TOTW: Recuperation

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While it’s easy to place emphasis on the more exciting forms of state violence—baton-wielding, armor-clad riot cops through a teargas haze—it’s equally important to be mindful of another ever-present and much more boring reality: recuperation. The murky ways in which once-radical acts are disarmed, defanged, redirected, or otherwise rendered ineffective of their original purpose. Recuperation shows itself in many forms. It can quickly swoop in with well-intentioned activists as a project gains popular favor, reveal itself across generations of rebels using the same tired tactics, or even grow from poisonous seeds assumed to be benign, dooming efforts from the start.

An example of recuperation I’m fond of is how the 60s psychedelic movement has morphed from a form of escape into microdosing psilocybin as a “productivity hack” for millennial careerists. A complete reversal achieved through countless subtleties, like this, is fascinating and worth a moment of reflection.

Our own good intentions as anarchists aren’t enough to save us, either. We can unknowingly play the role of unreliable narrator in our own stories, burdened by the baggage of what we claim to refute: identity, morality, productivity, class, comfort.

“It is a malady of the soul, an addiction. It is our little problem. You quit one day and start again the next. You abandon it one week and reinvent it the following. You do it in denial of doing it. ” - Hello

What does recuperation look like? Where is it most obvious, and where does it lie in wait? How do you defend yourself from being swept up in its current? How do you respond to a world largely hoping to twist your words and actions? How do you trust yourself?

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The George Floyd protests of 2020 which for a time was a global phenomenon withered away as the election season approached. ABOLISH THE POLICE! is now uttered behind closed doors. ABOLISH THE POLICE! was never enough. If we want to abolish the police we will also have to dismantle the city and a lot more.

Creating zones of autonomy in conflict with the political order can do the job. Like Harlem and/or the Bronx for several decades, as well as other "gang-dominated" Black areas of several other big US cities; the infamous Tepito black market neighborhood in Mexico City; and our more well-known Exarkhia, to some extent (since a few years the police did come in for evictions, tho that was during a relative weakening of anarchist activity and organizing in Athens).

Thing is the city's still a toxic, overwhelming, oppressive environment, and people in these neighborhoods may tend to shut down upon their zone as a kind of comfort bubble.... that integrative socio-economics (aka "gentrification") may burst gently in the space of a few years... These other realms within society are yet fascinating for the Other avenues of life they're offering.

I lived in the Bronx in the 60s and 70s. The gangs either terrorized anyone not affiliated, or the ended up working with the cops (young lords, black spades, etc).

It was 1960, and doo-wop was the sound on the streets. It felt like there was a doo-wop group on every corner back then. What a time it was!

The New York Yankees were playing the Pittsburgh Pirates in the World Series... and Mickey Mantle was like a god to me. My dad would take me to Yankee Stadium and we'd watch the Yankees win.

Chez Bippy - that's where all the guys hung out. But I'll tell you about them later. I live right there on the third floor. And on warm summer nights all through the neighbourhood... you would hear young Italian men romancing their women. And right there, right there under that lamppost there, stood the man - the number-one man in the neighbourhood... Sonny. Everybody loved Sonny and treated him like a god. And in my neighbourhood, he was a god. And I would sit on my stoop and watch him, all day and all night. But he would never even look at me. Never, until one day.

Nothin's really changed dude, the terror is just anesthetized and digitally formatted, but overall the stress and fear are qualitatively comparable.

Nowhere I did say gangs are a course of action for anarchists. Actually I've always been apprehensive of the whole "me and my gang" and the affinity group gimmicks as not only they're more collectivism delving in herd mentality, but also pave the way for more preservation of social status through capital accumulation (that marxists would call class-building). Just that their dominance of violent gangs over some areas has allowed for a relative clearing from cops and other state institutions... yet indeed gangs being like cops but with feudal practices aren't any improvement over actual cops.

Whcih shoehorns us back to this TOTW, as there are patterns with breakway social milieus that make them easier to be recuperated by state forces... That is something not to be overlooked by anarchos of course.

I made the point that it's an example of a trick pulled by the system(Teddy Bomber) to initiate changes to solve technical problems. The police, the product of an older power system, need to be replaced by something softened and more controlling as opposed to repressive. What many of these leftoid recuporators want to do is replace(at least partially) them with a different type of controlling process. They are not interested in eliminating civic guardian structures perse.

I've said that the Convoy was a bit more authentic due to the fact that supply chains were being fucked with. Say what you will about the threat overrated Trump but at no point did he do the Floyd protesters what Trudeau did with convoy protesters via enacting emergency measures. That tells you something.

