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Author's note: Throughout my life I have been a political activist, cynical of government and corporate power but ultimately believing in the system. Since the election of Barack Obama and his bowing to corporate America it has become clear that the present system is a complete failure unless you are a corporate mogul or a government official on their payroll. That "hope for change" cannot come from within the actions of the system; it is incapable at this point of ensuring anything except fueling the destruction of the planet, the enslavement of workers and the promotion of a growing war and police state. 
IWW image of Capitalism by IWW
Because of that I have abandoned any belief that our current form of government can prevent the further growth of wealth disparity, the destruction of the environment and ultimately, the likely demise of most of life (including human) on the planet. It is only through individual and collective non-cooperation and direct action that this outcome can be prevented and a sustainable future evolve. It is all based on decisions of individual conscience and consciousness.
Voting and participation in the system only furthers the problem by giving its massive exploitation legitimacy. What is the answer, I don't know, but the teachings of the Anarchists give us a good beginning. Whatever evolves must be sustainable, cooperative and of free will, you know like bottom up democracy. Therefore over the next few months I will be writing about current and historical examples of the impacts of Anarchism on our society. A metaphorical message in a bottle to like minded individuals seeking answers to their malaise. There is an answer to the depression of exploitation and learned helplessness, stop participating in it.
Pot, revolutions, hactivists, and the World Anarchist movement
An important event happened in the world recently but was just a blip on the mainstream media radar and there is a reason, it's too big a threat to the system to be talked about openly. While CNN and the rest of the world were happily munching on Rupert Murdoch avoiding cream pies in the British Parliament the crackdown by governments and corporations around the world went mostly unreported. The arrests of 21 "hacktivists" or "internet vigilantes" who allegedly belong to the online group "Anonymous" marks an escalation against internet protestors and dissenters in the battle that has reached a new epigy after the disclosures of Julian Assange's Wikileaks site.
The group anonymous" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anonymous_(group)) is built on a "hive mind" concept, it is an online collective that functions on image boards and pursues social goals by attacking and punishing corporations, religions and governments for wrongdoing. The group members don't even know each others real identities, in fact if you are found out, you are out. But they do have rules, including no destruction of records at the invaded site and no leaving of any code except to cover your tracks. One self description is "We are Anonymous. We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us."
16 adults in the U.S., four in the Netherlands and one 16 year old in Great Britain were arrested for crimes against the system, shutting down PayPal, Citibank, Visa, Mastercard and other websites in retribution for their refusal to process donations for the investigative reporting website Wikileaks. The companies presumably acted at the behest of the Obama administration after Wikileaks posted evidence of what appears to be an American war crime and 250,000 other hacked state department emails on its site.
While one or two primary members of Anonymous may have been arrested, internet insiders pose that only newbies and amateur protestors who viewed their actions like an online sit in and really lacked the skills to thoroughly conceal their identities got swept up in the raids. The rest are still out there as proven by a challenge to the FBI the next day stating "you can't arrest an idea" and attacks that followed. Since then another group Team Poison mounted an attack on Blackberry following an announcement they would turn over logs to police following accounts that rioters were using Blackberry's to coordinate their efforts. Anonymous also announced that they would shut down Facebook for not protecting privacy of its users, on November 5th, Guy Falk day.
Evidence of American War Crimes?
The latest escalation in these cyber wars began when Wikileaks posted a leaked 2007 video from a helicopter showing the shooting of eight Iraqi's, including two Reuters photographers, who are casually walking around in a Baghdad courtyard. The 250,000 emails posted by Wikileaks had numerous revelations but were screened to insure no person was endangered, that information was redacted or withheld by Wikileaks.
The first release however was a disturbing view of American policy in Iraq. In the video there is one AK47 and one RPG present, both slung, none of the individuals are acting in a hostile manner. It is impossible to determine if they are hostiles or regular Iraqi's concerned about a firefight going on a short distance away. The initial strafing wipes out the group. The only survivor one of the photographers is badly wounded and crawling towards a building, the gunner is begging for him to reveal a weapon so he can shoot him again.
Two men come in a van a few minutes later and load him up. The pilot tells command there are weapons present even though none are seen. They blast the van with machine gun fire and blast it again after it is stationary. Ground troops find both men killed, the photographer and two children ages 8 and 4 wounded, they find no weapons. It gave folks back home a real idea about what their tax dollars were going for, not something the Obama administration wants you to see.
The Army arrested Private Bradley Manning as the source of the material and subjected him to conditions comparable to those used on terrorists for releasing the information to Wikileaks. Physical and emotional isolation, removing his clothes, and other techniques used in American interrogation centers.
Meanwhile the Obama administration has pursued every means possible to jail and silence Assange. The U.S. applied pressure everywhere it could and Sweden suddenly decided it had two sexual misconduct cases against Assange. Banks, which have never found any money too dirty to manage, suddenly decided not to process Wikileaks' donations.
Anonymous as an Anarchist movement
There is a word that modern mainstream media really avoids using, Anarchist. It seems threatened by the very idea. It talks about anarchist activities and but scrupulously avoids using the name and either ignores the evidence or fails to recognize it as a growing movement around the world. Maybe because Anarchists don't have a public relations department and a press secretary, perhaps because they don't function like an international corporation like Exxon, or perhaps because they form the biggest threat to the government-corporate stranglehold on freedom since the French Revolution. They range from Egyptian rebels, to Mexican drug cartels to hactivists, but they and their movement is growing.
