Why should anarchists use all vocabulary to their disposition

[el topo]

I start this topic to continue the discussion some of us had on this one http://www.anarchistblackcat.org/index.php/topic,9504.30.html and was out of thema.

the discussion was about the using of the word "party".
I'd like to use this exemple to show why we should not exclude some words of our vocabulary because they seems to don't fit with our ideology.

I'd like to defend the use of the word "party" by anarchists. To me the fact that it's usually a word used to define institutional and parliamentary organizations is not enough to decide to don't use it.

what definition could we give to this word.
I'm not an etymologist (if someone is, thanks to correct me or add some elements) but, I would tend to link the word "party" with "partisan" (in french dictionary: 1483, female name; italian partigiano from parte, "part, party". first meaning person attached to his/her party. second meaning persone who takes party for a doctrine).
I will use the second meaning.

before going forwards, lets have a look to an other word that may interest us, "organization": again in french dictionary, female name, 1390 from to organize. first meaning, state of an organize body. second meaning, action that organize something, its result (action d'organiser quelque chose; son résultat). third meaning, association which proposed determined goals.
I'm interested with the first and third meanings. with the first meaning I would tend to link it with the word organism. there something biological with the organization, it's an organism, composed by other organisms, the militants (I think that the biological approach of politic is something old in anarchism, see kropotkin, bakunin and malatesta for the most popular).

So, I'd like to conclude this way. I'm not a partisan of my organization. my organization is an organism within which I'm also an organism.  I'm a partisan of social anarchism. social anarchism is my party.
I think we have an advantage using the word party, because it's allow us to be member of different organizations, but partisan of the same party, social anarchism.

I think this interesting because i'm not a defender of the one big union* or the united front or whatever stuff which is unique and monolithic. for many reasons, one of them (except the biological approach I like very much) is that our ennemies have more difficulties when attacks come from different fronts than from one. but I agree that we need something that unite us (the party). An other reason is that the party still continues to live when an organization dies and what have the organization gave to the party still continues to live in the party, carried by other organizations/organisms.


I'm made the exemple on the word "party" because the discussion was about this word, but I would tend to have the same approach in general for two reasons. meanings of words is a battle we can't let our ennemies have the monopoly of ideas. the second is linked to theory. to go forward with anarchist theory we need all the tools to our disposition, words are these tools, choosing not using a word, means you decide not to use a tool.

democracy, power, majority (and others), are words some anarchist dislike, but I think they're very usefull. the better exemple is the us comrades campain: http://anarkismo.net/article/21554

sorry it's a bit bad written, hope you'll understand it.

*I'm not against IWW and not saying IWW are monolitic, dont misunderstand me

[syndicalist]

Comrade el topo, I understand your point about language. And, in fact, I think too many of my north american comrades use a langugae that I would not neccesarily use.... and a language that anarchists, anarcho-syndicalists of my generation might never use or have grown up with (from the 1970s). Perhaps some of this is generational. Perhaps some of it is, as Sabotage indicatd, local/regional. Perhaps.

Comrade, you write: "choosing not using a word, means you decide not to use a tool."

"Tools" in politics can be a  funny thing, right?  Direct action tools can be helpful. Parlimentary tools not so helpful. The "tools" will always be on the table, it depends on which tools one feels are right to do a job.  I do not think the "party" tool is a tool at all. I think it creates an illusion, but make the use of the terminology into fools and not tools.

Let us just say I will respectfully and comradely agree to disagree on the use of the term "party".
Of course, I like social parties and enjoy drinking beer with comrades, but that's about it for me and parties.

[el topo]

"Tools" in politics can be a  funny thing, right?  Direct action tools can be helpful. Parlimentary tools not so helpful. The "tools" will always be on the table, it depends on which tools one feels are right to do a job.

+1 ouch 
perhaps a very bad exemple. I was thinking about a discussion we had some months ago with french comrades (i will not give any name  ), during this discussion we came on the table with the concept of "radical democracy" and as reaction we had to hear about that "democracy" is not an anarchist word it's a capitalist one and that we're not allowed to use it. during the same discussion we had the same reaction when we came with the concept of "social majorities" (concept we use when we need something larger than "working class"), and again as "majority" is always a "dictature" on "minorities" we are not allowed to use it. etc, etc. that's why I used tool, I wanted to say that language is a tool for thinking and if we decide to not use some words because they're not anarchists, then we have lower capacities to think.
but you made a good point, my argumentation on this point was not very good.

[syndicalist]

Right quick, before I go to work.

El topo, I hear what you're saying. I think many of us in the english speaking world use direct democracy (or even democracy) in a way and manner that comrades who speak, say french, spanish, italian, would not.  So confusion can become real when using terms others don't use. But, I think, a party is a party, no matter how one tries to cut the bread.

A bit off the topic of the term "party", but in line with how we use words as tools in our own organizations and between comrades. Sometimes words can be very sharp, like a scalpel, and sometimes very blunt like a hammer. Or very soft like a feather. But we wouldn't use a hammer when, say, a feather is needed or a feather when a scalpel is needed. It's all a matter of using and choosing the right words for the right moments. Very broadly speaking and not directed at you or this conversation, but some comrades don't get that difference either.

Ciao.