A review by nb_leftist
Armed Joy by Alfredo M. Bonanno

challenging dark emotional informative inspiring reflective tense fast-paced

5.0

I don’t agree with everything in here, but 99% of it is so good.

Notes from my second read (6 pages, 2801 words):

“By abolishing the ethic of production you enter revolutionary reality directly.” 

-        Interesting to think about in terms of language production. Production, contrary to Bonnano’s claims about production being unneeded, there are obviously some types of production which are inherent to existence. 

-        The bourgeoisie also produces language, those in power have control over the production mechanisms of language. If not the bourgeoisie through an economic sense, the core’s of society rather than the peripheries have control over the vast majority of language. Someone without power/social credibility/etc. will not have control over language. This issue is most likely unavoidable. 

-        There are forms of power which are inescapable. 

 

“No matter what, the bosses must ‘pay’ for their wrongs. Very well! We will carry the Christian ethic of sin, judgement and reparation into the revolution. As well as the concepts of ‘debt’ and ‘payment’, clearly of mercantile origins.” 

-        I think this is important and can maybe be rectified with the recent pursuals and investigations about the idea of restorative/non-punitive justice. 

-        Very interesting because although I see a lot of restorative justice moves, some are still overcome by a “need” for revenge against the bosses. 

 

“To the question: ‘What will we eat?’ one could quite simply reply: ‘What we produce.’ Only production would no longer be the dimension in which man determines himself, as that would come about in the sphere of play and joy.” 

-        So its not a war on production, but a way on over-production. 

 

“Circulation of goods will not base itself on objects and their illusionist reification, but on the meaning that the objects have for life. And this must be a life meaning, not a death one. So these objects will be limited to the precise moment in which they are exchanged, and their significance will vary according to the situations in which this takes place. … The same object could have profoundly different ‘values.’ It will be personified. It will be personified.” 

-        Seems to be more abstract but in reality is just more subjective. An embrace of subjectivity and subject value. Creating an infinite amount of value and invalue. 

-        Seems to be echoing the ideas of One-Dimensional Man by Marcuse in the idea of manufactured needs and the needed embrace of subjectivity, specifically negative subjectivity (in terms of challenging the system), for any real revolution to take place. That abstractness is needed. 

-        An earlier line: “The refusal of the spectacular market of capitalist illusions will create another kind of exchange.” 

o   Directly referencing a refusal, most likely the Great Refusal. 

 

“We work all year round to have the ‘joy’ of holidays. When these come round we feel ‘obliged’ to ‘enjoy’ the fact that we are on holiday. A form of torture like any other. The same goes for Sundays. A dreadful day. The rarefaction of the illusion of free time shows us the emptiness of the mercantile spectacle we are living in. … To seek ‘joy’ in the depths of any of the various ‘recitals’ of the capitalist spectacle would be pure madness. But that is exactly what capital wants.” 

-        Horrifying. The more I think about it is terrifying. Whenever I have a day off I get more worried about not enjoying it than anything else. It feels wasted if I don’t enjoy it, and consistently there is an overwhelming feeling that it’s my fault, that I’ve squandered my one chance at joy again. 

 

“By a strange twist of irony the roles are reversed. If life is something serious death is an illusion, in the sense that so long as we are alive death does not exist. Now, the reign of death, i.e. the reign of capital, which denies our very existence as human beings and reduces us to ‘things’, seems very serious, methodical and disciplined. But its possessive paroxysm, its ethical rigour, its obsession with ‘doing’ all hide a great illusion: the total emptiness of the commodity spectacle, the uselessness of indefinite accumulation and the absurdity of exploitation. So the great seriousness of the world of work and productivity hides a total lack of seriousness.” 

-        Seems to be a repetition/related to the idea of Being vs. Nonbeing. That one is a naming of nothingness, if there was nonbeing then it would not be known, it would not be there, but nothing and Nonbeing are both existences, they are named, nothing exists and nonbeing exists. 

-        Expanding this to life and death, death exists, one can be dead, but if one knows about death, they are not dead, they are alive. We can only experience life. 

-        Capitalism denies us life, capitalism keeps us chasing life through the idea that we must produce to be a human, without production you aren’t human, you’re either an animal or do not exist (or not worthy of existing). Thus capitalism dangles in front of us the carrot of “Being”—of life—while if we are able to experience (anything) we are already alive. 

-        Next line: “On the contrary, the refusal of this stupid world, the pursuit of joy, dreams, utopia in its declared ‘lack of seriousness’, hides the most serious thing in life: the refusal of death.” 

o   The “carrot” capitalism dangles in front of us is “Being”, specifically “Being” through endless production. We already live, we are already Being. Thus, to refuse the capitalist idea of “life” and “Being”, we are refusing to participate in production—in work—and due to this we will be seen as playing. Of course, the path forward for Bonanno is to pursue Joy, play. When we pursue Joy we are refusing capitalism, the reign of death (since under capitalism we are not living until we participate). The refusal of death (capitalism, etc.) is a very serious structure, thus in playing we are being serious. 

