Zoe Baker
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anarchozoe.bsky.social
Zoe Baker
@anarchozoe.bsky.social
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Historian of political thought. Trans woman (she/her). Author of Means and Ends: The Revolutionary Practice of Anarchism in Europe and the United States. For all my work see https://linktr.ee/zoebaker
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anarchozoe.bsky.social
Kropotkin's analysis of women's domestic labour remains relevant over a century later.
Kropotkin quote from the Conquest of Bread: "Why has woman’s work never been of any account? Why in every family are the mother and three or four servants obliged to spend so much time at what pertains to cooking? Because those who want to emancipate mankind have not included woman in their dream of emancipation, and consider it beneath their superior masculine dignity to think “of those kitchen arrangements,” which they have rayed on the shoulders of that drudge-woman. To emancipate woman is not only to open the gates of the university, the law courts, or the parliaments, for her, for the “emancipated” woman will always throw domestic toil on to another woman. To emancipate woman is to free her from the brutalizing toil of kitchen and washhouse; it is to organize your household in such a way as to enable her to rear her children, if she be so minded, while still retaining sufficient leisure to take her share of social life. It will come to pass. As we have said, things are already improving. Only let us fully understand that a revolution, intoxicated with the beautiful words Liberty, Equality, Solidarity would not be a revolution if it maintained slavery at home. Half humanity subjected to the slavery of the hearth would still have to rebel against the other half."
November 20, 2025 at 9:54 AM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
Me whenever my best friend complains about her toxic ex boyfriend:
Quote by Chinese anarchist feminist He-Yin Zhen writing in 1907: "there is not a single woman who has not been ill treated by some man. Consequently, there is not a single woman who does not bear a grudge against men. Critics compare this situation to the political subjugation of a subject to his prince, but I beg to disagree. It is true that men can be subjugated and must submit to an alien group, the will of a king, or some capitalists. When that happens, the people who rule and the people who submit to the rule are both men. With women, however, the subjugation takes on a whole different character. One cannot deny that an empress occupies a highly esteemed position, but she never questions her own subjugation to a man (men). At the other end of the hierarchy, one finds beggars whose social position cannot be more degraded, yet even a female beggar would not question her subjugation to a man (men)".
November 16, 2025 at 3:21 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
What abolishing the state meant to anarchists in the past.
November 15, 2025 at 2:49 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
Great article on @intrrgum.bsky.social about how engaging in precarious jobs impacts migrant labourers.

interregnum.ghost.io/from-the-gro...
October 31, 2025 at 8:35 AM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
In 1583 the puritan Philip Stubbes claimed that women who cross dress as men would change their sex and become men if given the opportunity. For context the weird looking f is actually an s.
September 28, 2025 at 2:52 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
King James I of England sounded like an anime villain:

source: J. P. Kenyon, ed., The Stuart Constitution 1603-1688: Documents and Commentary, 2nd Edition (Cambridge University Press, 1986), p12.
"Kings are justly called gods for that they exercise a manner or resemblance of divine power upon earth, for if you will consider the attributes to God you shall see how they agree in the person of a king. God hath power to create or destroy, make or unmake, at his pleasure; to give life or send death, tojudge all and to be judged not accountable to none; to raise low things and to make high things low at his pleasure; and to God are both soul and body due. And the like power have kings: they make and unmake their subjects; they have power of raising, and casting down; of life, and of death, judges over all their subjects, and in all causes, and yet accountable to none but God only. They have power to exalt low things, and abase high things, and make of their subjects like men at the chess — a pawn to take a bishop or a knight — and cry up or down any of their subjects, as they do their money. And to the king is due both the affection of the soul and the service of the body of his subjects."
September 22, 2025 at 2:34 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
Male names were also interesting

Source: M. Inez Hilger, Together with the Ainu: A Vanishing People (University of Oklahoma Press, 1971), p107-108.
"Some masculine names were “Be-a-good-hunter,” “Be-a-good-fisherman,” “Quiet,” “Calm,” and ‘“‘A-small-thing-that-grows-into-something-larger.” Sasaki of Higashi-Shizunai later told us that his father had given him the Ainu name, Rounekae, which means “‘Drive-back-an-argument.” He explained, “My father wanted me to be able to argue wisely, to have the gift of eloquence. My father’s name was ‘Be-an-expert-with-spears,’ and he was the best spears-man in Hidaka province. He often speared a tuna from a distance at which he could see only the tuna’s fins; seldom did he miss his mark. My younger brother’s name was “T’o-grow-up-with-his-baggage-on-his-back,’ or “Io-grow-up-carrying-bundles,’ that is, bundles of good things, both material and non- material. He has died. My older brother’s name was ‘Lay-hold-of-the-wind.’ He was to have high ideals. He died in World War II.”
September 12, 2025 at 2:27 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
TIL that Ainu parents tried to manifest via child names.
"Ainu names were meaningful and usually expressed a wish of well-being for the child. Some feminine names were “Be-able-to-do-work-well,” “Be-chaste,” “Remain-faithful-to-husband,” “Be-quiet-and-calm,” and “Prosperity-for-posterity.” Kinaratup’s name meant “A-woman-skilled-in-weaving-bulrush-mats.” It might also be interpreted to mean ““T’o-be-sitting-on-a-mat.” Kinaratup explained that it meant to have a good home and be free from worries. A Toyohata woman’s name was “T'o-have-a-good-grain-harvest.” She explained, “When I was born, my father was working away from home. He sent this name to my mother. The harvest of that year promised to be an abundant one and he wanted me always to have such a harvest.” “And she is a woman who in truth always reaps a good harvest,” remarked a man who squatted near us".
September 12, 2025 at 2:24 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
More evidence of some Inuit women hunting like men.

