More Anarchist or Communist?

I’m firmly rooted in my beliefs as an anarcho-communist, but what does that mean? Am I an anarchist or a communist? How can one be both? Every political label has a built-in identity crisis, but few produce quite as much confusion as anarcho-communism. People squint at it like it’s a glitch in the ideological matrix: “Are they more anarchist or more communist? Which part matters more?”

Here’s the honest answer: you can’t pull the two apart without breaking the whole thing. Anarcho-communists aren’t halfway between the two. They’re the union overlap in the Venn diagram. Let’s break it down:

Anarchism: The Method

Anarchism begins with one foundational argument: hierarchy is not self-justifying. If someone claims the right to rule you, the burden of proof is on them. And good luck making a convincing case.

For anarchists, freedom isn’t something the state grants. It’s something the state obstructs. No kings, no presidents, no vanguards, no bosses, no landlords. Human beings coordinate their own lives without coercive authority. So when anarcho-communists talk about society without a state, they aren’t being edgy. They’re being consistent.

Communism: The Goal

Take the classic communist vision:

No classes

No private ownership of the means of production

No wage labor

No markets

No state

Marx called this the “higher phase of communism.” The endpoint. Anarcho-communists don’t disagree with that goal. They disagree with the path.

Where Marxists-Leninists picture a transitional state to shepherd you into communism, anarcho-communists see the contradiction immediately: You can’t build a stateless society by strengthening the state.

To them, that’s like saying the way to eliminate fire is to pour gasoline on it “temporarily.”

So which matters more? This is the fun part:

They’re anarchists in strategy and communist in outcome.

If you ask Marxist-Leninists then anarcho-communists are “too anarchist” because we reject the transitional state.

If you ask a market anarchist they’re “too communist” because we reject markets entirely.

If you ask an anarcho-communist then we’ll tell you the question is wrong. We see anarchism and communism as two sides of the same project: a society without domination, whether political or economic.

For us, you can’t be truly anarchist if you still allow economic hierarchy, and you can’t be truly communist if you preserve political hierarchy. Authority and exploitation are one machine with two gears.

So what’s the cleanest definition? Anarcho-communism is communism without the state and anarchism without the market. No bosses, no state, no landlords, no wage slavery, just cooperative, decentralized, freely associated communities handling things together.

The “more anarchist or communist?” debate only makes sense from the outside. From within, the two are inseparable.

The Myth of Choice

**This is not my original work. I received it in an email from a group I joined called “Simplifying Socialism.”**

We’re told capitalism is freedom because it gives us choice. Thousands of products, dozens of brands, endless options. Pick your sneakers, your streaming service, your fast-food meal. The market is democracy in action, right?

But peek behind the curtain and you’ll see how “free” the choices we make actually are.

Abundance as Illusion

Walk into any grocery store and you’ll see aisle after aisle packed with competing brands. Twenty different cereals, fifty kinds of chips, hundreds of drink options. It feels like abundance. But behind the labels, the vast majority of those products are owned by the same handful of corporations. Nestlé, PepsiCo, Unilever, Kraft Heinz — a tiny cluster of companies control most of what fills the shelves.

What looks like competition is often monopoly in disguise. The “choice” isn’t between different visions of production or different systems of ownership. It’s just which logo you want stamped on the same profit-driven structure.

This isn’t just food. Tech is the same story. We’re told we have freedom because we can pick Apple or Samsung, Android or iPhone. But each comes with its own traps (proprietary software, built-in obsolescence, surveillance baked into the product). The decision is narrowed to surface-level differences while the real power remains untouched.

The illusion of abundance is shoved down our throats as we are relegated from humans to consumers.

Essentials Without Real Options

The illusion gets crueler when we look at the choices that actually matter for survival.

Healthcare: You can choose between insurance plans, but every option is unaffordable, confusing, and leaves you vulnerable. Millions still go bankrupt over medical bills. Your healthcare is often tied to your employment. Where’s the freedom in that?
Housing: You can pick your landlord, but the rent keeps climbing. You can choose between renting forever or drowning in mortgage debt. Owning a home isn’t a dream for most — it’s a chain and shackles.
Work: You can choose which boss to sell your labor to, but you can’t opt out of selling it entirely. Unless you’re independently wealthy, your “choice” is which workplace will exploit you. Fear not, you can make the choice to go into business for yourself (if you have good credit).

