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Against Sectarianism: by Monica and Francisco

from https://anarchistnews.org via Contra Info and AMW … By thecollective

Banner: "COMBATIVE AND SUBVERSIVE SOLIDARITY with thx ANARKISTS Mónica and Francisco" Title: "Agaisnt Sectarianism: For an affinity based in practice. Words from the comrades Mónica and Francisco"

Anarchist Prisoners Mónica and Francisco: Against Sectarianism. For an Affinity Supported in Practice.

Facing what we see as direct interpellations towards us, the need arises to write this text to make clear the issues.

As we have written on several occasions both individual and collectively, we understand anarchy not as an embodiment or place of arrival, but as a tension, a permanent confrontation in the first person putting at the center the search for individual freedom.

For us, this constant struggle has been real, which is why we find ourselves today behind bars. This situation has not prevented us from continuing to participate in struggle initiatives both inside and outside the jail.

In short, anarchy for us is an ethics and a permanent practice against authority, a practice in which we have met with others (not necessarily “anarchists”), enriching and enhancing our visions and capabilities, as well as forging close relationships of complicity, strengthened in the course of years and confrontation.

To designate that these relationships can only be established with those who are called “anarchists,” apart from being a fallacy that can only be believed by those who have not ventured to travel the paths of the conflict and spend their time in front of the computer, is something that we reject from the moment when we prioritize establishing links over repeating empty slogans until you get enough.

To self-identify as “irreducible anarchists” does not mean anything without being accompanied by a confrontational practice that sustains it.

On the other hand – and most importantly – assuming that anarchists only should relate to anarchists reflects an absurd purism and a sectarianism that, without a doubt, is an expression of authoritarianism.

Establish coordinations and joint struggle initiatives only between those who are self-defined “anarchists” is to restrict and limit greatly our relationships and with this our chances of growing. It is to lock up stupidly in dogmatisms that restrict us and prevent us from free association. So, we see how in the name of freedom, some raise absolutely the opposite, setting sects as the basis for relationships.

With this, we do not want to say that we establish indiscriminate relationships or do not have a type of filter.

We have left clear points that for us are impassable in previous communications; repentances, dissociations and institutionality corresponds to some red lines that constitute insurmountable aspects that prevent carrying out any joint initiative with those who opt for these roads.

As you can appreciate, these points do not correspond to empty labels but are concrete, in ways of living in prison and not only here. They are options that generate a total contradiction between what is said and what what is done.

Well, maybe for some, the only value is what incendiary proclamations are said online or on some social network. On the contrary, we prioritize the practice and from there, we are establishing affinities and ruptures.

And certainly, authoritarian practices represent a point that we will not tolerate. We have never established fighting relationships based on authoritarianism and the experience of anarchist and subversive prisoners is no exception.

The common points we have between all of them are a lot stronger than the discrepancies that we can have, discrepancies that evidently, do not represent insurmountable aspects, since if it were so, we would have set aside from the beginning of this initiative.

The ties that unite us with the comrades have been forged in the confrontation. Inside as outside the jail, for more than a decade, meaning for us a relationship and enriching experience that, undoubtedly, has nourished, strengthened and qualified our anarchic path.

Today, in this new confinement situation, this joint initiative is not new, but the last year has counted on important mobilizations that allow us to develop interesting projections. Now, as we affirm it in the article “about the need for continue the fight within the prison” of the magazine Kalinov MOST 4, the anarchist prisoners have broken with certain codes inside of the prisons, installed and reproduced by the members of the armed left groups from the ’80s, codes that mainly had to do with the reproduction of organic-partisan logic inside jail and also with establishing a ratio of superiority with respect to the rest of the penal population.

They have been in charge of keeping live subversive codes with which we feel identified and that we see indispensable to incorporate and live. We refer to a refractory position and attitude against the prison institution that grants a particular identity, view and recognition both by social prisoners and the jailers.

We also refer to the undeniable fact of continuing the fight within the prison, to show in practice that with the confinement nothing ends, that It is only another struggle, which breaks with victimism. Many times in the struggle for liberty of prisoners, comrades for decades have raised and taken forward an anti-carceral practice that has pierced the walls that divide the street and jail.

These are just some of the subversive codes that we share with the comrades, who reinforce our ties of affinity in the task everyday and we are moving away from those who, even calling themselves anarchist, diverts away from the fight or is completely disconnected from this.

What do these purists and so-called “anarchists” who are completely disconnected from these ideas and practices do when they face a trial or are in prison? We reiterate, we establish relationships based on common practices, not on the basis of words or incendiary announcements published on the Internet.

Finally, we see the need to refer to the danger that sectarianism or purism represents within our spaces, apart from authoritarian relationships mentioned above.

From our clear anarchic positioning, supported in the permanent conflict and in individual freedom, we are establishing relationships and coordinations that potentiate us and strengthen us on this path for total liberation.

As the incendiary comrades of Conspiracy of Cells of Fire said a few years ago: Solidarity with Anarchist Prisoners and Those that Do No Repent of all Revolutionary tendencies!

