Spencer Beswick
@spencerbeswick.bsky.social
Historian of anarchism, labor, and the left in the Americas / Postdoctoral Associate at Cornell's Humanities Scholars Program / Views my own, not my employer's
The feed today. (Full disclosure: I am enjoying the treat.)
November 5, 2025 at 9:28 PM
The feed today. (Full disclosure: I am enjoying the treat.)
I don't think I can resist including this in a talk on the historical movement from Marxism to anarchism in the late 20th century.
November 4, 2025 at 7:33 PM
I don't think I can resist including this in a talk on the historical movement from Marxism to anarchism in the late 20th century.
Lmao they got him now!
October 27, 2025 at 4:05 PM
Lmao they got him now!
"Historians for the Right to Work: We Demand a Continuing Supply of History"
Banner from a 1980 march against cruise missiles in London organized by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
Banner from a 1980 march against cruise missiles in London organized by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
October 20, 2025 at 2:53 PM
"Historians for the Right to Work: We Demand a Continuing Supply of History"
Banner from a 1980 march against cruise missiles in London organized by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
Banner from a 1980 march against cruise missiles in London organized by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
Academic freedom in Florida is dead, killed in the name of academic freedom. Florida and Texas are the vanguard, but this is coming soon to all red states.
October 10, 2025 at 10:14 PM
Academic freedom in Florida is dead, killed in the name of academic freedom. Florida and Texas are the vanguard, but this is coming soon to all red states.
Trump has crossed so many lines, but I think it will be truly crossing the Rubicon if he jails Illinois Governor Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Johnson and replaces them with his cronies. At that point, which now seems all too possible, liberal democracy as we know it will be gone.
October 8, 2025 at 5:57 PM
Trump has crossed so many lines, but I think it will be truly crossing the Rubicon if he jails Illinois Governor Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Johnson and replaces them with his cronies. At that point, which now seems all too possible, liberal democracy as we know it will be gone.
In 2017, I was in DC at Trump's inauguration protest. We were scared but we were together. I was wearing this shirt. I saw a punk standing by the march holding a sign saying "please be brave." We hugged and promised each other we would be brave. Things are scary. Please be brave.
September 14, 2025 at 1:47 PM
In 2017, I was in DC at Trump's inauguration protest. We were scared but we were together. I was wearing this shirt. I saw a punk standing by the march holding a sign saying "please be brave." We hugged and promised each other we would be brave. Things are scary. Please be brave.
I'm sure this will go well! Remember, Trump is the anti-war president -- that's why he wants to rename the Defense Department to the War Department.
(Yes, I know it used to be called that, but the change seems a pretty clear signal from Trump and Pete "Warrior Ethos" Hegseth.)
(Yes, I know it used to be called that, but the change seems a pretty clear signal from Trump and Pete "Warrior Ethos" Hegseth.)
August 26, 2025 at 4:43 PM
I'm sure this will go well! Remember, Trump is the anti-war president -- that's why he wants to rename the Defense Department to the War Department.
(Yes, I know it used to be called that, but the change seems a pretty clear signal from Trump and Pete "Warrior Ethos" Hegseth.)
(Yes, I know it used to be called that, but the change seems a pretty clear signal from Trump and Pete "Warrior Ethos" Hegseth.)
Maybe I'm just an elitist asshole, but I can't imagine how impoverished my life would be without reading for pleasure. Not to mention all the downstream effects at a societal level, starting with intellectual curiosity and ending with engaged, critical citizenship.
August 21, 2025 at 5:30 PM
Maybe I'm just an elitist asshole, but I can't imagine how impoverished my life would be without reading for pleasure. Not to mention all the downstream effects at a societal level, starting with intellectual curiosity and ending with engaged, critical citizenship.
Re: the south -- I say we bring back the Communist Party's Black Belt Thesis from the 1920s-30s.
But anyway, my prescriptive vision is a revolution across the US/North America (and the world). I don't want the US to just break into smaller pieces while leaving social relations unchanged.
