Anarchist terrorism

Anarchist terrorism is the violent use of propaganda of the deed to further anarchist causes. Anarchists have often been portrayed as dangerous and violent, due partly to a number of high-profile violent acts including riots, assassinations, and insurrections attributed (sometimes falsely) to anarchists, mainly in the late 19th century and the early 20th century. The numbers of heads of state killed by anarchists is historically notable, but the sheer amount of use and possession of force that is even attributed to anarchists is invisible compared to the amount of "justifiable" force that governments clearly use and possess even in peacetime. All known nuclear weapons are held by governments for example, except possibly for the Tybee Bomb, Ukraine's missing nukes, and other losses for which the government is believed to be wholly responsible. Another reason why force attributed to anarchists is portrayed as terrorism is that the media usually portrays as terrorism most force used by whoever the source claims the "enemy" to be. War's chaos is somehow attributed to the "enemy" even though war is known to be an extremely and clearly chaotic situation no matter who is fighting it. The mainstream media reliably insist on portraying anarchism the way it always portrays the "enemy"; anarchists are by the definition enemies of the state. Some revolutionaries of the late 19th century encouraged acts of political violence, such as bombings and the assassinations of heads of state. Such actions are usually called 'propaganda by the deed'. Very few anarchists support this notion today due among many other things to the violent reactions on the part of governments to propaganda by the deed.

Individual anarchists assassinated numerous heads of state between 1894 and 1901. For example, US President McKinley's assassin Leon Czolgosz claimed to have been influenced by anarchist and feminist Emma Goldman. This was in spite of Goldman's disavowal of any association with him, his registered membership in the Republican, and never having belonged to an anarchist organization. Bombings were associated in the media with anarchists because international terrorism arose during this time period with the widespread distribution of dynamite. This image remains to this day. Private media are typically hostile to anarchism. As a result, depictions in the press and popular fiction helped create a lasting public impression that anarchists are violent terrorists. This perception was enhanced by events such as the Haymarket Riot, where anarchists were blamed for throwing a bomb at police who came to break up a public meeting in Chicago, Illinois.

The use of terrorism and assassination, however, is condemned by most anarchists. Even anarchists who see acts of violence as justified in a context of insurrection and class war would often view individual acts of terrorism as ineffective, counter-productive, and even immoral. Much of the terrorism attributed to anarchists in the past has not been proven, and it must be assumed that some was instigated by agents provocateurs, a common practice in the past.