FILLER COLLECTIVE: The Counterinfo Site is Calling it Quits

From Filler Collective
July 22, 2023

“What becomes a burden can be abandoned. We want more strength and energy with time, not less — so do what moves you.“
– How to Start a Fire

As of August 13th, 2023, the Filler Collective will no longer be maintaining this counterinfo website. We will continue to publish the submissions we receive, local zine PDFs, and other miscellaneous updates on this website until then.

Filler’s three longest-running projects are the zine distro, the DIY punk label thing, and this counterinfo website. As an informal crew, any given Filler project lasts only as long as there’s still one of us who feels like doing it. Maintaining the blog at fillerpgh.wordpress.com is no longer a priority for us. The hundreds of articles, communiques, report-backs and zine submissions that we’ve published here will be left up as an archival resource — so don’t you fret, fellow anarcho-nerds. All other filler projects (the distro, bands, screen-printing, etc.) will continue as normal.

A few of us initially began working on the idea of starting a local news project sometime around 2013 or ’14 after stumbling upon older local news projects like The Yinsurrectionary Times, Pittsburgh Anarchy, and Pittsburgh Indymedia. We were still the new kids in three rivers anarchyland then, so we hoped that stepping up to carry on the counterinfo torch might help us discover ways into the existing insurrectionary milieu. Gotta start somewhere, right?

In its first ten months, this site logged under 100 total visitors. It took years of soliciting writing submissions through flyers and conversations for us to build up a consistent online readership… let alone for us to actually start receiving report-backs, critique, analysis, and anonymous submissions on a routine basis. Fast forward a decade and the articles we publish will regularly break over 30,000 hits, submissions end up receiving long-form replies and critiques… shit, a few months ago there was a single action that resulted in FIVE separate anonymous report-backs!

We are confident that there is writing published here that has helped anarchists living in the so-called greater Pittsburgh area to not only clarify their ideas, but also to spread them. This site sometimes helped bridge communication gaps between different scenes, and we are proud to have opened up space for locally-specific autonomous discussions and debates (sometimes even interesting ones! =P ).

So then, if shit’s so hot then why are we dropping the counterinfo project now?

Three simple reasons:

We think others can do it better.
We believe good projects quit while they’re ahead.
Long-form autonomous news and discourse in this city deserves a platform that is unmarred by its affiliation with a bunch of shit-for-brains punx and meme queens who still tow the Crass Font party line.

If you appreciated this filler project and are bummed to hear we’re dropping the website, then go start your own counterinfo blog. Don’t know where to start? Check out this handy primer! Sure wish we had before we started…

Starting a regional counterinfo project? Hit us up! We can boost your project on our socials and via flyers if you want! Shoot us an email if you have any questions or hot tips; we’ve learned a lot from running this site, and while there’s A LOT of things we fucked up along the way and we still have no idea what we’re doing, there’s also a decent number of things we got pretty fucking good at.

Many thanks to everyone who’s ever sent something in to be published on this website. Seriously. We thank you with the deepest sincerity, respect and gratitude. It’s truly been a pleasure reading about your ideas and your actions. Even if we don’t take ourselves seriously sometimes, we do take all movements for anarchy seriously. So thanks for all the hot takes and sketchy stories.

As the last active admin on the counterinfo site, I want to end this statement by dropping the royal “we” of our informal collective and to just speak for myself real quick.

Every. Single. Time. That I’ve opened the email and realized that we’d received an anonymous submission, the excitement would carry me the entire day. On some days, it was the only reason I would get out of bed. It brings me so much joy in knowing that somewhere nearby, my neighbors are risking their freedom to attack this wretched fucking leviathan that I so deeply despise.

No act is too small. You’re braver than you think, and don’t ever forget it. LIGHT IT UP!

https://alertaantifascistarecords.bandcamp.com/track/light-it-up

When our movement becomes stagnant, anchored by apathy
We can’t just give up, we can’t just give in
There are no wasted attempts when it comes to action
The smallest act could cause a chain reaction
That could bring this entire system down
Light it up
Ignite a spark
Every single action could be the start
Light it up
Ignite a spark
It will take all of our efforts to get out of the dark
You could be the one
That offers hope and inspiration
To everyone who feels defeated
And moves the depleted towards motivation
And helps the flame continue to burn
The most important thing that we still need to learn
Is that we’re in this together, don’t shut out one another
Don’t ever forget that we depend on each other

You can send your report-backs, zine submissions, critiques, graffiti/action photos, demo tapes, hate mail, & memes to
Filler_PGH@protonmail.com

We’ll try to get back to you in a reasonable amount of punk time.

Send reports in email form, as an attachment, or better yet, on an easy to use (and free) Riseup Pad or CryptPad.

There are 7 Comments

Good riddance to bad rubbish. Communization masquerading as anarchism, publishing maoists masquerading as anarchists.

Now get rid of the metal music masquerading as punk.

maybe you could give some examples of what you're complaining about? otehrwse you just seem ranty.

the fun thing about being an anti-sectarian clearing house for local anarchist writers is that you get accused of being an advocate of whatever hot take you published last. And always by people who don’t actually know you.

Filler’s been accused of being:
- “nihilist lifestyle fashion squatters”
- “white college kid tiqqunists”
- “transphobic primitivists”
- “tenderqueers cosplaying as punk”
- “the token POC anarchist project that defends white anarchists”
- “NOFX kids pretending they’re crust”

What we really are is much, much worse. We are distroists. And distroism is here to stay

WE WILL MISS YOU!

hope you're doing like lbc and going undercover...

Ha! fun stuff

every single one of those tells me everything about what type of jerkoffs made the accusations

got yer garden variety unhinged i-see-commies-everywhere types and yer identity politics vampires getting defensive about their little castles and even the classic crustier-than-thou!

and of course, always with the anarchist race baiting, can't forget the race baiting

Always sad to see another counter-info site calling it a day - the list of English-language counter-info sites is becoming smaller and smaller, it seem like most anarchists in the English-speaking world prefer to get their info from corporate social media instead, which is really sad and depressing. At least we still have Anarchist News, Act For Freedom Now, Dark Nights, IGD, Crimethinc, Abolition Media and IGD - while none of these sites are perfect they are still a preferable alternative to browsing corporate news sites or endlessly doom-scrolling corporate social media feeds.

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