Green Anarchy, #25 P58-61, 2008.
This piece was published in the final issue of Green Anarchy, a magazine that ran from 2000 to 2008, starting as an environmentalist anarchist publication and slowly evolving under new editorship into an anti-civilization anarchist magazine from the 5th issue onwards. It came out two years before Russel “Maroon” Shoatz’s famous article on the Maroons and since this magazine was given to prisoners perhaps it was an influence, but we’ll never know for sure.
The magazine is avalible as a OCR’d PDF here
Maroons: Guardians of the flag of liberation
Wage Slavery
Wage-based economic systems are nothing short of slavery. The plantations have been replaced largely by the industrial-urban centers. Strip-malls and service jobs. Modern techno-industrial society, or the misleading label “post” industrial, is only the most recent manifestation of mass production with gadgets, widgets, and information replacing sugarcane and cotton as the commodity of choice. The master’s bullwhip has been perfectly replaced by the instrument of law. The use of violence, or more overtly the threat of use, keeps the wage-slaves in check thereby transforming spontaneous, creative individuals into diligent worker-bees. The owner’s brand has been replaced by the name brand: the corporate logo. However instead of holding a child down to sear a glowing iron into her shoulder to symbolize ownership, they are chained to assembly lines forcing them to sew on designer labels for 13 hours a day. “The Nike Swoosh is nothing more than a whip in mid-swing.”
One is compelled to work because s/he knows that if s/he doesn’t they will be forcefully removed from their home. They will be unable to buy groceries. And yet those that cringe at the mention of plantation-slavery, no doubt thinking it some relic of a bygone era and not a reality in present-day society, are on their knees, hands outstretched begging to accept the conditions of wage-slavery. But not every slave ran into the burning house to save their master; some ran away, others added fuel. What exactly happened to those who ran away? His-story does not tell us, because in doing so, it would be forced to admit it’s illegitimateness: That while some accepted the terms, others refused. That many resisted and had to be crushed. That civilization is not the natural climax of human evolution it proudly proclaims itself to be. It would be forced to confess it’s biggest fear: That all civilizations fall. Out of fear some slaves voluntarily elected to stay on the plantations. Believing the few scraps thrown at their feet sufficient enough to ‘survive.’ Positing that being given a discarded ceramic plate by the slave-owner demonstrated an actual improvement of their condition.
Believing that purchasing a luxury SUV confirms an actual improvement of their condition. But by accepting either the dish or the SUV, the slave accepts the circumstances, despite the fact that, in reality, they are contributing to their own demise. Those who stayed on the plantations survived just long enough to work themselves to an early death. Can anyone imagine a group of slaves ever desiring to “collectively-oversee” their own bondage? Why would an individual wish to self-manage the chains of syndicalism’s servitude? Those that did not desire to braid the very rope that was to eventually hang them escaped. Those who ran away survived. They ran into the bushes of Brazil. They ran into the mountains of Venezuela. They ran into the swamps of Carolina. They ran into the forests of Mexico. They ran into the open arms of their Indian brothers and sisters: the natives. Fugitives and Savages. And it was here, among the howling wilderness out of civilization’s reach, that they formed their alliances. Alliances that welcomed all who fought against the colonial megamachine. New tribes were founded. (In America alone, over 200 tri-racial isolate communities existed). New cultures were created. Cultures of resistence.