Source: Diamond Jenness, Report of the Canadian Arctic Expedition, 1913-18, Volume XII: The Life of the Copper Eskimos (F. A. Acland, 1922), p88.
"Vice versa, a few of the women take part in the hunting and sealing. The eldest of Uloksak’s three wives, indeed, was quite a noted caribou hunter. The same woman sometimes went sealing, as did also Milukkattak, Avranna’s wife. The two of them went out together one day, leaving their husbands to mind the huts, and they often taunted the men with this afterwards. During my stay with Ikpakhuak the old man was teaching his little step-daughter to seal. She was only twelve years old at the time, and when she did finally transfix a seal in the winter of 1916 she had to call to one of the other hunters to help her drag her victim, on to the ice. It is only the younger women, however, who go out hunting, though everyone, men, women and children, have to take part in the organized caribou-drive."
September 7, 2025 at 2:18 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
Evidence of some Inuit women hunting like men:

Source: Jean L. Briggs, “Eskimo Women: Makers of Men,” in Many Sisters: Women in Cross-Cultural Perspective, ed. Carolyn Matthiasson (The Free Press, 1974), p271).
Quote reads: "Similarly, if a family has only daughters, a father may decide to bring up one or two daughters as hunters, so that they can help him and also that, if anything should happen to him, the family will not be left without a provider. Again, the older daughters tend to be chosen for this role. Such girls will go hunting with their fathers from the time they are small. To be sure, they also learn female skills, and eventually they marry and have children, but the masculine training they have received may show itself, according to the same female informant, in a tendency to be somewhat bossy toward their husbands."
September 6, 2025 at 2:09 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
Aristotle thought (via the Homer passage quoted below) that prior to the emergence of organised political life humans lived in scattered groups where men ruled over their wife and children. Think this might be one of the roots of later 19th century anarchist ideas that patriarchy preceded government
"We sailed on from there, grieving at heart, and came to the land of the Cyclopes, insolent giants who had no concept of right (themis): they trusted the immortal gods, and neither planted with their hands nor plowed the ground, but everything grew without sowing or tilling - wheat and barley and grapes in wide clusters that made wine, and Zeus brought frequent rain for them. They have no assemblies to give counsel, nor any rules of themis, but they dwell on the heights of lofty hills in deep caverns, and each one makes his own themis for his women and children, and does not care about the others"
August 15, 2025 at 2:25 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
Find it bizarre that anarchist debates about democracy often focus on the etymology of the word democracy in ancient Greek, whilst ignoring what democracy actually meant to ancient Greeks eg for all to rule and be ruled in turn or isonomia (equality before the law). Passages like this are typical:
"It is agreed that there are three kinds of constitution in the whole world, dictatorship (tyrannis), oligarchy, and democracy, and dictatorships and oligarchies are governed by the temperament of those in power, but democratic cities are governed by the established laws. You are aware, men of Athens, that in a democracy the persons of citizens and the constitution are protected by the laws, while dictators and oligarchs are protected by distrust and armed guards. Oligarchs and all who run a constitution based on inequality must be on guard against people who attempt to overthrow the constitution by force; but you, and all who have a constitution based on equality and law, must watch out for people whose words and way of life contravene the laws. For your real strength is when you are ruled by law and are not subverted by men who break them. My own belief is that whenever we pass laws, our concern should be how to make laws that are good and advantageous for our constitution, and once we have passed them, we should obey the laws in existence and punish those who disobey, if the city is to flourish".
August 13, 2025 at 2:32 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
They were very enthusiastic about early sex change operations and thought they demonstrated that sex is a malleable accident that shouldn't limit the mind.
"sex is an accident. We have always maintained that the outer frame is nothing, compared to the mind. The mind ought to be free to pursue its own paths of advance, untrammelled by considerations of bodily constitution. And now that it is proved that sex is changeable, there can be little further need to elaborate the contention. So long as bodily sex was supposed to be inveterate and inherent to the individual there was some shred of excuse for fancying that it was a necessary fetter to the mind. Now, it is obvious to the meanest capacity that a changeable thing like this can constitute no such imperious fetter".
August 8, 2025 at 2:42 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
The mission statement of the early 20th century journal Urania. They wanted to abolish the division between men and women.
"Urania denotes the company of those who are firmly determined to ignore the dual organization of humanity in all its manifestations. They are convinced that this duality has resulted in the formation of two warped and imperfect types. They are further convinced that in order to get rid of this state of things no measures of ‘emancipation’ or ‘equality’ will suffice, which do not begin by a complete refusal to recognize or tolerate the duality itself. There are no ‘men’ and ‘women’ in Urania".
August 8, 2025 at 2:33 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
Am extremely hyped to finally read this book. It debunks lots of sexist ideas in archeology and anthropology.
July 26, 2025 at 2:27 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
Find this paragraph from Jules Gill-Peterson's latest essay strange. She contrasts working class material struggle with self-actualisation, which is a liberal American value. But the core of 19th century proletarian theory is that communism is a society based on individual self-actualisation. . .
July 22, 2025 at 2:45 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
What is being done to children in Gaza is so awful that I cannot describe it with words.

