The Brilliant

Since Bellamy was here at the start of The Brilliant project it is great to check in where he is at regarding the things we are talking and thinking about. Obviously Bellamy and I have been having similar experiences in the Anarchist Space over the past few years. This episode is about some dissimilar experiences and what is next with each of us and our respective media projects.

Ultimately I am not a nihilist but this might be a de jure vs de facto kind of distinction that people hate hearing people drone on about. No matter how we land on this question the little thing I wrote nearly 20 years ago on the question did force it to be an ongoing concern of mine. The question about whether there is a difference between belief in the good (ie anarchy) and christianity is more important now than ever. Additionally, who does faith in ongoing social change (in a good way) benefit? But the truth is that there have been better, more pithy, less chained critics of activists and other christians than I have been. This episode we discuss some of these critics and having a balanced approach towards that most anarchist of problems. This is done in a modern context.

Among the people I met in the Berkeley Anarchist Study Group (aka BASTARD) are people I should have met more generally. I'm referring to the reading group this way because I have found that in the last 20 years the number of places where you might meet an (anarchist) interesting person has shrank dramatically. Luckily 10 years ago I was at the reading group. Maybe I'm not giving the hardcore/metal scene enough credit but there seems to be slim pickings anytime I dip into that world nowadays. Carrie (the interview subject of this episode) is an incredibly interesting person who I never would have met if the circumstances weren't exactly what they are and I'm sorry for that. I'm sorry Carrie hasn't been a larger part of my life. Listen to the interview and it'll be clear why. Late in the interview I talk about a possible experiment around religion and spirituality. Probably we'll talk about that more as the year goes on.

I was a big supporter of Green Anarchy back in the day. Even today I host a remembrance site for them, am close friends with the old editorial team (except for the Z who has feelings), and am part of the Black Seed editorial group that was deeply inspired by GA. This conversation is between the GA team and I and concerns Black Seed #7 which they review and we discuss. This conversation is very much "in the weeds." We go through the project article by article. We frame out Black Seed by context, order, and authorship. You can get access to Black Seed via LBC email us at [email protected] if you have questions, concerns, or whatever

Duane and I have known each other for a number of years. (At least 12!) He was one of the first people who found the first http://irc.anarchyplanet.org IRC server (which in fact used SILC) and joined the merry band that started The Anarchist Library. He was doxxed by a rival group, was lost, then found, and wrote a book for LBC called After Post-Anarchism. This was nearly 10 years ago and since then Duane finished his PhD, started teaching, and then landed in my hometown. This wide ranging conversation happened in a coffee house (terrible sound) but is an interesting snapshot in where the academy, anarchy, and mf Lacan will take you.

I have mentioned the influence of Dreamtime Village on me quite a few times. I only visited there once before this interview but it really something. It involved an aborted attempt at a midwest anarchist network (I was living at the Trumbelplex in Detroit at the time). It was at least a dozen of us, enough for a dance party, enough for some embarrasing photos, not enough to make a network happen. Dreamtime may have been amazing but it was not exactly a laboratory of the anarchies. It hosted anarchists but may have been more accurately been described as a permacultural art space. The prime movers behinds the project were mIEKAL aND, Elizabeth Was, and their son Liaizon Wakest. Here are some links about them (recently) and their ongoing publishing project. https://isthmus.com/arts/what-ever-happened-to-the-church-of-anarchy/ https://www.xexoxial.org/

Ian is an old friend that used to go by different names. I was passing through the midwest on the way to the GSABF and got to visit. Our conversation passes through NVC (non-violent communications), the Intentional Community scene, and a tiny bit of the recent history of Bay Area radicalism (the hilarity house).

Angela Nagle's book was released at exactly the right time, with a perfect title, and great marketing. It is a leftist take on the Trump era, it is exactly on point about the intersection of a bunch of shitty tendencies, and speaks of them with surprising fluency. That said, this book is a lie. It is a dissertation about women and the Internet. It is more-or-less from a hard leftist position. It's reach far exceeds its grasp. chisel and I discuss all of this and more. Here is a link to the book. http://www.zero-books.net/books/kill-all-normies Contact us at [email protected]

I put together a book. It is not a book about me. It is about a dozen other people who are, in some way, the audience and content of the book. It was a real challenge putting it together as the interview subjects did not conform to the framing I eventually put on the book. Most of the conversations were about people, biographies, and local challenges. The book is about an epic fight for Turtle Island that is invisible to most people. It is about memory, family, and the future of a livable planet. It is also about anarchism. The original thesis of this book went something like this: The difference between indigenous and anarchist perspectives only requires some sort of keystone or translation guide; the two perspectives have so much in common that the only work is mapping the geography. But as the saying goes the map is not the territory. Clearly many, if not most, anarchists are happily married to Enlightenment thought and believe that the problem is not the production of widgets but how the widgets are produced. Similarly many indigenous people are not exactly on board with the kind of total social and material transformation alluded to by an anti-civilization, green anarchist perspective. To put this another way, I was wrong in my initial thesis and in face of that wrongness I am questioning both my anarchism and my relationship to indigeneity. Couple this to the general exhaustion I am feeling in my seemingly complete transition from trickster to bear and it has been difficult to talk about this book. To get the word out. To care about how anyone not in the book feels about it. But this is how projects fail. This one deserves a full airing and luckily my friend Obsidian (along with peanut gallery) was up to the task. This is an hour interview with me about the book I edited "The Fight for Turtle Island." Enjoy and then pick it up at Little Black Cart. Contact us at [email protected]

