Submitted by celebratedrecluse in Anarchism
While the need to eschew industrialism-as-an-ethos might seem obvious to many communists-- for practical, as well as theoretical reasons-- the fact remains that anarchist communists often engage in magical thinking which elides the concerns inherent within industrialism.
Specificially, the nature of commodity production, and the way in which workers' enterprises remain capitalist even after political gains made by the working class.
It is important to have a vision of a world that one desires to implement. While anarchist communists are hardly the drivers of capitalist and industrialist destruction, without a clear idea in mind of what we seek, the authors of revolutionary praxis can easily fall into reactionary mind-traps.
For instance, the idea of space colonization as a communist/anarchist/revolutionary possibility. It makes no sense to terraform worlds we cannot even yet reach, when we could far more easily stop terraforming our own world into oblivion.
The idea that unlimited production and consumption could be had under a communist mode of production, is absurd and totally opposed to science and a humane conception of ecology. Therefore, anarchist communism will entail a more conscious and reserved approach to production of goods, producing locally-as-possible only that which was necessary and never in a centrally controlled way, and would be anathema violently to any recapitulation of commodity exchange.
To flesh out this ideology further, it is needed that anarchist communists and their fellow travellers reject a common "trolling" discourse which immaturely disregards the critiques of industrialism. centrally planned, and even disaggregated industrialism, needs to be distinguished from anarchist communist modes of production which hope to find success in fulfilling basic human needs as well as making the fulfilment of those needs sustainable and ecologically reasonable.
Rather than dismissing primitivist ideology with cheapshots (its ableist/transphobic/etc), I want anarchist communists to engage meaningfully with the critiques, and find ways to solve these problems without reflexively and foolishly falling in line with industrialist propaganda. Because, frankly, without this type of nuanced discourse, anarchist communism falls into the same ideological and emotional appeals that lead revolutionaries back to capitalism, fascistic politics, and total ecocide.
An_Old_Big_Tree wrote (edited )
Sounds about right! One thing I've really been wanting to figure out is how to break through that wall of confidence that prevents people from being critical about their positions because they have weird straw man perceptions of other positions.
So yeah, if anybody has some thoughts on this, holy shit please let me know.