Source: Their Eyes Were Watching God
“The words “communalism” and “communalist” seem to have died out and it would be good to appropriate them to this group, although the by now too confusing word “communist” actually fits them best of all.”
Introduction : The Libertarian Tradition
Communalism (1974)
Context: People who believe in libertarian communism can be grouped roughly under three general theories, each with its old masters, theoreticians, leaders, organizations, and literature. First there are the anarchists in a rather limited variety: communist-anarchists, mutualists, anarcho-syndicalists, individual anarchists, and a few minor groups and combinations. Second, the members of intentional communities, usually but by no means always religious in inspiration. The words “communalism” and “communalist” seem to have died out and it would be good to appropriate them to this group, although the by now too confusing word “communist” actually fits them best of all. Third, there are the Left Marxists, who prior to 1918 had become a widespread movement challenging the Social Democratic Second International. It was to them the Bolsheviks appealed for support in the early days of their revolution. Lenin’s The State and Revolution is an authoritarian parody of their ideas. They in turn have called it “the greatest pre-election pamphlet ever written: ‘Elect us and we will wither away’.” Against them Lenin wrote Leftism: An Infantile Disorder. There is a story that, when the Communist International was formed, a delegate objected to the name. Referring to all these groups he said: “But there are already communists.” Lenin answered: “Nobody ever heard of them, and when we get through with them nobody ever will.” Today these ideas are more influential than they ever have been.
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Kenneth Rexroth 65
American poet, writer, anarchist, academic and conscientiou… 1905–1982Related quotes
Conclusion
Misquoting Jesus (2005)
“We have too many high sounding words, and too few actions that correspond with them.”
Abigail Adams
(1744–1818) 2nd First Lady of the United States (1797–1801)
Letter to John Adams (1774)
Source: The Book Thief
Source: The Sound of the Mountain
“People to whom sin is just a matter of words, to them salvation is just words too.”
Source: As I Lay Dying (1930)
“How many unuttered words died in the heads of those for whom a word was too expensive.”
Dejan Stojanovic
(1959) poet, writer, and businessman
“Unuttered Words,” p. 59
The Sun Watches the Sun (1999), Sequence: “A Stone and a Word”
Gloria Steinem
(1934) American feminist and journalist
The Humanist interview (2012)
Context: I think most social justice movements take the words that are used against them and make them good words. That’s partly how “black” came back into usage. Before we said “colored person,” or “Negro.” Then came “Black Power,” “Black Pride,” and “Black Is Beautiful” to make it a good word.
"Witch" was another word I remember reclaiming in the 1970s. There was a group called Women’s International Terrorist Conspiracy from Hell (WITCH). They all went down to Wall Street and hexed it. And Wall Street fell five points the next day; it was quite amazing! “Queer” and “gay” are other examples. … I think we all have the power to name ourselves. I try to call people what it is they wish to be called. But we can take the sting out of epithets and bad words by using them. Actually, I had done that earlier with “slut” because when I went back to Toledo, Ohio, which is where I was in high school and junior high school, I was on a radio show with a bunch of women. A man called up and called me “a slut from East Toledo,” which is doubly insulting because East Toledo is the wrong side of town. I thought, when I’d lived here I would have been devastated by this. But by this time I thought, you know, that’s a pretty good thing to be. I’m putting it on my tombstone: "Here lies the slut from East Toledo."