WEBVTT - CZM Book Club: Against the State by James Stout 0:00:01.760 --> 0:00:03.240 Al Zone Media. 0:00:06.559 --> 0:00:11.520 Book Club, Club Club Clear Club. 0:00:11.720 --> 0:00:12.000 Yay. 0:00:13.039 --> 0:00:15.160 The reason that that's a fun bit is that when 0:00:15.200 --> 0:00:17.320 there's more than one person is that you can't synchronize 0:00:17.400 --> 0:00:20.200 things like chanting over the zoom. 0:00:20.280 --> 0:00:24.120 It's actually genetically built into me from years of watching 0:00:24.160 --> 0:00:26.920 football matches to synchronize. But I have to say a 0:00:26.920 --> 0:00:29.960 couple of words that unfortunately we cannot broadcast. 0:00:31.800 --> 0:00:34.320 Hello, and welcome to Cools One Media book Club, the 0:00:34.360 --> 0:00:35.839 only book club where you don't have to do the 0:00:35.880 --> 0:00:38.400 reading because James Stout does it for you. I am 0:00:38.479 --> 0:00:41.720 your host, Margaret Kiljoy, and my guest today. As you 0:00:41.800 --> 0:00:44.000 might have guessed by hearing his voice and the fact 0:00:44.040 --> 0:00:46.680 that I just said his name, is my colleague, my 0:00:46.800 --> 0:00:49.360 frequent collaborator, and my dear friend, James Stout. 0:00:49.440 --> 0:00:52.880 Hi, Hi, Margaret. It's nice to be doing a podcast again. 0:00:53.000 --> 0:00:55.160 Last time we were on the floor of the bedroom 0:00:55.200 --> 0:01:02.720 of an Airbnb and instruction at midnight, completely delirious. Yeah, 0:01:02.800 --> 0:01:06.000 absolutely exhausted and having recovered from being locked out of 0:01:06.000 --> 0:01:08.600 said airbnb and like, my. 0:01:08.040 --> 0:01:10.440 God, I forgot about that. Yeah, we got locked yep. 0:01:10.480 --> 0:01:12.320 You'll probably heard us talk about this a bunch of times, 0:01:12.319 --> 0:01:14.440 but we sure got locked out. Of an airbnb and 0:01:14.680 --> 0:01:16.839 temperatures that are absolutely dangerous. 0:01:17.520 --> 0:01:18.960 Yep, it's good times. 0:01:19.319 --> 0:01:25.040 Well, James, we are here today so that I can 0:01:25.080 --> 0:01:26.280 be the book club where I don't have to do 0:01:26.360 --> 0:01:28.760 the reading because you, James, are going to do it 0:01:28.800 --> 0:01:32.360 for me. I heard you have a book. 0:01:32.959 --> 0:01:33.360 I do. 0:01:34.160 --> 0:01:36.680 I heard that because I've well, I blurbed it. 0:01:36.959 --> 0:01:38.320 Yeah, your name's on the back of it. 0:01:38.520 --> 0:01:41.000 Yeah. What's this book. 0:01:41.440 --> 0:01:44.320 It's called Against the State. It's about anarchists at war, 0:01:44.640 --> 0:01:47.800 and it draws on the time I spent with revolutionaries 0:01:47.920 --> 0:01:51.440 in Mianma and Rajava, which is part of Kurdistan, as 0:01:51.440 --> 0:01:53.960 well as my historical research into the Spanish Civil War. 0:01:54.360 --> 0:01:58.800 It looks at how people have organized themselves horizontally during 0:01:59.080 --> 0:02:02.559 what's obviously a pretty stressful and difficult time for organizing, 0:02:02.720 --> 0:02:05.000 and what we can learn from that for our own, 0:02:05.440 --> 0:02:08.400 hopefully peaceable and much less dangerous organizing. 0:02:08.919 --> 0:02:10.840 I think it's fascinating for a lot of reasons. One 0:02:10.880 --> 0:02:13.079 because we live in a real uncertain world and I'm 0:02:13.120 --> 0:02:15.400 with you on the sure hoping all of our organism 0:02:15.440 --> 0:02:19.560 will get to be peaceful, but I'm certainly not certain 0:02:19.639 --> 0:02:25.160 of that. And yeah, specifically, that's what always people have said, 0:02:25.280 --> 0:02:28.200 is like, ah, but you know you need hierarchy, And 0:02:28.960 --> 0:02:33.080 that's a delicate and careful an important question where you're like, 0:02:34.320 --> 0:02:38.000 war absolutely is kind of the most authoritarian. It's sort 0:02:38.040 --> 0:02:40.440 of like like, there's kind of nothing more authoritarian than 0:02:40.520 --> 0:02:41.959 killing someone, right. 