Artxmis & Brady
The Uncivilized Podcast
Genetic Engineering: Playing God
Genetic Engineering Part 1: Explanation and History
Genetic Engineering Part 2: Pros
Genetic Engineering Part 3: Cons
Genetic Engineering Part 4: Reflection & Opinion
Cascadia: A Dream For Bioregional Autonomy
The Attitude of Trump’s Administration Towards Environmentalism
Collapse: Observations and Predictions
Fallout as Ideology: Why Nuclear War Is Not A (Primary) Option For Collapse
Manpower: Towards a New Anti-Technological Cause
The (Expansive) Nature of Technology
Water Seeds, Build Revolutionaries
Revolutionary Philosophy And Organization
Regional Collapse, Regional Liberation
Violence and the Comanche People
Becoming. Wildness. Human/Inhuman. Badgers!
Locating a Green and Pink Anarchy
Spare the Child: A primal anarchist view of how civilization breaks children
Episode 5.1: Ted Kaczynski And The Anti Tech Revolution
#11. A Talk With Popular Front
#13. On The "Rightprim" Question
Platform Links:
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Artxmis' Dead Instagram: <instagram.com/unabombing>
--- Artxmis' Medium ---
Genetic Engineering: Playing God
Feb 9, 2018
[The following has 3 research sections and 1 opinion section.]
Genetic Engineering Part 1: Explanation and History
Genetic engineering is defined by Merriam-Webster Dictionary as “the group of applied techniques of genetics and biotechnology used to cut up and join together genetic material and especially DNA from one or more species of organism and to introduce the result into an organism in order to change one or more of its characteristics.”
A real life example would be Humalin, derived from bacteria to create a cheap and quick insulin for diabetics. A more fictional example could be any ‘dinosaur’ from the Jurassic Park series. [None of them are true dinosaurs and are really a mix of various animal DNA to create a pseudo-Dinosaur.]
Given the definition using the term ‘biotechnology’ a form of genetic engineering has existed for thousands of years. This form was human directed, and is linked to the domestication modern pets and also the rise of agriculture, through artificial selection. Dogs were domesticated about 12,000 BC and the cat about 2.5 thousand years later, then livestock between 9000–8000 BC.
Agriculture through this method is theorized to have been done in the Fertile Crescent 10,500 to 10,000 years ago, firstly with emmer and einkorn wheat. This would have been done via gathering wild plants and then sorted in villages for harvesting and sowing. Agricultural development that arose independently of the Fertile Crescent [Northern/Southern China, New Guinea and areas of North America] had crops including emmer and einkorn wheat; barley; peas; lentils;bitter vetch; chickpeas and flax. [These are known as Neolithic Founder Crops.]
Now, Humans played a major role in affecting the ways these organisms evolved through selective breeding, hybridization and a Human-influence natural selection. Grafting also played a role, albeit smaller.
Now, genetic engineering we know of, through more modern methods is the true topic and we should get to it. With the findings of genetic inheritance, DNA and the double helix. In 1970, about a hundred years after the discovery of inheritance, restriction enzymes were uncovered. These specific enzymes are for splicing DNA at specific points. With this, scientists were able to separate specific genes and also made it possible to merge different pieces of DNA together into rDNA. In addition, plasmids were useful in the process of transferring and replicating DNA sequences. PCR (Polymerase chain reaction) allows small sections of DNA to be copied and expanded, making it easier to study and separate the genetic material.
Research showed some bacteria is able to take and express foreign DNA (Natural competence). Using this method, science was able to transfer this ability into other organisms and the modern genetic engineering method was born. Early examples of this being used on animals is mice having foreign DNA embedded into an embryo. Another example was tobacco, when it was mixed with a resistance gene.
Genetic Engineering Part 2: Pros
There are dozens of pros and cons to the concept of genetic engineering. First, we shall go over the pros. When you think of genetic engineering, I think of GMOs, our food. Through this form of science, we have achieved better nutritional value, taste and abundance of our food. Soybean, rice and tomatoes are some of the biggest subjects to this. Another interesting pro is the ability to grow food where it previously couldn’t be. (Example: Corn in the snow or something along those lines.) Alo, we have pest resistance and longer shelf-life. A method is using the gene At-DBF2 in tobacco to increase survival rate in rough soil and harsher climates and conditions. In the future, scientists hope to be able to broaden the sphere of creating new foods all together.
Another field is the medicinal and research field in terms of animals. For example, there has been cases of testing the effects of cancer on mice in search of a cure. Other tests are disabling or activating genes, or using mice (or other animals) for insulin development. (Cloning sometimes can be considered in this realm, but they are two very different concepts/)
The next pro(Or con?), and perhaps the most controversial is that of human engineering. What if we could totally prevent genetic diseases and deformations? If we can cure fibrosis or cancer? Perhaps totally extend the Human life. This is what science is attempting to achieve.
Genetic Engineering Part 3: Cons
Now, we are focusing in on the cons. Here is where things can get tricky since some cons can be complete contractions to the pros. An example is it could actually nutritional value, not improve it. This is possible through accidental mutations, side effects and plant allergies.
The next issue is the effects on the environment though GMOs. Pesticides and herbicides are often used alongside GMOs. Also, the effects of the GMOs can directly harm unintentional targets like bees and butterflies. Both of whom interact with these genetically altered plants and are killed or injured through that interaction. Also, the long term effects are not known and pests can adapt, effectively making GMOs more deadly than useful. Adding onto this, GMOs can be invasive and take over an ecosystem because of the resistances, as well as hurting biological diversity.
Now, take these issues and place them into a Human body. Unwanted mutations, toxic makeup, limiting diversity are some of the many possible effects genetic mods could have on the Human body.
A more indirect, but still serious issue is the possibility of monopolies on the food industry. Or worse, a monopoly or wealth owned industry for Human genetic mods.
Genetic Engineering Part 4: Reflection & Opinion
As most of you know, I am a Green Anarchist and that belief will surely influence my ideas. As great as the concept of surplus and better(?) food is, there is a lot of problems and unanswered questions. We haven’t seen the long-term effects on us, the food we eat or environment. However, there has been an outcry from sources such as American Academy of Environmental Medicine who said this in 2010, “There is more than a causal association between GM foods and adverse health effects. There is causation”.
There have been studies using NK603, a Monsanto corn variant. The test involved feeding this corn to 200 rats, and the results were shocking. 200x 300x faster tumor growth, liver and kidney damage. They also died faster than the group not fed any of this corn. And if you say “those are mice, it doesn’t count” then why do we use Mice for most of our research? I’m sure if GMOs benefited Mice, you’d use it as a source too. Now, I simply fear there can be long-term effects on animals and us, and we have seen it in these tests.
Now the most important part to me is the effects on nature. Many of the chemicals have done irrevocable damage to the environment. Monsanto’s Roundup chemical, which doesn’t affect the engineered plants, has created superweeds and superbugs, who have built resistances. While some believe GMOs have lessened the use of pesticides, they have actually seen increased use! This means we ingest even more chemicals, and so does the environment, such as soil and rivers. Essentially, the more GMOs, the more chemicals..
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https://www.honeycolony.com/article/gmos-seeds-of-sickness-part-1/
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https://www.onegreenplanet.org/environment/how-do-gmos-impact-people-and-the-environment/
Topics: GMO, Genetic Engineering, Jurassic Park, Playing God, Natural
Cascadia: A Dream For Bioregional Autonomy
Mar 7, 2018
“More than just a bioregion, Cascadia is also a positive and inclusive, place based inter-dependence movement to break down boundaries and borders that are arbitrary or negative; shift our actions and impacts locally; build models we can share for the rest of the world; and build a bioregional community that fosters a culture rooted in a love of place.” — CascadiaNow!
The United Green Alliance has posted already posted an article on the political goals and support for Cascadia, however this is a more social and scientific approach for the same subject: The free nation of Cascadia!
Even if you haven’t heard of Cascadia, chances are you have heard of the environmental mindset of those who live in the Pacific Northwest. At base level, this is the entirety of Cascadia, but once you delve into it, you realize the movement isn’t just an idea, it is a way of life.
Firstly, let us establish what exactly Cascadia is and what it is not. Cascadia is a Pacific Northwest secession movement based on bioregionalism, cultural unity, personal liberty and environmentalism. The locations usually involved would be British Columbia; Oregon; Washington; Northern California and less commonly, pieces of Idaho and Southern Alaska. Cascadia is not to be confused with Northwest Front (NWF) which is a white nationalist movement who has taken the basic flag design and a similar location of Cascadia.
The history of Cascadia is rich, and somewhat complex. There have been several movements previous to this, and the most famous is the concept of Jefferson State. This idea stems back into the early 1800s when Thomas Jefferson commissioned the Corps of Discovery Expedition (Lewis and Clark). The state, an independent nation and ideally a republic would be composed of Southern Oregon and Northern California. This movement gained traction in late 1941, but lost the momentum after the events of Pearl Harbor. Since then, there have been surges of commitment to the idea of Jefferson, but this idea has, for the most part, merged with the larger Cascadian movement.
The Cascadian Flag known as the Doug Flag, Cascadian Doug or Old Doug
Cascadia’s main premise is freedom from the United States, supported by the idea of bioregionalism, as mentioned earlier. What is this exactly? Bioregionalism is essentially the relationship between environmentally focused cultures and bioregions (geographic areas with several shared ecological traits and characteristics). A loose analogy is civic/liberal nationalism, but with an emphasis on Human-Earth interaction and relationships.
Another important factor in the movement is the cultural identity. Commonly shared traits are liberal politics, pro-Marijuana legalization, veganism and or vegetarianism and an overall sense of health and being outdoors. [This is most represented in the Western-most locations of WA and OR, while East would be more conservative in terms of culture and politics.]
The LGBT+ rainbow variant of the Cascadian Flag
With the idea of secession comes personal liberty. Cascadians in general want to battle not just in the defense of Earth, but for minorities, LGBT+ members, women and the disabled. This is self evident in one of their flag variants, which features the iconic Douglas Fir (hence the flag name) with a rainbow background in reference to LGBT+. In addition, they support Marijuana legalization, an open trade within their nation as well as a better sense of community and autonomy.
Perhaps the most important point, which directly ties into the sense of bioregionalism and all previous factors is environmentalism. The idea of a healthy Human interaction with the environment is at the core of many Cascadians. The movement pushes for a sense of ecological responsibility and a culture based on understanding Humans are apart of nature, not above it.
Going back to the concept of Bioregionalism, it is important to know not just what it is, but how it plays into Cascadia as a whole. The social aspect of the bioregion formed in the 1970s when scientists within the sociology, biology and environmental fields as well as community leaders and landowners began to work together with the vast natural resources.
Generally accepted illustration of the Cascadian bioregion
Cascadian Bioregionalism is of course, concerned with PNW (Pacific Northwest) bioregion. Politically, this sense of connection in the proposed Cascadia causes a rift between the States and Canada region and their capitals.
Two leading characteristics make up the accepted bioregion: The Cascade Range and the Columbia River watershed. In relation, fauna; flora; soil makeup and climate help make up the details.
The basic concept is this: The states and territories have more significant biological and geographical characteristics in common than with Washington D.C. or Ottawa, which then creates a cultural and economic divide.
How bioregionalism plays into environmentalism can be described in 3 steps, as laid out by Peter Berg of Planet Drum: “ 1) restore and maintain local natural systems; 2) practice sustainable ways to satisfy basic human needs such as food, water, energy, housing, and materials; and 3) support the work of reinhabitation. The latter is accomplished through proactive projects, employment and education, as well as by engaging in protests against the destruction of natural elements in a life-place.”
Essentially, environmentalism and bioregionalism go hand-in-hand quite well. In the eyes of the supporters, Humans can live in a comfortable manner while protecting and assisting nature in its attempt to recover.
While the idea of seceding from the Union and Canada is a very far fetched idea, it doesn’t mean they cannot make smaller pushes for the same reasons for which to want to secede. For example, the states of California, Oregon and Washington are members of the United States Climate Alliance, a non-legal binding between several other States (in addition to Puerto Rico) to uphold the Paris Agreement after President Trump pulled from the agreement in June 2017.
With the growing sense of independence and environmentalism, perhaps it is time to combine these concepts and create a truly free Cascadia.
Contributors:
Mariah Cook; A.S. Robak; Rose F.
Sources:
http://www.planetdrum.org/bioregion_bioregionalism_defined.htm#Bioregionalism
The Attitude of Trump’s Administration Towards Environmentalism
Apr 28, 2018
[Prelude: I understand this following article contains an obvious bias towards a more Leftist and Environmentalist standing. Please understand it is not my intent to be outwardly hostile to Right Wing followers and advocates. To show for this, I include a variety of sources of Left, Center and Right leanings, all of which have been cited in text as well as links to the specific sites and articles included at the end. What I intend to do is an simply create an observation of Trump’s team and their actions that endanger the environment. I am not and never will apologize for my Libertarian-Leftist or ecological beliefs. Thank you. — Jay Burton, Independent Amateur Eco Journalist and former Writer for United Green Alliance.]
At the time of writing this article, President Trump has been in office for 1 year and 96 days. Within this relatively short amount of time the Trump administration began pulling from the Paris Agreement; proposed over a 20% cut for the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) funding; approved the Keystone XL pipeline as well as recently issued a presidential message in regards to Environmental Regulations, according to CNN.
From the White House’s official website, the Presidental Message reads as follows:
“Today, our Nation commemorates Earth Day, a celebration of the blessings given to us by our Creator. Among them, we cherish our magnificent land and waterways, abundant natural resources, and unique wildlife. As a Nation, it is our duty to recognize the importance of these life-sustaining gifts, and it is our responsibility to protect them for our own benefit and that of generations to come.
A healthy environment and a strong economy go hand in hand. We know that it is impossible for humans to flourish without clean air, land, and water. We also know that a strong, market-driven economy is essential to protecting these resources. For this reason, my Administration is dedicated to removing unnecessary and harmful regulations that restrain economic growth and make it more difficult for local communities to prosper and to choose the best solutions for their environment. Already, we are making great economic progress in concert with — not in opposition to — protecting our environment.
Americans embrace the idea of enjoying nature in a responsible fashion, while preserving the blessings of the land for future generations. My Administration is committed to furthering this rich legacy of conservation.
This Earth Day, I hope all Americans will give thanks for the environment we share, protect, and call home.”
This message, to some sparks a sense of national identity in regards to our ecosystems, others found themselves outraged. Breaking down this presidential message, it is easy to see why many are angry.
“Among them, we cherish our magnificent land and waterways, abundant natural resources, and unique wildlife.”
A beautiful statement indeed. However, recent legislative history by the POTUS seems to conflict with the message at hand. Our land is in danger, backed up by Trump’s decision to shrink Bear Ear and Grand-Staircase Escalante. Both are National Monuments. Bear Ear’s land was heavily hit, going from 1.35 million acres to roughly 228,337. Grand-Staircase Escalante went from 1.9 million acres to just around 1 million. By shrinking these monuments, it opens up the land for deforestation and oil / natural gas obtainment. In regards to the waterways of USA, they too face uncertain fates. The Keystone pipeline, given permission to be expanded on in the XL Pipeline has in the past caused unruly damage, in which it leaked 210,000 gallons in November 2017, as reported by FOX. Not only does the Keystone XL and Keystone Pipeline bring notorious history, so does the Dakota Access Pipeline. This pipeline, which to some, violated Indigenous peoples’ rights and treaties, would put their local water supply in danger. All of this comes from CNN.
Now, the wildlife. According to the EPA’s website, over 1,3000 animals are considered Threatened or Endangered in the United States alone. In October of 2017, Trump announced 25 species did not qualify for protection, which comes from the Endangered Species Act, according to the Center for Biological Diversity.
“A healthy environment and a strong economy go hand in hand. We know that it is impossible for humans to flourish without clean air, land, and water. We also know that a strong, market-driven economy is essential to protecting these resources. For this reason, my Administration is dedicated to removing unnecessary and harmful regulations that restrain economic growth and make it more difficult for local communities to prosper and to choose the best solutions for their environment. Already, we are making great economic progress in concert with — not in opposition to — protecting our environment.”
The first half of this statement, like before, shows a considerable sense of care for our Earth, but again crumbles, given the later comments. Laissez-faire capitalism and business operations have never proven to help the environment. Only once the EPA was established were businesses held accountable for Carbon Emissions, unethical deforestation and oil spills. However, companies don’t necessarily need to be punished for mistakes. Instead, looking to benefit companies who seek new solutions to the global economy AND environmentalism is the solution. Sadly, Trump doesn’t seek to do this, instead, he seeks to begin to loosen the economy in terms of environmental regulations. How can a local business succeed when larger companies (who took their tax breaks to invest, rather than raise wages or lower prices) have stripped the world of its precious resources?
With the message and pipelines discussed in enough detail, it is best to discuss another topic: The Paris Agreement.
Here is an excerpt from Trump’s speech in June 2017, once again courtesy of the White House’s website, in regards to the Paris Agreement:
“As President, I can put no other consideration before the wellbeing of American citizens. The Paris Climate Accord is simply the latest example of Washington entering into an agreement that disadvantages the United States to the exclusive benefit of other countries, leaving American workers — who I love — and taxpayers to absorb the cost in terms of lost jobs, lower wages, shuttered factories, and vastly diminished economic production.”
It is odd that the POTUS put it that way, seeing that the green energy market is growing. For example, according to EDF, solar and wind jobs are growing up to 12% faster than the rest of the U.S. economy. What this market offers isn’t just creating the solar panels and windmills, but installing and repairing them as well. In regards to USA’s donations into the Paris Agreement, we ranked 11th in donation count, despite being 2nd in CO2 emissions, only behind China, the latter of which comes from Union of Concerned Scientists.
Despite President Trump’s decision to pull out of the Paris Agreement, his views were not universal in the United States. 16 states plus Puerto Rico formed a non-formal agreement, called the United States Climate Alliance, to uphold the standards of the Paris Agreement. The agreement holds both Democrat and Republican Governor support and generates $8.6 trillion dollars alone, based on Bureau of Economic Analysis and the alliance’s official website.
Another point that needs to be discussed is Trump and Pruitt and their relationship to the EPA, the first and last governmental defense of the environment besides Fish and Wildlife Services (FWS) and to a lesser extent, the Department of Agriculture and Forest Service. From the EPA’s website, the 2017 budget for the EPA was $8,058,488,000, down from $8,139,887,000 in 2016.
“EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt speaks Thursday in the Rose Garden after President Donald Trump announced his decision to pull the United States out of the Paris climate agreement. | Getty” — Politico.com
The Washington Post had this to say in February 12 of 2018:
“The White House is seeking to cut more than $2.5 billion from the annual budget of the Environmental Protection Agency — an overall reduction of more than 23 percent.
The fiscal 2019 proposal released Monday marks the Trump administration’s latest attempt to shrink the reach of an agency the president once promised to reduce to “little tidbits.” The EPA already has lost hundreds of employees to buyouts and retirements over the past year, and its staffing is now at Reagan-era levels.”
What seems to be often forgotten is the EPA doesn’t just deal with the natural environment and conservation, but also human health. One such example is the regulations and dealings with asbestos in schools and other public areas, as well as other chemical and or hazardous materials. When a budget cut of is up to 20–26% (depending who you are citing) it won’t matter what areas are being cut, you are risking the health of Earth and Americans as a whole.
In regards to Pruitt, who is currently under investigation on Capitol Hill for abuse of power, has taken fossil fuel donations, despite being the department head of an agency who seeks to limit or regulate such a market.
“Photo credit: Adapted by WhoWhatWhy from EPA / Wikimediaand azmichelle / Flickr (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0).” — WhoWhatWhy
There is but one more topic that must be discussed that was not brought up earlier, the notorious border wall. According to the Scientific American, the longest running magazine in the United States, one that even Albert Einstein has contributed to, has pointed out the possible dangers and effects of such a plan. They stated the present fence has cut off and separated populations of wildlife. To back this up, Vox also stated that species such as the jaguar ( considered ‘Near-Threatened’) and the ocelot (which has a decreasing population) would be animals facing the dangers. In addition, the current fences already act as dams, blocking water ways.
In Texas, two major conservation sites for bobcats and armadillos would be in danger, according to Vox. Not only are bobcats, ocelots and armadillos threatened but also over 360 other species would be effected.
Not many scientists have measured the border’s biodiversity in its totality — or the full impact of fences. One of the few studies to tackle these questions was written by Lasky and co-authors in 2011. They estimated that 134 mammal, 178 reptile, and 57 amphibian species live within about 30 miles of the line. Of those, 50 species and three subspecies are globally or federally threatened in Mexico or the United States. And they survive only because people on both sides have worked hard to conserve them. — Vox
Seeing all that there is in this article, it is only the tip of the iceberg and luckily everyday there are hundreds of like-minded men and women all over the world fighting for a healthy world and Human population- We can serve both! Together, we can make this dream a reality.
As promised, I have included all articles and websites used in this work. If you have any questions, concerns or corrections, be sure to notify me by commenting below. Thank you.
Sources
5 major changes to US environmental policy in 2017
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/presidential-message-earth-day-2018/][
Presidential Message on Earth Day, 2018
https://www.epa.gov/endangered-species/learn-more-about-threatened-and-endangered-species][
Learn more about Threatened and Endangered Species | US EPA
https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2017/25-species-10-04-2017.php][
Trump Administration Denies Endangered Species Protection for 25 Species
Key Moments In The Dakota Access Pipeline Fight
Keystone Pipeline leaks 210,000 gallons of oil in South Dakota
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/statement-president-trump-paris-climate-accord/][
Statement by President Trump on the Paris Climate Accord
http://www.businessinsider.com/solar-energy-job-growth-2017-1][
Solar-energy jobs are growing 12 times as fast as the US economy
Each Country's Share of CO2 Emissions
https://www.usclimatealliance.org/governors-1/][
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/trumps-wall-could-cause-serious-environmental-damage/][
Trump's Wall Could Cause Serious Environmental Damage
https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2017/4/10/14471304/trump-border-wall-animals][
The ecological disaster that is Trump's border wall: a visual guide
https://medium.com/tag/epa?source=post_page-----b1c1d248e2e2---------------epa-----------------][
Collapse: Observations and Predictions
5 min read
Jun 24, 2019
Collapse?
The ‘Collapse’ is a term employed by the whole of the political spectrum, from communists referring to the collapse of capitalism, to right-wing celebrations for the collapse of the Soviet Union. Unlike aforementioned political groups, ‘Collapse’ has come to define entirely different things for Luddites, Primitivists, and movements alike. The ‘Collapse’ is an observation, and a prediction to the degradation of world society.
As stated, it is both an observation and a prediction. What does this mean? It means the Collapse is happening now, and if we stay on our current course, it is within the realm of possibility that it is inevitable.
Before we expand, we should further define ‘Collapse’. A rough and offhand definition can be written as:
Either a long-term or short-term degradation of major systems of organization (states; governments; economic systems; and in our case, World Society) that eventually leads to a total withering or restructuring of said systems that primarily represents itself in political and/or social upheaval and disillusionment. Usually violent in cause and/or consequences.
Such visions of Collapse can be pulled from major anti-tech writers, such as the likes of Kaczynski:
The aim of the Freedom Club is the complete and permanent destruction of modern industrial society in every part of the world. This means no more airplanes, no more radios, no more miracle drugs, no more paved roads, and so forth.
Observations
A prevalent example of our observations is the anti-globalization movement that spanned from the 80’s to the early 2000’s. It was a widely spread movement, ranging from communists and socialists, to primitivists and neo-nazi movements. Such cases would be the Paris 89 protests (July 1989), WTO protests in Seattle (Nov 30, 1999) and the 27th G8 Summit Protests (July, 2001).