I made a promise to Nick the last time I was in Victoria BC. I said I would meaningfully engage (I might have even promised a review) of his book (co-authored with carla bergman who I don't know) Joyful Miltancy. There are a lot of reasons to believe that I would be hostile to this book, which we obviously discuss in some detail in this conversation, as it is a IAS/AK press joint but there are also reasons I would not be. One, I like Nick and he has been generous with me. Two, the talking point of this book is that it is about recovering from "activist burnout" which, aside from the words themselves, I'm interested in (and really experienced after the 60 book publishing spree we did between 2012 and 2017). There is also something of a critique that I can feel (at least the radiant heat from) that they call rigid radicalism. I would call it something more like "what Christian value systems have wrought" but perhaps that's a lot more blame-y than they want to sound but again back to the content of this podcast. I forced my collaborater chisel to read this book and we use this hour to talk it through. Thanks to chisel, Nick, carla, and all of you listeners. Together we can do as the authors desire which is to Fusing together movement-based perspectives and contemporary affect theory, they trace emergent forms of trust, care and responsibility in a wide variety of radical currents today, including indigenous resurgence, anarchism, transformative justice, and youth liberation. (which of course sounds like a jargon-laden nightmare but whatever floats your boat) BTW the book is available on The Anarchist Library. Check it out! Contact us at [email protected]

Getting specific is part of what Season 4 of The Brilliant podcast is about. Specifics about what a green perspective is (this conversation with BF is about the book Corrosive Consciousness). Specific about what different projects of dialogic anarchist practice looks like (namely an announcement for our new project Anarchy Bang https://anarchybang.com/ and, of course, this podcast). For my first The Brilliant conversation in 2019 I sit with Bellamy and talk about what he intended to do with his book Corrosive Consciousness, talk about what was done well (the argumentation) and what wasn't (the tone) and the disingenous politicking that resulted once John Zerzan got ahold of the book and presented it on his bully pulpit. I was upset that the book was undermined, this is the full story of how, what, and why that happened. An interesting test case of what politics look like in the anti-political milieu and what bad faith looks like in practice. We also get the skinny on leaf-cutter ants which I can't get enough of.

This is the last episode of 2018. In 2019 along with the Brilliant I'll be working on a weekly call in show called Anarchy Bang that you should check out on Sundays at noon (PST). Bellamy and I have another conversation that I'll release next week about Corrosive Consciousness but for now we discuss anarchism in 2018 (http://thebrilliant.org/podcast/episode-65-what-is-anarchism-in-2018/ and text here http://thebrilliant.org/2018/11/19/season-3-of-the-brilliant/) and where we agree and where BF is wrong (joke!). We discuss whether we are in a third wave of anarchism and what it's boundary is compared to second wave. Should we fight for the word anarchism, the loyal opposition to anarcho-liberalism, or should we go another direction? If you haven't you should check out Bellamy's article from Backwoods #1 you should. An Invitation to Desertion to understand some of BF's position in this conversation. Finally we gossip about Dr. Bones, anarchist nationalism, and spirituality. Contact us at [email protected]

As this season of the podcast comes to an end… I wanted to review what we have done in 2018 and what we hoped to have done. I presented my initial sketches of what is to be done and wanted to discuss them with some people. The next few episodes will be those conversations from three different post-left positions. Andy Robinson is an author, commentator, and provocatour. From the article Thinking from the Outside: Avoiding Recuperation Working inside the system in any way immediately creates difficulties, not least the dangers of recuperation, reformism, and selling-out. These dangers have a structural form — the turning-against-itself of desire, the conversion of an active force, which uses the external world as a series of tools or partners in dialogue, with a reactive force, which comes to value the fixed forms of the external world as goods in themselves. We discuss the crisis in anarchism (and second wave in particular), the critique of modern reason and cybernetic capitalism, 1973 (and the end of Breton Woods), and the movements we need now (the fight against fordism vs cybernetic power). How a yearning for an authentic life pits us against the monopoly of violence. Andy is very smart. Contact us at [email protected]

As this season of the podcast comes to an end… I wanted to review what we have done in 2018 and what we hoped to have done. I presented my initial sketches of what is to be done and wanted to discuss them with some people. The next few episodes will be those conversations from three different post-left positions. Chris Kortright is a long time green insurrectionary anarchist who has more recently gotten involved in more explicitly indigenous survivance struggles in Saskatchewan. Our discussion begins with nostalgia (about fighting nazis & KKA), passes through controversies like GA framing of Sasha K, Keith Preston and anarcho-nationalism, disagreements (generally). Then we talk about indigenous struggles in Regina and how to practice political conflict in 2018. Maybe later we'll have an answer to what turns out to be one of the biggest problems of our time.

