Our power lies in a rough unity, the ability to heal rifts and work together even through discomfort.
Division, misunderstanding, conflict, fear and confusion is wonderful for those who desire to control others. It prevents any meaningful action that requires the support of the majority. It provides false enemies for people to get angry about, diverting attention from whoever is trying to control the population for their own gain. It reduces the capacity for the target population to create anything on a large scale such as infrastructure, keeping them dependent on what the controllers provide. It cuts the flow of information across bubbles of belief, ensuring that if anybody wanted to envision a better world, their vision wouldn’t be in everyone’s interests and they will have no idea why.
The Rebel Warrior Movement will do the opposite. We will heal rifts, foster communication between different groups of people and find ways to work together despite disagreement. We will do this via means that can be verified to work. With those directly opposing our movement, we will reach out and try to understand their perspective instead of treating them as an absolute enemy.
Whoever you are, you deserve better.
Gender, race, religion, sexuality, gender identity and disability are some of the characteristics that are typically associated with divide. Lurking under the taboo about being pro-discrimination in any form is a network of discomfort, misunderstanding and conflict that exists on a deep level collectively. At the risk of the movement losing face amongst activists who are tackling discrimination, these undercurrents are not solved by being, for example, ‘against racism’.
The Rebel Warrior Movement commits to tackling the unseen, the taboo and the unspoken. There is often underlying discomfort between people who are different, whether it is race, disability or otherwise. The discord between men and women in modern times is shocking, causing suffering for all involved and the ways this is being addressed is clearly not working. We want to accurately gauge and compassionately address all of these issues, not shroud them under stigma. This way, we can achieve our objective of communicating and coordinating amongst as many people as possible. ‘Anti discrimination’ rhetoric can also be used as a cover for abuse, censorship and control and should not merit unquestioned acceptance.
Beyond these characteristics, there is a far bigger scope of divide. Appearance, mannerisms, profession and economic status are some examples. Culture can be very different within, for example, a race, religion and ethnicity – for example, a conservative traditional culture with family values can be very different from one that more values independence and self expression. Attitudes to sex and sexuality are very different, for instance, promiscuity being accepted and valued in one and taboo in another. Even in terms of profession, for example, farmers (usually a generational profession) have an associated culture. A family that has a lot of builders usually talks and acts differently than a family that has a lot of white collar workers, even if they have similar income, religion and race.
In terms of divide within everything listed above, from race to profession, we have things ranging from fairly innocent to deep conflict. For example, information is restricted between cultural bubbles, and one might know the odd trick that the others don’t (such as a good herbal remedy, or how to haggle). An example of something more serious, is that different races and religions, regardless of how against racism everybody is, often have an underlying discomfort around each other. And we also have the issue that certain cultures across all skin colours and religions, are either uncomfortable around homosexuality or outright dislike it.
We also have naked conflict and ideological differences. During Covid, there was a conflict between those who felt the pandemic was a serious and genuine threat and those who felt it was overblown or even an outright hoax. This isn’t something minor, this has left a serious rift in the population and we need both sides to work together. If there is a sudden dividing event in the future, and a consensus cannot be reached on what is happening, we need to find a different way to deal with the situation because neither side dealt with it well.
Additionally, in the UK we have a large population of immigrants, refugees, victims of violence caused by this country and its allies, and people who’s parents or grandparents migrated here. We also have a large population of people who are either against the scale of immigration, against immigration altogether or against some sort of real or perceived consequences of immigration. Guess what? Anybody somewhat working towards the principles of this movement is welcome, and I think people might be surprised and learn a few things if we turn down the noise and aggression. Hardline extremists and outright racists are unlikely to find this movement appealing anyway, and they are in the minority.
Scaling up the level of aggression, we have people who not only could prove to be an adversary, but can actually throw you in jail. Their morality is usually geared towards presenting themselves in a positive light, rather than what is objectively in the best interests of the people they claim to serve. Sometimes their service is objectively useful and justified. Other times, horrendous cruelty is simply an afternoon’s shift, and they have no compassion whatsoever if doing so threatens their self image. I am talking, of course, about the police.
The Rebel Warrior Movement, by definition, has a duty to question a force that literally claims to ‘police by consent’, and hold them accountable where such claim cannot be verified and there is no clear way to withdraw consent. However, we do not support a wholesale dislike or aggression towards them. This does not mean that victims of police violence are expected to suddenly hold hands and pretend that everything is ok – and remember this because this applies to any group or cultural conflict. As a movement, we need to be the mature ones who initiate diplomacy and negotiation.
There are strategic reasons for this. First of all, the dismantling of the police system with nothing to replace it is not a strategy that this movement will support (or is able to achieve anyway). By definition, we need them (for now). Secondly, police are part of the population as well. They have many of the same issues with the system that others do. We want to encourage them to question things, and create an avenue to get involved. Thirdly, let’s say some members of the police decide that they are fed up with the system and get involved with the movement, but for whatever reason choose to stick to their job. If the police who have more than a few brain cells all drop out, who are we left with? Utter morons and yes men! Fourth is that they will have information and knowledge that we don’t. There is a valuable perspective in any cultural group, and the police are no exception. Fifth, of course, is that doing so reduces the chance of being arrested!
Coordination is a weapon
I can’t stress enough how improving cohesion between different groups of people is a victory in and of itself. If someone was to design a campaign around that, and it was to prove effective, this would be a great benefit to society. However, this is more than that. Being able to work together well, whether it is dispite differences, because of differences, or even when we are tolerating some form of disagreement, is the most powerful weapon we have against any regime.
It allows us to get accurate information about everybodys situation, needs and desires. Thanks to communication, rather than assuming or guessing, we can ask and find out. Taboo and discomfort won’t limit the questions we can ask, the answers we can accept or the people we can connect with.
Because we can know what is going on with people, we know how to help. We will also know how to trade, we will know who is abundant and deficient in which knowledge, skill or resource. This means we can solve problems such as poverty, overwork and emotional issues. The result of this is less time and energy spent surviving and struggling, and an ease takes over, giving us spare energy to play with.
So, what can a functional, well connected group accomplish? Quite a lot. We can do actions that need the coordination of many people. This could range from creating infrastructure, mass non-compliance to creating a new political party and voting them in.