Anarchy Bang: Introducing Episode 39: Anarchist Colonization of the Mars

From Anarchy Bang

In 1974 Ursula K. Le Guin published the science fiction novel "The Dispossessed", which told the story of a movement of anarchists who collectively left an Earth-like planet to go colonize a Mars-like planet, establishing there a new society organized around their anarchist beliefs. In 1992 Kim Stanley Robinson published the science fiction novel "Red Mars", the first book of his "Mars Trilogy", which told the story of people colonizing the planet Mars, including a number of explicitly anarchist groups, who then go on to become independent from the various authorities on Earth.

Then last Saturday, September 28th, Elon Musk held a press conference where he introduced the world to the "Starship" vehicle that he intends to use to send humans to Mars to begin the process of colonizing that planet. Musk's company, SpaceX, has already shown the world that reusable rockets which are capable of going out into space can be made, and that a private company can make them. Prior to this only single-use rockets were made for space travel, and government agencies were seen as the only organizations capable of going out into space.

Taking inspiration from all of this, the question here becomes: How about we build some real-life anarchist colonies on Mars? Our current planet is fucked, in all kinds of different ways, so how about those of us who yearn for a completely different world go set up shop on a completely different world? How about we turn "the Red Planet" into "the Red & Black Planet"? Let's become Martians!

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There are 28 Comments

“How about we build some real-life anarchist colonies on Mars?”

Dude, Mars is irradiated and mostly dry, with a thin atmosphere you can’t breathe on. If you think you can TERRAform MARS, it’s far easier in comparison to cease polluting Earth and make big reforesting, relearning better ways of life etc is far more viable and easily done, even if it’s just a lighter shade of impossible. AT LEAST YOU CAN BREATHE HERE FOR NOW.

“Our current planet is fucked, in all kinds of different ways, so how about those of us who yearn for a completely different world go set up shop on a completely different world?”

It’s that simple, huh. Go ahead, sounds great, go for it! I wish you luck!

Try not to fuck up the corner of the earth i live in, in your big effort.

“How about we turn "the Red Planet" into "the Red & Black Planet"? Let's become Martians!”

How about no? Okay, maybe you do it...gather all your enthusiastic pals...

Oof...you couldn’t even manage to Naruto run into Area 51, but now you’re going to Ursula Musk skedaddle into Mars and make it habitable? Not only habitable, but anarchist!

Ha! And somehow this is easier than a bolo on a piece of land or a building, or other earthly schemes?

Is buying a rocket or rocket tickets for all your pals, plus rocket and terraforming personel -including slaves for labor more arduous than what it took to build the pyramids, or transcontinental roads and rails, crossing mountains and deserts- more accessible to you than buying a piece of hillside and building a couple of sheds for friends?

It will literally be a colonization, since the amount of slave labor necessary (mostly entirely outsourced on earth and not on Mars) will resemble all the captured and enslaved people from Africa brought to America.

Earth will resemble a colony of Mars, since all goods will be extracted from Earth and exported to Mars. Imagine Earth producing resources for two planets worth.
Everything necessary for life on Earth (already to costly an uphill burden thanks to us), plus everything necessary to terraform/colonize Mars plus expeditions to meteors for resources!!

New rockets wont be made of recycled scrap metal from cars in junkyards nor use fairy farts as fuel! No such thing as a solar powered rocket to take off from earth!

You want to kill us faster, harder, stronger!

Good luck!

Speaking of Elon Musk’s similar logic on his other endeavors: “Hmm, so much traffic in LA...I know...let’s dig holes so we can cram MORE cars into it...yes...not to mention cars that drive themselves will imply potentially more cars on the roads at all times...hmm...I see absolutely nothing wrong with this...let me check which countries will be devastated by the extraction of minerals necessary to make ny batteries...oh, nice, excellent.”

I read this topic as more of a thought experiment. What would we do with a blank slate? Obviously there are no blank slates, but if there were what would we do?

As a thought experiment, the proposition of terraforming any planet cannot be any other than dystopian and civ. A project currently antithetical to anarchy.

But, nevertheless in our current situation of space shenanigans that don’t involve terraforming other planets, there is space -uh, ehem- room to imagine things like space mutiny and space illegalism (there are precedents: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=I-6F_sxHo1k, https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KwF1z_Iv8WU, https://www.forbes.com/sites/daveywinder/2019/08/25/nasa-astronaut-accus...).