 

“Poverty and hunger are still the driving forces of the revolution. But capital is widening the spectacle. It wants new actors on stage. The greatest spectacle in the world will continue to surprise us. Always more complicated, better and better organized. New clowns are getting ready to mount the rostrum. New species of wild beasts will be tamed.” 

-        Once again referring to an idea mentioned in Marcuse’s One-Dimensional Man, the creation of false needs; that capitalism has created “needs” which are completely unneeded. 

 

“The truth is that the spectacular mechanism of commodities must be broken by entering the domain of capital, its coordinating centers, right to the very nucleus of production. Think what a marvelous explosion of joy, what a great creative leap forward, what an extraordinarily aimless aim.” 

-        I assume this means attacking the core, the idea of production. 

-        It could also be the idea of attacking death, rebelling by embracing Being, Life, and Play. Destroying the false “carrot” of Joy, Being, and Life which capital dangles in front of us by refusing to partake and participating in real play. 

-        Next line: “This is the other enemy of the revolutionary movement. Incomprehension. Refusal to see the new conditions of the conflict. The insistence on imposing models of the past that have now become part of the commodity spectacle.” 

o   Definitely means rebelling in new ways, Playing as rebellion, integrating play and joy into methods of rebellion. 

o   If capitalism is death, and capitalism embodies seriousness and forces “work” and not “play”, in fact creates a false idea of “play”, to rebel one must embody life, one must be un-serious, one must rebel against the serious mode of rebellion which directly supports the system of seriousness. When playing and rebelling against seriousness, we are rebelling against death, which is indeed a serious action. 

 

“The introduction of aims programmed and imposed by an outside organization would kill the movement and consign it to the commodity spectacle. … Most of us are tied to this idea of revolutionary organization. Even anarchists, who refuse authoritarian organization do not disdain it. … We refuse to admit that not everyone might see things the way we do. Our theory is identical to the practice and strategy of our organizations.” 

-        I think the FARJ Social Anarchist and Organization hits on this, that there are different types of anarchists, different types of people, and especially different levels of organization. A political and a social. You can find people around you who might agree and you are able to work with, but then—to make ourselves heard in larger movements—participate in social movements. 

-        I do think it still plays into the issues Bonanno has, it is still relying on organizational rebellion rather than self-organizational model. 

o   I don’t think agree, mostly just because we have to operate in a way which people will somewhat identify with to build people power, then move towards self-organizational forms of rebellion once there is a large amount of refusal. 

o   On the other hand, I do think it’s important. Having these negative abstractions against the current society as ways of thinking of things differently is incredibly important. This allows us to rebel within our minds against the spectacle. 

 

“Supermarkets are destroyed, shops and food and arms depots are looted, luxury cars are burned. It is an attack on the commodity spectacle in its most conspicuous forms. The structures are moving in that direction. They take form suddenly, with only the minimum strategic orientation necessary. No frills, no long analytical premises, no complex supporting theories. They attack. Comrades identify with these structures. They reject the organizations that give power, equilibrium, waiting, death. Their action is a critique of the wait-and-see suicidal positions of these organizations. Anathema! There must have been a provocation.” 

-        FARJ is definitely contradicting this—having the political level, not relying on the spontaneity of actions and social movements for all organization and rebellion. Definitely not something that Bonanno—according to this specific document—would support. I wonder what he would think about having both a social and political level. I also know that it is an idea from Malatesta which I am sure Bonanno would have experience with. 

-        Next line: “People are tired of meetings, the classics, pointless marches, theoretical discussions that split hairs in four, endless distinctions, the monotony and poverty of certain political analyses. They prefer to make love, smoke, listen to music, go for walks, sleep, laugh, play, kill policemen, lame journalists, kill judges, blow up barracks. Anathema!” 

-        Next line: “Hurry comrade, shoot the policeman, the judge, the boss. Now, before a new police prevent you.” 

-        Next next line: “To kill a policeman it is not necessary to don the judge’s robes hastily cleaned of the blood of previous sentences. Courts and sentences are always part of the spectacle of capital, even when it is revolutionaries who act them out.” 

 

“Capital devours everything, even the revolution. If the latter does not break from the model of production, if it merely claims to impose alternative forms, capitalism will swallow it up within the commodity spectacle. … Only the struggle cannot be swallowed up. Some of its forms, crystallizing in precise organizational entities, can end up being drawn into the spectacle. But when they break away from the deep significance that capital gives to production this becomes extremely difficult.” 

