If the starting point is the overthrow of the rulers and all domination, then this is a requirement that must encompass the totality and extent of the ruling system. The struggle against domination is a „total“ struggle. Partial struggles that do not encompass the totality of the exploitation and destruction of the earth are doomed to stagnation. The self-limiting goals of a partial struggle become limitations, acting blindly and deafly in the shadow of a much wider horizon. Because yes! We want more, much more. But we are certainly not movement managers or preachers of ideological anarchism. The need to destroy all coercive relations is based precisely on destruction, whether material or metaphysical. But for the many wild creatures (Latin creatura, „creature“, from creare, „to create“, „to build“, „to generate“) who reject all authority, destruction is also a moment of creation. Taking the space and time to act means filling and using both differently. On the way to destruction, we often direct our thoughts and energies to how we can most effectively achieve our goal, because neither time nor space is unlimited. The prevailing „common sense“, logic, draws the conclusion. This leads to the pursuit of efficiency in the implementation of our plans. The degree of goal achievement, or in other words, efficiency, can be determined by comparing the actual value with the planned target value. This apparently logical idea is subject to a mathematical formula. But this calculation is a myth of management. It shows the „most efficient“ tactics for managing people, means of production or bureaucracy, and even for politics. But isn‘t it precisely administration and the order it creates that is the problem? Why should we, on the one hand, attack and destroy any administration and its effectiveness (which we criticise) in order to replace it with a different, but still efficiency-oriented, basic attitude? After all, it is our struggles that want to propose something different in their fundamental contents and perspectives and express it in action.

The opinion of others is one of the great metaphysical hurdles we face as soon as we step out into the daylight, into the streets and squares. There, detached from the feel-good plenum, the walls covered with political posters, we stand on somewhat precarious legs because someone might ask uncomfortable questions. There are only us, with our questionable and incomplete ideas, who seem shy and uncertain when talking to other people. Perhaps because many of us have never been used to putting content, positions, ideas and proposals into our own words, without beating about the bush and without being ashamed to talk about them. An exercise, certainly, but just one of many.

But the opinion of others is a problem we encounter more often than when we hand out leaflets on the street. Because it is our subjective opinion about the opinion of others that makes us doubt our ideas and actions. Legitimate questions arise: Do „people“ understand us? Shouldn‘t we write „simpler“? Maybe we should swap that black hoodie for a nice shirt? The dilution of ideas is always lurking around the corner, and so we disguise ourselves in order to be more accessible, i.e. more efficient. The „easier“ way is to make us feel less alone with our ideas. The biggest nightmare for many people in any kind of movement seems to be the „political“ loneliness. Being or feeling isolated is tantamount to non-existence and can lead to giving up activism and going through life with resignation.

The efficiency spiral is also a danger in „combative“ circles. It is not necessarily expressed in resignation, but rather in the question of the communicability of actions. This often leads to a kind of hierarchisation that distinguishes between „easily communicable“ and „badly communicable“ actions. Smashing a fascist‘s kneecaps is just about acceptable today; hanging him from a rope would probably meet with less understanding, even though this has happened time and again in the „glorious“ history of anti-fascism. But now without metaphorical allusions: In France, hundreds of radio masts, fibre-optic cables and electricity pylons are sabotaged every year, anonymously or not. And the number is increasing. Like all sabotage, its effect is temporary, until it is repaired, which is out of the question, but the fact of future repair cannot be a reason not to sabotage. In Germany, such forms of action could probably lead to a great social outcry, and probably parts of a radical left would also join this outcry. But what would that mean for the people who sabotage, or want to sabotage, out of their analysis? Do they not act because there is no immediate communicability? The value of such actions lies not only in their expression, i.e. the result of an action, but also in the motivation through the choice of the form of action and the target itself. The value also lies in the quality of wanting to break with the status quo, without waiting for the masses, consensus or broad agreement. Ultimately, the question is: how do we decide what is „communicable“, when, how? How can we determine this?

We have no social barometer. We only have our debates and analyses in which we discuss what could be done, how and why. That is the real value, the quality. What is the long-term perspective of indiscriminate vandalism? It may sound exaggerated, but smearing paint on a window, even the one of the National Parlament, is in form and expression a trivial threatening gesture that does not carry the desire and will to destroy. We cannot afford to merely threaten or intimidate the rulers with whom we are engaged in a social war and resign ourselves to their eventual satisfaction. In this way, no one creates a threat that can be perceived as a real danger to the ruling order. The opinion of others, and the fear of it, which could lead us to choose colour, has at this moment become an obstacle to a possible wider perspective. If we set ourselves the goal of launching an attack, but exclude certain actions and means a priori because we find the level of presumed repression (the opinion of the cops/ judges) and „unpredictability“ (the opinion of society) too disturbing, and adapt our action to this standard, does this make us strategists or revolutionaries? Rather the former. Not that revolutionaries (only) act out of recklessness and stubbornness, but perhaps the bar could be set a little more independently of factors that we can never really assess objectively anyway. Constant tactics can lead to a wait-and-see attitude that does not fuel fights. We need more cheerful daring than a tight timetable, and we should push ourselves and others towards that rather than always rationalising everything.