Fire And Flames - A History Of The German Autonomist Movement - Geronimo

FIRE AND FLAMES - A HISTORY OF THE GERMAN AUTONOMIST MOVEMENT -

GERONIMO

Politics has always been the playground for the rich but more and more it's becoming the courtyard of the prison where the rulers of the roost carve and stake out their areas, and woe betide anyone who crosses the line. There has, however, always been incursions into politics that are uncontrolled and often uncontrollable. One example of this is the Italian Autonomia movement of the 1970s that saw a uniting of students, the unemployed and unskilled workers organizing themselves independently of the traditional workers' unions. These bodies of people weren't interested in reformist mediation via the unions but rather a complete negation of the existing system and the holders of power at all levels within it. Rather than arbitration and moderation, what this led to in Italy was an embracing of militancy, riot and spontaneous revolt as a means to an end.

According to Fire And Flames - A History Of The German Autonomist Movement, 'the theory and praxis of the West German Autonomen of the 1980s can be seen as a second wave of autonomous struggles after the crushing of the Italian Autonomia movement in the late 1970s'. And yes, there is a lineage, and one that I would even argue goes way beyond Germany in the 1980s and into other countries in the 1990s right up to the present day - and England is included in that.

In Germany, one of the largest and most impressive manifestations of the Autonomia movement took place in June of 1987 when 50,000 people gathered in Berlin to protest against the State visit of Ronald Reagan, with 4,000 of them forming an autonomous bloc. Dressed mainly in black, sporting scarves, ski-masks and motorcycle helmets, the bloc made for a mightily impressive sight. Clashes with police and mass rioting, of course, ensued.

The bloc was a coming together of multiple political affiliations, bonding over one specific aim: to protest the Reagan visit in whatever way they saw fit and if that meant attacking police lines then so be it. It was collective, spontaneous, autonomous strength in action. To join and form such a bloc took a particular mindset, one that though organized was essentially anarchist in nature. A mindset that fully understood what Raoul Vaneigem meant when he spoke of the positive in the refusal of constraints.

Beyond the anti-Reagan protest, those in possession of this same autonomist attitude would also be involved in countless other campaigns, protests and alternative forms of living, with West Berlin being arguably the epicentre of radicalism during the 1980s. The strength and successes of the German Autonome lay in the fact that to all intent and purpose it was non-hierarchical. There were plenty of forms of organization, of course, but there was never any central organizing committee. As said in Fire And Flames in its reproduction of the 'Autonomous Theses' 'To this day, the movement has not produced any individual representative, spokesperson, or celebrity. That is, no Antonio Negri, Rudi Dutschke, Cohn Bendit, etc'.

To my knowledge, there hasn't been very many books written about the German Autonomist movement (or at least not in English) so for this reason alone, Fire And Flames is important. One of its strengths is that it's written from the personal experience of the author which means that whilst there are things that are obviously missed out such as cultural influences upon the movement and the involvement and the role of women, you know that what he does write of is more than likely to be factual. Or at least factual as in seen through his eyes.

Interestingly, the book ends in 1989 with the fall of the Berlin Wall which to put it mildly, left everyone reeling not least the Autonomen. There comes a time, it seems, in the journey of every social movement that an event occurs or an impasse is reached and the only question to ask is 'What now?' The end of the (West) Federal Republic of Germany was one such moment: 'It seemed clear that coming to the defense of disappearing nation-states was not very autonomous. But was there anything else to do?'

Whilst all the many squats in Berlin were steadfastly evicted, the black bloc tactic of the German Autonomen - like a genie from its bottle - had been released and would continue to be utilised over the years and throughout the world, particularly in regard to the mass protests against the WTO and G8 summits.  As almost a prelude to these, the Stop The City protests in London during the 1980s can also be linked to the German autonomist movement in the way that both were excluded from the main organizing bodies of the anti-Cruise missile protests of that time.

According to Fire And Flames, in Germany the peace movement with its strong nonviolent ideology distanced itself from the Autonomen, choosing to collaborate instead with the police. In England, the CND leadership did likewise when it came to the Stop The City demonstrations, believing that because Stop The City was unregulated and without any clearly defined structure that it would be too unpredictable, potentially leading to a clash with the police. To have a protest take place in the heart of the financial district of London might also lead to antagonism from those who worked there as any disruption to 'business as usual' might have significant impact on the diverse range of business interests located there. The penny was being dropped but the CND leadership were failing to pick it up.

Fire And Flames is a good book because not only does it go some way in joining the dots between such things as industrial disputes in Italy during the 1970s and the social upheaval in Germany during the 1980s, but it also goes some way in recording a history that over time is being forgotten if not even being erased. 

Know your history, is what I say. For those who fail to remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

John Serpico

The Triple Echo - H E Bates

 THE TRIPLE ECHO - H E BATES

It's my contention that rather than Vanessa Redgrave it should have been Glenda Jackson who starred in Ken Russell's 'The Devils'. She would have made the perfect possessed nun and would probably have been down on the church floor with the rest of them, shedding her robes and cavorting for all she's worth around the pews. In fact, she may well have insisted on it even if it wasn't in the script. For authenticity. 

Oliver Reed and Glenda Jackson made for a good pairing when cast together in Ken Russell's 'Women In Love' though it wasn't until the following year after the release of The Devils that they came together again in the film adaptation of H E Bates' The Triple Echo.

When it comes to films based on books and vice versa, the question always rises as to which is better: the book or the film? Nine times out of ten the book wins but when it comes to The Triple Echo I'd say it's a draw. Both have their merits but then both have their shortcomings. The merits are in the compactness and brevity of the main characters playing out their respective roles against a background of a wide open landscape under a vast sky. The main problem of both is in the story's central premise.

