization moves us to live as shy mice. Instead, lets be crazed & laughingmonsters, joyfully tearing down the walls of society and creating lives of wonder andamazement for ourselves .

War is the manifestation of the Stateit uses War to construct its system ofdomination and exclusionMartin 90(Brian, UPROOTING WAR)

Is the state system really so bad?War is the most obvious indictment of the system , and thisalone should be enough to justify questioning the state. As wars have become moredestructive, there is no sign that any steps to re-examine or transform the state system arebeing taken by state elites. This should not be surprising.War is not simply a by-product of

the state system, to be moderated and regulated when it becomes too dangerous topopulations. Rather,war is part and parcel of the state system, so the destructiveness of warmakes little difference . State elites (and many others) see the world as a state-structuredworld, and all action is premised on this perspective.War is the external manifestation ofstate violence. Political repression is its internal form. Political freedoms are not only at apremium under military dictatorships and state socialism, but are also precarious in therepresentative democracies, especially in relation to 'national security. '

Contention 3: Alternative

The 1NC is a FERAL revolutionto deconstruct the State we have to STOPfocusing on power relations and START focusing on desiring-pleasure. Thealternative methodology is critical to achieving any kind of withdrawal from thestatus quo system of domination and persecutionFeral Faun '88 (published inDemolition Derby #1, Anarchy A Journal of Desire Armed, A Journal Towards Wilderness, andElephant Editions' Feral Revolution Feral Revolution)

When I was a very young child, my life was filled with intense pleasure and a vital energy that caused me to feel what I experienced to the full.I was the center of this marvelous, playful existence and felt no need to rely on anything but my own living experience to fulfill me.

I felt intensely, I experienced intensely, my life was a festival of passion and pleasure. Mydisappointments and sorrows were also intense. I was born a free, wild being in the midst of asociety based upon domestication. There was no way that I could escape being domesticated

myself. Civilization will not tolerate what is wild in its midst. But I never forgot the intensitythat life could be. I never forgot the vital energy that had surged through me. My existencesince I first began to notice that thisvitality was being drained away has been a warfarebetween the needs of civilized survival and the need to break loose and experience the fullintensity of life unbound. I want to experience this vital energy again. I want to know the free-spirited wildness of myunrepressed desires realizing themselves in festive play. I want to smash down every wall that stands between me and the intense, passionate

life of untamed freedom that I want. The sum of these walls is everything we call civilization, everythingthat comes between us and the direct, participatory experience of the wild world.Around ushas grown a web of domination, a web of mediation that limits our experience, defining the


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boundaries of acceptable production and consumption. Domesticating authority takes manyforms, some of which are difficult to recognize.Government, capital and religion are some of the more obvious facesof authority. But technology, work, language with its conceptual limits, the ingrained habits of etiquette and propriety these too aredomesticating authorities which transform us from wild, playful, unruly animals into tamed, bored, unhappy producers and consumers.

These things work in us insidiously , limiting our imaginations, usurping our desires,suppressing our lived experience . And it is the world created by these authorities , the civilizedworld, in which we live. If my dream of a life filled with intense pleasure and wild adventure is to be realized, the world must be

radically transformed, civilization must fall before expanding wilderness, authority must fall before the energy of our wild freedom. Theremust be for want of a better word a revolution. But a revolution that can break downcivilization and restore the vital energy of untamed desire cannot be like any revolution of thepast . All revolutions to date have centered around power, its use and redistribution. They havenot sought to eradicate the social institutions that domesticate; at best they have only soughtto eradicate the power relationships within those institutions. So revolutionaries of the pasthave aimed their attacks at the centers of power seeking to overthrow it. Focused on power,they were blind to the insidious forces of domination that encompass our daily existence andso, when successful at overthrowing the powers that be, they ended up re-creating them. Toavoid this,we need to focus not on power, but on our desire to go wild , to experience life tothe full, to know intense pleasure and wild adventure.As we attempt to realize this desire, we