Injuns, Niggas, and Feral Cattle
The word Maroon is derived from the Spanish Cimarron, which originally referred to domestic cattle that had taken to the hills. Later, it was pejoratively used for Indians who, knowing the terrain better than the Africans, were the earliest to escape. Ultimately, the term became almost exclusively a label for Africans, although Maroon communities consisted of natives, Africans, Europeans, and possibly slaves brought over to the Americas from India and the Middle East among others. Michael Kolhoff gives a brief overview of their connection: …that fugitives would band together for survival isn’t unusual. The runaways would have a common enemy, the colonial governments of the coast and the slave masters of the plantations. The plantation fields of the early colonial period also incorporated a wide diversity of forced labor. There would have been Native Americans of the coastal tribes, kidnaped Africans, Gypsies (who were transported to the “New World” by all the colonial powers), and British and Irish prisoners working out their sentences. It’s not hard to imagine that all the individuals interested in escaping would have been drawn to the Native Americans, who knew the land and had contacts in the wild [Kolhoff]. Describing the historical Maroon in Brazil, Roger Bastide hints at the parallel to our present situation, when he states, “The basic maroon context is the struggle of an exploited group against the ruling class” [Bastide].
Studying the weather patterns and natural cycles of this strange, foreign land, slaves waited weeks, months, even years for the right moment to escape. When they did, they opted to give themselves fully to the wilderness, rather than face another day of enslavement. They abandoned the guarantee of slave quarters, tattered clothes, and measly food choosing the possibility of dying free in the unknown jungle. Will we desert our square apartments, sweatshop denim, and bio-engineered food for even a brief taste of feral freedom? Ethnobotanist Mark Plotkin, who has lived and studied among contemporary descendants of these early Maroons, characterizes the observation a few Slaves undoubtedly made prior to their escape, “Hey, this is Equatorial Rainforest….we’ll see you white boys later!” [Plotkin]. Sometimes the opportunity for slaves to escape arose purely by chance. During the early 16th century the region of Esmeraldas in Ecuador became a Maroon haven by accident when, “Spanish ships carrying slaves from Panama to Guayaquil and Lima were wrecked along the equatorial coast amidst strong currents and shifting sandbars. A number of slave castaways consequently dashed to freedom in the unconquered interior, where they allied with indigenous groups and a handful of Spanish renegades” [Romero].
What opportunity will we take advantage of for our chance to race towards freedom? Slaveships are no longer our carrying vessel, so a shipwreck will present us with little opportunity to be sure. Nevertheless, although ships no longer crash (except when they are transporting oil, then they appear to tip over with alarming frequency), stock markets certainly do. Lines of communication crash. (One of the most effective and certainly one of the easiest forms of resistance among Native Americans was the chopping down of telegraph poles). Information superhighways crash. (12 yr old kids have cost multinational corporations millions of dollars with just a few minutes of hacking). Structures crash. (With a simple shrug of an earthquake entire cities have disappeared). And not just the linear metal and concrete type either, but social structures, too. Networks of importing natural resources crash. (In recent years sporadic blackouts throughout the country have left millions without electricity). Financial institutions crash. Foundations of exploitation crash. Civilizations crash. Who will be the next generation of Maroons when Western Civilization capsizes?
Quilombos: The Original Autonomous Zones
North America
Fighting between colonial powers oftentimes led to a power vacancy that was exploited by the Maroons in order to establish independent, self-sufficient communities. Three regions in North America stand out for both their longevity and their determination: The Great Dismal Swamp (along the North Carolina and Virginia border), The Neutral Strip (a 500 square mile expanse of impenetrable wilderness among the backwaters of Louisiana), and the Florida Everglades (which were interspersed with villages populated [both separately and together] by Native Americans and Africans). The Great Dismal Swamp and the Neutral Strip were both claimed by competing colonial powers but in the absence of permanently stationed imperial authority, were in actuality governed by neither. The Neutral Strip emerged in 1806 when the American and Spanish governments could not agree on the definite borders. When the British arrived to develop North Carolina as a commercial plantation, “…the Maroons retreated to the depths of the Great Dismal Swamp and from their sanctuary waged a 160-year guerilla war against slavery” [Koehnline]. In the years prior to the Civil War the Great Dismal Swamp also, “became a major stop on the underground railroad….No doubt many of the runaway slaves decided to remain in the swamp. During the war the Great Dismal Swamp was an area that the Confederate forces stayed clear of” [Kolhoff]. Similarly, it is reported that amongst the “swamp and canebrakes (of the Neutral Strip) that many who went in uninvited never came out again” [Kolhoff]. Largely due to their astounding inaccessibility, these three regions were immune to colonial, governmental, and state interference and provided inspiration to those who consequently revolted. The relationship between free slaves and plantation slaves continued to induce leading citizens to complain that their, “….slaves are becoming almost uncontrollable. They go and come when and where they please, and if an attempt is made to correct them they immediately fly into the woods and there continue for months and years committing grievous depredations on our cattle, hogs, and sheep” [Price].
