TOTW: The year past, the year ahead

Here at ANEWS, we’re glad you made it through 2019 with us and best wishes to you and friends for a tumultuous 2020. CYA (next decade) IN THE STREETS!

A quick glance back and some wild eyes toward the future. As 2019 comes to a close, let’s take a look back at the ongoing social upheavals worldwide, the inspiring international anarchist actions, some books that have kept you up till the early hours, and the music that has been the soundtrack to it all. How was your 2019?

What were your favorite anarchist actions and communiques from the year? What made them standout? Which social uprising that anarchists are partaking in has the most potential to change everything? Is there a looming spectre of social chaos that anarchists can prepare for?

In media, what are the anarchist (and not anarchist) books you think that anarchists need to be adding to their reading list? Can you share a quick blurb of what made the book important to you? How about music; and please – at risk of creating a comment thread of lonely YouTube links, add some actual sentiment that others may like to hear about what makes this artist / song so wonderful?

Here at ANEWS, we’re glad you made it through 2019 with us and best wishes to you and friends for a tumultuous 2020. CYA (next decade) IN THE STREETS!

There are 14 Comments

being a choice...it last over 400 years...that has to be a choice, right? Well, he has a point. There are more of us who are supposedly enslaved and yet, year on year, we remain slaves...is this our choice too? Do we actually prefer the security rather than the unknown? What are we prepared to put up with? It seems more and more to me. Yes, this is provocatively written but still, the point remains. If things are so bad why, given their are billions of us, do we not just stop putting up with it? I mean, there is the internet. we could organise a peaceful walkout, say for 30 mins per day, just to see if the numbers are in the billions who are in agreement. Even walk out at lunch time just to demonstrate we are not happy. This could be done on a global scale. XR have planned demos on a global scale so did occupy. All that has to be done (initially) is a show of hands so to speak: walk and out during lunch time wherever you are. We are heading to a global dictatorship with 5G 6G 7G etc, the internet of things meaning total tracking of one's life and habits, the Green New Deal meaning an intensification of capitalism and crackdowns, smart cities, social credit scores, universal basic income which can be withdrawn if you dare to fight back....by then it will be way too late!!! Or maybe, we prefer to be enslaved but we don't want to admit it....we have already been infantilised, so domesticated that to be free is just too scary. Kanye West has a point. Thankfully, some enslaved folks still had the belief and the guts and there was others the whites) who appeared to have greater autonomy. When we are globally enslaved and our history has been erased, we will have no reference point, maybe just some repressed aching in our hearts that something is not right, so to speak!

I don't see any extraordinarily thought-provoking content in this TOTW... or nothing about putting up with the social order.

You realize the point about how much boot people will tolerate on their necks has been made many times by far better than that jackass yuppie halfwit, yes? He was likely just barfing up a rightwing talking point he got from someone with a brain...

To be free is not scary today... it's not even relevant anymore. I hear social media zoomers talking all the time about their representational rights and equality, about safe spaces and group identities. All of it is shallow totalitarian talk. Those people have shown above all this they were okay being owned and controlled by global tech corporations. "Freedom", what is that? They were born into enslavement to commodity spectacle. Their collective dreams are a product of Disney and Condé Nast.

Kanye is a slave to corporate Muhrika himself, we ARE ALL SLAVES TO GRAVITY!!

Yes, all slaves to gravity, but some of us have attained Stirnerian freedoms of consciousness which enlightens cognitive orientation towards a psychological weightlessness.

when there is anarchist news! someone puts forward an idea, an idea that is for anyone to participate in without much risk and demonstrates solidarity and dissatisfaction with the global status quo. the responses just kill it dead without offering anything but negativity. no wonder anarchism is such a niche: you bring it on yourselves.

all these malicious troll responses are likely done by the same person.
i even suspect yours.
there are people eager to engage with the TOTW with earnest and amicable disposition, but since the topic suggests an analysis or summary of the whole year, and speculation about the next, or to curate a top 10 list of events, songs, and or books from this year, then the task is a bit longer, and therefore requires a bit more time.
meanwhile, trollish low effort comments can be deployed immediately to derail conversation. it's just as easy to reply to them, making it worse.
but in the end, they're just background noise for those that come here for the good stuff and can filter the rest.
these comments even serve as smokescreen for uh...nope now i'm just reaching...

Things happened, it was great.

To those who were thinking of posting music, it's great that it doesn't expire:
you can enjoy music in 2019 from all previous years, and it can have new interpretations and make you feel different things.

I'd also like to see people respond with their new year's resolution if they're into that type of thing.

