elections – Shores of Anarres

To My Friend Van Drew

Umm, what? Who the f… I mean who are you? V-Van…Drew?

Well. I see you’re running for congress. That’s pretty much all the information I need, to be fair. Now, Van Drew, don’t take this personally, but I trust politicians just about as much as I trust data viruses, so I won’t click your link, because I’m afraid I might get one.

But, tell you what, Van Drew. I’ll make it up to you by giving you more than you bargained for. You called me a “principled” and “commited” New Jerseyan, after all, which is flattering. But you know what, Van Drew? The part that most caught me off guard in that sentence was “New Jerseyan”.

I’ve lived here for almost two years now, but haven’t thought of myself as one. I’m definitely not the typical one, Van Drew, that’s for sure – I don’t even have a car, for crying out loud. But, damn it, Van Drew, you are right. I am a New Jerseyan. Huh.

Now, before you get your hopes up, Van Drew, just let me tell you that I won’t be voting for you. Because I can’t, even if I wanted to. Not a citizen (not that that always helps, though). Albeit white and privileged, I’m one of those New Jerseyans without a voice in politics. Or, so it would seem. In fact, I don’t see it that way. Truth is, Van Drew, if I could, I probably wouldn’t vote anyway. Not out of spite, not out of principle – I’m not that principled in this regard, despite your kind words. Just.. out of the sheer feeling of how meaningless it is. But no, it’s not that I’ve given up. I’ll explain in a while.

Some say that my attitude here is in itself a privilege. That I am disrespecting the struggle of many fine people that fought hard for the right to vote. And to be sure, Van Drew, I’m totally against the discrimination of people in terms of refusing them their right to vote, if others have that same right. Be they indigenous peoples, black, women, working class people, or, like today, prisoners… but also those some call undocumented or even “illegal” (you’re not one of those a-holes, are you, Van Drew?) immigrants. So yes, people say it is privileged not to vote. But the thing is, I don’t mind people voting. This is not me telling people not to vote.

And the fact of the matter is, Van Drew, that those who predominantly don’t vote, even if we discount all the ways in which politicians and those with economic power try to prevent them, are poor and marginalized people. Rich, privileged people generally vote. You know why, Van Drew? Because if you’re well off, you both tend to think you deserve it, and that you actually have a say. The first part is self-delusion, but the second part is true, Van Drew. Those on the economic and social margins of this society, though, they know that their voices – votes or no votes, don’t matter. Because no matter who they vote for, the government and the capitalists always win.

This is the thing, Van Drew. You know what I believe in? I believe in freedom and in a society where everyone’s needs are met. That might sound simple, it might sound utopian, but, by god, Van Drew, with the resources we have today, do you know how easy that would be to implement? That’s why, to be honest with you, I am not that fuzzed about voting or the question you ask. “Should members of congress work across the aisle?”. I mean, what the actual… heck, Van Drew. That’s like asking someone in a burning house whether they prefer rice or pasta. That’s like asking people to vote on the color of traffic lights while their homes are commodities on a market. That’s like asking someone to recycle plastics in a world economy based on mass production and consumption, governed by infinite exponential growth.

I don’t know how you did at math, Van Drew, but let me tell you something about “exponential”. Picture a curve. It’s not one of those rather straight lines, or even slightly bent ones, this sucker is curving upwards – like hell. It’s one of those where, pretty soon, the line looks like it’s heading straight up, in fact. Imagine if that means resources over time. That is, plainly speaking, a hella lot of resources over very short time.

But, I digress. Suffice to say, Van Drew, your question sort of misses the point. Voting sort of misses the point. With all due respect, I think the problems in our society actually have a lot to do with most of us being told that the only way we can change society is voting for people like you. Now, ok, Van Drew, calm down, don’t take this personally. The problem isn’t you as an individual, or even all politicians. The problem is a society where we supposedly are free but yet can’t decide anything about most of the things in our everyday life without either having to defer to politicians, or simply abdicate to bosses and business owners that rule over our places of work and preside over our homes with the apparent authority of modern day feudal lords.

