Most Recent Additions

For the past five years I have been a reference librarian at a small public library in Florida. Today I pulled into the parking lot at my usual time of eight-thirty. The Library did not open until ten, but people often lined up early at the front doors. The library was the most impressive building in town. It was big, modern and well lit. It really stood out among the small rental houses and grungy bars that make up the rest of the area. The only person waiting when I arrived was Marco. Marco sat at his usual morning post on the green bench next to the main glass doors of the library. He got there every morning hours before the library opened. Marco was in his fifties. He described himself as a special forces killing machine created by the United States government. He did not look like much of a killing machine. He was an overweight guy with a dazed facial expression. His dazed expression may have been caused by the prescription medications he got from the veteran’s administration or perhaps that was just his natural state. I did not know. He always wore black and had a collection of crosses hanging around his neck. These were the kinds of crosses they sell at the flea market for bikers and metal heads. Because of these decorations Marco was known to the young teens who hang out at the library as Ozzy. My car was the only car in the parking lot except for a big black Escalade. I knew it was not Marco’s. Marco rode the bus.

...

Three new ones: The Raging Pelican; The Anvil Review; Psychic Swamp #1

The Raging Pelican, A Journal of Gulf Coast Resistance, published by a group of “blue collar New Orleans residents,” who are understandably pissed about what’s been done to their piece of planet. Their first issue came out in the weeks following the BP oil spill and they’ve broadened their focus to include a whole range of the worst abuses of cops, bureaucrats, politicians, and principals. Reach them at ragingpelican.com and on Facebook.

...

Fuck Hamas. Fuck Israel. Fuck Fatah. Fuck UN. Fuck UNWRA. Fuck USA! We, the youth in Gaza, are so fed up with Israel, Hamas, the occupation, the violations of human rights and the indifference of the international community! We want to scream and break this wall of silence, injustice and indifference like the Israeli F16’s breaking the wall of sound; scream with all the power in our souls in order to release this immense frustration that consumes us because of this fucking situation we live in; we are like lice between two nails living a nightmare inside a nightmare, no room for hope, no space for freedom. We are sick of being caught in this political struggle; sick of coal dark nights with airplanes circling above our homes; sick of innocent farmers getting shot in the buffer zone because they are taking care of their lands; sick of bearded guys walking around with their guns abusing their power, beating up or incarcerating young people demonstrating for what they believe in; sick of the wall of shame that separates us from the rest of our country and keeps us imprisoned in a stamp-sized piece of land; sick of being portrayed as terrorists, homemade fanatics with explosives in our pockets and evil in our eyes; sick of the indifference we meet from the international community, the so-called experts in expressing concerns and drafting resolutions but cowards in enforcing anything they agree on; we are sick and tired of living a shitty life, being kept in jail by Israel, beaten up by Hamas and completely ignored by the rest of the world.

...

The international press is constantly writing about the economic crisis in Greece. Economic pundits speculate less about whether or not Greece will default but in what manner and when. Absent from these considerations is the massive popular revolt in Greece against the Draconian measures already in place. Totally absent from mainstream commentary is the effect on European stability the mass resistance developing in Greece might have if replicated in other EU nations. The massive marches in Greece have gotten considerable coverage, but far more significant are the unreported successes of the I Won’t Pay movement and the communal revolt in Keratea, a small seaside town 25 miles southeast of Athens.

...

My father had strong ideas about heaven. He would share them with his congregation like sweets for good behaviour. ‘There will be no gravity,’ he would say with irresistible certainty. ‘And no sun or moon. God’s love is all the light we need.’

At home on grim, rainy Saturdays he would stand looking out of the window for long durations while I lounged around reading comics. ‘We won’t have to endure this for much longer,’ he would say, looking up to the continents of clouds overhead. His eyes would close and a serene smile form in his mouth; and I, just a boy, would look up in wonder knowing that in those moments he was not thinking of this life, of me, but of paradise.

...