So long as there was only the infrequent runaway, the outlaw villages were small, and raiding of plantations was a rarity, the Great Dismal Swamp could be tolerated, albeit grudgingly. When more and more slaves began to taste freedom however, slave rebellions multiplied, threatening the economic progress of the colonial government. The Maroons of the Great Dismal Swamp could no longer be ignored, eventually leading to, “such a prominent figure as George Washington to recommend its draining and conversion to farmland” [Kolhoff]. Fortunately the task proved too much even for the noble father of this great nation. No form of punishment was ever considered too “cruel and unusual” for recaptured slaves. In July, 1837 a Maroon leader named Squire, whose tribe had lasted over three years conducting raids on plantations and killing slave owners, was tragically killed in the swamps. His body was fished out and exhibited in the public square of New Orleans for several days [Price]. Locals in South Carolina took it a step further when, after a Maroon was captured near Pineville, he was subsequently “….decapitated, and his head stuck on a pole and publicly exposed as ‘a warning to vicious slaves’” [Price]. Despite the occasional death and all governmental attempts to eradicate their settlements, the roving Maroons within these swamps continued to survive, the descendants of which are still there today. In North Carolina, breaking their backs working on farms owned by multinational corporations. In rural towns of Virginia eking out a meager existence as day laborers. They are the Melungeons of North Carolina. The Redbones of Louisiana. The Seminoles of Florida. Beautiful blends of African, European, and Indian features, each with a faint trace of revolution still burning in their eye.
South America
Like their counterparts up north, the Maroon communities that endured in South America were the ones that were the most isolated and the most exhausting to reach. In this respect, South America had a definite advantage in the sheer amount of jungle, mountains, and rainforest. Successful Maroon communities learned quickly to turn the harshness of their immediate surroundings to their own advantage for purposes of concealment and defense. Paths leading to villages were carefully disguised, and much use was made of false trails replete with deadly booby traps. In the Guianas, villages set in the swamps were approachable only by an underwater path, with other false paths carefully mined with pointed spikes or leading only to fatal quagmires or quicksand [Price]. The Maroon villages of the Caribbean and South America were referred to variously as Quilombos (free towns), Palenques (slang for the palisades surrounding most Maroon encampments), or Mocambos (a variation of Mu-kambo which means ‘hideout’ in Ambundu). Unquestionably the largest Quilombo was the triumphant village of Palmares, “a federation of Maroon communities whose population was estimated by contemporary sources, variously, to be 11,000, 16,000, 20, 000, and even 30,000 people” [Reis].
The saga of Palmares are still celebrated today in song and folklore. In addition to Brazil, other countries including Peru, Colombia, Suriname, Venezuela, French Guiana can boast a strong tradition of Maroon havens. In Bolivia “communities of Tupinamba Indians and escaped slaves…existed in Jaguaripe for over forty years” [Schwartz]. In Colombia the community of Sombrerillo numbered over 200 inhabitants including Maroons, free blacks, whites, Mulattos, and Zambos (Afro-Indians) [Romero]. Unlike their fugitive brothers and sisters in North America, who were subject to a full onslaught of Empire demanding acculturation and assimilation, a large number of Central and South American slaves were able to survive thanks to the same challenging terrain that helped them escape. Today along the Amazon remains several villages which originated as Quilombos, whose “inhabitants managed for generations to pass on the secrets of the rivers and jungle, from which they had been collecting fish, wood, wild fruits, medicinal leaves, and so on” [Reis]. Tragically as the rainforest around them disappears, these tri-racial communities are being systematically exposed and re-colonized. Individuals whose ancestors were bought and sold in the market are finding their own lives bought and sold in the free market. They are also finding new battles to fight: cultural survival, globalization, genocide. They are discovering that they are viewed as pawns in the game played between both leftist and rightist governments where the grand prize is their natural resources. The sugar plantation owner is reincarnated in the CEO. The master’s house is re-established in the hydro-electric dams. Likewise the fierce fighting spirit of their ancestors is being rediscovered, as well. In the late 80’s, when the great-grand-children of slaves were clashing against the government of Suriname, medicine bundles from Africa that had lain buried for 200 years were unearthed and carried into battle [Price].
