On Anarchy and its Spectators, from the Occupation of Exarcheia

From Pastebin via https://twitter.com/exiledarizona

Much has been lost within the stream of content piling from Exarcheia and its defenders this past week. A constant barrage of images and text connected but impossible to arrange into simple stories for the curious. For those who resist, there was and never will be a question of clarity. These images complete the gaps between passive and aggressive. Between creeping and totality. Where the naked hatred polite society has for its devils is placed on a pedestal as a beacon of order. They gather around its warmth to feel the comfort of authority.

For anarchists, we only need history and experience to understand the conditions normality needs to function. We know that the uniform and gun is a symbol of authority for the uneasy masses that will often choose death over resistance, comfort rather than freedom. As anarchists we desire freedom! Our enemy authority, waits to emerge as our existence becomes unmanageable. And as the world moves into disorder, Exarcheia, a symbol of possibility for us turns to barricades for them.

Time may bring justice or at least an ounce of truth but within the fog of war there are only sides. Individuals having never questioned the need to act against authority cannot contemplate the scope of our situation. Some see armed men surrounding a neighborhood, checking IDs and attacking crowds as brutal occupation, others as an unfortunate need for order. Even the progressive journalist immersed in the intelligentsia can only see "both sides." Where the rioter, an individual against order must be punished, and if this takes collateral damage, so be it. After all, who wouldn't want normality to be maintained?

Although that normality, is anything but maintained. For an entire decade the world has been experiencing continuing degradation of living conditions. The economic collapse of the credit system in 2007 has persisted into a consistent form of austerity for the entire planet. This system is unsustainable, kept barely alive by cash handouts from wealthy nations. The clock has stopped ticking.

The world is heading back into recession. We face catastrophe. Exarcheia is a neighborhood that promotes self organization against economic efficiency. It should be obvious why they face us, authority doesn't need complex reasons, just continuity. And now that their comfort begins to recede, Exarcheia and its inhabitants have been cast as the undesirable enemies of order. As anarchists, we never denied it! The threat of anarchy grows as their order becomes tenuous.

The collective enforcement of this order is obsessed with undesirables. The hatred of the individual is a condition for the totality of control. And within that condition exists a sliding scale of criminality. There should be no surprise regarding increasing attacks on any undesirable individual. Not much has ever separated those who burn people and those who enforce the law. They are usually the ones to order it! Knowledge and difference breed dissension against order. For them the devil is never just an idea. Whether it is women, students, refugees, potential anarchists or others, individuals are always the objects of cleansing.

And so we sit locked in our homes much of the day, traveling in groups looking over shoulders waiting for what may come. Many who have work or school outside the confines of the occupation are checked and stopped daily. Facing harassment is now part of leaving and entering the neighborhood. Of course for polite society, those desirable in the eye of the law may pass freely. Individuals marked otherwise dodge a watchful eye.

So war comes to the streets and fills our nights and with it the eye of the world seeks to understand its conditions. But there is no lens other than our ideal. And that ideal, anarchy, is the reason we still fight! It is through these battles that Exarcheia, now boiling with resistance will spread back outwards. The question is, can it be stopped? Can total occupation defeat an ideal, never the less a neighborhood and its history?

The state believes that through constant occupation and brutality Exarcheia will be bled out of its desire. Although this plan never took into account the condition that allowed them to begin the attack in the first place. The coming economic disaster! So we should ask, who will wither? Those who desire freedom at any cost or a government already experiencing deteriorating conditions that negate their own plan for the area? How many more will we be in a month or year during a new crisis? Even if they take the occupations and beat and arrest hundreds what will become of their plans when the world itself falls into question?

The Future is Unwritten.

For Freedom, For Exarcheia.

Exiled Arizona
September 2 2019

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There are 15 Comments

As an anarchist news supporter I demand sarcastic rollovers for what I write.

I have none to offer, much less to meet your demands!

It does make me fear, when you paint the government in such a frail and disadvantaged position, that they would seek assistance from outside armed forces (my geopolitics are shit, who would be the first to call, and to respond?).
Could it become another Sarajevo? I'm sure many will not appreciate my ignorant comment. I apologize. Help me learn.

I think any escalation beyond what the state is currently employing would require a tactic change that is not acceptable within the European democratic framework. Maybe in the mid term future all bets are off concerning your question but that would probably come after the current occupation and crisis.

I hope that answers the question.

It does. I hope it doesn't escalate to a tragedy of such a scale.

I guess that, indeed, civil wars are the most unlikely under a democratic system. You'd be needing a severe deterioration of the political institutions for that to happen, at least. As far as student unions and party machines are still predominating...

A society may come to a context of near-insurrection as we've seen at a few places in the West lately, but there's always the specter of democracy preying over people's heads. And that doesn't just mean voting for parties... it's way deeper than that. This means clinging to consumer society and work as the conditions of abdication. People may protest for a long while, but how they gonna feed themselves and have some security, comfort, relationships... that's the question they aren't asking for an answer to, yet the answer's always "provided" by the dominant system, even if you gotta work work work for it.

In the latest news the Greek military had a big progressive base, and it's rather the cops who're crawling with fascists. I recall even a demonstration in Athens, a few years back as Golden Dawn started to get big, where protesting soldiers were shouting against Neonazis.

What's more likely is that the EU would send in troops, and that was the threat looming during the wilder days around the anti-bailout protests.The Greek army's got too much to deal with Turkey persistent bullying.

The Greek army is the largest in Europe because of mandatory service so yes there's a large base of normal people. I have friends currently doing their service, a lot of people get out of it but if I were a citizen I would go just to get the training.

Then again even in the USA the average soldier or specially nat guard is infinitely more likely to be more agreeable than a cop. So maybe for whatever reason it's the same anywhere.

Turkey is a funny situation since it's basically been used as a nationalist lightning rod since the Ottoman empire. The funny part is that now it just happens that with the current state of the word and the region it's probably a decent idea to be ready for anything from Turkey.

National Guard? Not sure what you meant with that line, but they're the ones trained and mandated to shoot domestic civilians if told to. Remember Ferguson? U.S. Marines are those more likely to side with civilians, I think.

we have added a roller and enabled them again for all future posts across the site.

- thecollective_1.8

Which of the articles posted on this site has the clearest info, as opposed to Alfredo-Bonnano-type bad-writing?

You're supposed to write them up and submit them yourself.
So far it seems that you've been slacking, spectator.
Too busy provoking the only idle person who's loitering the comment section at this hour.

This is the author Alfredo here, there's literally been 8 articles posted here in a week along with numerous mainstream media sources. I commend you if you're only source of information is the visible page of Anews daily but I'm not sure if you're getting everything you might need.

I don't know jack about it -- and while this amply qualifies me for expertise in stinky-anarchism-land, it won't give me useful info about what's happening in the conflict in question.

Why do you have to be so mean about it though? Are you Z?

Autonomies.org and Crimethinc.com, etc posted articles which were then reposted here last week.
Use the numbered below in the home page to navigate. You could also try using a search engine.
The author of the article above has also posted many things in their twitter.

It's this guy Kevin Keating who appears every few months to yell at the 90s.

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