Austerity is Prison

[Corvus]

Now, finally, the money is gone. The world has run out of future, used it up, wasted it on the grotesque fantasies of the rich, on technologies of death and alienation, on dead cities. Everywhere the same refrain, the same banners and headlines: there is nothing left for you. From the US to Greece, from Chile to Spain, whatever human face the State might have had: gone. The State is no longer a provider of education or care, jobs or housing. It is just a police force, a prison system, a bureaucracy with guns. . .
Sometimes, maybe, we get treated to some political theater: faked expressions of concern or outrage from the puffy, grimacing faces. But the result is always the same – in Oakland, in Sacramento, in Washington, in the offices of the IMF – whatever the owners of wealth want, they get. The rest of us are sacrificed on the altar of the bottom line.
No money on which to retire after a lifetime of crushing work. No money to go to college. No money for the grade schools and high schools, which every day look more and more like prisons. No money for the people maimed, sickened and driven insane by this unbearable society.
We could go through the new California budget line by line, but you basically already know what it contains. It’s not a budget but a bludgeon. Every line says the same thing: Fuck you. Die.
There is no money. And yet, still, we live in a society of vast, almost obscene wealth: blocks of homes sit empty, mountains of luxury goods glut the shopping emporia, unused factories and equipment gather rust. All of it under the spell of a strange collective hallucination called “property.” All of it protected by cops and the threat of prison. . .
Yes, the money is gone and there is no future. No future for capitalism. All attempts at reform are now as absurd as making home repairs while the rest of the house is on fire.

finish that shit at bayofrage.com

 

[Gudj]

Best communique in recent memory.

 

[CXR1037]

Now, finally, the money is gone. The world has run out of future, used it up, wasted it on the grotesque fantasies of the rich, on technologies of death and alienation, on dead cities.

Grotesque fantasies such as social programs or universal health care or bank bailouts?

Everywhere the same refrain, the same banners and headlines: there is nothing left for you. From the US to Greece, from Chile to Spain, whatever human face the State might have had: gone. The State is no longer a provider of education or care, jobs or housing. It is just a police force, a prison system, a bureaucracy with guns. . .

It's never provided education or care, it just provides money.

Sometimes, maybe, we get treated to some political theater: faked expressions of concern or outrage from the puffy, grimacing faces. But the result is always the same – in Oakland, in Sacramento, in Washington, in the offices of the IMF – whatever the owners of wealth want, they get. The rest of us are sacrificed on the altar of the bottom line.

Seems like a lot of recent protests across the nation/world have had some effect...maybe I'm wrong?

No money on which to retire after a lifetime of crushing work.

That's the fault of the individual for wasting away their lifetime on "crushing work".

No money to go to college. No money for the grade schools and high schools, which every day look more and more like prisons.

There seems to be a lot of money out there for people. I see a lot of scholarships and grants for low-income people, people of color and other minorities, etc.

Education has been "redefined at the demand of the uneducated to suit the ideas of the uneducated." Standards, corrupt teachers unions, and government control, combined with a lack of parental responsibility, turned schools into baby-sitters, prisons.

No money for the people maimed, sickened and driven insane by this unbearable society.

I don't believe that it's the responsibility of the state to take care of it's citizens. And either way this is bullshit, I know firsthand because my sister just went on Medical and got great medical care.

We could go through the new California budget line by line, but you basically already know what it contains. It’s not a budget but a bludgeon. Every line says the same thing: Fuck you. Die.

I imagine it's closer to: "give us your money and stay alive so you can give us more so we can cover our asses after blowing it all on total bullshit."

There is no money. And yet, still, we live in a society of vast, almost obscene wealth: blocks of homes sit empty, mountains of luxury goods glut the shopping emporia, unused factories and equipment gather rust.

Was this written by some guilty crimethinc kid in Malibu? I spend a lot of time going back and forth throughout the West Coast and outside some select areas in LA and Orange County, most places I've visited are desolate and run-down. I wouldn't refer to that as "vast, obscene wealth".

All of it under the spell of a strange collective hallucination called “property.” All of it protected by cops and the threat of prison. . .

Property is a hallucination, the author is correct. I'm going to take his/her computer for myself now.

That being said, I don't see anything wrong with squatting and the like when people just leave their property vacant and there are homeless people out there.