Slave Rebellions: The Earliest Resistance to Globalization
America. In honor of Amerigo Vespucci, who, upon arriving in South Carolina in 1497, began routine enslavement of the Native Americans to transport back to Spain. Ultimately this was abandoned, “for they chose to die rather than work as slaves” [Sivad]. What is it that causes a person to make that decision? What is it that urges one to fight for absolute freedom; especially when outnumbered and up against superior firepower (advanced technology) and against a mentality that manifests it’s destiny via domestication, enslavement, oppression, rape, and unmatched brutality? Could it be generations of communal, egalitarian upbringings immersed in unadulterated wildness that compelled Indian mothers to suffocate their own newborns rather than have them grow up in bondage? [Sivad] Indians, Africans, and poor whites that did manage to escape returned to help free others. Fugitives, in collaboration with plantation slaves and freed slaves working in urban centers, constantly organized revolts and uprisings throughout history. While acknowledging that slave rebellions “were contemporaneous with the beginning of the slave trade”, Richard Price traces back the first major insurrection to December 26, 1522 in Santo Domingo [Price]. It is perfectly reasonable to assume that tens of thousands of years earlier, the first attempts made by an individual to exercise authority over other tribal members was met with the same fierce opposition. Maroons engaged in various forms of resistance ranging from property damage: -In 1692 a group of runaway slaves began to plunder farmlands near the town of Camamu. When their Mocambo finally fell their battle cry was, “Death to the whites and long live liberty” [Price]
to direct action:
– In 1876, in the village of Viana runaways came down from a Quilombo and occupied several nearby, demanding the end of slavery [Reis]
to insurgency:
-In the forests and hills on the outskirts of Salvador, the region of Bahia “hid numerous small Quilombos that served as temporary respite for the large urban slave population, which from time to time became involved in slave conspiracies and insurrections.” [Reis]
Interestingly enough, there exists no evidence that slaves ever achieved freedom through signing a petition, participating in letter-writing campaigns, or holding candlelight vigils. Perhaps these illiterate, unlearned savages were wise enough to see the futility of it all. They fully understood the context of their bondage. It was not a condition that could be eradicated through reform. Nothing short of insurrection would suffice.
“One of the most violent of the uprisings occurred in Tado in 1728. The rebels, made up mostly of African-born slaves, but also some Creoles, killed 14 white mine owners and administrators before retreating into the forest. Two of the principal leaders, remained at large…seeking refuge in neighboring free communities” [Romero]. In North America the Seminole were an out-standing Maroon force, due to geographic and political reasons, and were a major impediment on the colonial governments march toward global imperialism. Troop after troop of U.S. soldiers were defeated amidst the swamps and waterways of the Everglades. On September 11, 1812, a train carrying troops under the command of Captain Williams thrust deep into the region known as Florida. Williams was headed to support Colonel Smith whose own battalion was taking a beating. Along the route Seminole sprang forth from bushes, trees, and undergrowth charging the iron beast that stole upon their land, tearing through their mothers’ flesh and belching blackened clouds of slow death into their father’s skies. Inside the belly of this iron beast sat dozens of colonial soldiers, pale and deranged, determined to kill every Seminole brother, rape every sister, burn every village, steal every item, and finally to kidnap every last child (the ones not killed for sport that is) and convert them to the dignified ways of Christianity. The Seminoles had seen these actions before firsthand; indeed it was this psychotic civilized mentality that had originally pushed the Creeks into Florida, passing rows of plantations along the way. They were forced into a corner and, listening to instinct and not pleas for “moral purity,” they lashed out. The train was attacked and routed. A number of invading soldiers perished at the spear point, including Captain Williams himself [Price].
