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naming 
I believe that the children should be fed 
That families should have a roof 
That the sick should be healed 
That the youth should have education 
That communities should have the freedom to self determination 
 
Not because they can afford it 
Not because they have the right color skin 
Not because they live in the right neighborhood 
Not because they are able bodied 
 
Because none of that matters 
All that matters is that they are here  
and they are in need. 

 
 
 
 

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RADICAL 
adjective rad·i·cal \ ˈra-di-kəl \ 
1 :of, relating to, or proceeding from a root: such as a (1) :of or growing from the root of a plant radical tubers (2):growing from 
the base of a stem, from a rootlike stem, or from a stem that does not rise above the ground radical leaves 
b :of, relating to, or constituting a linguistic root  
c :of or relating to a mathematical root  
*  d :designed to remove the root of a disease or all diseased and potentially diseased tissue 
radicalsurgery radicalmastectomy 
 
2 
:of or relating to the origin :fundamental 
 
3 
a :very different from the usual or traditional :extreme 
b :favoring extreme changes in existing views, habits, conditions, or institutions  
c :associated with political views, practices, and policies of extreme change  
*  d :advocating extreme measures to retain or restore a political state of affairs the radical right 
 
4 slang :excellent, cool 
 
Intersectionality (or intersectionalism) is the study of intersections between forms or systems of oppression, domination or 
discrimination. ... The theory suggests that — and seeks to examine how — various biological, social and cultural categories such as 
gender, race, class, ability, sexual orientation, religion, caste, species and other axes of identity interact on multiple and often 
simultaneous levels, contributing to systemic injustice and social inequality.  
— Wikipedia 

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ANARCHISM IS RADICAL INTERSECTIONALITY 

 
Anarchism is radical Intersectionality. It is the definition of Liberatory Praxis. There can be 
no Anarchism without Feminism, and Queer liberation. "Identity politics", as understood by 
Anarchist theory, is explained in “Anarchism As Emancipatory Theory and Praxis” which states 
-  
 
"Anarchism, in the broadest sense, can be defined as an ideology that is premised on a 
profound skepticism towards skewed, coercive and exploitative social power relations, and thus 
gives ontological primacy to the negative, that is a situation of oppression. Anarchism is 
underpinned by a broad ontology, encompassing different forms of oppression, among them 
those of class, race, gender or people with different sexual orientations (McLaughlin 2010: 26, 
29; see also Maiguashca et al. in this issue).  
 
Rather than accepting such forms of oppression, anarchism aims at maximizing both 
individual autonomy and collectivist freedom, and reducing ‘fixed hierarchies that 
systematically privilege some people over others to a minimum’ (Albert 2012: 327). Anarchist 
struggles include, amongst others, anti-capitalism, radical environmentalism, queer 
liberation, anti-militarism, prison abolition, information freedom and free speech, freedom 
of movement, anti-racist, anti-fascist and labour struggles (Bray 2013). The state is criticized 
for codifying, legitimizing and embodying social inequalities and oppression (Williams 
2007: 300; McKay 2008: 1633), but anarchism is more than simply anti-statism." (n.p.) 
 
So....is Anarchism for you? -Jondean Walwyn 
 
 
 
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NAMING 
 
Naming as conquest. 
 
Colonizers naming the stolen land. 
 
Patriarchs naming the devalued feminine body. 
 
Philosophers naming reality as reducible to one word. 
 
Naming as a prophecy for what you are--- 
what you can be--- 
what you should be. 
 
Naming as delimiting on your anima[cy] 
 
prof.Ound 
 

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RADICAL ANARCHISM 
 
Anarchism transcends political theory. It is more than just another political ideology among 
many. Anarchism is a process of radical liberation, nothing less.  
 
There can be no comfort zone; either we are constantly pushing forward in our 
understanding, our actions, our language, our theory, and our praxis, or we are nowhere. 
 
Where conservatism and fascism celebrate uniformity, conformity, coercion, and hierarchical 
domination, Anarchism seeks to foster multiplicity, non-conformity, radical consent, and 
decentralization. Unity under oppression and fascism can never be more than a coerced 
faux-unity; unity within anarchism can never be less than the unity that flows uncoerced 
from the revolutionary concept of consent. Anarchists do not fight to gain power as such, but 
liberation. 
 