For genuine non-recuporated discourse I would have to see something that began to strike at things like science and technology. That is still uncharted territory for movements outside of a small radical niche. If or when anti-tech and anti-societarian tendencies become a thing then that will be a sign that things are getting interesting again.

Yes, the Floydal Flop and Climate Anti-Climax marches failed because they were largely a bourgeois moral guilt trip reformist self-righteous self-valorizing exhibition. Ultimately the only physicality that will surpass protest, marches even warfare, will be meteorological climate incursions impacting societal/ideological incumbency and short circuiting digital propaganda systems. Even a one in a millenium solar storm destroying micro-circuitry in combination with climate famine will be the straw that breaks the corporate/oligarchal monopoly on property and authority.

Nice one. I'm not inherently against these movements but I see them for the system reorganization movements that they are. There is certainly a meta-crisis coming in the greater 21st century and that will shake things up on its own(The Limits To Growth doc remains correct and on course). This plus a realignment of power and positions which I hope benefit anarchy more then what happened in the 20th century via national liberation and all the adjacent pseudo radical positions.

Yeah I generally approved of the whole BLM and Climate movements, finally the huge bourgeoisie inertia was taking its first tentative defiant steps against authority spurred on by its teenage and 20something family members. I cynically expected the flop that usually follows these tantrumesque explosions, often media fueled, but atleast the masse sentiment had made its mark on the massive rolling ball of hedonistic consumption, superfluous progress, growth and the shallow narcissistic emotional fetishism of Western culture.

I always just saw BLM as being reformist identity politics. I felt sympathetic towards George Floyd...he was just trying to get some ciggs and chill for christ sake...and then all the sudden he's a martyr for some cause that would reinforce white guilt and inverted racism. I was excited about all the riots and "un-precedented" attention being brought to police brutality, yet it really wasn't unprecedented because getting angry about cops killing people has just been a part of the outrage cycle for a very long time now.

As SE hints at: the laws, the courts, and people who reinforce the draconian/bureaucratic victim/perpetrator binary. Your average joe normally has an easier time with controlling overwhelming situations than any punk mothafucka with a badge and a gun!

I don't know about this solar storm though, i'm getting dizzy! Folks have talked about how climate change is destined to kill all of us, yet i think only a population bottleneck is possible to get all science-ey.

I was thinking of mainly the satellite hardware in space which takes the main blast from a solar storm, enough to put everyday telecommunication services back to a 20th Century analogue speed.
Humans are here to stay, as vain and stupid as their journey has been, they will persist, by resuscitation, the mother of recuperation.

Look at it this way, even if humanity had no influence on climate, the Earth would still follow on with its glaciation ice-age eras every 10,000 years approx which would make only equatorial regions tolerable and sparsely populated. It could be described as a clean slate event on a planetary level. Yes, SE is correct about the victim/persecutor binary which seems to me to be locked into societal formations based on hierarchy.

"but at no point did he do the Floyd protesters what Trudeau did with convoy protesters via enacting emergency measures"

are you seriously implying that trudeau is more authoritarian and oppressive? you do realize that floyd protesters weren't blocking much of shit, while the convoy blocked real shit. that provides some context for a different response, don't you think? even though he waited for like 3 weeks before actually doing anything other than "those truckers are mean!"

Well howdy there [user screen name]

Looks like you've encountered sireinzige, aka ziggles the douche canoe, sirjackass, ziggythediddler, etc

His interests include: arguing about whether viruses exist, arguing about age of consent laws, arguing about whether the proud boys are just misunderstood, arguing about whether snitches are snitches even tho they publicly bragged about snitching and so on and so on ....

Be advised that you will find most theoretical exchanges with him to be disappointing! Thanks for reading and have a nice day!

BEEP BOOP

I concur with SirEinzige. I'm flabbergasted that you couldn't provide a counter example indicating that Trudeau is less authoritarian than Trump was. Just some handwringing and hand waving. Honestly, Trump was practically identical to past and the current president. Yet, leftists aren't up in arms about them. Ironic. The fact that you're insinuating you approve of the crap Trudeau did because the convoy "blocked real shit" for a few weeks is very telling. I find some folk similar to you very confusing

You could say you "disproved" what SirEinzige said about leftoids just wanting to change the control processes to their own control processes. You seem to want to keep the current processes of control & power fully intact and not eradicate them entirely. Definitely not eradicate them on a deeper level. Especially, if it's "blocking real shit."

