With the upcoming elections in Germany and the revival of the far right, many of my friends urge me to vote, but I refuse since to vote means to legitimize the current system of rulership.
It has been argued that the refusal of the Spanish anarchists to take part in the power games of the Spanish Republic lead to their defeat, but as an anarchist you cannot take part in something you regard as utterly wrong, even if that refusal leads to your downfall, because if you would, you would have let yourself down and this is the worst defeat.
For me, the understanding that humans ruling humans is morally wrong and therefore the refusal of the masses to accept the authority of the state and its institutions is the paradigm shift which is needed for humanity to reach a new level of enlightenment. Like the renaissance which started the movement to free us from the grips of superstition and religion by explaining certain phenomena with the tools of science and rational thinking, a process which still continues today, we need a movement to enlighten the people about the absurdity of stastism. When people are really grown-up, they will understand that they don´t need Vater Staat (Father State), as we call it in Germany, any longer, that they can rule themselves on the basis of voluntary agreements.
We Germans have shown the world where blind belief in state, government and authority can lead to, but I take solace in the fact that some of the most profound thinkers and philosophers of anarchism were also Germans.
Ni dieu ni maitre, pas l´etat!