The second issue of the insurrectionary / nihilist anarchist newspaper “Blessed Is The Flame”, originally published in 8 July 2024 in Greek, has now been translated in English. By doing so, we hold the ambition that this newspaper can become an international effort, bringing together all the direct action reports, statements and texts of comrades, and news about the struggles of anarchist prisoners that are scattered across the world, divided by language and communication barriers.
We make a call to any willing comrades around the world to assist us in translating the newspaper in other languages as well and diseminate it both digitally and physically; the document was designed to be easily printable as a A5-size booklet. Ideally, we would like to suggest an international collaboration between counter-information projects from all corners of the world, defying the recent repression efforts of various states who want to put an end to the diffusion of the ideas and practices of the anarchy of action.
The link for the PDF file: http://blessed-is-the-flame.espivblogs.net/files/2024/07/Blessed-Is-The-Flame-Issue-2-2.pdf
The current issue includes direct action reports of the last four months (March – June 2024) from around the world, claims of responsibility from Greece, Italy, Germany, Chile and USA, news and statements from anarchist prisoners, as well as some texts with discussions related to organisational and strategic issues and considerations for the anarchist offensive, counter-surveillance and security, and (non-primitivist) critique of civilisation.
If anyone is interested in translating the document and/or creating an international collaboration, you can contact us at blessedistheflame@riseup.net
We can provide the editable source file of the document.
We hope we will soon be able to translate the first issue of the newspaper aswell (Jaunary 2024), covering counter-info for the period of November-December 2023. The link for the first issue in Greek can be found here: http://blessed-is-the-flame.espivblogs.net/files/2024/01/Ευλογημένη-Η-Φλόγα-Τεύχος-1.pdf
The link for the second issue in Greek can be found here: http://blessed-is-the-flame.espivblogs.net/files/2024/07/Ευλογημένη-Η-Φλόγα-Τεύχος-2-2.pdf
A final note: This newspaper is meant to be just a few pages per issue, so that it can be easier to read and cheaper to print. The current issue however is 28 pages long due to the fact that we were absent from the counter-info scene for about half a year and we wanted to cover as much material as possible from the time period that we were missing.
LONG LIVE THE BLACK INTERNATIONAL
FOR THE DIFFUSION OF ANARCHY AND CHAOS
EDITORIAL
After almost half a year of absence, we return with the publication of the second issue of our newspaper, reporting the international insurrectionary actions and the struggles of anarchist prisoners for about the last four months, thus trying to fill a large part of the vacuum left by our absence. Since we are now the only anarchist project in Greece that deals adequately with these issues on the international level and takes care to translate into Greek claims of responsibility, statements and texts of anarchist rebels from all over the world.
We are at the doorstep of a new geopolitical order of things and a new technological and industrial revolution, i.e., in a phase of history where global power relations are changing again, and therefore there is a need to have a bridge of communication between affinities from all latitudes and longitudes, since despite the peculiarities of each place, the enemy remains the same: the system of domination called civilisation.
The hegemony of the West is fading, its sphere of influence shrinks as the power of other states such as Russia and especially China increases. The struggle for technological development is perhaps the only front of this heating cold war that the West can hope to gain some superiority. However, regardless of the winner, the course of the techno-industrial civilisation will be the same; artificial intelligence and the new technologies that promise to further connect the natural with the digital world, such as the internet of things, will continue to grow until they too become an indispensable part of our lives, setting the way for a more inhumane technocratic regime where the governance and the enforcement of order will be guided by data science and algorithms, the surveillance of our lives will become more intrusive and domestication and repression more effective.
Digitilisation, changes in labour relations, the reduction of rights, gentrification, and, in general, the policies that are being followed in recent years, with their main tool being the successive states of emergency that impose on us with the pretext of the memorandums, the refugee issue, covid, etc., are the first steps of this great socio-economic transformation.
But no matter how much the world changes, it remains the same in its core; a world built in the systematic exploitation and oppression of human and non-human beings, alienation and subjugation of individuality, and in the plunder of nature, a reality that is being perpetuated, expanded and is evolving ever since the first cities and the first states began to emerge, in other words since the beginning of civilisation.
No matter how many empires were born and died, no matter how many old religions were replaced by new ones, or how many traditions have changed, how many revolutions have been done, this core remains unchanged. By making this finding, we are released from the toxic feeling of hope and we are no longer satisfied by the illusion of a “better tomorrow” (or a “better yesterday that must become tomorrow” in the case of primitvists). But we do not choose the – unfortunately popular – path to resignation. Repeating the words of the conspiracy of Cells of Fire: “As anarchonihilists we hate both the hand that holds the whip and the back that endures it and passively accepts flagellation without reacting.” Disobedient people have always existed and will always exist in every society, who, armed with negation, dare to take life into their own hands, defying fear, shame and any other psychological or material means that are being used in the name of the false idols of law and morality. Individual rebellion is a natural consequence of life in a society and, anyhow, the cornerstone on which the conditions of mass uprisings are built. Thus, anarchy is not placed somewhere in the vague future, but is immediately experienced here and now with every act of disobedience, defiance and rebellion, acts that are not motivated by a utopian vision but stem from the total negation of the existing. To become wild again, to embrace our individuality, and to attack on the structures, institutions and symbols of power that are permanently attacking our lives, bring life to anarchy as a liberatory process.
Under this perspective, the separation between the means and the end, and the concepts of victory and defeat become meaningless. But in order for our attacks to truly become thorns in the flesh of this monstrosity called civilisation, communication, organisation and coordination at an international level is required. Although the attacks by the Informal Anarchist Federation have been significantly reduced lately, endeavours such as the “Switch Off! The System of Destruction” in the German-speaking parts of Europe show that the informal organisation of affinity groups is still a relevant and effective model of action. This campaign was recently launched by a call of anarchists, autonomists and social revolutionaries for offensive mobilisation against every company, industry and infrastructure is responsible for the destruction of the environment (i.e. all of them). Since then, countless arson attacks and sabotages have disturbed the smooth operation of the capitalist / techno-industrial system and caused damages worth million of euros. This campaign begins to expand to other corners of the Earth, such as the US and Chile (see page 9). Without international counter-information projects this would have not been possible.
Beyond that, something often overlooked, is the need to develop a strategy for our attacks. That is why we include some discussions in this issue around this topic. But it is necessary to know how the world is changing nowadays, as we have mentioned before, so that we can recognise what will the new vulnerabilities of the system be, which of the old vulnerabilities will have been enhanced against attacks, how will the methods of repression against us change, and how our methods of action will need to be changed correspondingly.
We are aware, of course, that the ideas mentioned in this text need more pages to be explained adequately. We refer the interested reader to the publications of our project. Here we summarise these ideas to set a framework around which we hope that this newspaper is read. Already, as we gladly observed, the first issue had some influence on the practical level, and this gives us more courage to continue our project regardless of the pressures of our personal lives.
For anarchy, nihilism and individualism