Anarchism is more than the polar opposite of fascism; fascism is a stagnant, self-negating 
ideology of death, while Anarchism is a living process, a dynamic ideology. Unlike the 
regressives and liberals, who fear diversity and change, we welcome it. We refuse to conserve 
traditions or practices that serve to bolster the scaffolding of oppression and reproduce the 
pricks of dehumanization. If a thing is hindering our ability to be free, we yearn to jettison 
it, to cut it away; in this purge, Anarchism is a knife. There's nothing revolutionary about 
"anarchism" or activism that strays from the cutting edge to protect the status quo. 
 
 
 

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PRIVILEGE 
 
Privilege is like air conditioning. 
Some people have it, some people don't. 
Some people only have it at work, some only have it at home. 
Some never have it, some always have it. 
Wherever you have it, you will defend your right to have it and become down right nasty if it's 
taken from you. 
When you have it all the time, it's easy to forget that some people never have it or only have it 
some of the time. 
When you're used to it and you go to a space where it isn't, you can easily become so self 
absorbed in your discomfort that you forget to appreciate the experiences of those that have to 
live in that space without it. Your voice inadvertently becomes the loudest in the room, but 
it's not because you have the most experience with the oppressive heat. Counterintuitively, it's 
precisely because of your familiarity with the comfort of climate control that you feel the need 
to be heard the most. 
 
 
LANGUAGE & VIOLENCE 
 
Language can be violence. Here's why.  
 
Marginalization, oppression and exploitation are by definition violent. This all occurs systemically. This 
means that they are imbedded in our social institutions. Cultural norms and practices give these social 
institutions legitimacy. Cultural norms and practices are transmitted primarily through speech and 
writing. Therefore, language ultimately legitimizes oppressive social institutions and perpetuates cultural 
norms of marginalization. In this manner, language is violence. ​ -Noble Brown 

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On Violence 
“I believe violence is NEVER the answer,” a girl announces proudly from the front row of desks. 
 
We’re sitting in our squishy, height-adjustable, swivelling office chairs in the new building on campus, discussing decolonization 
and resistance movements in our Indigenous Studies class. Each desk has several electrical outlets installed, conveniently placed for 
our laptops (mostly MacBooks) to stay charged during the three-hour lecture. It’s minus twenty degrees Celsius outside, but we all 
have our jackets off in this comfortably-heated room with double-glaze windows. 
 
“Non-violent methods are more productive.” 
 
We read an article by Frantz Fanon, “On Violence”, about the decolonization movements in Algeria. Decolonization will always be 
violent, he says. And maybe that’s not a bad thing. But nobody seems to agree with him. 
 
Non-violent methods are more productive? 
 
That’s easy for you to say. That’s easy for any of us to say, sitting in our expensive room on our expensive computers completing our 
expensive undergraduate degrees. We’re cosy. We’re comfortable. Violent resistance is a theoretical abstract that is just so 
wonderfully easy to dismiss. 
 
Don’t we need to consider the fact that maybe we can so self-assuredly say that “violence is never the answer” because we’ve never 
been put in a position where actually, maybe violence is the only answer we have left? Maybe deciding that “violence is never the 
answer” is much more straight-forward when we’re not faced with immediate, actual, physical violence? Maybe, just maybe, sitting in 
a university classroom in Canada and deciding that violence is never the answer is a bit different from the conclusion you might 
come to if you were living the experience of being actively, violently colonized. 
 
Canada WAS actively and violently colonized, and the colonization of Indigenous peoples is ongoing and still violent, albeit in 
usually more covert, indirect, non-physically violent ways. I’m not dismissing that. But the idea that violence is never the answer 
— coming to that conclusion so easily and assuredly — often comes from a place of privilege. The privilege of thinking of 
state-endorsed violence as an abstract concept. We’re not faced with imminent physical danger as we sit in our classroom. 
 