confront the real forces of domination, the forces that we face every moment of every day.These forces have no single center that can be overthrown. They are a web that binds us. Sorather than trying to overthrow the powers that be, we want to undermine domination as weconfront it every day, helping the already collapsing civilization to break down more quicklyand as it falls, the centers of power will fall with it. Previous revolutionaries have only explored the well-mappedterritories of power. I want to explore and adventure in the unmapped, and unmappable, territories of wild freedom.The revolutionthat can create the world I want has to be a feral revolution. There can be no programs ororganizations for feral revolution, because wildness cannot spring from a program ororganization. Wildness springs from the freeing of our instincts and desires, from thespontaneous expression of our passions. Each of us has experienced the processes ofdomestication, and this experience can give us the knowledge we need to underminecivilization and transform our lives. Our distrust of our own experience is probably what keeps us from rebelling as freelyand actively as wed like. Were afraid of fucking up,were afraid of our own ignorance. But thisdistrust and fear have been instilled in us by authority . It keeps us from really growing andlearning. It makes us easy targets for any authority that is ready to fill us. To set uprevolutionary programs is to play on this fear and distrust, to reinforce the need to be toldwhat to do. No attempt to go feral can be successful when based on such programs. We needto learn to trust and act upon our own feelings and experiences, if we are ever to be free.So Ioffer no programs. What I will share is some thoughts on ways to explore. Since we all have been domesticated, part of therevolutionary process is a process of personal transformation. We have been conditioned not to trust ourselves ,not to feel completely, not to experience life intensely. We have been conditioned to accept thehumiliation of work and pay as inescapable, to relate to things as resources to be used, to feelthe need to prove ourselves by producing.We have been conditioned to expect

disappointment, to see it as normal, not to question it . We have been conditionedto acceptthe tedium of civilized survival rather than breaking free and really living.We need to exploreways of breaking down this conditioning, of getting as free of our domestication as we cannow. Lets try to get so free of this conditioning that it ceases to control us and becomesnothing more than a role we use when necessary for survival in the midst of civilization as westrive to undermine it. In a very general way, we know what we want. We want to live as wild, free beings ina world of wild, free beings.The humiliation of having to follow rules, of having to sell our lives away tobuy survival, of seeing our usurped desires transformed into abstractions and images in orderto sell us commodities fills us with rage. How long will we put up with this misery? We want to


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make this world into a place where our desires can be immediately realized , not justsporadically, but normally. We want to re-eroticize our lives. We want to live not in a deadworld of resources, but in a living world of free wild lovers . We need to start exploring theextent to which we are capable of living these dreams in the present without isolatingourselves. This will give us a clearer understanding of the domination of civilization over our lives, an understanding which will allow usto fight domestication more intensely and so expand the extent to which we can live wildly.Attempting to live as wildly aspossible now will also help break down our social conditioning. This will spark a wildprankishness in us which will take aim at all that would tame it, undermining civilization andcreating new ways of living and sharing with each other. These explorations will expose the limits of civilizationsdomination and will show its inherent opposition to freedom. We will discover possibilities we have never before imagined... vast expanses of

wild freedom.Projects , ranging from sabotage and pranks that expose or undermine the dominantsociety , to the expansion of wilderness, to festivals and orgies and general free sharing, canpoint to amazing possibilities. Feral revolution is an adventure. It is the daring exploration of going wild. It takes us intounknown territories for which no maps exist. We can only come to know these territories if we dare to explore them actively. We must dare to

destroy whatever destroys our wildness and to act on our instincts and desires. We must dare to trust in ourselves, ourexperiences and our passions. Then we will not let ourselves be chained or penned in. We willnot allow ourselves to be tamed. Our feral energy will rip civilization to shreds and create a lifeof wild freedom and intense pleasure.

The kritik dodges the link to victimizationour micropolitical analysis of powerallows us to speak only for ourselvesMay 94 (Todd, The Political Philosophy of Post-Structural Anarchism)

The antirepresentational character of poststructuralist micropolitics occurs along tworegisters, one epistemic and the other political. The epistemic attack on representation we have already seen. Itconsists in the denial that people have a nature or a natural set of interests that their political liberation will allow them to express or fulfill.