What are the implications of such a movement? Obviously, the movement has died off and replaced almost entirely by alt-globalization pushed solely by leftist types. However, there is light at the end of the tunnel, because it proved that people will not blindly accept a future in which their personal and local lives will be dictated by elites (however, one failing of the movement was a lack of a strong definition of who these elites were — Bankers? Jews? Capitalists? Technicians?).
It also proved that it was not necessarily a political movement in a traditional sense, rather, a social movement. It spread across so many ideologies and tendencies that it showed a HUMAN drive, not purely classist or political. This of course, calls back to Jacques Cammatte’s idea, that the true revolution would not be a class war, but a war of humanity against domestication and capital.
Yet another observation is that Collapse is a contemporary phenomenon, proven by the re-emerging interest in Primitivism, through writers such as Zerzan, Kaczynski and Jacobi.
In August of 2017, Discovery aired their first episode of Manhunt: Unabomber, a dramatizedlook into Kaczynski’s life and theories. This brought on a whole reemergence of his thought, as explained in Jake Hanrahan’sInside the Unabomber’s odd and furious online revival, where he explored the ‘ironic’ rise of internet interest in Kaczynski’s theories. (NOTE: The subjects of the article are commonly associated with eco-fascist ideology, less so with mainstream primitivism or neo-luddism).
John H. Richarson also has written on the topic of anti-tech movements, publishing a lengthy, and in-depth analysis of Kaczynskian movements, individuals and the consequences of it all in New York Magazine. It mainly features John Jacobi, but delves into movements and individuals surrounding them, such as Deep Green Resistance (DGR), Individuals Tending Towards the Wild (ITS, now Wild Reaction) and so on.
In addition, ecological devastation has been common in popular discussion because of new findings, publications and demands of climate science panels such as IPCC’s report. With post-industrial behavior, we are expected to reach an increase of 1.5 °C / 2.7° F above pre-industrial levels in the coming decades. To put this in perspective, the report stated that by 2017, human induced change had caused an increase of 1°C.
Of course, IPCC states the world’s nations must come together to stop this destructive behavior, and instead we have seen an increase of emissions in 2018. On the other hand, several nations have indeed pushed to reduce carbon and other emissions in coming years, as well as other policies, such as cutting plastic waste.
Predictions
The fact of the matter is that there has yet to be a global social movement to stop the effects of techno-industrialism, that does not also pull into question the existence of the system. Why? Because the two cannot exist together. To make a stand against these behaviors, one must be critical towards World Society and large-scale organizational technologies.
Our predictions stem from these facts of recent history and also contemporary phenomena. We see the questioning of World Society has been a social, human movement, and that with the rise of ecological devastation* (and systematic opposition to fixing such problems) we can deduce that such a movement congruent to the anti-globalization movement is then possible.
In fact, people like Jacobi predict such a movement to be an international populist movement:
“It’s very likely that some form of anti-technology populism is going to replace what was once an anti-government populism; whereas the main objects of disdain were once politicians, the new objects of disdain will be scientists and engineers, as well as technology itself.”
*This is not to say it will be focused on ecological devastation, but the accelerated devastation of our planet must necessarily accelerate social and political actions, if there are to be any at all.
Aha! Natural Collapse!
The question naturally arises then: Should we simply rely on a natural collapse? (Naturally meaning without human influence.)
My answer is no. I say this only because the safety nets around modern civilization are so advanced, and are becoming greater and greater, and we should not praise the Collapse like the Book of Revelation, with us then hoping for the best!
However, a Collapse is, on this course, unavoidable- not meaning ecological collapse will directly cause civilizational collapse, but that a rise in stresses in society will lead to a movement against the system itself. The only way it can be avoided is that:
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Genetic engineering surpasses and overtakes human freewill. (See “Control of Human Behavior” inIndustrial Society and Its Future.)
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Pass into a stage of human development in which humans and all other life and aspects of Earth are fully assimilated. (Possibly linked to A, but also possible through “Fully Automated Luxury Communism”)
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Replacement of Man by a superior system such as AI. (See the second chapter of Ted’s Anti-Tech Revolution: Why and How.)
To clarify, I am NOT saying a natural collapse is not possible, I am saying it should NOT be seen as a solution to our problems, or as an excuse for laziness on the behalf of “revolutionaries”.
Conclusion
With the rise of primitivism and skepticism on technology, and the furthering ecological devastation (and the two are definitely linked!) we can expect, or in the least, hope for a populist, social movement against world society, similar to the anti-globalization movement.
Keep in mind, not to treat this as communists do, praising their Proletarian Revolution in a biblical light. Our movement, the Collapse is now and we should see ourselves actualizing it, operating alongside this phenomenon to accelerate industrial collapse.
Special thanks to my friend, Iktomi, who edited this piece for me.
Fallout as Ideology: Why Nuclear War Is Not A (Primary) Option For Collapse
Jun 27, 2019
“We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried, most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad-Gita: Vishnu is trying to persuade the Prince that he should do his duty and, to impress him, takes on his multi-armed form and says, “Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.” I suppose we all thought that, one way or another.”
Skyline of Pripyat (Daniel Berehulak/Getty Images)
Apocalypse Now?
The rise of public interest in the collapse of civilization has exploded in recent years, due in part to articles such as what VICE has written. Often the shout is heard, ‘My generation is doomed!’, and such a cry spans millennia, from religious apocalypses and to modern economic crashes, and then following the Great Depression throughout the 1930’s.
It is unfortunate that Primitivists (I will use this term as a label for Luddites and related ideologies) fall into this, because it suits their political worldviews. It can be compared to Communists foaming at the mouth whenever a new click-bait publication writes about a coming recession.
An even more interesting representation of this interest is its presence in entertainment mediums like Fallout. It breaks from the ‘Doomer’ mentality of click-bait articles and conspiracy theories, and shifts it into a sort of escape from reality, almost presenting such a world as better than our current one. The issue is of course, an obsession with an end, not the movement itself.
The Issues At Hand
While I would agree that any form of collapse of global institutions is a net positive, I’d argue against using Nuclear Holocaust as either:
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A solution to our problems, or excuse not to be actively resisting World Society
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A method of attracting new followers to our ideology
In addition to these problems, the System; especially in its capitalist forms, has the ability to commodify the movement into a non-revolutionary shadow of itself (part of recuperation).
Not A Solution
As a supposed solution or excuse, this calls back to my last work, where I mentioned that using ‘natural collapse’ as a solution is cowardly, and I’ll extend that logic here as well. It is similar to natural collapse idea in that revolutionaries have little control, but in this case, those in bureaucratic positions have more power.
The Primitivist revolutionaries should not have aims related to controlling technology, such as nuclear devices; instead only in imminent destruction of said technologies. This then rules out the possibility of it being a revolutionary action, because those still in control of said devices necessary to carry out such acts are also world leaders (and in some cases, leaders of rogue states like North Korea).
Some may argue for accelerating the tensions to where leaders use nuclear weapons, and this is of course, a laughable position. It has no historical basis, nor one that can be predicted with any sort of materialist analysis.
Whether Primitivists like to admit it or not, as civilizations progress and grow, violence declines, especially the chances of mutually assured destruction (MAD). Because of this, banking on accelerated stresses leading to MAD is baseless and likely would lead only to ‘basic’ warfare or some form of Cold War scenario, as opposed to the idea of all-out global Nuclear War.
Simply put, it won’t heat up.
Ron Cobb — “Blessed Are The Meek: For They Shall Inherit The Earth.” (1968)
Some may then try to cite Kaczynski, who had this to say on a similar topic (reduced quote from Anti Tech Revolution: Why and How):
“[…]Some time ago this writer received a letter from an individual who asked whether revolutionaries should strive to bring about the collapse of the technological system even though the chaos attendant on the collapse would entail an increased risk of nuclear war. The answer is that revolutionaries should not be deterred by such a risk.
[…], if nothing intervenes to prevent the technological system from proceeding to its logical conclusion, there is every reason to believe that the eventual result will be a planet uninhabitable for all of the more complex forms of life as we know them today. So if we had to choose between a major nuclear war and the continued existence of the system, we would have to take nuclear war as the lesser evil.
[…], if we allow the defenders of the system to deter us with the threat of nuclear war or of any other dire consequences, then we may as well give up. A revolutionary movement can’t be successful if it allows its pursuit of its objective to be limited by reservations or qualifications of any kind, for these can only lead to fatal hesitation at critical times. Revolutionaries must take their goal to be the collapse of the system no matter what. You have to make a decision: Is the elimination of the technological system worth all of the desperate risks and terrifying disasters that it will entail? If you don’t have the courage to answer “yes” to that question, then you’d better quit whining about the evils and hardships of the modern world and just adapt yourself to them as best you can, because nothing short of the collapse of the system will ever get us off the road that we are on now.”
Kaczynski here is not advocating for a nuclear war situation. He is referring to a situation in which we face the threat of nuclear war either as a consequence from the revolution, or as a threat to it.
He simply means that, if given the choice of maintaining the course we are on, or opting for nuclear war as a result of the revolution, we must choose the latter.
Unsurprisingly, I agree.
Besides claims to revolutionaries gaining control of Nuclear weapons, or hoping certain tactics can nudge leaders to do so, we also cannot rely on it as a logical end of our society. There is no evidence to lay claims upon it, since there are few examples of civilizations falling to war (most collapse under economic, ecological and exhaustion issues- Rome, for example, had all 3).
We must deal in a material analysis, not hard-Determinism or in any sense of idealism. Therefore, accelerationism (in this case!) and assumed Nuclear collapse are off the table.
Collapse as Commodity
Back to entertainment; before we discuss Nuclear War as a method of attracting certain individuals or groups; we should understand the literary, theatrical and gaming fascination with Nuclear apocalyptic scenarios serve dual and contradictory meanings through two methods:
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Commodification as Reinforcement — a negative light. It has taken any threat to mainstream society and altered it into a devastating situation unthinkable and inhumane, such as movies about the USSR / Communism in the Cold War.
Sometimes, it takes apocalyptic scenes, usually post-Nuclear and makes them into hellish landscapes as to present it as a less preferable situation to modern day.
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Commodification as Escapism — a positive light. Presenting alternative situations that allow us as consumers to have short term ‘escapes from reality’, taking away revolutionary design.
This meaning presents the Wastelands of apocalyptic Earth, again, usually post- Nuclear, as a free and anarchic world. While filled with danger, the universe is still seen as a positive, as the main character (either one we sympathize with in movies or play as in video games) can take on all challenges. However, as it becomes an escape tactic, it loses all its original potential.
Obviously, we see contradictory meanings in these messages, as is the way with our society. However, both act as a method of recuperation:
the process in which radical, threatening ideas are slowly merged into society, stripped of revolutionary edict and finally appropriated into the system, adding another commodity to be sold and consumed.
Sometimes the meanings are separate, never interconnecting in a specific medium. However, there are cases in which a product, such as how the The Hunger Games movie and book series* presents both meanings in truly contradictory manner.
This doesn’t even take into account apocalyptic clothing lines, or other sources of commodification.
The Fallout game series may very well be the prime instance of point B, which I find to be the scariest of the two, which I will explore soon.
The Fallout series is a series of games that explores a post-Nuclear Armageddon United States, through different characters, settings and struggles. It typically is notable for world design, where cities are ruins and vast deserts reach as far as the eye can see. Raiders, bandit-like gangs roam while other major factions all claim to ruling the U.S.A, like military remnants of the old government or those who wish to horde technology from the masses to prevent another War.
An excerpt from one of the Fallout sites describes the world, the Wasteland as such:
Countries such as the United States were turned into scorching wastelands that became filled with new dangers due to mutations in wildlife that altered many of the species, making them more dangerous than before. As the remnants of humanity began to spread once again, new violence was introduced in the form of different factions. They began warring against each other in the new anarchic world which they now reside in, and though more than two centuries have passed since the Great War, progress in the reclamation of humanity has been slow and the wasteland remains a radioactive and war-torn desert, where life itself is a struggle.
Notice, the description is grim, but the games themselves present themselves as a free world, almost cartoony in fashion.
Glowing Sea — Fallout 4 (2015)
Despite my hostility to those who worship Nuclear Holocaust, I understand the Escapist mindset, wanting to retreat to a world, even if fictional, to have a sense of ‘freedom’. However, people who do this are less likely to be radicalized, especially for the right reasons — as long as they are in that mindset of Escapist hedonism.
*Note that Hunger Games is set in a world likely caused by environmental disaster; not nuclear, but the message is still the same.
Followers of the Apocalypse
This method of commodification and presentation poses the largest threat because it has the ability to manipulate Primitivist and non-Primitivists alike into glorifying a certain outcome, distracted from the movement itself. It can even convince Primitivists to use the subject or the culture around it as a recruitment pool, as it presents a sort of quasi-consciousness as the culture grows.
Beware of this, for it also attracts a certain type of people to the anti-Tech movement, those who deal in idealism and worship a certain outcome, somewhat similar to mainstream anarcho-primitivists, who romanticize the Paleolithic.
While, in the future, we may be able to utilize certain fascinations or worldviews separate from our own to bring people into the fold, we should primarily be focused on agitation and raising stresses in society. Using a commodified concept like the Fallout series* is not going to help.
This means not using the culture around the franchise, nor appealing to the concept (surviving in overgrown cities of mutants and warring factions) as to recruit.
The culture around it is already an Escapist one, given the fictional nature and immersion principles of mainstream entertainment, but also, as mentioned earlier, people who are obsessed with this culture are already preoccupied with a sort of Hedonism.
The people we should ‘recruit’ (if that even is the word to use) are not those constantly trying to escape this world, but understand and confront it, and give them direction. Otherwise, our best options at this time are agitationand education.
*It should go without saying, I mean all mediums or franchises similar to this, such as Metro.
Fin
While many concepts were tackled, the short of it can best it can be simply put as not allowing the System (the growing World Society, Capitalism, Techno-Industrialism in most people’s cases) to appropriate or disfigure the movement. Going forward, as Primitivists gain more traction in society, the more the System will threaten us and turn the movement against itself.
In doing so, revolutionaries and thinkers must do their best to avoid the cesspool of mainstream Collapse culture and entertainment, as this will lead the movement to misdirection and total commodification, and soon enough, the movement will become pacified.
Uncivilized: Who We Are
Aug 9, 2019
An Introduction
Firstly, we aim to be Uncivilized and Unapologetic — meaning, we seek to deconstruct civilization on both a personal and social level, and fuck you if you want to stop us.
This project has roots in the Critical of Capital (CoC) Podcast, which was a Ultra/Post-leftist podcast designed by myself and Brady. Eventually, it faded, and from that, came the short-lived Wildness Collective (WC), a theory group of luddites, primitivists and co., also designed by Brady and I; but included several others.
Now, Uncivilized takes the best of both of these — public intrigue of CoC and theory creation of WC. We seek to agitate, entertain and serve as a place of education.
Mostly importantly, however, is community. In the coming weeks and months, we want to build a sense of unity, bond and trust between us here at Uncivilized, and you, the supporters. We want you to be uncivilized!
The message of Uncivilized
Where others either adopt the anarchist Utopian image or reject the label entirely, we seek a middle way — to make anarchism an identity that is anti-political and anti-technology. We believe one cannot be an anarchist and not reject technology. As others such as Ellul, Pealman and Kaczynski have shown: personal and local autonomy is not compatible with technology.
We are Luddites, Primitivists, Anti-Civilizationists and Post-Civilizationists.
We are Anti-Theists, Nihilists, Egoists and Materialists.
We do not preach a future, some specific worldview. Instead, we critique historical and contemporary attitudes and polices that have led us down this reckless path of ‘progress’.
What we do advocate for is a revolution, which, outlined in Industrial Society and Its Future and Anti-Tech Revolution: Why and How, may or may not be peaceful. We believe we must abandon, abolish and eradicate this system, and what comes next will be history for later generations.
Voice and Writing
Uncivilized will have two primary mediums. First being the podcast episodes seen on Youtube, with plans for platforms such as Soundcloud. This will be the primarily the work of Brady and I, with support from those behind the scenes. You should expect these to be more conversational, relaxed, yet still educational. Topics will range from relevant global events and specific topics (a global event may be a natural disaster, while a specific topic may be about revolutions).
Second, we will have the writing arm, here on Medium. Primarily, works here will be more theoretical and formal. Specific concepts will be explored at various levels of depth, and from different views, as our writing community grows.
We encourage submissions or requests to be featured here on the publication or on our podcast!*
* Not all submissions and requests are going to be approved, and such decisions will be handled behind the scenes.
The Future
Moving forward, both aspects of Uncivilized are excited for the prospects of personal and communal growth. We are also excited in hopes of working with similar projects and individuals, forming a larger network of anti-technological outlets.
For Wild Nature,
Sal Sobre La Heridas, Co-Founder and Chief Editor of Uncivilized
Manpower: Towards a New Anti-Technological Cause
Aug 23, 2019
Forward
The ideas put forth are not meant to be original. Many readers may claim most of the ideas such as the critique of Leftism is simply a reduced carbon-copy of Kaczyski’s Industrial Society and Its Future. This is largely true. The purpose of this work is to condense the ideas from Kaczyski and others into a more layman-friendly, print-out friendly piece. It is also a critique of ‘Neo-Luddism’, which I haven’t found outside of Techie criticisms.
In addition, the ideology presented below is a synthesis of philosophical anarchism or political nihilism, anarcho-primitivism and Kaczyski’s own anti-tech ideas. Thus, one may see a large collection of varying ideas. Eclectic is a term to use here.
For Wildness,
Sal Sobre La Heridas
Introduction
From the actions of the quasi-labor movements of the 19th century Luddites, to the 1970’s-1990’s radical anti-tech campaign of Theodore Kaczyski and the deceased anti-globalization movement; skepticism of the myth of progress has been present in the last few hundred years.
This skepticism has developed alongside the development of Industrial technologies such as mass communication and transportation, as well as surveillance systems and advanced weapons.
Now, as we are reaching a tipping-point of environmental sustainability and mass violence, the ‘luddite’ movement can be argued to have stagnated. It has maintained reformist attitudes, concerned more with liberal environmental issues and socialist-labor rhetoric. This is Neo-Luddism.
Such a source of these attitudes is Chellis Glendinning’s Notes toward a Neo-Luddite Manifesto, published in 1990. The content is a fair analysis of the reality of the old Luddite’s goals: concerned more with “hurtful” technology and free-market capitalism. In addition, Glendinning puts forth a program in which technologies of our time should be rejected: television; nuclear, chemical, genetic, electro-magnetic and computer technologies.
I agree these technologies should be rejected, but this shows Glendinning and the old Luddites were concerned more with certain technologies rather than the basis of the larger issues themselves: the whole of the present technological and economic system of their (and our) time.
The reality is, we must object, in a revolutionary manner, all Industrial technologies. Such a view means a break with ‘Neo-Luddism’. Neo-Luddites are again, reformists and labor activists. The Social Democrats of technology.
A New Ideology
Anti-Technology (Anti-Technologist, Anti-Tech) is a reaction to two main components of society: the basis of present society, technological and economic advances (the totality of modern civilization) and the failed reactions to it. Such failed reactions are anarcho-primitivism, neo-luddism and radical environmentalism.
If Anti-Tech shares ideas with these groups, what are those ideas?
Anti-Technology rejects technology for reasons such as the centralization of power into the hands of a technocratic class (beyond the bourgeoisie), environmental degradation, the removal of individual and small group autonomy and dignity.
The details have been laid out from works of individuals such as Jacques Ellul, Theodore Kaczyski, Edward Abbey and organizations such as the early EarthFirst! movement.
Unlike Neo-Luddism, Anti-Tech rejects all technology, in the sense of industrial technologies. Many within AP would like a total return to a non-civilized way of life, but such a goal is idealistic, as after the collapse of world-wide industry, history will not be guided by revolutionaries.
As such, Anti-Tech creates a revolutionary value system based on the rejection of industrial technology, and the exalting of ecological systems outside of systematic human control (Wild Nature), community, self-reliance and dignity.
This is where the largest divide of Anti-Technology and Neo-Luddism is. The Neo-Luddites want to keep industrial society within a framework, based on communal and organic design.
Anti-Tech, however, wishes to see a sort of ‘collapse’ of techno-industrialism, meaning all technologies based on the principles and developments from the Industrial Revolution, on a global scale.
Anti-Technologists should question the legitimacy of the state, morality, ideology and mass-economics, all in addition to the core critique of techno-industrial society and civilization.
This is because we push for the highest state of personal autonomy, or in the least, giving people a chance to find it. Post-Collapse, the power of states, churches and other large institutions will be severely weakened.
We can be described as anarchists, populists, nihilists, primitivists (in the general use of the term) but people will choose to use or not to use these secondary-labels, as Anti-Technologist should come first. (For example, the author of this uses all previously listed labels as complementary to Anti-Tech.)
Activism or Revolution?
Despite the similar surface-level goals of Anarcho-Primitivism (AP) and Anti-Tech, AP is concerned more with non-revolutionary politics. It is a programme for activism, for the sake of activism. It has more in common with political Leftism than a truly revolutionary movement that seeks the goals AP claims to uphold. In fact, it more concerned with these ideas than the collapse of industry or civilization!
Political Leftism, in the Western sense, is a programme of activism: gay rights, animal rights, women’s rights and other such movements. Interestingly, many leftists do not fit into these groups, and seek to ‘protect’ them. They align with these groups as long as it is in their political interests.
Should a gay-man not align with a Leftist, the Leftist becomes frustrated, because in their eyes, the gay-man belongs to their movement. He is a token marginalized person of the Left. The Leftist does not believe the gay-man can help himself.
When a marginalized person or group does not align with Leftism, or specific Leftist movements (say, Marxism-Leninism), the Leftist will become hostile and reject that individual or group. They may call them Uncle-Toms or self-hating, when in reality, the Leftist is self-hating, or hating of others.
Activism for the sake of activism, best put as reformism (usually social or basic economic reforms such as gay marriage and universal healthcare), takes away from revolutionary potential. Some may argue it serves as a breeding pool of revolutionary potential and values, but this is uncommon at best and ahistorical at worst. For example, the Bolsevhik’s reformist policies came from pre-developed revolutionary notions, as a means to an end.
However, reformism, either for the sake of, or for a means to an end, is not suited for the purposes of Anti-Tech.
This is because we are not seeking seats in the government, nor a revolution to seize it. We are not revolting to embrace a global communist society, nor enforcing some ‘green radicalism. There is no Anti-Tech Party.
Our goal, as stated above is simply: the abolition of the present technological and economic system, a rebellion against modern civilization
Anti-Technologists, then, should avoid such activism. Not because we don’t believe gay men and women, animals, trans-people and people of color don’t deserve the same respect as others, but because such activism does not suit the purposes of an anti-technological revolution.
Reject The Dichotomy
The sins of the Left does not absolve the Right. The Right is dogmatic, hypocritical and equally hating of others. When their idealistic vision of the world is questioned, they become frustrated, too. They want medical and communicative technologies and economic growth. But they also want tradition. You cannot maintain your nation’s or tribe’s traditions while pushing for technological and economic growth.
Both the Left and the Right are assimilative programmes. As with the current technological and economic system, we should also reject political ideologies of Left and Right. Not in the way fascists are a ‘third-way’, but we call for a full break from such thinking.
In other words: Reject the dichotomy, fight for autonomy.
The (Expansive) Nature of Technology
Neo-Luddism and AP are often subject to the irrational conclusion that technology is unnatural, which in the following section, we will discuss.
(See Ted Kaczynski’s Why the Technological System Will Destroy Itself for a deeper exploration of the following ideas).
The nature of technology is simply that: a nature. It has functions that are defined by itself, and functions that are influenced by other factors such as the material conditions around it. Very similar to biological organisms like Humans.
