Territory - Our backs to the wall

I'VE FELT LIKE A DOG CHASING HER TAIL WRITING THIS. I'M NOT HAPPY WITH, ESPECIALLY THE CONCLUSION, WHICH I'M NOT EVEN SURE *I* AGREE WITH, LET ALONE ANYONE ELSE. I HAVE LEFT THIS HERE TO PROVOKE DEBATE MORE THAN ANYTHING ELSE AND MAY BE EDITING IT HEAVILY IN THE NEAR FUTURE


Anarchists - We're a people without a home and no place to roam.

Currently I'm sitting on what's known to some as "British Territory". That means that by some crazy logic that I've consented to respect and obey the deeply unjust rules of the British state. I've had no say in what the rules are other than the flawed process of voting for representatives and at no other point am I even asked if I want to be part of the British state, let alone if I'm allowed to make an informed choice about whether I agree with the rules that have been drawn up by overpaid Eton politicians.

Furthermore, part of those rules set out by the British state is that they will allow the governing of British territory to be carried out by anyone with enough cash to pay them. Landlords, property developers, estate agents, home owners, banks, businesses, tenants, etc are all granted a varying degree of governance over the territories that they have made a financial contribution to. A neat little border is drawn around it and it's made clear that whoever has the most cash in that area will decide who lives there, what's built there, what's not built there, whether it is land for grazing cattle, or land for a call centre, or industrial development.

The amount of control that the various parties have over a territory is not decided by need, or even by the fact that there might be families living or working within a territory, but purely based on a legal peice of paper, which is granted power and paramilitary support in its enforcement through a democratic process that most people in the world have little or no control over. A tenant may be granted the governance over the colour of the walls in their flat at the discretion of the landlord. Why is the landlord allowed to have the final say on the colour of the walls? The landlord doesn't live there (usually). Even worse, the tenant must pay the landlord what meagre earnings they might scrape from employers or face homelessness.

The landlord's power has been granted through purchasing the flat itself from whoever, so long as their behaviour is within the guidelines set down by Westminister, or to a lesser degree - local councils. Again, what is acceptable for the property owner to do is decided by government, even worse, so is what is deemed acceptable for the tenant to be doing.

Losing your job and not being able to afford the rent for example, has been decided by the powers that be, to be totally unacceptable behaviour for a tenant. The law is very clear on this - the most vulnerable people should be made homeless, not for their own benefit, but for the benefit of the landlord. Did I agree to this? I know I signed a tenancy agreement (under duress I might add), but the law says that power of that agreement comes not from me, but from the state and I most certainly did not consent to British State giving landlords this power.

So to sum up:
- Because I was born and currently live on one of the islands of the British Isles, I have somehow consented to being ruled by the decisions made by the palace of Westminister, often before I was even born.
- Unless I want to colonise Mars, Antarctica, or the middle of international waters, then no matter where I go this will still be taken as consent to be ruled by whatever government claims rule over wherever I do move.
- Private citizens are granted a degree of governance over parts of a territory by the state, based upon wealth, not need.
- Other than, the proven to be ineffective system of, representative democracy I have no say in changing any of this.
- If I break these rules that I am told I have consented to, even though I haven't, then the government is right to use whatever means nessicary to punish me for it, including using paramilitary forces to beat me up, haul me out of my home, and lock me in a cage.

To call this democracy is a joke. It is merely a circular system for keeping the rich in power and everyone else with no rights, no voice and no hope within the current system. I feel like I'm chasing my tail just describing it. There is a name for a system like this where all the vassal (land)lords take tithe from the peasants, with the support of a nation's ruler. It's called feudalism and believe it or not, House Windsor is still at the top of it!

So, that's the situation. We are ruled without consent at every stage of our lives, but what's the way out? Despite the meatheads in town yelling "Go back to Russia!" every now and again, that was never an option. There is no where for us to run to. We're cornered in, surrounded by capitalism and with no escape. Not surprisingly, it's meant that we end up doing what any threatened animal does when it has its back to the wall - it fights. The options are limited. We stay where we are and be destroyed, or we take our chances and try to fight our way through the system that is threatening us.

Doesn't seem like a formula for victory really, does it? Perhaps instead we should try a third option. Perhaps, like the commissioned explorers and prospectors of the past, we should be running around, planting flags on things and declaring them to be free territories to be governed the way that we see fit? After all, there are plenty of precedents for doing it, often ignoring the current sovereignty of existing government.

But, wouldn't that make us as bad as the people who we're trying to escape? The Jews, another group of people who historically lived without self-determination, fled persecution throughout history. The end result was Zionism, which has had genocidal consequences for the natives, both ancient and the current Palestinian situation. Again, this is hardly a recipe for success.

This is hard stuff. You can't just draw a ring on a map and say "This is ours. We will rule ourselves" unless you had the situation of everyone within the ring consenting to this. On a geographical area the size of a country, a town, or even a street, this is unlikely and although attitudes are changing, this is far too big a jump for most people to embrace. What we need is an area where everyone is an agreement about wanting to rule themselves.

One such place is the commune. Isolated and shut off to the world and usually end up becoming hopelessly unable to cope with the realities of life. There is also the issue of needing to work with the capitalist system to either pay the rent, or mortgage and that comes at the price of freedom. Squats can be great while they last, but ultimately, can never be a permanent solution. I'm sure that there are a lot of people who are very happy in communes, who are happy to accept the problems in return for a bit of freedom and self-determination. Even the people involved in these places though would probably admit that communes are not for everyone.

Another place is during a public gathering. This can be something as simple as when you're sat around in the pub with friends deciding whether to get another pint, or to move to another pub. Oddly enough though, when you put a few hundred anarchists, even when they don't know each other, in one spot they quickly begin to start using principles of direct democracy and consensus to decide how that spot and its current residents should be governed. If you haven't witnessed this, then you're missing out, as it's a beautiful and inspiring example of anarchism at its best and it's usually happening in the midst of some of the toughest scenarios faced by most people - where our personal safety is under real and immediate threat.

Unfortunately, as wonderful as that is, these sorts of things are temporary. We can only sit in the pub for so long and we can only stay on the streets as long as we can stop our heads getting caved in by the coppers. Even if that wasn't an issue, living on the streets isn't exactly a fun idea to do for any length of time.

The only other option I can come up with is form some kind of non-geographical worldwide nation. Wherever people can come to consent an area under their control should be run through real democracy, should be able to declare themselves part of this nation. It would be like an island nation, with pockets of civilisation sat in the middle of the sea. Organised all together in some kind of federation with one self-determining area to be a squatted house, another to be a commune and another to be something as small as somebody's living room and even temporary liberated zones like those at public gatherings.

Then I realised... we already have that. We don't lack identity at all. We already operate in this way as one unified and consenting force and it's under the banner of anarchism - not a state.