MovingThrowaway

Paintball gun maybe? Don't have to be a good throw that way

Eh mister "I will own slaves after the apocalypse" probably doesn't deserve the grace

Iirc the accusations reeked of 4chan troll, but idk.

God if I learn Mandarin will xi let me move to china

Been pretty rough. Lucky to have made it this far I guess. I know a lot who've had it worse.

But yeah it's been interesting to witness other people be able to weather the same things that put me on the street simply because they had a support group to lean on. I'm not bitter anymore, it's just a testament to how important that is. We just have much less of a barrier, if any, between us and homelessness, and the state violence that comes along with it.

I'm only now sort of stable due to undeserved kindness from people who barely know me. Intersections of privilege made a difference too I'm sure. Definitely nothing to do with any merit or personal strength.

Moving countries with a language barrier sounds incredibly difficult. Being a statesian that's not something I've had to deal with. Hope things go well for you!

Yeah it's not bad but it is a problem, in the same sense that any social, economic, environmental, whatever change is a problem that needs to be adapted to. Planned proletarian economies are just the ones best suited to meet these problems head on instead of weathering, externalizing, profiting from, or collapsing because of them.

Where is the lie

Anyways I'm ranting and not really arguing against you. Just wanted to add context for how to think about adventurism.

No I appreciate the discussion!

state will have an excuse to escalate, it's that the wider public may be alienated by it

Maybe nitpicking but these are largely the same thing in my view. We're talking about the legitimacy of the state, about the social fabric that influences behavior and flows of energy despite being entirely immaterial in and of itself.

In a vacuum, the state would have no qualms with executing every single one of the student protestors on the spot. The thing stopping them is the fact that a faith in the state and its legitimacy still effectively maintains capital's dominance. People still trust that laws are just and institutions will handle things in the end. A disproportionate escalation on their part undermines that social understanding.

That's why as long as we're working within the system, i.e. understanding and following laws, attempting to use laws and institutions to enact change, we have to allow the state to be the one to violate its own legitimacy. The dual purpose of this part of a movement is to legally interfere with systems, thus drawing attention to them, while demonstrating the illegitimacy and hypocrisy of the state through its disproportionate retaliation.

A separate prong of the movement that's willing and capable of taking non-legal action serves as both the radical focal point for people who see and experience the repression, as well as the revolutionary cudgel by which reforms become palatable to the state and ruling classes. If organized well enough, the two prongs can (secretly) work in tandem, potentially even offering an alternate legitimacy that's capable of seizing and replacing the bourgeois state if the opportunity arises.

But there has to be an organized entity capable of doing so, otherwise revolution isn't yet possible. So the primary focus imo should always be to build this organization, and every potential action should be judged by whether it serves that purpose or not.

Secondary to that are actions that may not grow power but still achieve positive outcomes, such as industrial sabotage. In that case it just has to be a careful analysis of whether the immediate material impact outweighs the potential harm to public opinion and legitimizing of state violence. And as the state undermines its own legitimacy, non-legal action begins to be viewed less negatively by the general public.

Thanks for sharing, this is really good insight for someone who hasn't interacted with these groups.

Critical support. Tbh I think this is a good strategy in general, there's only so much that public, legal, and peaceful tactics can do without a separate entity doing more dangerous but costly direct action. As far as specifics goes, what qualifies as adventurism and when it may be making things worse, idk. But clearly doing this as a separate entity from the student movements, while still voicing support for them, is correct. I believe it was George Jackson that advised a similar two-prong strategy.

Direct escalation usually isn't a good nor possible strategy by peaceful protestors, but peaceful protest isn't nearly enough and the modern prison system is far too massive to hope to gum up with nonviolent bodies.

The anti-communist bit is ignorant, but I think self-described communists are better off vocally supporting any action like this. Not sure if it's a sort of pick-me leftism or just typical sectarianism. But in any case, prove them wrong! Burn 30 cop cars in the name of communism!

Imo this seems like the best take

Haven't been in a strictly communist org tho so idk

This reminds me of a logical critique or concept I've been trying to figure out for a while now, but having a hard time concretely conceptualizing it or finding other resources on it (I wish Google still worked). I call it a scope error for lack of a better term.

But it's like, when thinking about or discussing a scenario or metaphysical claim or whatever, usually it exists in an implied scope or from an implied frame of reference. That context may be subjective or intersubjective, but it exists nonetheless.

So for example if you're asking the question "does x matter" there's an implied frame of reference and/or scope (to whom might x matter?). In some contexts a technically more accurate signifier for the concept might be 'do I care about x" or "do people I respect care about x" or "does the existence or nonexistence of x bring about pain or pleasure to me or people or things I care about". Although of course the essence is obscured by the signifiers used, even sometimes to the person using them, so someone pondering such a question might themself be unable to answer it without determining the frame of reference.

As a side note, in Western culture, or at least my experience of Statesian culture, the frame of reference is often (implicitly and usually subconsciously) the christian god. I think even for some devout atheists, it's just unspoken and unrecognized, like they abandoned belief in such a god but failed to restructure the way they conceptualized things, leaving a god-shaped void in their mind. If it's not that, it's usually within the tiny scope of the individual ego. A scope that's either infinitely and unrealistically large or asocially small.

One popular but vulgar version of nihilism is guilty of this. Should I exercise, should I treat people well, should I contribute to a higher cause, etc? "No, it doesn't matter because you'll be dead eventually", "the plight of any given human is inconsequential and meaningless in the face of the heat death of the universe / climate change / capitalism / multiverse / god. But no one is talking about whether an impact or value exists beyond the heat death of the universe. It's not only a ridiculous point of reference, it's non-unique, applying to everything equally, and can thus be eliminated from any consideration.

A concept exists with an implied context, so to address it using a different implied context or scope or frame of reference is a non-sequitur. But because these contexts are implied, it's difficult to see what exactly is happening in a non-discussion.