TOTW: L is for Love

what if we kissed?

Topic of the Week – Love is in the air this week as Valentine’s Day is being celebrated in many places around the world. The holiday has become a day for consumers to express their affection for one another by buying gifts such as flowers and sweets for their significant others. Around the year 2000, the anonymous authors at CrimethInc. wrote a book called “Days of War, Nights of Love” which in one part states: “Falling in love is the ultimate act of revolution, of resistance to today’s tedious, socially restrictive, culturally constrictive, patently ridiculous world.[1]” This week we’re taking a break from playing kissy-face and drooling over each other to take a moment to get all sappy and talk about love.

What is love? Are you in love? Who do you love? Destroy what you love? How has love transformed your anarchist world? Who in the anarchist space has addressed the subject of love that you enjoy / dislike? How do you think most anarchists think about the topic of love? What historical examples are there of anarchists and the subject of love? What annoys you most about this topic? What is your favorite song about love?

<3 xoxo
thecollective_6.9

[1] https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/crimethinc-days-of-war-nights-of-love#toc75

Listen to the conversation here!

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Agreed, anon. CrimethInc is the best anarchist project in North AmeriKKKa. Superb and stellar work indeed.

ugh, just links are irritating. say something about the content, like a sentence or too at leat!

the link is to a talk by non-anarchist kim tallbear, who writes about (a lot of things including) how colonial culture has attacked and subverted native relationship models, something called eco-love, and how promiscuity is a good thing, and we have relationships with all kinds of beings, not just humans.

but don't take my word for it. she's an engaging speaker. worth the time.

I love you.

Prove it.

Tres romantique. Fall in love with a spy and fuck/
love the universe. Lol. I kid. I kid. But do I? So wrong, wrong, wrong. But what is a fantasy, anyway? Would you be on top or bottom? I can't decide... write an anarchist prisoner today and say you are sorry! Happy V-Day, soldier-in-a-uniform. Act like you weren't a child before you were an anarchist and condemn me. Happy looooooove day. Kiss your friends consensually. Kiss your enemies with fingers-crossed and daggers drawn. Take care and use protection. -Mom

What is love?
A word, concept, a notion, chemicals, feelings, an evolutionary survival strategy, a whim, a promise, a burden.

Are you in love?
I am not currently infatuated with anyone in particular, nor experiencing limerence.

Who do you love?
Materially, those who I help. Emotionally, anyone who I really really like.

Destroy what you love?
Only with works of art, never people. On second thought, I don't love the work itself, but the acts of creating and destroying.
While sometimes being destroyed by who/what I love seems preferable to destroying it, I want to avoid that as well.
I can think of toxic examples, as most are.

How has love transformed your anarchist world?
It hasn't. Its the basis of it in a way, not some external thing that changes it.

Who in the anarchist space has addressed the subject of love that you enjoy / dislike?
I've heard and seen anarchists have good takes and practices on love irl but often what's written about it is lackluster.

How do you think most anarchists think about the topic of love?
With their hearts and minds.

What historical examples are there of anarchists and the subject of love?
Pass.

What annoys you most about this topic?
That people online don't have much to say. I think it's because there's no love in the deep web.
Those that know more about this topic don't comment.

What is your favorite song about love?
Most songs are about love in one way or another, so the list would be endless.

a.i. will drown out human to human interaction on the internet unless the equivalent to ad-blockers and spam-blockers is invented and popularized as a browser add-on

It's funny how this commercialized holidays is also celebrated in Spanish-speaking countries under the names of "Día de los Enamorados", "Día del Amor" or "Día de la Amistad" [The day of those who are in love, the day of love, and the day of friendship, respectively.] Kinda points to the whole ambiguity or all-encompassing nature of the love and of relationships.

The eight different types of love, according to the ancient Greeks, are:

Eros (sexual passion)
Philia (deep friendship)
Ludus (playful love)
Agape (love for everyone)
Pragma (longstanding love)
Philautia (love of the self)
Storge (family love)
Mania (obsessive love)

I think anarchist's contribution to a discussion of love is to emphasize freedom, diversity, and equality in relationships of different kinds. Often duty, sacrifice, loyalty, and being bound to love or by both is emphasized in other contexts.

Topic: adult / sexual convo - not for everyone's tastes.

"Often duty, sacrifice, loyalty, and being bound to love or by both is emphasized in other contexts." ... can BDSM ever be anarchist? I've been on this question for years. Like, I don't personally mind BDSM because I don't require a purity of anarchy in my relationships like I don't require perfect dedication at all times. We could all use a break from *this* at times imo. I know the simple answer is consent, consent, consent. But when someone ask you for it, do you cock your head and wonder what is going on? If BDSM is not anarchist like I suspect, is missionary the ultimate anarchist position?* *loaded Chriatian morality implied? ... that's a lot of jumbled thoughts. Reply with whatever comes to mind. - Mom

That encompasses a lot of practices and dynamics, and each would have to be discussed separately and specifically, and the hows, and not just issue a blanket statement that covers them all. Taking turns playing roles, such as teasing & denying and the one being teased & denied, is different that getting off on humiliating or being humiliated, or to perform domination and submission for a prolonged period of time that extends to everyday life and not just a play setting, to mention just one contrasting example. And people will disagree. And of course, these activities can be carried out with love or with a lack of love, and it makes a difference.