But as I said, Van Drew, I believe in freedom and in a society where everyone’s needs are met. Now, it is easier said than done to just “be free”, right? We can choose what we think, what we believe in, and how we act in the world, but we don’t exactly choose our conditions. And as little as we can choose our conditions, we can choose to simply “become” better or different people overnight.

But don’t get me wrong here, Van Drew. A lot of people like to talk about human nature. Human nature, this, human nature that. Humans are naturally greedy, naturally competitive. It’s a dog eat dog world, and so on. I don’t buy that crap, Van Drew, do you? Like, as I said about you and the rest of your politician friends, I don’t think y’all are bad people. Really. I don’t think you for some reason lack character or moral backbone, and thus I don’t think that the solution is to replace you with other, supposedly better people.

The problem, Van Drew, is that you and your politician friends, are placed in a situation within a definite set of conditions with certain clear cut incentives, that, pretty much like gravity makes an apple fall, make you and your politician friends “fall” from grace and time after time turn out to serve the interests not of the people, but of vested powerful interests, both political and economic. So it’s not that we’re not good enough to be free, Van Drew, it’s that we, if anything, are not good enough to rule over others.

What’s more, we humans don’t have a rigidly fixed human nature, we have all sort of tendencies and propensities. Egoistic ones, as well as altruistic ones. Peaceful and harmonious ones, as well as violent and unpleasant ones. So the question, Van Drew, is not what kind of humans we are, but what kind of conditions that bring out the best out of us, that bring out those qualities which enable us to live together, free, in a society where everyone’s needs are met.

And true, we can’t choose the conditions we try to realize this under, Van Drew. We can’t change ourselves by snapping our fingers. But do you know, Van Drew, how we humans evolve as social beings? By acting on our conditions, and changing them, we change ourselves. And if we want a free society where everyone’s needs are met, we can’t expect to accomplish that by social forms that are everything but free. Freedom cannot be given, Van Drew, it can only be taken. We can only become free and realize our aspirations for a different society, by directly acting for it ourselves. Despite certain appearances and narratives, that’s always how social change has come about.

That is why, Van Drew, I don’t care much for politicians and voting. That is why I instead see hope where people organize directly in their everyday lives to change their conditions there and then. In grassroots-organized unions, in tenant associations, in neighborhood assemblies, in social centers and book cafes, in study groups, in migrant sanctuaries, in mutual aid associations that help feed people or perform disaster relief, in autonomous art spaces and community gardens, and in a thousand other places that provide us with the means to change, but also with beautiful radiant things.

And where we struggle for dignified working conditions today, tomorrow we want to control and transform our places of work without any bosses or owners. Where we fight against gentrification and rent hikes we want communities to cooperatively manage the neighborhoods, and homes being a matter of needs instead of a commodity on a market. Where we fight with undocumented migrants, colonized peoples and people of color, against state repression and racist violence, we want a world without states and borders, divided and united only by the intricate social relationships we build as individuals, groups and communities, always fluctuating and morphing into something new, while respecting each others autonomy.

Where we do prison support we want to abolish prisons together with the economic and social roots for most so-called crimes, and otherwise use methods of restorative justice and mediation to resolve inevitable conflicts and hurtful behaviors. Where we fight for food security and decent access to basic supplies we want to let a thousand gardens grow under the control of those communities they concern, and turn them into wonderful flowering commons, while in the process creating independent, resilient communities where we contribute what we can and take what we need.

By starting to change the things around us, directly, as equals, in solidarity both because we care for each other and because we realize that our freedoms are inextricably linked, we also start to change ourselves. This is why the things I describe are not utopian, Van Drew, but a practical and open ended road map, an inspiring glimpse of what could be and a rough sketch of how to get there.

Do you see now, Van Drew, why your question washes off me like the New Jersey dirt when I hop into the shower in the morning? The aisle you speak of is a mirage. Bipartisanship is not open minded or pragmatic, but incredibly narrow and hopelessly far away from anything meaningful. The gulf between what is and what could be is an ocean, wide, uncrossed and untamed, and you’re sitting at the beach of reality, thinking pragmatism is using all the wood to make a bonfire instead of building boats to get to the other side.

