Edit for clarity: I’m not asking why the Tankie/Anarchist grudge exist. I’m curious about what information sources - mentors, friends, books, TV, cultural osmosis, conveys that information to people. Where do individuals encounter this information and how does it become important to them. It’s an anthropology question about a contemporary culture rather than a question about the history of leftism.
I’ve been thinking about this a bit lately. Newly minted Anarchists have to learn to hate Lenin and Stalin and whoever else they have a grudge against. They have to encounter some materials or teacher who teaches them “Yeah these guys, you have to hate these guys and it has to be super-personal like they kicked your dog. You have to be extremely angry about it and treat anyone who doesn’t disavow them as though they’re literally going to kill you.”
Like there’s some process of enculturation there, of being brought in to the culture of anarchism, and there’s a process where anarchists learn this thing that all (most?) anarchists know and agree on.
Idk, just anthropology brain anthropologying. Cause like if someone or something didn’t teach you this why would you care so much?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kronstadt_rebellion
None of the Kronstadt rebellion’s demands were met.[205] The Bolsheviks did not restore freedom of speech and assembly. They did not release socialist and anarchist political prisoners. Rival left-wing groups were suppressed rather than brought into coalition governance. The Bolsheviks did not adopt worker council autonomy (“free soviets”) and did not entertain direct, democratic soldier election of military officials. Old directors and specialists continued to run the factories instead of the workers. State farms remained in place. Wage labor remained unchanged.[206] Avrich described the aftermath as such: “As in all failed revolts in authoritarian regimes, the rebels realized the opposite of their aims: harsher dictatorship, less popular self-government.”[207]
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emma_Goldman
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Disillusionment_in_Russia
Goldman described the rebellion as the “final wrench. I saw before me the Bolshevik State, formidable, crushing every constructive revolutionary effort, suppressing, debasing, and disintegrating everything”.[1]
Sure, but how do people learn about those things, and how do they learn to assign importance and significance to these historical events? What’s the process by which people become part of the culture and learn that these events are an extremely important part of who they and their comrades are, something that defines their relationship to the world?
Like, you don’t come in to Hexbear knowing Maoist Standard English. You pick it up a bit at a time. You work out what it means from the context of the jokes. People recommend books or articles and you see the origin of the Maoist Standard English jokes in some of those works. You riff with friends to come up with new ways to use MSE or develop new terms.
It’s all a process of culture, where you learn about the culture through immersion, direct teaching, observation, personal study and research, and play.
Ps, if you want to know about anarchist archaeologies and anthropologies:
https://anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/aman.13940
Pps I like a lot of communists especially the Ultras lol. I find Marxism really helpful for deconstructing western thought.
Having read My Disillusionment with Russia after learning how genocidal the war against the Soviets was and how stretched thin all aspects of society were due to the breakdown of economy, Emma Goldman unfortunately comes off as an extremely embarrassing American who can’t stop expecting everything to revolve around her. It also goes unmentioned in her account how many of the anarchist cells that were being “purged” were openly destroying and murdering the emerging Soviet state, this would be unacceptable anywhere and especially because this emerging Soviet state was exactly what was needed to end the economic crisis.
The conditions the Soviets made their revolution under was harsh and unfortunately necessitated the decisions made later on, but they should be critiqued with the context in mind or else we’re failing to learn from their successes and failures. When we apply our own context and preconceived notions onto a revolution which happened over a hundred years ago we are unable to take anything meaningful away except the most basic and propagandistic things.
It also goes unmentioned in her account how many of the anarchist cells that were being “purged” were openly destroying and murdering the emerging Soviet state.
Being frankly honest, this is just the history of reprisal and counter reprisal starting from the Russian revolution. If you read my post here and look into the history of the Russian civil war, it’s very plainly spelled out.
The Bolsheviks criminalized this as wrecking which allowed them to propagandize future Marxist-Leninists against understanding a more neutral version of the history of conflict between the two groups. Many anarchists feel exactly what you describe here about the Bolsheviks actions towards Maknovischina during the Revolution – the only real difference is that the Bolsheviks were successful at snuffing them out.
Kronstadt has a false mythology and this was quickly picked up by Western anarchists who were beginning to create a mythological canon of one-directional oppression by and the necessity of division from what they termed Marxists. The Soviet Archives dispute the narratives sold and resold, with the most important being that Kronstadt’s uprising was coordinated by new recruits from Eastern Ukraine, not those who had previously been key to revolution in Kronstadt. And, as in Eastern Ukraine - sometimes Makhnovschina - they started much of the infifhting and agitation against Bolsheviks, started campaigns to remove them from all soviets, created self-serving structures to isolate their islands of production from everyone else, and created self-serving organizational positions that even oppressed those sailors thst had been part of revolution there.