And it’s not that there aren’t people living in those situations who don’t still think that violence is not the answer. It’s not that 
thinking that violence is not the answer is only EVER a privileged opinion. It’s not that it’s a less legitimate opinion. It’s that 
those of us who live comfortable lives need to stop to wonder why that’s such an easy conclusion for us to come to, why we so 
immediately dismiss anyone suggesting violent resistance as “wrong” or “irrational” or somehow “behind the times”. 
 

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We value non-violent methods of protest so highly, and we consider them so much better than violent methods. If someone says 
“yeah actually, violence is sometimes called for,” we consider ourselves much more progressive and liberal and just nicer people than 
them. They’re advocating people KILLING people!!!!!!! Aren’t they?? HOW COULD ANYONE ADVOCATE THAT. They must be right-wing psychos! 
Or extremists! Why would they not see that sitting down and talking out our problems is just so much more civilized? 
 
Civilized. 
 
Another of the activists whose work we’ve been reading for this class, Taiaiake Alfred, talks a lot about resisting the colonialist 
framework; he says that trying to work within the framework, to try to get the government to recognise Indigenous people’s rights, 
is completely futile. To work within the colonialist framework (“Aboriginalism”) basically lends that framework legitimacy that it 
doesn’t deserve. Trying to make a place for yourself in that framework helps to support it and ensure that it stays in place. So, Alfred 
suggests, to effectively decolonize, Indigenous people need to break away from that framework, create their own, to stop from 
depending on the colonial systems. 
 
People in class didn’t argue with that. Taiaiake advocates for non-violent means of decolonization, and everyone likes that. Idle No 
More comes up in the discussion, of course, and people think that it’s great that the movement is non-violent because then the media 
has no ammo to discredit them. They have to be viewed as legitimate now! 
 
Legitimate. 
 
There’s something underlying this discussion that doesn’t come up, and it bothers me, but I don’t say anything because I can’t quite 
think of how to articulate the feeling of yuck. But as the conversation goes on, the idea starts to form and by the end of class I am 
uncomfortable and I can identify why that is. 
 
The professor asks a question that brings my issue into sharp focus. 
 
“Who defines violence?” 
 
“The colonizer.” We all know the answer. Gosh, we’re so self-aware. But nobody takes this further, nobody applies this to the 
assumptions and claims that we’ve all been making throughout the three hours of class. Non-violent means of resistance are always 
better. Violence is never the answer. Is it a coincidence that all of us, brought up in the West, in a colonialist school system, in 
colonized countries, unanimously agree that violence is never the answer? Why do we all agree? 
 
Maybe because that is exactly what we are taught. By the colonial system. The colonial system that gets to define even the meaning of 
violence. The colonial system gets to decide what counts as violence, who’s a terrorist. But not only that; it also gets to decide that 
“violence is never the answer”. Because why would a colonialist system want anyone to think otherwise? Non-violent means of 
resistance can be a lot easier for a colonialist state to ignore. Do I think that non-violent means are NEVER effective? No, of course 
not. But maybe, just maybe, there’s a reason we’re all taught that violent resistance groups are wrong and bad and irrational and 
taking things too far. 

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We learn about Martin Luther King Jr. and “I have a dream”. We’re taught that Nelson Mandela and Gandhi are peace-loving, 
non-violent leaders of protest movements. Look, they are good! They are just, and their movements are successful! They are how 
protest leaders and movements Should Be! 
 
Martin Luther King Jr. made many more speeches than just that one. How many of them have you read or heard? A lot of them were 
just as — if not more — stirring, inspiring, and effective… and also a lot less white-colonialist-friendly. A lot less 
“non-violent”. Same goes for Mandela and Gandhi. There were also protest movements that were explicitly violent, or a lot less 
dedicated to being non-violent, that we are taught are BAD BAD BAD, WRONG. TERRIBLE. Maybe we’re only learning about certain 
resistance leaders, and very particular parts of their histories and opinions, for a reason. 
 
Maybe the colonialist state is choosing how we define and think of “good” resistance and “bad” resistance. 
 
As I said, people in my class like Idle No More because they are non-violent and thus can’t have their acts misrepresented by the 
media. So people acknowledge that the media has an agenda, that when a resistance movement can be discredited, it will. 
 