Larry Portis (1943–2011)

Larry:Portis grew up in a working-class family in Seattle, Washington and Billings, Montana. His father was a sheet metal worker and city fireman. His mother was an occasional secretary. At the age of 18 he married and quickly had two children. In 1968 he graduated from Montana State University Billings where he was active in university and local politics, wrote (1965 through 1968) weekly articles on politics for the university- newspaper (The Retort) and created an underground newspaper (The Free Student Press) in addition to working for a living. Before leaving the area he participated in organizing the municipal water workers in Billings.

...

a review of Subversions: Anarchist Short Stories Ed. Anarchist Writers Bloc, Les Pages Noires 2011, Montreal 115 pages, Softcover, $14.95 U.S.

This collection is the first ever in English or French of new anarchist fiction. These sixteen stories, offer something for everyone: If you like action, there is plenty of action, as well as surprise endings and thought provoking parables. This is a great idea for a collection of stories and it is wonderful that it exists as an accomplished fact. Pulled together with lots of hard work and inspiration--expressing self-organization, self actualization and cooperation at its best--the publication of this book is a do-it-yourself revolutionary action that means to make a difference in this world.

...

On the left: a white-haired shoemaker in checkered shirt and brown khakis, casting uneasy glances at the circle of people surrounding him. A smirk settles on his lips as he prepares a witty rejoinder; perhaps he’s amused by the tourists, too.

To the right: a tan young man with a single dreadlocked braid hanging from the back of his scalp, tattered pajama pants, dirty fingernails. His hands move in front of him as though describing a box, and the words come slowly, ineloquently. His eyes evince a friendly conviction.

...

People sometimes inquire what form of government is most suitable for an artist to live under. To this question there is only one answer. The form of government that is most suitable to the artist is no government at all

-- Oscar Wilde

I used to see my interests in anarchism and fiction as wholly separate things, because I didn’t know there was any overlap. None of my activist friends were writing stories--at least that they told me about--and I hadn’t yet realized how rich the history of anarchist fiction is. But there are anarchists, philosophical and active alike, in mainstream fiction--it’s just that their politics are rarely shown to the world. There are writers among the activists, but their writing is rarely distributed. And there is a remarkable, broad history of multilingual anarchist culture from around the world, although most of it is hidden by obscurity or time.

...

I.

flat gray surfaces

curved metal architecture a cold sphere in space

the earth died screaming

epidemics, plagues

starvation, dead ground

above, we orbit

clean children, good water

Caucasian intellectuals

the holograms of

vermont skies or florida

glades o’er white steeples

til one day the burned

...

DIALOGUE I

And what happens when you don’t take

the medication?

I’m a danger to myself and others.

Is that your opinion, or someone else’s?

I think we’re in agreement on this one.

What happened before you had the

medication?

I would eviscerate things with my teeth.

What kinds of things?

Moles. Voles. Shrews.

...

The first night after leaving their hide-out in the Vancouver Island woods, Jerry and Max climbed the drawbridge off the last ferry of the day onto what they hoped would be the safety of Inner Island and headed down the beach to avoid meeting anyone.

Inner Island bobbed comfortably in the calm waters between the mountainous spine of Vancouver Island and the mainland Coast. After the indigenous Pentlatch had been decimated by lethal doses of smallpox and colonialism, it had- been settled for the past half century by an assortment of old-time pioneer families, hippie dropouts, draft dodgers, and a scattering of retired criminals.

...

A protester raises a black flag during the Pittsburgh G20

A voice says, “Step Forward,” and we do.

We stand one heel touching the other. We are haggard. We have slept coiled next to and on top of one another for weeks, maybe months, it’s impossible to know.

“Remove your clothing.“The voice says.

We do. Our bones jut, poke, and hang from our skins. We are not fed. The woman in front of me, my forward toe touching her back heel, is my wife. We are twenty-eight and will remain twenty-eight for eternity. At this point, I can’t care. I haven’t seen my wife naked in so long I don’t recognize her anymore. There are others behind me, five total.

...

World-wide events organized to show solidarity with Marie Mason and Eric McDavid, the two longest sentenced environmental prisoners, were an overwhelming success.