"How was your 2019?"
Weird, it kinda blends with the past year and with the next one.
It alternated in slow af moments, and then blur of days passing by.
The two halves or three thirds were each different.
It kinda broke with last year's rhythm, and I don't want to return to it, but I also don't want to repeat this rhythm next year.
There's the good kind of uncertainty; knowing my life could be different, rather than the bad certainty of stagnation.
and i don't mean socioeconomic upward mobility btw. i'm trying to be vague and share at the same time lol.

"What were your favorite anarchist actions and communiques from the year? What made them standout?"

athens went boom (detonated by cel)
cel antennas were fell
vans torched
headquarters ransacked and firebombed
subcowmandante shows how to make a quick big buck
guy shot some cop car from grass at night
gals wrecked shit in mexico
etc etc

"Which social uprising that anarchists are partaking in has the most potential to change everything?"
All of them at once, the interaction. Everything's connected and changing. Not towards progress or stages tho.
Not every year is like this, a lot of revolt/unrest and more to come. It's not prophetic tone, it's just how it looks like at the moment.

"Is there a looming spectre of social chaos that anarchists can prepare for?"

Yes, different kinds of. A way to prepare among many is to really take in the calm moments until you're full to brim of them, satiated to where you can't really stand em, while you can. This will make the eruptions feel like a release/relief, whether you start them out or they startle you, or else you might find yourself craving or regretting or longing those moments if you find yourself in the middle of turmoil for months on end. Savor the calm in between storms, then go wild and celebrate when the storm hits.

"In media, what are the anarchist (and not anarchist) books you think that anarchists need to be adding to their reading list? Can you share a quick blurb of what made the book important to you?"

No more homework pls. Add uh places to your walking and meandering list, retroactively after you've been there and all over and back. Add people to talk to, there's probably someone you've been meaning to pester with questions or curiosity.

"How about music; and please – at risk of creating a comment thread of lonely YouTube links, add some actual sentiment that others may like to hear about what makes this artist / song so wonderful?"

subdued intensity, intense focus, sneaking and prowling at night...a burning passion behind a deep stare
https://soundcloud.com/errxrmusic/do-you-love-me
https://soundcloud.com/wrcktngl/small-talk

This one is like you feel melancholic, but strong and powerful at the same time; you endure the tempest and enjoy the overcoming of resistance, your knees hurt and you feel cold, but your core has more than enough fire and energy to get you home:
https://soundcloud.com/blvthe/orion

Here's a short concert, all the lyrics are wonderful, the interpretations are perfect and the music is catchy.
The relatable lyrics coupled with the interpretations make it hard for me to sing along cuz i swell up with emotion with a knot in my throat (except for the "cannot eat money" chorus one, just corny, tho true). So much intention put into each enunciation of each word.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEYH_pefoiQ

This one very fun to sing in falsetto XD: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3tA-Y5D8jU

This comment doesn't do justice to the year, the questions in the prompt, nor the songs, but week's almost over and I hadn't commented yet, lol.

LOL this next level bougie neohippie post-hipster shit never gets less pathetic and funny at the same time, but also very skippable after 3-4 seconds of viewing/listening.

Some other electro shit u posted was pretty neat, tho. So thnks for this, and happy New/Old Year! I judge harshly but also am very open-minded.

haha, i could've reacted to it in a similar way, but i didn't, can enjoy it through the cynicism.
i could recommend more music similar to the one you liked if you tell me which one it was.
i'd also like it if you would show me what kind of music you like. : )

2019 is the year i acquired eye floaters and i have to change the way i cast my gaze now and perhaps reconcile my aversion to visiting the offices of professionals.

https://archive.org/details/yearinreview2019540p

Video compilation of protests and direct actions mostly but not entirely in the DC area as the resistance against the regime of Donald Trump enters its third year. (16 min 58 sec)

Begins with the "government shutdown" (cops, prisons NOT shut down of course..) that pitted Trump against his own workforce, highlights multiple confrontations with fascists, features the month-long siege of the Embassy of Venezuala, and ends with the impeachment of Donald J Trump. Protests and battles of all kinds rock the streets in between. Lots of marches and civil disobedience, occasional fire and smoke.

We know Trump won't be removed by that MAGAT-ridden Senate, and that even if he was he would still be the GOP candidate for 2020's election. Racism, hate, and concentration camps are still on the ballot, only question is whether they will be on both sides of the ballot.

Be ready for a very rough ride in 2020 and the Great Grandmother of All Battles on Jan 20, 2021 if Trump claims to have been re-elected and is to be inaugurated a second time. Not J20 2.0 but J20^2, and that goes double if it is a disputed election.

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