THE TEAPOT COLLECTIVE INTRODUCTION TO ANARCHY, CONCLUSION.

       This is the back and final page of The Teapot Collective Introduction to Anarchy. You can read page 14 HERE.

The Anarchist teapot.

      The Anarchist Teapot has to date (December98) moved through eight buildings in Brighton and two in Worthing, born out of the idea “to have free minds, we must have free tea”. The squatting of disused buildings created autonomous spaces, where we could give tea and food freely without giving ourselves wages or making profits, and encourage communication and organisation. We've also taken the “kitchen” to actions and events around the country, and bookstalls to car boot sales and gigs.

      These are, as we feel, a few of the small things we can do to create anarchy.

Suggested for further reading  (there's lots of interesting stuff in our reading room too!)

Spectacular Times, series of cheap booklets A Distribution, 84b Whitechapel High street, London E1.

Anarchy a graphic Guide, by Clifford Harper, 9the pics and some of the text in this leaflet are stolen from this), Camden Press £4:95.

The Revolution of Everyday Life, by Raoul Vanigen, Rebel Press, £7:95.

Check out the Public House Bookshop, 31 Little Preston Street in Brighton, to the extensive catalogue from AK Distribution, PO Box 12766, Edinburgh EH8 9YE

Or see our bookstall, somewhere near you (maybe)!

      “We are not in the least afraid of ruins. We are going to inherit the Earth. There is not the slightest doubt about that. The ruling class might blast and run its own world before it leaves the stage of history. We carry a new world here in our hearts. That world is growing this minute.”
Buenaventura Durruti, Spain 1936.
 
      I hope you have found the Teapot Collective's little booklet both enjoyable and informative, though a lot of the above information may be out of date as it has just been copied straight from the wee booklet printed in 1998.

ann arky's home.

TEAPOT COLLECTIVE INTRODUCTION TO ANARCHY - PAGE 14.

       Next up is page 14 of the Teapot Collective Introduction to Anarchy, This is the last page, the next part is about the Teapot Collective and some suggested further reading. You can read page 13 HERE.

By the hundreds of thousands peasants organised in the MST ("Movement of the Landless") in Brazil are squatting land to live and work collectively. In the LA riots a few years ago, the poor revolted, looting and making their communities no-go areas for the authorities. In 1994, theZapatistas liberated many villages in Chiapas, Mexico, and their struggle against free trade agreements which had disasterous effects on the large peasant population has become international with the Encuentros, gatherings of groups and individuals from all over the world fighting corporate powers.

       But anarchy is also about small-scale resistance, about individuals refusing standards, ignoring authority and joining up to improve their lives. Everyday, we can experiment with and learn ways of dealing with each other without leaders or domination, with mutual respect, building the world we want now - in our relationships, our interactions and our resistance. 

ann arky's home.

TEAPOT COLLECTIVE INTRODUCTION TO ANARCHY - PAGE 11.

 

       Here we go with another exciting page from that wee book, Your Anarchist Teapot Souvenir Introduction to Anarchy, from the Teapot Collective.  Enjoy page 11, page 10 can be read   HERE.         

     --we'll need to do away with both bosses and factories. Anarchists have been up trees, occupying offices, trashing machines, stopping roads, sinking whalers, fighting against a system which is wiping out the future and making the present a misery.

Anarchism is a vision.

     Imagine living in a world where people were able to come together to create a new, free society, realising their desires. Grim and anonymous cities could become places we can actually live in. Tedious useless work would become redundant and room made for play and productive activities we enjoy. Crime could be reduced drastically by a return living in real communities where people look after each other. With the decline of industrial agriculture and economy, the rivers could run clear--

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TEAPOT COLLECTIVE INTRODUCTION TO ANARCHY PAGE 10.

       Here we go with the next exciting page from The Teapot Collective Introduction to Anarchy. Enjoy page 10, page 9 can be found  HERE.

       Women were conditioned and beaten into the roles of dedicated mothers, housewives and general carers. We were (and still are) there to make everyone happy but not to demand anything in return. Feminists broke out of this, challenging the way women are brought up, sexually used, denied our own thoughts and judgements. And they fought for this, bring about many changes we take for granted today. Feminist also created their own structures to deal with life and to practise mutual aid. One example was "consciousness raising groups", where women came together without leaders to talk about their lives, support each other and organise.

      One large anarchist current today consists of those influenced by ecology which seeks to understand the living earth as a whole, including us. This is one of the most critical periods in the history of life on earth - by the end of next year another 10%  of the world's species will be extinct. Industrialisation is a tool created by elites to shackle humanity and control nature,---

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INTRODUCTION TO ANARCHY - PAGE 7.

       Here we go with page 7 of the Teapot Collective Souvenir Introduction to Anarchy. You can find page 6 HERE.