Technology, say for example, like capital, is an expanding force. It seeks, by its non-sentient nature, to expand and solve its contradictions. It is a technical evolution, per say. The evolutionary capability of technology does not come from its physical, mechanical aspects. Rather, it comes from two reasons:
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The development and usage of technologies by institutions (ie, states or corporations)
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The ideas and social attitudes (myth of progress, rationalization)
1, expanded- If industrial technology was not an efficient method of production, transportation and warfare, it would not be used. It would be weeded out by social evolution, replaced by another system, or perhaps no system may have come close.
2, expanded — Glendinning does put quite well in her manifesto that: “As philosopher Lewis Mumford pointed out, technology consists of more than machines. It includes the techniques of operation and the social organizations that make a particular machine workable. In essence, a technology reflects a worldview. Which particular forms of technology — machines, techniques, and social organizations — are spawned by a particular worldview depends on its perception of life, death, human potential, and the relationship of humans to one another and to nature.” For the same reason as point a, if these industrial technology proved unfit to uphold these ideas, it would be rooted out by another system.
These reasons don’t show just the ways technology is able to be developed and grow, but it also serves to benefit the reasons. What I mean is that because technology proved efficient for warfare, it allowed advanced militaries to win, and expand, improving their systems as others rose to challenge them. The same can be said for the worldview of progress and rationalism- such ideas influenced the creation of industrial technologies, and those technologies expanded those ideas.
The technological-system and its development can then be understood to be a sort of evolution, as mentioned earlier, placed under evolutionary pressure and forced to adapt, as a biological species would. This is not a conscious choice on the part of the system, just as the evolution to grow legs was not intended by the animals who left the seas.
As such, the development of the system of industrial technology is a natural occurrence of social evolution.
The Bureaucracy of Technology
The Industrial Revolution can be best understood as a factory revolution, based on rationalization, a term we will use often here.
It is best we describe it now:
Rationalization is the method of social and technical organization that places emphasis on: efficiency, predictability, calculability and dehumanization. Such an idea first came from Max Weber, and later expanded upon by thinkers within the Marxian field such as Adorno and Lukács.
Because technology requires and also reinforces a culture of rationality, in the sense we used above, it does so too with bureaucracy.
Weber went to explain how such an organizational discipline emphasizes the need of bureaucracy:
“It is horrible to think that the world could one day be filled with nothing but those little cogs, little men clinging to little jobs and striving towards bigger ones — a state of affairs which is to be seen once more, as in the Egyptian records, playing an ever-increasing part in the spirit of our present administrative system, and especially of its offspring, the students. This passion for bureaucracy … is enough to drive one to despair. It is as if in politics … we were deliberately to become men who need “order” and nothing but order, become nervous and cowardly if for one moment this order wavers, and helpless if they are torn away from their total incorporation in it. That the world should know no men but these: it is such an evolution that we are already caught up, and the great question is, therefore, not how we can promote and hasten it, but what can we oppose to this machinery in order to keep a portion of mankind free from this parcelling-out of the soul, from this supreme mastery of the bureaucratic way of life.”
For this society to function (which has existed and does now), a knowledgeable group of technicians (those from engineers, programmers, certain politicians and benefactors and so on) must exist to keep the system running, creating dependency on that singular group. A dependency on such a group creates the cog in the machine social order.
Of course, the cog in the machine concept raised here by Weber is one of the greatest examples of the removal of individual dignity. The whole array of technologies and the present economic system could simply not operate if we were to return to an artisan-based society.
What we are speaking on here is not just a political-bureaucracy, but a social-bureaucracy, a fixed state of the individual, bound up in the larger society. And as we have explained above, it is always expanding, meaning, there are less and less places to hide.
This is not to say bureaucracy did not exist before the industrial revolution, but since then, individuals and small-groups are more easily subject to scrutiny from larger organizations, bureaucracy and political leaders. Such methods would include expansive prisons, surveillance systems such as street cameras, and online-monitoring.
Corporations, governments and other organizations (scientific, data collecting, advertising, etc) all take advantage of these processes. Where governments can track our personal experiences, corporations and advertising firms can capitalize on it, for example.
It is also unreasonable to hope all citizens can learn and maintain proper security culture, online and when unplugged. This is because effective methods take dedication and mindfulness and a larger (but perhaps growing?) population do not immediately see the need for such personal security.
‘Socialized Technology’
Much of the concerns raised can be attributed to current applications of technology, not possible future ones. Communists may raise concerns that industry, capital, commodity production, class societies are the issues — not technology.
While it is true that technology may look radically different under Communism, it is faulty to assume we will know for certain, the functions of such an expansive system.
We can frame it in a way Communists will likely agree with: movements that simply restructure or reorganize capital are not truly revolutionary. The movement may alter the expression of capital, allow it to reorganize and generalize, but it is fundamentally the same.
The same can be said for technology — a restructuring of the system does not necessarily change the system’s basic properties. Expansion is the largest threat of the system, and perhaps communism, after eliminating the contradictions of producers (proletariat) and exploiters (bourgeoisie), the system may find new ways to expand even faster. It is also possible that after eliminating the profit-motive, technologies may generally speaking, become eco-friendly. Still, we cannot guarantee that outcome and ecological damage is only a part of the larger puzzle.
Who Is The Revolution?
No movement ever succeeded without support from a dedicated and motivated ‘base’, the larger support, either from fully-formed members or supporters within the masses. These values also should extend to the core, the professional and leading revolutionaries. They should also exemplify values of discipline, unity, dedication, pragmatism, and most importantly, they should be inspiring.
The movement needs to develop where the pains of society are most felt, and apply itself to those conditions. The lumpenproletariat (vagabonds, criminals, prostitutes- as Marx put it), those living in ‘ghettos’ or slums, the underpaid factory worker, the illegal immigrant -those living in the ‘shadow’ of progress.
This is not the White Savior complex in the way Modern Leftists are paragons of false virtue for marginalized groups, but in the way Lenin and Bakunin preached the downtrodden are capable of the highest consciousness.
The privileged bourgeois-minded college kid is not as likely to be committed to these ideas, but only appear to be so. (Not to say some bourgeois-minded people won’t be useful in their own way.)
Bakunin said of such lower members of society:
that eternal ‘meat’, […] that great rabble of the people (underdogs, ‘dregs of society’) ordinarily designated by Marx and Engels in the picturesque and contemptuous phrase lumpenproletariat. I have in mind the ‘riffraff’, that ‘rabble’ almost unpolluted by bourgeois civilization, which carries in its inner being and in its aspirations […] all the seeds of the socialism of the future…
Of course, we do not claim hold on a socialist future, but rather no future at all, a negation of progress!
Water Seeds, Build Revolutionaries
Early revolutionaries, those who are likely to form the ‘core’ of the movement- the leaders and major theorists, need to apply themselves to local communities. This means spending time in places that may be alien to them, such as ‘slums’ or ‘ghettos’ and put aside one’s personal opinions of the locale and the people who live there.
(In reality, if you are repulsed by the people and not the conditions or the larger issues that put them there- you are not wanted in this movement.)
Such starting points may differ, depending on your geography and audience, but you are not there to save anyone, you are there to make revolutionaries, to be the gardener of the seed that is in many of them: that of revolution.
Primarily, the ‘riffraff’ and ‘rabble’ struggle to stay above just surviving, and many struggle to even make it there. Giving them the resources to build and tend gardens, create community watchmen and so on will allow the revolutionaries an audience. The movement is built, off the shoulders off a beneficial relationship.
I feel the need to say this again: You are not here to save anyone.
You are here to guide, and make revolutionaries. Direct their anger, primarily away from ‘pseudo-issues’ such as immigration, or the liberal-conservative divide. Instead, their minds and hearts should be directed towards techno-industrial society.
Online ‘activism’, such as debates are no use to us. The major use of the internet should be publications and research, nothing more.
Revolutionary Philosophy And Organization
All actions in the name of the movement, within these local communities and abroad, will alter and manifest as the revolutionaries learn from experience.
In the words of Edward Abbey in his work, The Monkey Wrench Gang, “We’ll work it out as we go along. Let our practice form our doctrine, thus ensuring precise theoretical coherence” (pg 69).
That being said, should future revolutionaries find what has been laid out above does not manifest in creating revolutionary actions and values, it should be discarded, either in bits or in whole.
On a personal level, The Revolutionary Catechism by Sergey Nechayev (1869) should be of heavy influence to members of the movement, especially the ‘core’ group, the leaders. It outlines, in simple terms, that a revolutionary’s primary concern be the revolution itself, becoming almost a manifestation of the movement itself. Nechayev believed the Church, State, etc., operated with violence and amoral character, and to fight these institutions, a revolution should act in the same way to negate these larger forces. We apply the same logic to the Techno-Industrial system.
The movement’s conception of organization should take from Lenin, Stalin and Mao’s concepts of party organization and philosophy, ie Vanguardism and Democratic Centralism. To save time, below are listed works that serve as good introductions to the idea of party organization and discipline:
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Lenin’s What Is To Be Done (1901)
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Lenin’s Freedom to Criticize and Unity of Action (1906)
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Chapters VII and VIII of Stalin’s Foundations of Leninism (1953)
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Mao’s Combat Liberalism (1937)
It should be noted that, just because we find inspiration in the ideas of Communists does not mean we agree with their overall ideology (ie, Marxism and Marxism-Leninism) or actions done in the name of those ideologies. However, we have found that the organizational and disciplinary theories from these leaders were effective in achieving primary, first goals.
Again, if future revolutionaries find these organizational ideas are not effective, they should be discarded. It is likely we will have to adapt or completely rework our organization, but what was laid out above gives the movement a basic framework, in which to operate from.
A Final Note
The term ‘Anti-Tech’ (or the other forms we find it used above) is also used by Kaczynki, but we extend the critique in a more open manner against civilization and metaphysical enslavement (ie, religion, moralism, the state) in ways that compliment the goals at large.
We understand people who have identified with this label before us may not totally agree with our message and expansion of the definition. In all seriousness, we don’t care. A label is simply an identifier, and drama around the title is a waste of breath, and obsession over finding a new label is an equal waste of time. Should, down the line, the title of this ideology or any breakaway ideology change, so be it.
This may be a piece I revisit in the future, as the movement and myself evolve. By all means, I am open to criticism on the points presented, especially about organization and philosophy.
I have also chosen to not write in detail, the future of the movement’s actions, because I cannot control it, and revolutions are rarely, if at all, subject to predictable cause-and-effect decisions. This is one major issue I see with Kaczynski’s idea of revolution, even if I agree with the larger premises he has laid out.
Such ideas I do agree with are that the system will not likely collapse on its own any time soon, nor will it collapse because of purely revolutionary action. Instead, revolutionaries need to keep a keen eye out for weaknesses, or where the system is struggling. At this point, revolutionaries need to be ready and motivated to kick the legs out from under the system, be it communication systems, power-plants, etc.
I want to thank those who looked over this piece for conceptual and logical errors. I have abstained from fixing a majority of the finer grammatical errors, because in my mind, I want the piece to look friendly, and readable, and I was much less concerned with the grammatical errors, within reason, of course.
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Also, Medium’s formatting sucks, I apologize.
Regional Collapse, Regional Liberation
Sep 27, 2019
or: The Primitivist Theory of Combined & Uneven Development
Introduction
The spread of Capitalism and Industrialism was predominantly a ‘Western’ phenomenon, which slowly disseminated among the world through trade, and colonial and imperial relations.
The centers of industrial-economics, or the First World, outsources the process of primary industry — the extraction and collection of natural resources to the Third World. The First World then takes this industry and turns it into secondary industry — the goods themselves- manufacturing.
With the expansion of decentralized production, we see a more efficient system of the development of technologies and general goods in the First World, while the Third World provides the basis for that system. It is no secret that the Third World is under the systems of neo-colonialism and imperialism, their labor and resources extracted at an unfair, and uneven rate. This creates a hierarchical system of power, creating an interesting situation in the fight against Industry: If civilization and industry did not come across the world evenly, then we cannot expect the collapse to act in such a linear, immediate manner.
Historical Precedence
In the words of Leon Trotsky, “…[T]he entire history of mankind is governed by the law of uneven development.” Trotsky saw development as uneven, meaning the world does not progress at the same pace, either through economic developments or cultural norms. It also would include secondary characteristics such as population density.
Even within a single state, we can see developments that do not progress equally. The greatest example is the North-South divide of the United States. Where the North embraced and grew under the Industrial Revolution, limiting the need for slave labor, in exchange for a wage system; the South kept a primarily agrarian economy, relying more so on slave labor and plantation systems.
However, the North and South were of course not isolated from one another, but had constant relations, positive and negative. The North was able to finance their industrialization through taxes on imports, many of which impacted the South more so than the North.
Besides the North favoring an industrial, free-market economy, and the South’s preference of agrarian slavery; the cityscape and transportation methods were vastly different, due to the factors of economic differences.
Industrialism allowed the North to enlarge their urban areas. The North’s largest cities in 1860 were New York City and Philadelphia, whose populations were roughly 813,669 and 565,529, respectively. Contrast this to the South in the same year, whose largest cities were New Orleans and Charleston, with populations at 168,675 and 40,522, respectively. The North’s two largest cities as listed alone added to 1,379,198 and the South’s added only to 209,197. Only one-tenth of Southerners lived in urban areas, while the North held one-quarter in their urban areas.
I found some varying reports on this information, but this seemed the most consistent— from battlefields.org
The North also held over 7/10ths of all railroads, allowing a growing effective method transportation of both people and goods. This also served important during the Civil War. In contrast, the South utilized horse-drawn carriages and steamboats more often.
Perhaps another example of this theory of development can be shown, but more on the side of ‘combined’ rather than ‘uneven’. For this, I will cite two passages from Trotsky, the main proponent of the theory:
“The meagerness not only of Russian feudalism, but of all the old Russian history, finds its most depressing expression in the absence of real mediaeval cities as centres of commerce and craft. Handicraft did not succeed in Russia in separating itself from agriculture, but preserved its character of home industry. The old Russian cities were commercial, administrative, military and manorial — centres of consumption, consequently, not of production.. Even Novgorod, similar to Hansa and not subdued by the Tartars, was only a commercial, and not an industrial city. True, the distribution of the peasant industries over various districts created a demand for trade mediation on a large scale. But nomad traders could not possibly occupy that place in social life which belonged in the West to the craft-guild and merchant-industrial petty and middle bourgeoisie, inseparably bound up with its peasant environment. The chief roads of Russian trade, moreover, led across the border, thus from time immemorial giving the leadership to foreign commercial capital, and imparting a semi-colonial character to the whole process, in which the Russian trader was a mediator between the Western cities and the Russian villages. This kind of economic relation developed further during the epoch of Russian capitalism and found its extreme expression in the imperialist war[…] The law of combined development reveals itself most indubitably, however, in the history and character of Russian industry. Arising late, Russian industry did not repeat the development of the advanced countries, but inserted itself into this development, adapting their latest achievements to its own backwardness. Just as the economic evolution of Russia as a whole skipped over the epoch of craft-guilds and manufacture, so also the separate branches of industry made a series of special leaps over technical productive stages that had been measured in the West by decades. Thanks to this, Russian industry developed at certain periods with extraordinary speed. Between the first revolution and the war, industrial production in Russia approximately doubled. This has seemed to certain Russian historians a sufficient basis for concluding that “we must abandon the legend of backwardness and slow growth.” In reality the possibility of this swift growth was determined by that very backwardness which, alas, continued not only up to the moment of liquidation of the old Russia, but as her legacy up to the present day.”
As Trotsky explained, Russia’s unique development was largely due to Russia’s relation to Western Europe through foreign financing, which can be seen as a growth retarder and a semi-colonial oppression. This led to a mix of Russia’s ‘backwardness’ (feudal relations) and industry (from the West). It did not develop on its own, but rather, was inserted into its condition, as Trotsky stated.
Interestingly, the United States also had its own combined development, as it had skipped the stage of feudalism. Instead, it was born among competing Western nations, predominantly France and Britain in the later years. While it did begin mostly as an agrarian nation, it did not have the ‘tributary’ aspects of Feudalism. This may be an explanation for the North-South economic divide. Also, the historically large amount of slave labor, shared by the North and South, may have also been caused by this — as it had not developed its own cultural economic identity.
Compressions and Descalings
The progression of technology and culture has not developed on a linear path, but rather a complex series of ‘compressions’ and ‘descalings’. A compression (or acceleration) is seen in developing countries’ pseudo-industrial developments paired with their more tribal or primitive social organization. A descaling is more in-line with the fall of political, economic and/or technological capabilities of the post-Soviet states.
Compressions and Descalings can come in different intensities. For example, the descalings of the post-Soviet states is hardly comparable to the situation in which Western Rome fell into smaller Nation-States. The Soviet Union, under the NEP and the 5-year plans of Lenin and Stalin respectively, accelerated scientific; technological; agricultural; and cultural developments under the influence of their respective systems, but also due to relations to other countries. The Soviet Union, despite holding contrarian ideology, held trade and service relations to countries like the United States, Canada and Western Europe. This could include bartering products, hiring foreign construction and engineering firms, and standard credit/cash-for-product trade.
These relations, especially under the first two 5-Year plans between 1928–1937, compressed or rather, accelerated the Soviet industrial system.
Exploitation
While the Soviet Union benefited heavily from these accelerations, other countries do not. Russia before the Bolsheviks had a semi-colonial relation to Western Europe; today, areas of Asia, South America and Africa have similar relations to pre-Bolshevik Russia. It creates a culture where these developing, exploited countries are “inserted…into this development, adapting [the West’s] latest achievements to its own backwardness.”
These countries are victims of exploitation such as neo-colonialism and imperialism. They are given foreign aid; machinery; and corporate and political influence from the West only as long as they use it to benefit their oh so benevolent benefactors.
With the growing environmental crisis, there will be a larger and larger cause for ‘green’ and ‘sustainable’ technology. Such issues from this includes the health issues from producing Silicon, impacting both miners and the environment. Silicon is currently the most popular material in Solar Cells.
But health issues are the least of our worries, especially in the developed world, where health and work codes are most advanced. Istead, it is the Developing World — where the highest price has been paid for humanity’s rare mineral addiction.
Take the Democratic Republic of Congo, where 60% of cobalt, a material popular in batteries. Excessive human rights abuses, child labor and environmental negligence have been birthed by the growing market for cobalt, especially under the guise of electric vehicles. Colton’s main producers are Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Nigeria, Brazil and China, and this production has constantly stirred what can be called ‘Colton Ethics’. Almost all the listed countries have been accused of human rights and child labor abuse, either in the extraction or processing of the materials, according to the ILRF. Colton of course is used primarily in smartphones and computers, a large ‘necessity’ in today’s day-to-day life.
Copper and cobalt mine, DRC
Many companies like Apple only temporarily ceased buying materials from countries like Democratic Republic of Congo after large report of ‘slave conditions’ was released in 2016 and 2017, despite smaller reports repeating the same horrid information years prior. Apple has even moved to purchase those materials from China, despite having their own disastrous human-rights and ecological issues. China even has their hands in the DRC, so this is more a round-about purchase than benevolent market decisions on the side of Apple and others. So evidently, this growing Green Revolution is not as sustainable as one may believe.
Some may make the case for Socialist or Communist relations as a solution to this exploitation, but there simply is a lack of evidence to show the end of capital is the end of all exploitation. Citing Marx and Co. as prophets is only an appeal to authority, not an analysis of previous socialist experiments or ‘post-Socialist’ states.
Regional Collapse
The above mentioned information may very well seem irrelevant to the Primitivist movement, and more in line with Communist rhetoric, and this is true. Most talk of exploitation is associated with a critique of class society than technology, unless it means as a general rule of thumb of the common person.
However, this does not mean we cannot adopt Communist analysis for our means. It also gives us the basis of a more realistic analysis. Where many Primitivists (such as Kaczynski) see a total collapse (either quickly or over a period of time) as feasible, other Primitivists such as myself and Jacobi instead push for the idea of “regional collapse.”
This is not to say we dismiss the idea of a total civilizational collapse, or don’t want it, but we don’t see it as necessarily realistic. If we understand the rise of civilization, agriculture, capital and technology as uneven, and sometimes in completely isolated areas, how can we expect the collapse of industrial / world society to be some sort of global apocalypse? We can’t.
While globalism expands via increasingly effective methods of travel and communication, we may very well see domino effects — a truly crippling strike can indeed cause a rapid collapse, but an apocalyptic worldview is more cinematic than realistic. The timescale of such a collapse will indeed be quick in a historical sense. For example, Rome’s collapse was a collection of mass diseases, financial issues, infighting for power, incompetent leaders and a total complexity that far outweighed any available energy (food, manpower, technology). These collective issues spanned almost 300 years until Rome’s total collapse between 476–480.
By regional collapse, we essentially mean regions of varying sizes and cultural diversity will see localized movements against industrial / world society. These movements may or may not share our ideological views. But, whether or not they mean to, they are fighting against industrial/world Society. Religious fundamentalism, tribal conflict against larger nations and so forth are examples. This method of revolution, of course, is a sort of balkanization.
We can see inspiration in movements that base their seizure of power through balkanization, such as the Zaptasitas. In the words of John Jacobi:
The Zapatistas, of course, are the most obvious example of the latter. In the 90s they utilized new internet technologies and the political power of NGOs to win a sufficient amount of territory for their social ideals. They survive to this day, and have, in most respects, won. Not nearly enough to challenge industrial society, they are nevertheless representative of the kind of balkanization we should like to see in the future.
Furthermore, Jacobi said:
Even since 2001 there have been a number of revolutions, successful insurgent struggles, and related radical political events. That these are only regional supports the author’s contention that revolutionary struggle alone cannot solve the global ecological crisis, but there is no reason to dispose of regionally-confined revolutions as a tool in our toolkit. It is entirely feasible to imagine ecologically-based social transformation happening through a series of revolutions, just as Enlightenment ideas started in France, spread to the rest of Europe through Napoleon, and eventually made it to the New World with the American revolutionaries and Simon Bolivar.
And finally:
But if the preservation of traditional communities and the collapse of industrial infrastructure is to be assured, we will need tofigure out a wayto mobilize these regional phenomena for an offensive against industrial society.
These regional collapses or balkanizations are extreme examples of the above mentioned descalings, with massive implications in all regards. What is needed is a mobilization and critical support of these movements under our ideological framework. What these specifics will be, are beyond us at this time.
In addition, the continued exploitation, unless solved in the near future, will continue to create situations of conflict, mostly those with many parties involved, and with new rules of engagement.
Jean Baudrillard best put this as, “Today’s terrorism is not the product of a traditional history of anarchism, nihilism, or fanaticism. It is instead the contemporary partner of globalization.”
Regional Liberation
With our proceeding statements of regional collapse, descalings and uneven development leading to exploitation, we have come to the last major point in this piece — our support for regional liberation. This has heavy similarities to the Leninist conception of National Liberation — where a nation has the right to fight against colonial or imperial powers in order to define their own destiny in terms of socialist development.
However, of course our support comes from challenging the stability of regions, economically and politically. With the rise of multi-party conflicts in exploited nations and semi-colonies, at home and abroad, there is a possible future of Primitivist support and even influence in these events.
Of course, not all regional movements will necessarily benefit us. However, tribal insurgencies, national movements, religious uprising, anti-Western demonstrations all are possible events in which we can place our critical support or even assert possible influence, either through a future, above ground movement; or disseminate our ideology through other, secret methods.
Typically the regional liberation side of balkanization will likely exist in the Developing world, or areas within developed nations that are ‘backwater’. For example, in China, the peasants stand in stark contrast to the urban centers. In America, share-cropping exists in its own contrast to Western development.
Otherwise, balkanization movements, either with politics that are Primitivist or not — will have their own reasons. These may be a result of political turmoil, desertification or other destabilizing events.