Events took place in at least 30 cities across the world including two in New York City, ones in Chicago, Detroit, Baltimore, and San Francisco, but also in places such as Fresno, Calif, Worcester, Mass., Salt Lake City, and Asheville, NC. Internationally, people responded in Toronto, Guelph, Ontario, Montreal, Melbourne, Barcelona, Jerusalem, and Tel Aviv.

...

The surging waters of the collective unconscious that were unleashed in the Vancouver “Hockey” Riot of June 2011 made it abundantly clear just how fragile the artificial ice age of industrial civilization can be when it comes in contact with the searing heat of the moment.

Faced with the nagging miserabilism of daily life, the emotional dam of mutual acquiescence finally burst its walls and a tidal wave of repressed desire obliterated the illusion of social peace.

...

a review of

In the Crossfire: Adventures of a Vietnamese Revolutionary, by Ngo Van; Eds. Ken Knabb and Helene Fleury; Trans. Helene Fleury, Hillary Horrocks, Ken Knabb, and Naomi Sager; AK Press; 2010; $19.95

There is a sub-genre of science fiction called alternative history, which consists of works such as Philip K. Dick’s The Man in the High Castle, in which Germany wins World War II, and Hitler becomes the ruler of the U.S. Works of this type offer a counterfactual version of past events, allowing readers to think along different lines about how the world has developed.

...

Most everyone knows that the small encircled, lower case letter “c” indicates that a piece of work is copyrighted, and that it designates legal protection of creative work and intellectual property. Perhaps the key word for this discussion is the last one in the sentence--property.

How copyrights are applied and the protection they provide for work that is intended as property within the commercial marketplace, on the face of it, wouldn’t seem to need much elaboration. However, its definitions and applications are quite complex, but fortunately aren’t what will be under discussion here. This article will center on how anti-statists can or should relate to state protection.

...

Send letters to fe — AT — fifthestate.org or Fifth Estate, POB 201016, Ferndale MI 48220

All formats accepted including typescript & handwritten; letters may be edited for length.

The Fifth Estate/Support Marie Mason table at the 5^th annual New York City Anarchist Book Fair, April 8–10. Several FE staff members and friends from Detroit and New York distributed 300 copies of the new FE, sold books, and back issues, and raised funds for Marie. The fair featured dozens of exhibitors, a film festival, workshops, children’s programs, and the 3^rd Annual NYC Anarchist Art Festival PAnarko Lab” and art exhibit, including a Living Theatre performance. Hundreds of attendees crowded Judson Memorial Church.

...

FIFTH ESTATE

ANARCHIST FICTION ISSUE

FIFTH ESTATE #385 Fall, 2011, Vol. 46, #2, page 1

2 LETTERS

4 COPYRIGHT OR WRONG by Walker Lane

6 INTERNATIONAL DAY OF SOLIDARITY WITH MARIE MASON

9 HOCKEY RIOTS IN VANCOUVER by Ron Sakolsky

11 A BRIEF HISTORY OF ANARCHIST FICTION by Margaret Killjoy

...

Most publications receive more books for review than they can possibly do. What’s needed is an Anarchist Review of Books [now, there’s a project waiting to happen]. We are often disappointed, to say nothing of the authors, when we cannot find reviewers for excellent titles that are sent to us. Here are a selection of books we’ve gotten recently, and this isn’t a complete list.

...

The DIY Bandits collective are many things: a record label, a distro, a booking agency, and a bunch of cool people from many walks of life who are tired of the status quo.

The Bandits do not see themselves as anarchists, as they say on their website, “DIY Bandits do not belong to the anarchist scene, punk scene, underground scene, or mainstream scene. Bandits are not interested in being seen as a scene but rather in dismantling all scenes.”

...

Milicia women at the Madrid front, 1936

a review of

The CNT in the Spanish Revolution, Volume I

by Jose Peirats, Edited and Introduced by Chris Ealham; Translated by Paul Sharkey

PM Press / Christie Books; 432pp, 628; www.pmpress.org

The Spanish anarchist movement and revolution of the late 1930s are undoubtedly the historical force and context most praised by Western anarchists. In absolute numbers, in proportion of the overall population they were part of, and in the radical transformation they accomplished in much of Spanish society, the reputation is well deserved.