Capitalism calls this freedom, but it’s a false freedom. A choice within limits you didn’t set, with outcomes you can’t control. Real freedom lies not in the illusion of choice, but in the ability to live day-to-day without the worry of hospital bills or rising rent prices destroying our dignity.

Manufactured Desires

Even when options exist, they’re shaped by advertising and cultural pressure. “Choice” becomes less about what you want and more about what you’ve been convinced to want.

Do you really need a new phone every year, or has marketing manufactured that need? Do you choose fast fashion because it’s what you want, or because the industry deliberately conditions you to keep buying at the pace of their profits? Do you have any use whatsoever for Birkenstocks, or do you want them because they are trendy right now?

Capitalism sells us the story that we’re sovereign consumers making rational decisions. But in reality, our desires are engineered, our needs distorted, and our choices narrowed to what generates profit. Capitalism wins when companies succeed at turning our wants into needs, or at least by making us think that we need things we absolutely do not.

Freedom vs. Necessity

Here’s the Marxist insight: freedom isn’t about picking between products; it’s about control over the conditions of your life.

Choosing between Uber and Lyft is not real freedom.
Choosing between ten brands of sneakers is not real freedom.
Choosing between healthcare plans that all bankrupt you is not real freedom.

Freedom is having power over how your labor is used, how resources are distributed, and how your community is shaped. It’s the ability to decide not just between products, but between systems, to collectively govern the economy instead of being governed by it.

That kind of choice, democratic, collective, meaningful, is what socialism points toward. A society built on real collaboration instead of false competition is what we are missing out on by continuing to accept capitalism. Our labor keeps the machine going but instead of reward we are met with a whip to the back proclaiming that we must “work harder!” That is the reality of capitalism.

Conclusion

Capitalism hands us a menu full of small, shallow choices while stripping us of the big ones that matter. We can debate endlessly about which streaming service to pay for, but we have no say in whether housing is affordable, whether our cities are polluted, or whether our labor enriches us or someone else.

Socialism isn’t about taking away freedom. It’s about making real freedom possible. Because the ability to pick between fifty cereals means nothing if you can’t afford breakfast. We can, and we must, leave capitalism in the “museum of antiquities,” as Engels put it.

The future belongs to us, but it will not be handed to us.

Can you be a Marxist/Leninist/Kropotkinist/Chomskyist?

Short answer? Yeah. Long answer? It’s complicated, but that’s never stopped me before.

Look, these four thinkers don’t exactly hold hands and sing the Internationale together. They’ve got different blueprints for tearing down capitalism and building something better. That doesn’t mean you can’t steal the best tools from each of them and sharpen your own.

Here’s how it breaks down:

Marx gives you the blueprint.

He’s the one who showed us that capitalism isn’t a glitch, it’s the whole fucking operating system. Class struggle. Alienation. Historical materialism. Without Marx, you’re just vibing in the ruins, not naming the enemy.

Lenin says “Great. Now do something.”

Marx diagnosed the disease. Lenin started the surgery. He understood that capitalism doesn’t die politely. You need pressure, structure, and a strategy. That’s the whole vanguard party thing: not perfect, but a reminder that wishful thinking doesn’t start revolutions. Power has to be seized, not begged for.

Kropotkin asks, “But what are you building?”

The anarchist in the mix who is the heart. He reminds you that the goal isn’t just a new boss in a red hat. It’s no boss. Mutual aid. Voluntary cooperation. No centralized state. No boot, no neck. A vision beyond power games.

Chomsky cuts through the bullshit.

The living dissident. He’s not storming palaces, but he’s tearing down lies. He’s a scalpel for empire, for propaganda, for power dressed in liberal clothing. Chomsky shows you how to spot the cage even when it’s painted blue.

So can you be all four?

Only if you’re okay with contradiction. With mess. With not having all the answers but refusing to settle for anyone else’s either. You take Marx’s critique, Lenin’s urgency, Kropotkin’s ideals, and Chomsky’s clarity, and you use them all to fight the system while knowing none of them alone are enough.

It’s not a clean ideology. It’s a war room.

Capitalism is adaptive, violent, and relentless. Fighting it means pulling from every angle: materialist analysis, revolutionary strategy, anarchist ethics, and relentless truth-telling. That’s not confusion, that’s firepower.