This interview was by request of an anarchist news thread. While Ria does call herself an anarchist their primary interests appear to be animals (in the vegan sense of the word) and native plants (in the rewilding sense). This conversation ends up being a mix. I think both of us tried to respond to the questions from the @news thread but I was a little spaced out due to a brain malfunction. Ria was a gentle interlocutor, quizzing me about books and vegan things. Email us at thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org We appreciate correspondence (1305)

I didn’t know how sophisticated and interesting comedy was until about five years ago. I really fell in love with this kind of comedy by listening to podcasts for hours at a time while driving. The WTF podcast in particular was really interesting to me as it was two comedians talking to each other about how they do what they do. It is ultimately as un-glamorous as one can imagine. Of course I see, in this kind of comedy and in its lifestyle, something quite similar to anarchists. These are people doing a ridiculous thing (entertaining people/changing the world) that they need a lifelong commitment to (many fail at this stage of course) and in odd cases something pops. Whether it’s Occupy, BLM, or just that moment where one feels free there is something parallel to mind between laughter and anarchy. As I think about future projects, I think about how to make people laugh, since making people love freedom doesn’t seem to be nearly as successful. Email us at thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org We appreciate correspondence (807)

In early fall I went up to British Columbia and met with Seaweed. This is a partial record of that meeting. We discuss learning/reading, history (specifically Montreal and Vancouver in the 80s), John Zerzan and Green Anarchy magazine, and more. “It all has to go” – MW 1982 Politics as personal attack (ancom vs green), complicated French nationalism in Quebec, anarcho-liberals and municipal libertarianism, pragmatists, koans. A wonderful conversation about how much has been going on in @Canada over the past 40 years. (1699)

TL;DR This is an interview with Gregor of Tribes magazine. His story (and article in Tribes) is about the move from “left anarchism” to national anarchism. The discussion is about WTF is left anarchism, National anarchism, and a kindred. This third episode on the question of nationalism wraps up the conversation with a nice bow. I talk to one of the authors of Tribes magazine about their story (and apologies but the first part of the episode was lost to the computer usability gods), and specifically how they went from being a “left anarchist” (which has less to do with leftist ideas than with leftist activities like squatting, occupy, and black bloc!!!) to becoming a national anarchist. We talk specifically about how fucking stupid that name is; what family looks like; why, ultimately, I can’t get on board with their program at all (which was obvious from the beginning but I use this as an opportunity to go through something in good faith and wash away all the cruft and grime to really see what’s underneath). I am really appreciative of Gregor’s patience and understanding in the conversation. They were a good advocate for their position, and really served as a not-paranoid or mealy-mouthed partisan of it. This episode will be challenging for many listeners as the position we are discussing (national or tribal anarchism) can be easily dismissed as racist. And I’m not going to say it is not racist but my reading of Tribes is that it tries very hard to dance around the issue (though sometimes dog whistling) and is worth examining closer. But I say this because I think that the idea of building community, and how it’s done, and who it’s done with, is worth grappling with seriously, before deciding specific efforts are bad, by whatever epithet. That’s what I try to do here. To put a point on it, I have not found many so-called anti-racists living in a way that is all that different than racists do. Mostly people surround themselves with a homogeneous group of people and don’t question their own social, cultural, and even ethnic comfort zones. This conversation starts to poke at that comfort zone, but I’m not sure where I’d go from here. To be clear, after this process of discovery of the Tribes/National Anarchist position, I reject it entirely. It turns out that like many other anarchist positions they end up having Hope (with a capital H) in something that I find totally absurd. In this case it isn’t the workers or the movement, but a construction of “heritability” that while being “true” is absolutely not true. You’ll have to decide how you feel about it by listening to the conversation. Email us at thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org We appreciate correspondence (1372)

I have been wanting to talk about the line between tribalism and nationalism for years but it is a challenge. All sides take the conversation very seriously ON THE INTERNET whereas my experience IRL isn’t quite the same. I’ve found people willing to joke and tease each other about the categories that do and don’t exist and our participation in them. I’ve found the hyperbole of tough guys, banning, gatekeeping, and racist bullshit to be quite rare in the corporal world. Not as much in the ether. Right-anarchist Keith Preston sent me a copy of a very interesting (and disturbing) magazine called Tribes that points straight at the issue calling itself a “National Anarchist magazine.” I did a conversation with KP where I tried to tease out the issue of how you can discuss nation in any meaningful way without discussing race (or the nation state tbh) and here is what he had to say about it. I simply described myself as a “racial atheist,” meaning I have no racial beliefs. And then he was like “But these folks do….” and I simply said that there are many people who do not have racial/ethnic beliefs in the N-A milieu, and those who do are very diverse in terms of their perspective on those issues, and that people of color were among the N-A milieu as well. To which I’d respond, why call yourself a national anarchist at all? How is a nation defined (especially if you use it in the sense that the Tribes editorial does as in nation = tribes)? I’d then laugh at the use of the term atheist in the same breath as race. You can claim all humans are of the same biological race (and I’d agree) but to say that “Race does not exist” is laughably stupid. But let’s not get distracted. If the post-modern definition of a nation, or a tribe, is possible, which I’m not sure it is, the place where it was articulated best was in the 80’s by the (not)anarchist, (not)utopian book bolo’bolo. Filled with a world where alco-bolos and les-bolos live together in perfect harmony. Let’s talk about this body of ideas in a context we share… which obviously doesn’t involve KP. In this two episode block we discuss our discomfort with KP’s approach (the first two episodes focus on the nationalism question in the context of bolo’bolo, the third on the context of bolo’bolo itself) and ask how to discuss nationalism at all in a modern (ie dramaful) context. Episode 81 – I discuss the specifics of what it means to be Indian (aka native americans or indigenous folk on turtle island) using terms like nation with Dominique. Episode 82 – Chisel and I discuss the topic of nationalism Email us at thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org We appreciate correspondence (1117)