Yes, the money is gone and there is no future. No future for capitalism. All attempts at reform are now as absurd as making home repairs while the rest of the house is on fire.

Capitalism has plenty of future, it got muddied up by all the socialism and stuff.

All in all I think I agree with the general message of this communique but for the most part it seems a bit too emotional.

 

[plagueship]

zzzz....mm? oh , another overly dramatic 'communique' full of apocalyptic rhetoric issued by west coast radicals who never explain exactly what their plan or ideas are?

wake me up when there's something to think about rather than just more 'militant' chest-beating about how 'the sky is falling'. i don't think i buy it. capitalism has survived all sorts of crises. it seems that certain 'anarchists', particularly on the west coast, have joined the long marxist tradition of constantly predicting the imminent collapse of capital in order to try to get people behind their banner. even though their style is a little more snappier, their sounbites punchier and more twenty-first century it still strikes one as an exercise in wishful thinking.

 

[Gudj]

CXR1037 I am so sick of your capitalist apologist bullshit. This isn't the first thread where there was some issue being discussed by radical minded people, and you had to insert your ignorant ass, counterrevolutionary, privileged statements and take away from the thread. Want an example of exactly what I just described? Here:

That's the fault of the individual for wasting away their lifetime on "crushing work"

To that I say fuck off, check yourself. Or the more probable: go have a circle jerk about how powerful voting can be or how great it feels to be (for the time being) indifferent to the brutality of the current system.
Oh wait, more of your completely out-of-touch wisdom,

There seems to be a lot of money out there for people. I see a lot of scholarships and grants for low-income people, people of color and other minorities, etc.

Now you are talking like a real right-winger. It's the working class' own fault that they're poor, and anyone can make it if they try hard enough (it's just that people of color aren't trying hard enough)? That is unrealistic and irresponsible.

I don't believe that it's the responsibility of the state to take care of it's citizens.

Neither do they. Again, you and the state are on the same page.

And to both you and plagueship (who has a similar history of detracting from threads by trolling with really base non-arguments), it wouldn't be such a big deal if you both ever put forward your ideas, or posted communiques from actions you take part in or support. However, most of what I see is either Liberal (plagueship) or conservative (cxr) tainted trolling of posts of a radical nature without any of your own ideas.

All that being said,
I agree with the one actual critique anyone has made so far, in that talking about how the collapse is just days away all the time does have the ability to detract from an argument, especially when capitalism and the total oppressive order of capital and state shows it's resilience. Boasting that "we" are about to bring about that collapse maybe is less effective than advertising the things that we are actually currently capable of, such as alternative strategies for staying healthy through the collapse. But I haven't thought about it that much. I am someone who usually falls for it and gets excited in hearing talk of taking it down.

 

[plagueship]

what if my ideas don't correlate to any particular action or communique that would be easily recognizable and digestible by such as yourself? what is with this "do something, anything!" attitude? what end does it serve? why is it useless for me to critique the vagued-out "radical" notions that are poured into feeding troughs like this one, so much slops for the anarcho-herds. what if critique is a form of action? why am i not allowed, in your opinion, to raise these questions or criticisms unless i have a communique of my own to release, an alternative radical sect to recruit people to? what if i just think people should think for themselves. think twice, ask questions, not just jump on any bandwagon that sounds good on the surface because it's against stuff they're against. the enemy of my enemy is not always, or even usually, my friend - if you'd ever studied the history of anarchism and social change closely enough i think you would have seen that by now.

it's even more ridiculous since i think you made my point best yourself: "I haven't thought about it that much. I am someone who usually falls for it and gets excited in hearing talk of taking it down." this describes many radicals i have known. they want a banner to get behind. they want a hammer in their hand, something to build or something to smash, something to do, so many busy bees, barely a moments reflection on what they're doing or why. and when someone asks them it's "fuck you for being a privileged capitalist apologist distracting form our glorious celebration of meaningless communiques!!" i would reflect on this: capital wants everyone to keep busy; part of its genius is that it can extract value from virtually any form of human activity. sad but true.

"alternative strategies for staying healthy through the collapse" - there, there is one germ of an actual idea floating about in your bilious stream of "fuck you"s and "shut up"s. please, expand on that. it's certainly one more concrete thought than can be found in the OP.

if i need to believe what you believe in order to have a valid point then i think this supports the suggestion (as much as your continual use of invective and ad hominems) that you might be an emotionally disturbed fanatic with no interest in a real discussion but only in a radical circle jerk for the chosen few true believers. or maybe you just want to have your political discussions on sites where you can expect more people to agree with you. obviously not everyone on stp agrees with either of us. i don't see why you think being so verbally abusive is going to change anyone's mind or even make your points sound better.

