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| Articles about Anarchist |
| Parenting as a Green Anarchist | | 2007-08-23 17:28:00 | | I consider myself to be a pirate in some contemporary sense of the word. This is the lens through which I try to view our world. I am a nice pirate, where others rape and pillage I salvage and sow; where others sack and burn I liberate and grow. I pirate software, vegetables, herbs, bulk food aisles at corporate grocery stores, garbage, books, clothes, thrift stores, free boxes. I find homes for books lost on these high seas of a culture that, for the most part, doesn't read. I steal from the rich and give to the poor whenever possible. I try to be free in the fullest sense of the word and dream always of furthering that freedom. I live with my twin three year old daughters on an old 250 acre farm outside of Shelton, Washington at the inner-most tip of Puget Sound. I try to live as a Green Rebel and a Pirate in this commodified world of disposable consumables. Does this mean I live a zero-sum harmonious existence with my local ecosystem, feeding wild animals by hand and growing or scavenging all my food while refusing to pay taxes and stockpiling an enormous underground arms cache of sustainably gathered weapons of creation? Well... not yet. So I try instead to let these simple ideas bleed into my everyday interactions with nature and with the individuals around me. I try to be anti-authoritarian with my children for the most part, but every parent raises their voice or demands some sort of obedience from their kids, because that is the world we live in, try as we might to escape it. But I have become acutely aware of what a collaborative process parenting is and, as surely as I am raising two beautiful, intelligent, gentle girls in this crazy world, they are raising and molding a new kind of parent in me. And these new kinds of people we are helping each other foster and create and assemble from old bones will be the same people faced with solving the growing problems of tomorrow and bridging our polarized communities with what common ground we have: o | | By: Pirate Papa | | |
| | My Anarchist Parenting Hero | | 2007-06-22 17:12:00 | | Sorry China, my review is still pending. But I frickin' love the book! So here, I'm reposting this other review just for you. Come visit us again sometime. We're still here while you're shooting to stardom. You deserve it.The Future Generation China Martens Created Her New Book the Way She Raised Her Daughter--One Day at a TimeBy Violet Glaze If you went to a punk show in Baltimore in the early '90s, you remember Clover Martens. She was the only toddler in attendance, a wispy-haired imp in Goodwill sundresses darting in and out of the crowd of slam dancers and malcontents. Her supermodel-tall mom, China, was always with her, available for a quick snuggle or suckle but otherwise letting her daughter zip around at her own whim. There was sometimes talk that China Martens didn't have a steady partner to help raise her daughter, that her anarchist principles meant she wasn't going to enroll Clover in school or immunize her. One of two things (or sometimes both) crossed the minds of the callow suburban punks who'd never seen this model of parenting before: That kid is going to have an amazing life, or Is she going to turn out all right? She turned out great. Seated next to her mom at the dining room table at a reporter's house, the now 19-year-old Nadja (nee Clover) Martens is much curvier and darker-haired than her toddler self would have indicated, but you can tell it's her in the almond-y slant of her eyes and the unselfconscious way she owns the space she occupies, in marked contrast to the cringing unease affected by some teenage girls. She says "please" and "thank you" and asks to interrupt when she's got a good idea. If she's any measure of the validity of an anti-authoritarian rearing, there ought to be Emma Goldman memorial day care centers nationwide. "This is my new realization of my parent stage right now--of how incredibly great it is," China Martens beams. Her voice is gentle and tentative--it sucks any intimidation o | | By: Pirate Papa | | |
| | Prioritizing Kids in the Anarchist Community | | 2007-01-11 09:01:00 | | Recently I attended the Permanent Autonomous Zone conference in Louisville, KY where I participated in my first parenting workshop. Even though I go to several conferences a year, this was the first time I saw a parenting workshop offered. Unfortunately, it wasn't even scheduled, but was a guerrilla workshop set up by a mama from Detroit. Why did it take so long for me to come upon a workshop like this? Why is it that a bunch of self proclaimed anarchists in this "movement" for social and political change are not prioritizing family and community?I am the mother of a 3-year-old kid, miss Anaya Cassidy Kelly. Anaya goes with me almost everywhere. She is by my side at meetings, workshops, benefits, during volunteering, demos, consciousness raisings, protests and other events. You name it, and if I was there, chances are Anaya was too. That kid has sat through the most annoying and frustrating of consensus-based meetings where even I was whiny and tired by the end. Anaya has to put up wi | | By: Pirate Papa | | |
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