Cultures of Resistance
Over several decades of creating free societies, the Maroon community became an amalgamation of African, European, and Native American cultures. These new cultures, birthed amidst a continuous outlaw environment, became suffused with varying characteristics and traits of fugitive lifestyle. Rebellion and resistence defined every aspect of their life. This tradition continues to the present Maroons in Jamaica today, notes Kenneth Bibly, continue to possess their own religious beliefs, pharmacopeia, oral historical traditions, music, dance, esoteric languages, and other distinct forms of expressive cultures [Bibly].
Perhaps the best description of what characterizes their defiant culture, in this case the Maroon communities throughout the PacificLowlands, is that their music, religion, poetry, etc. “reflects not a shared sense of past or present subjugation, but rather of past and present autonomy” [Romero]. Immediately following a slaveships arrival,the cargo was quickly divided and separated so as to more effectively exercise control over them. Subjected to such an atrocity as enslavement, a transatlantic voyage covered in urine, feces and vomit, all so one could see their family members dragged away screaming, individuals attempted every method to try to maintain some stable social coherence. Fictitious kinship ties and their associated rituals provided one means of making sense of the world, or at least maintaining spiritual well-being, despite the omnipresence of slavery [Romero].
The extension of family links between both plantation-based and free slaves also served the purpose of solidifying unity “so tight that slaveowners could never break it”[Romero]. These newly-formed ties strengthened the fabric of relationship passed on generation after generation. If our children are to survive in a post-collapse world, egalitarian tribes based upon invented kinship ties need to be established. Then our children can look back upon us as the Maroons of the 1960’s looked upon theirmforebears and, “felt tremendous pride in the accomplishments of their heroic ancestors and, on the whole, remained masters of the forest” [Price]. In Alagoas, Brazil rural poor blacks still celebrate the indomitable Maroon fortress Palmares in folklore through poetry and songs:
Enjoy yourself, Negro
The white man doesn’t come here
And if he does
The devil will carry him off
[Bastide]
Solidarity extended beyond racial and ethnic boundaries to include class-based perspectives of insurgence. During the Balaiada Revolt, slaves joined forces with Brazilian peasants“against an oppressive and economic order” of both state and national governments, and were aided by bandits and political dissidents [Schwartz]. Maroon historian Mario Diego Romero divulges an effective argument for analyzing Maroon cultures to further advance ideas for a post-collapse community when he states that the Maroon forms of social organizations, “though sometimes dismissed as chaotic – constitute peaceful enclaves of mutual respect. Certainly they could serve as models for other societies” [Romero].
Allies
The temporary coalitions of oppressed (African/Native/European) were invaluable for the magnitude of armed struggle undertaken and resultant degree of liberation achieved. Equally crucial was the collaboration with the fortunate, privileged individuals within civilized society. Citizens aiding and abetting ex-slaves via food, clothing, or ammunition. They are the towns folk covertly supplying weapons. The merchants secretly re-supplying caches. They are the villagers providing underground shelter. They are the Culture traitors. Near Dover, North Carolina a citizens militia searching for runaways came across a child playing in the woods who confessed that his mother provided food rations for half a dozen runaways daily. After investigating the womyn’s house the militia found additional stores of meat, as well as arms and ammunition for the Maroon insurrectionists [Price]. Also in North Carolina, a 1864 newspaper article mentions the fact that, “white deserters from the Confederate Army were fighting shoulder to shoulder with the self-emancipated Negroes” [Price]. Worth noting here is the story of a particular Ex-Confederate soldier who married a descendant of the Yanga people (the “Black Mexicans”) whose ancestors were rebel slaves that established a Maroon community in Veracruz on the Gulf Coast in 1609. After receiving one too many death threats based on their interracial union, Lucy and Albert Parsons moved to Chicago where they became prominent anarchist organizers. Unquestionably there were thousands of instances where individual residents assisted escapees; clearly there existed entire villages that supported fugitives.