It's World War Two and a 'war widow' whose husband has been taken prisoner by the Japanese is living alone at subsistence level on an isolated farm somewhere in the English countryside. She one day comes upon a young soldier out wandering around on his day off from the local Army barracks, and after no time at all they become lovers.

Together, rather than him going back to his regiment it's decided he should stay with her at the farm, disguising himself as a woman with fake breasts and all. To quell suspicions when anyone asks, she tells them that it's her sister who has come to stay a while.

Into the mix enters another soldier (in the film played by Oliver Reed), a very uncouth and brutish man who takes a shine to the woman's 'sister' and gets 'her' to go to a Christmas Eve dance being held at the barracks. It's at this point that everything starts to unravel. 

On one level, The Triple Echo can be read as a description of one of the more unusual sorrows of war but on another level it can be read a bit more lightly: War! What is it good for? Absolutely nothing apart from men dressing as women only to then invite the amorous advances of Oliver Reed.

Was H E Bates an inhibited and repressed cross-dresser, I wonder? A would-be sweet transvestite? Was him writing The Triple Echo a way of safely coming out of his closet under the guise of fiction? Everyone likes a bit of cross-dressing, for sure. It's only natural. So is The Triple Echo the equivalent of H E Bates sending a message in a bottle, with the hope that it might one day wash up on a shore and lead to his rescue? I think it might be.

John Serpico

Breaking Convention - A Seismic Shift In Psychedelia

 BREAKING CONVENTION -

A SEISMIC SHIFT IN PSYCHEDELIA

And there was I thinking nobody takes drugs seriously these days and that it was all now purely recreational. That all the psychonauts of old have been there and back again, up the hills and down the valleys, through the avenues and alleyways of your mind, my mind and out of their minds. Where the likes of Timothy Leary have been in, out, shaken it all about and done the Hokey Cokey just to find that actually that's what it's all about.

Well, it seems I was wrong and the Breaking Convention symposiums are the proof positive of this, these being biennial events where presentations are given by people of an academic bent in regard to research into psychedelic science and culture. After each symposium a book is then published of essays based on talks given by their authors, Breaking Convention - A Seismic Shift In Psychedelia being one of them.

So what do we have? Well, there are eleven essays here in total, all acting almost as teasers in regard to the specific subject each is alighting on. Acting as precursors to further discussion, consideration and exploration. Adding fuel to the fire and greasing the wheels to keep the train rolling and the party rocking.

As might be expected, the subjects are varied though still all falling under the psychedelia umbrella. Have you ever heard of Psychedelic Feminism? Me neither, but it's a thing and actually it's pretty interesting, the essay here covering Charlotte Bronte, Maria Sabina, and Anais Nin - psychedelic feminists all.

Not so good is the essay regarding the approximation of the near death experience via the consumption of magic mushrooms, it being the ultimate ego death. You might well indeed come out of such an experience a better person but it's still a bum trip, man.

And then there's one about the decline in the growth of peyote as demand outstrips supply, that kind of links to another essay about how psychedelics might help in tackling climate change and other earth crises. If the root cause of the world's environmental crisis is arguably consumer capitalism held in place by the 'reality principle', the suggested solution would be if a total shift to a new reality principle was to happen, brought about through drugs. In essence, to save the world we need to blow our minds.

This all leads on to what is one of the best essays in the book where the author considers the so-called psychedelic community itself, in particular its social make-up:

'Much of the psychedelic community identifies as spiritual but not necessarily political. Politics is simply the organization and structuring of power within a society. When we belittle the importance of recognizing those power structures, they don't go away - they simply become invisible to us. It is particularly easy to ignore them when many of us in the community don't feel negatively impacted by them - often because we sit at the intersections of multiple forms of privilege, whether it be race, class, education, physical ability, gender identity and more.

Yet one only has to look around the room at a 'psychedelic' event to see the dynamics at play. Who is in the room and who isn't? Who has the mic and who doesn't? Who is facilitating the research study? Who is more often criminalised for engaging with these substances? Who has the disposable income to attend an ayahuasca retreat? Whose cultural traditions of knowledge are recognised and valued and whose aren't?' 

Of that last line I would humbly include myself, as in being among those whose cultural traditions of knowledge are not recognised nor valued. I have no academic background in the slightest so who am I to pass comment upon those who have? Who am I to criticise? Criticise, however, I will because I have now read this book although it's not so much criticism I give but reflection.

Are the Breaking Convention symposiums and the publication of this book an indication of a seismic shift in psychedelia? Personally I think not. It is, rather, a coalescing of elements within academia who share a common interest but a shared interest does not a seismic shift make. If anything it's more an affinity group, although that's no bad thing and I don't say this to belittle it.

Can drugs change the world? They can certainly change a person's perception of the world but that doesn't necessarily mean in a good way. There is no tipping point as in if enough people turn on then the world will become a better place. There is, however, such a thing as tilting at windmills. In fact, tilting at windmills is what the world and everyone in it does. I do it, you do it, the academics involved with Breaking Convention do it.

Drugs are all things to all people. They can be good, bad, happy, sad, positive, negative or even all these things all at the same time. For some, drugs can be food for thought, even. And that is what we have got here with this book: food for thought. To bring ethnobotanist Terence McKenna into the conversation, it's food for thought in regard to the food of the gods, and seriously so in the way that academics always try to be. And again, that's no bad thing at all.

John Serpico