0:02:42.480 --> 0:02:45.960 But there's also nothing more egalitarian than everyone having the 0:02:46.000 --> 0:02:50.080 ability to kill someone, right, Totally. If you're in charge 0:02:50.080 --> 0:02:52.400 and you keep fucking up, any of the people you're 0:02:52.400 --> 0:02:54.040 in charge of can just kill you. 0:02:54.480 --> 0:02:57.160 Yeah. Yeah. 0:02:57.400 --> 0:03:00.000 Guns have that kind of equalizing effect. 0:03:00.480 --> 0:03:04.560 Yeah, in a you know, we're capable of doing terrible 0:03:04.600 --> 0:03:06.040 things to each other with them. 0:03:06.240 --> 0:03:08.160 Yeah. Yeah. One thing I want to push back on 0:03:08.280 --> 0:03:12.440 is that, like I don't like violence. I don't attend 0:03:12.560 --> 0:03:15.600 wars because I think it's cool to kill people or 0:03:15.760 --> 0:03:17.840 bomb people or any of that stuff. And find that 0:03:17.880 --> 0:03:20.720 stuff horrible. I think the moment you stop feeling that 0:03:21.240 --> 0:03:23.440 it's time for you to move along. Yeah, as a 0:03:23.480 --> 0:03:26.240 conflict reporter, like some of the stuff I've witness has 0:03:26.280 --> 0:03:28.839 been horrific, but also I think it's beautiful that people 0:03:28.840 --> 0:03:31.079 are willing to go through those horrors to liberate themselves 0:03:31.080 --> 0:03:34.120 and other people. So I want to record that. 0:03:34.960 --> 0:03:37.360 I think that's great and it's a great book and 0:03:37.400 --> 0:03:39.000 we're going to read some of it, or you're going 0:03:39.080 --> 0:03:40.400 to read some of it and I'm going to go 0:03:40.560 --> 0:03:45.800 oh oh and other reactions. Okay, cool here, But for 0:03:46.000 --> 0:03:49.880 someone to apologize to the audience, your book isn't fiction, 0:03:50.240 --> 0:03:54.160 you are both known is what you call nonfiction because 0:03:54.160 --> 0:03:56.840 normally if like truth and then non truth like lies, 0:03:56.960 --> 0:03:59.120 is like kind of the opposite of truth. I like 0:03:59.160 --> 0:04:02.760 that nonfiction is the one that's marked like fiction is 0:04:02.800 --> 0:04:07.800 the default of a story. Yeah, nonfiction the real one. 0:04:08.280 --> 0:04:10.320 Yeah, it's just like the negative. 0:04:10.560 --> 0:04:14.800 Yeah. But this book club will always be mostly will 0:04:14.800 --> 0:04:18.640 probably be continue to be mostly fiction. But we do 0:04:18.680 --> 0:04:21.960 try to also say, like there's things worth reading and 0:04:22.000 --> 0:04:25.800 paying attention to, and we think James's book is one 0:04:25.839 --> 0:04:31.200 of them. And I also want to say that on 0:04:31.320 --> 0:04:34.480 April nineteenth, the day that this is released, it is 0:04:34.520 --> 0:04:37.760 a sad anniversary. It is the three year anniversary of 0:04:37.800 --> 0:04:40.200 the death of three anarchist comrades who are killed in 0:04:40.320 --> 0:04:44.359 Ukraine fighting to defend the Road of Life, which is 0:04:44.400 --> 0:04:49.400 a road in Bakhmut that carried humanitarian aid into the city. 0:04:49.680 --> 0:04:51.760 And you've probably if you listen to my podcast Cool 0:04:51.760 --> 0:04:53.960 People Who Did Cool stuff. I have talked about these 0:04:54.000 --> 0:04:56.400 three anarchists, both in their own episodes a couple of 0:04:56.480 --> 0:05:00.040 years ago, year or so ago, and then recently I 0:05:00.360 --> 0:05:02.880 also talked about it again a lot in my episode 0:05:02.920 --> 0:05:05.440 about Russian partisans. So if you want to hear more 0:05:05.480 --> 0:05:07.960 about it, but I just want to take a moment 0:05:08.200 --> 0:05:12.880 to remember Cooper Andrews from Cleveland Heights, a Black autonomous 0:05:12.960 --> 0:05:17.000 who died, Finn bar Kafarki and Irish anarchists from the 0:05:17.000 --> 0:05:21.400 Galtech on the west coast of Ireland. And Dmitri Petrov, 0:05:21.600 --> 0:05:26.040 who was a Russian who spent his entire life as 0:05:26.120 --> 0:05:31.960 adult life fighting against Putin by organizing by midnight arson 0:05:32.760 --> 0:05:37.120 and eventually by fleeing the country and joining an army 0:05:37.240 --> 0:05:41.479 that opposed the government that was the dictatorship that he 0:05:41.560 --> 0:05:44.080 grew up under. And so the three of them died 0:05:44.160 --> 0:05:47.120 on April nineteenth, I believe, twenty twenty three. That's how 0:05:47.160 --> 0:05:49.039 math works. It's the three universary. 