via: fuoridallariservaTranslated by Act for freedom now!
Message in the barrel about operation Sibilla and much more
The passion for destruction is also a creative passion
— M. Bakunin, The Reaction in Germany
The story goes that one day Alexander the Great went to the barrel in which Diogenes of Sinope lived. Diogenes was the only philosopher who had not gone to pay homage to the great king. So Alexander went to him. Alexander asked him: “Tell me what I can do for you”. And Diogenes answered: “Yes, move away, stand out of my light.”.
Reflecting on conditions of incommunicability, autonomy and refractoriness towards power is far more complicated today than it was in the 4th century BC.
Today power does not move, there is no longer a barrel inside which the shadow of the State does not reach. The only possible relationship with this global organism is violence. One hears all too often, like a plaint of bigots at evensong, that revolutionary violence is out of date. It is said that “times have changed” when, if anything, it is the possibility of escape that has changed.
The last two years have been a sad confirmation of this old story. A new era was heralded in with the massacre in the Italian prisons, the people locked in their homes while production continued to go ahead, the attacks and killings during the transport strikes, the countless repressive manoeuvres against anarchists, and finally through the green pass, the final (?) destination of the new society of control.
In so-called global civilisation, the disasters of capitalism reach us in every nook and cranny. The parable of the latest environmental movements seems eloquent to me. The “blah blah blah” of little Greta which falls back on her head: it is precisely you pacifists who only make “blah blah blah”, meanwhile the bosses of the world continue to lead us all towards the catastrophe. What should we do then? Get out of the barrel, and act.
We can interpret the recent operation «Sibilla» from three points of view: the dynamics of desolidarisation; the new form of authoritarian turn; the nihilist phase.
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The dynamics of desolidarisation
The investigation is aimed primarily at targeting Alfredo Cospito’s writings and those who disseminate them. The magistrates’ declared objective is to create a moat more powerful than the physical one surrounding the prison. So giving revolutionary solidarity to a prisoner like Alfredo means attracting the attention of the repression.
Some things cannot be said! Still not enough attention has been paid to a fact concerning the raids of 11 November. The ROS seized all and I mean all the traceable copies of Vetriolo, of the book Quale internazionale? [What international?]and the book Mio caro padrone domani ti sparo [My dear boss, tomorrow I will shoot you](Edizioni Monte Bove) in an attempt to wipe out an important piece of anarchist publications of recent years. The words, analyses, proposals of revolutionaries must disappear, condemned to damnatio memoriae, they will probably be burned on the first night of the full moon, with the blessing of the bishop and the curses of the holy inquisition. But the dynamics of desolidarisation are something creeping, they do not end in a night of witch-hunting. They are expanding like a toxic cloud.
How do we respond to the dynamics of desolidarisation? With solidarity, yeah, but what does solidarity mean? I am not in solidarity with Alfredo’s ideas. Some of them I share, others I do not. I am an anarchist and I think for myself. I am in solidarity with the practices he is accused of. I think the practices of which Alfredo is accused are a heritage of the revolutionary movement.
And I am not using the word ‘heritage’ by chance. Our class does not possess wealth. It inherits nothing of the land of the bosses. Our only wealth, our heritage, are our struggle practices. They are our only inheritance, we must guard them jealously, but above all we must nurture them. Every generation can be a ‘messianic’, revolutionary, generation, Walter Benjamin said.
Of course, bread is made with the flour one has. When Diogenes was asked about the best time to eat, it seems the philosopher replied: ‘The rich man when he likes, the poor man when he can’.
A great revolutionary strategist, Carletto Mazzone, said that ‘technique is the bread of the rich, tactics the bread of the poor’. We do not have technique, we do not have science and we do not have millionaire foundations. We have our intelligence and our hunger.
And intelligence scares, that’s why they seize our books and newspapers.
