#really good stuff

The disillusioned veteran has spent years on the frontlines face to face with the revolution’s shortcomings, and they choose to insulate themself through sneering detachment and gallows humor—which equip them to continue their struggle. At the opposite extreme, the newly arrived naive utopian is wholly incapable of seeing the revolution’s shortcomings, full of infectious revolutionary fervor as they are. The total loyalist takes a similar approach, but their initial naivety becomes a permanent condition. They decide to swallow the Kurdish movement’s grandest ideological claims at face value, a one-shot tonic for any nagging doubts. And finally, the cynical idealist takes a similar path a step further. Undertaking a true absurdist commitment, their eyes are open to the contingent and limited nature of the revolution, yet they nonetheless choose to struggle anew each day. [...] It’s only through our own infinite resignation we can leap into true, existential conviction, placing our hopes not in our day-to-day record of successes or defeats, but in a perhaps unreachable goal. This is what Kierkegaard calls the “double movement” of faith: first the infinite resignation, then the irrational leap. Our final type of internationalist militant, the cynical idealist, goes through just such a double movement. They may arrive in Rojava as naive utopians, bursting with hope; they may witness the compromises and flaws of the revolution and endure a difficult spell as disillusioned veterans, doubting whether revolutionary transformation is indeed possible. Through this process, they resign their naive, childish* hope. But they thereby achieve a more profound commitment, dedicating themselves to the cause not despite but because of these flaws and compromises. The cynical idealist’s hope is more serious, since it is informed by a clear-eyed assessment of the perhaps impossible challenges faced by the revolution and therefore more capable of equipping them for a lifetime’s struggle. As we saw, the total loyalist might too easily close their eyes to their comrades’ failures to live up to the Kurdish movement’s principles on either the personal or political level, thereby harming both their comrades and the revolution itself. Conversely, the cynical idealist recognizes and holds these contradictions, wrestling with them even as they continue their work in support of the movement’s broad goals. For example, the total loyalist might downplay an incident of abuse, choosing to believe that Kurdish revolutionaries are immune from engaging in patriarchal behavior. But the cynical idealist would follow the Kurdish women’s movement in recognizing that patriarchal power dynamics exist even within the radically autonomous women’s movement itself, thereby proving the need for continual anti-patriarchal struggle once more. If the total loyalist were confronted with incontrovertible evidence of an abuse of patriarchal power or a lack of women’s solidarity, the shock might drive them from the movement altogether. But the cynical idealist knows that individual failures only prove the need for continued revolutionary organization on the internal front. They are alert to contradictions and shortcomings and therefore protected from the shock of small defeats.

i started listening to T. Playwright recently but i havent gotten around to listening to most of their discography sooo i miiiight do that while working on my fucked up and evil mass attack