the thing that i think most people (not excluding myself) use to combat recuperation is clarity and firm boundaries, the polarization and binary thinking that of course create other problems. gatekeepers and identity politics-ers, purists and historians...
aside from that, which i think is a reasonable tactic to combat the cooptation of our language and practice (but only a part of a strategy, and itself easily fucked with), the fight is pretty subjective, which makes it an issue of...
who are your friends, who do you check yourself against when you're doing something or going somewhere? and *that* makes the question of who your friends are gain a kind of philosophical significance that is extremely challenging in itself. or a measure of what you *actually* want to be maintaining in your life. or both.
do you pick people for yourself who are kind and generous and whatever, or people who will say "that's bullshit" when you do bullshit, or people who will say "what would emma do" (lol), because usually those are not the same people, and even when they are, then they die or go off to have kids or something.
(maybe that's just me.) (oops, got distracted...)
nice topic.

I want friends who can do all three?

Put another way, I try to be the friend who can do all 3.
Most people fixate on the part where I say "that's bullshit" over and over.
That might be the "canada" thing ...

huh? Nostalgia? Are you talking about punks fighting nazis at shows or something? Bans on consumer products? If those boundaries are so firm and clear, could you be a little more specific?

"who are your friends"

Now THAT is a good question. I've honestly had to purge most of them over the years just because it's weak long distance stuff.

I want friends who are kind and generous & who will also check me on my bullshit. But not just say "hey, that's bs" but will take the time to get into the weeds as to why they think im spouting nonsense. And, will accept the same back.

But recuperation is more than just how *we* engage, but is a thing *they* do to get a handle on things. Like, all knowledge production is ripe for being used by [the state, authority] *them* against *us*. The University has the collections (of papers, past scholarship, letters, etc), the money, the status etc. to allow work that *friends* might generate, and that work may be helpful in our struggle (for lack of a better term) but still the University owns it and will eventually use that work to our disadvantage.
+ the uni is only one such site of recuperation.

pro-situ who imagine their beloved publications to be so subversive mourned when they were inducted into french national library as national patrimony. the type that's written books with titles like "50 years of recuperation". their whole lamenting is as pathetic as those who are outraged in disbelief when a banksy graffiti is torn from its place, wall and all, and sold to millionaires. they're concerned with recuperation because their subversion doesn't leave the page or the canvas, it's a product that can packaged and sold, replicated and shared indefinitely, many iterations until semantic satiation, noise, meaninglessness. such limited realm of illusory subversion is always already recuperated, specially when produced within academia or the art world.

To worry about recuperation is to be optimistic to the point of even maybe having delusions of grandeur, much like Debord. This is because how can you be so sure, as this topic questions, that your actions are subverting anything in the first place, that your tactics are now effective and will only later be twisted against you. What we often see is uncritical action which is innocuous or subservient from the start, like activism (whether liberals or the sometimes indistinguishable anarchists); or actions from our opponents which are only lightly dissimulated or not at all, like political propaganda, or advertisement for products, like the picture above. The peaceful protests by liberals were never a threat and are already in the repertoire of aesthetics used to reaffirm and preserve the status quo, and that is not to say that aesthetics could be subversive in the first place, at least not in the radical way that some would purport in manifestos, generations after generations, seemingly ignorant of the past and current utopian failures, and the limited utility and relevance of extremist political poses and gestures.

When it comes to weapons, whether literally or as metaphor, we’re not talking of recuperation, but of arms race. Arrows and bullets can wound whoever they shoot, but innovations were/are made in armor and sighting systems etc. You may have obsolescent gear which may not fare well in competition but the threat they pose is not completely neutralized. Things can become obsolete and fall out of favor but still have applications in specific uses depending on context. But despite pretensions of being a threat, the harmless theoretical and artsy cultural context in which recuperation is discussed is much more speculative and the effects of their “weapons” (rhetoric?) and “tactics” (wishful thinking?) are hard to measure, even their goals are sometimes unclear.

Anarchists who live without measure cannot be recuperated if they are not even playing that game, but their way of life may be very similar to some who don’t call themselves anarchists, and may not even be a threat to those who govern, but they’re an ungovernable inconvenience to their schemes. So in their case they have to be wary of not unwittingly becoming useful idiots to them. But is it recuperation when you’re just going about your life coincidentally according to, or at least non-obtrusive to, someone else’s design? It’s not a catastrophic threat unless a critical amount defect or attack. When the targets can quickly and readily recover from attacks or noncompliance, that’s a relevant form of “recuperation”, as in recovering from attacks even though the same attacks might remain effective and available for any to use at a later time.