0:05:49.880 --> 0:05:53.160 Yeah, I guess I'll just add that a friend of mine, Pierre, 0:05:53.320 --> 0:05:56.080 he was an anarchist too fighting in Ukraine, died in 0:05:56.880 --> 0:05:59.039 June of last year. One of the things he sent 0:05:59.080 --> 0:06:02.040 me from Ukraine before he passed was a mural of 0:06:02.080 --> 0:06:04.120 these three that he'd gone to visit to pay his 0:06:04.200 --> 0:06:04.880 respects to them. 0:06:05.160 --> 0:06:10.320 Yeah, anarchists are dying in that war, unfortunately, quite a lot, 0:06:10.400 --> 0:06:14.960 because when you live somewhere and someone invades it, you 0:06:15.160 --> 0:06:16.880 try to stop them. Yeah. 0:06:17.080 --> 0:06:18.680 Yeah, I guess you don't get to always fight the 0:06:18.720 --> 0:06:21.760 war you want. Sometimes the war comes to you, and 0:06:22.040 --> 0:06:25.600 they're fighting for a more free world than they would 0:06:25.600 --> 0:06:31.400 experience if they were colonized by Russia. And often they 0:06:31.440 --> 0:06:34.640 die and heralded, and like they don't get their respect 0:06:34.680 --> 0:06:37.440 they deserve, especially from the anarchist community, because like the 0:06:37.760 --> 0:06:41.040 war itself is not an anarchist struggle, but these people 0:06:41.120 --> 0:06:45.400 are building their little beautiful worlds as they fight, right, 0:06:45.560 --> 0:06:49.320 like people who are organizing horizontally, even in a military 0:06:49.360 --> 0:06:53.120 which itself it's not horizontally organized. Yeah, they're fighting their 0:06:53.160 --> 0:06:55.520 own little struggle and like as they do so, they're 0:06:55.520 --> 0:06:57.000 trying to build the world that they want to live in. 0:06:57.240 --> 0:06:58.080 We should respect that. 0:06:58.440 --> 0:06:59.960 No, I really like the way you phrased it, where 0:07:00.040 --> 0:07:01.960 it's like you don't always get to pick the war 0:07:02.000 --> 0:07:04.680 that you fight, because overall, like you probably shouldn't fight 0:07:04.680 --> 0:07:07.040 wars unless you have to, and that usually means because 0:07:07.080 --> 0:07:10.920 someone has brought war to you. And my favorite Tolkien quote, 0:07:10.960 --> 0:07:13.000 I'll say a different quote every single time I say 0:07:13.000 --> 0:07:16.240 that sentence. But those without swords can still die upon 0:07:16.280 --> 0:07:19.280 them is honestly at the end of the day, like 0:07:20.760 --> 0:07:24.400 I mean, it's why I trained with firearms, is that 0:07:24.400 --> 0:07:27.080 there are people wanted to hurt me. You know, those 0:07:27.080 --> 0:07:29.240 of that swords can still die upon them, And so 0:07:29.800 --> 0:07:32.480 that's you can be anti war all you want, but 0:07:32.520 --> 0:07:33.880 there's a war there. 0:07:33.960 --> 0:07:36.520 You know. Yeah, and you can't argue with it, right, 0:07:36.840 --> 0:07:38.640 it doesn't matter if you are correct. 0:07:39.080 --> 0:07:42.280 Yeah, the working class shouldn't shoot each other, but they're 0:07:42.320 --> 0:07:43.720 trying to kill you in your family. 0:07:44.280 --> 0:07:46.040 Yeah, yeah, at some point you have to deal with 0:07:46.080 --> 0:07:47.440 that in a non ricorbical sinse. 0:07:47.680 --> 0:07:51.000 Yeah. Well, and if people want to hear a little 0:07:51.000 --> 0:07:54.520 bit more also about those three particular fighters, but also 0:07:54.560 --> 0:07:56.640 there are a lot of other anarchist fighters. It's just 0:07:56.680 --> 0:08:00.400 three people died in one day, and you know, so 0:08:00.520 --> 0:08:02.520 often those are those are some of the ones that 0:08:02.520 --> 0:08:04.520 we write about the most. But if you go to 0:08:04.520 --> 0:08:07.080 Anarchist Federation dot net, there's a tribute written to them, 0:08:07.440 --> 0:08:12.960 and yeah, but today that's not the struggle we'll be 0:08:12.960 --> 0:08:15.160 talking about, but we will be talking about Anarchist at War. 0:08:15.240 --> 0:08:18.080 We're going to read what what are we. 0:08:18.080 --> 0:08:22.240 Reading's first chapter of my book. It's called Mountains. As 0:08:22.240 --> 0:08:25.760 you'll hear. It draws on some of Jim Scott's ideas. 