Kids: if you study hard and apply yourself you can grow up to be a nihilist space pirate!!!!!! ; )

Imagine this scenario for the next Hollywood blockbuster:
(Maybe the next “Die Hard” sequel)

ASTRONAUTS HELD HOSTAGE IN SPACE STATION BY RUSSIAN HACKERS!

They ask for BIG MONEY ransom, and other miscellaneous eccentricities.

Gov says “We don’t negotiate with terrorists!”

Tensions escalate as relations between US and Russia were already tense, and worsen as they blame each other.

John McClane’s daughter Lucy is one of the astronauts held hostage!

Her hacker boyfriend, Matthew "Matt" Farrell, from the other movie (Die Hard 4) has to help!

Meanwhile John and his son already familiarized with Russia (in Die Hard 5) go back there to kick some hacker ass!

But plot twist!

The hackers were actually anarchists in low earth orbit using a VPN! And they were the astronauts themselves!

Now John McClane and his son must help swindle the US and Russian gov in order to get down Lucy safely and avoid her arrest upon an unauthorized reentry!

They crash safely in ocean water to be greeted by anarchist pirates who (submarine?, sail?, jet ski?), into the sunset!

I’d buy a ticket for that.

Since this is totally not a blueprint for a feasible plan, you know.

Well, they (Anarchy Bang) did choose an example (Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trillogy) where a major faction of anarchists ("the reds") directly sabotage the terraforming process, wage a guerilla war against it even. The best thing in Robinson's writing is his anarchic imagination. His imagined futures always include people creatively confronting, subverting, and evading authority; sometimes in anarchic but not directly "political" ways, and sometimes in ways that look a lot like anarchist practice on earth, but applied to new situations.

It'd be nice if they would make those into movies instead of all the sequels and remake rehash which seem to be the only thing getting made these days.

Knowing how expensive some movies are to make, I was ready to make the joke that you could almost launch a rocket into space with the money it would take to make the Mars Trilogy into a big Hollywood production.

A quick search of the most expensive movies ever made got me the number 379 million dollars.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_expensive_films

Here's a list of cargo price by weight. It's interesting to see all the absurd and seemingly pointless and terribly expensive stuff to launch stuff they have up there; like a gorilla suit ($39,130), and bagpipes ($259,000).
https://www.businessinsider.com/spacex-rocket-cargo-price-by-weight-2016...

"For SpaceX — the cheapest of NASA's new carriers — dividing the cost of each launch ($133 million) by the cargo weight of its most recent resupply mission (5,000 lbs.) gives you about $27,000 per pound."

Obviously there are so many things besides the cost of the actual launch that factor in that it's beyond a big movie budget.

What do you think pollutes more? NASA or Hollywood?
Well the easy way to answer is Hollywood pollutes "exotic" locations more (https://theconversation.com/eats-shoots-and-leaves-what-the-movie-indust...), while NASA pollutes the air and low Earth orbit with a lot of debris.

Cheers to a (highly unlikely, they assure you) Kessler Syndrome (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome)!

I'm sure no one will hack a satellite to make it crash into another in a very calculated and deliberate way.
Not many hackers play Kerbal Space Program right (https://xkcd.com/2204/)? And you know, people just don't do that type of thing for the lols. Right? https://www.forbes.com/sites/daveywinder/2019/06/20/confirmed-nasa-has-b...

https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/287284-hacking-satellites-is-probabl...
https://www.nextgov.com/cybersecurity/2019/07/report-pentagon-should-ass...

I dunno, I may just be momentarily pipedreaming but how about humans not being mature enough to be using their quickly-developed technologies, like cars, properly, so that a more advanced AI-controlled transport grid may be required to keep them in check? The numbers of deaths by motor vehicle (incl non-humans) is very telling... If these self-driven cars are programmed to stop at every passing living being, that'd be a good development, no?

Hello you. It's me, allow me to reply:

A.I. can drive cars in a way that is safer.
It would be even safer if there were no cars.

We could arrive at a compromise by allowing for A.I. controlled trucks and mass transport vehicles, but not so many individual automobiles clogging up the streets.

Yes, we manage our way into a utopia through centralized planning! Gosh darn market is getting in the way...

...or wait, maybe the market is a form of A.I. that is better suited at allotting and managing resources with its invisible hand, or at least better than any individual can...

Ha, there! Everything is perfect! Problem solved! Fewer A.I. piloted cars pollute less and cause less accidents!

I love you dear anon! Together we solved the world!

It would take one 10 trillionth less energy to reforest the Earth, implement population control, cleanse toxins and give everyone on Earth three meals a day and a roof over their heads than to colonize Mars. Learn physics and read books about photosynthesis and get all the absurd international "my rocket is bigger than yours" male ego fantasy!

