Criticism
Critics of anarchism cite the Catechism as the most notorious document in what they take to be the anarchist tradition, arguing that it reflects the innately violent and nihilistic nature of the philosophy. Scholar Michael Allen Gillespie has hailed the Catechism as "a pre-eminent expression of the doctrine of freedom and negation" that arose in the Fichtean notion of the "Absolute I" that had been concealed in Left Hegelianism. Prominent Black Panther of the 20th century Eldridge Cleaver adopted the Catechism as a "revolutionary bible", incorporating it into his daily life to the extent that he employed, in his words, "tactics of ruthlessness in my dealings with everyone with whom I came into contact". The ideas and sentiments in the work had been in part previously aired by Zaichnevsky and Nikolai Ishutin in Russia, and by Carbonari and Young Italy in the West.
The journal "Cahiers du monde russe et soviétique" published a letter from Bakinin to Nechaev, in which Bakinin particularly wrote:
| “ | Your remember how you were angry with me, when I called you abrek and called your Catechism the Catechism of abreks. | ” |
Read more about this topic: Catechism Of A Revolutionary
Famous quotes containing the word criticism:
“It is ... pathetic to observe the complete lack of imagination on the part of certain employers and men and women of the upper-income levels, equally devoid of experience, equally glib with their criticism ... directed against workers, labor leaders, and other villains and personal devils who are the objects of their dart-throwing. Who doesn’t know the wealthy woman who fulminates against the “idle” workers who just won’t get out and hunt jobs?”
—Mary Barnett Gilson (1877–?)
“A tailor can adapt to any medium, be it poetry, be it criticism. As a poet, he can mend, and with the scissors of criticism he can divide.”
—Franz Grillparzer (1791–1872)
“Of all the cants which are canted in this canting world—though the cant of hypocrites may be the worst—the cant of criticism is the most tormenting!”
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)