Nobody should allow you or disallow you. Whether you still can and want to is up to you.
Generally what I and other anarchists find is that none of us can live outside of exploitative structures right now, so it’s a matter of being kind and patient with each other and ourselves while weaning ourselves off things one at a time. Which is easier when you replace it with something better.
Eating vegan became a lot easier after helping out in a few community kitchens. Calling out unjust authority became a lot easier after organizing a soft coup of an anarchist book club lead by someone who didn’t act anarchist.
In the end, doing right by people only takes sacrifice if society is built wrong, and the best solution to that is to build society right instead. Maybe you can help make NYC a better place, maybe you’re glad to make it out of there needing less than a week’s rest. And while sacrifice can be worth it if the short term gains are big enough, nobody is going to be helped if you’re making yourself miserable.
(Concretely for NYC and every city in the US, a good start would be superblocks. Though Manhattan should probably go car-free and rely entirely on public transit. That way every street can be converted into greenery, and you don’t need to go to Central park to sit under a tree and enjoy the sounds of birds and of children playing. Restorative justice for Seneca village probably wouldn’t involve sweeping changes to Central Park - the descendants have built lives elsewhere - but that’s for the descendants, the people of New York, and for white and black USAmericans in general to reckon with).
Nobody should allow you or disallow you. Whether you still can and want to is up to you.
Generally what I and other anarchists find is that none of us can live outside of exploitative structures right now, so it’s a matter of being kind and patient with each other and ourselves while weaning ourselves off things one at a time. Which is easier when you replace it with something better.
Eating vegan became a lot easier after helping out in a few community kitchens. Calling out unjust authority became a lot easier after organizing a soft coup of an anarchist book club lead by someone who didn’t act anarchist.
In the end, doing right by people only takes sacrifice if society is built wrong, and the best solution to that is to build society right instead. Maybe you can help make NYC a better place, maybe you’re glad to make it out of there needing less than a week’s rest. And while sacrifice can be worth it if the short term gains are big enough, nobody is going to be helped if you’re making yourself miserable.
(Concretely for NYC and every city in the US, a good start would be superblocks. Though Manhattan should probably go car-free and rely entirely on public transit. That way every street can be converted into greenery, and you don’t need to go to Central park to sit under a tree and enjoy the sounds of birds and of children playing. Restorative justice for Seneca village probably wouldn’t involve sweeping changes to Central Park - the descendants have built lives elsewhere - but that’s for the descendants, the people of New York, and for white and black USAmericans in general to reckon with).