Man’s Liberation – Marcus Graham (1925)

From ‘The Road to Freedom, A Periodical of Anarchist Thought, Work, and Literature,’ May 1925, Stelton, New Jersey, edited by Hippolyte Havel

By Sh. Marcus [AKA Marcus Graham]

Transformed from the ape, Man still resembles his image.

Encircled by Nature and amidst its wilderness, Man began his life.

Gradual rebellion against Nature betook Man.

Man created for himself gods of tinsel and clay. To them he worshipped and brought sacrifices, even sacrifices of human blood.

This was followed by Man’s changing of the deadly gods into the human ones. For these newly created gods Man continued to offer sacrifices. The sacrifices became heavier and more horrifying. They brought upon Man wars in which the gods who failed to perform miracles as well as thousands of men lost their lives.

Centuries pass and Man casts overboard all the earthly gods. Man now begins to worship a god that cannot be seen nor heard. And, for the sake of this non-approachable god, Man has and is bringing such Sacrifices that far exceed any of those that were ever offered to all the previous created gods.

Divided into scores of religious denominations, Man murders Man under the very blessings of this or that particular religious creed — yet — all praying to the very same singular “heavenly” god for each others quick annihilation.

Such is the spiritual (?) progress that Man has made.

* * *

In the sphere of sexual relations Man has attained quite as much progress as in the spiritual one.

Passing the various stages of development in the stages of family evolution, Man has reached the stage that is known as the monogamist one.

To protect this monogamy state Man introduced marriage. The sanctifying process of a priest or rabbi, coupled by the seal of a government official completes the procedure.

To this fetish god of marriage Man is paying untold of sacrifices. Compared with those that Man pays for the god fetish, they leave one gasp in amazement and horror.

Determined first and foremost by the economic disarrangement of Man’s life, marriage has sunk down to a mere commodity to be purchased, bartered, sold, exchanged and preferred according to one or the other party’s means of income.

As a consequence of such a deplorable state of affairs marriage as it is being practiced by Man is nothing less than a mockery and slur upon love.

Love as is sung by the poets and dreamed of by Man has been drowned by the institution of marriage.

In its natural form, love ought to be beautiful, grand and free. Such it can only become when it is and remains the sole concern of two singular individuals. As long as two such individuals find mutual interests in and with each other love can last. Whenever these interests begin to cease in one or the other, love’s dead has set in.

In attempting to prevent the unevitable Man created marriage, the innumerable divorces and illicit love affairs bespeak of Man’s utter failure in this direction.

* * *

The most significant of all the three phases in Man’s evolution is along the economic line. It is here where one finds interwoven many factors.

When Man evolved out of the ape, he found shelter and food amidst the wilderness. Man could and did subsist then chiefly on fruits and nuts. Little was also known then of diseases.

A few thousand years of “progress” and “civilization” finds Man having cast off completely all the natural foods, using them only as luxuries. Instead, Man has substituted artificial foods.

The machine that keeps the human body of Man moving was badly effected by this change. As a result, it brought Man numerous ravaging diseases. The once natural fed, and therefore healthy stomach broke down. It is only kept up by a struggling attempt to subsist on artificial harmful drugs. And, the life of Man was thus shortened.

Closely related with the food of Man is property, or rather private property. For the sake of this monster Man kills Fellowman. Man lies to Man. Man turns hypocrite to Friend. Man becomes the enemy of Man.

Following the start of plundering other people’s toil, Man created Governments. The government legalized the plunder as private property. It brought into existence and sanctified the monetary exchange of money. It builded jails for the transgressors and doubters. It started wars for and at the behest of the plunderers in search for new markets or for the destruction of rival competitors.

The governments — Man’s own creation — have murdered legally in wars as well as in peace times millions and millions of Men. It imprisoned tens of millions, destroying their characters, assassinating their hopes and desires and obliterating their dreams and wishes.

Government thus became the Killer, Jailer and Restrainer of Man.

In order to obtain the unnatural and useless luxuries of life and upkeep to the government institutions, Man created industries, harbored in immense factories.

Day in and day out, for a whole life time, awakening before sunrise, rushing and crashing through trains and subways, elevators and trolleys, steamboats and automobiles into the jail factories devoid of air and sunlight!

Man created machines. Machines that were to lessen Man’s need to toil. But, alas! The machine has increased the wealth of the few idlers and brought misery, unemployment and old age to the many.

What is far worse, the machine destroyed Man’s joy of artisan creation. Man merely became a minute spook of the very machine that he himself has created.

The machine age of industrial civilization didn’t help to liberate Man. On the contrary, it succeeded to enslave him.

The dwelling places of Man as the place where he prostitutes his mind and brow only resemble the form of structure of ordinary jail houses.

Such is in a very brief form Man’s attainments since his evolution from the ape until this very day.

* * *

What about Nature in comparison with Man?

Nature prefers to remain natural.

Nature frowns upon tinsel earthly or heavenly gods. It refuses to create such. It has no need for any kind of a god.

It is its own god within itself.

* * *

As to monogamous life, Nature is very little concerned with. Its healthy and joyful union is chiefly based upon (according to the knowledge of the scientist) mutual attraction of opposites. This attraction is voluntary, that is free. Wherever interfered with by Man, its natureliness and beauty is crippled and destroyed.

For its voluntary unions, Nature didn’t find any use for priests, rabbis or government officials.

Nature lives and procreates natural as the word Nature actually implies.

* * *

Compared to Man on the economic field, Nature stands far, far indeed above.

Nature subsists on natural foods: soil, rain and sunshine.

Nature didn’t create any governments to cage and strangle its freedom.

Nature has not created such a monster as property. It gives forth its fruits free to all alike.

Nature has very little use for all the machinery that Man’s industrial age has created. Neither has it any use for the toiling and dwelling jails in which Man passes away his life.

Instead, Nature preferred to remain in the open-wide and free.

Nature has not prostituted itself as Man did.

Compared with Man — Nature is happy, contented, full in health and free, as Nature to remain Nature must ever be.

Man on the contrary, by running away from Nature has lost happiness, contentment, health and freedom.

Man in the process of what is termed civilization has succeeded to cage himself by his own self-created Frankenstein — the machine age.

* * *

Today, at the approach of another May down upon us, these thoughts crop up again and again in one’s mind.

Let Man only stop to view and attempt to comprehend the inner workings of Nature, and the secret of Liberation that brings true joy will be revealed to him.

Let Man only compare his unnatural life to the natural one of Nature and the question will as of itself come forth: has not the hour, for Man’s awakening arrived at last?

And, behold! When Man begins to place before himself this question —- the resounding gladdening answer in terms of deeds will assert itself and become visible to all; Man will cast overboard his own worthless created gods and institutions that have destroyed or bound him. Likewise Man will joyfully crush to dust the monster-machine age that has destroyed his initiative and made of him a voluntary slave.

Bold and courageous Man will march back to the bossom of Nature and alongside with it begin the natural worthy life which is the only one that can and will ultimately bring true freedom and happiness to all the children of Mother Earth.