Anarchism

Always been one, just didn't have words for it

Joke answer: jordanlund

Real answer: ...

Studied econ and poli sci, taught myself programming, became a good little corpo...

... learned, in depth, first hand, that it was all diabolical horseshit, quit, sought out my own education beyond the system, put my skills to use to serve the homeless.

Autism and The Conquest of Bread

Always been a leftist and have had a distrust for authority and hierarchy (autism? Idk). Seeing how the state abuses people, especially minorities and the lack of repercussions (“we investigated our selves and decided to issue a slap on the wrist”) made me outright hostile to it.

The statements

"if we give all the power to the market and it will regulate itself"

and

"if we give all the power to the government and it will regulate itself"

make equally little sense.

Was in college for wildlife conservation. Came across "Mutual Aid: a Factor of Evolution" by Kropotkin and while reading it was reaffirming everything I was reading about in my studies on wildlife while providing me with new perspectives I had never conceptualized. Became interested in Kropotkin and then read "Conquest of Bread". The rest is history.

observing the world and reading history. It's the only system that ever works long term

The anarchist peasant from Monty Python.

I saw through the hypocrisy of most liberals and their desire to support those who seek to exploit them. I think I largely owe that realization to my joining this community, because I probably wouldn't have seen it or would've excused it.

As time went on, I've lent pretty far left, but had never read theory. My understanding was far-left = communism. I'd never read Marx but I watched a few videos and podcasts on an introduction to communism. But most resources are ML and eventually I couldn't agree with their authoritarian ways. I learned some history about the DPRK and the CCP and it was really interesting, but their successes didn't make up for their atrocities.

It just wasn't clicking and I didn't know what to do.

I was floating in a soup of leftist values but without a unified framework to understand them.

I'm subscribed to a newsletter from Go Make Things, who does web development but is also politically outspoken. He did a newsletter or two about anarchism, and it clicked with me. I subscribed to Lemmy communities and watched videos, read some Anarchist FAQ, Anarchy Works, The Conquest of Bread, Everyday Anarchism podcast. It all made so much sense to me.

At first, I was like most people and asked "sounds good, but how would this work?" but I know now that anarchist communities have worked, and that anarchism more is a set of principles than a plan for society.

Turns out I had a lot of anarchist values already, but I have learned a lot in the process and changed my mind on some things.

And a massive bonus is that anarchism is just fucking cool!

Punk rock

My first exposure to anarchist theory was a few random players chatting on a FOSS Quake-based FPS called (at the time) "Nexuiz" (that has since renamed to "Xonotic"). I owe them a debt, but I don't remember their usernames and I probably will never interact with them again.

I mostly just don’t get the point of most things like society, money etc. so it stands to reason that govt fits in with that too.

I found r/anarchism on Reddit years ago, probably around 2010-2012. It put into words what I've been feeling, especially with the fresh wounds from the 2008 recession.

Learning about anarchism helped validated some my feelings and life choices up to that point and helped me continue to do what I thought was right, even when others tried to make me feel wrong. I'm glad I didn't give up, over the last 1.5 years I've finally found others who understand anarchism and they've become some of my closest friends ever.

Being quiet and observant made me a target for bullying and abuse so it makes sense why other people who felt out casted by their peers are so open and comfortable with me. Listening to their stories made me more sure that anarchism is something worth working towards.

Realizing that the other liberals, including the elected officials, couldn't define liberalism.

This is what you might call a systemic vulnerability.

To the extent that I could be called an anarchist, it was randomly wandering into an anarchist bookshop and reading The State: Its Historic Role which got me started.