@SUB HEAD LG = L&R GIVES BAD HEADLINE @LTRTXTNOIND = @LTRTXTNOIND = Dear Love and Rage, @LETTER TEXT = As a gay man, I've been annoyed all my life by hearing people say that such-and-such unpleasant thing sucks. This common piece of slang contributes a steady drip of anti-gay prejudice into all our lives, mostly by people who never think about the meaning of what they say. @LETTER TEXT = The dictionary defines suck in the slang sense as to be extremely or disgustingly unpleasant or objectionable. ``Disgustingly'' makes the connection to cocksucking. That sucks gets its emotional force from the idea of cocksucking as dirty and disgusting. Of course, when we say this we're not usually thinking directly about cocksucking. Like many terms in the language, this one has lost its direct connection with the idea that lies behind it. But if you think about sucks as a figure of speech, what is it referring to? There are several different slang uses of sucking or sucker (never give a sucker an even break; he comes sucking around when he needs a favor; that sucks). With a little thought they can be traced to different actions. The idea of sucking as degrading, disgusting, or unpleasant probably relates to cocksucking. The idea is not just that the act is disgusting, but that the person who does it is disgusting too. Someone will say of a particularly nasty task, That job was a real cocksucker, or for short, That job sucked. @LETTER TEXT = So I was bothered to see Love and Rage, which ought to know better, use sucks (spelling changed) in two headlines in the most recent issue (Sept.-Oct.-Nov. 1992): Skool Suks, and on the same page Oolskay Uksay. I'm not accusing anybody of sexism; nobody was thinking cocksucking when they wrote the headline. Unfortunately, nobody was thinking at all when they wrote the headline, and that's what I'd like to change. I'm not asking us to PC each other to death. I'd be quite happy if people were just to think about the possible connections between the slang term and the actual act that most of us approve of (whether or not we engage in it), and draw whatever conclusions seem best. @BODY TEXT R = Love (predominantly), @BODY TEXT R = Chris Hobson @BODY TEXT R = New York, NY @SUB HEAD LG = <%-4>MAKING PUCKS A THREAT AGAIN<%0> @BODY NO IND = @BODY NO IND = Hey, @LETTER TEXT = The Profane Existence Collective challenges you hapless Love and Ragers to a game of hockey any day (street or ice) to determine once and for all who is the coolest anarchist paper in North America. Not that we really don't already know, heh heh. @LETTER TEXT = Please get mohawks, especially Matt, @BODY TEXT R = Joel @BODY TEXT R = Profane Existence @BODY TEXT R = Minneapolis, MN @SUB HEAD LG = RIGOROUS DEBATE @BODY NO IND = @BODY NO IND = Paul, @LETTER TEXT = I'm glad you wrote your letter in response to In the Belly of the Beast. I have two things to say in response to your letter. The first is about what you wrote, and the second is about the fact that you wrote. @LETTER TEXT = You wrote that while you don't oppose confrontational politics, you think it is necessary to bear in mind, particularly when not in a revolutionary moment, that the ideological component of conflict and order function such that confrontations and actions can be counterproductive, misunderstood, or authoritarian, even as they are perceived as revolutionary acts by some. @LETTER TEXT = I don't have your letter in front of me as I write this, so I hope I'm not misrepresenting your statements. Are we on the same wavelength? I hope so, because, if we are, I agree with you about this and commend your addition of this important and necessary dimension to the recent debate about action. @LETTER TEXT = I'm glad if your letter is a sign that we can start to move beyond the armchair anarchist vs. cult of action dichotomy and begin to transcend the moralistic view that actions have absolute meaning and inherent effects (e.g. this is revolutionary while that is bourgeois, or this is heretical while that is holy) in favor of a relativistic, social definition of actions as playing this role in this circumstance and having this or that effect then. (If I were a little less abstract here, we could title this Streetfighting: Utopian and Scientific. Get it? Little Engels joke.) I would hope we could begin to think more strategically and less prejudicially about using action instrumentally to effectively reach the goals we seek, even as these goals develop and change dialectically through our experiences with action. I'm being vague, but its a start. @LETTER TEXT = I guess it's useful to note something about the context of the argument I was making. Its understandable that you took it as an argument against the passiveists, since just about every pro-action argument in the anti-authoritarian movement seems to be just that; however, my