Typo, get all the international " my rocket is bigger than yours " male ego fantasy bullshit out of your head!!

anarchists terraforming mars lol.

reusable launch systems has been around since the 80s. there is no single stage to orbit launch system. spacex uses a two-stage to orbit launch system. full fledged reusable launch systems has mostly to do with if it's economically worth it and has little to do with the capabilities of making it.

there have been plenty of private companies that have launched stuff into space prior to spacex. it's almost like you guys read a p.r. press conference and believed it all. hook, line and sinker lol!!! this is funny to me lol.

transhumanists are only good for working as hype machine, not reading the specs.
they get too giddy to think properly if you let them near the tech.

leftists are gonna say colonizing mars is just like colonizing the US.

This whole topic summarized in a song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dygHVfjNGRE

You know, some times I'm so fed up with things
I wanna pack my bags and leave
Leave the whole world behind
Ain't comin' back any time soon
But where am I supposed to go
When there ain't no air to breathe
And no one to talk to
On the moon?

[Chorus]
So I'm asking all the children to quit wasting time
With music that's been so auto-tuned
And stand on the shoulders of Galilee
To learn how to fly up and fabricate
An atmosphere on the moon

Now you may wonder, you may ask
Why is it that I want to steal
All the fun away
From the younger generation
Well, you know I would do it all myself
'Cause it sounds like fun to me
But I just don't seem to have
The imagination

[Chorus]
So I'm asking all the children to quit wasting time
With music that's been so auto-tuned
And stand on the shoulders of Galilee
To learn how to fly up and fabricate
An atmosphere on the moon

(With an atmosphere) we can have the rain and flowers grow
(With an atmosphere) sun on the bright side, dark side and there's snow
(With an atmosphere) so much of land, spreading far and wide
(With an atmosphere) we'll make an ocean, and the earth can bring the tide
Ha ha ha

[Solo]

So why go through the trouble
When we have everything we need right here
Why not just stop fighting each other
And live in peace
Well we've been tryin' and tryin' and tryin'
For so many thousands of years
But nothing seems to work, so I'm gonna live
On a big piece of cheese

[Chorus]
So I'm asking all the children to quit wasting time
With music that's been so auto-tuned
And stand on the shoulders of Galilee
To learn how to fly up and fabricate
An atmosphere on the moon

[Chorus]
So I'm asking all the children to quit wasting time
With music that's been so auto-tuned
And stand on the shoulders of Galilee
To learn how to fly up and fabricate
An atmosphere on the moon

(Lyrics: https://genius.com/Paul-gilbert-atmosphere-on-the-moon-lyrics)

So nice to have atmosphere, and oceans and beaches and forests.
Imagine having the gall to think you can replicate it all from scratch.
It was a happy little accident, for a limited time only. Cherish it while it lasts.
No one's stopping you from trying tho.

MARS DOES'NT WANT US!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That's not exactly what the other guy meant by "we need a space program", you know? :-P It was more about living or organizing spaces for anarchos, down on Earth. That we're lacking space and spaces... If groups like Hare Krisha and Triskelion can have it their ways, then why not "us"?

I mean, basically this is what squats are... but what about when above-ground squats are mostly impossible like in North America? Then you gotta hack things at another level. Create a Stirnerian Church and spread it, or something.

So back to Earth, on that last idea... if anyone wants to start a chapter in their town I'm up to do the same in mine. But let's fucking do it. Or find a way to do it. Not pipe-dream or joke about it. Contact me if you're down!

ha, it seems the problem is on my side. i'm locked out. are the keys under the rug or inside a plant pot by any chance?

Aragorn! please do an episode on Flat Earth as it more plausible than this! Do anarchists colonise???

Even primitivism sounds more do-able and 'realistic' than this having listened to the whole episode.

When Aragorn! left the room part way through, I reckon he went outside and let out a massive laugh at what he was hearing.

And the dude who said life is too easy and earth...well, there is privilege speaking to us. Why doesn't get off his ass and sift through rubbish dumps to eek a living like some have to do in the south?

I feel I've just listened to White males (having it all too easy on the backs of others) wishing to take their dominating colonising mind-set elsewhere: The Founding Fathers of Mars.

Well done Aragorn! for holding yourself together as I would have lost it.

And Ian, is there anything he hasn't tried???

Anyway, I gotta go as my sex doll has just winked at me ;-)

Only in America

God Bless America

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