0:08:25.840 --> 0:08:29.400 James C. Scott has influenced my work very much. He 0:08:29.560 --> 0:08:31.880 sadly passed away a couple of years ago. He was 0:08:31.880 --> 0:08:33.719 one of the founding members of Mutual Aid ME and 0:08:33.840 --> 0:08:37.240 MO as well, and it asked people to donate to 0:08:37.320 --> 0:08:40.320 the revolution in Memma in lieu of sending flowers after 0:08:40.360 --> 0:08:40.880 he passed. 0:08:41.320 --> 0:08:44.640 This is the anthropologist. Yes, I didn't know that he 0:08:44.800 --> 0:08:47.880 was Wait, nope, now I do I remember it now? Yeah, okay, 0:08:48.120 --> 0:08:49.079 I always forget what I know. 0:08:49.320 --> 0:08:50.640 He did his field work there. 0:08:50.840 --> 0:08:52.880 Oh no, I knew about that part. Yeah, I'd forgotten 0:08:52.920 --> 0:08:55.880 that he stayed involved in Yeah. 0:08:56.040 --> 0:08:58.839 Yeah, very much so, and often had and at the 0:08:58.880 --> 0:09:02.800 time his passing had been graduate students. I know. Yeah, yeah, 0:09:02.800 --> 0:09:06.640 it was very involved in the struggle. Okay, are you ready? 0:09:06.840 --> 0:09:07.600 I am ready? 0:09:08.200 --> 0:09:11.520 All right, let's go against the state. Anarchists and comrades 0:09:11.520 --> 0:09:15.079 that war in Spain, Mia and Ma Java by James Stout, 0:09:15.880 --> 0:09:21.520 Chapter one mountains. Ethnicity and tribe begin by definition where 0:09:21.520 --> 0:09:25.320 sovereignty and taxes ended. The ethnic zone was feared and 0:09:25.360 --> 0:09:28.560 stigmatized by state rhetoric precisely because it was beyond its 0:09:28.559 --> 0:09:31.480 grasp and therefore an example of defiance and an ever 0:09:31.520 --> 0:09:34.319 present temptation to those who might wish to evade the state. 0:09:35.440 --> 0:09:41.200 James C. Scott the art of not being dubbed. There 0:09:41.240 --> 0:09:44.520 isn't much to fachekable. A few single story flat buildings, 0:09:44.640 --> 0:09:48.040 a dusty courtyard, a small taxi rank, and a giant 0:09:48.040 --> 0:09:50.280 flag for anyone who has failed to notice that although 0:09:50.280 --> 0:09:53.839 the Tigris River runs through Kurdistan, the Iraqi Autonomous Reading 0:09:53.840 --> 0:09:56.640 of Kurdistan and the Autonomous Administration of North and East 0:09:56.679 --> 0:10:00.160 Syria an ees better known as for a Java and 0:10:00.200 --> 0:10:03.040 not an agreement about very much. On the eastern side 0:10:03.080 --> 0:10:06.959 of the border, two intelligence officials from the Kurdistan Regional Government, 0:10:07.360 --> 0:10:10.120 a more neoliberally aligned government that controls an area of 0:10:10.120 --> 0:10:12.880 for ruck as practically a separate country and has deep 0:10:12.920 --> 0:10:16.200 ideological differences with Rashaba, quizzed me for more than an 0:10:16.240 --> 0:10:20.280 hour about my intentions in Rajaba. All the areas you're 0:10:20.320 --> 0:10:23.200 going to are under heavy bombardment. One of them told me, 0:10:23.720 --> 0:10:26.600 I advise you not to go. It was surreal to 0:10:26.600 --> 0:10:28.760 hear about the bombing from a very smartly dressed man 0:10:28.800 --> 0:10:31.480 relaxing on a leather sofa while I sat across the 0:10:31.559 --> 0:10:33.679 room trying to squeeze my six foot three frame into 0:10:33.720 --> 0:10:37.040 a comically small chair. And the time since I'd boarded 0:10:37.040 --> 0:10:40.240 the first to a series of flights, buses and cars 0:10:40.400 --> 0:10:42.440 that had carried me from California to the bank of 0:10:42.440 --> 0:10:46.000 the Tigris River, Turkey's drones had struck dozens of targets 0:10:46.080 --> 0:10:49.840 inside AA and E S territory. Those targets were not 0:10:49.920 --> 0:10:53.120 military facilities, but civilian different structure in the middle of cities. 