Miami Dispatch: 11/12

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Jonathan Luna speaks next. He is from Tallahassee, spent his childhood in Colombia, and tells us about how his group has taken their education into their own hands and founded the Center for Participant Education, the longest-running free school in the country.

Javier del Sol is a Quaker anarcho-pacifist of Mexican/Cora India descent who lives right here in Lake Worth. He talks about indigenous cultures as models of anarchism, societies based on cooperation and organic forms of organization, and links anarchism with his Quaker religion.

Then I speak about the spiritual basis of anarchism -- with a disclaimer that many anarchists don't identify with 'spirituality' or religion at all. There is, however, a kind of spirituality that is not about dogma or belief systems or sacred texts, but about mystery -- that is, approaching the most common things of life, birth, death, growth, healing, with a sense of awe and wonder. And seeing the earth as alive, a living being with a consciousness and a presence we can feel, in which all of us are deeply interconnected and interdependent. From that point of view, we are all mutually responsible for each other, and anarchism is about attempting to build a society based on those values.

By this time the whole audience is applauding us all, firmly on our side. The press asks the usual questions, about the "violence in our movement," which Sara answers well and I elaborate. They ask a lot of other questions, and then finally go, and we resume with the community portion of the evening.

Terra, who didn't want to be on camera, speaks now and says she prefers the term "anarchy," with all its connotations of creative chaos, to "anarchism," which is a political system of thought put forth by dead white men with all its own rigidities. It's a new insight for me. Then comes David Solnit, puppetmaster extraordinaire, instigator of many pageants and projects to bring art into action. We've been doing actions together since the eighties, when he was an angelic looking 20-something with a cloud of curly hair and eyes that glowed with innocence as he evaded police custody or performed some outrageous act of disobedience. He stands up and does a short Conte-story, an Italian form of popular education that uses big pictures and call and response to teach a political lesson.

Here are some things that matter," He says, pointing to a chart. "When I say 'Air,' you say 'Matters.' Air!"

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