...

a review of

So Much Pretty by Cara Hoffman. Simon & Schuster, 2011, 304 pages

I wrote So Much Pretty because I wanted to talk about family and community and the ways in which things that have become familiar to us are often not what they seem, are rife with meanings that elude our selective senses, that turn us into unwitting accomplices, secret sharers of observable but unspeakable things. Our desires for security, or belonging or freedom suddenly becoming the weight that sinks us...I wanted to discuss how well meaning people are often complicit in destroying the things they most want to preserve.

--Cara Hoffman

from www.carahoffman.com

...

Essay by Jonathan Swift (1667–1745), Illustrations by Peter Kuper (1958-)

It is a melancholy object to those, who walk through this great town, or travel in the country, when they see the streets crowded with beggars. Having turned my thoughts upon this important subject, I fortunately fell upon this proposal, which is wholly new, and of no expense. I shall now therefore humbly propose my own thoughts, which I hope will not be liable to the least objection.

...

Many anarchist book fairs are scheduled for 2012, and the Fifth Estate will make an appearance at some of them.

We will have a booth for our magazine at the 6^th annual New York City Anarchist Book Fair, which we will share with the Support Marie Mason Committee as we’ve done in past years.

We will also will share tables at the Montreal and San Francisco events.

...

The Montreal zine and distro, Mauvaise Herbe (MH; The Weed), celebrated its tenth anniversary in 2011. The journal, with its green and anarchist insurrectionist influences, prints articles in French and English, was first to publish this perspective in French in Quebec.

Since 2002, Mauvaise regularly presents workshops at the annual Montreal Anarchist Bookfair and at other events including the city’s Eco-radical festival. The topics include anarchism and the anti-civ critique, the question of organization, the concept of autonomy, and on the challenges to Quebec’s eco-radical movement.

...

Militarized police attack unarmed demonstrators at a protest against the G20 meeting in Toronto, June 2010

In a packed Toronto courtroom, November 23, the prosecution dropped all conspiracy charges against the so-called “Main G20 Conspiracy Group,” 17 organizers from Southern Ontario and Quebec.

The G20 Summit, a meeting of international finance ministers held in Toronto in June 2010, was met with huge protests, followed by unprecedented mass arrests: 1105 people detained, and over 300 charged. Countless others were targets of police brutality and violations of fundamental human rights. Of those charged, almost 200 had charges dropped.

...

Painting, Michelle Waters, “Luddites,” acrylics. www.michellewatersart.com

Anarcho-primitivism comes in several flavors. In fact, there are probably as many varieties of anarcho-primitivism (AP) as there are anarcho-primitivists.

Some varieties focus more on primitivism, and emphasize the negative impact of industrial technology and the positive benefits of a return to a technological state better aligned with our evolutionary roots.

...

Hundreds of films take on anarchist themes in some manner, but only a handful deal with anarchist governance. Three of the most interesting of these are, Alexander the Great (Megalexandros, 1980, Greek), Viva Zapata! (1952, United States), and Rebellion in Patagonia (La Patagonia Rebelde, 1974, Argentina).

...

By its own lights, the history of modernity has been a history of resentment, despair, and annihilation. God is dead, and nothing is permitted. The echo, in every cell of our dark prison, is a resounding “No!” Hegel, an early and influential theorist of modernity, found a starting point for modern philosophy in the spirit of absolute negation. This negative path, he averred, was necessitated by the very form of modern subjectivity. Through a series of dialectical movements, thought could bring itself into reconciliation with the positive order of the day. But the task of relentlessly overcoming its alienation by seeking to fill the void inherent in self-consciousness could not be ignored by the modern subject.

...