I have been wanting to talk about the line between tribalism and nationalism for years but it is a challenge. All sides take the conversation very seriously ON THE INTERNET whereas my experience IRL isn’t quite the same. I’ve found people willing to joke and tease each other about the categories that do and don’t exist and our participation in them. I’ve found the hyperbole of tough guys, banning, gatekeeping, and racist bullshit to be quite rare in the corporal world. Not as much in the ether. Right-anarchist Keith Preston sent me a copy of a very interesting (and disturbing) magazine called Tribes that points straight at the issue calling itself a “National Anarchist magazine.” I did a conversation with KP where I tried to tease out the issue of how you can discuss nation in any meaningful way without discussing race (or the nation state tbh) and here is what he had to say about it. I simply described myself as a “racial atheist,” meaning I have no racial beliefs. And then he was like “But these folks do….” and I simply said that there are many people who do not have racial/ethnic beliefs in the N-A milieu, and those who do are very diverse in terms of their perspective on those issues, and that people of color were among the N-A milieu as well. To which I’d respond, why call yourself a national anarchist at all? How is a nation defined (especially if you use it in the sense that the Tribes editorial does as in nation = tribes)? I’d then laugh at the use of the term atheist in the same breath as race. You can claim all humans are of the same biological race (and I’d agree) but to say that “Race does not exist” is laughably stupid. But let’s not get distracted. If the post-modern definition of a nation, or a tribe, is possible, which I’m not sure it is, the place where it was articulated best was in the 80’s by the (not)anarchist, (not)utopian book bolo’bolo. Filled with a world where alco-bolos and les-bolos live together in perfect harmony. Let’s talk about this body of ideas in a context we share… which obviously doesn’t involve KP. In this two episode block we discuss our discomfort with KP’s approach (the first two episodes focus on the nationalism question in the context of bolo’bolo, the third on the context of bolo’bolo itself) and ask how to discuss nationalism at all in a modern (ie dramaful) context. Episode 81 – I discuss the specifics of what it means to be Indian (aka native americans or indigenous folk on turtle island) using terms like nation with Dominique. Episode 82 – Chisel and I discuss the topic of nationalism Episode 83 – I chat with the editor of Minor Compositions (an Autonomedia imprint) Stevphen Shukaitis about bolo’bolo and his general outlook. The episode barely counts as being on the general topic but it tries. 🙂 Email us at thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org We appreciate correspondence (1486)

I spent a week at the Labadie Collection this summer. I highly recommend it for any anarchist who wants to have a different, fuller relationship to anarchist texts. The librarians are great and very understanding of the anarchy people. While I was there I ran into the anarchist-known-as-Nikita who was doing a variety of great projects. One of them, which I’ll update with website information if/when that is available is Labadie related. It is an oral history project much like Paul Avrich’s Anarchist Voices (the expanded version from Anarchist Portraits which I believe is widely available). Our good friend Audrey was in Anarchist Voices and having a written remembrance of here is still very sweet. When Nikita invited me to participate in this new (unnamed?) project I overcame my hesitance and here is the result. I broke it into two parts for your entertainment. Part II – Publishing and being involved in so much drama as a result Email us at thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org We appreciate correspondence (1031)

I spent a week at the Labadie Collection this summer. I highly recommend it for any anarchist who wants to have a different, fuller relationship to anarchist texts. The librarians are great and very understanding of the anarchy people. While I was there I ran into the anarchist-known-as-Nikita who was doing a variety of great projects. One of them, which I’ll update with website information if/when that is available is Labadie related. It is an oral history project much like Paul Avrich’s Anarchist Voices (the expanded version from Anarchist Portraits which I believe is widely available). Our good friend Audrey was in Anarchist Voices and having a written remembrance of here is still very sweet. When Nikita invited me to participate in this new (unnamed?) project I overcame my hesitance and here is the result. I broke it into two parts for your entertainment. Part I – The Late Eighties and Nineties. Anarchy and Punk. How do we live this thing? Traveler kid stories. Moving from the Midwest to the Bay Area Email us at thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org We appreciate correspondence (1287)

Layla is a pleasure to talk to and so the fact that she is in this series of podcasts is a bit of a misnomer. Which is not to say that we agree so much as to say that our disagreements aren’t the focus of our conversation here. I’m happy to, and ended up, set Layla up to present her ideas and projects for the general anarchist space. I think they are interesting and more importantly, how she came to this place is very interesting. That is the bulk of this episode. That said, if I were going to try to articulate how I think we should disagree with each other I’d start with information/data. Most of the “hot takes” I see on social media and whatnot start a disagreement off my misrepresenting someone else’s position. Layla is a vegan anarcho-primitivist but I am not, in fact, interested enough in either topic (especially from the perspective of trying to somehow win them) to talk about them. But Layla is interested especially in how these principles (or ideologies depending on your point of view) apply to children, raising children, and literature around children. This is very interesting to me (especially as a non-breeder) and I really appreciated the chance to think about something deep and different than I would normally absolutely fulfilling. Check out Layla in her own words Email us at thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org We appreciate correspondence (1126)

Many of you will have heard of NAASN, the North American attempt at creating an academic anarchist event. It has has nine events around North America. I’ve attended about 4-5 of them and our guest this week is somehow involved in the event/project. Nathan Jun is not just an academic though, he is also a social media commentator and the editor of a new collection of Hipolyte Havel essays by AK Press. What is old is new again! This discussion doesn’t sell any books or ideologies. We attempt to talk through our fundamental disagreements and perspectives to what feels like a productive end. I’m not so sure that is what my takeaway from the conversation should be though as just yesterday NJ threw out another bag of flaming shit about one of the projects I’m involved in. I guess no good deed goes unpunished and public anarchist projects are a cesspool compared to… Anyway, I really enjoyed this conversation with NJ and hope it begins a productive series of conversations with people who I don’t really agree with, but who are also interested in anarchist theory. Email – thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org We appreciate correspondence (933)

