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tnstaec wrote

Really? I'd hazard to say most are of the firmly labor-left variety. At least they are the most prominent. Unless you're including insurrectionists under the the banner of individualism?

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ziq wrote (edited )

In my experience, anarchists in Europe especially are what ancoms would call lifestylists. Living in squats and communes, engaging in direct action, dumpster diving, practising illegalism, etc i.e. we live anarchism now, in this world, instead of waiting for some utopian revolution to happen.

I personally live alone in the mountains (in West Asia) in a house I built, eating food I grow/steal/forage for and wouldn't be described as anything other than a 'lifestylist' or individualist by most ancoms I know.

But that doesn't mean I don't also support social anarchism, I'm still a worker (in a warehouse) so of course I'd prefer if we lived in an anarchist society. But it's out of our control and I don't like putting my faith in things I have no ability to effect.

I'm not personally compatible with collectivist society - so even if by some miracle the whole world embraced anarchism, I still would live alone in the woods.

Too many idealists have lived and died waiting for an utopian collectivist revolution - we have to make the most of the world we were put in. We can live anarchically right now, without waiting for the entire world to become anarchist.

-edited-

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aiwendil wrote

I try to live this way also, but I think in the US, because it is hyper-capitalist makes it very difficult and the last 10 years here has seen a push to criminalize and enforce any behavior that would allow you to live outside the system in any way. I still spend a lot of time in the woods in shelters that I have built myself and try to live outside of the system in any way that I can, but I guess I don't feel that collectivism and individualism have to be so mutually exclusive that they become reactions to the other. I think it would certainly benefit everybody(save maybe the robber barons) if certain resources were collectivized, including individualists. I also think that anarcho-communism can allow for personal property, while collectivizing things that are currently considered private property. The distinction being that it is possible to own certain things, without denying those resources to other people. The classic argument here being the collectivized toothbrush thing that ancaps always bring up. I don't think anybody envisions a society in which we are all swapping one toothbrush because we've collectivized the toothbrush(maybe some tankies would be into this idea, but I'm certainly not). Like I think you can still have some sense of ownership of your home/shelter, provided that the way you've built it is not denying access to other people(like if you decided to build your home in the middle of a street for example, or you chopped down endangered trees to build it). I think maybe we need to make more room for things like this philosophically while allowing for collectivization of things such as the means of production.

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stardust_witch wrote

Anarchists who participate in direct action tend to be the exact opposite of what I think most ancoms would consider "lifestylist."

As someone who's constantly decrying lifestylism, I don't think there's anything wrong with squatting, dumpster diving, illegalism, etc... I love all those things. But simply changing the way you alone live is not some kind of revolutionary praxis. Lifestylists are people whose response to oppressive systems is only to remove themselves from them, rather than attempt to alter or destroy those systems.

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Defasher wrote (edited )

How many ancoms are actually doing anything to destroy the system? What are they doing that's so much better than what so called lifestylists are doing?

At least by living in squats, not paying for anything, participating in projects like food not bombs and generally ignoring capitalism, we're showing anyone paying attention that the system can be effectively bypassed. Idk what you think acoms are doing that's so revolutionary but I'd be interested to hear about it. Exarcheia is a lifestylist project btw, since it's essentially an anarchist commune that exists inside a state.

People that belittle individualists for trying to live anarchically are infuriating, but you don't seem to apply the label 'lifestylist' the way most ancoms do by the sounds of it.

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stardust_witch wrote

I really don't understand how you can try to claim FnB as a "lifestylist" project when it's probably the most well-known example of mutual aid in action. I basically consider any form of gift economy (the free software movement, really really free markets, anarchist disaster relief, etc...) to be an anarcho-communist project, regardless of how the people who participate in them identify politically.

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Defasher wrote

I don't even believe that lifestylism is real, it's just what I've heard ancoms say.

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