Everyday Anarchism:Self governance for the home and beyond

It's a rainy day in Grahamstown. It's been wonderful and refreshing. The garden has been loving it.

Recently (December) my lady and I bought a house. And this was a trying time, ethically, for I. Most of us cannot afford to buy a house for cash unless we have been saving for years upon years.
The way our societies have been structured, people hardly earn enough to save their earnings, which is the cornerstone of capitalism. Well, supposedly. As far as I was taught, Capitalism is meant to be a system of savings and growing of surplus in order to maximize value and quality of life. Obviously, that has \n't been ultimately true, as many people can't keep up with Capitalism's other harsh realities, like inflation, for one. Lotto winners and drug dealers tend to afford these things quicker but the rest of us have to deal with the terror of the bank. Loans, bonds and other such bindings will then connect us to this broken, criminal system for decades.But as our partners tend to do, my lady convinced me that this sacrifice was for our greater good. And here we are.

In me, a concession was made: that the house is a tool. A tool to help us grow and manifest our magick. Here we can work from home, safely and with no office stress. Here we can manage the Front as best as we can, from home. Time and space management also was a big motivating factor for getting a house. Here we can plant our own food and depend less on stores for our most basic resources. We get our water from a well nearby. We have started growing our own herbs, carrots and beans. The carrots are taking well, so far. I will expand the types of beans I plant in due time. The herbs have been moody, as their cuttings were torn violently from their hosts and not cut at all.. Jasmine, sage, mint, and others are growing, though. I even managed to save the succulent which was damaged by the first gardeners we hired. The plants have been loving the rain but the winds can be trying. I have been building defenses for them steadily and patiently. The time will come when we don't have to buy much at all. And I hope we won't have to depend too much on external labour. It's difficult at this time, with the space that we have, to start a rice paddy. Rice is something that I'd like to grow. But it needs a lot of water.

Right now, this area is suffering ridiculous "water rules" even though we have enough water. Also, the "water discipline," as Frank Herbert once called it, is poor in most parts of this country. It's mostly the regions like the Northern and North-Western Cape that have instilled cultures of water discipline. They have been exposed to water shortages a lot longer than areas like KZN, at least in the past. Having been a country suffering so many social ills, the space for ethic construction has been short. We've done more damage in our people than repair. The power is innate in all men to be the best citizens they can be, and we only need facilitate this process so that people end up running them selves.

Since reading Dune, I have figured out that one's personal responsibility is not that separate from one's social responsibility. The things we do are not insulated from the social and political milieu. When we grow our own food or supply our own water, we are practicing self governance on the ground. If we truly want to protest, taking over our systems is the best way to do it. So far, South Africa has not really taken to local banking. South Africa has also not been training people to manage their own things. The Land Question is still being debated. We are still far from giving back the stolen land, which will then allow our people to get back to managing their lives from the ground up.


Subjects such as Philosophy and Critical Thinking should not be limited to the university curriculum alone. If we train our young to philosophize, build their own points of view while studying and living with those of others. If we teach them critical thinking exercises, we will improve the thinking faculties of our people for each forthcoming generation. And our view must not be narrow or short. The cosmos is large and we need to be focused. Our consciousness is a tool by which to observe and act within this environment. We are all superheroes. We are all mages. WE are all stars. Powerful enough to build an atom bomb. And surely, we are powerful enough to build a better inner world. Thing is, we like to think that politics is something 'out there.' No. Politics is in the home. It's in the fact that one company manages the electrical power of millions. It's about the fact that too many systems out there are so mediated, we forget that there are actually real people behind the screens, numbers and walls. The Federal Bureau of Investigation or the National Intelligence Agency are places with flesh and blood people who make things happen.


It is within every individual, and the onus is on every individual, to further the survival of our kind. To manage the dark and the light in each of us. When we think that we can do nothing, we are actually giving away our power to do something to someone who says that they can. The more we nurture capability in each other, the more capable we become. Magick isn't just about Merlin, Tinkerbells and Gandalf the Grey. Magick is the manifestation of our will. When we do, we are practicing magick. When we don't, we fail our own will. And in this way, the world can fall to ruin. The more apathy we have, the more things will go wrong. We must have opinions. We must criticize and construct. We must destroy the things that hinder our survival. We can.


Look at our townships. They are the prime example of the built environment as an imprint device. The environment used as a weapon of control. These places have often lacked usable water, been far from hubs of commerce and have had the worst of the negatives of this country of ours. If it's crime, poverty, power shortage or lack of service delivery, the townships suffer if worst and usually suffer it first. Remember that the Masons of old used their architectural knowledge not only to expand consciousness, but also to stifle it in others. Operant conditioning is a learning principle in which environmental contingencies are controlled and manipulated to change behavior. And for your information, operant conditioning is not just done to rats and monkeys in science labs. It is done in the countries we call home, to us and to others. Becoming aware is the best way to manage one's self.


It is this home, these walls, this incense permeating the space. It is the subtle light coming through the windows, the herbs growing behind me. It is my lady at the controls of our screen which receives (purposefully) no TV signal. It is these things and more that inspire me to share. To share that it is possible to manage one's self and one's space. That it is possible to change one's behaviour and build a better world. It is possible to manifest one's dreams. And it lies in our consciousness. Focusing our will to the places of growth and sustenance.


Anarchy is not just throwing molotov cocktails at parliament. I wish it was that easy. I wish Anarchism was just lawlessness and living in a constant drug high while filling the Nkandla swimming pool with the heads of our parliamentarians (not you, Miss Mashego, you'll get a warning email.) But it's actually about responsibility. From when you wake up to when you go to sleep, you must be the master of your universe. The minute you give away that authority is the same minute someone will take it from you and sell it back to at a markup.

Remember, death lurks where life is cheap.