But nobody points out that the whole idea that a protest movement MUST BE NON-VIOLENT to be considered legitimate, is in itself a 
colonialist system’s means of discrediting a portion of resistance movements. Somebody pipes up and says that being non-violent 
means that the colonizer will be more likely to listen. Hence why violent resistance movements are unproductive. 
 
Maybe those who advocate violent resistance don’t care about being misrepresented by the media. Maybe they don’t care about the 
colonizer being more likely to listen. Maybe that’s because so far, the colonial system has come up with an awfully large number of 
reasons not to listen. The media, as extension of the colonialist system, will always be able to find ways to discredit a resistance that 
is inconvenient. So maybe working within the colonial framework of non-violent-is-the-only-way-to-go is futile. Because the 
colonial system is defining how people are even allowed to resist it. We’ll only listen to you if you say it nicely. No shouting! Stop 
being so aggressive! Maybe we’ll start listening if you’re more polite! Say please! Say thank you! Say “sir”! It means the colonizers get 
to move the goalposts and forever decide that your resistance efforts aren’t legitimate enough. Aren’t civilized. And so they don’t 
have to listen to you. 
 
So maybe those who advocate violent means of resistance are fed up with that and are choosing to ignore the framework that 
non-violent = good, legitimate, worth listening to and violent = bad and irrational. 
 
After all that, it might sound kind of contradictory of me to say that I’m NOT arguing that violent resistance is the better or only 
way to go. I am just questioning the assumption that the opposite is always the case. Think about the major social revolutions that 
have occurred; there was a lot of non-violent protest. I have a dream, and all that. But, alongside it, there was ALSO a lot of violent 
protest going on. Maybe instead of looking at it as the violent resistance being wrong and unnecessary and it was the non-violent 
portion of the resistance that won people all those rights and recognition under the law, maybe it was both at once. Perhaps both 
methods of resistance are necessary to achieve decolonization? 
-Jennifer Rachel Ateyo

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History is an interpretation of past human events. Since no interpreter is an objective 

observer, history is by definition, a social construct. This means that it is told from the 
perspective of the individual telling it and their perspective, their values and interests, are 
determined by their social environment. 
 
So different social classes present different histories. The ruling class presents history meant 
to reinforce their narratives and legitimize their authority. 
The revolutionary class produces history that counters those narratives. The working class 
produces their own narratives as do the colonized. 
Histories are social tools. There is no such thing as a history that is true for everyone 
everywhere. 
When the oppressed subscribe to the ruling class histories, this begins the process of Erasure. 
Grand theories are a colonizer's tool. 
 
 
THE PERMANENCE OF SETTLER COLONIAL STRUCTURES 
 
The permanence of settler colonialism makes it a structure, not just an event. The settler 
colonial structure also requires the enslavement and labor of bodies that have been stolen 
from their homelands and transported in order to labor the land stolen from Indigenous 
people. Settler colonialism refers to a triad relationship, between the White settler (who is 
valued for his leadership and innovative mind), the disappeared Indigenous peoples (whose 
land is valued, so they and their claims to it must be extinguished), and the chattel slaves 
(whose bodies are valuable but ownable, abusable, and murderable). We believe that this triad is 
the basis of the formation of Whiteness in settler colonial nation-states, and that the 
interplay of erasure, bodies, land, and violence is characteristic of the permanence of settler 
colonial structures. — Tuck and YaNg 
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RACISM 
 
If a white man murders a black man, because of racial hatred, he has the full weight of an oppressive system behind him. If he claims 
that he was afraid, chances are he will be let off with a slap on the wrist.  
 
If a black man murders a white man because of racial hatred, chances are he'll receive life in prison, or the death penalty; he has the 
full weight of the same oppressive system turned against him.  
 
Despite the fact that both murders are racially motivated, one is racism and the other is not; in fact, the racially motivated murder 
committed by the black man is clearly a reaction (albeit misguided) to living under a racist system of white supremacy. It makes no 
sense, (and is in fact counterproductive and an obfuscation of the real problem) to use the same term (racism) to describe both 
phenomena. 
 