So yeah, I’m a Marxist/Leninist/Kropotkinist/Chomskyist. Call it a contradiction. I call it a strategy.

What I take from Marx, Lenin, Kropotkin, and Chomsky

American politics are broken. Not just crooked or corrupt, but structurally, irredeemably broken. Corporate power is propped up, sociopaths are rewarded, and it dangles just enough hope to keep people from revolting. Voting feels like choosing flavors of decay, while the wealthy buy policy and workers beg for crumbs.

Instead of looking to the ballot box ever four or two years for salvation, I’m looking to four thinkers: Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin, Peter Kropotkin, and Noam Chomsky. I’m not looking to them as prophets, but as strategists, builders, and demolition experts. Each of these people offer a different tool for ripping this thing apart and reimagining what politics could be. I’m not interested in dogma. I’m interested in results.

From Marx, I take the foundation that class struggle is everything. Marx didn’t give us a blueprint. He gave us a lens, a way to see power for what it is. Capitalism isn’t just unfair; it’s a system that demands exploitation to survive. You can’t vote away the class war. You have to understand that politics is economics in disguise, and that real change starts by confronting the structures that divide labor from power.

You want to change America? Then start by naming the enemy: capital.

From Lenin, I take the strategy that power doesn’t surrender, it gets taken.

Lenin knew that moments of chaos don’t organize themselves. He built a disciplined machine not to preserve power, but to capture and redirect it. I don’t want a vanguard party or a permanent state, but I do believe in planning, timing, and coordination. American politics love spectacle but fear movement. If we want to be more than angry individuals yelling online, we need to move with purpose. The system isn’t going to implode on its own. You either build power or beg from it.

From Kropotkin, I take the vision that mutual aid is not utopia but strategy.

This country is obsessed with bootstraps and billionaires. Kropotkin said fuck that. Cooperation is how we survive, and always has been. Fuck waiting for the state to save us. Let’s build networks, councils, co-ops, and clinics … parallel structures that meet people’s needs now, not after the revolution. Politics don’t just happen in voting booths. It happens in kitchens, strike lines, and occupied buildings. Real change starts when we stop asking permission and start taking care of each other.

From Chomsky I take the filter, meaning if an institution can’t justify its power then burn it down.

Chomsky taught me to look at power and say: “Prove you deserve to exist.” The state, the police, the military-industrial complex, corporate media … none of them pass that test. He also taught me to not waste time reinventing the wheel. If a structure is doing harm then dismantle it. If it’s helping people then democratize it. Reform what you must. Abolish what you can. Build what they fear.

American politics are a shell game designed to keep us chasing scraps while the ruling class counts profits. I’m done playing. If we want to change things then we have to stop trying to fix a broken system and start building a new one from the ground up.

The state won’t save us. The market won’t feed us. But we might if we finally get to work.

Revolution: What Can Be Done?

The other day I asked a communist friend of mine what needed to be done in this day and age, especially in this day and age. She didn’t hesitate.

“We need to form revolutionary cells. Militant, and armed. We need to combine these cells with mutual aid groups and cadres to act as the vanguard. Re-education and promoting independent political action outside of the established bourgeois parties and a focus on anti-imperialism are essential to our movement’s success.

That’s a lot to drop in one breath.

But beneath the revolutionary jargon is something real: the blunt recognition that voting isn’t saving us, capitalism is devouring everything, and the time for passive outrage is long past.

Let’s break this down–not to dismiss it, but to figure out what, if anything, we can actually do.

“Militant and Armed Revolutionary Cells”

This isn’t Reddit larping. She’s talking about small decentralized groups trained in organizing–and possibly armed in self-defense–read to protect their communities and resist oppression. Think Black Panthers, not TikTok tankies.

But here’s the catch:

America isn’t ripe for revolution. Not yet. And we’re up against the most bloated, surveilled, militarized empire in history.

So while “armed cells” sounds bold, it’s also a neon sign flashing “federal indictment.” Strategy matters. So does survival. We can’t fight for a future if we’re locked up before we build anything.

Mutual Aid + Cadres as Vanguard

This part is gold. Mutual aid isn’t charity–it’s infrastructure. It’s food banks when the state fails, rent support when capitalism crushes, first aid when cops won’t help. When you pair that with politically trained organizers (cadres), you start building a base that can actually resist–not just survive.

