(Different?) pirates also frequently liberated slaves from ships they captured, and democratically elected their captains. That stuff did happen too.
But I kind of like the pirate myth. Obviously. It beats, say, patriotic myths for both accuracy and inspiration. I guess the question is, are anarchists allowed to have historical myths like that? Is it just an aesthetic complaint with the particular myth chosen that you have, or do you have a political complaint with any kind of historical mythmaking like this at all, since it's always doomed to oversimplify and romantisize history--which is the point of such myths after all. (Myths about the IWW, or the Spanish Civil War, or the Paris Commune, or whatever, just the same). Must anarchists be cold rational clear eyed and mythless? Is it possible to have a myth while recognizing that it includes fictional aspects, but still keeping it as an inspirational myth or model? I dunno.
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Date: 2006-02-03 09:15 pm (UTC)But I kind of like the pirate myth. Obviously. It beats, say, patriotic myths for both accuracy and inspiration. I guess the question is, are anarchists allowed to have historical myths like that? Is it just an aesthetic complaint with the particular myth chosen that you have, or do you have a political complaint with any kind of historical mythmaking like this at all, since it's always doomed to oversimplify and romantisize history--which is the point of such myths after all. (Myths about the IWW, or the Spanish Civil War, or the Paris Commune, or whatever, just the same). Must anarchists be cold rational clear eyed and mythless? Is it possible to have a myth while recognizing that it includes fictional aspects, but still keeping it as an inspirational myth or model? I dunno.