The Match
Encyclopedia
Arizona
Arizona ; is a state located in the southwestern region of the United States. It is also part of the western United States and the mountain west. The capital and largest city is Phoenix...
, United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
since 1969. The Match! is edited, published, and printed by Fred Woodworth
Fred Woodworth
Fred Woodworth is an anarchist and atheist writer based in the United States. He is an anarchist without adjectives, saying: "I have no prefix or adjective for my anarchism. I think syndicalism can work, as can free-market anarcho-capitalism, anarcho-communism, even anarcho-hermits, depending on...
. The philosophy
Philosophy
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
of the journal is ethical anarchism
Ethical anarchism
Ethical anarchism can refer to*a position in postmodern philosophy*the philosophical position of Fred Woodworth and his publication The Match!...
, which is elucidated on the back of the journal.
The Match! is published irregularly; new issues usually appear once or twice per year. Over 100 issues have been published to date.
Ideology
The Match! espouses a generally individualist anarchist form of anarchism. In addition the magazine also espouses atheismAtheism
Atheism is, in a broad sense, the rejection of belief in the existence of deities. In a narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there are no deities...
, opposition to surveillance
Surveillance
Surveillance is the monitoring of the behavior, activities, or other changing information, usually of people. It is sometimes done in a surreptitious manner...
technologies which may be seen as posing a threat to privacy
Privacy
Privacy is the ability of an individual or group to seclude themselves or information about themselves and thereby reveal themselves selectively...
, and opposition to computers. For this reason, Woodworth prints and publishes The Match! entirely without the use of digital technology, and neither has nor desires a web site.
Critical stances
The Match! is critical of some anarchists such as Noam ChomskyNoam Chomsky
Avram Noam Chomsky is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, and activist. He is an Institute Professor and Professor in the Department of Linguistics & Philosophy at MIT, where he has worked for over 50 years. Chomsky has been described as the "father of modern linguistics" and...
's support for social democracy
Social democracy
Social democracy is a political ideology of the center-left on the political spectrum. Social democracy is officially a form of evolutionary reformist socialism. It supports class collaboration as the course to achieve socialism...
, for what the editor sees as compromises with statism
Statism
Statism is a term usually describing a political philosophy, whether of the right or the left, that emphasises the role of the state in politics or supports the use of the state to achieve economic, military or social goals...
. In particular, the magazine is critical of religion
Religion
Religion is a collection of cultural systems, belief systems, and worldviews that establishes symbols that relate humanity to spirituality and, sometimes, to moral values. Many religions have narratives, symbols, traditions and sacred histories that are intended to give meaning to life or to...
or supernatural beliefs of any kind. The publication also criticizes writers such as Bob Black
Bob Black
Bob Black is an American anarchist. He is the author of The Abolition of Work and Other Essays, Beneath the Underground, Friendly Fire, Anarchy After Leftism, and numerous political essays.-Writing:Some of his work from the early 1980s includes...
, Tad Kepley, Feral Faun
Wolfi Landstreicher
Wolfi Landstreicher is the former nom de plume of a contemporary anarchist philosopher involved in theoretical and practical activity...
and organizations such as CrimethInc.
CrimethInc.
CrimethInc., also known as CWC , is a decentralized anarchist collective of autonomous cells. CrimethInc. emerged in the mid-1990s, initially as the hardcore zine Inside Front, and began operating as a collective in 1996...
, Killing King Abacus, and Venomous Butterfly Publications. Woodworth criticises as unethical their support and justification of theft
Theft
In common usage, theft is the illegal taking of another person's property without that person's permission or consent. The word is also used as an informal shorthand term for some crimes against property, such as burglary, embezzlement, larceny, looting, robbery, shoplifting and fraud...
(shoplifting
Shoplifting
Shoplifting is theft of goods from a retail establishment. It is one of the most common property crimes dealt with by police and courts....
and plagiarism
Plagiarism
Plagiarism is defined in dictionaries as the "wrongful appropriation," "close imitation," or "purloining and publication" of another author's "language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions," and the representation of them as one's own original work, but the notion remains problematic with nebulous...
) and revolutionary violence
Violence
Violence is the use of physical force to apply a state to others contrary to their wishes. violence, while often a stand-alone issue, is often the culmination of other kinds of conflict, e.g...
under the rationales of illegalism
Illegalism
Illegalism is an anarchist philosophy that developed primarily in France, Italy, Belgium, and Switzerland during the early 1900s as an outgrowth of individualist anarchism...
and insurrectionism
Insurrectionary anarchism
Insurrectionary anarchism is a revolutionary theory, practice and tendency within the anarchist movement which emphasizes the theme of insurrection within anarchist practice. It is critical of formal organizations such as labor unions and federations that are based on a political programme and...
.
Technical information
Woodworth uses "cold type" composing machines from the mid-20th century such as the VariTyper and JustoWriter to typeset copy for The Match!. He then makes pasteups of each page and shoots them with a home-built copy camera to make negatives. The negatives are then used to make offset printingOffset printing
Offset printing is a commonly used printing technique in which the inked image is transferred from a plate to a rubber blanket, then to the printing surface...
plates using direct solar energy by exposing them to the sun. The plates are then mounted into a small offset printing press and thus used to print the pages of The Match!.