Furthermore, the modern system of racism finds no direct parallels in pre-imperialist/pre-colonial history. While tribalism and the 
like may have superficial similarities, racism is a comprehensive system of oppression intended to fracture class solidarity, instituted 
by European imperialists/colonialists and their mother countries at the expense of Black and Indigenous populations which it was in 
their economic interests to subjugate. 
 
This is why we can't use "racism" as a catch-all terminology. Despite the dictionary definition, "racism" is a historically specific 
system of racialized hierarchy codified by European and early colonial powers which placed Europeans (labeled "white") at the top of 
said hierarchy, with a sliding scale of groups placed beneath it, culminating with "black" people at the bottom (these people could be 
made slaves, justifiably, based on this system). The only "racism" we know is the white supremacist variety. Europeans invented it, as 
well as the terms "white" and "black", as a means to justify the barbarism of slavery, as well as limit land ownership to the few, in the 
interest of empire and economic expediency. 
 
Some people will continue to cling to the dictionary definition of racism, and there isn't much that can be done about that, outside 
of changing the dictionary definition itself to reflect the insights brought forth through Critical Race Theory, but I see no reason why 
oppressed people who are subjected to actual racism should use the definition concocted by the group oppressing them, nor do I see any 
reason why we should submit to having that label placed on us, when after lifetimes of living in a white supremacist society (which 
barely acknowledges that racism exists at all), we finally explode​. 
 
 
 

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KYRIARCHY & INTRA-CLASS OPPRESSION 

 
Well...understanding the Kyriarchy is key to understanding what prevents Intra-Class 
oppression... So, when we talk about "Unity", it's important to understand the factors that 
actually prevent it from occurring. Now, while a great deal of the hindrance of "Unity" is 
VVhyte supremacist Neoliberal Capitalism, the prevention of "Unity" also comes from 
individuals who hold major axis of privilege colluding with this kyriarchal system.   
 
Oppression is rooted in Power, and is the ability to prevent individuals and groups from 
gaining access to material resources, socioeconomic power, and sociopolitical power. 
 
When you engage and collude with kyriarchal privileges....you prevent individuals and 
groups from gaining access to material resources, socioeconomic power, and sociopolitical 
power. 
 
"Unity" cannot exist where there is Inequality, and oppression. 
 
Anarchism is not a redux of failed sociopolitical and economic distributive justice models... 
Anarchism calls for Horizontalism. All is for All...and that means that All must have 
equitable access to material resources, socioeconomic power, and sociopolitical power. 
 
And it is the work of Every Single Individual to engage in the creation of an Anarchist 
distributive justice model. Not because wide-eyed optimism...but because you will never have 
the society you want if you don't. 

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THE INFINITE MOTION MACHINE 

 
Capitalism relies on infinite economic growth in a way that’s impossible. When someone 
claims to have invented an infinite motion machine, it always has a hidden power source. The 
hidden power source of capitalism is stolen labor. Both in the case of labor that’s completely 
unpaid, such as slave labor and housework or child rearing work usually done by women, or 
people being underpaid for their labor, which is the case for almost every job that has a fixed 
salary. As long as this system is active, some people will be the exploited and some will be the 
exploiters and beneficiaries of that exploitation. 
-Ivy 
 