Rotn and I (along with Belligerence who doesn’t talk much) use the opportunity of me being in town to talk about aging, peers, and whatnot. Enjoy Email – thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org We appreciate correspondence (780)

For anyone who has met Cody (ie if you’ve been around the west coast anarchist or communization space for the past 10 years) it is highly doubtful you’ve forgotten him. He has a huge personality and is an outspoken advocate of… that is what we discuss during this episode. If a heretic is someone whose position is hard to understand based on the company they keep and the actions they take then Cody may be a heretic but if you pull the lens back one click and see the field something else emerges. Often times I’m confronted with choices that really want to be solved by making either/or decisions. I try to turn them into both/and choices and am called a fool. It is clear from this conversation with Cody that he is a similar kind of fool. Note we are breaking in a new audio engineer. Please comment on success! Email – thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org We appreciate correspondence (809)

The second interview is the heretic series is long time anarchist heretic Rotn. Rotn and I met just before the “battle in Seattle” that really boosted his notoriety (he appeared in 60 minutes in the following weeks) and is a great start to a two decade long friendship. During about a decade of that friendship we were publishing rivals. Me with Anarchy: A Journal of Desire Armed and he with Green Anarchy. This conversation should have happened some time ago as our chemistry and spiritedness is apparent. If you want to ask us questions for a deeper discussion on topics, leave a comment here or email us! Email – thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org We appreciate correspondence (1358)

In the process of thinking about what is an anarchist position in 2018 I was struck by how many people, and perspectives, aren’t going to fit in to any definition. This probably was what interested me in post-left anarchism 20 years ago–not that the bearded men of the 19th century weren’t eclectic and open-minded, but by the end of the 20th century anarchists, by and large, did not appear to be. My first exposure to milieu anarchists was at a collective restaurant that had a type of infoshop connected to it. While I was aggressively trying to come to terms with living and learning about anarchy, the dude bros who inhabited that infoshop were actively suppressing any position other than theirs. It was red, collectivist, and very connected to the broader milieu (they even knew Chumbawumba). This so-called infoshop was not a place to get information about any perspective but the one of its inhabitants. Even though I’ve been hostile to 75% of the anarchist space most of my time here, I have always done my damnedest to inform people where they can go to find “their people,” if they are articulate enough to give me a hint as to who those people are. As much as I might disagree with a syndicalist, workerist, or strugglist I have always paid enough attention to them to point the way to the people who need to be there. The last thing I want is to create an orthodoxy and trap people inside of it. Run, forest, run! To that end I have spent much of my life with people who fit no orthodoxy and never will. Whether due to temperament, ideas, or personality, this next series of podcasts includes some conversations with these people. This is not the heresy of a religious order but the heresy of strange, goofy people who happen to be fellow travelers to an anarchy of bruises and disorder. This first interview is with a long-term friend and participant in the weekly anarchist study group in Berkeley CA. Lew is a wild consumer of philosophy and magick (yes, with a mother-fucking k). You never find him without a pile of books (mostly continental philosophy) and recent magazines on marxism and theory. He quotes from the high theorists of heresy; Blake, Benjamin, and Bey. Lew is a feature of the study group and a wild idea man. In the fight between poetry and facts, he has picked the same side as me. The side of the beautiful losers. Email – thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org We appreciate correspondence (1021)

As you can imagine doing these little series of conversations is a tiny bit harder than I anticipated. I was hoping to have all of these available to you around the end of April. There is a ton of content locked up waiting for this to come out and I look forward to sharing it with you but… Egoism! IV! We begin our discussion with Bellamy with a slightly off-topic discussion about catastrophe and leaf cutter ants (and eusocial insects). Around minute thirteen the Stirner begins. There is a quibble about the new title (and some nerdy translation talk). There is some history talk (Proudhon and Marx are discussed). What is to be done? Corrosive Consciousness is discussed, as is Bellamy’s new project Backwoods. What it is is not a program. It is a mode of analysis. The moment you believe you have more power, you do. Sound editing by birds! Music Intro: OBSTRUCTION – “Pressure Breaks” Outro: POLICE DE MOEURS – “Out from the Void” (Antisect) Email – thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org We appreciate correspondence (1532)

In this third episode my goal was to talk to someone who was newer to egoist ideas. My hope was to see how these ideas layer over time, but at an earlier time slice. Daniel/birds was gracious enough to sit through this conversation but I suspect they were agitated at the idea that they were a newbie to egoist ideas. Of course they aren’t! but the last two interviews were with known egoists. Anyway, this was a useful conversation because it does establish a baseline from which to understand what this egoism thing is all about. It is worth noting that Daniel is doing the sound editing for these past few episodes and is doing a fantastic job! Audio Intro: FASTIDIO – “Generación” // Outro: RIXE – “Condamné” Email us at the Brilliant (1580)

In this second part of our series on egoism I discuss illegalism as the natural answer of “What is to be done? with regard to egoism” with the editor of the LBC book Enemies of Society. We discuss the context of France around the turn of the 20th century. Bonnot and crew are discussed. Shoplifting and other modest acts of illegalism are discussed. We discuss hope and the future (ha). This episode is both more fanciful and more practical than our first episode on egoism. Be warned. Email us at the Brilliant Enemies of Society Disruptive Elements (1803)