This isn’t the sexy part of revolution. It’s slow, often invisible. But it works

Re-education

Not brainwashing. Just unlearning the shit we’ve absorbed living under capitalism

That billionaires deserve to rule.
That America is a force for good.
That our only power lies in voting every four years and complaining online the rest of the time.

Re-education means study groups. Memes. Teach-ins. Dismantling propaganda with actual history (I recommend Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States, which I will be reviewing once I finish.) Turning alienation into understanding and understanding into action.

Independent Political Action

Translation: Stop begging Democrats to save us.

This isn’t about throwing elections to the fascists. It’s about building real alternatives. Tenant unions. Worker co-ops. Local campaigns that aren’t bankrolled by the same people gutting your town.

We can’t beat capitalism by playing its game. We need to flip the board.

Anti-Imperialism

This one gets ignored the most.

You can’t fight for justice at home and ignore what your country does abroad. Every bomb dropped, every coup backed, every sanction enforced–it’s part of the same system. Anti-imperialism is not a side quest. It’s the heart of the fight.

So … now what?

You don’t have to be ready to go full Che Guevara in a balaclava. Most people aren’t. But if you feel the rot of this system in your gut, you are ready to do something.

Start local. Start small.

Join or start a mutual aid group.
Host a study group.
Disrupt your comfort zone.
Organize outside of parties that profit off your despair.
Connect with people who want more than reform.
Learn security culture–because if shit gets serious, you’ll need it.

And keep asking: What am I willing to risk? What am I willing to build?

Revolution isn’t a mood. It’s a movement. And movements need more than slogans.

They need people willing to do the work even the unsexy parts.

Even the dangerous ones.

Libertarian Socialist or Anarcho-Communist? Depends on Who’s Asking.

When a Democrat asks about my politics, I tell them I’m a Libertarian Socialist. It sounds just palatable enough to pass through their MSNBC filter. You get the “socialist” part—Bernie vibes, maybe some Chomsky seasoning—and “libertarian” makes it sound like I still believe in rights or property or some other adult word they can handle.

But when a Republican asks? I’m an Anarcho-Communist.

No soft edges. No training wheels. I want them to picture Molotovs, mutual aid, and the local Starbucks being reclaimed as a community kitchen. I want them to flinch like they just heard “abolish landlords” whispered behind their 401(k).

The thing is, it’s all the same to me. Libertarian socialism, anarcho-communism—both oppose capitalism, hierarchy, and the state. The labels are just different levels of shock therapy depending on who’s in front of me.

I’m not here to fit into anyone’s Overton window. I’m here to kick the damn thing open.

Democrats still think change comes from voting a little harder. Republicans think billionaires are their friends. I don’t have the patience to explain mutual aid to someone clutching a Pelosi bobblehead, or the difference between anarchism and chaos to a guy with a Punisher sticker on his pickup.

So I adjust the mask, not to deceive, but to translate. Because if you say “anarcho-communism” to a liberal, they hear “chaotic Stalinist death cult.” And if you say “libertarian socialist” to a conservative, they hear “soy boy who hates America.

I just believe no one should rule and no one should starve.

I want a world built on cooperation, not coercion. A world where communities thrive without CEOs, landlords, or billionaires buying bunkers while the world burns.

If that sounds extreme, maybe the problem isn’t the label. Maybe the problem is the system that makes those ideas sound extreme in the first place.

Does Communism Kill Individuality?

Or Is That Just Capitalist Propaganda?

You’ve probably heard it before: “Communism doesn’t breed individuals.” It’s a go-to jab for anyone trying to defend capitalism as the champion of freedom, creativity, and self-expression.

But let’s stop and ask: Is that actually true? Or is it just one of those lazy talking points that people repeat without thinking?

The Claim:

Critics of communism love to say it crushes individualism. They’ll tell you it turns everyone into drones, serving the collective and losing all sense of self. No more art. No more weirdos. Just gray buildings and gray people, all saying the same thing in perfect unison.

Scary, right?

The Reality:

1. Not All Communism Is Stalin in a Bad Mood

There’s no single “communism.” What people usually mean is authoritarian state socialism—like Stalinism. But that’s not the whole story.

There’s also:

Libertarian socialism, which emphasizes radical freedom through collective liberation.

Anarcho-communism, which fights both capitalism and the state.

Council communism, where power is decentralized and workers run everything directly.

