The Project For Productive Independence

FightingFireWithWater.com – by Jess

The need is clear for anarchists to become productively independent in the effort to cut the necessity to remain in the constructs of capitalism and hierarchy. The reason why black bloc has failed to accomplish autonomy from the state is because this tactic requires being somewhere in which that voice can be heard. But in these major cities there are rules that you must follow, which form legal pressure and natural pressure. In these environments, whatever goods that must be surcharged out of necessity, must come from exploitative capitalism because there is no other way of obtaining needed goods in places where protesting is worth doing. Protesting can not provide a solution because protesters have to be sustained by the products of capitalism. Cyclical consumption is, then, not the enemy of activists.  It is the means.  

The action to take when coming to this understanding is to create the means to break away from cyclical consumption. The proposal is to establish in remote locations and make it possible for individuals to join one another and mutually aid each other to exist independently of capitalism.

To create necessities as close as possible and boycott capitalist products 100% is a true means for a general strike. The only way to stop capitalism is to no longer support capitalism of any kind and this is not possible without a replacement. To completely boycott capitalism, individuals need to pool skills and resources to work on independent horticulture, alternative energy, building with natural materials, but most importantly building the communities in which social construct is possible.

So, the outcome is an indefinite general strike. The idea is to COMPLETELY refuse to support capitalism and government all together. There are no demands of this general strike, only that capitalism and hierarchy come to a complete stop without compliance, or at very least lose power over those who remove themselves from capitalism and hierarchy through these means. This is then an extreme implementation of the general strike proposed by the anarchists of the late 19th and early 20th century.

Let’s go over some examples of things that can be done to thrive in this general strike as proposed.

With horticulture…

Let’s say for example that there is a remote section of land designated to accommodate the needs of 24 people. That is assessed by the amount of food that can be grown in so much acreage. Each individual is involved in the effort to sew, maintain and reap that farm. Each individual, then, benefits from the fruits of production. The benefit is not a distant capital benefit in which the workers of that farm receive capital in exchange for `what could equally sustain the needs of those workers. You can call this collectivist communism if you want, but all previous occasions in which “communism” has been implemented, there has always been the exchange of useless paper for real goods. It is then only capitalism by another name.

With alternative power…

This, even ignoring the environmental advantages of alternative power, has a large political advantage.

If we’re going to ignore the illegitimate hierarchy and capital, then there has to be a replacement for the oil, coal and nuclear power used to power communications. Seeing the necessity of communications in this kind of community, solar power and radio linked with Linux software, can provide text communication without the use of the Internet as we know it.

These are just rudimentary examples of creating the means for independence to make a true general strike possible.

For information about how to join this project or how to create a similar project in solidarity, you can e-mail info@fightingfirewithwater.com

Jess is the author of Fighting Fire With Water, available at fightingfirewithwater.com and Amazon Kindle.  He is also a co-author of Surviving Survivalism – How to Avoid Survivalism Culture Shock.