But anyway, my prescriptive vision is a revolution across the US/North America (and the world). I don't want the US to just break into smaller pieces while leaving social relations unchanged.
August 19, 2025 at 7:47 PM
Re: the south -- I say we bring back the Communist Party's Black Belt Thesis from the 1920s-30s.
But anyway, my prescriptive vision is a revolution across the US/North America (and the world). I don't want the US to just break into smaller pieces while leaving social relations unchanged.
But anyway, my prescriptive vision is a revolution across the US/North America (and the world). I don't want the US to just break into smaller pieces while leaving social relations unchanged.
Dug up an old picture from the game of Red Rover with Vermin Supreme in the streets of Chicago.
August 8, 2025 at 7:09 PM
Dug up an old picture from the game of Red Rover with Vermin Supreme in the streets of Chicago.
I miss the playfulness of radical politics that Vermin Supreme embodies. One of my favorite demo memories is playing Red Rover with him at the NATO summit protest in Chicago 2012. I know things are bad and the stakes are high, but joy and silliness are important too.
August 7, 2025 at 7:11 PM
I miss the playfulness of radical politics that Vermin Supreme embodies. One of my favorite demo memories is playing Red Rover with him at the NATO summit protest in Chicago 2012. I know things are bad and the stakes are high, but joy and silliness are important too.
"For your freedom and ours." Banner held by Russian dissidents in Red Square in solidarity with the 1968 Prague Spring in Czechoslovakia, crushed by Soviet tanks. One of the demonstrators later noted: "a people that oppresses others cannot itself be free."
August 7, 2025 at 2:38 PM
"For your freedom and ours." Banner held by Russian dissidents in Red Square in solidarity with the 1968 Prague Spring in Czechoslovakia, crushed by Soviet tanks. One of the demonstrators later noted: "a people that oppresses others cannot itself be free."
This is wild: in Poland in 1990(!): "200 members of Anarchist Inter-City, waving black flags and shouting ‘Down With Prices’ ran through Warsaw ... breaking windows in the Polish Senate and Communist Party headquarters and barging into a luxury hotel" and targeting Solidarity headquarters.
July 29, 2025 at 7:22 PM
This is wild: in Poland in 1990(!): "200 members of Anarchist Inter-City, waving black flags and shouting ‘Down With Prices’ ran through Warsaw ... breaking windows in the Polish Senate and Communist Party headquarters and barging into a luxury hotel" and targeting Solidarity headquarters.
"It's easy to forget that the average person probably only knows about the Spanish Civil War and the anarchist roots of mutual aid."
"And has read Kropotkin's Conquest of Bread, of course."
"Of course."
"And has read Kropotkin's Conquest of Bread, of course."
"Of course."
![xkcd comic. Transcript:
[Ponytail and Cueball are talking. Ponytail has her hand raised, palm up, towards Cueball.]
Ponytail: Silicate chemistry is second nature to us geochemists, so it's easy to forget that the average person probably only knows the formulas for olivine and one or two feldspars.
Cueball: And quartz, of course.
Ponytail: Of course.
[Caption below the panel]
Even when they're trying to compensate for it, experts in anything wildly overestimate the average person's familiarity with their field.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:76u2okyn5zvvavtgpedzyfi3/bafkreieikmvuvpb3ip2hugpb3hlhdz2y6ydd5xourylww7iwcpimiqicv4@jpeg)
July 29, 2025 at 6:04 PM
"It's easy to forget that the average person probably only knows about the Spanish Civil War and the anarchist roots of mutual aid."
"And has read Kropotkin's Conquest of Bread, of course."
"Of course."
"And has read Kropotkin's Conquest of Bread, of course."
"Of course."