Not exactly hive mind territory.

2. Marx Wasn’t Anti-Individual

Marx’s whole project was about freeing people from wage slavery and letting them develop into full human beings. He didn’t hate individuality—he hated a system that forced you to sell your life by the hour just to survive.

“In communist society… the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all.” – Karl Marx

That doesn’t sound like someone who wants to erase you. It sounds like someone who wants you to have time to actually be you.

3. Capitalism Doesn’t “Breed Individuals” Either

Let’s be real. Under capitalism, your so-called “individuality” often boils down to which brand you consume or how well you perform on social media. You’re free to express yourself—as long as it sells. You can “be yourself,” but only if you can afford the entry fee.

Capitalism sells individuality the way fast food sells happiness: brightly packaged, deeply hollow.

4. Socialist Cultures Produced a Lot of “Individuals”

Ever heard of Dostoevsky? Eisenstein? Mayakovsky? Hell, even the Red Army Choir slaps. The USSR may have been authoritarian, but it wasn’t artistically sterile. And outside of the USSR, there were experiments like anarchist Catalonia and Yugoslavia that explicitly encouraged creativity and local autonomy.

Individuality didn’t die—it evolved.

Does authoritarian communism sometimes suppress individuality? Yes.

Does capitalism do the same, just with better marketing? Also yes.

The truth is: The system that actually supports individuality is the one that liberates you from economic coercion. That might be socialism. That might be anarchism. But it sure as hell isn’t wage slavery in a hoodie.

So next time someone says “Communism kills individuality,” ask them:

Does your job let you be yourself? Or just sell a version of yourself that keeps the shareholders happy?

Does Socialism Stifle Creativity?

One of the oldest, dustiest arguments against socialism and communism is that they supposedly stifle individuality and creativity. No more artists, no more inventors, no more rebels, just gray uniforms, gray buildings, and gray minds.

This idea gets dragged out every time someone suggests workers deserve rights or billionaires shouldn’t exist. But here’s the truth:

This claim is propaganda and it’s tired.

Yes, in some authoritarian regimes that simply called themselves communist (Stalin’s USSR or Mao’s China), artistic and intellectual repression happened. That’s real. But equating all socialism with state authoritarianism is like saying all capitalism is just Enron and child labor in sweatshops.

Authoritarianism stifles creativity. Not socialism.

Let’s flip the script.

Capitalism loves to parade around as the champion of individuality. But unless your creativity makes more money? It’s worthless.

Under capitalism:

If your art doesn’t sell, it doesn’t matter.
If your innovation can’t be patented or monetized, tough luck.
If you’re too exhausted from your soul-crushing job to create? Oh well.

Creativity under capitalism is only celebrated if it turns a profit. Everything else? It gets buried.

Socialism doesn’t kill creativity. It frees it.

Under democratic socialism or libertarian socialism or anarcho-communism, creativity can actually flourish. Why?

Basic needs are met. You’re not working three jobs just to survive. You have time to think and make things.

Your worth isn’t tied to profit. You don’t need your poem to be a product. Your band doesn’t have to blow up on Spotify to matter.

Community matters. Creativity isn’t just for clout, it’s for connection.

Imagine millions of people who are free to paint, code, write, build, and dream — not because it’s marketable, but because it’s meaningful.

Let’s talk about some actual socialists:

George Orwell wrote 1984 and Animal Farm as a democratic socialist.

Albert Camus was anti-authoritarian, anti-capitalist, and deeply creative.

Nina Simone was a radical, a revolutionary, and raw.

Kurt Vonnegut was openly socialist and still endlessly imaginative.

Entire movements — Soviet avant-garde, worker theatre, Cuban film collectives, Indigenous co-ops — were built on socialist principles.

And let’s not forget that Marx and Kropotkin were writing philosophy and science, not just manifestos.

Bottom line: if communism killed creativity, we wouldn’t have all the radical art, music, theory, and rebellion.

If capitalism encouraged creativity, you wouldn’t be drowning in Marvel sequels, AI sludge, and corporate TikToks trying to go viral by pretending to be relatable.

So no. Socialism doesn’t stifle creativity. Capitalism just wants you to believe that so you don’t imagine something better.

The Lazy Argument Against Socialism

Every time someone dares to critique capitalism, someone inevitably lobs the same tired grenade: “What about the 100 million people killed by communism?”

