The whole concept of natural resources belonging to elites under any regime is dubious to me. Claims of legitimate vs illegitimate transfer of ownership are nonsensical from that perspective.

If you unstack all the turtles, it doesn’t take long to get to private property rights established by force under imperial rule. This holds true throughout the Americas, as does “independence” being a consolidation of power and property in the hands of breakaway colonial elites.

US corporations took advantage of long-term extraction rights granted by early 20th century authoritarian regimes in Venezuela. Typical imperial-era bullshit. They were getting a steal and they knew it. By mid-century, Venezuelans saw this as legalized plunder. By 1976, they set things right.

Thanks for taking the time to give me feedback. I’m a writer, not an artist. You’re correct that I use Gen AI to generate thumbnails (and for proofreading). Can you help me understand how the thumbnail leads you to believe the writing is not my own?

“The Russian Anarchists” by Paul Avrich is a history of Russian anarchist movements from the 19th century to the Bolshevik Revolution. It covers figures like Kropotkin and Bakunin as well as non-hierarchical social forms like the artel.

Kropotkin’s “Mutual Aid” (1902) includes his firsthand observations of artels in practice. This book should be on anyone’s anarchism 101 reading list.

I’ve always understood Marxism to be state-oriented, at least until the state withers away naturally in the inevitable progression of history. For sure Marx himself was a state solution guy in his lifetime. Bakunin was the anarcho-socialist vying for control of the Internationale back in the day.

I had a similar journey growing up that I wrote about here. I had to learn that I value more than individualist freedom before I realized that the viable voting options on offer in the US don’t offer a platform I can support.

666673.substack.com/p/growing-pa...

I'm choosing to believe this was a deliberate jibe by Downrange, and I love them for it.