-        I like this. The struggle will always exist as it is a struggle against death, the reign of death—animals, human or otherwise, will always attempt to realize themselves, will always attempt to actualize themselves. 

 

“Revolutionaries’ most important weapons are their determination, their conscience, their decision to act, their individuality. Arms themselves are merely tools, and as such should continually be submitted to critical evaluation. It is necessary to develop a critique of arms. Too often we have seen the sanctification of the sub machine-gun and military efficiency. … Armed struggle does not concern weapons alone. These alone cannot represent the revolutionary dimension. It is dangerous to reduce complex reality to one single thing. In fact, play involves this risk. It could make the living experience become no more than a toy, turning it into something magical and absolute. It is not by chance the machine-gun appears in the symbolism of many revolutionary combatant organizations. … We musts go beyond this in order to understand joy as the profound significance of the revolutionary struggle, escaping the illusions and traps of part of the commodity spectacle through mythical and mythicized objects.” 

-        Certain types and methods of revolution become overused and simplified to the point they become caricatures. They lose their depth, their revolutionary, playful character. 

-        Our revolution must not be limited to just physical and armed violence, rather must be prepared on all fronts, against psych warfare, propaganda, spectacular methods, etc. 

 

“In order to break out of the magic circle of the theatricals of commodities we must refuse all roles, including that of the ‘professional’ revolutionary.” 

-        I really like this. Nobody is “a revolutionary”, they just happen to be living in the exploitative society we are living in. They are just playing as one should during their limited lifetime. 

 

“Capital will give the last word to the white coats. Prisons will not last for long. Fortresses of a past that survives only in the fantasies of some exalted old reactionary, they will disappear along with the ideology based on social orthopaedics. There will no longer be convicts. The criminalization capital creates will be rationalized; it will be processed through asylums.” 

-        Instead of relying on prisons, Bonanno is suggesting/predicting that society will make a transition to “asylums”, where the “criminals”, the “delinquents”, the “dangerous”, and the “insane” will make their residence. 

o   I also think it has to do with the domination by scientific rationality as the only real way of viewing and processing the world. 

§  Next line (multiple paragraphs later): “Capital is programming a code of interpretation to be circulated at mass level.” 

·       Although still a focus on mental asylums, through Marcuse’s critique of operationalist rationality and an over-reliance on scientific positivism/rationality, it can be expand to include all reason. Where anything not directly supported by the scientific system (built by them) is mad, insane, and completely irrational. 

-        Next lines: “When the whole of reality is spectacular, to refuse the spectacle means to be outside reality. Anyone who refuses the code of commodities is mad. Refusal to bow down before the commodity god will result in one’s being committed to a mental asylum.” 

-        Next Line: “There the treatment will be radical. No more inquisitorial-style torture or blood on the walls, such things upset public opinion. They cause the self-righteous to intervene, give rise to justification and making amends, and disturb the harmony of the spectacle.” 

o   These forms of “rehabilitation” are much more approachable—palatable—to the “self-righteous”. They emanate a sense of progress which comforts those caught up in the spectacular. 

 

“The asylum is the perfect therapeutic rationalization of free time, the suspension of work without trauma to the commodity structure. Lack of productivity without denial of it. The madman does not have to work and in not doing so he confirms that work is wisdom, the opposite of madness.” 

-        Foucault’s idea of identity creation, (I believe also Nietzsche’s idea of identity/morality creation) where everyone is created and exists in discourses—where everything/one is identified by their differences. 

-        To build on this, also echoed in Lisa Lowe’s “Immigrant Acts” where when identifying an “other”, villainizing it, and then visibly/materially putting limits and strains on it, the sheer existence exists as both resistance against the oppressor and a reinforcement/reification of that identity of otherness. 

-        Finally, Bonanno’s claim is not wrong. The reifying force of the “other”, whether mad or prisoner, is obvious when looking at the PIC (Prison Industrial Complex), where many incarcerated individuals are not questioned and their criminality is believed and taken for granted by almost anyone/everyone. 

-        Next Lines: “When we say the time is not ripe for an armed attack on the State we are pushing open the doors of the mental asylum for the comrades who are carrying out such attacks”. 

o   Against protest police, arguing for immediate violent action. Although I do not completely disagree, I think individual and isolated action will result in very little real results. 

 

“The flattening of opinions is a therapeutic process, a death machine.” 

-        Definitely a direct reference to Marcuse’s One-Dimensional Man. 

-        Next Lines: “The passage from the world of joy to the world of death is not easy. The codes are out of phase and end up wiping each other out. What is considered illusion in the world of joy is reality in the world of death and vice versa.” 

o   Another reference, Marcuse explains something similar to the idea of: “Something rational in a different world might be completely irrational in ours.”