Our goal should be to bring these movements under a larger movement, or political identity. If not, our support for them will be crucial. Global crime, terrorism and war will be our situational allies. Paring with other political and/or religious radicals, and tribal or oppressed national groups, especially those already involved with their own conflicts, will be of good use in our toolkit.
Federation of American Scientists published a piece in 1996 titled ‘Global Organized Crime’ and the following selection makes an interesting point:
[…] Many terrorist groups that engage in violent acts are motivated by specific political causes, such as Egyptian Islamic Fundamentalist terrorists who use violent means to protest their country’s current government and Western influences, most organized crime groups are only interested in political power for the security it would provide their organization and are primarily motivated by money.
The international economic threat, posed by Global Organized Crime, in an increasingly global economy is among the major “new” threats to national security. The major economic powers and the less developed nations did not previously share a collective problem of this nature. Global Organized Crime does not just affect a select group of financial institutions or regional areas, it affects international financial networks and economies at a national level.
The author believed such Global Organized Crime threatens our global economy and political structures, global and national:
Transnational organized crime groups pose more of a threat to international financial markets as the world economy becomes increasingly interdependent. Laundering billions of dollars in organized crime money worsens national debt problems because the large sums of money are then lost as tax revenue to that country’s government.
Global Organized Crime can have a damaging effect on political structures, especially the fragile new systems of government found in the former communist or totalitarian regimes. South American drug cartels have a destabilizing effect on governments through their financial support of local guerilla rebels, such as the Sendero Luminoso in Peru and the Revolutionary Armed Forces in Columbia, who share their animosity toward the government and who exchange protection for money and arms supplies. The Sicilian Mafia have used their economic power over local businesses and banks and their supplies of cash to corrupt politicians, judges and Law Enforcement, assassinating many of those public figures who will not cooperate. Media polls indicate that the many Russians believe the “mafiya” is more powerful than the government. As people feel that the government is powerless to stop organized crime, they turn to crime leaders for protection and political institutions begin to deteriorate. Fear of organized crime undermines the credibility of political reform and may encourage support for anti-democratic, hardline politicians such as Russia’s Vladimir Zhirinovsky who promised during the 1993 campaign to end organized crime in 3 months through mass arrest and execution.
The global networks of criminals, terrorists and corrupt government officials and their complex methods of smuggling goods could easily be transferred to the smuggling of nuclear materials on a massive scale. While Global Organized Crime has become increasingly more involved in the transfer of arms, encouraged in part by conflicts in the Balkans and former Soviet Union which proved to be profitable for the Russian and Italian mafia, the smuggling of nuclear materials seems to be currently isolated to select incidents and mostly to amateurs. Russia no longer has the nuclear materials protection that it had during the Cold War when materials were controlled by a tight, centralized system under a politically powerful government. In the past year, the FBI has seized major shipments of nuclear materials in Eastern Europe, including large seizures of cesium in Lithuania and uranium in the Czech Republic. As Global Organized Crime groups become more powerful and as nuclear materials become more vulnerable (through poor management, underpaid desperate workers in the nuclear facilities, and government corruption) the threat becomes more serious.
International drug trafficking poses a threat to the social fabric of all countries. The increase in the scale of these operations has led to an increase in drug use, addiction, and general crime level. The common U.S.-Mexico border alone causes a tremendous increase in the American drug problem: 60–70% of cocaine in the U.S. enters at this border through a Mexican-Columbian organized crime partnership. Other European organized crime groups use this border to transport heroin, marijuana, and methamphetamine. It is becoming increasingly difficult to track the flow of narcotics into the United States as the drug cartel methods become more technically sophisticated: redesigning the interiors of Boeing 727s to hold maximum amounts of cocaine; transferring drug profits electronically to dozens of banks around the world in less than 24 hours; and using falsified export documents and invoices for goods in order to disguise drug trafficking transactions.
So not everyone who will be contributing to the balkanization of society will have ideological motivations: some will simply be in it for self-motivation, weather that be in relation to religious loyalties, or community, or money. But because these interests naturally clash with the dominant society, they function well as a source of radical political energy and potential.
A Final Note
While the above mentioned theories have basis in Marxist, Communist and Far-Left analysis, I by no means agree with their overall goals. Primitivism as a semi-coherent ideology is still young and absolutely should look to a plethora of other, history-tested ideologies to supplement itself.
As always, the ideas and theories presented here will continue to be tested as Primitivism spreads and is challenged. At no point will I ever imply my ideas are set in stone, or my theories are immortal. I hope for my ideas to be challenged, both in discourse and in action.
For Wildness,
Sal Sobre La Heridas
Violence and the Comanche People
Feb 3, 2020
No Noble Savage, No Hobbesian Barbarian
Recommended readings:
Future Primitive: Revisited by John Zerzan.
“Return of the Warrior” & “Atassa: Lessons of the Creek War (1813–1814)” essays in Atassa.
I
The view on violence, and its relation to the Human condition is a divisive one. Historically, the world-builders have believed Humanity is a violent species, greedy and prideful. They believed early, primitive humanity was in a state of barbarism. In the words of Hobbes, primitive life was, “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short” because individuals existed in a state of “..war of all against all.” In their own ahistorical understanding, the world-builders believed social contracts were formed, bringing about a more stable society, what we call civilization (especially in a Eurocentric understanding). Ironically, such stable societies have created, out of necessity, unique social regulators like ever growing laws and religious institutions (Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity, Islam..) that help us understand the human condition and keep the peace. See the Christian view:
For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.Mark 7: 21–23
However, there has been a tendency in anthropology circles since the 1960’s that has countered this view: That early Homos, since their split with their more violent Chimpanzee cousins, were an example of affluence, little to moderate violence, and social equity that stands in contrast to modern society. One pioneer of this anthropological revolution was/is Marshall Sahlins, with his work, The Original Affluent Society. We’ve also begun to understand since then, especially with the popularization of Marxian history, that mass societies were not a peaceful development, but one born from violence and coercion. Read The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State by Friedrich Engels. Even before this, there was Jean-Jacques Rousseau, ideological enemy to Hobbes who stated, “Man is born free and everywhere he is in chains.”
As the debate on violence continues, anti-civilization circles must try to break with the Noble Savage analysis, as seen in my Zerzan suggested reading; but take care not to be edgy contrarians and adopt the Hobbesian view, which is but a World-Builder ideology, one that comes through in the first suggested Atassa reading I have included.
There is instead, a ‘spectrum’ of sorts. It wasn’t that one day, groups of humans woke up with new views on violence and waged war for their neighbor’s land and trading materials; on the other hand, to believe humans are “naturally” and unconditionally peaceful is simply untrue. For example, the Comanche people were in near constant conflict (endemic conflict), but the values and goals represented what some like myself consider a middle-path of the development of mass-violence. For the bulk of this essay, we will examine the Comanche people and their relationship to violence in hopes of breaking from the dogmatic view of humanity’s capacity for violence.
II
The Comanche were a nomadic people, who lacked any true central governing body. Instead, they had ever developing ‘divisions’, which can be understood as affinity tribes. The divisions were largely built on common interests such as trade, peace-making, and war. The Comanche were reliant primarily on hunting, trading, and raiding. The hunting provided basic subsistence for them, as they were a nomadic people. To understand the importance of trading and raiding within the Comanche way of life, one must understand that the Comanche identity was based within horses, and thus, ventures of trade and raids centered on obtaining more horses.
One may argue then that wealth was the center of what violence the Comanche had initiated, but I’d argue differently. Wealth here was an individual’s wealth, and his prestige. In fact, a man’s wealth was often measured by the size of his horse herd, and young boys were even taught to ride before they could even walk — further showing the cultural and economic importance of the horse in the Comanche way of life. [1] It is important to also understand the horses’ relation to the male-female relations in the Comanche way of life, as it strengthened the division of labor. Women did not have access to horses, and already were confined to ‘home-life’ typical of institutional divisions of labor.
Wealth and the social view of greed in Comanche society was similar to many pre-agricultural societies, with a hoarding of most forms of wealth being looked down upon. Material wealth and other possessions were often discarded upon death of the owner, much like their neighbors, the Kiowa. [2] Not only this, but possessions were given up during a ‘Give-Away’ ritual, where a young man had his coming of age and was announced as a warrior. Members of the band would offer up most, if not all, of their own belongings to the larger community during these rituals. This was common across the Plains Indians, and could almost be considered a rule of thumb for all nomadic and semi-nomadic indigenous people of ‘America.’ [3]
It is important to understand the view of wealth in these societies, because of the actual use of it. Since horses were a tool for hunting, war, and travel, the wealth here is tangible and visible, it has human use. [4] It is not like the flow of Capital in our industrial era, which acts as a mediator of relations. Violence, then, is a way of accumulating wealth and possessions that had use-value. This is further supported in the specific case of the Comanche, who’s raids were almost entirely focused on obtaining horses, sometimes numbering in the hundreds. [5]
Another important note is that the accumulation of wealth here, that of a communal wealth, is not quite easy to compare to those of modern nations. The fluid change of hands, and use-values represent their own ends, while wealth accumulation is a means to mediation and representation of Capital in industrial nations.
However, we must note that this accumulation is also based in the domestication process. Were it not for horses, and the Comanche’s relation to other domesticators, logically their wealth and possessions would look radically different; more so comparable to hunter-gatherer proper, whose wealth was truly negligible. This is especially true with the growing trade with European powers. As their relation to the colonists grew, so did the Comanche range of influence. A self serving cycle.
III
The other point of violence to be discussed is one’s sense of identity. I don’t mean identity in some larger-than-life ethnic construction. What I mean is one’s identity in their day to day life, and their self-realization through communal life. This could manifest in conflict with other inidigenous peoples, but I wish to focus on their anti-colonial struggles, the Comanche Wars, specifically.
In defense of their way of life, and the corresponding natural terrain, the Comanche held the region commonly called Comancheria, Comanchería, or Nʉmʉnʉʉ Sookobitʉ (Comanche land). This region spanned a large portion of modern day New Mexico, west Texas, and parts of Colorado, Oklahoma and Kansas. Conflict was between the Comanche and Spanish, Mexicans and Americans, depending on the time. [6]
Interestingly, disease, at first, failed to weaken the Comanche forces, but groups like the Apache were hit hard, and this allowed the Comanche to expand influence over the region. Some have come to call this phenomenon empire building, which I disagree with on the basis they expanded not by conquest, but because competition had left, died off, or assimilated into the Comanche.
However, drought eventually began to weaken this ‘empire’, which had also begun to expand into Mexico for resources, specifically horses. With this drought, diseases finally began to overtake the Comanche people. This weakening prompted the local non-indigenous forces to attack. Fast moving raids on forts and settlements proved to be the Comanchean solution. Assisted by horses, they began to be seen as the strongest cavalry in the world, and gained the title of “Lords of the Plains.” One such raid was the Fort Parker Massacre, where Comanche and allied indigenous peoples attacked a pioneer family, the Parkers. Several children were taken and either sold or assimilated into Comanchean culture. The most famous, Cynthia Ann Parker, a nine-year old girl was taken into her captors’ culture. There, she lived with them for 25 years and married to Peta Nocona, a chief of the Nokoni band.[7]
With Peta, Cynthia produced three children, one of them being the last chief before the Comanche were placed into reservations. She was brought back to Anglo society after her band was attacked by United States Texas Rangers. She even attempted to return to the Comanche years later, but was brought back to her home. She failed to reintegrate and eventually died of self-induced starvation after her daughter passed of influenza. [8]
There is much to be said of Cynthia choosing to live among the Comanche, and grieving the times long past, failing to return to her parent culture in a healthy way. She was not the only one of this case, and her brother had a similar fate. [9]
Returning to the main point: in fact of extinction, or assimilation, the Comanche chose conflict, violence against pioneers who encroached on their land. In what may be seen as hypocrisy, Comanche continued to trade with any and all who would benefit them, even if some of the population (Divisions) were at war with their trading partners. However, an interesting point can be made on this observation: the reason the Comanche never developed mass society and through this, mass violence, was because their culture lacked any concrete central governing body to represent the whole of the people. Instead, the Divisions, these affinity tribes, functioned by common interest, not coercion.
IV
What does this rambling history lesson mean for the anti-civilization, eco-extremist, primitivist milieu? Not much, if one continues to believe violence is a law of civilization alone. It also will mean something radically different for those who perhaps worship, or revere violence (see the first Atassa recommended reading). I hope that these circles embrace a more nuanced understanding of violence beyond the typical Leftist “class war.”
Phenomenologically speaking, war of pacification and assimilation, ie, violence by the State, or within a larger framework of what we call (industrial) civilization is radically different than “democratic” war of prestige and identity within tribal contexts. Individualist anarchism of Europe pioneered a sort of way of discerning violence of the individual and that of the State/Society, and perhaps we need to revisit that mentality in a 21st century anti-civilization context. I personally do not believe myself to be the one to define that, only to help begin the dialogue by analyzing historical trends of violence in relation to social structures.
~Sal Sobre La Heridas
Footnotes
Humanism and Misanthropy
Apr 7, 2020
Historical Relativism, Contradictions, Twin-Ideologies
For the sake of this piece, I mostly analyzed American humanization, because I know my audience is mostly of this history. Greek xenophobia, Christian missionaries, early agricultural ecocide are all examples of what I am discussing.
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What defines a Human? Is it a set of biological processes? Is it a cognitive ability? Perhaps it is a socio-economic and ecological relationship. We need to understand Humanization and Dehumanization (an idea I want to elaborate on in the future! )are historical processes and related to social relations.
The Three-Fifths Compromise is such an example of (De-)Humanization being a product of social relations. One is only considered a Human when it benefits a dominant social and economic class, or when Capital necessitates new labor.
Article I, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution states: Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons.
Other Persons were, of course, Slaves, African descendants or those only recently ripped from their Homeland. The reasoning was the South wished to count their slaves as citizens in order to gain pull in Congress, while the North wanted only to count Free Persons (including Free Africans). It made it so out of every 5 slaves, 3 were counted as Persons.
Turn the clock back to the original 13 Colonies, and see the requirements just to participate in the electoral system:
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Connecticut: an estate worth 40 shillings annually or £40 of personal property
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Delaware: fifty acres of land (twelve under cultivation) or £40 of personal property
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Georgia: fifty acres of land
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Maryland: fifty acres of land and £40 personal property
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Massachusetts Bay: an estate worth 40 shillings annually or £40 of personal property
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New Hampshire: £50 of personal property
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New Jersey: one-hundred acres of land, or real estate or personal property £50
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New York: £40 of personal property or ownership of land
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North Carolina: fifty acres of land
-
Pennsylvania: fifty acres of land or £50 of personal property
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Rhode Island and Providence Plantations: personal property worth £40 or yielding 50 shillings annually
-
South Carolina: one-hundred acres of land on which taxes were paid; or a town house or lot worth £60 on which taxes were paid; or payment of 10 shillings in taxes
-
Virginia: fifty acres of vacant land, twenty-fives acres of cultivated land, and a house twelve feet by twelve feet; or a town lot and a house twelve feet by twelve
Unlisted is the requirement of being a White Male (unlisted because the only way to fulfill these requirements was often to be a White Male). Only roughly 80 years later were all White Men allowed to vote, not restricted by access to capital. Voting laws have of course changed substantially since then, allowing (on paper) women, Asians, Africans, Indigenous people and others to vote. The voting age was also lowered from 21 to 18 due to the Vietnam War.
So, we can thus compare a Human, in the eyes of historic trends, as someone with a certain relation to social and economic relations. Another way to say this is a Human is one who has personhood in a social context. Personhood was expanded, generalized, to fit the needs of Capital, of Progress. The Leviathan demanded a larger and more modern workforce. However, of course, Slavery still exists in the prison system, especially the private prison system of America. The contradictions are innumerable.
If we can explain personhood through the lense of a material development, Humanism is but an ideological justification of these developments. It brings logic to a world individuals and groups have little sway over (Some may see what I am alluding to as Historical Materialism or Dialectical Materialism — I would agree. I have my disagreements and do not consider myself a Materialist, but I believe this is an effective method as to explain it simply).
Humanism is an approach to life based on reason and our common humanity, recognizing that moral values are properly founded on human nature and experience alone.
– The Bristol Humanist Group
The Bristol Humanist Group fails to see that human nature, and what even defines a Human, is often viewed through a historical bias, and subject to conditions often pervading individual agency. Humanism is a philosophy born to convince altruists that ‘Progress’ was a conscious ‘Human’ act.
Even more obvious, experience is a subjective, dynamic phenomenon. How can morality be probed through constantly changing experiences, of 7-billion individuals? We must decide all experiences may lead to vastly separate moral codes, thus negating the apparent usefulness of generalizing a moral code, that Humanism seeks to do; or that not all experiences are useful in creating such a code, leading to show how useless the analysis of ‘Humanity’ is. One can also elaborate on the problematic nature of this rationalistic utilitarianism and how we define ‘goodness,’ but I find there are many others who can better explain.
More simply put, perhaps to condense my rambling, Humanism fails to define a Human, and in trying, fails to see the historical relativism of such an object, falling into a hypocritical metaphysical mess, especially given Humanism, at large, is a secular venture.
As Julian Langer said (and I paraphrase), “Humanity is just a stereotype.”
And this leads to another critique….
That of Misanthropy. Followers of his trend fall into the same as Humanism, instead a love for ‘Humans’, it is a distrust or hatred. How can they hate what is relative and ever-evolving?
A misanthrope may have a rainbow of reasons for their hatred, but I’m targeting those who do so on the grounds of Wild Nature, Ecology, etc.
‘Eco-misanthropy.’
What does a Hunter-Gatherer in say the Amazon have in common with say, Jeff Bezos, or Ma Huateng? Little, when we use the logic of Humanity being a historically relative notion. This is especially true in terms of our ecological role.
Homo has its roots as seed-carrying forest dwellers, who, after several millennia, began to scavenge, then hunt. Their tools and ecological footprint developed alongside their role in their ecosystems (which quickly spread to a global scale). Then, skip ahead to a not so distant past, we see agricultural societies with wide stratification. After this, in a blink of an eye, industrial society, with its own wide ranging power dynamics. An African Farmer is not comparable to an Anglo Industrialist, even in the eyes of eco-misanthropes, if they wished to be logical.
Groups like ITS are misanthropes as they compare the Human with the Civilized, which itself reflects the same notion as the Human, becoming a point that just falls on its own face. Where do we draw the line on what is Civilized? A farmer, a landlord, an industrial worker, an industrial leader?
It becomes more difficult to confront when we see while one may be a ‘Human’ or ‘Civilized,’ but maintain ideas contrary to their own existence, much like a Colonizer who wishes to break down colonial power dynamics. Even still, this goes to show that ITS and other eco-misanthropes maintain a civilized ideology, generalizing groups on what are nothing but widely accepted stereotypes, ie upholding Humanism.
Re-reading this, I find some points lack a good flow between one another or I may have over and under explained certain ideas. Honestly, in the case of this piece, I find that excusable, given my targets are in their own ways, contradictory and far from nuanced.
Becoming. Wildness. Human/Inhuman. Badgers!
Jun 16, 2020
A review of the second editions of Feral Iconoclasm: Anarchy as Rising and Dying and Feral Consciousness: Deconstruction
Julian Langer is an author who is not easy to pin down. They are not the next great thinker of this generation of wild ones. They are not discovering new ideas. They are not superhuman. What Langer writes, what they seek to express are ideas we already know, and show us, is that we are more than ‘Human’, and have the ability to Become.
Linking ideas from Derrida, Deleuze, Althusser, and the likes of Freud and Lacan, Langer brings forth ideas that are actually unique, and in many ways, wild. In the foreword of Feral Iconoclasm: Anarchy as Rising and Dying, Langer writes, “…this book is overly wordy, intentionally confusing and is often indulgent.” I was skeptical of this, it made me nervous it could become some sort of pseudo-intellectual dribble.
I was wrong.
Feral Consciousness: Deconstruction of the Modern Myth and Return to the Woods and Feral Iconoclasm: Anarchy as Rising and Dying have been growing influences on me. My initial reading was scattered, confusing, and frustrating. Without much exposure to aforementioned thinkers, some of the ideas were seemingly inaccessible. What in the hell is this ‘becoming’ and every time I saw the word ‘ontology’ I initially cringed. However, when I stopped reading like I would read Marx or any other theorist, and more as a journal of an expressive mind, it all began to make sense. In fact, these works are majorly a critique of ideological thinking, and specifically that which denies its own ideological framing. Materialism, the Human concept, Civilization, Leviathan are not free of Langer’s feral criticism!
If you read Feral Consciousness and Feral Iconoclasm as doorways to self-evaluation and outwards critique, I believe you begin to read them as they were intended (if there ever was such a true matter of literary intent..). We must see these works as Langer’s way of expressing the wild impulses of individuals and affinities, and not as theoristic blueprints of so-called anarcho primitivism and collapse ideology (I’m looking at you, Ted.)
I can otherwise describe these works in comparison to the likes of Daniel Quinn’s Ishamel or Story of B and John Moore’s Beyond the Fragments: A Reaction to Industrial Society and Its Future. However, this would be unfair to Langer, and their uniqueness, their wild nature, and their project of becoming-more/less-than-human.
I’m likely rambling at this point, and this is not an orthodox way of reviewing a book, but Langer is not orthodox and would not warrant any sort of normalcy. In fact, they’d be offended if I tried!
I will leave this review with a quote from Feral Consciousness, as I feel it best describes these two works:
We can perhaps form the type of communities —
psychological and material — needed to survive what is
to come and, it is to be hoped, we can oppose the
violence and bring it down.
Let the mythologies of the left-right and authoritarian
libertarian political theologies die, and from their
carcasses a forest grow, in which entire communities
can form homes, and live their lives authentically
Locating a Green and Pink Anarchy
May 12, 2021
Some notes and thought
A very wonderfully done image. Another ideology-symbol for the internet!
When I say Anarchy, I do not mean a programme seeking to establish anarchism, but a realization of anarchy-as-negation. I speak of Anarchism-as-negation as a continual process of struggle against all that affronts us as individuals and friends, by which I mean society / civilization / leviathan / mass society / class society. Others, who say Anarchism, mean anarchism-as-affirmation, a future of establishments, often a Left-Anarchism, so to speak.
This is where Green and Pink meet. Green anarchy, or more specifically, anarchy that stands against Civilization, looks upon mass society as a collection of life-denying systems and techniques to be conquered and demolished. Pink anarchy, the insurrectionary mode of Queer expression, finds itself as the embodiment of the “Other,” a victim of oppression and marginalization, as brought on by mass society.
Both are Pariahs of so-called Anarchism. For example, Green Anarchists have been characterized as those “who sidetracked true anarchist goals,” and object to organization in favor of self-reliance and so-called lifestylism.[10]
Pink Anarchists too do not escape criticism from the Left-anarchists, who shout that queer folks are creating divisions and they must simply fight capitalism and establish communism to affirm their own rights and liberties.
On the criticism of organization, it is true that Green Anarchists reject organizations such as the platformist model or revolutionary unions, seeing them as institutions that recreate Death. As Perlman says, “Institutions are impersonal and immortal. They share this immortality with no living beings under the sun. Of course they are not living beings. They are segments of a carcass. Institutions are not a part of Life but a part of Death. And Death cannot die.”[11] Green Anarchists, dedicated to life-affirmation must, on principle, reject such relations as life-denying. We find our success in our individual disgust to the Leviathan just as much as we do in our coordinated response in affinity groups, which are but mortal, temporary associations. However, not every Green Anarchist is against certain formal organizations just as long as they serve immediate purposes and reject bureaucracy. If the aim is free association, the organization itself must act in such a way — our means must represent our ends. Diversity of tactics and organization is a key aspect of resistance. That said, we need no Vanguard! As per the criticism of side-tracking anarchist goals, so be it. If the Anarchist Revolution came tomorrow, we would not stop our resistance to their Leviathan, even if its flags are Black and Red. We need no Communes!