arguments came from another context. I wrote it as an argument against a different dichotomy. It was given as a speech at the Class War conference last year, meant to stress that we live in a global economic system and must each struggle solidly from our own position in that system, whether that means from the elite capitalist core of the empire, from the advanced industrial working class, from the elite of the tricontinent, or from the periphery in any state. I was writing this in argument with those who said revolution is about class or race, who said we have to have a working-class revolution or support national liberation struggles. In part, too, I was trying to articulate something about the specific location of middle-class anti-capitalists in the United States and Europe. I guess it only matters to point out the difference made by the context (the emphasis on confrontation you perceived as compared with the emphasis on class I meant), because that gives me a nice chance to warn, once more, against the dangers of transplanting politics. (Ah, see what an opportunist I am?!) @LETTER TEXT = The second thing I wanted to say in response to your letter has nothing to do with what you wrote. I was excited about your letter well before I read it. We are not living in a revolutionary moment in this country. In such a (revolutionary) moment, the immediate reality of everyday lives would force on our thinking, as revolutionaries, a rigor and depth uncommon in more settled times. It is one of the tasks of a revolutionary movement to create the conditions for revolutionary moments to result in the emergence of a better society rather than in a new and greater dominance and oppression. One of the ways such a movement can do this is by demanding of itself that it approach in its thinking the rigor and depth of the revolutionary moment. To me, this is one of the main purposes of a revolutionary paper. Without it, many are drawn to left parties precisely because these parties try to, and sometimes do, provide this stimulus and this intellectual community. I watch people go to these parties with a combination of sadness, disgust, and a small bit of understanding. Afterward, I wander around in a state of despair that the anarchist/radical movement can't seem to fulfill these functions well enough. I am heartened and happily reminded by your letter that it is not necessary to belong to a party to have constructive, rigorous debate. Thanks. @BODY TEXT R = Kate Star @BODY TEXT R = Chicago, IL @SUB HEAD LG = WOMEN AND CLASS WAR @BODY NO IND = @BODY NO IND = Dear Love and Rage, @LETTER TEXT = This is a late reply to Kate Star's article on the Class War International Conference in a recent issue of Love and Rage (Vol. 3, #4), late because I only saw the article recently. @LETTER TEXT = Although the introduction was one of the most accurate accounts of the Class War Federation I've seen, I would like to refute nearly everything else in the article. Here goes, @LETTER TEXT = Because your political analysis does not include an understanding of class you are doomed to go round in circles for eternity. The reaction of the white working class to immigration is not, as you say, central to determining the power in the hands of the right! Racism exists only to serve capitalism, and is used by them to divide our class, just as is sexism, homophobia, etc. You argue that German reunification has as one of its functions to provide a native and white workforce to the country. It could be more realistically argued that German reunification was more along the lines of uniting Europe economically. The state itself doesn't give a toss on how many black people are in the country, only in so far as this can be used to promote division within the working class. The only color the state is interested in is the green colour of currency. @LETTER TEXT = As for your being offended by a male comrade at a conference asking whether or not you were coming to a social that evening, you only had to tell him to fuck off, as I would have done had I seen it as an offence, rather than condemning the whole of Class War as a bunch of revolting sexists. Your attitude to women involved with Class War is particularly patronizing. Women members of Class War are involved in the Federation at all levels: paper group editorial, Heavy Stuff editorial, the lot. @LETTER TEXT = American anarchists in particular seem not to understand the basis of Class War. Our organisation is made up of working class people, including many survivors of lifestylist anarchist politics. It is a class struggle organisation whose main aims are to promote revolutionary ideas and understanding whilst working alongside the rest of our class (75% of the population!). You refer to the inappropriateness of simplistic class-based