> Marx lived in the 19th century, whereas today's North American
> anarchists live in the 21st century. Shouldn't people of color expect
> some progress after more than 150 years?
>
> Rather than progress, there has been regress in the anarchist movement,
> which is whiter today than during the days of the IWW. Worth analyzing
> what caused the regress, in my opinion.
Sorry, Yoshie, but you are making an unfair comparison here. The anarchist movement in the United States wen through a long period of decline that lasted many decades, basically from the 1920s to the 1990s, with a brief spike in the late 60s and early 70s. A more accurate comparison would be to compare the current North American anarchist movement to what it was like 5 or 10 years ago. Since the North American anarchist movement has only really grown exponentially in the past five years, I would compare the demographics now to the situation in 1997-98. From what I've seen, there are more people of color in the North American anarchist movement now than there were 5 or 10 years ago. Last March I attended the Bay Area Anarchist Conference, which had a considerable number of people of color in attendance.
I wouldn't say that I'm happy with the current state of the North American movement on this subject, but many anarchists feel the same way I do. The anarchist movement has put alot of time, energy, and resources into addressing this issue. It's not that easy for us, since we aren't recruiting-oriented like most of the socialist groups. And we have this problem with the white punk anarchist ghetto (which is a good problem to have by the way, since the punk movement sustained the anarchist movement through many dark years).
In any case, it is unfair to compare the contemporary anarchist movement to the days of the early IWW (the IWW is still around!). It has not enjoyed the continuity that the socialist and communist movements have enjoyed in the latter half of the 20th century, although things are looking up for us anarchists.
Yoshie Furuhashi wrote again:
>
> It's up to anarchists to figure out if it is wrong or racist or if it is
> a problem at all. As a socialist currently residing in the USA, I think
> socialists should do better than the US military, corporations, the
> Bretton Woods institutions, etc. If I were an anarchist, I would think
> that anarchists should do better than the US military, corporations, the
> Bretton Woods institutions, etc. also.
I agree, but this isn't a problem that is easily solved. The U.S. military can offer people jobs and economic stability.
What would be wrong is if anarchists or socialists weren't trying to rectify this problem. But neither tendency isn't trying.
> I've found the following essay by Lorenzo Komboa Ervin on the subject,
> which argues that it's a problem that the anarchist movement is
> "overwhelmingly white" and looks like a "white rights" movement:
Lorenzo's essay is pretty good, but please understand that it was written several years ago.
Thomas Seay wrote:
> You seem to imply that American anarchists are "wrong"
> or perhaps even "racist" because it is (or so you say)
> whiter than other groups.
>
> Does the fact that the Democrats or the Republicans
> for that matter have black members make them "right"?
>
> Back in my leninist days (a long long time ago) I
> belonged to the Communist Workers Party which was BY
> FAR more racially heterogeneous than any of the
> existing left parties in the USA. What did that mean?
> Did it mean we we had the correct "line"? Should
> people have just automatically signed up with us
> because we had large numbers of blacks, hispanics and
> asians? Is that the criterion?
>
> Of course that is what we thought. It was just
> tokenism, which is a rabid form of racism on the Left
> (and, in the case of Republicans, the Right).
I've been very upset lately that some people on the Left have started accusing anarchists of being racists, not including people of color, and sometimes suggesting that anarchism is a racist ideology. This are all desperate attacks from people who simply can't stomache the existence of anarchists.
Another hurdle that anarchists face is that we don't place an emphasis on recruiting new anarchists. We like to see our numbers increase and we share our ideas, but I think we prefer that people really think about stuff before identifying as an anarchist. Another problem with simply identifying anarchists with the anarchist movement is that there are many anarchists out there who don't use the label. A friend was telling me recently about a local nurse who is very much against the state and has socialist politics, but they don't call themselves an anarchist.
Chuck0
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