It looks like the Wobblies, the old Industrial Workers of the World - which is still a thing. You can Google IWW and see what their goals are. It’s pretty radical. They were radicals. They put the “a” in “anarchy”. No rulers. None at all.
My grandfather was a Wobbly.
What was the focus of the Wobblies? It was all about unionism. It was also anti Communist, even though many of the ideas were also found in Communism. The Wobblies were fiercely libertarian, so Communism was viewed as being too rigid and silly. The Wobblies were pro family as well.
Why do I define the Wobblies as being pro family and strongly libertarian? That’s how working stiffs are. A man will sacrifice everything for his family. Family is everything.
How do I know that? I lived it growing up. I grew up in a strong working stiff, union, children of the Wobbly movement kind of household.
The book Wildmen, Wobblies, and Whistle Punks is a collection of articles by the author, Stewart Holbrook. This quote from one of those articles entitled The Last of the Wobblies sums up how I see the Wobbly movement - and how it was lived out in my family. It is about one of the Wobbly leaders, Arthur Boose. The articles are also called Holbrook’s lowbrow Northwest. That is the Northwest I grew up in and still live in. The academic world is not my world - obviously - nor do I want it to be. Here’s the quote.
Judges have lectured and fined him. His meetings have been broken up with fire, with water, with stinkballs, eggs, brickbats, with shouting and rioting.Yet Old War Horse Boose, a name applied by admiring Wobblies many years ago, is still packing the rigging, as they say of active I.W.W. organizers, and he remains a cheerful and wholly unreconstructed Wobbly. ‘I’d prefer anarchism, ‘ he told me one day recently, ‘for that is the highest and finest form of civilization possible. But we aren’t ready for it yet. We aren’t even ready for the kind of world the I.W.W. wants. It takes time.’ He considers Communists both comical and hopelessly entangled in dogma. He would as soon think of voting the Republican as the Communist ticket
1.
How do I know anything about Arthur Boose personally? My aunt was a friend of his. Several of his paintings hung in our family home. I grew up with him, but never met him. He was like a part of our family, though.
So, my observations are not meant to be academic or even accurate. Others will disagree with me. That’s fine. Live and let live.
It seems to me that Boose - and my family of Wobblies and Unionists - were not interested in controlling the lives of others. The movement was about freedom - freedom to live a decent life and to raise a family in peace. It was also about setting working stiffs free to work without fear of dying in unsafe conditions. It was about having a decent job and earning a decent living. It was also about providing a better future for one’s children.
The problem is that anarchy tends to open the door to totalitarianism in an organization or in a society.
Does anarchy always lead to totalitarianism? I wonder. The union movement forgot it’s anarchistic roots and opted for a more totalitarian form of unionism. Possibly?
My grandfather was a proud member of the I.W.W. My father and 3 of his brothers became members of the very powerful ILWU. Harry Bridges was my mother’s hero. The union now may be facing bankruptcy.
Along the way, the ILWU along with pretty much all unions have provided slush funds for Democrat Party candidates - many of whom betrayed the unions when they got the power they desired. Workers’ rights now take a backseat to the will of our rulers in Washington D.C. and even state governments. Workers become cogs in the machine once again, serving whatever dumb ass “progressive” ideas the Democrats dream up and the Republicans go along with.
Maybe it’s inevitable. Maybe progressivism is just another form of feudalism. Feudalism in one form or another seems to be the most natural form of human government in a fallen world. The Book of Judges with its emphasis on God being King and His Law the rule is an ideal. Fallen mankind can’t live up to that ideal.
So why is Antifa a fake anarchistic group? They are being supported by establishment Democrats who want more power over people’s lives. They are anything but libertarian and anarchistic. Democrats of today act more like the silly, dogmatic Communists that Boose found objectionable.
Sure. The I.W.W. was involved in violence. Boose later felt that was a mistake.
Here is a quote from the Holbrook article.:
‘For every miner killed,’ Boose went on, ‘a mine cop must die!’This kind of talk was a great mistake, Boose says today.
2.
1. Wildmen, Wobblies & Whistlepunks: Stewart Holbrook's Lowbrow Northwest. (Edited and introduced by Brian Booth.) Oregon State University Press, 1992. p. 303
2. Ibid. p. 300
No comments:
Post a Comment