 
MONEY + PROFIT + COMPETITION = GREEDY INDIVIDUALISM 
 
Profit seeking, in a very general sense, is a natural tendency. Resources are traded between 
individuals and groups almost exclusively for some form of abstract or subjective advantage 
in value, i.e gain. Even if the gain is intangible, such as something as abstract as the feeling 
you get for doing something nice for someone. For this reason hard altruism is difficult to 
detect. 
Some use this fact as a means to justify the profit motive of capitalism. "We all seek profit 
naturally, what's so wrong with it?". 
So is there something fundamentally unique about gain/profit seeking in a capitalist 
landscape? I think this could be debated quite a bit, but in the interest of the continuity of my 
argument I will allow that there isn't. So, if it's not a fundamental difference, then does 
that mean they are indeed one and the same activities, capitalist mode profit seeking and 
social mode gain seeking? Well, not exactly. 
There are two other components, intrinsic to capitalism, that have perverted naturally 
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occurring social mode gain seeking. These other two components are money, or more 
specifically, a common medium of exchange, and competition. Put these together you get a 
rather nasty brew of hyper-individualist profit maximisation. In other words, unrepentant 
greed. 
Let's look at money first, and in order to find out what's going on we have to analyse what it 
is that is unique about having a common medium of exchange. There are a few well recited 
advantages of having a common medium of exchange. One not so well recognized is the way 
it enables resource accumulation. Currency is a fully transferable resource. As such, it makes 
it much easier to accumulate large quantities of this transferable resource and to even hoard 
it if one so wished. One could hoard less transferable goods, but it just isn't very practical. 
Another advantage is that the qualitative value one gains from social transactions of favors, 
goods and debts can now be, at least mostly, quantified. If we can now objectively measure 
our gains/profits then we can also start keeping score much easier than before. Profit and 
gain seeking now becomes a comparable activity. This brings us to the last component, 
competition. 
You see competition has always existed. Just like gain seeking behavior. So what is unique 
about competition in capitalist modes? Well the answer is the other two capitalist components, 
the profit motive and money. Incorporating all three of these components together in an 
economic theory results in an inherently exploitative, self seeking, corruptible, social 
institution. The only way to mitigate these affects is to incorporate a strong state apparatus to 
regulate the inherent economic tendencies of the capitalist mode of production. 
As an anarchist, the corruptibility of hierarchical authoritarian social stratifications is 
obvious. Therefore, there is no alternative, capitalism and the state must be compromised, with 
extreme prejudice if necessary. 
 
N. Brown 
 

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STRUCTURAL INTERSECTIONALITY 
 
Intersections of oppression aren't static; they are fluid, constantly evolving, allowing 
themselves to be occupied by the potential for infinite forms of subtle and overt 
dehumanization. 
 
 
A PRAYER 
 
Thinking about the interplay between the symbolic or idealistic and the material that occurs at 
demonstrations against confederate monuments, most notably at the Charlottesville 
demonstrations. What more symbolically potent physical locus/focus for the direction of 
insurrectionary energy than a centrally located, phallic, patriarchal, highly visible material 
symbol of white supremacy and oppression? In these moments, these oppressive reminders 
become avatars, fractal microcosmic prayers to the macrocosm, effigies in the most material 
sense to 500 years of brutal repression. In their destruction, we rip them out of the intangible 
and untouchable ether of the symbolic and force them to exist in our reality, in their true 
form, stripped of their medals and shields of mythology. Let all of our small destructions and 
explosions prefigure the ultimate explosion of radical consciousness and liberation. 
 
 
 

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THE SEEDS OF REVOLUTIONARY CONSCIOUSNESS 

 
I see anarchists as something like the Johnny Appleseeds of revolutionary 
consciousness. There exists a moral imperative to seek out the fertile ground 
of social unrest and disobedience. Planting the seeds of a critical social 
analysis in the minds of those that have nothing left to lose. 
We shouldn't seek to deliver a nicely packaged bundle of ideas and 
opinions. This is counter intuitive to the anarchists conception of a 
communities right to self determination. Instead we deliver a toolbox of 
evidence and the floodlight of a critical eye in order to empower those 
communities and individuals towards a self-awarenes so that they may 
grow, develop and build free from the chains of the state and the taint of 
capitalism. 
 
Noble Brown 
 
 
 

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CAGES 
 
No one should be in a cage. I spent 14 days in solitary and part of me died in that box.  
 
No one should be in a cage. We can't simultaneously fight r*pe culture and not talk about the 
tremendous and horrific levels of sexual violence enacted in carceral institutions. Me too. 
#MeToo. Me too. Many times me too. 
 
No one should be in a cage. I would rather die than be subjected to such torture again. 
 
No one should be in a cage. This should not be controversial. 
 
No one should be in a cage. 
 
I dream of a world without cages. 
I am haunted by them; I will always be.  
 
No one should be in a cage. 
I will never stop screaming this. -ashe evyn nidam 
 
 
HORIZONS 
 
When the synthetic barriers to human potential and creativity are removed, when all are fed, 
and clothed, when dehumanization in all forms is abolished, and mutual aid is not 
criminalized but encouraged... that is Anarchism. 
 
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