0:10:53.640 --> 0:10:57.280 Power stations, oil wells, and a cooking gas bottling facility 0:10:57.320 --> 0:10:59.000 had all been bombed in the quiet of the night 0:10:59.559 --> 0:11:03.280 when fell from the dark sky with no warning. Electricity 0:11:03.360 --> 0:11:07.120 was intermittent and water wasn't running in some cities. This 0:11:07.200 --> 0:11:10.440 happens every autumn. Turkey steps up its assaults on the 0:11:10.440 --> 0:11:12.959 independent Kurdish region that it sees as a threat to 0:11:13.000 --> 0:11:16.959 its ability to control Kurds within the Turkish borders. It's 0:11:17.000 --> 0:11:19.560 a concerted effort on the part of the Turkish state 0:11:19.720 --> 0:11:22.920 to make sure that democratic confederates experiment in Rasjava ends 0:11:22.920 --> 0:11:27.680 in failure. Despite this and other difficulties, Rasjava still exists 0:11:27.720 --> 0:11:30.079 as a society trying to build democracy without the state. 0:11:31.040 --> 0:11:35.120 That's why I was there. I suspected the intelligence agents 0:11:35.200 --> 0:11:37.800 knew that I already knew what was going on in Risjava, 0:11:38.240 --> 0:11:40.120 and that it was part of why I was going there. 0:11:40.760 --> 0:11:42.280 But I knew it was their job to tell me 0:11:42.320 --> 0:11:47.280 not to go. They weren't wrong. It was dangerous. As 0:11:47.360 --> 0:11:49.439 far as I could tell. I was entering at the 0:11:49.480 --> 0:11:51.640 same time as a handful of other journalists working in 0:11:51.640 --> 0:11:56.440 the region were leaving. Kurdish people are remarkably hospitable, so 0:11:56.440 --> 0:11:59.000 in addition to asking me probing questions about my past, 0:11:59.320 --> 0:12:01.679 the agent's also invited me for lunch and offered me 0:12:01.720 --> 0:12:03.760 the Wi FI code. While they debated whether they would 0:12:03.760 --> 0:12:06.960 allow me across the floating bridge over the Tigris, I 0:12:07.040 --> 0:12:09.640 politely declined the offer of lunch. I had no desire 0:12:09.679 --> 0:12:12.079 to lay my trip and drive in Syria after nightfall, 0:12:12.559 --> 0:12:15.160 especially if we were going through regions and along roads 0:12:15.200 --> 0:12:17.720 where people had been killed in drone strikes the night before. 0:12:18.559 --> 0:12:21.040 But I gladly accepted the Wi Fi code, booted up 0:12:21.040 --> 0:12:23.600 my tour browser and tried to work out if my 0:12:23.640 --> 0:12:27.040 hotel was close to any power stations. Looking out the 0:12:27.080 --> 0:12:29.600 window and across the river, I thought about how much 0:12:29.640 --> 0:12:31.920 I wanted to visit Rajava and breathe the air in 0:12:31.960 --> 0:12:34.360 a society that was trying to do away with the state. 0:12:35.960 --> 0:12:38.560 In the eleven years since the Kurdish majority cities Norse 0:12:38.559 --> 0:12:41.079 and Eassyria managed to expel most regime forces in a 0:12:41.080 --> 0:12:44.199 bloodless show of force, the conflict in a region more 0:12:44.240 --> 0:12:46.360 from one about the character of the state in Syria 0:12:46.679 --> 0:12:50.160 to the existence of the state in Syria. In this conflict, 0:12:50.280 --> 0:12:55.320 the embattled Bathist regime, the increasingly authoritarian Turkish regime, the 0:12:55.400 --> 0:12:58.680 remains of the so called Islamic State, and Iranian proxy 0:12:58.679 --> 0:13:01.679 militias in Syria have all found themselves at war with 0:13:01.720 --> 0:13:04.240 one another, but united in opposition to the projects in 0:13:04.320 --> 0:13:08.040 Rojava and elsewhere in Syria that seek to redistribute power 0:13:08.080 --> 0:13:10.880 away from the state and toward the people. It was 0:13:10.960 --> 0:13:13.880 these people who had managed to emerge from the fire 0:13:13.880 --> 0:13:16.240 of a burning country and the darkness of the so 0:13:16.320 --> 0:13:19.640 called Islamic State to secure their liberty, autonomy, and equality 0:13:20.040 --> 0:13:22.840 that I wanted to visit, but first they had to 0:13:22.840 --> 0:13:25.560 persuade it. Two intelligence officers who were scrolling my Facebook 0:13:25.600 --> 0:13:27.720 page that they wasn't off to join the Islamic State. 