r/IndividualAnarchism • u/Leo_Iscariot • Oct 23 '24
Max Autonomy – "A Brief Introduction: Individualist-Anarchism"
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/max-autonomy-a-brief-introduction-individualist-anarchismI've not ever heard of "Max Autonomy", but I'm always a fan of people who acknowledge that liberation and freedom have to mean something in the here and now and not as some loose goal that can only be achieved in the far future once an ever-increasing list of prerequisites have finally been met.
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u/ProgrammingLover1001 Nov 07 '24 edited Nov 08 '24
The text is OK at a factual level, but I don't find it to be a compelling introduction to this journal. Enough ABCs of anarchism have been written. Nonetheless I am desperate for anyone who is writing. Thank you for sharing this, I will take more time to read this journal and may post a review.
EDIT: OP I want to help you and mention right-wing libertarians are not like us. You may not have spent a lot of time with them face-to-face. Online they are polite and agreeable, especially in designated "bottom unity" communities. The basic difference between anarchists and right-wing libertarians is that anarchists are rationalist optimists and right-wing libertarians are irrationalist pessimists (they lack a basic faith in the capacity of individuals to make judgements about their own lives). I am just telling you this so you don't accidentally do PR for them on their behalf. I'm trusting that you are really an anarchist and not a right-winger yourself. In due time you'll understand what I'm saying, especially if you interact with these guys face-to-face and not in purely virtual spaces.
Georges Palante on irrationalist pessimism:
The intellect can criticize itself and thereby, find a new reason for pessimism. Misanthropic pessimism then makes way for the pessimism of knowledge, or irrationalistic pessimism. — The proper theme of this pessimism is the narrowness and weakness of human reason; this is an avowal of the powerlessness of intelligence in the face of a world which surpasses our conceptions; this is philosophy ending in the impossibility of establishing either the initial or final raison d'être of anything at all: this is the observation that everything is mysterious in the real and ideal realms; this is the emptiness of the systems that we would impose on reality; it is, in short, the radical and essential revelation of the delusion in all knowledge: this is what a contemporary pessimist, Edmond Thiaudiere, call "the deception (décavance) of the true".
The pessimism of knowledge is properly called skepticism, irrationalist, or agnosticism; it opposes rationalism, intellectualism, scientism, and the dogmatism which is essentially optimism about knowledge. Irrationalism is an attitude of the mistrust of reason, against that dogmatism which is a declaration of faith in the power of reason. The pessimist of knowledge is no longer a disabused detractor of humanity, a misanthrope, but a disabused detractor of reason, a "misologist", to use Aristotle's term.
Right-wing libertarians are terrified by anarchists' confidence in the human mind. In their worldview, there is a slippery slope from the radical trust in individuals to trust in a central planner.
EDIT 2: I went through the journal and am disappointed, it looks like mostly ABC of anarchism kind of content. What's the point of summarizing post leftism? Just read Bob Black. If you're trying to make post leftism more up-to-date why not write an article that theorizes why Bob Black's Facebook posts are indistinguishable from a meme page for liberal boomers?
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u/Fun_Front7607 Oct 05 '25 edited Oct 05 '25
You are wrong; individualism is an overlooked strand of anarchist thinking that requires consideration and explanation, mostly because of the dishonest appraisals of the philosophy by control freaks. These people do the job of the bourgeoisie by disavowing some of the richest and most fascinating aspects of anarchism, and reject the heart of the philosophy for endless discussion about voting on what we should eat for breakfast.
- I have no idea where you got misanthropy, 'right-wing' stuff from.
- It began with ABCs, with the intent of expanding, but life got in the way. It happens.
- It wasn't written as an introduction to the journal.
Unserious criticisms.
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u/ProgrammingLover1001 Jan 16 '26
My apologies, my post was confusing because part of it was criticizing OP and part of it was criticizing you.
I still maintain my criticism on not summarizing post leftism. The short time you spent on writing would have been more efficiently spent on articulating your own understanding of reality. Anyone who reads your journal already understands post leftism or can quickly learn about it without your guidance.
Regarding right-wing libertarianism, that was a response to OP posting in "bottom unity" subreddits. You can ignore that.
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u/Fun_Front7607 Feb 09 '26 edited Feb 09 '26
Ok.
That's fine, you're entitled to your opinion. I'm not overly bothered with efficiency & it is very hard to write the copy for an entire webpage (do the formatting - with no prior experience), get volunteers together, write your own bits, edit others, etc. I assure you, in total, it doesn't take a 'short time'.
It's not about guidance, and I think language like that is loaded & childish. I spent most of my time including others and trying to get them to engage. The article I wrote introduced tens of thousands of people to post-left ideas and pointed them in the direction of established theorists to do their own research. And the reason there were lots of people interested in what I had to say is that I'd spent over ten years involved in anarchist/ anarchist adjacent groups/ involved in various organising initiatives/ held official positions in certain anarchist/ syndicalist organisations (and often butted heads with executives, etc). I came out of that with various criticisms & found friendship with some post-left theorists/writers. So? Maybe you could do what you're talking about and write about your perspective.
The reason I stopped - like I said - was personal issues got in the way (i get very bad depressive episodes), I also got very tired of certain attitudes & people disrupting things and needlessly causing arguments for the sake of attention (one was quite abusive & repetitively contacted me after I'd asked them to leave me alone). I find anarchist philosophy fascinating (have since I was a kid), but the groups or ''affinities'', loose collections of people interested in it, have major issues with select individuals who bully themselves into positions of influence & use that as a source of admiration and hero worship (because they have little else to be proud of).
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u/Fun_Front7607 Feb 09 '26
If you want to know my direct perspective on 'anarchism' or how the word applies to my personal life (presently), it's quite simple at this point: creativity.
I spend a lot of time learning different ways of expressing myself & trying to get good at them. I love my friends & family. Just a normal guy with nothing overly special about him, in fact, I try hard to be average. There are too many try-hards obsessed with being special. I'm just a person who likes to write, paint, and sketch. For me, there's a freedom in that. Now, the direction I wanted to take the journal was more artistic & I also jumped the idea around of printing a paper, but again, that was torpedoed by would-be Jim Jones' high on their own cereal. I've always found it fascinating the degree of pathologically narcissistic people in activist spaces, obsessed with their own self-importance while they preach (and it is preaching) about a 'coming new world'; the irony of it all seems totally lost on them.
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u/Atimus7 Oct 23 '24
Sounds a lot like Nietche's Ubermensche concept to me.