This is the first part in a series (part of the over-arching theme of The Brilliant in 2018) on egoism. While not an egoist myself I consider myself a fellow traveler and consider egoism to a core theoretical concept in anarchist thinking for better and worse. Post-left anarchism is a modern, North American, veneer on egoism. The Situationists, while arguably marxist, were also using thematic elements from egoism (especially The Treatise). Several prominent North American anarchists have been working on Stirner and the general concepts around egoism for decades. For anyone following the themes we cover in The Brilliant, post-left anarchism, or Stirner our guest this episode needs no introduction. Wolfi Landstreicher has been a translator, writer, and merry interlocutor for decades. He has been an inspiration for my own projectuality for a long time and I count him as a friend. Our conversation in this issue is centered on the effort Wolfi made in translating The Unique and all the details around it. Enjoy. Mail us PS Note that this episode is the first effort of our newest sound engineer. Welcome Daniel (birds)! (4642)

Scott Crow has been a good friend for nearly a decade (!!!). We agree on almost nothing except on how to disagree. As a grown adult I’ve probably had the longest conversations on record with Scott. We are both talkers. We both have a bit too much pride in our ability to convince people by using our words. I’m not sure we ever consider ourselves convinced, or convincable, by others. We power on. Anyway, this conversation rotates around the axis of social change. Scott is a well known “social changer” and I am not. I am largely critical of the way social changers minds work but there is something there. Something I still desire, even though I hate the whens and wheres in the here in now. How can we think about big change without hope in it? In this episode, and as a way to introduce anarchism in 2018, Scott and I try.

Dominique is a close friend. If we didn’t live in the big city we’d probably be closer but here we are. Two particles flying around the same center at different speeds. I’m slowing down. He is speeding up. We have been working around the conversation of Indigenous Anarchy for a number of years but perhaps you haven’t seen that. Black Seed is the platform we are trying to do this work but this conversation is as clear as I think we are capable of being around the topic. Here is our interview in Black Seed 3 – https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/aragorn-there-s-no-place-to-go Here is a link to get issue 5 – https://littleblackcart.com/journals/black-seed-5/ Here is the general Black Seed link – http://blackseed.anarchyplanet.org/ email us at

Most recently Klee has been a movie maker but is also known as a musician and media activist. I interviewed him in the first few issues of Black Seed but that really isn’t where our relationship begins. I’d say our friendship begins exactly where most should, in humor. Klee is one of the first “radical” people I’ve ever met who has joked and criticized and laughed with me as soon as we met. I hope that current is obvious in this discussion which centers on the core of Turtle Island anarchism. Enjoy and make sure to email us (1666)

In this season three opener we review what the intention is for the 2018 season. This initial set of four conversations (of which this first is more of a presentation) cover four themes. Second Wave Anarchy, Indigenous anarchism, the (im)possibility of social change, and Earth centeredness. This is to set the stage for an anarchism without limits, without the left, and without sounding so doom & gloom. For further information on these themes Links Second Wave Anarchy John Moore Desert or LBC physical book link Dark Mountain Manifesto Russell Means 2017 BASTARD Chronicles – Boom! Thank you so much for your attention and feedback. Mail us (2108)

The goal of this series is to discuss our critique(s) of technology and how these critiques have changed in the past few decades. Specifically we are discussing new technologies like mobile and Internet technology. Communication has changed. How we access information has changed. How has this meant that we have changed too? Episode 59 – Gerardo (haters to the left) Episode 60 – Paul Z Simons (wandering post-left anarchist) Episode 61 – Ramon Elani (black seed editor) Episode 62 – Rydra! (Free Radical Radio) Episode 63 – Jason McQuinn (Modern Slavery editor, A:JODA creator) The intention of this series of podcasts is not to do your work for you. It isn’t to tell you what to do or think. It is to examine the weaknesses of a set of thirty year old critiques of technology to our current situation. Especially in the context of the tremendous growth and change of information technologies like the Internet. The final episode is Season two and in our series on technology is a conversation with Jason McQuinn where we tackle technology but also many other concepts. Join us! Thank you so much for your attention and feedback. Mail us (1384)

The goal of this series is to discuss our critique(s) of technology and how these critiques have changed in the past few decades. Specifically we are discussing new technologies like mobile and Internet technology. Communication has changed. How we access information has changed. How has this meant that we have changed too? Episode 59 – Gerardo (haters to the left) Episode 60 – Paul Z Simons (wandering post-left anarchist) Episode 61 – Ramon Elani (black seed editor) Episode 62 – Rydra! (Free Radical Radio) Episode 63 – Jason McQuinn (Modern Slavery editor, A:JODA creator) Rydra is the former host, and now ringleader, of the Free Radical Radio which transitioned from a conversational podcast into a sort of anarchist reading rainbow program. Recent episodes include “A Burglar’s Guide to the City” and “The Broken Teapot”. Check it out here http://www.freeradicalradio.net/ Rydra is a big personality. Our conversation is easy because he has opinions and even if they are wrong opinions are easier to talk to than the cagey motherfuckers I usually have on the show. We even, recently, had a conversation that was interesting, nuanced, and careful that the guest pleaded I didn’t share after it happened. Rydra would never do that. They make big mistakes all the time. Joy. Thank you so much for your attention and feeback. Mail us (1176)