Pink / Queer Anarchists and other Insurrectionists reject their own assailaints’ criticisms as assimilationist lies that would continue to foster new communities on the outskirts, new queer identities to be othered. While Queer Anarchists do not sow divisions, choose their existence, they often revel in “the anti-social turn,” as Baedan puts it. The existence of society deems the necessity of Others, just as Fascism necessitates its ow enemy Others, who just so happen to often be Queer people. We do not want Trans Rights, Gay representatives, or diverse conscription into the anarchist verymuchnotapoliceforce milita. This would only serve to remove our individuality and assimilate us into the Leviathan, as well as create new Others, new Queer folks, to be attacked, as stated above. An Anarchist society is not free from the ever-hungry institutions! Queerness demands life-affirmation as the only alternatives are renunciation or death, or both. From the piece, Anti-Left Anarchy: Hunting Leftism with Intent to Kill, there is a similiar analysis of Green Anarchy that I find in my own understanding of Pink / Queer Anarchy:
All ideologies are straight jackets to the Free Spirit, but ideologies that don’t reflect the chaos, nonsensical whimsy, and maniacal laughter of life — like Leftism — are particularly boring impediments to the unrestrained expression of autonomous and uncivilized rebellion. Green Anarchy — or the critique of civilization — is class analysis that doesn’t go halfway, that doesn’t remain trapped in capitalist logic (as communism does), and that attacks alienation, domestication, and division of labor at their roots…their civilized roots. The Left is solidly embedded in the civilized order and as we struggle against this poisoned, horrible darkness that is dragging us towards universal collapse, it would behoove us to struggle with open eyes.[12]
The intersection between Green and Pink anarchy is simply that: anarchy, not anarchism; absolute negation with no interests in positive affirmations. To be queer and to be wild are one in the same, as they stand in contrast with societies, constantly outside of them as constantly changing “Others.”
This realization has already been found by the likes of Baedan and others before me. I am not providing anything new with my writing, but showing a more simple understanding that Green and Pink Anarchy are one in the same, fundamentally. Where before, and even today, many Leftists call for the unity of Red and Black, of Communists and Left-Anarchists, Anarchists should call for the unity of Green and Pink, of Wildness and Queerness.
___
Works Cited
Spare the Child: A primal anarchist view of how civilization breaks children
“The subtext of all of it is really that the worst civilization can do, it does to children.” — Kevin Tucke
Jul 21, 2021
“Distant view of Fort Qu’Appelle Indian Industrial School with tents, [Red River] carts and teepees outside the fence, Lebret, Saskatchewan, [May 1885?]. Image courtesy of Library and Archives Canada.” — irshdc
Children are born as individuals. Wild. Screaming. Emotional. Impulsive. They cry when exposed to this new world, and it helps them develop. They expand their lungs and expel all their mucus and other fluids. The children may not be fully aware of it, but they are born as unique and beautiful as any other. Their life has begun, and so has the attack by Civilization upon their uniqueness.
Jacques Camatte — still not fully appreciated in the many circles he has influence in — understands that children are domesticated, broken into submission. Camatte states Civilization needs repression in order to suit someone to the conditions of civilization. In particular, Camatte believed the parents, despite their confessed love of the child, repress her desires and ‘naturalness.’ By naturalness, I mean her instincts and impulsive behaviors not suited to the cold and unliving demands of Civilization. In addition to the suppression of these drives, the child has to cope with what has been done to her. A level of neurosis forms.*
Of course, this isn’t an attack on the role of the mother, father, and extended family as natural caretakers of the child. This abuse and repression was done onto the parents when they were children by Civilization, and they reproduce this onto their own child. Under Civilization, the parents become an authority, a home-bound domesticator. The parent instills social consciousness. In another context, this could be a consciousness of freedom and intimacy. In our context, it means submission and fear.
A recent 2020 study found:
Approximately one in four children experience child abuse or neglect in their lifetime. Of maltreated children, 18 percent are abused physically, 78 percent are neglected, and 9 percent are abused sexually. The fatality rate for child maltreatment is 2.2 per 1000 children annually, making homicide the second leading cause of death in children younger than age one. Exposure to violence during childhood can have lifelong health consequences, including poor physical, emotional, and mental health. 1
Risk factors provided by the study were, “Young age, prematurity, special needs, twins, colic/crying, behavior problems, and toilet training/accidents increase the risk for child physical abuse. Perpetrator risk factors include poverty, parental alcohol or drug abuse, and domestic violence in the home (30% to 60% co-occurrence); 91% of the time the perpetrator is a parent.”2
From the same study, “[S]tudies have found a quarter of all adults report enduring physical abuse as children. One in five females and one in 13 males report experiencing childhood sexual abuse. Emotional abuse and neglect are common. Females are especially vulnerable to sexual violence, exploitation, and abuse.” 3
How else can this be explained beyond pressures of raising a child under the conditions of Civilizations? The risk factors provided by the study are indicative of Civilization and the breakup of the communal family. When all life, including the basic components of survival, has become commodified, such abuse seems to become commonplace. When we (children or parent) are alienated from support channels, the risk of this abuse occurring and not being stopped is expected, too.
Of course, as one might imagine, this has worsened under the ongoing pandemic. Another study found that, “During the COVID-19 pandemic, the total number of emergency department visits related to child abuse and neglect decreased, but the percentage of such visits resulting in hospitalization increased, compared with 2019.” 4
The continued isolation, the most vulgar expression of our domesticated alienation, cannot help but worsen the issues we face in our everyday lives. The abuse of children is no exception. In addition, there has been a rise in domestic abuse, generally. A study titled, “Family violence and COVID‐19: Increased vulnerability and reduced options for support” confirms this:
As the novel coronavirus outbreak has intensified globally, countries are adopting dedicated measures to slow the spread of the virus through mitigation and containment (van Gelder et al. 2020; Campbell 2020). Social distancing and isolation are central to the public health strategy adopted by many countries, and in many settings, penalties are in place for any person who breaches these imposed restrictions. Social isolation requires families to remain in their homes resulting in intense and unrelieved contact as well as the depletion of existing support networks, such as through extended family as well as through social or community‐based support networks for families at risk. Additionally, isolation places children at greater risk of neglect as well as physical, emotional, sexual, and domestic abuse (National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children [NSPCC] 2020). Due to (necessary) imposed social distancing and isolation strategies, and the resulting shortages of essential resources and economic consequences of these measures, people globally are living under stressful conditions. While social isolation is an effective measure of infection control, it can lead to significant social, economic, and psychological consequences, which can be the catalyst for stress that can lead to violence.
[…]
Isolation paired with psychological and economic stressors accompanying the pandemic as well as potential increases in negative coping mechanisms (e.g. excessive alcohol consumption) can come together in a perfect storm to trigger an unprecedented wave of family violence (van Gelder et al. 2020). In Australia, as social distancing measures came into place, alcohol good sales rose more than 36% (Commonwealth Bank Group 2020), and as restaurants, bars, and pubs closed, people are now drinking more within the confines of their homes. Unemployment figures around the world have rapidly risen into the double digits, with millions signing up for welfare payments and a worldwide recession predicted in the near future (Kennedy 2020). Substance misuse, financial strain, and isolation are all well‐known domestic abuse risk factors (Richards 2009). During isolation, there are also fewer opportunities for people living with family violence to call for help. Isolation also helps to keep the abuse hidden with physical or emotional signs of family violence and abuse less visible to others (Stark 2009). 5
Such abuse is not limited to the household, but unfortunately extends to all of the world. Schools are a place where children spend most of their waking hours, and are exposed to increased possibilities of abuse. concluding thoughts of a relevant study by NHERI were that there was a “remarkable rate of abuse of U.S. schoolchildren by school personnel (e.g., teachers, coaches, bus drivers, administrators, custodians).” The study also attributed that the many regulations and policies not only did not prevent the abuse, but contributed to the lack of reporting. 6 In particular, there was an increase of more than 50% pertaining to reported sexual violence at schools (“9,600 in the 2015–2016 school year to nearly 15,000 in the 2017–2018 school year”). 7
School, be it public or private, makes good captives, not individuals. Just as the Worker is abused, so is the child. There is no coincidence that while the Worker is the prisoner of labor, the Child-Student is the prisoner of education. (There is a joke about Foucault here, probably.) It is also no coincidence that the infamous zero tolerance policies are major contributors to the school-to-prison pipeline. 8
The Church is another location of abuse and domestication. T When I say the Church, I mean the Christian Church as a whole, from the established dominion of the Vatican to the sects of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. No religion, especially those with temples for their dead Gods, are free of this. That said, the focus will be on the role of the Roman Catholic Church (RCC), both for the sake of brevity and to be more specific on more recent issues.
In 2004, the United States RCC — in light of upheaval against the institution regarding sexual abuse accusations — approved a study into the accusations. Working alongside the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, the US RCC produced surveys to provide information on the cases. Though, it is important to note that it is possible the Church was selective in information, and should be kept in mind. The range of the study ranged from 1950 to 2002 and found that, “A total of 10,667 individuals made allegations of child sexual abuse by priests. Of those who alleged abuse, the file contained information that 17.2% of them had siblings who were also allegedly abused.”9 All victims were younger than 18 and victims of priests and deacons. The study also found:
When allegations were made to the police, they were almost always investigated, and about one in three priests were charged with a crime. Overall, few priests with allegations served criminal sentences; only 3% of all priests with allegations served prison sentences. The priests with many allegations of abuse were not more likely than other priests to be charged and serve prison sentences.10
Such a study was groundbreaking. Many could never have known, or accepted, the scale of the abuse, and remember, these are only the accusations found by the surveys. Imagine the unreported crimes, those not found by the survey, and those outside the range of the survey (before and after, and outside the US.) I couldn’t find reliable studies on abuse in general, and I cannot even begin to imagine the scale of it.
This all culminates in a tragic story; one that has not ended, despite the claims of liberals: the abuses of Indigenous children by state created and Church run schools.
The RCC has a history of being a main vehicle of colonization. The introduction of this belief system, by force or otherwise, would break up traditional social bonds, which were often based in the traditional spiritual practices. The Church didn’t simply convert the Indigenous peoples to their belief, but came to assimilate them into the European society the missionaries came from. The Indigenous people had to be made into Whites.
Indigenous children. Kidnapped. Murdered. Culture taken. No traditional language, hair cuts, clothes taken. No identity.
Genocide.
Since May of 2021 to today (19 July 2021), more than 1,000 Indigenous children’s remains have been found at Canadian Residential schools. 11
This is how the residential school systems worked, as per the Indigenous Foundations:
The term residential schools refers to an extensive school system set up by the Canadian government and administered by churches that had the nominal objective of educating Indigenous children but also the more damaging and equally explicit objectives of indoctrinating them into Euro-Canadian and Christian ways of living and assimilating them into mainstream white Canadian society. The residential school system officially operated from the 1880s into the closing decades of the 20th century. The system forcibly separated children from their families for extended periods of time and forbade them to acknowledge their Indigenous heritage and culture or to speak their own languages. Children were severely punished if these, among other, strict rules were broken. Former students of residential schools have spoken of horrendous abuse at the hands of residential school staff: physical, sexual, emotional, and psychological. Residential schools provided Indigenous students with inappropriate education, often only up to lower grades, that focused mainly on prayer and manual labour in agriculture, light industry such as woodworking, and domestic work such as laundry work and sewing. 12
Where traditional schools operate to assimilate and break children, and ready them for the performance of their roles as Worker and child domesticators, residential schools were the most vulgar. They had to locate children who were born and/or raised outside of Colonizer Civilization and rip them from their identities, their communities, and their worlds. They were kidnapped and abused. This is a genocide.
The logic of Canada’s residential school system is innately tied to those in the US. As one of its foundational architects, Captain Pratt said, “Kill the Indian, and Save the Man.”
The programs were a clear articulation of the genocidal intent to overwhelming disrupt and disturb Native communities already under assault. The abuse that the children endured was relentless:
At boarding schools, staff forced Indigenous students to cut their hair and use new, Anglo-American names. They forbid children from speaking their Native language and observing their religious and cultural practices. And by removing them from their homes, the schools disrupted students’ relationships with their families and other members of their tribe. Once they returned home, children struggled to relate to their families after being taught that it was wrong to speak their language or practice their religion.13
The specifics of the relationships between the schools and churches varied between the US and Canada. In the US, the most common operator of these indoctrination centers was the Methodist Church. The Catholic Church was fourth on the list. 14
Despite this, they were functionally the same system: “There were more than 350 government-funded, and often church-run, Indian Boarding schools across the US in the 19th and 20th centuries. Indian children were forcibly abducted by government agents, sent to schools hundreds of miles away, and beaten, starved, or otherwise abused when they spoke their native languages.”15
To get a grasp on the context of the residential school program in the US, there were 20,000 children in the schools in 1900. By 1925, that number increased to 60,889. The program expanded to 367 schools spread out over 29 states. 16
These numbers are just the tip of this iceberg. Genocide is the interwoven of flow between dead children and tears in the fabric of Native communities. We still don’t know the exact number of children who died in these torture schools, nor do any of these statistics encapsulate the extent of personal and inter-generational trauma of abuse that these children and their families endured. This is the cost of Civilization, of “civil society,” but how is any of this civil? What is the real savagery at play? These genocidal practices carried on through the 60s Swoop, forced sterilization programs, foster systems, and is continued in ICE detention camps, of which many or most detainees are Indigenous or of Indigenous descent.
This focus on Canada and the US is limited in scope. This is civil terror, and the continuity between here and abroad demands persistent attack. The true realities, the sheer and unending brutality of colonization and civilization, demand more attention and outrage. I hope I can continue to spread the information of Civil Terror, both in the context put forth here, and abroad. I urge all readers to continue the research too, and learn the truth of colonization and civilization.
In Civilization and Its Discontents, Freud identified the innate hostility we all harbor against civilization:
But it would be wiser to reflect upon this a little longer. In the third place, finally, and this seems the most important of all, it is impossible to overlook the extent to which civilization is built up upon a renunciation of instinct, how much it presupposes precisely the non-satisfaction (by suppression, repression or some other means?) of powerful instincts. This ‘cultural frustration’ dominates the large field of social relationships between human beings. As we already know, it is the cause of the hostility against which all civilizations have to struggle. 17
And struggles there have been. For George Guerin, former chief of the Musqueam Nation, the hostilities were explicit at the Kuper Island residential school (which lasted until 1975):
Sister Marie Baptiste had a supply of sticks as long and thick as pool cues. When she heard me speak my language, she’d lift up her hands and bring the stick down on me. I’ve still got bumps and scars on my hands. I have to wear special gloves because the cold weather really hurts my hands. I tried very hard not to cry when I was being beaten and I can still just turn off my feelings…. And I’m lucky. Many of the men my age, they either didn’t make it, committed suicide or died violent deaths, or alcohol got them. And it wasn’t just my generation. My grandmother, who’s in her late nineties, to this day it’s too painful for her to talk about what happened to her at the school. 18
Abuse and repression, for all that the colonizers say about civilization, this is what it really means. And this is how its cycles of violence perpetuate.
* I recommend “Capital Abaddon: Some words on and oft inspired by Jacques Camatte” By Howard Slater for interesting summaries and explanations on this.
1. Brown CL, Yilanli M, Rabbitt AL. Child Physical Abuse And Neglect. [Updated 2020 Nov 20]. In: StatPearls [Internet]. Treasure Island (FL): StatPearls Publishing; 2021 Jan-. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK470337/
2. Ibid
3. Ibid
4 Swedo E, Idaikkadar N, Leemis R, et al. Trends in U.S. Emergency Department Visits Related to Suspected or Confirmed Child Abuse and Neglect Among Children and Adolescents Aged <18 Years Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic — United States, January 2019–September 2020. MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep 2020;69:1841–1847.
5. Usher, Kim et al. “Family violence and COVID-19: Increased vulnerability and reduced options for support.” International journal of mental health nursing vol. 29,4 (2020): 549–552. doi:10.1111/inm.12735
6. Ray, Brian D. “Child Abuse of Public School, Private School, and Homeschool Students: Evidence, Philosophy, and Reason.” National Home Education Research Institute, NHERI, 21 Feb. 2019,
7. Balingit, Moriah. “Sexual Assault Reports Sharply Increased at K-12 Schools, Numbering Nearly 15,000, Education Department Data Shows.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 28 May 2021, www.washingtonpost.com/education/2020/10/15/sexual-assault-k-12-schools/.
8. Kopas, Anne. “Learning About the School-to-Prison Pipeline Puts Theory into Practice for Students.” Hamline University, 7 Oct. 2020, www.hamline.edu/news/2020/school-to-prison-pipeline/.
9. John Jay Report (New York, 2004.)
10. Ibid.
11. Weisberger, Mindy. “Remains of More than 1,000 Indigenous Children Found at Former Residential Schools in Canada.” LiveScience, Purch, 13 July 2021, www.livescience.com/childrens-graves-residential-schools-canada.html.
12. Hanson, Eric. “The Residential School System.” Edited by Daniel P. Gamez and Alexa Manuel, Indigenousfoundations, 2009, indigenousfoundations.arts.ubc.ca/the_residential_school_system/#what-were-residential-schools.
13. Little, Becky. “Government Boarding Schools Once Separated Native American Children From Families.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 19 June 2018, www.history.com/news/government-boarding-schools-separated-native-american-children-families.
14. Nabs. “For Churches.” The National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition, boardingschoolhealing.org/healing/for-churches/.
15. Nabs. “US Indian Boarding School History.” The National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition, boardingschoolhealing.org/education/us-indian-boarding-school-history/.
16. Nabs. “US Indian Boarding School History.” The National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition, boardingschoolhealing.org/education/us-indian-boarding-school-history/.
17. Sigmund Freud, Civilization and its Discontents (New York, 1961)
18: Stolen from Our Embrace the Abduction of First Nations Children and the Restoration of Aboriginal Communities, by Suzanne Fournier and Ernie Crey, Crane Library, 2014, p. 62.
FOR SALE. RE/MAX ULTIMATE.
Dec 3, 2021
I halt before the mouth of the ravine, where the cul-de-sac serves as the portal to the other world.
I launch off the sun warmed pavement and onto the damp organic debris. My shoe crunches the vegetation underfoot. Here, mankind fades and Wild Nature engulfs me.
Among the trees and tall brush stands a plastic sign.
I’ve never seen it here before. It reads: FOR SALE. RE/MAX ULTIMATE. CALL.
I contemplate yanking the sign up and tossing it, but I ignore the urge.
I’ve come with another purpose.
I keep moving into the ravine. I pray that any development here faces disruption, either by my hand or Nature’s Providence.
A house will be built here, filled to the brim with all the marketable amenities that no one really needs.
It will swallow the grass and the flowers, the trees will be reduced to flooring, the earth will be deformed.
Deer and squirrels that already call this place home will be displaced. They will be refugees.
17 million vacant houses litter the country.
“Let them build their houses out of rock, for chrissake, or out of mud and sticks like the Papagos do. Out of bricks or cinder blocks. Out of packing crates and Karo cans like my friends in Dak Tho. Let them build houses that will last a while, say for a hundred years, like my great-grand pappy’s cabin back in Pennsylvania. Then we don’t have to strip the forests,” Hayduke once said.
What is this growth and progress bullshit when it is in reality the greatest barbarism?
We need a counter-industrial revolution. We must resist this plantery work-death machine.
All these thoughts fill my mind as I kneel ahead of a tree. I speak silently to myself as I use a can of green spray paint to write a demand: Do Not Build Here. - FC.
There is no catharsis, my anger continues to boil. This action, this demand, this act, means nothing. My mind still swirls with thoughts of tortured animal souls and unheard cries of greenery.
Does Humanity deserve salvation? G-d flooded the world before and prepares to do so again. “So God said to Noah, ‘I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them.’”
I drop the can and walk away.
A tree is knocked over but caught by its bark-peer. I duck under it and keep walking as I reach the curve of a hill, lowering myself further and moving down the hill with a level of composure, careful not to get caught up on a root or slip. As I near the bottom, I hear a small creek running.
Freyr came to Earth.
While the ground has largely dried up, the creek has become an ocean. I look over the edge and into the flowing clear water. I see my distorted reflection, and that of the canopy above me.
Before mirrors, water was the only method to appreciate our own image. If it was enough for Narcissus, it is enough for anyone.
After a while, I take note that it is midday, with how Sol and the trees interplay to make the shadows. Late May, there is intense heat, though under the green canopy, I feel cool. Even without them, being lower in the ravine helps. Sometimes, during early Spring, I notice the creek is frozen in spots and I can stand on it with confidence. Another reality. Things are different here, not even a quarter mile from home. Things feel much more alive. The inhuman seems much more comprehensible. You can walk in certain places and feel your hair stand on end, as if you are being watched. Not by people, but by things beyond. Spirits are as common, as tangible, as the grass under your feet or the annoying fly in your face. People in the distant past understood this phenomena as spiritualism, what some call Animism; where there is no duality of spirit and us. I lay against a tree, an oak tree. My eyes closed, I felt a union between us. My head and hair mangle with the bark and moss.
There is a not so distant sound and I open my eyes and look up. Above me is a squirrel running around the branches. I assume she makes her home here and I wonder what her history is. Was she born and raised in this ravine, or some other place? A tree in someone’s backyard miles from here? The wonder of Nature and Wildness is its endless possibilities, the chaos of it all. There is no domestication of species or knowledge. This is what some call Anarchy. Some contemporary thinkers look back on the thought of those such as Thoreau as proto-Anarchist, whose reflection on nature encompassed the same ethics as those of Anarchists.
Thoreau said:
In short, all good things are wild and free [...] I rejoice that horses and steers have to be broken before they can be made the slaves of men, and that men themselves have some wild oats still left to sow before they become submissive members of society. Undoubtedly, all men are not equally fit subjects for civilization; and because the majority, like dogs and sheep, are tame by inherited disposition, this is no reason why the others should have their natures broken that they may be reduced to the same level (Walking).
Hoping to not disturb the squirrel in her home, I stand and walk away. Before getting far, I slip off my shoes and socks and feel the damp mud and leaves between my toes and extend my arms out and let the rays of sun baptize me.
Eco-catharsis is not found in cities, in modernity. There, everything is imprisoned. G-d is kept in the temple and humanity at the labor camps, also known as “place of employment.” Wages are another set of chains. Barbatity is not the jungle or desert, but the modern places that enslaves us, those traps of walls and guns, of alien and lifeless machines.
Progress.
I walk for minutes, but what seems like hours. Here, time is different, the flow of reality not determined by clocks and alarms. I, like many others, are tamed by clocks. At work, you count down the time until the shift ends and you go on an extended break until you clock in again. At school, I could almost guess down to a few seconds when the bell would ring and class would end. It was a curse, having the sound of the clicking clock in your subconscious. But out here, my “clock” is the sun, and the “alarm” is when one sound is replaced by another, when the song birds hang up their music sheets and the owl sings his lullaby to the bees.
The Greeks spoke of this time, the Golden Age, followed by a general decay of morality and human culture in later Ages. (1) These Ages are defined by the relationship between humanity and the divine. The Golden Age was understood to be a time in which we directly mingled with the Gods, under the rule of the Titans. It ended with Prometheus awakening us from so-called primitive ignorance and the overthrow of Titans by Olympus. We lived in a mythical place of Arcadia, the land of primitive life. The later ages are characterized by a growing alienation between us and the Gods and the divine experience. Perhaps Arcadia is much like the Garden of Eden, both a place and a state of being. Is the Abrahamic Fall, Hesiod’s Bronze Age, telling us something about our past?
These are thoughts I have as I wander the ravine.