 

[Gudj]

what if my ideas don't correlate to any particular action or communique that would be easily recognizable and digestible by such as yourself? what is with this "do something, anything!" attitude? what end does it serve? why is it useless for me to critique the vagued-out "radical" notions that are poured into feeding troughs like this one, so much slops for the anarcho-herds. what if critique is a form of action? why am i not allowed, in your opinion, to raise these questions or criticisms unless i have a communique of my own to release, an alternative radical sect to recruit people to? what if i just think people should think for themselves. think twice, ask questions, not just jump on any bandwagon that sounds good on the surface because it's against stuff they're against. the enemy of my enemy is not always, or even usually, my friend - if you'd ever studied the history of anarchism and social change closely enough i think you would have seen that by now.

So... I didn't say or suggest that it's against anyones rules to critique an action or communique.
My problem is that there were no critiques made except the one I responded to, and cxr's post was extremely frustrating.
I don't get how you took my post to mean that I am against the critiquing of this or any other communique. My frustration was that there was virtually none, just a bunch of shittalk on it.
In anycase, "do something, anything" makes a hell of alot more sense than the most popular alternative of "talk shit and put everyone's ideas down to really take moral and momentum out of the movement, maybe even show up to a march to put newspaper boxes back on the sidewalk, but probably not since leaving the house is rare." I am not accusing you of doing that, just saying that it is most often one or the other of those veiwpoints.
Secondly, no, critiquing this communique is NOT action. Like I said, if you were to offer suggestions, or better yet organize and action that you think would be more effective than this one was, then that would be great. But sitting around on the internet critiquing people who actually do shit does not count as action, in the same way buying greenwashed products does not count as action.

it's even more ridiculous since i think you made my point best yourself: "I haven't thought about it that much. I am someone who usually falls for it and gets excited in hearing talk of taking it down." this describes many radicals i have known. they want a banner to get behind. they want a hammer in their hand, something to build or something to smash, something to do, so many busy bees, barely a moments reflection on what they're doing or why.

Well I was being honest about my own lack of understanding of an issue ,something absent from most of the "critiques" of this sort of thing that I see. But it's true, the point you brought up hasn't been thought very much on by myself, that's why I didn't argue against it, and even said it seems to make sense.
We wan't some sort of movement and action, diversified. I don't go to actions like the one that this thread is about, but don't try to belittle people who do. Your accusation about me and all of the radicals I personally know is false. They are experimenting and trying to find things that work, NOT just scrambling to get behind someone else banner.

if i need to believe what you believe in order to have a valid point then i think this supports the suggestion (as much as your continual use of invective and ad hominems) that you might be an emotionally disturbed fanatic with no interest in a real discussion but only in a radical circle jerk for the chosen few true believers. or maybe you just want to have your political discussions on sites where you can expect more people to agree with you. obviously not everyone on stp agrees with either of us. i don't see why you think being so verbally abusive is going to change anyone's mind or even make your points sound better.

Again, I do encourage discussion. What CXR posted, as well as most of your first post is not discussion, and it's definitely not a helpful critique. I don't what what emotionally disturbed means to you, but I have never met anyone who wasn't that way. That's why there is action at all, to try and do something to break this extremely hopeless and depressing system that rules most of our existence.
I obviously wish more people agreed with me, and my language written while being really pissed off at cxr is harsh as fuck and unnecessary. It also won't change their mind, but I doubt anything will. If you can react to this communique with mostly substanceless shittalk , then I can respond to super ignorant posts with frustration. I wish I had the energy or vocabulary to take on all the things that cxr posted but I don't.

I didn't do the one thing you asked me to do in this reply, which is elaborate on my alternative to claiming to be able to bring about the collapse in the very near future. I would like to think and talk more about that, but this isn't the thread for it. This thread was for people to read the communique from a recent action.

Also, I edited my second post to make it less "verbally abusive".
But in all honesty, someone who blames people with shit jobs for having to work shit jobs is not someone I worry about having hurt feelings.