These “free towns” or autonomous zones were built alongside governed ones “with the express purpose of assaulting their structures of domination” [Romero]. During the 18th century in the upper Patia Valley a “Maroon aid society” developed, acting as a passageway to freedom among the Andean mountains. Through associations such as this, it was capable of protecting and absorbing slaves escaping both highland haciendas and lowland mines whose descendants are still found there today practicing small-scale agriculture [Romero]. In his account of the Maroons from the Great Dismal Swamp, James Koehnline ventures to say that, “perhaps, four hundred years ago, these Maroons of four continents held a big pow-wow, dedicating themselves to fight against slavery even then” [Koehnline]. It’s time for another pow-wow; this time dedicated to attacking not just (wage) slavery,but the very source of alienation, domestication, and domination.
Conclusion
In a society where the very air we breathe is polluted, the water we drink is poisoned, and the soil we dig is contaminated there can be few options other than to escape to outside of the ever-expanding suicidal techno-industrial apparatus, and since it must “expand or die” any life forged on the periphery must be nomadic. When our existence is threatened by the very system that is designed to protect us our only hope lies in a life outside that system. Physically, spiritually, and mentally. And as the indigenous populations dealt with the encroachment of the techno-industrial empire of standardization by an organic ebbing and flowing tactic that embraced African slaves and lower class Europeans into a unified fight, they have left us a legacy of resistance. We can honor that legacy by continuing and expanding their struggle. Both inside and outside of civilization.
Bibliography
Bastide, Roger “The Other Quilombos”
Bibly, Kenneth M. “Maroon Autonomy in Jamaica” Cultural Survival Quarterly. Winter 2002
Koenline, James “Legend of the Great Dismal Maroons: Swamp Rats of the World Unite! A Secret History of ‘The Other America’”
Kolhoff, Michael “Fugitive Nation”. Anarchy: A Journal of Desire Armed. Fall/Winter 2001-2002 Plotkin, Mark “Tales of a Shamans Apprentice”. Bullfrog Video.
Price, Richard (ed.) “Maroon Societies: Rebel Slave Communities in the Americas”
Price, Richard and Sally Price “Maroons Under Assault in Suriname and french Guiana”
Reis, Joao Jose and Flavio dos Santos Gomes “Quilombo: Brazilian Maroons During Slavery”
Romero, Mario Diego and Kris Lane “Miners & Maroons: Freedom on the Pacific Coast of Colombia and Ecuador”
Sakolsky, Ron and James Koehnline (ed.) “Gone to Croatan: Origins of North American Dropout Culture”
Schwartz, Stuart B. “The Mocambo: Slave Resistance in Colonial Bahia”
Sivad, Doug “African Seminoles”
Further Reading
Maroon Societies – Richard Price
Runaway Slaves – John Hope Franklin
Hidden Americans: Maroons of Virginia and Carolina – Hugo Leaming Prosper
Breaking the Chains – William Loren Katz
Africans and Native Americans: The Language of Race and the Evolution of Red-Black Peoples – Jack Forbes
The Mother of Us All: A History of Queen Nanny, Leader of the Windward,Jamaican Maroons – Karla Gottlieb
Audio/Video
Tales of a Shaman’s Apprentice (Bullfrog Films)
Black Indians: An American Story (Rich-Heape Films)
Quilombo (New Yorker Films)
Drums of Defiance: Maroon Music from the Earliest Free Black Communities of Jamaica (Smithsonian/Folkways)