I cannot help but think about them.
My thoughts can be tortuous.
Every single day, my world is razed.
Replaced by the artifice.
I plunge my feet into the cool creek. I connect with the flowing water and the rocks that lay beneath. I sit in it before rubbing the water over my shoulders and feel the coolness drip down my warm skin. My second baptism of the day. Once in divine light, once in holy water. There’s no fish here, but there are worms and water striders. Some move past me, others inspect me as a guest, not a stranger. I consider how finite their lives are compared to me, but how finite I am to the creeks’ rocks. Born from stardust, we return as earth dust. I sat on the side of the creek for a while, and the sun moved, marking my time here. Just across from me, three deer enter the creek and drink up. I could reach out and touch them, but I let them be. In the back of my mind, I consider the fact that deer don’t need us, but we need them.
-
Hesiod, admittedly a Conservative thinker, characterized humanity into six ages. First, the Golden Age, where we lived in relative peace and in harmony with the Earth. Despite its romantic nature (no pun intended), there is some truth to this. The next age was the Age of Silver, when the Olympians took control from the Titans. This was a time of greatness, but less so when compared to the Golden times. Next, the Bronze Age, the time of war but no heroes. Following, came the Heroic Age. It includes the heroes of the Argonauts returning from the War of Troy. Finally, we exist in the Iron Age, where immorality and depression reins.
What Is Home?
Jul 15, 2022
A Short Anthropological Overview of Paleolithic Shelter
So-called neighborhood crime watch (ie, snitches) and a faltering sense of community* are but a few symptoms of the decay of the idyllic cul-de-sac image. Today, your neighborhood is a method of monitoring, with doorbell and driveway cameras. A sense of community in one’s neighborhood is quickly draining away. I often hear those older than me reflect when it was much more common to walk over to the neighbor’s house for dinner or a movie, with parents talking and children playing. Cookouts, yard sales as social events, scavenger hunts are events I remember as much more common events from my own childhood (I am only 23, for reference).
Is this because of the rise of neoliberalism, a decay of moral values, home development plans or something else? How far back does the issue at hand go? What caused it? Without giving an elaborate history of neighborhoods and capitalist home design, I want to explore the ethos and strategies of shelter building in the Paleolithic, to be read alongside the likes of The City and its Inmates by John Zerzan. This text is limited in scope, because originally, it was intended as a shorter polemic, but quickly transformed into an anthropological examination of an often unattended topic, to show there is an alternative to the current system, albeit in a very focused manner.
In 2018, I contributed to the Ultra Left International: A Manifesto. One of my most important contributions was a small one, a footnote that became a sentence within the work itself, “Even under primitive communism alienation from the natural world was arguably the seed which evolved into societal alienation.”
While I now hold a differing view, that Ritual was the birth of social alienation, I think that this notion of separateness has stuck with me for a while because I keep finding others have a similar view of separation, including the physical, spiritual and the psychological manifestations of it. It makes my understanding of the apparent decay of social relations more clear.
Fredy Perlman, in his Against His-Story, Against Leviathan, wrote:
Those who wall themselves in fall into a similar trap [self-defeat, my note].
Communities built walls before, at Jericho for example. But they built a wall once. Wall-building was not an institution among them. […] Jericho’s walls will no longer do. The walls have to be high and strong, and they have to be repaired as often as the ditches of Erech. [..] The seasons pass and the generations pass, yet the walls must still be maintained. And maintained they are, generation after generation. […] Walls cannot be permanently maintained with a temporary division of labor. 1
I don’t write this with the intent to speak extensively of the ills of urbanization and cities. That much is self-evident within the Anti-Civilization milieu (or at least, I hope so, as some individuals try very hard to “synthesize,” and or otherwise bring about nonsense). What I wish to speak about is the formation of physical separation before cities. What I mean is the enclosed living space and how we got here.
The development of enclosed living spaces has within it the nucleus of separation that we continue to perpetuate today, as described above. What I mean when I say enclosed living space is a more permanent shelter in which only a section of the wider community (immediate or near-immediate family, roommates, a single individual, etc) is housed. These buildings also tend to rely on a division of labor and later, resources from abroad. Houses, apartments, and condos are contemporary examples. I contrast this with the existence of shelters in the Paleolithic that I define as temporary, encompassing a large portion of a foraging community, and based on the resources from the immediate environment. Such examples will be discussed below.
The most popular conception of Paleolithic shelter is, of course, the cave. However, while there is consensus on humans using caves as shelters, the amount of caves would never have housed the existing numbers of ancient Humans2 (of which I mean species ranging from H. Erectus to H. Sapiens). So, while understanding caves were important for the Human family, especially when leaving our native Africa, I will focus on built structures. Also, these are not Human-made structures, and are at best, altered to suit more comfortable living.
Of course, a suburban home is hardly comparable to a living space like that possibly found in Terra Amata, France some 400,000 years ago. This contested site showed evidence of fire hearths within a space made of wooden poles and even animal skins, possibly housing twenty tо forty people at once.3 That number would represent a large portion of a band, that of Homo Erectus or Heidelbergensis, which had a median community size of 50–100. While it is disputed if this was indeed a shelter (as opposed to natural placement of these materials by wind and water), reconstruction images show it would have had an open space as an entrance, a welcoming and non-enclosed space (excluding a possibility of a cover for the entrance). 4
Living spaces such as Neanderthal-made mammoth bone shelters are a similar example. A Ukrainian site was the site of a shelter described as, “The home was apparently built in two parts. The lower part, or base, was made by assembling large mammoth bones to support the whole structure, which was 26 feet across at its widest. The bones themselves were likely obtained both through collecting those found on the ground and by killing the large beasts directly themselves.”5 A similar find in Siberia, also made by Neanderthals, was indicative of housing several families, by the presence of several small hearths. 6 This is even more interesting by the fact that Neanderthals had smaller communities than compared to us.
In addition to what I define as a typical Paleolithic shelter, is that when they were left behind, these shelters would simply fall apart and decompose or some parts may have even been recycled, hence the little evidence until later in the archeological record. The ethos and characteristics of these shelters are extensions of the foraging way of life. A South African history site the San of the Stone Age describes their shelter practices in a similar way, “[They] did not live in permanent houses, but in shelters made of materials they could find around them, like thin branches and tall grass. […] They never settled in the same campsite, but used the same waterholes as they moved around. This also ensured that the land did not become exhausted.”7
After the move out of Africa, and the extensive use of new environments, the use of caves in relation to Human-made shelters likely would be lower, especially as I said, caves could not support the relatively low Human populations. Is the decrease in cave habitation and other uses for survival a reason we find evidence of Ritual-Art in them? In fact, evidence for cave habitation in the Upper Paleolithic decreases and it is only in this time period that we find evidence of Ritual! 8 Is this because our mental association with caves and rock shelters had faded and instead been used for Ritual because of a need for space to express Symbolic behavior, both in Art and more advanced forms of burial? Perhaps, since Ritual is an act that is disconnected from the day to day lives of individuals.
Locations in the Upper Paleolithic begin to take on the role of sanctuary, with man-made structures exhibit ritual affairs, too, such as elaborate disposal of dead group members. 9 Perhaps there is a link of separateness between the building of more complex (still not housing, per say) campsite shelters and the Ritual mediation we know developed in the Upper Paleolithic? This would line up with the writing of Chris Scarre who states that less ambiguous evidence for shelters appears after 50,000 years ago. Scarre states these “more substantial structures” contrast with the earlier “flimsy” shelters of the Lower and Middle Paleolithic.10 The importance of the date is that this aligns with the so-called Behavioral Revolution, which brought about an explosion of symbolic expression, such as Ritual and art. 11 Echoing upcoming Neolithic and even modern housing is evidence of multi-room structures in the Upper Paleolithic as well. 12
There truly is no place like home, when Earth itself is recognized as the home.
NOTES
* I remember a Real Estate website stating, “Neighbors aren’t as friendly as before due to changes in lifestyle and technological advancements that have reduced social interaction and made many less open to meeting others.” The fast paced, online experience of modern life is so visible, yet never criticized by many..
1. Perlman, Fredy. Against His-Story, against Leviathan!: An Essay, Black & Red, Detroit, MI, 2010, pp. 34–35.
2. Libretexts. “2.2: The Paleolithic Period.” Humanities LibreTexts, Libretexts, 13 Mar. 2021, https://human.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Art/Book%3A_Art_History_(Boundless)/02%3A_Prehistoric_Art/2.02%3A_The_Paleolithic_Period.
3. Gerry. “Before the Ice: The First Inhabitants of Nice.” That’s How The Light Gets In, 16 July 2016, https://gerryco23.wordpress.com/2014/01/13/before-the-ice-the-first-inhabitants-of-nice/.
4. Hays, Jeffrey. “Homo Erectus Tools. Language, Art and Culture.” Facts and Details, https://factsanddetails.com/world/cat56/sub360/entry-2754.html#:~:text=Homo%20Erectus%20Shelter,-Terra%20Amata%20Hut&text=There%20is%20evidence%20that%20Homo,been%20footings%20for%20a%20windbreak.
5. Yirka, Bob. “Neanderthal Home Made of Mammoth Bones Discovered in Ukraine.” Phys.org, Phys.org, 19 Dec. 2011,
https://phys.org/news/2011-12-neanderthal-home-mammoth-bones-ukraine.html.
6. Libretext, Op. cit.
7. “San Hunter-Gatherer Society in the Later Stone Age.” South African History Online, 27 Aug. 2019, https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/san-hunter-gatherer-society-later-stone-age.
8. Libretext, Op. cit.
9. Ingersoll, Richard. “Architecture As Second Nature.” World Architecture a Cross-Cultural History, Oxford University Press, New York, N.Y, 2019, pp. 4–5.
10. Scarre, Christopher. The Human Past: World Prehistory and the Development of Human Societies, Thames & Hudson, London, 2018, p. 114.
11. Bar-Yosef, Ofer. “The Upper Paleolithic Revolution.” Annual Review of Anthropology, vol. 31, no. 1, 2002, pp. 363–393., https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.anthro.31.040402.085416.
12. “Tarpology — Know-How How to Set up a Shelter in the Wild.” BUSHMEN, 24 May 2017, https://bushmen.pl/en/tarpology/.
--- YouTube ---
Critical Of Capital Podcast
Episode 1: Introductions
1,493 views
Nov 14, 2018
This is the first episode of the Critical of Capital podcast, with Brady and Jay, two dissatisfied leftists with more than enough bullshit to share.
Brady: All right. How's it going? This is episode one of the critical of Capital podcast. We are a pair of left wing activists who are critical of capital, bored as **** and commodified
How are you doing Jay?
Jay: Not too bad. It's a beautiful ******* day in the middle of the desert.
Brady: Alright, so this is what you need to do. What was that?
Jay: Let's hear about your beliefs, Brady.
Brady: All right, so I am a post sieve anarchist in the sense that I believe that the collapse of industrial society will bring about the abolition of capital and all of its forms, and that people will be liberated. It's really just the basis of my beliefs. About you.
Jay: I'm somewhat of a primitivist. I have anarchist and Marxist influence, but I don't really consider myself either of those. I just do believe that the destruction of both technological society as you. But it and civilization is necessary for human liberation.
Brady: So let's delve a little bit more right away into technological society like you just said. Can you kind of just give me an outline of what all encompasses technological society?
Jay: So it really depends who you talk to. So you have people like Ted Kaczynski who believe anything basically that predates the the industrial Revolution, for example, would be considered ethical or good for the environment. So stuff like your agrarian society, then you have full blown primitivists like Zerzan who believe. If anything, post Paleolithic or Mesolithic can be considered unusable and so they tend to stay towards stone tools. So it depends who you talk to. I fall into both of those camps.
Brady: So then what would you say about, like, modern medicine more than of like traditional medicine, herbal medicine, like Chinese medicine? Or are you just against all sorts of medicine?
Jay: Herbal medicine has been proven to work because what people forget is medicine from today is, for the most part, is not synthetic it. It comes from your local environment. That's where it's from.
Brady: Yeah, a lot of people don't.
Jay: And so.
Brady: A lot of people don't realize that that all of these ******* medicines that we have actually come from plants. That's why we're destroying the rainforests is to find these new plants, to develop medicine for the capitalist.
Jay: Exactly. And a lot of. The diseases we have now are actually directly linked to civilization and sedentary lifestyles, for example. Mental health is a big one. Schizophrenia, depression and generalized anxiety disorder are directly proven to be at higher rates in industrial societies through things such as epigenetics.
Brady: Can we also talk about the correlation of industrial society and things like depression and anxiety disorders? I think that's something we should really.
Jay: Yeah, I mean obviously I. Mean I can try and pull up some sources later on, but there's stuff where it's directly linked that this is a known fact that people in the more developed industrialized countries have higher rates of anxiety and depression.
Brady: I completely agree.
Jay: Now the. Direct causes for it are. Some people think the higher industrial society means. The idea of more. Work obviously like we think technology should reduce work, but for some reason we're still working the same amount of hours a normal surf well, obviously it's different conditions, but it's almost the same. Amount of work per week.
Brady: Well, that's one thing that I have issue with a lot of with all capitalists and a lot of these technocrat socialists is that they push for advancements in automation which come in direct expense of the of the workers generally. Exactly it's it's.
Jay: Which she when marks even pointed out that he. Saw higher levels of automation. Even even at the point he lived in. You know the late mid to. Late 1800s. He would. He was noting that he saw this higher rise of technology that should be reducing work, but it kept people still working for even less or stagnant wages, and that just doesn't make sense.
Brady: I completely agree. So that's kind of just a little background of our ideas. How would you describe yourself socially? I of course I'm an anarchist, but how would you describe?
Jay: I know some people. When you're primitivist, they think very reactionary. But I'm a I'm a very progressive person, I believe, obviously LGBTQ plus right liberation. Minority liberation through National Liberation, any methods necessary to destroy what is essentially called settler colonialism, which is the influence of. Basically, settlers or colonizers on the indigenous peoples, for example, like American indigenous and the the conditions they live in. Despite this being the land they exist in is poor, and that's an influence of settler colonialism. So I consider myself highly progressive and somewhat of. A I I wouldn't use the term. Egalitarian, but that's the best one that that. Comes to my.
Brady: Head awesome. I completely agree. So one thing that we can start to touch on right away now kind of gone over our beliefs a little bit is how do we solve the problems of the modern day. What would be the basis or the? Starting point for you, in your opinion.
Jay: Kevin Tucker, who I plan to actually interview in about half a week or so, would be they advocate for things such as primal Warfare or primal rewilding, which is the concept of. Kind of returning yourself to nature, undoing the aspects of domestication, essentially.
Unknown Speaker: Right.
Brady: I agree. I'm. I'm more fan of the late 1800s to early 1900s anarchist movement. Very militant, lots of open protesting and open resistance against the state and capitalism, various acts against the power structures that maintain the oppression that we live in, things like that.
Jay: So go a little bit more into, you know, as your as yourself, as an anarchist, as I'm aware you're you kind of consider yourself a philosophical anarchist, not a political one. So what does that mean to you? Just people?
Brady: Idea that, yeah. So basically, how are you most anarchists would describe themselves as as a political anarchist and I. Really saw issue with this back when I was just a political anarchist. I really didn't understand a lot about anarchist. Philosophy or what it truly means to be an anarchist, an anarchist, is not just a political label, and anarchist is how you live your life, how you carry yourself, how you recognize your place in the systems of oppression and the actions you take to. Sort of litigate the oppression and. Take a step forward in your own life so. One thing is that a lot of modern anarchist movements talk about how they are against capitalism and against the state, but they do not recognize their own place in those oppressive systems, and they continue to be an active part in those systems, which is something that I'm very much against. I want to recognize those systems of oppression. And cease my participation in those systems and not just have. It be a political label.
Jay: Obviously you have you have these groups of anarcho communists, right? I'm not trying to say all anarcho communists do this, but there's a trend also with, you know, syndicalists is general strikes or work strikes, labor strikes, labouring, unionizing when when they don't, when you have to understand that is just the perpetuation of capital. You have been giving these privileges by bureaucrats that exist. Within the system that we. This then only to give you just enough that. You don't rebel, you.
Brady: I think one thing we talk about a lot in our circles of leftist is this idea of workerism, but I don't think a lot of people who don't study leftist thought understand what workerism is. So if we could kind of go over that. Explain how various aspects of leftists, aside or not, leftist society, but. Leftist thought perpetuate this idea of workerism that would be.
Jay: Yeah, here I just pulled up the definition of workerism. It's from the anarchist library. It says Workerism in the form of capitalist ideology that is endemic amongst self defined revolutionaries. It is an. Ideology that encourages the acceptance of and the propaganda for wage labor amongst individuals who have realized exploitation and alienation that wage labor entails. So image. The idea that you are a worker, you should you should. Find pride in that. We shouldn't find pride in being workers. We should find pride in the abolition. Of the proletariat.
Brady: Not exactly. When I really started to notice this workers tendency in. Anarchist circles, mainly in the syndicalist and communist circles. That's when I started to take this dip into post civilization and realizing that the only way that we're really going to get rid of these workers tendencies and capitalism just abolishing. Capitalism as a whole. Is through the destruction of industrial society. We have to get rid of the conditions which maintain and which created the system that we live in.
Jay: I agree for you. What would that look like? Something kind of like Ted Denski pre industrial society. Agrarian or do? You not. Really have a vision. For that and you just understand the system, we exist and. Kills the revolution.
Brady: That's the thing I really don't have. Like a. People have asked me what my ideal society would be like. I'm not. I'm not really sure. I recognize the symptoms in the disease, but I don't really know what the cure looks like yet. That's something I'm really. Going to. To think about quite heavily, to realize. I'm not sure if there really even is an answer to that. Question everyone is going to say things a little bit differently. I'm not really. Big on returning to a pre industrial society but I I just don't know how to explain what I want. I'm going to be honest. What about you?
Jay: Honestly, my thing is obviously into this. I do believe some level of pastoral nomadism or hunter gatherer society that is obviously we can't go back to the. Conditions that breed that, but we can use it as. A as an. Ideal to bring about. But that can never fully come back. So I advocate. For banned or Proto tribal society in which that is egalitarian with no gender division of Labor, the gender division of. Labor is the root. For me of all. Quote evil right? Dividing people up in society based on things like gender is both unnecessary and destructive. And you see obviously trying to force a woman to have to do some like be a, you know, a housewife or a man to be. Breadwinner if they don't want to do that, that causes strife within society, even within the person, a sort of cognitive dissonance. And if we can start to remove these these factors, we can see a, a society that's healthier between all genders.
Brady: So I noticed you said quote evil. Do you kind of. Want to dive into that a little bit? I don't think we talked about our egoist ideas. At all quite yet, but. You think it'd be a good idea to dive into those?
Jay: No, because I'm aware you. And I both subscribe to what is? What is the idea of egoism? From Matt Sterner. Kind of considered a meme online, but you. My, at least for myself, considered morality to be subjective, and the idea of good and evil to not be good ways of. Analyzing the world. Everything exactly everything just is it's the way you perceive it because you've been socially conditioned. To believe that. Now, I don't believe that.
Unknown Speaker: Right click.
Jay: Like when people say natural rights, I know someone in my class who says Ohh, natural rights all exist, but they have to be. Respect it, else they didn't do they really exist or do they just exist because the law tells you they?
Brady: Yeah, something that exists does not need to be or not. Be respected, it just exists.
Jay: Yeah, I do. Believe everyone is in some sense self interested, but that doesn't mean selfish for me. I'm even though I'm aware that what I do is in my own interest, you know, I'm an I'm an animal Liberator. I believe in animal liberation. I'm trying to become vegan. I've been vegetarian for a while.
Unknown Speaker: See, that's. Don't do that.
Jay: Official reasons I do that because those things make me happy.
Brady: And I think that's one thing that a lot of people get wrong about egoism in general. If they see egoism as this selfishness towards that tends to steer towards capitalism or the oppression of others, when really that's not what it's about. Even in the slightest, it's. About us recognizing our place in the system as well and doing things in our own interests that are going to help liberate us or make us feel more liberated in the system. That we live in.
Jay: Of course. And so. How do I want to put this? The idea of Max Turner's egoism? It's not. It's not supposed to be selfish oriented necessarily. It's the fact that you have. To be aware of what your conditions happen, so a lot of you joists have a sense of what people can just call liberal morality that we say Ohh murder is not don't murder people don't. It's not that we just dismiss. You should be able to kill. It's the fact that you at least recognize where your sense of. Values come from. It's that sense of awareness that allows you to open yourself. Up I'm nice. To people, not because society tells me to be. But because I enjoy. That I understand where that where that influence. Comes from and he talks. About what he calls Spooks. But I didn't. Sorry, stay away from the word cause as racist connotations. They do have apparitions, things that don't exist. They only exist. As you give them power. The government, for example the. Government doesn't exist. It exists because you give it validity. Because someone told you it exists morality. The soul God, humanism, humanism is, as Max Stern calls it. Basically the new God. For the atheists that atheists just use Christian morality right without questioning.
Unknown Speaker: Oh yes.
Brady: Oh yeah, definitely. I really even know that myself. When I was first leaving the Catholic Church about five years ago was that I might have left the church, but I still had this really ingrained sense of Christian morality that even sometimes today I find myself struggling to. Recognize and to dismantle in my own brain and my own thoughts and actions. So I definitely agree that these are some things that really need to be challenged and we aren't going to be able to understand each other in a deeper way until we get rid of these constructs that have been implanted in us.
Jay: And I totally agree with that so. Can you talk a little bit? About kind of your. Political journey and what got you. To where you are now.
Brady: Honestly, the first time that I ever. Thinking about politics was back when I was in the Catholic Church. I think I was around 1413 or 14 years old. 20 years old now, and the thing that really got me looking politics was we are actually in a Sunday school. And we were talking about. LGBT rights, basically, and in terms of talking about LGBT rights, I was actually kicked out of the church and that's what really started my journey into anarchism. Basically, I grew up in a household of people who are very nationalist, military and police background. On both sides of my family and very right wing conservative, both my parents voted for Donald Trump. But I really started to notice. The political atmosphere during the Bernie Sanders campaign, I actually participated in volunteered for the Bernie Sanders campaign in Minnesota went I went to his rally in Minnesota. Actually, I stood out in the side, outside in the rain for three hours waiting in the line to.
Unknown Speaker: Get in.
Jay: Oh, Bernie.
Brady: No, that's that's really my start into the political left after that. I really didn't understand what democratic socialism was I. Just looked at. His platform and at the time when I was about 16, I really agreed with it. I thought these things were I was about 17. I said these things I agree with. So I started looking into democratic socialism. And then I saw, well, I was really hesitant because of the word socialism, you know? As most people are before they start actually digging into new styles of. Thought and I really started to look into what socialism actually was. Why is there such a negative connotation associated with the word socialism? I really started to think about what I learned kid growing up the, you know, the standard socialism is evil. Socialism is when the government takes your car, takes your home. Everyone gets paid the same and they burn that into you from. Such a young age.
Unknown Speaker: Yeah. Yeah, because.
Jay: When people, they don't question why are we taught these things? Why is it this way? What is the historical reason for why it is the? Way it is.
Brady: Exactly and. Around that same time I started getting really active into protesting and occupying movements. So I started to dig a little bit more into anarchism. After I went to my first really militant protest when I. About 17 at the Minnesota State Capitol and it's just been a journey from there. Just learning as much as possible, trying to figure out who I am and what I am and what my place in the world is. That's what anarchism is to me. It's my journey of figuring out who I am.
Jay: All right. So how does are? You consider yourself anti fascist? Have you been a part? Of the Antifa movement.
Brady: Yes, yes, I've been a part of anti fascist movements for about 3 and a.
Jay: What is this?