TODAY WE SAY: Comrades Pablo Bahamondes, Marcelo Villarroel, Juan Aliste, Juan Flores and Joaquín García: To the street!

Mónica Caballero Sepúlveda. C.p.f San Miguel.

Francisco Solar Domínguez. C.p. Rancagua.

comment…..

This article is in response to the sentiments expressed in articles like these:
https://anarchistnews.org/content/hands-gunpowder
https://anarchistnews.org/content/dancing-edge-abyss

What do anews anons think? more comments HERE

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sectarianism among anarchists

Submitted by mikegilli (not verified) on Thu, 08/05/2021 – 23:12

In the case of Francisco and Monica they are promoting a resistance movement inside and outside prisons, specifically to the repression of the Chilean Uprising, which has been strongly influenced by anarchist theory, practice, solidarity and mutual aid. For them it must be frustrating that anarchism and the Left are plagued by schisms, splits and petty power plays.
Which prisoners to support with very limited resources depends on many circumstances.
For example I think Crimethinc did a post supporting the Vaughn 17.. revolutionaries but not anarchists with the comment.. “Bringing these two very different insurrectionary currents together has the potential to enrich us all in unimaginable ways, open up our vision, threaten the State, and bring us closer to collective liberation”. https://wp.me/pIJl9-liv
Closer to home, we just shared Freedom’s post supporting the just sentenced prisoners of the Bristol KIll The Bill demonstration in March. https://thefreeonline.wordpress.com/2021/08/06/freedom-now-for-brave-bri… Nobody should ask ‘But are they Anarchists? And from what “sect”?. we know that they lost their freedom fighting for ours, and that Bristol is one of the few places where anarchism has a following, which, as in Chile, is more than enough.

United We Stood: Writings and Analysis from the Vaughn 17

Announcing a collection of new writings and analysis from the Vaughn 17, a group of prisoners who faced charges following an uprising at the James T. Correctional Center in Delaware. Most of the Vaughn 17 are still being held indefinitely in solitary confinement in Pennsylvania. The following text is from the preface of the new publication.

PDF For Reading PDF For Printing

Click to access V17-zine-reading-version.pdf

Click to access V17-zine-print-version.pdf

On February 1, 2017, prisoners in C–building at James T. Vaughn Correctional Center in Delaware took control of the building and held guards hostage in an uprising that lasted over 18 hours. That morning, several prisoners had put on masks and rushed the guards who were letting them back into the building from yard, while another prisoner ensured that the counselor on duty was kept safe and held off a CERT team that sought to retake the building.

The prisoners leading the uprising called the media and released a list of demands; the prison eventually retook the building by breaching one of its walls with a backhoe. One prison guard, Steven Floyd, was killed by prisoners during the uprising.

The Vaughn 17 are seventeen of the eighteen prisoners who were subsequently indicted on charges including multiple counts of murder, kidnapping, assaulting an officer, and conspiracy, by the state of Delaware. The eighteenth person charged, Royal “Diamond” Downs, a notorious Black Guerrilla Family leader, turned state’s witness and provided much of the State’s case against the prisoners.

Despite that, the indicted prisoners, most of whom did not know or deal with each other prior to the uprising, organized their own defense and almost completely beat the State’s case at trial. Dwayne Staats and Jarreau “Ruk” Ayers represented themselves at court and took responsibility for their part in planning the uprising and with assisting with keeping everyone safe during the takeover itself, respectively. Both were already serving life sentences.

The other prisoners in the first two trials —Deric Forney, Kevin Berry, Abednego Baynes, John Bramble, and Obadiah Miller —were acquitted in court of all charges (the last two had a hung jury on charges of assaulting an officer, which were later dropped).

Roman Shankaras, who had helped organize nonviolent protests prior to the uprising and whom the State hoped to frame as the “mastermind” behind the prison takeover, was tried separately and acquitted on all charges. The State was forced to drop the remaining charges against the rest of the defendants.

The shared mission of the Vaughn 17 is to disrupt, dismantle and destroy the prison industrial complex. Many of the V17 are revolutionaries or insurrectionaries taking up the incendiary and blood–soaked tradition of figures like Nat Turner, Denmark Vesey, and George Jackson. The rest stuck together when indicted and made enormous sacrifices in the process.

Prisoners were physically tortured following the uprising and experienced extreme pressure from the state to cooperate. After Delaware failed to beat the collective in court, most of the Vaughn 17 were shipped to Pennsylvania, where the state could continue to keep them in solitary indefinitely with no way out. They have now all been in solitary for at least four consecutive years (most for much longer).

We support the Vaughn 17 because as aspiring insurrectionaries, we are inspired by their physical struggle against prison and systemic oppression and by their unflinching refusal to cooperate with the State. The writings in this zine come from captive revolutionaries whose analysis, experience, and abilities extend far beyond what most radicals on the outside have dared to explore.

Struggles out here against authority have a lot to learn from prisoners’ experiences on the inside. Bringing these two very different insurrectionary currents together has the potential to enrich us all in unimaginable ways, open up our vision, threaten the State, and bring us closer to collective liberation.