Anarchists argued that feminists must oppose the state itself as the ultimate patriarchal institution and the source of much of the violence they faced. Thus, rather than the slogan “we’re pro-choice and we vote,” anarchists often marched behind a banner reading “we’re pro-choice and we riot!” 4/
July 28, 2025 at 4:34 PM
Anarchists argued that feminists must oppose the state itself as the ultimate patriarchal institution and the source of much of the violence they faced. Thus, rather than the slogan “we’re pro-choice and we vote,” anarchists often marched behind a banner reading “we’re pro-choice and we riot!” 4/
Anarchist contingent at anti-Putin demonstration in Moscow, May 2012. Banner reads: “We have a clear plan: Self-rule, Self-organization, Solidarity.”
Source: countervortex.org/neither-east...
Source: countervortex.org/neither-east...
July 26, 2025 at 2:30 PM
Anarchist contingent at anti-Putin demonstration in Moscow, May 2012. Banner reads: “We have a clear plan: Self-rule, Self-organization, Solidarity.”
Source: countervortex.org/neither-east...
Source: countervortex.org/neither-east...
"No to US/USSR imperialism. Mayday! Anarchist Contingent" (1988)
One of the most interesting aspects of writing about anarchism in the 1980s-90s is their position re: the Soviet Union as it fell. They had great hope, but also saw the dangers of capitalist transformation. 1/
One of the most interesting aspects of writing about anarchism in the 1980s-90s is their position re: the Soviet Union as it fell. They had great hope, but also saw the dangers of capitalist transformation. 1/
July 26, 2025 at 12:22 PM
"No to US/USSR imperialism. Mayday! Anarchist Contingent" (1988)
One of the most interesting aspects of writing about anarchism in the 1980s-90s is their position re: the Soviet Union as it fell. They had great hope, but also saw the dangers of capitalist transformation. 1/
One of the most interesting aspects of writing about anarchism in the 1980s-90s is their position re: the Soviet Union as it fell. They had great hope, but also saw the dangers of capitalist transformation. 1/
"Smash the State and Have a Nice Day!" A poem from "Mob Action Against the State: Haymarket Remembered... an Anarchist Convention." This 1986 anarchist convention in Chicago was the first of a series of continental gatherings that revitalized the N. American anarchist movement.
July 24, 2025 at 4:50 PM
"Smash the State and Have a Nice Day!" A poem from "Mob Action Against the State: Haymarket Remembered... an Anarchist Convention." This 1986 anarchist convention in Chicago was the first of a series of continental gatherings that revitalized the N. American anarchist movement.
The framing in this piece by @batallonbakunin.bsky.social is super helpful for thinking about anti-deportation struggles: taking concrete action to physically prevent the state machinery from carrying out its program, rather than just symbolically protesting against it.
June 18, 2025 at 12:39 AM
The framing in this piece by @batallonbakunin.bsky.social is super helpful for thinking about anti-deportation struggles: taking concrete action to physically prevent the state machinery from carrying out its program, rather than just symbolically protesting against it.
"Anarchy is... Community gardens and potlucks. Sitting under a tree on a hot day. Playgrounds and children's art classes. Never having a job. Laughing. Friends. Family. It's dancing on the ruins of a system that has done nothing but kill us."
June 16, 2025 at 6:29 PM
"Anarchy is... Community gardens and potlucks. Sitting under a tree on a hot day. Playgrounds and children's art classes. Never having a job. Laughing. Friends. Family. It's dancing on the ruins of a system that has done nothing but kill us."
I'm reading "Another War Is Possible: Militant Anarchist Experiences in the Antiglobalization Era" by Tomas Rothaus @batallonbakunin.bsky.social (@pmpress.bsky.social) and it is SO GOOD holy shit. It's giving me the same intense emotions as Victor Serge's "Birth of Our Power."
June 12, 2025 at 2:21 PM
I'm reading "Another War Is Possible: Militant Anarchist Experiences in the Antiglobalization Era" by Tomas Rothaus @batallonbakunin.bsky.social (@pmpress.bsky.social) and it is SO GOOD holy shit. It's giving me the same intense emotions as Victor Serge's "Birth of Our Power."