At this level, representation is not oppressive; rather, it is false, or at best implausible.To talk about representing theinterests of others as though those interests were either natural or given, even in the unfoldingof a historical destiny, is simply to be mistaken in one's view of what people are like : it is tocommit the error of humanism. However, as the poststructuralists recognize, this error is not politically neutral. Bound

to the epistemic error is a political significance, one whose consequences have playedthemselves out over the course of the past two centuries of Western history.Micropoliticalanalysis , if it is not to fall into epistemological and political inconsistency (or worse), mustreject the attempt to explain the victims of various oppressions to themselves and mustcontent itself with talking to them about how their situation arose. "In my opinion," Deleuze once toldFoucault in conversation, "you were the first--in your books and in the practical sphere--to teach us something absolutely fundamental: the

indignity of speaking for others." 24 If the genealogical perspective is right, thenneither genealogy nor anymicropolitical. analysis can claim for itself a privileged position above the social network. Itcan be, at best, a more or less general analysis of our situation and perhaps in addition--though here much more modestly and carefully--a set of tentative suggestions for itsresolution or escape. If it is the latter (which Foucault mostly avoided and Deleuze and Lyotard mostly did not), it must be modestbecause although it can offer another set of possibilities and perhaps a route to them, it cannot do so under the guise of representing the

interests of victims to themselves. Indeed,it cannot even represent them to themselves as victims if they donot share the ethical commitments that infuse the genealogical analysis . Further, thosesuggestions must be tentative in that all politics is a matter of practices and power, both ofwhich are contingent and may turn out to create a situation worse than the one from whichescape is sought. "My point," Foucault once said, "is not that everything is bad, but that everything is dangerous, which is not exactlythe same as bad. If everything is dangerous, then we always have something to do. So my position leads not to apathy butto a hyper- and pessimistic activism." 25 Micropolitical theory, then, must be seen as carryingthrough the anarchist critique of representation. By articulating the epistemic problem ofrepresentation in its entwinement with the political one, poststructuralism has completed that


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critique by showing where political representation fails. This completion was unavailable to traditional anarchismbecause of its commitment to a humanism whose foundations are not the alternative to representation, but the very core of the problemitself. Once this is recognized, not only does the problem of representation become clear, so does the place of theory in political struggle.

"Who speaks and acts?" Deleuze asks, answering: "It is always a multiplicity even within the person who speaksand acts. All of us are 'groupuscules.' Representation no longer exists; there's only action-theoretical action and practical action which serve as relays and form networks." 26

Contention 4: FrameworkKeep your role-playing to yourselfengaging in political representation cedespower to the Political destroying individual agency; it's another link to thecriticismMay 94 (Todd, The Political Philosophy of Post-Structural Anarchism)

The rejection of centralization in an organization dedicated to producing "the embryo of future human society" is part of the larger, centraltheme of anarchism: the rejection of representation. What Bakuninand the Jura federation rejected in their dispute with Marx was

representation on the political level. To the anarchists,political representation signifies the delegation of powerfrom one group or individual to another, and with that delegation comes the risk ofexploitation by the group or individual to whom power has been ceded. It is a mistake to view theanarchist diatribes against the state as the foundation for its critique of representation. The state is the object of critique

because it is the ultimate form of political representation, not because it is founding for it.Bakunin, defining "the sense in which we are really Anarchists," wrote that "we reject all legislation, all authority, and all privileged, licensed,official, and legal influence, even though arising from universal suffrage, convinced that it can turn only to the advantage of a dominantminority of exploiters against the interest of the immense majority in subjection to them." 5 The crucial element in representation, then, is

the transfer of power.In order for liberation to occur , individuals and groups must retain theirpower; they cannot cede it without risking the loss of the goal for which all political strugglesoccur: empowerment. For anarchists, the goal must be reflected in the process; otherwise, thepermanent possibility of distorting the revolutionary process will be imminent .Leninist vanguardismis anathema to anarchists, precisely because it represents the ultimate form of representation. Some anarchists, most notablyProudhon, even resisted the immersion into any political activity at all, arguing thatthemoment one enters into political organizing one begins playing the very game that needs to beovercome; liberation arises through the construction of alternatives, not through thedestruction or reformation of insupportable realities. "We must not suppose the revolutionary action is the meansof social reform, because this so-called means would simply be an appeal to 56 force, to arbitrariness, in short a contradiction," wroteProudhon in a letter to Marx. 6 The critique of representation in the anarchist tradition runs deeper than just political representation.