It’s a rhetorical nuke meant to shut down debate. And like most nukes, it leaves behind more smoke than substance.

Let’s unpack it.

First, the death tolls often cited (Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, etc.) come from sources like The Black Book of Communism, which bundle together famines, wars, executions, and sometimes even natural disasters under the label of “communist killings.” By that logic, capitalism is responsible for every death under every U.S.-backed dictatorship, every colonial empire, every war for resources, and every child who dies because their parents couldn’t afford insulin.

Want to play that game? Fine. Let’s talk:

Colonialism under capitalism killed tens of millions — India under British rule, Congo under Belgium, the Americas under British conquest.

The Atlantic slave trade was a capitalist enterprise. Tens of millions died or were enslaved for profit.

Modern capitalism kills 8 million people every year from poverty-related causes like hunger, unsafe water, and lack of healthcare. Quietly. Systemically.

If we’re comparing body counts, capitalism is still actively killing.

Authoritarianism is not socialism.

The atrocities committed by Stalin or Mao were products of totalitarian regimes — not the idea of socialism. If we’re blaming socialism for every tyrant who used the label, then we have to blame capitalism for Pinochet, Hitler (who privatized heavily), and every U.S.-armed strongman from Latin America to the Middle East.

It’s not the label that matters — it’s the structure of power.

Socialism, at its core, is about democratic control of the economy. It’s about prioritizing people over profit. When done right, it looks like universal healthcare, strong labor rights, public ownership of essential services, and economic dignity for all.

That’s not a death camp. That’s a lifeline.

There’s the “Freedom” myth of Capitalism.

The defenders of capitalism always fall back on the idea of “freedom” — the freedom to start a business, chase your dreams, and become the next Jeff Bezos.

But for most people, capitalism means the freedom to work 60 hours a week and still not afford rent. The freedom to die if you can’t pay for insulin. The freedom to drown in debt because you got sick or went to college. Capitalism promises opportunity, but mostly delivers exhaustion.

And let’s be real: billionaires don’t get rich by working hard. They get rich by owning things other people work hard to maintain.

Karl Marx didn’t create the Soviet Union. He didn’t build gulags. He sent his life writing about a world where ordinary people could live without being exploited. The fact that authoritarian regimes warped his ideas doesn’t erase the truth of what he fought for anymore than capitalist’s crimes erase the concept of free markets.

The irony? Under capitalism, Marx’s grave now charges admission. Even in death, the system tried to make a profit off of him.

Socialism doesn’t need to be perfect to be better. Capitalism isn’t judged by Stalin. Why should socialism be?

If you’re tired of a system where billionaires fly to space while kids go hungry, maybe it’s time to stop fear the word socialism and start fearing the status quo.

Ash and Seed

The cities fell quietly. Not with fire or fanfare, but with a flicker. Supply chains snapping like old rope, currencies crumbling into irrelevance, and governments too bloated to breathe. People had waited for rescue. None came. Then, something stranger happened: they stopped waiting.

Maya lived in one of the Transition Zones, carved out of the skeleton of what had once been Pittsburgh. Skyscrapers stood hollow, colonized by vertical gardens and data relays. Streets were no longer roads, but corridors of barterless exchange: food grown by solar-fueled machines, distributed by drones with no masters.

She remembered the old world in fragments: clocks, ads, the endless scrolling of fake urgency. In this new world, days were marked by need and contribution. Some days she coded for the mesh network. Other days she repaired the water-capture towers or helped with conflict mediation—though those requests were rarer now.

There was no money. No one starved. The idea of “earning a living” had become as quaint as leeches in medicine. What did it mean to earn what had always been a birthright?

Occasionally, envoys came from outside the Zone—wandering emissaries from collapsing enclaves or liberated factories. Some brought new blueprints, others just stories. Maya loved the stories. One woman spoke of how a collective in former Indonesia had wired up an entire island to run itself, then dismantled their last police drone ceremonially, like a funeral for fear.

In the evenings, Maya sat under the wind trees, their turbines singing above, and read aloud to anyone who wandered by. Tonight it was McCarthy. Tomorrow, maybe Marx. No one made her do this. That was the point.

They lived without rulers or markets, not because they had to—but because they finally could.

And in the ruins of profit, something strange had taken root:

Hope.

But not the kind you wait for.

The kind you build.