13/08: From the Eastside to the Westside
Well, it has been several months since I attempted to create an "Eastside Praxis", which had marginal success. Where I have found success is in my job, my adventuring, my martial arts group and my zines. Where I've suffered failure is in expanding towards an interventionist group as I initially planned to do. My failure here was based primarily in failing to rally interest in where I outlined my desire to act. I had not expected not being able to break out faster with the projects I was interested in.
The beginning of the year I had a lot of participation in Indymedia and interest was high in expanding. We had several people on the Eastside that were interested in doing more with Anti-Racist Action and with the move of the Indymedia center to the Eastside, it seemed perfectly natural to propose a new direction and work towards abtaining it. However, like all projects, my fellow participants, including myself, suffered from burnout rather quickly, especially when we achieved a very successful level of activity. The stress of success seemed to of wore on a lot of people. At the same time, others were excluded as time went on. They were interested in activism and anarchist projects, but they didn't share any interest in what Indymedia was becoming, a high tech collective. So when interest fell out, it fell out on both sides. Other priorities were found while some continued to enjoy the multi-media possibilities that the IMC offered. Currently we have a active monthly zine that acts as a lot priority for a handful of people, but we get enough participation to put out our small zine every month with original content. We also have maintained our websites, an internet stream and podcasting site and so on. We syndicate John Zerzan's Anarchy radio at 1:00am at radio.freepress.org for those out there interested.
Now we are moving in a new direction for the Westside. As Arawak City has become very successful, I have seen that more must be done to find ways of including people normally excluded in my own social network and within society. I want to outline another aim or project plan. I felt good that we achieved an office and figured the next step would be to create a document that aimed for a new vision of intervention. Though I still have no fixed answer, I see many possibilities of getting involved. Perhaps the biggest thing I've learned since I began calling myself an anarchist is to first get involved in a minor project that aims towards your intentions and then develop from there. So I'll just say I've created another discussion group, this time it is a West Side discussion group, different from all the previous, which have been located primarily on the North Side to increase participation. At this point, our discussions will be able to pull old faces that have enjoyed discussion in as well as give more importance to the interests of those that usually have to travel further to get involved. Hopefully I'll hold back my enthusiasm enough to get a collective desire to move in a direction that is more socially critical and more interventionist.
The beginning of the year I had a lot of participation in Indymedia and interest was high in expanding. We had several people on the Eastside that were interested in doing more with Anti-Racist Action and with the move of the Indymedia center to the Eastside, it seemed perfectly natural to propose a new direction and work towards abtaining it. However, like all projects, my fellow participants, including myself, suffered from burnout rather quickly, especially when we achieved a very successful level of activity. The stress of success seemed to of wore on a lot of people. At the same time, others were excluded as time went on. They were interested in activism and anarchist projects, but they didn't share any interest in what Indymedia was becoming, a high tech collective. So when interest fell out, it fell out on both sides. Other priorities were found while some continued to enjoy the multi-media possibilities that the IMC offered. Currently we have a active monthly zine that acts as a lot priority for a handful of people, but we get enough participation to put out our small zine every month with original content. We also have maintained our websites, an internet stream and podcasting site and so on. We syndicate John Zerzan's Anarchy radio at 1:00am at radio.freepress.org for those out there interested.
Now we are moving in a new direction for the Westside. As Arawak City has become very successful, I have seen that more must be done to find ways of including people normally excluded in my own social network and within society. I want to outline another aim or project plan. I felt good that we achieved an office and figured the next step would be to create a document that aimed for a new vision of intervention. Though I still have no fixed answer, I see many possibilities of getting involved. Perhaps the biggest thing I've learned since I began calling myself an anarchist is to first get involved in a minor project that aims towards your intentions and then develop from there. So I'll just say I've created another discussion group, this time it is a West Side discussion group, different from all the previous, which have been located primarily on the North Side to increase participation. At this point, our discussions will be able to pull old faces that have enjoyed discussion in as well as give more importance to the interests of those that usually have to travel further to get involved. Hopefully I'll hold back my enthusiasm enough to get a collective desire to move in a direction that is more socially critical and more interventionist.