We’re builders, Van Drew, but we’re also pirates. We will build our boats and sail off, with no regards for your laws and regulations, for the sanctity of property or borders. We will not sit around and wait for you or someone else to deliver us to the world we dream of. We’re dreamers, it is true, but what we dream of is a greater reality where we ourselves are the heroes of our story.

That is why, Van Drew, you have nothing to offer me, and why I now bid you farewell. Good luck with the questionnaire, which undoubtedly will provide invaluable information for your campaign team when it is time to decide the correct slogans to win back your seat. And, as soon as you’ve done that, I’m sure our lives will improve immediately. But, really, joke aside Van Drew, that’s not what it is about, is it. That, my friend, would be utopian thinking.

On elections and voting

USA, now that you’ve had your midterm elections, I’d like to say a few words about electoralism and voting.

First, let me say that I am not overly bothered about whether people vote or not, so I am also not interested in trying to shame people into doing either. I don’t think there is any merit to moralizing about it either way. If it makes you happier to vote – then do it, if you feel better not participating, then go right ahead and ignore it. Neither really affects your possibilities to organize and change the world around you in a positive way.

But here is the thing. Voting as a concept, and the idea that real, tangible change can be accomplished by voting – or even that voting is a sort of damage control or harm reduction – are all propositions that, in my opinion, overestimate the power of voting and elections. The problem with that, is that it can have the effect of tricking people into a false sense of accomplishment when they do vote.

Most countries, and especially the US, are inherently tied to financial interests and big capital elites in terms of what they can do policy-wise. In the case of the USA, in fact, serious research institutions have come to the conclusion that the country is, more or less, a type of oligarchy. Or, put in academic terms:

“Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence.”

This is further underlined by the fact that pretty much none of the significant indicators such as income inequality, wealth inequality, situation for minorities, incarceration rates and so on is in any way correlated to any particular party being in power – be it federal or state level. The fact that one of the most important movements in recent years – Black Lives Matter – formed as a result of repression of black folks under the first black president ever is but the most ironic of many examples that together show a trend – it doesn’t really matter very much who is in power, because power is in power. No matter who you vote for, the government always wins. And the government, it turns out, pretty much ensures business as usual for itself and for economic elites.

Ok, but what about all the times that congress or state legislature actually passed progressive laws that helped poor people out? Surely this cannot be denied, and shows that despite all, there is change to be had within this political system? This might be a tempting proposition because after all, it’s there, right in front of our eyes. We can see the politicians smiling, signing off on one or another bill that actually helps folks in their everyday life, be it in economic terms, lgbtq+ rights, anti-discrimination or something else.

I once thought so too. Then I picked up – almost by accident – a copy of Howard Zinn’s amazing book A People’s History of the United States. That book clarified many things for me, but the most astounding was that I started to see history from a bottom-up instead of a top-down perspective. Instead of putting the spotlight and cameras on government men in suits, the idea of change that the media tries to sell us, I started to see change as the result of social movements fighting for it – in the streets, in the neighborhoods, in workplaces – in every corner of our everyday lived experiences.

This made me realize that in seeing governments, politicians and laws as the source of change I was getting things backwards – I was confusing cause and effect. The laws, oftentimes forced upon governments and legislatures, ware caused by all these people fighting for them. For every good thing that has happened, for instance in terms of legalizing gay marriage, trans rights or other important lbgtq+ issues, there’s been a Stonewall. For every civil rights gain there was a Rosa Parks, a Martin Luther King and a Malcolm X. For every immiserated neighborhood or minority there was a riot, for every change they managed to affect there was a social movement. Without these movements, there is nothing. But without these politicians in power, and the capital owning elites that mostly have them in their pockets, there would be, what?

We don’t need them, but they need us.