Brady: Half years now. I started with the party for Socialism and Liberation and the Socialist Alternative in Minnesota. We really started organizing with the IWW chapter in Minnesota. Which is one of the oldest in the United States. Fun fact, Minnesota also has one of the oldest standing socialist parties in the country as well. The revolutionary socialist parties. So that's where I really got my start into anti fascism and later on realizing that anti fascism has to be anti capitalism. Because without anti capitalism you'll never rid yourself of.
Jay: I totally agree. And you know there are some what? What are people called left calms or communist left or ultras believe the modern Antifa movement is. Class collaboration because they're defending the bourgeois, you know, liberal democracy, and I see that to an extent because it's not militant. They're not. It's like fascism. You can consider if the body had cancer and the part is capitalism, right? And so that the heart itself has cancer, but you're cutting off the leg. You're not. No, you're just. You're just. Doing things then you have to hit. It where it where it hurts, where? It's coming from and. And that's capitalism because fascism. Fascism is capitalism. There is no going around that. It is capitalism.
Brady: I really I agree with said, I think really where we start to see a lot of peoples criticisms of the modern Antifa movement is after Charlottesville. That's when a lot more of the just Liberals in general. Started to advocate and follow the movement after Charlottesville. So that's, that's where I kind of see it, not really the decline, but the more the liberalization of the anti fascist movement in America. And I think we really need to separate ourselves from those liberals who are really just actively pushing us away from our goal of liberation.
Jay: I agree and what the the issue is you know I have no issue punching a Nazi. Everyone should do it. It's when you just punch a Nazi and be like alright, I've done my deed for the day. No, no one go and lay a a a pressure cooker at your ******* boss's door. I don't problem.
Brady: It's not. It's not enough to just punch a Nazi if you punch a Nazi, he might have a black eye, but he can. Come back tomorrow. Is is what I'll say on that.
Jay: And the only thing that I think we. Do rely on. This sounds odd coming from someone like me that we put too much emphasis on violence and some of these people can be taught to. I can admit that I mean if I. Can go into my political journey. I was. A fascist at one point, and now I'm. A hard left right, socially and economically. So you know, my political journey as I got started basically kind of what you did, you know, the 2016 election, that whole, that's where really where got people politically active because.
Brady: That's that's been a that's been a crazy catalyst for all sorts of political movement in the younger population in the United.
Jay: Because I got started there and I was at first a Bernie. Supporter but for a. While I ended. Up becoming fairly conservative because I refused to vote for Hillary and I. I never I didn't voted in the election. I wasn't able to at the time, but I ended up supporting Trump for a while, and then I for about a year, a year and a half, I was big into people. Like Ben Shapiro. I was the dude. That wanted Ben Shapiro to run for president. I was one of those boys and then I. I I started talking to some people I went to college, I didn't get liberalized. I just opened up to new ideas. I was living in an echo chamber and I ended up reading. I did a reading recommendation from a friend in mutual aid effector and evolution by Peter Kropotkin. And I read I was like, hey this. Is this is pretty neat and I. Was kind of like a national. Enter a conservative anarchist for a little bit, because I didn't really understand who who I was or what I wanted to stand for. But as I started to meet more people and read more literature, I became highly progressive. And I this this is embarrassing, but I watched Fight Club and say, hey, this sounds pretty cool. And I realized that.
Unknown Speaker: You know.
Jay: No, in Dan and I did a bunch of research on the primitive or excuse me, not primitive indigenous people. And I started to realize this is this is a better. Existence than the one we currently have.
Brady: I will admit, as hard as this is for me to admit, I did vote in the 2016 election as the first and last time I will ever vote in an election.
Jay: Ohh man, I mean at least you didn't go. From a neo? Con to a like a clerical fascist and then.
Unknown Speaker: Look at this.
Jay: Conservative for a little bit at least, didn't. Go through that.
Unknown Speaker: I vote her.
Brady: I voted for Jill Stein. Just because because of her platform of basically abolishing the college debt. That's that's really what I was interested in, but I didn't really think it was. A realistic goal.
Jay: You know how we abolished college debt? How's that money? There you go.
Unknown Speaker: I hate it.
Jay: These issues with capitalism.
Unknown Speaker: It's, you know.
Jay: Capitalism is the issue.
Brady: There's a there's something. You talked about a little bit earlier talking about. And I think we should really talk about the topic of violence. And I think there's this really big misconception that people on the left are either very opposed to violence in all forms or are hyper violent. And I think both of those statements are completely untrue. I don't see myself as a violent person. I don't like to hurt people. I don't get enjoyment out of hurting people in in any in any form. I'm not some sort of guy who just wants to run around and hurt people to fulfill some sort of sick like fantasy or something. But I do recognize the need for violence. As a tool in the system as a means to liberate yourself, really. So I in a perfect world we would not need to use violence, but unfortunately we do not live in a perfect world and I am prepared to defend myself by any means necessary.
Jay: I totally agree, and someone could even you know, consider that part of a I think it was Aquinas's or Augustine's just war theory. While that is Christian, it's the same concept of is it the right thing to do? And The thing is, I wrote an essay on class conflict and the necessity of violence. And here's the thing. You can recognize violence as necessary without glorifying it. There is a difference between those two things. Recognizing the necessity and glorification are two different things, and no one should glorify.
Brady: I agree. It's really funny, actually, when people. Outside of my political sphere, the people that I associate with in my daily life, when I tell them that I'm a militant anarchist, they they kind of. Give me a weird. Look in the sense of they look at me like you are definitely not that kind of person and it it's kind of strange actually. I I don't know. Have you ever gotten something like that? When you tell people that? You are, or at least when you were a Marxist. Did you kind of get that same? That same thing happened to you?
Jay: I mean, I've been. Called a terrorist by people, by police. And it was we were talking about. Egalitarianism and someone made a joke. Oh, you know if women are equal, I should be able to punch them. I said Ohh, we shouldn't punch anyone and everyone, said says. The one who thinks he's the thought police.
Brady: It's funny you. Get all these people that support the American. And their intervention in the Middle East and in South America. But we'll call us terrorists for being against that oppression. It's it's, it's hilarious.
Unknown Speaker: What's interesting is.
Jay: What's interesting is when they. Support the idea of a nation state defending the interests of their of the people, and they believe that intervening in other governments through coups and all that is. Ethical and justified. But when people do it against their government for righteous reasons, it's considered terrorism. It's Max, Turner says. We pulled the next Stern quote.
Unknown Speaker: Will you will.
Brady: You do that. I'll actually just talk about these people that support these military coups and other countries that perpetuated by the United States. It that that is? That is terrorism against the people.
Jay: It is Max Sumner says the the state calls its own violence law, but that of the individual crime.
Unknown Speaker: And that is.
Jay: Exactly. It is hypocritical.
Brady: The The government and the state in general get away with things that if you and I were to do them, we would be in prison for.
Jay: It wouldn't be just prison. It'd be Quano Bay because. I believe that every I think every President. After World War 2, content they be held to. Like death penalty standards for war crimes.
Brady: Exactly, but that that's never going to happen. Unfortunately, as much as I'd like that to happen.
Jay: Oh, of course. You tell me right now. You don't want to hang every president that's ever existed.
Brady: I'm totally down.
Jay: I mean, people forget that even you know, just talking about that when people talk bad about Marxism or any leftism is that people like Abraham Lincoln. Were pen pals with marks?
Brady: They had the thing that I think is really, really interesting in the modern left movement is this idea of people being so like verily against Abraham Lincoln, when, like you just said, he was pen pals with Karl Marx. Marx actually congratulated. Abraham Lincoln on his victory in the Civil War.
Jay: And isn't it true that some? Of the Union generals were Marxists or. Self-described communists.
Brady: They they were. There's actually a book called Lincoln's Marxist. I'm not sure who the author is. I just remember hearing about this. The fact that a lot of these generals during the civil war, some actually being trained in Europe, were actually exposed to a lot of Marxist ideas and a lot of them would have considered themselves Marxist.
Jay: Then Lincoln's Marxist is by all Benson and Walter Donald Kennedy, and it's described as in 1865. Karl Marx authored the comments manifesto, praised Lincoln as a quote, single minded son of the working class. End Quote This book examines why Marks and other socialists supported Lincoln, Mr. Lincoln's words and notes his negative influence on modern society.
Brady: Yeah, that's it's not a whole lot of people realize that actually, I think it's quite interesting, yeah.
Jay: And it's really interesting to influence that. Basically what we call. The demonized or the intolerant left has had on. The the the move towards liberation of all people and obviously people can argue whether Lincoln actually truly feed the slaves or not. That's obviously open to debate, but the movement was there. Because he said, obviously. If I could end this war without. Freeing the slaves I could, but he did. Or to some. Extent did so obviously he was not the most. Perfect man. I won't say he was some. Crazy progressive by any means. I'm more glorifying, but he still did some good and so. I agree. Demonizing the union. During that time was kind of a negative thing to do in my opinion, because it was Confederacy versus Union and I think we should all support. The Union in that case.
Brady: All right, so we've talked a little bit about our personal journeys into leftist thought, primitivism, Marxism, anarchism. We talked a little bit about why we are against liberalism. One thing that I also kind of wanted to touch. On is this. Kind of fact that the the left wing, especially in America and in the West in general, has very much stagnated over the past. I'd say 30 years. What are your kind of takes on that?
Jay: I'd say after the assassination. Of president was it which McKinley was it badly? The yeah. McKinley from the anarchist. And that was in 1901. I'd really say the last.
Brady: OK.
Jay: 100 and 100. 50 years to be honest. The left is that maybe, yeah, I would say a.
Brady: Ohh really?
Jay: 100 years there. I mean obviously had the the Haymarket. Riots in what time was that? 1886. But that's obviously before the assassination. You had all these crazy movements, but the issue is they've been attributed to the moderate liberal. Not the radical socialist, because history is a way of changing itself.
Brady: I actually completely agree with you on that.
Jay: Because when you talk about. The Haymarket I've seen textbooks call them liberals. Like educational textbooks, refer to the Haymarket affair, people as liberals, not anarchists and socialists, and Marxists who are actually the planners and those involved.
Unknown Speaker: So exactly.
Brady: A lot of it a.
Jay: Lot of the reason that it that stagnated is complacency with. The world we live. A A euro centered. View of the world and false history. Those are the three big.
Brady: Well, one of those things is something that has changed in like the liberal tendencies. Recently is especially talking about Haymarket and these other actions being attributed to liberalism. Is a lot of these guys were union leaders and union members and at the time, Liberals were not pro union. They were very much anti union capitalists.
Jay: I've been doing a lot of thinking. Unions were a radical thing about them now.
Brady: Now Liberals have basically taken this idea. Of the union. And liberalized their, for lack of a better term, this into this basically limp wristed.
Jay: I mean like with the.
Brady: Kind of entity that really isn't for the workers anymore. Unions and political parties killed.
Jay: The revolution, in my opinion, alongside industrial. Society may 68, Paris, 68 a bigger influence on the ultra left and the communist left. The idea of a spontaneous uprising of the students and the workers, 12 down by self-described communist parties and unions, right? They were the. Ones that killed that revolution and that move. So I would I would definitely agree that things have what tools of the left have been modernized and liberalized against us.
Brady: I I completely agree with you on that. Is there anything else you wanted to talk about? While we've got some time here, any topics that you think that we missed that?
Jay: We should go over. Honestly not off the top of my head, but I do want to bring up that this will not just be a, a, me and Brady thing. We do intend to have people of different ideologies, mostly just on the left, so Marxist, leninists, Maoists, other forms of anarchists. Anything like that? Even just close friends having. Them on for a. Little bit just to make sure there's. Some variety and. People to learn because while this is. Fun for us, we would like this to. Be educational as well.
Brady: Oh, I completely agree. A lot of the episodes to come are going to be talking about a specific topic, something that we can talk about for about 25 to 30 minutes unless we really decide that we're going to. Talk about a specific topic for a longer period of time. This is just really something meant to be quick and easy to watch. All right, so this has been episode one of the critical of Capital podcast featuring Jay and Brady. We kind of went over our own personal beliefs, talk about some of our criticisms of the modern left movements and how we think that we should fix them. I hope you guys have a great night and thank.
Episode 5.1: Ted Kaczynski And The Anti Tech Revolution
2,561 views
Dec 19, 2018
In this gigantic 2 part episode, Brady and Jay talk about the alienation that technology brings about, and the Unabomber himself. Grab some popcorn, because this anti-civilization episode is our longest yet!
Instagram Pages:
Brady: https://www.instagram.com/anti.authority
Jay: https://www.instagram.com/paleolithicism
Gavin (editor): https://www.instagram.com/leftistgarfield
Viktor (pictures): https://www.instagram.com/militant.left/
Further Reading:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Kaczynski
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/ted-kaczynski-hit-where-it-hurts#toc5
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/fc-industrial-society-and-its-future#toc23
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Murray
Brady: All right. Hey. Everyone, this is episode five of the critical of capital podcasts. I'm Brady. Jay is joining me. We are a pair of radical left wing activists who are critical of capital bored as **** and commodified today's episode. We're going to be talking a little bit about technology and alienation. Specifically the story of Ted Kaczynski. And how his beliefs have sort of influenced our own personal beliefs. Jay, if you want to kind of start out, you know way more. About this than me.
Jay: Yeah, for sure. So you know, as everyone knows here, especially within the first episode and stuff I've mentioned in later episodes, I'm very critical of technology and civilization, you know, ironic. I'm part of the podcast. I have a phone, an Xbox and a laptop in front of me. But you know, I may do. You know the big topic we're only talking. About is you. Know like you said, technology, alienation, tech izinski and this whole thought, this whole thought kind of goes back to her. So who is a philosopher of the? Enlightenment, who talked about how primitive living was peaceful nature and man that coexisted, and everything that kind of culminated as time goes on to people like Ted Kaczynski. Who all kind of talk about here, for those who don't know, Ted Kaczynski is known as the Unabomber, who is serving 8 consecutive life sentences without possibility of parole. And his convictions are 10 counts of transportation and mailing of in use of bombs and three counts of. Harder, so you might be thinking of what the **** are you on? You know, some of the man worshipping ********. But you know it's. I won't try to say, you know, I I liked his ideas. Don't agree with what he did because I think what he did is in some sense justifiable, because if someone's theory is correct, if they're. Taxis is in line with their theory than it is justified, so to speak. If you want to take. A morality route. The type is the speed.
Brady: Well, now you're on. Every watch list in the American government.
Jay: From 40 M. That's Tyski actually was a really interesting dude, he. Issues that consider the mathematical prodigy and made breakthroughs in like the mathematical. Field and he went to Harvard and the University of Michigan, and he had a he has a PhD. I think it's. I think it's in mathematics, yeah.
Brady: It is he actually graduated high school at the age of 15. He skipped the 6th grade and the 11th grade and was enrolled into Harvard at the age of 16.
Jay: Yeah, yeah. And then he ended up, he finished with an above average GPA 3.12 he had a bouncers works degree in mathematics from Harvard. And then if people don't know when he was at Harvard, he was a part of a psychological study in which he was essentially kind of almost brainwashed to some extent. He was manipulated and kind of mentally tortured by professors who would eventually be a part of what was what would become the CIA. So it's really interesting stuff and body can go into it. Leader because you know, he's he's kind of more informed on that from a video he watched, but he ended up being also the youngest teacher. At the University of Michigan, where he also earned his master's and doctoral degree. But then he ended up uh teaching at Berkeley as well, which is really interesting. But he would, but he was the youngest enrolled staff member of all time as a as a professor in Berkeley.
Brady: One thing that I want to actually point out as we're talking about his like younger life is that he actually believed that his parents pushed him too hard in his earlier life into academia and his in his mind. Him skipping these earlier grades, the 6th grade and the 11th grade made it harder for him to connect with people because he was so much smaller than. His classmates and he was so much younger than his classmates, especially in Harvard, that he believed that his parents actually made it more difficult on him to assimilate into like modern mainstream society and culture because of the.
Jay: And it says here and where was it in 1967 he became the youngest assistant professor of mathematics in the history of California, Berkeley, where he taught undergraduate courses in geometry and calculus. And this is just from the Wikipedia. He was actually regarded as not being a very good teacher. He would teach like straight out of the textbook. He seemed uncomfortable. He wouldn't answer questions. And then one day he. Resigned and people say that because he would have nightmares, what they did to him at Harvard, the psychology study broke him. Whatever it was in detail, it they lasting the facts and. They ended up moving out. Into Montana, built a cabin and lived there for several years. Several years of very long term, self-sufficient. He grew and hunted his own, his own food. He ended up at some point he would kind of travel. Back in the town for. The library he would read a lot and that's kind of where his entertainment came from with self-sufficiency. Here, let me see. Here's his quote. So what radicalized him was obviously he saw issues and that's why he went self-sufficient to begin with is he had interest in nature. But he has this quote here. It's kind of like rolling country, not flat. And when you get to the edge of it, you see those ravines that cut very steeply into Cliff, like drop offs and there's. Even a waterfall there. Has been a two days hike from my cabin. That is the best spot until the summer of 19. 83 that summer, too many people around the cabin, so I decided. I needed some space. I went back to the plateau and when I got there I found they put a road right to the middle of it. You just can't imagine how upset I was. This I'm not playing on I. Decided rather than. Trying to acquire further wilderness skills, I would get back at the system revenge. He essentially have been radicalized. Through his own experiences and love for nature. But he saw that, basically his lifestyle. In a larger capacity and the techno industrial. System are at. Odds and he wrote. The Industrial Society and its future. And then started bombing in May. It was actually between 1978 and 1995. He led the longest FBI man in history, and the FBI ended up actually breaking some of their rules to get him, like, negotiating terrorists because he basically said if you don't publish my manifesto, I'm going to continue my bombings. He published his manifesto and he still continued his bombings.
Brady: Another thing too is that you said he led the longest FBI investigation. It was also the most expensive. I I don't even know if they we have the direct numbers of how much money the United States government spend on trying to find him, but. In the end, it wasn't even the federal government that caught him. It was uh, his brother David and his wife, who actually read his published manifesto in the New York Times. And cross referenced it back into his earlier writings and letters that he would send back and forth between him and his brother and made the connection between the two styles of writing, which determined that it was him. But yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely.
Jay: It's always the family.
Brady: But getting a little bit more into what Jay was talking about with the psychological study at Harvard, basically the outline of that study. Was that the young, gifted students that Ted Kaczynski was living with outside of the Harvard campus? They had a specific house that was on the property but hadn't been inhabited for a while, that they would let the gifted students live in, like the younger students who would go to Harvard. Brown, Ted's age at that time at that time, like 16 to 18. So before they were. Of normal entry age into Harvard, they would stay there and a lot of the students that actually lived in that building said that it was very socially isolating and that a lot of the people who actually lived in that house ended up confined in their in their rooms almost like it was like a. A makeshift prison. During that study, what would basically happen is that this professor would tell these students, Kaczynski included, Ted Kaczynski included, that they all are going to write essays about their personal beliefs and convictions. So all these students end up writing these big, long essays. Is about what they believe and why, and this professor basically had interrogators read their essays and personally attacked them on their beliefs without holding back as hard as they could. They would just attack and attack and attack. These 16 and 17 year olds on their personal. Let's say and they would be recorded, and after they were done doing this, they would force them to watch this recording over and over and over again until they were basically psychologically broken because of this abuse that they were forced to endure. And this professor I don't have. Is his name up at the moment? But I will make sure to get a link in the description to describe a little bit more about these experiments. This professor actually ended up working in the OSS. The Office of Strategic. Should I don't remember the rest of it. But the OSS which later became the. CIA is what you need to know, Aaron.
Jay: Strategic services.
Brady: Yeah, office of Strategic Services and the project that they were working on. With these students. Had a big effect on. If you believe in it, MK project MK Ultra, which is big into mind control and the use of drugs like LSD to initiate mind control. This professor also did have an infatuation with. LSD as a tool to learn how to control people's minds. Other workers at the OS, other officials at the OSS would also make testimony about this professor. Kind of. Almost being infatuated with mind control, but yeah, that's that's really what Ted Kaczynski has said in his own writings was the worst day of his life was that day of being forced to repeatedly endure that psychological abuse over and over to. Study its effects on the brain. Yeah, the the.
Jay: Actual name of him was Henry Murray.
Brady: Oh, Henry Murray. That's right.
Jay: Yeah, he was the he was a psychologist at Harvard University.
Brady: Yeah, it's, it's, it's wild. Obviously, you won't find any government sources on this because all that **** will be classified. But we'll do our best to get information down there in the description for you guys to look at. There also are just a lot of really good documentaries online that you can watch that. You'll learn quite a bit.
Jay: There's a mini series called the Unabomber Manhunt, I think, or something like that. Unabomber manhunt, I think that's what it's called. Yeah, it's in Netflix, it's called Manhunt.
Brady: I believe you're correct.
Jay: Unabomber on Netflix, YouTube, Amazon Prime iTunes, Google playing voodoo. You can watch it. There some 93% Rotten Tomatoes.
Brady: Yeah, it's actually. It's actually really interesting though, how you were talking earlier about how the the, the moment that really made him realize that he. Needed to take. A militant stance against techno industrial society was that a road was built through an area in which she liked to frequent. Because before that, he did try to lift peacefully, he. Kept to himself, he would ride his bike into town and do odd jobs and go to the library and read. It's kind of weird, but they their accounts that he used to check out books of theory and their original language like he would read like just German theory and Russian theory and things like that. He did try to live a peaceful life before this construction encroached on his on his cabin. I I don't know. It's it's really hard to say what specific instance set him off in a sense, and I don't say set him off in a negative connotation. Because like Jay said earlier. If you have theory to back up your actions, I think those actions should be supported. But yeah, what what? Are your thoughts on that?
Jay: See my my thoughts are more or less. On the reception of. His work, because I do think his targets are odd, because it kind of contradicts his later work, and that could just be with time. He he UM the he. He's altered his practice. His practice is now, you know, attack major components of. Of the system and all of that will topple, blowing up teachers and scientists doesn't really make a whole lot of. Sense to me. I just it doesn't seem to be compatible with this later theory, so it could just be with time he's adjusted the way his worldview has changed, and that would make sense. He's had a lot of. Time to think. About it so. Solitary confinement.
Brady: I would say his like his most like his most significant target was probably the. The lumber like basically, yeah, the lumber attorney who would go around.
Jay: The number attorney.
Brady: To advocate for lumber companies to be able to buy up more. Land to chop trees down, but other than that, a lot of his a lot of his targets for like computer store owners, he actually went after two computer store owners, a teachers assistant. One of them was a teacher.
Jay: Was he a?
Brady: Or was he a professor? He was a professor, I believe, of computer science. There was one who was? I think it was a biology professor as well. But yeah, his targets were his targets were really odd. Obviously sending bombs in the mail isn't really a very like, accurate way of reaching who you're trying to reach.
Jay: Yeah, I mean. Here's the big thing about. The he is a really personal vendetta against the Biogenetics Department of Science, basically. And that's when he attacked. Was a geneticist by this guy named Charles Epstein Epstein. But he's talked about and hit it where it hurts and all of his major works basically talked about bioengineering. He kind of predicts that bioengineering will basically be. Used to control human development, like on a much more physical level, so that we adapt to the system and not the other way around. And so he has a he he very much is big into, like stopping that. Before he gets bigger. And so I kind of want to use this as like a segue into more theory and just kind of talking more personal about what we think about and, you know, civilization and techno industrialism. Brady, do you want? To give your thoughts is obviously very recently, especially at the last day or two. You start to. Become more. Open to it more aware. Of it would you want to talk about it?