organising... oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. When I'm selling Class War in the town, and a pensioner buys a copy, or someone on their lunch hour from work, or kids stopping to make cheeky comments, or an upper class hysteric takes the time to be offended, I know I'm going in the right direction away from any lifestylist anarchist ghetto and @BODY TEXT R = Towards Revolution! @BODY TEXT R = Julie @BODY TEXT R = Tyneside Class War member @BODY TEXT R = UK @SUB HEAD LG = KILLING RAPISTS? @BODY TEXT R = @BODY NO IND = Dear Love and Rage, @LETTER TEXT = Chiquita La Pistolera wrote in the last issue (Vol. 3, #6) of Class War's exclusion of wimmin from their call to revolution. The only women's issue they raised, she comments, is rape, which they call an anti-social crime and advocate killing rapists. @LETTER TEXT = I'm taking a deep breath because I have a lot to say. O.K. First off, what is rape? It is an act of terrorist violence against women. The definition of rape which we use (forced intercourse) is only one kind of rape, the most common in European nations. Elsewhere, genital mutilation, forced marriage, purdah, etc. are more common acts of terrorism. @LETTER TEXT = Rape is so common that if every rapist were executed, the Holocaust would pale in comparison. We are talking about the system of patriarchy when we speak of rape. We are not talking about a handful of maundering lunatics. @LETTER TEXT = Killing is a patriarchal solution; it is not a revolution; it does not value living. Passivity too (as in passive resistance) opposes the revolutionary's basic agenda: life. Audre Lorde has written: the master's tools will never dismantle the master's house. We need to learn this; as anarchists and feminists we understand that we need to overthrow the oppressive systems as well as the individuals who enforce the systems. We know that the revolution begins when we free ourselves from state/family/religion/language/class/school teaching of obedience and submission and passivity. The master's solutions to problems are part of the master's system. Rape is part of (inherent in) patriarchy. So is killing. @LETTER TEXT = I am an advocate of self-defense, absolutely. I would be hard pressed to deny the validity of an attentat against Bush and the Supreme Court (except the media would make them into Great Martyrs). But I question whether a revolution fought in blood can overcome the ideology of war which supports the oppressor. @LETTER TEXT = Two other points I wanted to make: first, by excluding half the human race, Class War dooms itself to failure; second the assumption that class is the oppression around which the oppressed will rally, so the-we-might-as well-forget-the-other-oppressions ideology was already passé in the 19th century. In the last couple of issues, challenges have been thrown to the feminist movement to cease all alliances with the fanatical right-wing (i.e., anti-porn). Radical men who exclude women , all people of color, gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and organize in patriarchal ways also have allied themselves with the right- wing. We must recognize and fight this. Those who are against us cannot stand in solidarity with us. @LETTER TEXT = Whew...that's eeenuf for one letter. @BODY TEXT R = In Solidarity, @BODY TEXT R = Jackie Goldmyn @BODY TEXT R = Albany, NY @SUB HEAD LG = KILLING FASCISTS? @BODY NO IND = @BODY NO IND = Dear Love and Rage, @LETTER TEXT = Although the two page spread on German anti- fascism in the last issue (Vol. 3, #7) was generally good, it was marred in a couple of places. First of all, the headline Nazis Raus Aus Deutschland!, which translates as Nazis get out of Germany!, has never been a German antifascist slogan. Even the chant Nazis Raus! (Nazis get out) has been criticized by some who ask, and where should they go? Antifascists are internationalists; they do not want to export German fascists to cause problems elsewhere. @LETTER TEXT = Second, I find the graphic The only good fascist is a dead one very problematic. Indeed, we should fight fascism with any means necessary. In Germany this can include antifascist street patrols who beat the fascists off the streets. Killing fascists is not necessary. At the present, it would be a dangerous escalation, a bad strategy. Furthermore, we must always take care to uphold our humanity. Using deadly force against fascists might at some point be appropriate, but it would not be desirable. The average fasho skin in east Germany is not a dedicated nazi, but a working class youth who has been victimized by the East German society and state, by their family, and now by west German capital. This is not an excuse; but to call for their death, with blood in our eyes, only serves to brutalize us. @LETTER TEXT = Thirdly, in the article by Jan Kraker, Nazis are compared with cancer. This