Stepping back again, regardless of what one thinks of the efficacy of voting, there is an inescapable aspect of alienation about it. Voting is an inherently individualized and isolating thing. It doesn’t build any movements, it doesn’t create solidarity or bring us closer to people around us. It is just the ceremonial act of signing off on which group of powerful elites gets to decide over our lives for the next few years. The change it promises, as we’ve seen above, rarely materializes, and even in best case it is supposedly done for us, not by us, and not where we’re at.

Organizing, on the other hand, can have immense effect on our everyday lives and experiences, even before we’ve seen the change we’re working on. Getting together with people, establishing networks of mutual aid and solidarity, building affinity, empowers us and gives us a social meaning in our everyday lives. While your vote floats off into an intangible abstract political landscape, our everyday organizing, no matter how modest in scope and limited in time, makes real tangible change in your life and the lives of others, and when we succeed with something – winning a conflict with a landlord, a workplace struggle, providing food or security for our communities, etc – it is immediately felt and experienced by us and those around us.

Or, to sum up and put all of this more eloquently:

“Political rights do not originate in parliaments; they are, rather, forced upon parliaments from without. And even their enactment into law has for a long time been no guarantee of their security. Just as the employers always try to nullify every concession they had made to labor as soon as opportunity offered, as soon as any signs of weakness were observable in the workers’ organizations, so governments also are always inclined to restrict or to abrogate completely rights and freedoms that have been achieved if they imagine that the people will put up no resistance. Even in those countries where such things as freedom of the press, right of assembly, right of combination, and the like have long existed, governments are constantly trying to restrict those rights or to reinterpret them by juridical hair-splitting. Political rights do not exist because they have been legally set down on a piece of paper, but only when they have become the ingrown habit of a people, and when any attempt to impair them will meet with the violent resistance of the populace. Where this is not the case, there is no help in any parliamentary Opposition or any Platonic appeals to the constitution.” – Rudolf Rocker

Now, in an honest attempt to strike a balance, some people will inevitably say, “but why not both”? And this really leads us to the core of my issue here. Of course, as I’ve already expressed I don’t mind the act of voting as such. Since my entire argument is that, especially on a personal level, the act in itself is near enough meaningless, it shouldn’t matter much whether people vote or not, and if it actually has the slightest thrust, then why not do all these other things, and also vote?

The problem I have with this line of reasoning is connected to the problem I see every time an election nears. And this is the overestimation of the power of voting. “Why not both” puts organizing and voting on a sort of equal footing, as if we’re talking about a two pronged strategy. But a vote on an individual level has at best such minuscule influence, that it is an act of mystification to compare it to organizing. I could just as well be arguing that a steady breakfast is important, to have energy to be able to organize during the day. In fact, I believe a steady breakfast is probably more important than voting. There are probably thousands of things I could think of that are more important. So “why not both” is actually a rigged question – it is a symptom of the fact that even people that on some level understand how little – if any – difference voting makes, still act as if it made more difference.

This can have the effect of making people complacent, because if seen this way, voting in itself becomes an achievement, when in fact one of the main effects of the spectacle is precisely to act as a safety valve, redirecting popular anger and dissatisfaction into a sphere where it can safely be contained and worn down, like an animal stuck in quicksand. One highly unfortunate way in which this already happens in a very material way is union funds being funneled into political campaigns instead of used as leverage to express and expand workers’ power at the point of production.

In the end, there is no shortcut to affecting significant and lasting social change. It is a slow process of movement building at the grassroots, of experimentation, of failure, and of victories and gains. For those of us that want to build a new world, we have to stop looking at others and start building it ourselves where we’re at. If history has taught us anything, it is that such change can only come from us, and last only as long as we can reproduce it as a habit.

So no matter whether you vote or not, don’t let that process enclose the way in which you are political, straitjacket your activism, and curtail your imagination. From the point of view of electoralism and those in power, those of us that want to see a radically free and egalitarian society are demanding the impossible. But from our own perspective, such a society is not only possible, but increasingly necessary, if we want any sort of future at all. I don’t see how one can be any more realistic than that.