The impact of Orwell's "Homage to Catalonia" on Noam Chomsky's path to anarchism

> Orwell maintains that revolution is the only way to remove from power the oppressive business-based ruling class of the type that has dominated the West since World War II.

This line from the article seems to misrepresent Orwell. Perhaps it’s been too long since I’ve read Homage to Catalonia, but I’m pretty sure he arrived in Spain without any grand ideas of being part of a revolution, and quite simply wanted to fight against fascists. He makes it clear in his book that he initially had little understanding of the differences in ideology among the various left-wing groups, and chose to join the anarchists rather arbitrarily.

Chomsky's first article, which he wrote when he was 10 was about the Spanish Civil War, he was reporting that Texaco the oil company was supplying the nationalists with oil, despite their being an official embargo, and the US government knew about it.

for what it's worth, Chomsky is specifically an advocate of Anarcho-Syndicalism:

Anarcho-syndicalism is a political philosophy and anarchist school of thought that views revolutionary industrial unionism or syndicalism as a method for workers in capitalist society to gain control of an economy and thus control influence in broader society.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarcho-syndicalism

I think the cry 'down with the hierarchy' is morally correct, and replacing a hierarchy with nothing is foolish. Structure does not need to have any hierarchy. We should think less in terms of pyramids (only a few at the top)... maybe consider the humble circle instead where those insulated from change affect less of it.

The Spanish civil war is a fascinating topic and I can't do justice to it in the small space of an HN comment. Many Americans were sympathetic to the republic against fascism. It's not surprising that Chomsky could have that as such a foundational piece of his left wing politics.

I've read all of George Orwell's novels. Homage Catalonia is good, but Down and Out in Paris and London is better; possibly his best. Everyone knows Animal Farm and 1984. Chomsky is one of the great minds of the last century, surely even he would tell you he read a lot more than Homage Catalonia to shape his Anarchism.

Genuine question for this audience.

Given a general recognition of the philosophical grounding of Chomsky and the broader social anarchist philosophers (Henry George comes up frequently)…

Why is there not more directed advocacy or support for leadership that present anarchist political perspectives?

My observation is that in a large percentage of cases, people have such a strong reaction to the word, “anarchist” that they can’t actually evaluate it the way that political philosophers define it

And so there is no linguistic term that is not triggering, which also reflects the broader philosophical tradition of individual agent based Interactions that are disintermediated from other power structures.

Help me out. I have never understood the logic of anarchy.

So everybody for themselves, ok. But what if two form a group and start oppressing the one who thought he is free.

Group formation seems to be natural way humans organize up to a state level.

I love much of Chomsky’s writing as he opened my eyes in powerful ways, especially wrt media bias.

I would however hesitate to call him an anarchist after hearing his comments about the unvaccinated during Covid.

My man.

>When Chomsky was in his teens he read Orwell’s “Animal Farm,” “which,” he told me in 1995, “struck me as amusing but pretty obvious”

What a massive tool. Animal Farm was so obvious to Noam Chomsky that he forwent writing it, and he's going to make sure that you know.

This type of grifter personality would also be the one that lies about his stated political models, assuming that their essential nature is "pretty obvious" to Chomsky. The end result being his contribution to division and chaos.

Chomsky is only pro anarchism when it comes to the West. He is perfectly fine with communist/post communist regimes rampaging around unabated and uncriticized.

I would call his stance as "West bad, West always bad and at fault for everything!!1".