I like your dichotomy but I think you've hit on this point where uhm, only those who were there could say for sure and even then, maybe they're full of shit too, you know?

what we do MIGHT be delusions of grandeur or it might be effective and badass or it might be a bit of both and the only way to know is to be at least enough of an egomaniac to try?

first! the do-something and then you're already in an exclusive club, after which comes the but-are-you-any-good-at-it?

usually not the first few times!

It’s not a dichotomy, but a complication of the dilemma and questioning of the framework. Things are rarely recuperated once and for all, but it’s a complex back and forth dynamic of power struggle. A tactic might fall flat because of being applied in inopportune timing or lack of generalized adoption, not due to it being recuperated and therefore expired, to be discarded from “the toolbox”.

But before questioning a tactic, or any rudimentary means, what is the goal? Often people act within the bandwagon of movements, following their rituals, without clarity about their own desires (which may place them at odds with the movements they insert themselves in due to convenience) and without a realistic understanding of their context. Running in circles and burning out is not ineffective because it’s recuperated or co-opted, an intrinsic failure to launch is not the same as being outmaneuvered or outwitted by an opponent. And being overpowered is not the same as being outwitted.

Often the State relies on overwhelming force and lack of subtlety, even lacking understanding in the convoluted theories of its would be opponents from the anarchist camp. They cannot detourn (or impersonate without looking out of touch, like “fellow kids”, like the output of academia or hollywood) what they cannot understand, but they need not understand what they can overpower.

You may ostensibly be “the best at it” but up against the whole world, it doesn’t matter, it’s a losing battle. So if you pick your battles and constrain your scope to a very limited context, you may find “victories” as an anarchist, and often these will look as acts of petty sabotage and evasion. I guess what I’m saying is the problem of scale, our relative weakness (specially as single individuals) is a much greater limit than the rate of recuperation of our tactics by opponents. By refusing to engage grand opponents in quixotic losing battles, you preserve your life. There are ways to envision many anarchist lives that are not those of the anarcho-commander, even if some cannot imagine an anarchist life outside of the realm and rhetoric attack. And for anarchists who are against mass society, the entire question of scale is a distasteful pursuit that’s part of the problem.

ok, I see your points now and mostly agree! also regret that we're limited by the @news format for discussion. oh well!

that last sentence, I know that problem well.
such is the beautiful idea perhaps? pls let us all know if you figure that shit out!

I will buy you a beverage of your preference and you don't even have to drink it with me!

fair enough

^look at these nerds agreeing with each other!

call yourselves anarchists?! fukin embarassing! have some dignity

I live in the moment mindfully, and that suffices, because relationships only really exist in the present, and the memory of previous relationships become figments of dead desires not worth reliving or recuperating.

This is about respectful mutual pre-transactional interactions, reminiscent of the mindful infant focus maintained and carried on into adulthood.

You said that very beautifully. For I long time I was sad because friends broke contact through ghosting. I'm better now, and you put perfect words on it.

I did not know some people microdose psilocybin for the purpose of increasing productivity. Why not just get some adderall since doctors hand that shit out like it's Halloween candy or cook up some meth to microdose. I've known that people microdosed psychedelics to lessen their depression. I've tried microdosing tryptamines like 4-aco-dmt or 4-ho-dmt for about 6 months because in my 30s, I would suffer from 3-4 day long terrible migraines. I felt that since many antimigraines meds are derived from tryptamines, that perhaps tryptamines like 4-aco-dmt would help and it did help decrease how often I got a migraine. I discovered that smoking DMT while suffering from a migraine would immediately end the migraine for me. However, if I took something like 4-aco-dmt while having a migraine, it'd just make it worse and an unpleasant experience.

Anyways, I didn't know recuperation could be done in reverse by an individual and I'm probably misunderstanding what's being asked. I thought recuperation was something that could really only be done by the masses and converted into the more mainstream, like taking psilocybin to increase productivity?

This "analysis" and "insight" of this comment doesn't say to much in it's 1+ paragraphs. You can tell because it includes multiple paragraphs offering "insight" to unrelated matters that doesn't add anything and isn't connected in meaningful ways. This comment has motivated me to perhaps becoming an anarchist writer that "analyzes" events because, as I've noticed, sometimes you can write a whole bunch of nothing, throw in some misunderstandings about clearly worded questions, make vague allusions to the past and boom shakalaka - "anarchist analysis" materializes.