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A new form of authoritarian turn
Speaking of analyses that scare, the Sibilla operation confirms an important hypothesis of Vetriolo. The advent of a “new form of authoritarian turn”. To frame this concept correctly, we must first say something about the patron saint of the Sibilla operation.
Temporarily parked at the Perugia public prosecutor’s office, Raffaele Cantone is one of the shining stars of the Italian bourgeoisie. A reserve of the republic on permanent duty, his name has been mentioned several times for the presidency of the Council, particularly by Europeanist and liberalist circles and by the clique that revolves around Matteo Renzi. For a government of parliamentary conspiracy of course, these people, as we have seen with Mario Monti, do not even vote for their mother.
Of all the accusations made by Manuela Comodi and blessed by Saint Raffaele Cantone, item M) of the order is undoubtedly the most hilarious. One is accused of having written a text signed “Circolaccio Anarchico [Bad Anarchist Circle] – Spoleto” in which a call is made “for a real general strike” – fuck me! – “so as to publicly instigate the commission of crimes against the personality of the State, seriously threatening unjust damage”.
This is the new form of authoritarian turn: while the bosses’ terror gangs are beating the striking workers to a pulp, those calling for a real general strike at the level of the clash are threatening ‘unjust harm’ to the bosses who hold Dr Cantone in such high regard.
In order to avoid any danger of “victimism” or “innocentism”, it must be made clear that Cantone, how to say, has not made any goofs. His strategy fits into the new form of authoritarian trend perfectly. There is a red line connecting the Mottarone massacre in Stresa, the six deaths a day at work, the murdered trade unionists, the green pass and the Sibilla operation. This red line is called: recovery of the capitalist economy.
‘Cantone the censor’ is right, I am absolutely guilty of having advocated the sabotage of economic recovery.
Cantone’s accusation has a nostalgic flavour in fact that takes us back to a little old world. In fact, we must remember that, originally, Article 270 of the Rocco code punished associations that promoted ‘class hatred’.
Imagine if I were not guilty, we anarchists have been promulgating class hatred for 150 years! Not only do I declare myself guilty, but in order to make my confession more convincing I intend to call in complicity:
— the industrialists’ association (do you remember that scumbag from Macerata who said ‘if someone dies, so be it’?);
— the tradesmen’s association, for those 10-hour contracts and another 40 hours off the books (so during the lockdowns we only took redundancy pay on those 10 hours);
— companies such as the SPK in Milan, which rent «thugs» for the terror gangs with which they beat the workers on strike.
I apologize to the many I’ve forgotten. I’ve done everything I can to stir up class hatred in my life, but it’s only thanks to you that we’ve come this far.
If that’s incitement, well, it’s irresistible incitement!
Despite that little old world of the Rocco code that for 15 years has been making Manuela Comodi dream, it must be pointed out that the new form of authoritarian turn is not fascism. Just as the electronic tag is not the ball and chain. On the other hand, they promised that technology would improve our lives!
This clarification, by the way, keeps me far away from conspiracy. Those who believe, for example, that the State provokes tensions and crises on purpose, to then give an authoritarian twist. The State, if it could, would live in social peace. The State attacks us because it is attacked!
The truth is that the crises that capitalism is causing – environmental, health and social – are unmanageable. That’s why an authoritarian turn is needed. That’s what the technologies, digital control, internal passport to move around and work are all for.
This clarification, moreover, keeps me far from all democratic anti-fascism. It is true, as Bordiga said, that anti-fascism would become the worst product of fascism.
Immodestly, Vetriolo has always been the most lucid paper on these issues. In less suspicious times, when we had Matteo Salvini in government, Vetriolo always criticized those who spoke of the fascist/league danger. In the columns of Vetriolo it has always been written that the real authoritarian risks came from a tightening of liberalism, that we risked a Bava Beccaris rather than a Mussolini (just recently Bava Beccaris invoked machine-gunning the no green pass protests in the squares).
And in my history book, after Bava Beccaris comes Gaetano Bresci…
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The nihilist phase