No Gods, No Masters.

AM · January 6, 2021

"At one time in the world, there were woods no-one owned." - Cormac McCarthy.

"You cannot buy the revolution. You cannot make the revolution. You can only be the revolution. It is in your spirit, or it is nowhere." - Ursula K. Le Guin.

"Ask for work. If they do not give you work, ask for bread. If they do not give you work or bread, then take bread." - Red Emma.

Johanna Barrett.

Salt Lake Punk, SHARP, avid chemistry enthusiast.

Born to zealous Mormon parents in Salt Lake City, Johanna was raised with one core principle in mind. Obedience. There is nothing beyond the Latter Day Saints, and one should spend their life in service in order to attain their own celestial body in death. Expected to take a husband, so that she may serve him in the afterlife according to hard-line Mormon doctrine. It didn't last long.

Barrett swiftly found herself questioning the teachings of the Temple, and with her own research, discovered her own truths about the Prophet Smith. She lashed out against her environment. The aftershock of the Satanic Panic still remained, and Barrett happily labelled herself a LaVeyan - even if she never actually knew what Anton LaVey stood for. As a teenager, she violated curfews and found herself intertwined with the small punk scene of Salt Lake City. The Complex, Metro, the Social Club. All bars and venues she hung around, making herself a known face in the scene. Mosh pits and street brawls became her life, as she burrowed deeper and deeper into the true hardcore punk scene that went underground in SLC.

And through school, Barrett found few friends and little solace outside of the subjects she excelled in. Literature, and chemistry. She found herself delving into the world of anarchist literature, Le Guin, Red Emma, Proudhon, and most importantly of all - the Ukrainian Warlord, Nestor Makhno. She found an idol in the anarcho-communist warlord, and began modelling herself against the man. But what radicalized the young aspiring anarchist, was the encounters she had with the Nazi punks present in SLC.

Barrett swiftly found herself embroiled in street brawls against Nazis and white supremacists, and eventually became pro-active in finding and snuffing out Nazi hangouts. Coming under the wing of a SHARP, she began bearing patches and eventually shaved her hair in solidarity with the movement. She'd found a new home with the movement, leaving her parents as quick as could be. Her life was spent couch surfing, trading drugs and favours, broken up by concerts, jam sessions, and fights with boneheads. All the while, her love of chemistry hadn't faded. She first began with a 1st edition Anarchist's Cookbook. She graduated to 60's US Army manuals. Eventually, she began cooking up her own formulae for ANFOM based explosives and potential plastic filler based explosives.

Violence had become a useful tool for Barrett, and she began delving into the criminal underworld. Stolen pistols and rifles exchanged hands, and the young SHARP escalated against the Nazis. It was still about pushing back the National Front's attempt at hijacking punk and skinhead culture, but increasingly, it had become about chasing the adrenaline rush. All things come to an end however, and Salt Lake felt to Johanna like a small pond for someone with such grand ideas. To get away, as far as possible, became her goal in the short term.

Brief stints doing odd jobs and labouring at various machining workshops snagged her enough cash to transplant herself into somewhere new. Los Santos.

“To be GOVERNED is to be watched, inspected, spied upon, directed, law-driven, numbered, regulated, enrolled, indoctrinated, preached at, controlled, checked, estimated, valued, censured, commanded, by creatures who have neither the right nor the wisdom nor the virtue to do so. To be GOVERNED is to be at every operation, at every transaction noted, registered, counted, taxed, stamped, measured, numbered, assessed, licensed, authorized, admonished, prevented, forbidden, reformed, corrected, punished. It is, under pretext of public utility, and in the name of the general interest, to be placed under contribution, drilled, fleeced, exploited, monopolized, extorted from, squeezed, hoaxed, robbed; then, at the slightest resistance, the first word of complaint, to be repressed, fined, vilified, harassed, hunted down, abused, clubbed, disarmed, bound, choked, imprisoned, judged, condemned, shot, deported, sacrificed, sold, betrayed; and to crown all, mocked, ridiculed, derided, outraged, dishonored. That is government; that is its justice; that is its morality.”