Most people know me because of a Mastodon profile I used to run. This, of course, is highly comical because the core message of the profile was to divest from capitalism. Here is some biographical information that is more or less public.
I was born and raised in Bergen, Norway, with divorced parents from an early age, and I grew up moving between my father’s and mother’s homes on a weekly basis. This continued until I reached adulthood, and I eventually moved out at the age of 24. I live with SETD5 syndrome and ulcerative colitis, and in accordance with Buddhist practice, I see this as part of dukkha, something to be experienced rather than identified with as a fixed self.
I grew up around bike riding, gaming consoles, and Apple devices, and as a child I often played GTA San Andreas, using cheats and glitches to break the game so I could have fun on my own terms. I grew up jailbreaking my iPad Mini 2, and later my first-generation Nintendo Switch from 2017. I have always been drawn computer systems by breaking them apart and rebuilding how I use them, because I see them as tools I own rather than something controlled by the company that made them. I bought them, so they are mine, and I keep control over how I use them. This way of thinking is also part of why Linux and distributions like Fedora resonate with me today, especially in relation to it's close kernel development.
Around early 2020 I installed Linux for the first time (ElementaryOS 5.1 Hera) and have used it ever since. When Microsoft first announced the end of Windows 10 support, I transitioned fully to Linux on the desktop. I moved through Manjaro, Paldo Linux, Fedora, back to Manjaro, experimented with Arch, and eventually settled on Debian around 2023, which I have used since. My laptop followed a similar path, mainly running ElementaryOS until I also moved it to Debian.
And if you believe capitalism is something we simply have to live with, then we are not standing on the same ground. I cannot accept the idea of resigning myself to a system built on exploitation and inequality, treated as if it were natural or eternal, or as if there is no alternative direction to move toward. I believe, as Rudolf Rocker emphasized, that the working class must organize itself along syndicalist lines. Rocker taught that no political party can liberate workers on their behalf. Only through voluntary association, local initiative, and solidarity across trades and borders can we begin to dissolve wage slavery, and I don’t see how anyone can truly be free while their life depends on working for someone else.
Maybe I will return to this page, or maybe I will just leave it behind. Regardless, I still answer my email at pmarg@anche.no (PGP). Even though I hate email, it is still something I need to use to get by in this capitalist world most of you seem to love. If you are interested in my work and writing around anarcho-syndicalism, you can visit nsf-iaa.org and iwa-ait.org, who I’m working alongside now. I maintain this resource documment.
In closing, my mind is shaped by Buddhism, Anarcho-syndicalism, and the Free Software Foundation’s principles of software freedom.