         In the Ukraine an area of 400sq miles was held for over a year as an autonomous region based on communes without government. One of the large uprisings against the dictatorship of the Bolsheviks was in 1921, when (really cool) Petrograd sailors and workers occupied the fortress of Kronstad. They were massacred by the Red Army, after which Trotsky boasted, "At last the Soviet Government, with an iron broom, has rid Russia of anarchism."

       In the German Revolution of 1918, anarchist ideas were put into practise too, various council republics were formed, declaring themselves free from government.

       Probably the largest modern European example of anarchy in action was the Spanish revolution of 1936. Working class resistance to a fascist coup led to wide scale social revolution with millions of people organising their communities and workplaces on anarchist principles (the slowly spreading influence of anarchist ideas during the previous decades having convinced people this was possible)

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INTRODUCTION TO ANARCHY PAGE 5.

     More of the excellent small book by The Anarchist Teapot Collective,  "Your Anarchist Teapot Souvenir- Introduction to Anarchy."  Page 4 left you hanging, read it HERE, and now here is page 5. learn and enjoy.

     --small collectives roaming around eating berries and having a good time without any conception of needing states or government. Their lives were nothing like the constant struggle for survival against hostile nature and other tribes you might imagine. In fact some primitive anarchic cultures have flourished to modern times, but now are facing extinction at the hands of corporations and armies, and the destruction of their ways of life at the hands of aid workers forcing “development” on them.

      Anarchist ideas reflect a basic human desire which can be found throughout history, from Taoism and the Enlightenment to the first consciously anarchist movements in the 19th century. Anarchist demands have influenced most revolutions from the Peasants revolt in England in 1381 to the global uprisings in 1968. However the wish of the people to be genuinely free was always subverted by forces of Control, whether liberal, reformist, Marxist-Leninist or whatever. Just a few examples.

      In the French Revolution of 1789, the anarchist enrages struggled from the beginning with authoritarians and centrists. They created a federalist direct democracy in Paris with self-administrated districs until beheaded by the counter-revolution.

ann arky's home.

INTRODUCTION TO ANARKY, PAGE 4.

    With this, page 4, we continue with the wee booklet "Introduction to Anarky" by the teapot collective.

People with power don't want to give it up and the laws reflect that. But throughout history people have tried to do just that. to live freely. Sometimes on their own, sometimes in small groups, sometimes in great popular movements. From the peasants revolt to the Poll Tax people have come together in grass roots movements.

Brief History of Anarchy in Action.         History reflects the values of the people writing it, in the mainstream usually the ruling class. Looking at history with an anarchist perspective reveals something more interesting than the Kings and Queens we got bored by at school.
         "Has all this anarchy shit ever been tried at all?" you might ask. Actially about 99% of human existance has been shaped by tribal society, small collectives--- To be continued. It is a small book.

ann arky's home.

TEAPOT COLLECTIVE - INTRODUCTION TO ANARCHY, PAGE 3.

     

      Today we continue with the wonderful wee booklet, "Introduction to Anarchy" from the Teapot Collective. The recently posted pages 1 and 2 went down well, so read on.

        Page 3.

        At the moment we are all forced to surrender our independence, with no opt-out clause or exception to the “authorities”, And what kind of society has been created through this? One built on oppression based on gender, race, sexuality, species, nationality. Oppression based on class, with a whole section of society made dependent on dull, exploitive work. We're left with the false choice of voting in one bunch of lying scum or another, while the people with money and power remain untouched – landowners, directors of industry and finance, high ranking police and army chiefs, and the rich elite in general.

       According to our “democratic” system the problem is just with the policies of the political parties – every time one of them “fails” in government we're supposed to hope the next lot do better. Of course they rarely do. Even when a revolutionary party takes over, the names may change but power still stays with a small elite and everybody else get shat on. After all, we all know what great places the communist dictatorships of Eastern Europe were.

      So what hope is there for change? We can't just vote for it, and trying to act for ourselves can be difficult, ---

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TEAPOT SOUVENIR.

       There are those who say that the old songs are the best songs, well perhaps we can say the same about the old political leaflets. Recently I came across an old, probably from the 80's, very small booklet measuring just 75mm x105mm and 8 pages with a small illustration on each page, produced by the Anarchist Teapot Collective in Brighton. In spite of illustrations on each page, it said a lot, so much so that I have decide to reprint it and hand it out on the street.
      Below is the front cover, I'll try to print a page from the booklet every so often, let me know what you think of them.

 Your Anarchist Teapot

Souvenir

Introduction to

Anarchy.

For too long have we given up our pleasure for

the sake of production and development, Those

who want to maintain the arrangement appear

to have a great power over us, but this is just

cheap art. It is you and I who have maintained

this by performing our tasks on a daily basis, It

is you and I who can do away with this.

To be continued.

 

ann arky's home.