Love does make a difference, doesn't it? It sounds like humiliation is a line for you. Is that because it is not beautiful like the beautiful idea?

another annoying thing about the commercial aspect of this holiday is how weirdly pharmacies/ drug stores (specially big chain) seem to take some protagonism as purveyors of balloons, cards, candies, perfumes, etc.

something about these stores being more sugar per pound than anything. sugar being one of the causes of chronic cardiac conditions, obesity, and diabetes epidemics. and something about no remedies for being lovesick or heartbroken except the consumption of a pint of ice cream as per the lame cliche stand up comedy routines or rom com tropes.

seems the only anarchist reaction that comes to mind, that’s worthy of the internet spotlight, would be some form of vandalism accompanied by a communique

or maybe there’s nothing to look at here and it’s just another thing where you live and let live

Thecollective asks this topic because they will never know love because they have no capacity for love with all the seething ressentiment.

Good topic for we lovers, however!

It's okay to seethe with passion though, cos that's what love is!

Love is a weakness in the struggle against roses and shitty chocolate

instead of eating shitty chocolate, drink some rose tea, or bathe in rosewater.

cacao will probably be extinct by 2050. Climate change increased pests and diseases and decreased yields of cocoa plants. Cocoa has driven deforestation in nearly every country where it is produced, as rainforests are cut down to make way for cocoa monoculture.

I'll quote Marx:

I don't know what they have to say,
It makes no difference anyway,
Whatever it is, I'm against it.
No matter what it is or who commenced it,
I'm against it.

Your proposition may be good,
But let's have one thing understood,
Whatever it is, I'm against it.
And even when you've changed it or condensed it,
I'm against it.

I'm opposed to it,
On general principle, I'm opposed to it.

For months before my son was born,
I used to yell from night to morn,
Whatever it is, I'm against it.
And I've kept yelling since I first commenced it,
I'm against it!

I don't want to comment on a site that doesn't delete all my comments! {;))

i 'm gonna spend tomorrow alone in my room with a bottle of red wine listening to joni mitchell (esp. hejira and blue)

love?

that's a stupid question.

(no, not a boomer, so fuck off!)

tomorrow, the next day, the day after that, and the next. but i’ll stay sober and listen to some good music instead

but we up here trying to scramble hegemonic forms of relating; all the kitties are getting together for some non-sex sex, a tease and play orgy if you will, with wordplay, power play, horseplay, ropeplay, do whatever you'd like--don't do what you wouldn't like. everyone deserves reminders that their body is both the seat of their perspective of pain and joy. they machines can be very nice to occupy when positioned well in relation to other machines.

we're practicing remembering that there shall be no stigma on sexuality, no stigma on bodies, and even in jurisdictions where a person's alleged "reproductive rights" can be magically, selectively deprived, there are welcome forms of loving sexuality that overcome the new mental brakes.

all kitties can get the petting that they want!

> y'all nerds

i haven’t figured it out yet. i see people get to old age with 60 years long marriages, and then people with 5 divorces, then serial monogamists, and polyamorous people, etc. might as well each be foreign cultures to me

Well yeah, personal culture comes down to personal emotional intelligence mixed with lifestyle and things like financial tensions and living pressures which sometimes seperates people, but it can also bring them together. Having children may be a unifying element amongst compassionate folk, but this is fallible . As Sartre said, people are hell.

dating anarchists vs dating normies:
can anyone who has shopped around and compared share the results?

I regard dating normies as a great challenge because I see it as a challenge to enlighten them to the social reality of slavery from the capitalist hegemony and freeing them of their stresses.

work out your own salvation first,

you sound like you would benefit from a high fiber diet.

"Sometimes the soul takes pictures of things it has wished for but never seen." - Anne Sexton

when I first read this quote I think I recognized the whole of love in it. Love is some kind of confrontation between the individual and the other, the soul and the material nature of the world. It also brings up ideas about the pursuit of total freedom for me, which is why I keep coming back to it.

Don't date an anarchist. We are too old to betrayal, and too much like children.

Don’t stop fighting for the ones that you love
Life’s too short to take a break
Don’t stop caring for the ones that you fought
Life’s too short to hold a grudge

Take a step down
Remove your crown
You’re no longer ordering everybody around
We stepped up can't you see
You’re not the boss of me
TM's holdin' it down settin' everybody free
We can do what we want
We can do what we please
And we wanna have a party every night of the week
We won't lock you up
You can chill with us
I mean what kinda world would this be without trust?

Don’t stop fighting for the ones that you love
Life’s too short to take a break
Don’t stop caring for the ones that you fought.
Life’s too short to hold a grudge

Soon all shackles will have been shattered
Past foe
Each one will now be a friend

Seasons changing
So are we
Each person that you know eventually passes on
So don't waste time
When asked to befriend please do not decline
Too much hate already here
Let’s all rise up
Make it disappear
Work together
Everyone
Each obstacle we face we'll overcome

Soon all shackles will have been shattered
Past foe
Each one will now be a friend

Now let's go get ready
We’ve got our work cut out for us
Ladies and gentlemen
We’re in for a ride
Alright
1,2,3,4!

https://youtu.be/FeqP6HcRF0E?si=JKciv07oQ32HKKMh

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