The goal of this series is to discuss our critique(s) of technology and how these critiques have changed in the past few decades. Specifically we are discussing new technologies like mobile and Internet technology. Communication has changed. How we access information has changed. How has this meant that we have changed too? Episode 59 – Gerardo (haters to the left) Episode 60 – Paul Z Simons (wandering post-left anarchist) Episode 61 – Ramon Elani (black seed editor) Episode 62 – Rydra! (Free Radical Radio) Episode 63 – Jason McQuinn (Modern Slavery editor, A:JODA creator) Ramon Elani has entered our lives in a rush of output and energy. He is part of the new crew of Black Seed editors (starting issue 5). He has contributed content to both the Dark Mountain project and Gods and Radicals. One of the most denounced articles in Atassa 1 was written by Ramon. He is a post-academic (who is healing fast), that lives in the country, and attends to babies and whatnot. You can find the bulk of his creative output at his blog https://thetigersleap.wordpress.com/. You can give him all the monies at https://www.patreon.com/runewhisper. Our conversation ranges from academic poop (Hegel & Derrida) to Zerzan. I start saying “as far as I’m concerned” for some strange reason. What does a post-Heidegger critique of technology look like? Messiness! Rewilding is not enough (BS#5 reference). Hard rejection vs Soft rejection (Attack vs personal action). Facebook. Jung. Inward vs outward looking? Is technology fluid? We get into anthropology critique. Health (goop reference). Solutions, ha. Propoganda and anti-blackseedness. Indigeneity. How do we call out people for being sub-awesome without participating in what is horrible about call-out culture. Sacrifice. Intertwined. Thank you so much for your attention and feeback. Mail us (1207)

The goal of this series is to discuss our critique(s) of technology and how these critiques have changed in the past few decades. Specifically we are discussing new technologies like mobile and Internet technology. Communication has changed. How we access information has changed. How has this meant that we have changed too? Episode 59 – Gerardo (haters to the left) Episode 60 – Paul Z Simons (wandering post-left anarchist) Episode 61 – Ramon Elani (black seed editor) Episode 62 – Jason McQuinn (Modern Slavery editor, A:JODA creator) Paul requires no introduction to most The Brilliant listeners. He is a long time friend and collaborator (Check out Black Eye). He is an editor of Modern Slavery. He has been involved in AJODA and a ton of other projects. Most recently he has been proselytizing “black anarchy” and is based in São Paulo, Brazil. We spend the first twelve minutes catching up on what Brazil is like, what Paul is fascinated with currently, what sectarian anarchism looks like in South America before we get to the topic of technology. Paul describes the Internet provocatively as a weapon of war. email us at The Brilliant email address (1133)

This is a discussion with Andy Robinson. One of my favorite recent AJODA authors. Part of my interest in discussing exclusion was to begin to formulate a Grand Theory of Exclusion (I am only partially joking) to describe the why, how, and whatnot of why so many anarchists (that interest me) are excluded from most/many social situations. What organ do anarchists have (or have not) that forces them to make socially unacceptable choices. How does this relate/not relate to the desire for a total transformation of society? Can one be a revolutionary and anti-social? How about disliked? Andy is one of the few people who seems capable of talking/building theory on the fly so this conversation was particularly special to me. I had a blast having it and look forward to seeing what my people do with this raw material in future projects that attack the smiling happy people who make the rest of us feel bad by way of exclusion. Contact us at thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org (1814)

This is the third of four conversations about exclusion. This is an interview with Mitchell Halberstadt. He wrote a provocative essay back when I was with AJODA and I’ve stayed in contact with him every since. That said he has burned every anarchist bridge available to him since then. He’s been escorted out of several BASTARD conferences. He is one of the few not-houseless people banned from the Long Haul. He is the very definition of a social pariah. Halberstadt observes, “With 20/20 hindsight, I wish I’d invoked the name of Lenny Bruce. That might have avoided a lot of verbiage. Then again, I’m an original in my own right. It’s my hope that this interview succeeds in establishing that, in contradistinction to the notion that I ought to be viewed predominantly as a pariah.” This conversation is an attempt to grapple with why this is the state of affairs and who is MH. It was an enjoyable conversation for me for the way it tells a story about post-Stonewall NYC, a time when the Bay was still friendly to freaks, and what happens (inevitably?) as one ages. Contact us at thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org (991)

This is a discussion with Soren and Dominique. You have met Soren before as she was the star of episode 52 and before that we had a brief conversion on a TOTW about her “art” experiment of torturing Internet creeps. Dominique was introduced to many of you in our Black Seed #3 conversation that now lives on the Anarchist Library. Both of these people are my friends and our comfort level here shows. I’m not sure what else to say about this conversation as introduction other than it is chapter 2 in the 4 chapter sequence on Exclusion. I hope you get something out of this effort and please contact us at our email address for discussion and more. (1170)

This is the first of three conversations about exclusion in the @ space. In the old days I used to say that the only interesting people in punk were the ones in bands, doing zines, putting on shows. The active punks. Today I think it is fair to say that many, if not most, of the interesting people in the anarchist space have been excluded from some anarchist body. Sometimes it looks like typical social clique bullshit. Other times like fucking purges. This episode is the second step on a process on how to think about exclusion, how we are for and against it, how we learn and grow from it, and what is means for the anarchist space that exclusion is so central to it. In this conversation with Ben we learn about homogeneity, Portland, effectiveness vs maybe principles?, and like usual the gap between people and society. The first step of this process, for me btw, was the workshop I did for this years BASTARD Conference. Here is the writeup of that. This is a basic conversation that, if successful, will question a basic anarchist principle and point a way torward thinking about how to form pods of human activity in a possible, viable future. We will discuss what is social, society, and at what numerical breaks are different kinds of organizations possible and impossible. Mostly we’d like to talk about exclusion as a consequence of how this society is ordered but also how utopia planning is largely a reactionary and conservative process. We are against it. As always email us at the brilliant email address. (1469)