type of dehumanizing the enemy is the same used during the Third Reich against Jews and communists. We must be very careful of these terms. If we convince ourselves that our enemy is inhuman, on the level of a germ or a disease, what is to prevent us from advocating the torture and barbarisms practiced by Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot? We must never loose sight of our humanity. @BODY TEXT R = An antifascist @SUB HEAD LG = LYIN' ABOUT ZION @BODY NO IND = @BODY NO IND = Dear Anarchist Comrades, @LETTER TEXT = Your editorial note to my letter on Zionism featured in the Jan. 92 issue of Love and Rage, in which you stated that the Lubavitcher Jewish sect is not Zionist, obscures the fact that the Lubavitchers are intimately, actively involved in bolstering the most reactionary institutions and policies of the Zionist state. @LETTER TEXT = Under the command of their fuhrer Rabbi Schneerson, these authoritarian fanatics have not only supported Zionism's imperialist wars of aggression, they regret that more Arab territory hasn't been seized. They reject all so-called land for peace deals, and consider it an abomination to even think about granting any kind of autonomy to the Palestinians. @LETTER TEXT = Although disdainful of Zionism's secular establishment, the Lubavitchers nevertheless permeate Israeli society and politics. They spearheaded the recent unsuccessful effort to change Israel's Nazi-like Law of Return so as to allow only Orthodox-sponsored conversions to Judaism. And the Lubavitchers are effective power brokers in the Israeli Knesset, acting to force Shamir's fascistic Likud bloc even further to the right. @LETTER TEXT = In contrast, genuinely non-Zionist Orthodox Jews, like the Satmars, are explicit and consistent in their rejection of Zionism's statist edifice. @LETTER TEXT = Funded primarily by American Jews, the Lubavitchers rake in well over $100 million in donations yearly - hardly indicative of an oppressed community. @LETTER TEXT = The failure of Love and Rage to bring these facts to the attention of its readers is simply one facet of its overall failure, or refusal, to unambiguously address the problem of Zionism - an oversight which for some reason seems to typify far too many anarchist publications and anarchists in general. @LETTER TEXT = Love and Rage has no direct anti-Zionist assertion in its Political Statement; yet therein specifies opposition to ``anti-Jewish racism'' - a curious bit of phraseology which implies that Jews are a race (strangely enough, the position of Nazis and right-wing Zionists alike), rather than, as most anti-racists would agree, an amalgam of ethnic groups and individuals accepting or acknowledging a heritage of certain religious and/or cultural traditions. Moreover, anti-Jewish bigotry can manifest itself as a purely religious phenomenon, in addition to its more usual expression as misdirected anger over socio-economic inequities, and its less common but most virulent appearance as ideological racism. @LETTER TEXT = The sickening antics of David Duke and of a relative handful of thuggish Klansmen and neo-Nazis frequently seem to be the primary focus of attention for much of the anarchist press and for many anarchists personally; and granted, these racist freaks do pose a danger, for their hatemongering can and often does have murderous consequences. As a present threat and an even greater possible future menace, they can not and must not be ignored. However, the racist right, either here or abroad, is a feeble fart compared to the dynamo of international Zionism, which is backed by wealthy Jewish elitists and closely allied with the ruling class in the US and in other countries. @LETTER TEXT = No existing fascist movement so effectively dominates its ethnic constituents, molds so favorable a public image, or projects its military and political power around the world with such stealth as does Zionism. @LETTER TEXT = While many anarchists remain fixated on comparatively small numbers of highly visible (and usually ineffectual) white racist loudmouths, the Zionists, hiding behind religious respectability, liberal phrases, and endless references to the historical oppression of Jews, are committing genocide now against the Palestinian people. Some so-called left or humanitarian Zionists do occasionally speak out against the more obvious Israeli brutalities and sometimes talk about autonomy schemes which would amount to bantustans for the Palestinians. Citing these dubious murmurs as proof of its democratic nature, militant Zionism (including Labor as well as Likud) marches on toward its fanatical goal of an imperial Jewish super power, from the Nile to the Euphrates, with the shameful collusion of most of the Jewish community world-wide. @LETTER TEXT = Against these currents, the resistance of truly anti- Zionist