Kropotkin, in an article on anarchist morality, wrote that respect for the individual implies that "we refuse to assume a rightwhich moralists have always taken upon themselves to claim, that of mutilating the individualin the name of some ideal." 7What motivates the critique of political representation is theidea that in giving people images of who they are and what they desire, one wrests from themthe ability to decide those matters for themselves. Representation, in the anarchist tradition,must be understood not merely in its political connotations but more widely as an attempt towrest from people decisions about their lives. The political instance of this is only the most obvious, for it occurs onother planes as well: the ethical, the social, and the psychological, for instance. The effects of representation, as will be seen in Chapter 5,below, were not lost upon the poststructuralists; in fact, their political interventions deepen the critique of representation, including somerepresentational elements that found their way into the core of traditional anarchist thought.

Our activity in the debate space is criticalthe discussion of policy inherent tothe sphere makes this zone a knot in the network of power relations withrevolutionary potentialMay 94 (Todd, The Political Philosophy of Post-Structural Anarchism)

It is important to understand that the political picture of networks of power relationships is not a theoretical holism, if by that is meant that

everything is connected to everything else in a single realm of relationships called "society." First, theconnections are not to bepresumed; theyare to be discovered in the course of political analysis. Just as there can be no assumptionthat there is a founding cause for all relationships of power, there is no reason to assume that all those relationships are fundamentallyrelated to one another. Moreover, it is misleading to think of them as functioning within a single medium. This is why even the term "social


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space" is not completely accurate. There is no empty space that gets filled in by political relationships; there are only the relationships

themselves. "Social space" is the set of those relationships , not a space within which they arise.Deleuze and Guattari invoke the image of a rhizome, a stem or root that branches outsideways and connects with other stems or roots without a recognizable source or center, toexplain this picture of the social: "[U]nlike trees or their roots, the rhizome connects any point to any other point, and itstraits are not necessarily linked to traits of the same nature; it brings into play very different regimes of signs, and even nonsign states. . . . Itis composed not of units but of dimensions, or rather directions in motion. It has neither beginning nor end, but always a middle from which

it grows and which it overspills." 17 The search for a social space independent of the networks of politicaland social relationships that constitute it is similar to the search for a founding principle; eachseeks its object outside what is actually given in order to account for what is given, rather thananalyzing the given in its multiplicity and diversity. Its thinking, in the Deleuzian metaphor, is "arborescent" ratherthan "rhizomatic." There is a nascent strategic thinking behind the conception of social space as a medium, although it is perhaps lesspernicious in its effects on political philosophy than the assumption of a single founding cause. 18 Anarchist political intervention issues froma recognition of the network character of relationships of power and of the variety of intertwined but irreducible oppressions that devolve

upon those relationships.Just as power and oppression are decentralized, so must resistancebe. As ColinWard notes, "There is no final struggle, only a series of partisan struggles on a variety of fronts." 19The tactical character of this view of resistance, and its contrast with the strategic character of Marxism, is brought out by Murray Bookchin:"In contrast to the anarchist policy of continually pressing against the society in search of its weak-points and trying to open areas that wouldmake revolutionary change possible, Marxian theory was structured around a strategy of 'historical limits' and 'stages of development.'" 20

