Anarchy: Political Ideals To A Symbol Of Unconformity

Anarchy: Political Ideals To A Symbol Of Uncoformity

“Anarchism, then really stands for the liberation of human mind from the domination of religion, The liberation of the human body from the domination of property, Liberation from the shackles and restraints of government”#-Emma Golman. During the late 1800’s urbanization began to inflict the cities and the industrial revolution began resulting in governments gaining more and more power. “The state is authority; its force”#-Mikhail Bakunin. As the governments grew it was believed the state was more concerned with its growing power rather than the interests of the people. A group known as the anarchist believed that the government should be abolished and then the people would be free to live co-operatively with full social and political. Anarchy began as a political philosophy and soon turned in to an all out revolution resulting in assignations, bombings and kidnappings spanning over the better part of the past century. During the 1970’s and 1980’s, anarchy started to become more of a fashion trend if you will, rather than a political philosophy. “I Wanna Be Anarchy”-Sex Pistols. The Punk movement in music during the late 70’s was first to wide spread expose the public to anarchy and anarchist ideals. Followers of punk and punk music usually didn’t have the tendency to look of the proper meaning of anarchy, but since Johnny Rotten was saying it, it was cool. Today if you take a look at the public wither you are in a public school or a shopping mall, you can see teenagers with anarchy symbols on their shirts, pants, back packs and even drawn on their sneakers in an attempt to look what the public calls “hardcore”. “Anarchism is the sprit of the youth against out worn traditions”-Mikhail Bakunin, this would prove to be all too true in this new era of “anarchism”. This paper will further outline how anarchy started out as a political philosophy and turned in to a symbol of unconformity.

Anarchism can be defined as a political philosophy and social movement designed to destroy the government in hopes of creating a society based on voluntary co-operation of free individuals. In 1840 Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, a peaceful anarchist, published his controversial pamphlet titled “What Is Property”. Proudhon clamed that violence and crime was not caused by individuals but instead by the government. He believed that police and laws forced humans to live in an unnatural state of oppression and equality, according to Proudhon the ownership of property was the main root of all equality.