Jews, wherever they may be, stands out as all the more heroic and inspiring. @LETTER TEXT = Zionism is one of many authoritarian, statist, and fascistic forces on the rampage in the world today and must not be obsessively dwelt upon to the exclusion of other dangers. At the same time, by virtue of its symbiosis with the US Establishment (a symbiosis as strong as ever, despite the present lovers' quarrel between Washington and Tel Aviv), and in particular, by virtue of its amazing propaganda machine, Zionism must be recognized, if not as the most successful variant of fascism, then surely as the most insidious and thus opposed accordingly. @LETTER TEXT = Why do so many anarchists seem reluctant to mount that opposition or to even acknowledge this enemy of freedom? @BODY TEXT R = On behalf of the Collective @BODY TEXT R = Yours for an International Intifada, @BODY TEXT R = P.A. Ward @BODY TEXT R = Raven's Banner Collective @BODY TEXT R = Pinellas Park, FL @SUB HEAD LG = ANARCHY AND RACE @BODY NO IND = @BODY NO IND = Dear Love and Rage, @LETTER TEXT = Does anyone out there in the anarchist movement know of anything connecting the concepts of anarchy and race? @LETTER TEXT = I am looking for anarchist approaches to issues of racial in/justice, anarchist theory which treats questions of race, writings by anarchists of color, historical accounts of anarchists of color, and related topics. I am mostly interested in what has happened and what is happening in the US. I have been searching anarchist bookstores, reading anarchist periodicals, and asking people at anarchist coffeehouses and gatherings if anyone has any ideas, but I have very few leads so far. I have a book (very poorly written, I think) by Carolyn Ashbaugh called Lucy Parsons, and I have been told to read up on the early years of S.N.C.C.. Otherwise people just shrug their shoulders and say ask so- and-so. But the next so-and-so never knows anymore than the last so- and-so. @LETTER TEXT = Now I know that there are excuses, some more valid than others. I also know that for the most part anarchists' hearts are in the right place. However, I think that it is time to admit to ourselves and to each other in public that the anarchist movement in Europe, in North America, and even Latin America is overwhelmingly white, and our future will be white unless we do something to make it more colorful. @LETTER TEXT = I think that it is lazy and irresponsible of us (especially those of us who are white) to simply say as anarchists we are against hierarchical relationships, and that obviously includes being opposed to the idea that one race is superior and another inferior, and leave it at that. Nor is it adequate to abstractly proclaim that the struggle against ________ (choose one: state, capital, megamachine, system, hegemony, technology, civilization, alienation...) is a struggle for all people of any and all races. I also don't think it suffices to print a few short articles on the Black Panthers, the Mohawks, or on other non-white non-anarchist radicals. I am not against such efforts, I am merely saying that our efforts have not, as of yet, gone far enough. I would embarrassingly add that from what I can tell Marxists, feminists, and liberals seem to be more successful in addressing these forms of racism within their movements than we are. @LETTER TEXT = As a modest beginning towards a more honestly multi-racial and multi-cultural anarchist movement, I would like to ask for an inclusionary discussion of anarchy and race. I would like people to write letters which share resources, experiences, knowledges, ideas, proposals and anything else which seems like it will help out. Please don't hesitate to point out something which may seem obvious to you it may not be to me or someone else. @LETTER TEXT = I would hope that the character of such a discussion would be safe, supportive, and encouraging. Too often we viciously attack or attempt to intimidate each other instead of offering constructive criticism of our theories and actions. We should be able to admit mistakes, problems, and shortcomings, and it should be alright to ask for help. @BODY TEXT R = Sincerely yours @BODY TEXT R = for a diverse anarchy, @BODY TEXT R = Eric @BODY TEXT R = Santa Cruz, CA @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ @ _Love & Rage_ is a Revolutionary Anarchist newspaper produced @ by the Love and Rage Network. The Love and Rage Network is a @ continental network of groups and individuals in Canada, Mexico, @ and the United States. Subscriptions to the newspaper cost: @ $13 for first class (fast, envelope), $9 third class (slow, no @ envelope), $13 international (outside of United States), free for @ prisoners, GI's, published bimonthly. @ Please write to us at POB 3, NY, NY 10012 @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@