This is the last of the pre-planned hour long conversations with Isaac Cronin. We intend on doing at least one more episode on questions listeners have for Isaac so ask them as a comment to this episode or email them to The Brilliant email address. In this hour we see how the situationist analysis evolves into other aspects of life and continues to evolve itself. As Isaac aged and took on new adventures (like fatherhood) new challenges arose. In this hour we discuss how his sons health became the catalyst to entirely new direction in his thinking. As always, we thank Isaac for doing this project with me. Linn O’mable for their sound editing (they just visited us and blew our minds while watching them work). While the work will not save us, it tends to be a lot more interesting than most of the responses to it. (1040)

As most listeners know The Brilliant is related to a few other public projects, namely Little Black Cart (LBC) a publisher and distributor of anarchist books and material. Recently LBC has been called out and generally indicted by a host of individuals and projects for publishing texts by and about with the Mexican group ITS (individual tending to the wild), in particular the eco-extremist journal Atassa. This indictment reached a fever pitch when a few motivated individuals approached the LBC table at the Seattle Anarchist Bookfair to castigate them for the publishing and punctuated this by tearing a book apart. Around the same time an article was released saying that this publishing meant that LBC was not an anarchist project. Here is the LBC response. This week something like a reportback of the kerfuffle happened. Alongside a great conversation on anarchistnews.org there have been several, fairly specific, threats made against LBC, its people, and promises made about next weeks Bay Area Anarchist Bookfair. While camping (and practicing what I believe will be the shape of future anarchist events) a group of us got together to discuss recent events, strategize next weekends events (which will include the 2017 BASTARD conference), and discuss the current way in which anarchist disagreements are performed. Enjoy the conversation. Thanks a ton to the participants and especially to Linn O’Mable who turned this episode around in a heartbeat. (1812)

This is a discussion with Soren Cate who is a local anarchist friend of mine who I interviewed a few months ago for the @news podcast and mostly we discussed an art project they had worked on that explored the crossover between heteronormative internet dating culture and suffering. They have also done a newsprint publication called Trigger Journal “catarealism: below/against realism. waging war on reality and fantasy, one ugly moment at a time.” They wrote an article (with Dominique) for issue 5 of Black Seed and recently joined the new Black Seed collective group. We discuss age, local anarchist stuff, gender things, and more. Email us at thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org Tick Tock 1:00 Shout out to Slingshot! 3:00 Trolling project 6:00 Online dating 10:00 History of @ Internet 12:00 Black Seed issue 5 19:00 alt-right clowns 24:00 doxxing 29:00 polarized individuality 36:00 affirmative consent 43:00 More options around post-“bad things happening” 46:00 Reasons for coupledness 51:00 More anarchist models (Audrey stories) (1038)

Dr. Bones is a phenomenon that can only exist on the Internet. They are currently of face of egoist communism and only heard of Stirner through (social media) memes and who covers their face with a hammer and sickly scarf. A practitioner of Hoodoo whose most recent picture upload features a laptop surrounded by PBR. This is a traditional interview in that I attempt to get them to talk about their ideas but am not exactly sure I know what to make of their particular combination of folk magic, enthusiasm, and opinionated political perspectives. Dr. Bones is a far better self promoter than I am so take that how you will and enjoy this near conversation. Tick Tock 1:30 Hoodoo & Slavery 4:15 Africa, Catholicism, Protestantism 8:00 Cultural Appropriation 13:00 Colonialism and cultural continuity 18:00 Lots of race talk 22:00 There are plenty of toys for everyone 27:00 Practical magic 31:00 The Revolution 34:00 Hungarian Revolution 40:00 Anarchism 43:30 Burn the Plantation 49:00 Some ITS review 52:30 Dr Bones book and an anti-economic program via magic (with a k?) (1869)

There have been quite a few critical essays, rants, and podcasts about how horrible any curiosity about ITS by anarchists is. This chatter has increased in volume and intensity since ITS Communique 29 which threw down the glove on any illusion that ITS didn’t mean it. This communique admits to the murder of a female University student and two hikers. In this conversation we (Bellamy and I) attempt to distance ourselves from ITS, from their actions, but not from the challenge they represent. If I were to have a hope it would be that this ends my involvement in conversations about ITS as I think we’ve taken this as far as we could but I’m sure there will be another week or two of kerfuffle. Tick Tock :30 Catching up with Bellamy 2:00 Communique 29 – Bellamy 4:00 A! on violence-ism 5:00 What is a project of liberation? 9:00 Critical departure from @. What does that look like? 14:30 Transformative violence 17:00 What did Lenin say about white gloves? 21:20 Are ITS nihilists or “christians” (for lack of better language) 26:50 Do words mean anything? 29:00 Is there an anarcho-nihilism? 37:00 The social anarchist critique of eco-extremism 38:30 Freedom (Is there such a thing as freer?) btw the reference is to The Anarchist Tension and not Armed Joy. Oops. 44:00 What it’s like to be the focus of five minutes of hate 50:20 Good faith, quotations, snarl words, logical fallacies, and getting smacked 54:00 Who is responsible for other peoples bad behavior 59:30 At least we are talking about ideas? 1:05 Team sports email at thebrilliant@thebrilliant.org (1825)

This is the seventh interview with Isaac Cronin and it pertains to all the specifics of the film he made with his partner Call it Sleep. If you’d like to discuss any aspect of this podcast email us (824)