EG speaking in New York City’s Union Square, 1914

I had come to believe capitalism is just the tip of the iceberg of human stupidity. Altogether there is no injustice without complicity. And truly the sight of a brooding wage slave beguiled by some vapid ideologue of privilege is pitiful. So certainly I knew if you drift into complicity with the world in its ever rude war against you, you lose the world within, but by then I was dying and in need of quiet so was tempted to simply tell them all what they wanted to hear, by then it already seemed idiotic to have much conversation at all, we so readily scoff at any workable proposal for our common survival. And our fetishes abound, as if it were more comforting to obsess about some conspiracy than to face up to the elemental stupidity of our breed.

...

Disobedience, in the eyes of anyone who has read history, is man’s original virtue.

-- Oscar Wilde

...and then we go out and seize a square of singular symbolic significance and put our asses on the line to make it happen. The time has come to deploy this emerging stratagem against the greatest corrupter of our democracy: Wall Street, the financial Gomorrah of America.

-- From Adbusters (September/October 2011 issue)

We are not protesting. Who is there to protest to? What could we ask them for that they could grant? We are occupying. We are reclaiming those same spaces of public practice that have been commoded, privatized and locked into the hands of faceless bureaucracy, real estate portfolios and police ‘protection.’ Hold on to these spaces, nurture them and let the boundaries of your occupations grow.

-- Egyptian (Tahrir Square) Comrades

...

A specter is haunting [the world]--the specter of [the Occupy movement]. All the powers of [the world] have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this specter.

-- The Communist Manifesto--1848, Karl Marx & Fredrick Engels [altered to reflect current reality]

One hundred and sixty-three years after the original words were written, the specter the rulers of Europe so feared (communism, the word altered in the above quote) appeared to have been successfully vanquished. But suddenly the Occupy movement went from 0 to a 100 mph in a few weeks placing the question of the rule of money on the political agenda across the world, and, in the U.S. for the first time in a hundred years. Inspired by the Arab Spring, the Greek, Spanish, and English opposition to shifting the cost of repairing capitalism from bankers to the people, almost overnight, Occupy sites sprouted up in over a thousand U.S. cities.

...

a review of

Drawing The Line Once Again: Paul Goodman’s Anarchist Writings, PM Press, 2010, 122 pages, trade paperback, $14.95

While relatively unknown today, Paul Goodman was one of the most influential thinkers of the 20^th century. In books like Growing Up Absurd, published in 1960, Goodman captured the zeitgeist of his era, catapulting himself to the forefront of American intellectual life as one of the leading dissident thinkers inspiring the burgeoning New Left.

...

The word entrapment conjures images of agent provocateurs, phone taps, and men in suits listening to fuzzy conversations in white vans down the street. But most of all, it feeds into the myth of justice in a system that is hell-bent on pursuing the malicious prosecution of any and all movements that dare to oppose it.

...

Poster from a 1938 grade-B movie where the heroine joins a jail-break that turns into a riot

In July 2011, women at California’s Valley State Prison launched a hunger strike in solidarity with prisoners on a four-week hunger strike at Pelican Bay State Prison and also to protest their own Secure Housing Unit (an extreme solitary confinement unit).

...

Reversion to 1911 would constitute a perfect first step for a 21^st century neo-Luddite movement. Living in 1911 means using technology and culture only up to that point and no further, or as little as possible.

For example, you can have a player-piano and phonograph, but no radio or TV; an ice-box, but not a refrigerator; an ocean liner, but not an aeroplane, electric fans, but no air conditioner.

...

It seems apt now, a few months after Steve Jobs passed away, to turn a skeptical eye to the energetic display of grief that followed the news of his demise on October 5. For a few weeks thereafter, one could hardly turn on the radio, open the newspaper, or cue up the blogs on one’s iPhone without encountering another paean to the creative genius of Apple’s creator, another toast to the brave new world incubated by his products. Quibbles about the advisability of transferring our social and cultural lives to screens were shrugged off as misanthropy, or worse, Luddism.

...

Deadline: April 1,

Publication date: May 5

For the past several years, each edition of the Fifth Estate has had a specific theme. Maybe it’s the excitement of the era which has just opened up, but we have decided not to have a particular theme for our Summer edition, and simply let the imagination of writers get as wild as the times demand.

...

What I love about

the occupy movement

is that it makes

no demands.

Is

a space

in which possibility

expands.

