Anews Podcast 103, 2.15.2019

From ANEWS Podcast

Welcome to the anews podcast. This is episode 103. This podcast covers anarchist activity, ideas, and conversations from the previous week on anarchistnews.org.

Editorial: study groupers i have known, by chisel
TOTW: Criticism, trying again, with Aragorn! and Ariel
no Redacted this week

This podcast is the effort of many people.

  • sound editing by Linn O’Mable
  • what’s new written by Jackie and narrated by Chisel and Dim
  • Music!
    1) John Zorn – Drawing Down The Moon
    2) Kraftwerk/Underground Resistance – Expo 2000 (Remix)
    3) Yellow Eyes – Fallen Snag




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There are 25 Comments

Chisel, I also miss the old asg, and Audrey in particular. All the people you mentioned made the group better, imo, and it wasn't just a pissing contest to see who had the better take, it was a conversation. A reading/ study group benefits from a certain openness and if that fades the group is not as much fun.

I liked the rest of this episode too.
IT WAS AWESOME!

you were certainly one of the people i was thinking of, and just couldn't neatly encapsulate your participation (as i couldn't for ariel, sigh). too many to mention really anyway. :( :) :(

Chisel, noticeably absent from your supposed anarchist assessment of the Berkeley ASG, are the various power dynamics struggling for the soul of the group. It is hard to imagine an honest reflection not acknowledging these forces, and the usually, but not always, Big Men, who often were doing the battling (or giving up and leaving..).

When you speak of the qualities that Audrey brought to the group, it's hard not to notice the ways other people brought some of those qualities as well but who were regularly shot down, I guess because they hadn't achieved the life-long anarchist ideal..yet. Or, how the defacto group mascots tended to not contain much or any of the qualities you speak of in Audrey, even though I've strived and yearned to find them for many years now. Honestly, a lot of great people left because they were subtly, or not so subtly, pushed out by incessant toxicity. Some who were the focus of said toxicity, yet still kept coming, mostly seemed like lonely puppies whose loneliness was worse than than the abuse they suffered.

Hopefully it can find a dynamism in your absence, and not simply turn into a caricature-of-Stirner-show, which sadly seems to be the case.

so...I find it painfully myopic that chisel can discuss the study group without mentioning the fact there is basically one person, a big man of @, who they are quite close to...who is the only consistent study group member who ad hominems and name calls and makes personal attacks. One of the rad parts of the ASG is the idea of attack and the idea that attacking someones ideas is welcome, but the other side of this is that Chisel and their big man buddy take criticism and attack extremely poorly and often times respond with personal attacks instead of attacks back on ideas. This big man is a person chisel often teams up with at ASG despite his behavior. The lack of self reflection here, especially from someone who is not a child, or teen, but someone who is old enough to theoretically be able to take responsibility for their actions and role in a group, or social dynamic, is frustrating. Chisel, to act like you are somehow above this behavior, which many have witnessed you participate in, is honestly pretty absurd and ridiculous. There have been dozens of people to come through the ASG in the last several years and many of them have left due to the dynamic between you and your buddy. This essay or speech or whatever, felt like a teen looking at their self, not a full grown adult taking an honest look at their self and the dynamic they are partially responsible for creating.

Another note is the way we talk about the dead. I for one, hope that when I die nobody will act like I was a saint(which luckily in my case is extremely unlikely). I guess I don't care caz when I'm dead I'm dead, but I would be pretty annoyed if I was sainted and lionized and held up as an ideal, it would make me feel one dimensional and lacking in growth and change, and mistakes, which I know I personally will keep making and hopefully learning from the rest of my life. This might be another conversation, but anarchists like many religious people are guilty of making perfect idols out of "our dead."

You seem whiny and inclined towards rambling. Maybe that was part of the issue?

way to turn a fond reminiscence into infighting and drama.
thanks for playing.

ooh, it sounds like a dare, and that fact alone kinda makes me want to do it. but i’m a creepy neet and if i go around doing that it’s going to look kinda shady...”hey, wanna read some books and talk about it?”. can i really get strangers to talk to me by giving them homework?

While it is true that the big man & chisel can be abrasive, even hostile, at least they will say it to your face rather than hiding in comment threads.

Yeah, it is jarring to expect a nice reading group and expect to come into it and say whatever bullshit and not get challenged but that was never this group, even way before chisel & big man. I do sometimes wish criticism had not been so harsh, but otoh do you expect real enemies to go easy on you?

That was my contribution perhaps, seeing both sides and trying to find a way to bridge the gap. On the best nights of the asg there was a mix of the nice chat and the intense criticism.
Anyway, here's to a thousand blooming study groups!

It is a big bad world out there, so we better treat eachother like shit to prepare for it, amirite?! That way we can build trust, honesty and the capacity for vulnerability with one another without the fear of being kicked in the face. Wrong!!

I know the relations I can trust and it's absolutely none of these motherfuckers.

We're all alone and cant trust anyone. Thank God for the war of each against all.

attempting to cover a lack of something...
here's a hint: if you find yourself overstating your case, especially in such a way that it tends toward dualism, you might want to slow down and rethink what you're trying to get out of the conversation, or what you want someone else to.

I want to get something out of you two’s conversation, but don’t know what that would be.

The ANews podcast is certainly one of my regular must-listen podcasts. It's a pity the hosts haven't resolved that months-old podcast feed problem with the SSL handshake because they can only be losing potential listeners. I have tried 4 (or is it 5?) different programs in the last fortnight and not one of them accepts their feed.

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