0:13:30.360 --> 0:13:33.080 While I pondered if I had wasted my entire book advance, 0:13:33.640 --> 0:13:36.320 the intelligence agents called for a round of chai, a 0:13:36.360 --> 0:13:39.160 cinnamon of hues black tea served in tulip shaped glass 0:13:39.160 --> 0:13:41.679 with a generous helping of sugar, a drink that seems 0:13:41.679 --> 0:13:43.920 as critical to human existence as oxygen in this part 0:13:43.960 --> 0:13:47.960 of the world. Iraqi, Kurdistan's tea houses served as public 0:13:48.000 --> 0:13:51.360 spaces where, even under the oppressive bath regime of Saddam Hussein, 0:13:51.880 --> 0:13:55.160 Kurds could gather and share their stories. Later, they became 0:13:55.200 --> 0:13:58.359 places where the pesh merger a term that is translated 0:13:58.360 --> 0:14:01.120 as those who faced death, the much revered fighters of 0:14:01.120 --> 0:14:06.160 Iraqi Kurdist Dan could gather, plan and even recruit The 0:14:06.200 --> 0:14:09.040 intelligence opposite at the border was no tea house. It 0:14:09.080 --> 0:14:12.640 didn't even have the requisite domino table, but the intelligence 0:14:12.640 --> 0:14:15.080 officers still shared their stories as we sipped our tea. 0:14:16.360 --> 0:14:19.000 Soon enough, I was looking at polaroid photos that had 0:14:19.000 --> 0:14:22.760 been immortalized through the miracle of social media. One aged's 0:14:22.800 --> 0:14:25.920 uncle was a Peshmerger leader famous for his abilities with 0:14:25.960 --> 0:14:29.800 a rocket propelled grenade. I briefly considered offering the Kermanji 0:14:29.880 --> 0:14:32.240 word for the weapon as you search for the English one. 0:14:32.720 --> 0:14:34.200 I make a habit of learning as much as the 0:14:34.280 --> 0:14:36.440 language as I can before I travel. And I had 0:14:36.480 --> 0:14:39.960 been particularly charmed by the word bigsfing, which Syrian Curds 0:14:40.040 --> 0:14:43.280 used for the rocket propelled grenade. But my grandmother had 0:14:43.280 --> 0:14:46.080 been arrested entering Syria half a century before, and I 0:14:46.160 --> 0:14:48.520 decided that showing too much knowledge of weapons systems would 0:14:48.520 --> 0:14:51.840 be risking the same result. The other agent's grandfather had 0:14:51.840 --> 0:14:55.360 fought for years as a gorilla against Sabbathis, bravely holding 0:14:55.360 --> 0:14:57.200 out when the world had left the Kurds to die 0:14:57.240 --> 0:15:00.880 in and there thousands at that time, the agent said 0:15:00.880 --> 0:15:03.119 to me as he leaned across the sofa, to emphasize 0:15:03.120 --> 0:15:07.400 the point, our only friends with the mountains these days. 0:15:07.440 --> 0:15:10.359 The more state is conception of Kurdish identity that's predominant 0:15:10.400 --> 0:15:13.400 in the Kurdish automenous for region of Iraq has descended 0:15:13.400 --> 0:15:16.120 from the mountains and resides in the giant villas and 0:15:16.160 --> 0:15:19.360 skyscrapers of fuel the region's capital, which is called a 0:15:19.440 --> 0:15:23.440 Bill in Arabic. The government and its friends have built 0:15:23.480 --> 0:15:26.040 skyscrapers in the city with corporate logos that light up 0:15:26.040 --> 0:15:27.920 the sky at night, just like the drone bonds that 0:15:28.080 --> 0:15:31.400 up the sky and Rashava. However, the mountains of southern 0:15:31.440 --> 0:15:33.840 Turkey and north in Iraq have remained home to the 0:15:33.880 --> 0:15:37.080 Curdisdown Workers' Party, better known by its initials in Kurdish 0:15:37.240 --> 0:15:43.000 the PKK or Partier Karakeren Kurda Dastani for decades. In 0:15:43.080 --> 0:15:46.080 nineteen eighty four, the group began insurgency against the Turkish 0:15:46.080 --> 0:15:50.320 state in an attempt to establish their own However, over time, 0:15:50.480 --> 0:15:53.440 the group and its leader, Abdullah Shin have moved beyond 0:15:53.440 --> 0:15:56.000 the state based conception of ESTRA and instead have an 0:15:56.000 --> 0:16:01.080 embraced in ideology of radical feminism, environmentalism they called democratic 0:16:01.120 --> 0:16:05.200 and federalism. It was this ideology that had board about 0:16:05.200 --> 0:16:08.080 the revolution and eventually the self administration of a huge 0:16:08.120 --> 0:16:11.320 chunk of Syria. This way of thinking had come down 0:16:11.360 --> 0:16:14.560 from the mountains, swept across the plains and defeated the 0:16:14.600 --> 0:16:18.440 Islamic state. Now having gained so much, it was being 0:16:18.480 --> 0:16:21.520 bombed so heavily that its future was in down, and 0:16:21.560 --> 0:16:24.480 I wanted to see the only multi ethnic democratic project 0:16:24.520 --> 0:16:27.160 in the Middle East before its adherents had to retreat 0:16:27.240 --> 0:16:29.440 to the jagged peaks that I could see through a dusty 0:16:29.480 --> 0:16:35.040 afternoon Offeshka War. Eventually, after a prolonged conversation about the 0:16:35.040 --> 0:16:37.520 care and breeding of sheep, including questions from the agent's 0:16:37.600 --> 0:16:41.040 family members who are now attending my interrogation remotely via WhatsApp, 0:16:41.600 --> 0:16:44.160 I was allowed to cross into a shava. Growing up 0:16:44.160 --> 0:16:46.600 with livestock didn't seem abnormal or that useful to me 0:16:46.640 --> 0:16:49.160 as a child, but I've been pleasantly surprised with its 0:16:49.160 --> 0:16:53.880 ability to open doors in the most unlikely places. My 0:16:54.000 --> 0:16:57.240 interview completed, I began a circuit of small offices where 0:16:57.240 --> 0:16:59.480 people would stare at me for a few seconds, look 0:16:59.520 --> 0:17:02.480 at my past, read something down, and then send me 0:17:02.520 --> 0:17:04.800 forth to another official who would do exactly the same thing. 0:17:06.040 --> 0:17:08.400 It felt like an unconscious parody of the state's capacity 0:17:08.400 --> 0:17:10.600 to turn every action into an office visit and a 0:17:10.640 --> 0:17:13.840 form to be filled out. Eventually, I was sent to 0:17:13.880 --> 0:17:16.440 a small waiting room and then to a long suffering 0:17:16.480 --> 0:17:18.320 bus that had just dropped a full load of people 0:17:18.320 --> 0:17:21.399 from Rojava on the eastern bank of the Tigris on 0:17:21.440 --> 0:17:24.880 its return journey, I was the only passenger. The driver 0:17:24.960 --> 0:17:27.760 pointed across the river and I nodded. He took a 0:17:27.840 --> 0:17:30.520 huge drawer on a terrible cigarette and set off across 0:17:30.520 --> 0:17:32.879 the shaky bridge that floats on oil drums and spans 0:17:32.880 --> 0:17:37.239 the Tigris. From Rajava, my fixer, her Butt, and her 0:17:37.240 --> 0:17:40.640 brother Deirre greeted me with smiles, and as is often 0:17:40.680 --> 0:17:44.320 the case, I remark about my height. We showed my 0:17:44.359 --> 0:17:46.840 passport to an official who smiled and addressed me in 0:17:46.840 --> 0:17:48.919 English to welcome you to Rajava and sent me to 0:17:48.920 --> 0:17:51.119 the immigration office, where I'd be given a sort of 0:17:51.119 --> 0:17:53.879 permission slip that allowed me to travel freely throughout the region. 0:17:54.680 --> 0:17:56.520 The road of the border officials in Rojava, it's not 0:17:56.560 --> 0:17:58.480 so much to check for visas and the payment of 0:17:58.520 --> 0:18:01.720 import taxes as sure that those entering are not a 0:18:01.760 --> 0:18:04.080 threat to the community, in a manner not so different 0:18:04.160 --> 0:18:07.400 to Cattle, an anarchist militiamen who sees border checkpoints between 0:18:07.440 --> 0:18:10.880 Spain and France. In nineteen thirty six, the Ajavre officials 0:18:10.920 --> 0:18:13.639 permission slip also asked other group in the areas to 0:18:13.640 --> 0:18:15.879 accept their assessment that I was safe and should be 0:18:15.920 --> 0:18:18.719 treated as a guest because I was entering a country 0:18:18.800 --> 0:18:21.840 that is not recognized by other countries. Nobody stamped my 0:18:21.840 --> 0:18:25.960 passport after offering me a cigarette. The man across a 0:18:26.000 --> 0:18:28.640 death from me politely answered my questions about the half 0:18:28.760 --> 0:18:32.920 dozen yellow and green frame portraits and laminated little cards 0:18:33.000 --> 0:18:35.960 hanging from a tree in his office. All friends, he 0:18:36.000 --> 0:18:41.160 told me, All Shahed, Shahed, I soon learn means martyr. 