An opening

for imaginations

to upset

the applecart

of acquiescent

relations.

Imagine

clearing the slate

opening the gate

rejecting

the horrors

of industrial civ

un-Occupying

...

There has been an unnecessarily divisive debate distinguishing what the late Murray Bookchin designated as lifestyle anarchy from that of traditional ideological anarchy.

Yet under conditions of modernity, anarchist lifestyle centering upon the body and the intimate private sphere is often a necessary precursor to the development of more public articulation of systemic anarchist revolutionary sentiments.

...

Movement troubadour David Rovics performed a benefit concert in Detroit, October 27, for singer/songwriter/environmental activist, Marie Mason, the Green Scare prisoner serving the longest sentence for eco-sabotage.

Generous attendees at the benefit contributed over $1,000 to support Marie’s prison and legal needs.

...

When President Barack Obama announced on October 21 that the nine year U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq was ending, it didn’t even make first spot on many news reports. Another imperial slaughter had ground to an end, with many liberal publications, such as The Nation, declaring it an “ignominious end to a shameful debacle.”

...

Just when the corporate bosses thought their world-racket was secure (give or take a few economic crises), the old mole of revolution has suddenly poked her furry head above ground and has put the question of power and wealth on everyone’s lips. Hence, this issue could not have appeared at a better time.

...

In the waning moonlight, three bands of sullen men with ash-blackened faces stealthed through the woods and dales of central Yorkshire, one of the first counties in England to industrialize.

Quietly, the three groups, each traveling from different villages, picked themselves through paths they traversed since childhood and assembled in a clearing near their target. Though they passed outlying cottages, no dogs betrayed them.

...

Send letters to fe — AT — fifthestate.org or Fifth Estate, POB 201016, Ferndale MI 48220

All formats accepted including typescript & handwritten; letters may be edited for length

As a fellow traveler/indie film maker, I have had the chance to learn about copyrighting from posting and also utilizing other people’s videos. [ See Fall 2011 FE, “Copyright or Wrong.”]

...

View or download PDF [57 KB] fe-390-48-anarcho-crosswordHints are displayed below the puzzle.

See below for answers and annotationshttp://www.fifthestate.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/fe-390-48-anarcho-crossword.pdf

ACROSS

3. Brit anarcho-punk band; also rude or distasteful

5. Not charity; the Prince agrees 6,3

...

BOOKS

Sasha and Emma: The Anarchist Odyssey of Alexander Berkman and Emma Goldman, by Paul Avrich and Karen Avrich, Harvard University Press, 2012, 528 pp., 36 photos, $35.

The story of “the most dangerous woman in America” and her long-time companion, begun by the late historian Paul Avrich and completed by his daughter. Goldman’s words, whose quotes adorn everything from coffee mugs to Occupy placards, still resonate with the passion and vision of anarchy.

...

Audrey Goodfriend with Federico Arcos. —photo: J. Herrada

Lifelong anarchist Audrey Goodfriend died on January 19 at 92.

Over her lifetime, Audrey engaged with generations of anarchists, and in many ways served as a bridge between them. The fact that as a teenager in the late 1930s, Audrey hitch-hiked to Toronto to meet Emma Goldman, gave younger anarchists who met her a direct connection with anarchist history.

...

1. Subscribe. Subscribers are a publication’s life blood. If you bought this at a news stand, consider subscribing and buying one for a friend or a library.

2. Donate. Postal and printing costs continue to rise, making financial stability an increasing challenge to publications which refuse commercial advertising. Donations also allow us to continue sending free subscriptions to prisoners and GIs.

3. Distribute the FE. Sell or give away current or back issues. Get stores in your area to sell the magazine. Use them for tabling. Take them to events and demos. Bulk back issues are available for the cost of postage. Write us at fe@fifthestate.org for info.

4. Hold a fundraiser for the FE. A house party or an event not only provides revenue for the magazine, but gets people together that share similar ideas.

5. Become an FE Sustainer. Sustainers pledge a certain amount each issue or yearly above the subscription fee to assure our continuing publishing, and receive each issue by First Class mail.