Break what should be broken
A COUPLE OF WEEKS ago, I wrote on A Working Library about James C. Scott’s concept of anarchist calisthenics, and I want to expand on it a bit here, because I think it is a very useful—even existentially necessary—skill to be practicing in our workplaces these days. Scott describes living in Germany in 1990 and noticing that the locals seem scandalized by his casual jaywalking—even when crossing a road where there obviously aren’t any cars for miles. Perplexed by this response, he writes:
As a way of justifying my conduct to myself, I began to rehearse a little discourse that I imagined delivering in perfect German. It went something like this. “You know, you and especially your grandparents could have used more of a spirit of lawbreaking. One day you will be called on to break a big law in the name of justice and rationality. Everything will depend on it. You have to be ready. How are you going to prepare for that day when it really matters? You have to stay ‘in shape’ so that when the big day comes you will be ready. What you need is ‘anarchist calisthenics.’ Every day or so break some trivial law that makes no sense, even if it’s only jaywalking. Use your own head to judge whether a law is just or reasonable. That way, you’ll keep trim; and when the big day comes, you’ll be ready.”
I think there are two kinds of skills being practiced here: the first is the skill of judging whether a law (or rule, norm, edict, order, etc.) is just or reasonable. This requires considering why it exists; whether that reasoning makes sense under current, or indeed any, circumstances; and what the risks are of breaking it. There’s a kind of reflexive questioning or consideration here, not accepting any rule at face value, but upon encountering a rule, taking a moment to look at it critically. To practice this way is to break the habit of passively receiving things as they have been given you, to become adept at noticing where rules are wrong-headed or worse.
The second skill is the actual breaking of that law when you deem it right to do so, whether because it is of no consequence (as with jaywalking across an empty road) or because the consequence of compliance is too great. This is the key thing here: we practice breaking rules not for the sake of rule-breaking but because a great many rules do harm, and often our only defense against that harm is to refuse to comply.
Scott points out that people of subordinate rank or class often cannot afford to openly revolt against rules or leaders they disagree with. But a quiet but collective non-compliance can be just as effective, and with far less danger to the individual rule-breakers. Witness reports of engineers cheating to get to the top of inane token leaderboards, an act that required no coordination and no outright objection—but which still managed to torch those leaderboards into the ground.
Cheating about AI usage is on the order of Scott moonwalking across a street without a car in sight; that is, it’s not all that risky, and—on its own—likely not all that impactful either. But we’re not interested only in what any individual act of rule-breaking does to the world; we’re interested in how each act prepares you to break much bigger rules when the times require it. And, my friends, the times are here. Tech companies are falling over themselves to collaborate with the Department of War. Hospitals are continuing to abandon their trans patients while nurses are being replaced with AI-powered software; disabled employees have been targeted for layoffs; surveillance tech is being deployed across our cities with predictably dangerous consequences; and systems developed to help people buy groceries are at risk of being recruited in the Trump administration’s ongoing assault on immigrant communities. If your work doesn’t already touch one of these or similarly thorny issues, it likely will soon. What will you do if you’re ordered to refuse care to someone in need? If you’re told to approve a PR that shares sensitive data with a federal agency? If you’re tasked with making a list of disabled employees? How will you be ready?
Some months ago a group of scientists with more than fifty years of collective service left the National Institutes of Health after concluding that the storied scientific organization had been so perverted by the administration that they could no longer uphold their oath of office. They left us with a word of caution: “Please decide where your red line is so you can choose to act before the line is already behind you.” I will add: please practice stepping back from that line before you get too close. Break a rule, refuse a request, drag your feet, cheat or sabotage or leak to the press—look around and you’ll see endless opportunities to engage those muscles, to build up the skill and strength you will need, and soon.