 

[CXR1037]

To that I say fuck off, check yourself. Or the more probable: go have a circle jerk about how powerful voting can be or how great it feels to be (for the time being) indifferent to the brutality of the current system.

Well perhaps I didn't make myself clear; what I meant by that was: if you're wasting away your life, isn't it your fault? Anarchists far and wide like to use the term "sheeple", who's fault is it?

Now you are talking like a real right-winger. It's the working class' own fault that they're poor, and anyone can make it if they try hard enough (it's just that people of color aren't trying hard enough)? That is unrealistic and irresponsible.

To that I say fuck off, check yourself. There's obviously a ton of injustice in the world holding people back, blah blah, I hear that shit all the time. What I want to know is why you totally missed what I said and just went on an immediate attack of me!

Neither do they. Again, you and the state are on the same page.

State-run social programs...politicians demanding universal healthcare...what?

Gudj I think you take me as some Rush Limbaugh supporting, right wing koolaid drinking sociopath, which I'm not at all.

However, most of what I see is either Liberal (plagueship) or conservative (cxr) tainted trolling of posts of a radical nature without any of your own ideas.

Sorry my opinions come off as trolling, but to think my ideas are just copypasta and yours have any more substance is just dense.

What I first posted was my critique of this and just because I think differently you write it off as worthless.

Here's a more concise critique for you: I think this is all extremist, emotionally driven hype that offers nothing except an artsy way of making things seem on the verge of apocalypse. There's no real substance. So what there's no more money? So what capitalism is dying? I want to know where to go from here.

 

[wokofshame]

Yes, I like this. Can we say STP fight club? or perhaps you folks who are on the internets too much can just duel it out on World of Pedocraft or whatever it is.
DISSENT AND DISAGREEMENT ARE GOOD. that's what this anrchism shit is all about

 

[Gudj]

Gudj I think you take me as some Rush Limbaugh supporting, right wing koolaid drinking sociopath, which I'm not at all.

Your apparent blaming of the working class, your generic non-argument against a misinterpretation of "property is theft", your negative reference to socialism because it's mudding up capitalism, and your really strange idea that a state should not take care of it's citizens has led me to believe you are right wing. Not Rush Limbaugh style obviously, but a subtler style which has become sort of popular in co-opting radical aesthetics and rhetoric while simultaneously lacing it with nationalist/racialist/reformist ideas.
But if you say you aren't then fine, I won't tell you that you are, but you came off that way really hard to me.

To that I say fuck off, check yourself. There's obviously a ton of injustice in the world holding people back, blah blah, I hear that shit all the time. What I want to know is why you totally missed what I said and just went on an immediate attack of me!

Because it's obvious to most people who think about it for a second that the social programs that the state does offer are concessions and token gestures. The amount of wealth in most western countries, but especially the usa compared to the amount of those concessions made makes it clear that they are not designed (or allowed) to fulfill the need of the people. My strong reaction was due to my associations with arguments like "there is alot of help available for minorities, I don't know why they won't take it". Stuff like that is associated with racist fucks who are intent on victim-blaming as well as ultra-conservatives trying to make a case against welfare of any kind.

The communique was not intended to hold your hand and tell you what's next. The viewpoint that many people hold is that what's next is up to you, your affinity group, your community or your class to decide. The point of a communique is to help explain to certain people (or in this case, the public) why an action has taken place and the motivations behind it, not to solve all the worlds problems on one sheet of paper.

 

[shiftingGEARS]

burn it all down I say

 

[wokofshame]

I dont know gudj. This next year i'll be attending college completely for free, i haven't paid for most cold food in 5 years, and if i go to an ER they have to serve me.
Token gestures perhaps compared to the 300 million dollar loan guarantess going to big companies, but here's what's up.
If we were all rich, we STILL wouldn't pay our taxes and would still chisel welfare. Most of us have the same mindset as the CEOs "get it for free if you can", they're just on a bigger scale than us.
Like those 100 million campesinos romanticized by Marx aren't all that noble, they want TV and Ipod and Jimmy Dean croissant sandwiches but they just have to be able to afford them first.

And yes, most people on welfare are lazy fucks who are gaming it. Fact. Case in point- myself

 

[rezmutts]

When all fails in the eye of the humans. retreat to the mountains, Get back in touch with mother earth and father sky. because their in balance with nature unlike us humans. Go back to our Primitive ways..