Introducing episode 39 – Anarchist Colonization of Mars
In 1974 Ursula K. Le Guin published the science fiction
novel “The Dispossessed”, which told the story of a movement of
anarchists who collectively left an Earth-like planet to go colonize a
Mars-like planet, establishing there a new society organized around
their anarchist beliefs. In 1992 Kim Stanley Robinson published the
science fiction novel “Red Mars”, the first book of his “Mars Trilogy”,
which told the story of people colonizing the planet Mars, including a
number of explicitly anarchist groups, who then go on to become
independent from the various authorities on Earth.
Then
last Saturday, September 28th, Elon Musk held a press conference where
he introduced the world to the “Starship” vehicle that he intends to use
to send humans to Mars to begin the process of colonizing that planet.
Musk’s company, SpaceX, has already shown the world that reusable
rockets which are capable of going out into space can be made, and that a
private company can make them. Prior to this only single-use rockets
were made for space travel, and government agencies were seen as the
only organizations capable of going out into space.
Taking
inspiration from all of this, the question here becomes: How about we
build some real-life anarchist colonies on Mars? Our current planet is
fucked, in all kinds of different ways, so how about those of us who
yearn for a completely different world go set up shop on a completely
different world? How about we turn “the Red Planet” into “the Red &
Black Planet”? Let’s become Martians!
Join in the conversation!
Sunday at noon (PST or -7 UTC) at https://anarchybang.com/
Email questions ahead if you like
The real time IRC is a chaotic mess (and pleasure). There are better ways to connect to IRC but it involves some reading
The call in number is (646) 787-8464
Recent Comments