(written by Terry MacNeil, on September 30 and October 1, 2025)

The first anarchist I am aware of ever meeting – was a political science professor, named J. Frank Harrison. He was a character – but I’ll cover that in another note (to be written in the future). “Political Philosophy” was his expertise – though he almost never said anything about anarchism. There was one time, he said police are unnecessary in society – and cited the fact that during a blackout in Halifax, there was no looting or rioting. When I heard that, I thought to myself “Harrison is INSANE,” and I assume almost all of my classmates agreed with me – but no one dared debate him. Near the end of the academic year, Harrison handed out an essay he had written many years earlier – which he said was his take on anarchism (in a nutshell). However, that essay was not part of the course – and since it was only to be read if you were “interested”, I promptly threw the essay in the trash. Why? In university, I had zero interest in anarchism. Also, I was burnt out from mental illness, schoolwork, drinking, and regularly cutting back on necessary sleep – so reading for pleasure was THE LAST thing I wanted to do. It was MANY years before I would read for pleasure again. And it took me LOTS of practice (usually reading books that I today consider “light reading”) before I could FINALLY read for pleasure again.

After seeing the documentary The Filth and the Fury, and being exposed to (more of) the Sex Pistols’ music – punk rock became my favourite kind of music! And shortly afterwards, on my quest to learn about punk rock (and hopefully become a punk), I bought the Craig O’Hara book The Philosophy of Punk: More Than Noise! From what I remember, that book had a list of shit saying what’s a punk, and what isn’t. So O’Hara says punks are SUPPOSED to be anarchists – and that “Nazi punks” are NOT punks. In retrospect, I consider O’Hara’s definition of “punk” WAY too narrow (the same way many anarchists have WAY too narrow a definition of “anarchism”). I mean, to be a “metalhead” – it seems (to me) all you need is for “heavy metal” to be your fave kind of music. But there’s debate about what it is to be a “punk”. SOME SAY to be a punk, you have to dress certain ways (which I did not want to do). OTHERS SAY to be a punk, you need to be outspoken and always (confrontationally) say WHATEVER is on your mind – which amounted, in my opinion, to being a rude douchebag (which I also did not want to do). For a while, punk rock was my fave kind of music – now it’s only my fave kind of “rock”.

Back when I was Harrison’s student, I became friends with “my anarchist former friend” – a dude with a poster in his dorm that hilariously said “KILL THE COPS” in huge all capitalized font. He was a few years younger than me (he having become an anarchist at what must’ve been a very early age). It would not be until about half a decade later that I myself took an interest in anarchism (and actually became one, after reading a Derrick Jensen article “my anarchist former friend” posted on Facebook). That would’ve been shortly after I had read The Philosophy of Punk, and shortly after reading a collection of anarchist writings “my anarchist former friend” gave me. “My anarchist former friend” had respect for me in our university days, but would later view me with contempt – for various reasons (such as having zero interest in reading, watching too many movies/TV shows, having no ambition, having no work ethic, being unassertive, having bad taste in music, etc). That said, I must give props to “my anarchist former friend” and another former friend of mine – both inspired me to re-discover the joy/value of reading.

Today, I have no anarchist friends – and haven’t for a long time, which is fine.

And to this day, I sure wish I never threw out Harrison’s essay on anarchism. Ⓐ