This is the funniest fucking graphic omg. And is such horseshit. The Cosmists, founders of the Soviet space program & its scientific basis, were anarchists. The poverty lifting stats apply to capitalist states too, which shows why they’re bullshit. As for ended the Holocaust, lol https://twitter.com/eshalegal/status/1249346318201487360

The Holocaust was an example of abandonment. The world leaders all knew of the Holocaust’s occurrence & no one took any action to stop it. The final solution *sped up* in the last years as the invasion occurred. Refugees were kept in camps by all the powers.

It was called world war 2 because it was a literal world war. Yes the Soviet army did a massive portion, but it would be silly to deny the contribution of other militaries, not to mention partisans, resistors, militants, rioters, and defectors.

Thus as a specific claim (as in substantively & intentionally ending the Holocaust) it’s strictly false, and as a general claim (as in they generally stopped the Nazis, thus ending it), it’s true, but obfuscatory & frankly infantilizing & contemptuous of the victims.

So as far as their meme goes:
1. One Is actually a credit to anarchists & academics (as well as motley crew of other scientists & engineers)
2. Another is shared with capitalist states & nothing to write home about &
3. The final is either false or true but obfuscatory

As for contributions of anarchists, I’ll just skip all the contributions to philosophy, science, academia, art, poetry, music, culture, etc cus they’ll just pretend that shit doesn’t matter and go on to the rest.

1. Anarchists have participated in basically every (or literally every) epochal revolution, en masse, since the early 1800s, many of which could not have been carried without their contribution

2. Anarchism gave rise the expressly militant labor movement, as well as played a part in the founding of Basically all the mass peasant movements & resistances to the imperial powers in the 1800s

3. Tied to the above they played a large role in the Paris Commune, the founding of the 1st international, the labor wars, the Knights of Labor, the IWW and others, whose significance cant be doubted historically

4. Created several autonomous revolutionary zones in history, at least four of which, like the Spanish Civil War, were crucibles for the left of the era, forging the ties, organizations & experiences that united the left that point on

5. So terrified elites they spurred the creation of the FBI, Interpol, the anti labor laws & immigration quotas, proving the terror they inspired in elites, especially in the Americas and Europe

6. Related to this was the times that anarchist involved movements spurred mass elite panic, such as when Nixon was literally predicting a mass insurrectionary movement formed between anti war, student radicals & Black Militants, and Obama under occupy

7. Played a major founding role or other role in all major global uprisings since the 90s, including the several anti globalization movements, environmental movement, Arab Spring, the revolts, since 2017, Occupy, water protection etc

8. Have repeatedly founded and run mass mutual aid & assistance projects, such as Occupy Sandy, which served and saved many people, the Debt Jubilee, & a global network of intercommunal community & action orgs, insurrectionsry groups etc

9. Have the highest per capita casualty rate for capitalist & state elites, historically, spurring their name as the “enemy of all”, previously reserved for pirates & exiles, who threw wrenches in gears of the global system

10. Are the largest specifically political radical faction of the global environmental movement, &, as such, are listed as the top 10 most dangerous threats by most capitalist states, despite almost no casualties, & being the most targeted kind of activist by natsec & militias

11. Related to this is their role in mediating, assisting, providing aid to, & networking the mass of other already existing & autonomous struggles, like environmental, anti war, anti nuclear, anti globalization, Indigenous struggles, Black Militancy struggles, & so on

12. Have continually played a dominant role in exilic, cooperative, autonomous, mutual aid, and every day resistance struggles, that either provide infrastructures of solidarity for crisis events, drive states nuts by eluding, antagonizing & subverting them.

13. Have heavily influenced nearly every other left wing current, both past & present, movement, ideology, praxis, tactic, & strategy through decentralization, autonomy, mutual aid, direct action, illegalism, insurrection, cooperativism, etc

14. Have continually provided hope, solidarity, community, inspiration, energy, vigor, and an introduction to radicalism & leftism, to the disaffected, marginalized, alienate, downtrodden, depressed, especially among the youth, the world over

15. And, as I said above, however small one may think it, the contribution of anarchists to the arts, culture, music, folklore, entertainment, literature, theater, surrealism, science, social science, scholarship, history, pedagogy, penology, & humanities, are legion

This is true both *as* anarchists (as in their contributions were specifically anarchist ones), or as practitioners of the above who just happened to be anarchists. While art, culture, & intellectual life are often scorned by leftists, I think they’re an important aspect of life.

Anarchists are often mocked for their focus on spectacle, action, aesthetics & so on, or conversely as armchair theorists, who don’t contribute anything to actual action.

Some events they played a role in—like May 68, the US student movement, the anti war, anti globalization, Occupy, environmental, exilic projects & autonomous zones, are sometimes derided as both at the same time.

The other main critique is the transitory nature of their projects, or that their projects devolve into state ones or aren’t really anarchist, such as with Barcelona, Ukraine, Rojava, Oaxaca, and so on.

Frankly I think this critique is silly because it’s meant to function as a self fulfilling prophecy (the same way saying someone is unelectable is meant to make them lose the election), & the history of subversion of these projects is well known.

But the fact of the matter is that judged by influence, and actual behavior, anarchist influence is robust, continual, ever present & longlasting, in the social, organizational, logistical, tactical, strategic, intellectual, cultural, artistic, & lived life of leftism for 200 yrs

While anarchist sentimentality, nostalgia and focus on spectacle exists (Spanish Exceptionalism, or an overriding focus on May 68, or a nominally anarchist revolutionary project), it is not the dominant feature of it historically, but rather focus on the future.

Thus, rather than a focus on this or that revolutionary project, or states, worlds, & realities that no longer exist, the focus is on learning from the past, but carrying its momentum into the future, through adaptation to present realities.

This takes the form of a ceaseless, never ending commitment to emancipation, that can’t be ever finished, & far from being utopian, precisely weds intellectual pessimism, realism, willful optimism, commitment, embodied vigor, social movement, & lightheartedness about one’s self