Around 1991, you wrote a brilliant 7,000-word essay on political anarchism -- mostly dispelling misconceptions such as “anarchists are bomb-throwers” while setting out 17 principles of the philosophy. What got you interested in anarchism? For open-minded Holland, this may not be a big deal. But people in other countries may not be so accepting. How do you deal with dismissive attitudes – perceptions that you’re crazy?
Open-mindedness is good for everybody, I think. I only live once and I like to make up my mind on any subject myself. It did lead to clashes with my father, for example, but I would like to live my own life, not his. And in high school I was about the only one against alcohol. Group pressure can be severe, but I have always resisted it, from a very low age. Don’t know why, but I can recommend it to all. You are no group, aren’t you?
I am crazy in many aspects, but it doesn’t bother me. Anarchist, eating vegan and organic, lesbian, free-jazz tenor sax player, (see Muziek to hear some of her work), feminist, abstract painter, dragonfly specialist, world record holder and so on!
It is always difficult to explain why you have certain interests, especially when they are not mainstream. When I learned to read at age 6, I immediately started to follow the news (more or less) and after a month the Hungary tragedy started (1956). I saw those pictures and asked my father what it was about but received answers that I felt were not complete (he of course tried to protect me against bad things). But my conclusion was: This is not a nice world; it could be better.
Than followed the decolonization of Africa, the civil rights movement in the U.S., the no nukes movement, the French students in 1968, Vietnam. I started to study physics in 1969, switched to sociology in 1970. There was much leftism in the air, and part of it I liked. The way I went was: theory of Marxism, radical feminist, anarchist philosophy. It sounds like a logical evolution, but this only is a description. Explanations are hard to come by. Why would that 6-year-old child read the news? And why didn’t my brother do it also?
Posted December 3, 2002
http://masterstrack.com/2002/12/6779/