What are you going on about? I'm not analyzing anything in this TOTW. I guess what I wrote concerning certain psychedelics and migraines could somehow be considered insightful to someone, but I doubt it.

I realize this is copy pasta from a comment I left on an entirely different article and thread. It must've aggravated you in some fashion for unknown reasons, that you decided to copy pasta it in response to moi on this thread. Very odd. I don't know if I want to know the unknown reasons that that comment aggravated you. Yikes.

I am saddened, ,no, ,insulted by your assumption concerning recuperation as being solely a masse tendency, and my intellectual productivity as being an hallucinogenic fantasy. I am a naturally high individualist!

I'm glad sorry you're saddened, and later insulted by my assumption. I'm feel gratification that my superpower is still effective against people. Are you willing to explain what makes you sad and insulted by my assumption? The TOTW says people use tiny amounts of psychedelics in hopes of it improving their productivity. You should probably place parts of your despair and offense you felt onto whoever wrote the TOTW. Your incorrect assumption about moi subbosedly suggesting an individual's intellectual productivity as being an individual's hallucinatory imagination doesn't dishearten and insult me.

What do you mean that you're "naturally high?" I've heard people use "naturally high" to mean so many different things. I learned something about you; you're an individualist. I'm a bohemian. Like literally.

You're a newbie, drugs are not discussed here, they are off topic anyway, though addiction or drug induced awakenings to realities could be relevant in discussing human values and belief systems, but no. Also I'm not really sad or insulted, just parodying indignation, lol thanx.

My third sentence asked you a question related to the TOTW and unrelated to drugs, but your response indicates you're unwilling to answer. I'll have to make a note of what the expectations are for this website. You're a very intuitive person. ;-)

The term "recuperation" can be used on individuals or groups, even in describing single or multiple animal numbers. For instance, the population of bees within a hive might recuperate after unseasonal hot weather. It basically means a return to a previous state of health and functionality, political rule or sensibilities.
Hallucinogens can be used to recuperate productivity.
Sorry about your headaches, and ignore me if I'm not confirmed as registered. Impersonation has been an ongoing problem I've had on this site.

You seem important and successful in your life I would like to read more of your important thoughts where can I find them? This anews site deletes them so another place perhaps? Where might one recuperate your most splendid writings?

Umm, sorry, you have not logged in as a registered user of this site, and, forgive my paranoia, but I have been mislead by many purporting to be someone they are not, imposters, not realposters, and you may not be the real Tim. Also there's an ancient wise old saying "Beware of flattery", especially that which has a faint tinge of sarcasm.

one of the ways recuperation often manifest is in partial adoptions of alternatives or of critiques of totality. like when decentralization as a principle, or mutual aid gets adopted by itself, without the corresponding critique of authority, hierarchies, capitalism, etc. that way things can change while staying the same. by accepting one aspect of the opposition, the opposition can be integrated to the degree that they conform in the other aspects

So a gathering of anti-State egalitatarian individualists vs a democracy of conforming reformists. They both intersect in a radical centrist position.

The economy and broken dreams are some of the biggest drivers of recuperation I've seen - people with college degrees and nice backgrounds who, after graduation and a short time slumming it, succumb to social and economic pressures and, if they don't abandon their politics entirely, plunge into nonprofits, government social services or the academy to try to save their souls while also making a paycheck (the black panthers were skeptical of groups like SDS because they saw white radicals as sellouts-in-waiting, but then, bobby seale put out a cookbook after he got out of prison). People who turn skills they've picked up doing rad things into gigs like so many other things because they want to survive and don't want a normie job. Sad and often young people who see their radical dreams frustrated and run away from their politics and their friends.

I agree with chisel about the importance of friends, people who can support each other and keep each other honest. I'm not sure there's a great solution to the economic question except escaping work entirely or working as little as possible and finding a way to help each other survive. Kids, marriage and worker-run co-ops if you want, but those seem to come with baggage that I'm not sure how to unpack and which I've seen more than a few people deal with ungracefully. Spend as much time trolling anews as possible so you have neither the time nor skills to be recuperated even if you wanted to.

Whenever a TOTW is posted, I feel it says something about the person(s) who thought it up and in the subtext, I see someone anxious that they’re losing friends to society. Title should read “help! My friends are becoming yuppie liberal sellouts!”.

Aging is the great recuperator.

Whenever a comment is posted, I feel it says something about the person(s) who thought it up and in the subtext, I see someone anxious that they’re losing friends to society. Title should read “help! my friends have real social lives while I waste mine trolling the comment section!”.

The Internet is the great recuperator.

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