www.hrw.org/report/2024/...
Quote reads: "From the day the war broke out, they destroyed what was inside us. They demolished my house and my room, which held all my memories. They took everything that helped me to live, like my devices, my boot, and my wheelchair. How can I go back to how I was without all this? — Ghazal, a 14-year-old girl with cerebral palsy in Gaza"
July 16, 2025 at 2:40 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
This sexist pov can be contrasted with the following amusing anecdote:
Quote from an anthropology article. It says: Romanoff writes of the Matases of the Peruvian rain forest, "Men say that too many women can spoil a hunt, that excessive or inopportune intercourse can lessen a man's skill, and that women's presence at the tapir trap would leave an odor disgusting to the tapir. They say that women walk slowly, and that hunters can go farther in all-male groups(while a man thus complained to me, his wife, lagging a bit with a baby on her hip, located a paca; we all gave chase until she, correctly positioned, struck the animal with a machete)".
July 8, 2025 at 2:18 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
A trans woman reported this heartbreaking experience in 1890:

Source: Douglas Pretsell, ed., Queer Voices in the Works of Richard von Krafft-Ebing, 1883–1901 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2023), p183.
Quote reads: "A male friend of my youth has felt since the first time of life only as a girl but has affection for the male sex; his sister had it the other way round, and when the uterus demanded its right and she saw herself as a loving woman, despite her maleness, she cut it short and took her own life by drowning."
June 24, 2025 at 2:17 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
Ancient Greek medical texts claim that women are like sponges and this is why they menstruate.
Quote reads: "Diseases of Women 1.1 (= 8:2) attributes menstruation to the very nature of a woman’s flesh, which at puberty becomes loose and spongy, causing her body to soak up excess blood from her stomach (where it has been converted from the food she has consumed). The author uses an analogy to explain the difference between female and male flesh. If wool and cloth of equal weight are stretched above water and left for two days and nights, at the end of this period the wool will have become much heavier than the cloth. It soaks up more moisture because it is more porous (araia).*} So it is with men and women. A woman’s spongy, porous flesh is like wool (eirion) and soaks up more moisture from her belly than a man’s from his."
June 22, 2025 at 2:21 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
According to the UK legal system the rights of trans people are determined by their 'biological sex' (except when they aren't because vibes).

www.equalityhumanrights.com/media-centre...
Quote from new guidlines by the UK's Equality and Human Rights Commission. It says: "In workplaces and services that are open to the public: - trans women (biological men) should not be permitted to use the women’s facilities and trans men (biological women) should not be permitted to use the men’s facilities, as this will mean that they are no longer single-sex facilities and must be open to all users of the opposite sex - in some circumstances the law also allows trans women (biological men) not to be permitted to use the men’s facilities, and trans men (biological woman) not to be permitted to use the women’s facilities"
April 26, 2025 at 2:20 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
Charles Darwin was an incredible scientist. He was also very sexist. . .

Source: Darwin, The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex Volume II (Princeton University Press, 1981), p327.
Quote from Darwin reads: "The chief distinction in the intellectual powers of the two sexes is shewn by man attaining to a higher eminence, in whatever he takes up, than woman can attain—whether requiring deep thought, reason, or imagination, or merely the use of the senses and hands. If two lists were made of the most eminent men and women in poetry, painting, sculpture, music, —comprising composition and performance, history, science, and philosophy, with half-a-dozen names under each subject, the two lists would not bear comparison. We may also infer, from the law of the deviation of averages, so well illustrated by Mr. Galton, in his work on ' Hereditary Genius,' that if men are capable of decided eminence over women in many subjects, the average standard of mental power in man must be above that of woman."
April 4, 2025 at 2:22 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
If this doesn't radicalize the American people, I don't know what will

www.theguardian.com/business/202...
April 3, 2025 at 9:50 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
In the 19th century sexist pseudoscience and racist pseudoscience were interconnected.

Source: Russett, Sexual Science: The Victorian Construction of Womanhood (Harvard University Press, 1989), p28.
Quote reads: "In the brief publication annals of the Anthropological Review (1863-1869), the analogy between blacks and women was several times explicitly drawn. Thus Thomas Bendyshe, having heard James Hunt's paper, "On the Negro's Place in Nature," remarked that women were "in some respects as inferior to man as Negroes are to Europeans," because of their swifter maturation and decay and their imperfect development."
April 3, 2025 at 2:30 PM
anarchozoe.bsky.social
Old anime hits different:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=DA1w...
April 1, 2025 at 8:14 AM