On Feb 5, Chloe from Commune Magazine will be facilitating a discussion of “The Uses of Disaster”, a feature article by the Out of the Woods collective published in the first issue of Commune.
For those excited by the article who want to delve deeper, we recommend an earlier three part article on this subject by Out of the Woods, called “Disaster Communism”. READ | PRINT
As usual, we will meet at Breakaway Social Center, 2412 W. 24th Place.
On January 8, at 730 pm, Building the Commune returns with a double-reading, with double-guest facilitators. Our readings will be drawn from Huey P. Newton’s 1974 article “Intercommunalism”, recently published in Viewpoint Magazine [READ], as well as a Midwest manifesto from 2017 called “The Next Eclipse” penned by our friends at the Flyover Infoshop in Carbondale, IL [READ / PRINT], who will be joining us for the discussion. We will meet at Breakaway Social Center. Light refreshments provided.
The first meeting of our new winter discussion series will focus on Joyful Militancy, by Montgomery and bergman. We’re excited to see everyone there.
“There is something that circulates in many radical spaces, movements, and milieus that saps their power from within. It is the pleasure of feeling more radical than others and the worry about not being radical enough; the sad comfort of sorting unfolding events into dead categories; the vigilant apprehension of errors and complicities in oneself and others; the anxious posturing on social media with the highs of being liked and the lows of being ignored; the suspicion and resentment felt in the presence of something new; the way curiosity feels naïve and condescension feels right. We can sense its emergence at certain times, when we feel the need to perform in certain ways, hate the right things, and make the right gestures. Above all, it is hostile to difference, curiosity, openness, and experimentation. […] These are some of the questions we have been asking in our research: What is this force? What are its contours, and what are its sources? What triggers it, and what makes it spread? How can it be warded off, and how are people activating other ways of being?”
On Sat, August 27th, we will be reading Gilles Dauvé’s “When Insurrections Die”, otherwise known as “Fascism and Anti-Fascism”. The text was first published in 1979. Please read in advance, as we won’t be reading aloud. Print Pdf is here: Dauvé – when insurrections die. A read version is here.
The text is controversial, and has provoked much debate on the far left/anarchist/antifascist circles. Whether one agrees or disagrees with Dauvé, its worthwhile to challenge our perspectives by consulting principled and partisan debates from previous cycles of struggles. See you then!
After a short hiatus, the Worlds Apart reading group is back. On Thurs Aug 10, we will be reading “The Suspension of Historical Time”, the second chapter from Furio Jesi’s 1969 book, Spartakus: The Symbology of Revolt. This time, we ask that you come to the meeting having already read the text, as we won’t be reading aloud. A color zine version of our selection is here: [READ / PRINT]. A simple, low-ink black and white PRINT version is here. A pdf of the full book is here. Some questions to think about:
How does insurrection reorganize our experience of time, choice, personal and collective symbols, and linguistic expression? What relation to truth, to oneself, the world and others, does it bring forth? Can insurrection form a part of a longer term strategy, or is there something that is fundamentally incalculable about it as an event? If so, what are its internal dangers and risks, and how can we enter moments of insurgent revolt with an eye to overcoming them?
If you are enticed by the selected reading, we recommend the third chapter, “The Symbols of Power” as supplementary reading.