The tactical character of resistance, as Bookchin recognizes, does not preclude it from making changesthat ramify throughout society. To presuppose that tactics can only be "reformist" is to neglect an important factor: namely,that included in the picture of the political character of social space as a network of lines is thefact that power conglomerates at certain points and is reinforced along certain lines.Successful political intervention at those points is bound to have effects across larger regionsof social networks, vibrating throughout them, as it were. The mistake that is made in contrasting revolution toreform lies in the assumption that the former involves a qualitative change in society, while the latter involves only a quantitative change.However, on the alternative picture of politics being sketched here, there are in reality only quantitative changes, qualitative ones being

defined in terms of them.A revolution , then, is not a change from one fundamental form of society toanother; rather, it is a change or set of changes whose effects sweep across the society, causingchanges in many other parts of the social domain. No one, particularly not anarchists, would deny that a change inthe relations of economic production would have profound effects upon society. What is denied is the move from thatevident truth to the claim that society, and the question of revolution, must therefore bedefined in terms of those relationships of production (or any other set of privileged relationships). Once thestrategic picture of concentric circles or hierarchies of power is dropped, so is the idea that revolutionary change can be distinguishedqualitatively from reformist change. This is not to deny the possibility of revolutionary changes, but to admit that they are changes of degreerather than of kind--or, better, that they are changes of kind inasmuch as they are certain kinds of changes of degree. Michel Foucaultrecognized this point as well: It seems to me that this whole intimidation with the bogy of reform is linked to the lack of a strategic analysis

[in our terms, a tactical analysis] appropriate to political struggle, to struggles in the field of political power. The role for theorytoday seems to me to be just this: not to formulate the global systematic theory which holdseverything in place, but to analyse the specificity of mechanisms of power, to locate theconnections and extensions, to build little by little a strategic [i.e., tactical] knowledge. 21

The role of the ballot is very clearthe judge is an intellectual actor whosepurpose in the revolution is to give the tools to the teams doing the fightingthe

ballot is the endorsement critical to the success of the project

May 94 (Todd, The Political Philosophy of Post-Structural Anarchism)

Finally,the role of the intellectual, as a participant in theoretical practices rather than an observer of practice, isreoriented in poststructuralist theory. In strategic theory, the intellectual is part of the vanguard party; his or her functionis to articulate the nature of oppression, its principles, and the routes of escape. Poststructuralist theory rejects this function for threereasons. First, the contingency of the effects of practices rules out the possibility of understanding oppression to arise on the basis of a

single--or small set--of principles that it can be the task of anyone to understand. Second, since theory is itself a practice, andthus subject to its own genealogical investigation, the distinction between knowledge andpolitics that legitimates the role of the intellectual is called into question. Knowledge is notabove or outside practice but is itself a practice that cannot be judged in isolation from its


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effects. Deleuze notes that "for many people, philosophy is something which is not 'made', but is pre-existent, ready-made in aprefabricated sky. However, philosophical theory is itself a practice, just as much as its object. It is a practice of concepts, and it must bejudged in the light of other practices with which it interferes." 61 Third, the conception of the intellectual as vanguard is grounded in arepresentationalist picture of political intervention, one that is abandoned with the rejection of essentialism about human nature and the

recognition of the effects of representationalism in political theory. For poststructuralists, the role of the intellectualconsists in a participation in theoretical struggles that are local or regional rather thanuniversal. The intellectual offers analyses to those alongside whom he or she struggles , ratherthan sacred truths on tablets passed down to the oppressed. Deleuze, in a conversation with Foucault, onceremarked that "a theory is exactly like a box of tools. It has nothing to do with the signifier. It must be useful. It must function. And not foritself." 62 And Foucault, in another text, cites 131 the circumscribed role of the intellectual: "The intellectual no longer has to play the role of

an advisor.The project, tactics and goals to be adopted are a matter for those who do the fighting.What the intellectual can do is provide the instruments, and at the present time this is the historian's essentialrole. What's effectively needed is a ramified, penetrative perception of the present . . . a topological and geological survey of the battlefield-that is the intellectual's role." 63 In conclusion, these four political recommendations begin to sketch a perspective within which to think

about political action in the context of the anarchist project of a tactical-progressive political philosophy. These suggestions canbe developed, but at the theoretical level there is a limitation to their development, forpoststructuralist anarchism places much more weight on specific analyses and interventionsthan traditional political theory .

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