0:18:42.000 --> 0:18:43.880 You can't come to a Java and not learn that word. 0:18:44.840 --> 0:18:47.639 Fifteen thousand people, some of whom had come down for 0:18:47.720 --> 0:18:50.440 the mountains in twenty eleven to join a Syrian revolution 0:18:51.280 --> 0:18:53.639 or in twenty fourteen to take on the task of 0:18:53.680 --> 0:18:55.920 riding the world of the Islamic State, had lost their 0:18:55.920 --> 0:18:59.760 lives in the process. Camislo the capital of the AA, 0:18:59.760 --> 0:19:04.600 and e Yes Shahidah everywhere. Their portraits yellow back for 0:19:04.680 --> 0:19:07.560 men and green back for women, smile at you from 0:19:07.560 --> 0:19:11.560 billboards on every roundabout, reminding you that many of the 0:19:11.600 --> 0:19:13.919 people who died to rid the world of the Islamic 0:19:14.000 --> 0:19:15.840 State would be too young to get a drink in 0:19:15.880 --> 0:19:19.320 a bar in the United States, lined up in neat 0:19:19.320 --> 0:19:22.840 little rows in the March's grave lad in Commissieu. They 0:19:22.880 --> 0:19:24.520 remind you that there is no such thing as a 0:19:24.560 --> 0:19:28.200 surgical strike, and the grandmothers and children of the region 0:19:28.240 --> 0:19:30.239 paid with their lives for the crime of living near 0:19:30.280 --> 0:19:32.439 a power plant or being in the street at the 0:19:32.440 --> 0:19:34.560 same time as a recognizable military leader. 0:19:35.600 --> 0:19:41.200 Well, James, there they have something that's everywhere, but here 0:19:41.200 --> 0:19:43.120 in the West we have capitalism. 0:19:43.440 --> 0:19:45.040 We put different shit on billboards. 0:19:45.080 --> 0:19:48.800 There's a different thing that comes that you can see everywhere, everywhere, everywhere, 0:19:49.280 --> 0:20:00.879 and that is advertisements. 0:20:02.680 --> 0:20:09.159 And we're back. I spent the next few days in 0:20:09.359 --> 0:20:13.280 Jabe hearing martyr's stories from their friends. I met leaders 0:20:13.320 --> 0:20:15.600 in places where they thought they might be safe from bombing, 0:20:16.400 --> 0:20:18.080 and then nervously waited to hear if they made at 0:20:18.119 --> 0:20:21.080 home safely. I sat in my hotel at night, wondering 0:20:21.080 --> 0:20:23.520 if the bangs and flashes were bombs in the distance 0:20:23.920 --> 0:20:26.720 or street lights blowing their bulbs. I got up every 0:20:26.720 --> 0:20:29.520 morning with the fighter of prayer, reminding us all that 0:20:29.560 --> 0:20:32.080 we'd made through another night and now had to start 0:20:32.119 --> 0:20:35.040 another day that would inevitably begin with news of the 0:20:35.080 --> 0:20:38.560 people we were not waking up this morning. Every morning 0:20:38.720 --> 0:20:42.159 before Herbarton arrived. I'd walked through the market, ducking down 0:20:42.200 --> 0:20:44.479 the canopies that were too low for my head. As 0:20:44.520 --> 0:20:47.720 if I needed a reminder I wasn't from here. But 0:20:47.800 --> 0:20:50.000 despite standing out like a man with two heads, I 0:20:50.000 --> 0:20:53.840 felt welcome by everyone. Every morning, I shared cups of 0:20:53.880 --> 0:20:56.960 tea and stories with strangers, and faced to pot quiz 0:20:57.000 --> 0:20:59.600 from merchants who seemed to have taken on the in 0:20:59.800 --> 0:21:03.159 s a morble burden of improving my comandji Kurdish via 0:21:03.200 --> 0:21:06.639 a pedagogical medium of pointing at vegetables and shouting their names. 0:21:07.560 --> 0:21:09.760