Brady: Yeah, it's, yeah, definitely. It's actually really strange. My journey into these ideas. Even in the introduction I spoke of myself as civilization critical, but I definitely wasn't prepared to adopt the the label of anti SIV. But just very recently looking into. What Kaczynski writes about and his reasonings for doing. What he does. And applying those same thoughts to my own life, it's really started to make sense honestly. Like even just driving to and from work every day, seeing the. Thousands of people on the freeways in the metropolitan area I live in. It's it's really saddening. It's it's sad seeing. These gigantic stores and malls and parking lots full of people just aimlessly walking around consuming because they don't know anything better. And they don't know why they're consuming or they don't know why they feel the need to continue consuming, but they just do it because it's it's just normal for them at this point. It's been conditioned into them, like into their brains. It's just being normal and. I really think that. I'd be a hypocrite as somebody who is critical of civilization already to. Not adopt these ideas really, because that would be like the same notion of somebody who's saying that. They're they're critical of. Critical of capitalism, but not becoming a like a socialist or a communist. You know, how can you be critical of something and recognize the flaws in something without? Necessarily rejecting it in a sense like that's something like civilization, where I don't see very many very many benefits through modern technology, industrial civilization. Other than the fact that we can connect with each other without it, this podcast wouldn't exist. The small community that we have forming around this podcast would exist. I wouldn't have gotten to talk to. A bunch of people that I've gotten to know over my past few years. In the more activist side of the Internet, but other than that, I see technology as something that is ultimately going to just keep striving forward, alienating us more and. More every day. You can't stop. The progress of technology, you can't hinder it. I shouldn't say you can't stop it, but you can't hinder it. You can't guide it. Can stop it. But the only way to do that is. Total rejection and militant action against. Doctors that uphold that progression. You get a lot of these people who are advocating for, especially recently artificial intelligence, which I think is a terrible idea. There's actually a clip from the Joe Rogan Experience Podcast that I was listening to this morning where Joe Rogan was talking about Ted Kaczynski and the fact that. His ideas about the progress of technology and the the diminishing of individual liberties is very much correct. The fact that we're going to develop things like artificial intelligence that are going to make humanity obsolete, we're going to invent things that make us no longer necessary. And I think that's a very scary thought.
Jay: Ohh I agree, I totally agree. I mean, there's projects popping up all over the place of, you know, can we get AI or basically machines to write music or write novels? What's going to be the point if a robot can do something creative like? Sure, they can replace their job, you know, like a lot of communist ones. Let's let's automate the workforce. Sure, that gives us a bunch of time, you know, be free thinkers and do creative things. What happens when the machines. Started doing. That too, you're kind of removing just. The the organic production of art of Things that are supposed to be beautiful. Now you're replacing it with a machine doing it.
Brady: It's there's, there's. No heart behind it. There's no soul behind it. You can't. You can't program humanity. You you can program a machine to do a task, but you cannot program humanity into a machine. And I think that's something that people are starting to lose sight of. Is that our humanity is being? Encroached on more and more every day. Every year that goes by with. With the new iPhone, people start to care less about losing their humanity and more about how. Detailed the camera is on the new iPhone. And like, what's going to? Be the point when the air is so. Toxic that you can't breathe and. The ice caps are melting and. Every people are dying. People are dying because of your lust for a better camera on your phone. Hmm, how can you? How can you rationalize the death? Of your fellow humans, for your need for. So-called progress when you're really just. Further isolating yourself, it's it's a notion that has been pushed to us so hard that technology and. Society is progress. How are we progressing? Where are we progressing? Like I see, people are becoming more aware of social issues, but why do we need? AI to do that? Why can't we talk to? Each other. Why can't we explain our struggles? Why do you have to destroy humanity? Why do we have to make this planet so toxic that people in China can literally make a brick out of pollution? In the air. Like it just. It doesn't make sense to me and like I said earlier, I think I would be a hypocrite if I didn't at least address these notions in my mind, right? Right. That that'd be the same as somebody who says that they're critical of capitalism, but. Doesn't address the notions of. Communism, you know. So yeah, it's been a really, really strange past few days for me, honestly. And like, I've been talking about with Jay earlier before we were recording actually, just before we were recording, was that this notion isn't going to be something easy for people to adopt. It's not meant to be easy. The system is designed in a way. That having ideas like this is shaking. It's shaking your foundation and it makes you uncomfortable, but we have to be uncomfortable when we're comfortable in this system. We don't quest. In it. If you're comfortable living a. Certain way you're not going to question that. Way of life. You're not going to isolate yourself.
Jay: Sorry, no, go on.
Brady: You're not going to put yourself voluntarily in an uncomfortable position unless you realize that making you comfortable is actually detrimental to you and detrimental to your humanity, which is what I completely believe. Modern techno industrial society is. And before all of you. To a transhumanist people. Start talking in the comments or whatever techno industrial society does not just mean capitalism. You transhumanists who think that you're socialists and communists. Just you're misguided. Please just realize that. Putting the computer in your brain. Doesn't add to humanity. It takes away from it.
Jay: Yeah, like at that point, what defines humanity? I mean, if 20 minutes want to see humanity in a purely negative connotation, then sure, you can try and. Justify it that way, we. We, as materialists should understand while speaking for myself as materialist, that human nature is dynamic. It it it depends on the conditions in which it exists. So to say that humans are naturally or that humanity is naturally a destructive thing or a negative thing is kind of short sighted.
Brady: Yeah, and it's. Very strange because you've known me for what Jake's, like, 8 months now. Yeah, sometimes. Since the early to mid summers when I met you. And back then, I used to describe myself as like a a post humanist cyber nihilist is how I used to describe myself. And just looking back at that, it just it makes it makes my entire like. Being shiver it it just it makes me feel gross that I honestly held those notions and that I. Objectified myself to that notion where I made myself something that. Was advocating for the destruction of my own humanity. Like how? Does that even? Yeah, I'm. I'm a transhumanist and I think that I should lose. What makes me who I am so that I can be what I'm not. A cold dead machine that doesn't have life and cannot create life, you know. Like that's man, that's gross. Basically, I was a *******.
Jay: I mean that, you know, there was this, that that was the past, we. Can move on you. Know talking about this when you. Said, you know, people don't. Wanna complain? It's the it's the bingo. Bingo, bingo, song or whatever it's civilized by. It was written by Bob. Hillard and Carl Sigmund. And then also performed by Elaine. Stretch, I think, was her name. It's featured in that the Fallout games. It's a pretty popular song. There's the quote, although it's smoky and it's crowded. They're too civilized to complain. When you're in a place of privilege, it's really. Hard to complain about things that keep you. In that place of privilege. So I think it's interesting.
Brady: Honestly, honestly, it is though. So that's the only way that you can become. Necessarily critical of the conditions in which you live is to recognize, like I said, that that condition is. Harmful and I think. A lot of people do that necessarily with communism, right? They see capitalism as this system that disguises itself as a movement for progress, right? And as a ideology and I don't want to call it a philosophy, an ideology or a system of economics based on progress, but in reality it's not. But these same communists. Who are so willing to attack the core of capitalism are completely unwilling to attack the. Idea which gave birth to capitalism, you know which is techno industrial society? So I just don't see how one can have. They claim to be against the cognitive dissidence of the right wingers, right? But then they have their own problems with cognitive dissidence in relation to civilization, right? So that's that's basically how I've how I've gone from somebody in eight months who considered themselves a transhumanist, to somebody who is now looking at the works of Ted Kaczynski and realizing, you know what this ******* guy had a point. And the fact that he's been in prison for 20 years and still influencing people's. Beliefs throughout that whole time, keeping in contact with people you can write. Ted Kaczynski a letter. And there's a chance that he will respond to you, because that's basically the only human contact that he gets other than his one hour of outside recreation a day because he's been in solitary confinement for.
Jay: What did you say, Jay?
Brady: Around 20 years.
Jay: Yeah, let me see here. Give me one second. I think he was caught. He was caught sometime in 90 to 90. Yeah. He was apprehended in 96 and it's 2018 now. So. All while. Yeah, solitary confinement.
Brady: Yes it is. Solitary confinement being 23 hours of complete lockdown, no access outside of your cell, which is, I don't know, that the the normal dimensions of a solitary confinement cell, but I know it's basically large enough to have a concrete slab and. That's about it. And you're confined.
Jay: It's the United States Penitentiary administrative maximum facility. A supermax prison. Yeah, in Colorado.
Brady: Yeah, his his only human contact outside of writing letters is his one hour of time that he gets to go outside a day. He has no contact with guards other than when they hand him food. So yeah, if you want to write him a letter cup, his address in the supermax, you can write him a letter. But yeah, Jay was actually telling me earlier about how the warden at the prison was actually trying to take away his writing privileges. If you want to. Talk about that a little bit.
Jay: In a recent article that came out, it's on the intelligencer. I think that's how you would call it a new essay or article came out recently called. The children of Ted subtitled 2 decades after his last deadly act of Ecoterrorism the Unabomber, has become an unlikely prophet to a new. Generation of athletes. And there is a movement called. It's in Central America, mostly Mexico, kind of Latin America. And it's this quasi religious, nationalist, anti tech movement and they kind of get some inspiration from it might be the Aztecs, but I'm not being wrong on that. They refer. Basically they want to be warriors of old and they just start killing innocent people, children, women, they've raped and murdered. And Ted not only sees them as a negative group, he sees them probably run by the state to some level or to some degree that they're state funded or LED, but also that if you write him about it. Because there's such a high level. Terrorist organization. He could lose his writing privileges and that the warden wants to find any reason to take it away from him. And so he said before. Do not write. To me about them. Who says I've said what I. Have to say, but if. You write me about it, you might. Be screwing me? So don't do it. Does that some of his only human contact? Like Brady says it, so don't **** him over.
Brady: If you're going to, if you're going to write him a letter, and this is mainly the reason why I have personally written him a letter yet is because I I feel personally very afraid that I would. Say something that would. Affect his ability to have human contact, you know. With the with the outside world, that's his only contact. That's the only way he knows about what's going on. He doesn't get to watch the news. He doesn't get to. He doesn't get to read the latest. Like post on Facebook or on Twitter on Instagram, he doesn't get to go on Google to learn what's happening in the world. He he only gets his news from from other people who are sympathetic to his ideas, you know? So if you're going to write him a letter, please, please be careful. If you don't believe that the state will be reading your letter and will be reading his possible correspondence back to you. You're misguided. So yes, please be careful if you're going to write him. Just don't be the person that takes away his ability to communicate with the outside world, because that's literally all he. Has left.
Jay: Yeah. So we're sitting here about 32 minutes talking about just, Todd. So let's let's move on because you know Brady, you talked about your personal experience with that. I want to kind of get into mine here. You know, I've I used to identify as what you can call it anarcho primitivist, which is a return. To semi nomadic or completely nomadic like Hunter gatherer society or anything to that extent, but now I'm just comfortable with the title of anti anti civilization. I don't know identify as an anarchist though I. Don't really care for that label.
Brady: What's a question? Quick, what made you? What made you come to that? To that realization now going from. From Anarcho primitivism to just being a. Anti SIV person.
Jay: Good question. So. Kaczynski actually has a decent argument against primitivism. He has some bad takes. On it some. Anthropological and historically wrong facts and stuff like that. But his overall argument? Is you expect that core of this argument isn't just tech is bad, right? A big thing is you can't decide on micro levels. How society will form itself, because there's always contradictions that will exist in in uh, you know, conflicts between individual interests and that is the product, it it he quotes and goes along in his new book and tech revolution, how and why. And I would recommend. That you read it. Or write and how? Excuse me. It's it's a really good book and he represents angles and he does follow a form of dialect and pairs of technological determinism and basically a lot of his efforts in writing are that. You can make major impacts on society, but you can't decide the next part. So he says we should have a hunter gatherer ideal. I still hold that I still would like that, but he says we should move forward against the technological system. And while we have an enemy, we. Need to have an ideal that. Would be the hunter gatherer mode of production. And essentially I've moved away. From you know. Oh, there. I'm just going. We're going to. Bomber says that to the stone. Age because it's not feasible. That's not. Realistic it's. Not what we need to focus on is the system in which we currently the system and bringing it down. And yes, there will be pain and suffering. Basically right away. But The thing is, the more we become dependent, the more pain and suffering that will happen. So we need. To bring it down as soon as possible to limit the amount of suffering the pain that will. Happened right away and hopefully a new society, a better egalitarian society will flourish out of it because it won't be the same as doing much like feudalism, because we've had the knowledge and we've we're coming out of different conditions. You know what I mean? So it won't just be the same thing. You're not going back in. Time. That's ******* stupid. And so I tend to realization because I adopted A materialist view that you can't just say. OK, let's go back to this ideology is stupid. I don't consider antisense or anti tech to be ideology. It's not. It's not dressed in social dogma, and it's still materialist. I have values. These are what I would call values. And So what I'm trying to say here. Is you can't. Decide what the conditions in society will look. Like you can just make big impacts and that's a big argument, Ted, that has with technology, especially because people who say we can reform the system or we can have. Coexistence with technology in a good environment and human autonomy, and he would disagree. And at the end of anti tech revolution, how and? Why there is? A section called the Long term outcome of geoengineering, and he says basically us trying to control the environment is a bigger danger. Than nuclear weapons. Because expecting us to be able to take control of the environment and of weather and such, which is something that we are trying to do to slow down global warming and climate change, is to take control of the climate. Have we not noticed we have been trying to take control of the world and it is only fatas and that basically any small mistake, because everything is everything's interconnected, which is the idea of dialect. Once my mistake will set everything else off and it's really in depth and I can see if I can get that section up up a link to it, post it. If not, I can see if I can post the whole section I'm referring to in the comments, if that's possible. If we have room for. So that's a big part. Of why I made. The change is I. Still have the hunter gatherer ideal as it's told, but I do not consider it my ideology. I consider my my values to just be against techno industrialism. And so I want kind. Of delete ohh going.
Brady: And I think something that we need to stress about this as well. While you're talking about this is that we don't have a. Lot of time. You know, we don't, we don't have much time left. So I think if you want to talk about that a little bit more, but I think that really does need to be emphasis.
Jay: So, you know, recent studies. Have you know been? Coming out all over, we have. I've seen 12/20/30 and. 35 years. It's about 20 years or so, between 12 and 20 years to reduce carbon emissions, 30 to 35 to basically reduce it to a point where there won't be any impact, we need to start that process within 20 years. And by 3035 years, it needs to. Be gone or we're screwed. Because here's the thing, let me talk about this. So, like I said, everything is interactive, right? So overtime. There's kind of a range. Of which life can develop on Earth, right? Yeah, if you're you're low and you're high, whatever those numbers can be a meta geoscientists or it I won't ever claim to be. But you have a range in which life, you know microorganisms. That are high functioning enough to be considered life. Or mammals, fish. You know, mammals can live and thrive and evolve. And we have seen mass distinctions, but there's always a comeback from life, you know, from life and come back, you know, humans are cells faced A bottleneck like 75,000 years ago, where our genetic diversity literally battled that. But here's the. Thing carbon emissions. Have gone up and down the earth has. Cooled and warmed, we have accelerated that process. Released carbon emissions up to 10,000 times more so than it's supposed to be. Some crazy numbers like that 2018 is the highest year on record. Like so, we obviously do not have time.
Brady: It's it's crazy how much damage we are doing to. Ourselves without even realizing it. The fact that global warming is still up for debate is insane. Like the fact that you have these. Right wing politicians arguing the fact that the 3% of climate scientists who are paid by oil companies and natural gas companies who argue that global warming. Doesn't exist and I know a lot of Republicans recently have started to say, well, we think global warming exists, but we think it's a natural cycle. We don't think it's impacted by humans. It's it's it's pretty great, a lot of right wingers. Are all for. Statistics until the statistics go against their narratives. So take everything that these right wingers say with a grain of salt, and even take things that we say with a grain of salt. We don't want you. To just listen to what we say and believe things yourself, because like Jay was talking about with himself, this was a process for me as well and I'm still learning. I still know very, very little about these ideas, and I'm learning more every day and I'm honestly very excited to to delve deeper into these thoughts. But look into things yourself. We don't want you. To take our words and just. Believe them wholeheartedly. It's it's a process. And like I said earlier. Having these ideas and coming to these realizations is not easy. It's going to shake your personal beliefs. It's going to be scary, but it's ultimately something that is necessary for not only the survival of yourself and your own. Realization of your humanity in that sense, but for the survivability of. The human race. It's not. It's not just about us people. They're people that are coming after us, our children, our children's children. A whole group of people that haven't even had the notion of being conceived yet, so we have to think about the future and you get a lot of these, mainly older. Older right wingers who basically throw this notion of protecting not only the environment, but protecting the survivability of humanity and throwing it to the wind because they won't be alive to see the consequences. And I really do think that action needs to be taken against. That idea you need to attack their bad ideas with ideas based in fact. Yeah, whenever you. Can this isn't a joke anymore? This isn't. Just an online debate. This isn't even just our podcast. This is life or death at this point.
Jay: I want to go into something here. When people say humans don't have a large impact in terms of carbon emissions and the people you've seen ever seen through the maximum where the earth is essentially very hot. We 1.7 billion metric tons of carbon were released into the atmosphere every year for about 4000 years. That sounds like a lot. In 2014 alone, 9.8 billion metric tons of carbon were released. One year, one year, nine basically nine. What is it just? About 9 times more or so. In a year, compared to 1.7 every year, did you see an issue here 1.71.7? 9.8. That's there's no one see an issue there because the reason.
Brady: Yeah, Jay. But I read on Facebook an article from Fox News that said that Exxon scientists believe that global warming doesn't exist.
Jay: Oh, I'm sorry. I forgot my neoconservatism. Ohh yes, of course. Yeah. And then we forget the fact that just 100 companies are responsible for 71% of global emissions.
Brady: That's also something I want to talk about. The people that push this notion that if we just recycle more, Jay, if you throw your cans into the recycle.
Jay: You're going to save the planet. Do you know that? Yeah, that that. And I want to point out the danger of that thinking that is liberal individualism that seems to blink. To push the blame away from the system. Like you don't want to question the. Status quo, you. Put on the individual. You blame the individual. You, you pull them in. Look at this. Think of the children like, you know, are telling. You know, think of the children. Say, but it's your fault. You have to make these changes. Ohh yeah, those copies over there. Ignore them. You know they make money. It's alright, that's that's the issue with liberalism and conservatism even.
Brady: And and in saying this. We're not advocating that you just go ****. And throw all of your your garbage into your local park, because that's obviously not what we're advocating for. And I think people who. Take that notion out of what we're saying are completely misguided and without a doubt, there's going to. Be people who listen to this and think that. We have gone off the deep end right and people are going to dismiss.
Jay: Of course.
Brady: People are going to dismiss our arguments as soon. OK. Here the name Ted Kaczynski. But for those of you who are still listening to this and are interested in still listening to this, don't be fooled by that notion that you throwing your cans into the recycle bin or using a metal cup instead of plastic water bottles. Is going to save the planet. The planet will not die. We will die. The planet does not need us. We need the planet, so it's still good to. It's still good to recycle. It's still good to make use out of things that others have thrown away. I don't think any of us would argue against that. Fact, but don't think that you telling your community to recycle or to reuse things that others would deem as trash is going to make a large enough impact to. Sort of sway the amount of damage that we've done to the environment already.
Jay: Yeah. And like we've. Been talking a lot about the environment and I want to go in because we kind of went on a huge tangent there for about 12 minutes and I kind of want to pull something in here more about. Theory and about. How technology relates to the human sphere and such? And I'm referring here to the Industrial society's future by Techzone ski on the section called the power process. That starts with paragraph 33. This stuff is really interesting, so I refer that technological systems and in technical industry. Is basically in a contradiction to human freedom and right for, for human freedom, and basically meaning the ability for a person to find goals, work for their goal through hard work, and then achieve it because that. Is fulfilling for us. That that process is a sociological, biologically based part of our brains. It's the. It's the. What is it called? The reward part of our brain. Where if you do something good with this serotonin that is a part of us. And when you remove that right when you remove that ability to do that, you increase rates of depression and anxiety. And so I'm going to read a little bit here from tech business team and this is a big part of my argument. And we might even do another episode, maybe like a Part 2 to this, because this is interesting and there's a lot to talk about, especially between me and Brady and maybe other people. That would like to come along, but. Part 30 or paragraph 33, human beings have a need, probably based in biology, for something that we will call the power process. This is closely related to the need for power, which is widely recognized, but it is not quite the same thing. The power process. Is 4 elements. The three most clear cut of these. Or the three most clear cut we call goal, effort, and attainment of goal. Everyone needs to have goals whose attainment requires effort and needs to succeed in attaining at least some of his goal. So you can, let's say you're like, oh, I. Want to read? Two books today which you end up reading. One you still accomplish part of your goal. It says the 4th element is more difficult to define and may not be necessary for everyone. We call it autonomy and we will discuss it later. That's something I won't talk about right now. Because it's not as important as the three. Be listed considering the hypothetical case of a man who can have anything he wants just by. Wishing for it. Such a man has power, but he develops serious psychological problems. At first he will have a lot of fun, but by the by the end he becomes acutely bored and demoralized. Eventually, he may become clinically depressed. History shows us that leisured. Aristocracies tend to become decadent. This is not true of fighting aristocracies. Life the struggle to maintain their power. But leisured, secure aristocracies that have no need to observe themselves, usually become bored, hedonistic and demoralized, even though they have power. This shows that power is not enough. One must have goals toward which to exercise most power, and I want to point out here that doesn't seem. Advocating for any sort of monarchy or Stacy. It does critique such power structures, especially in anti tech revolution. He's just saying in this case of an aristocracy where we assume just because you have power, you're happy that's not true. That's what he's debunking. Paragraph 35. Everyone has goals, if nothing else, to obtain the physical necessities of life, food, water and whatever clothing and shelter are made and necessary by the climate. But the leisured airs aristocrat obtains these things without effort, hence his boredom and demoralization. Non attainment of important goals. Results in in death if the goals are physical necessities, and in frustration if not, a team of the goals is compatible survival. Something like, OK, if I wanted to read, it's not necessary enough for me to read for my survival. But if I don't reach my goal, then I might ohh ****. That sucks. And it's obviously becomes demoralizing, and it bothers me consistent failure to attain goals throughout life results in defeatism, low self esteem or depression. And then the final part is thus in order to avoid serious psychological problems, a human being needs goals. There's a team that requires effort, and he must have a reasonable rate of success. And attaining his goals.
Brady: How you were just describing that actually that's the first time I've heard that. But the thing that instantly came to mind was the story of King Midas, right where King Midas had this power to turn anything he touched into gold. Right. And that gave him great power. But with that, with that power. He realized that. Through that power, he was also taking away the humanity. Of life. So that's that's kind of what I got from that honestly.
Jay: And then I have a little bit more to go into here because now he's going to explain how this. Adapts to the. Modern way for the first world countries that are developed because he does believe similar things are in the Third world. But there's also physical. Pain in which you know they have to perform in low, low paying, highly dangerous jobs and which she does criticize. Else and so I will try to keep this short. We divide human drives into three groups, so drives us in our goals and such that we discussed just a little bit ago one those strings that can be satisfied with minimal effort. Two, those that can be satisfied. But only at the cost of serious effort. And three, those that cannot be adequately. Completely satisfied, no matter how much effort will. The power process is the process of certifying the drives of the second group, which is putting serious effort into something. The more drives there are in the third group, the more there is frustration, anger, eventually defeatism. Because like he says, you can't actually complete it. Or if you do, it's. Kind of like. It's kind of a consistent it's totally. Ohh ****, I don't want to mess this up. Excuse me. Assert good activity, so essentially something. That doesn't seem to have end to it, so like if I I used to be a runner so I. Use that as an example. And if I just keep running and running, I'm never satisfied with it. And because I'm never satisfied it starts to. Kind of emotional pulled down on me because I'm not setting myself actual goals and that's a tip of runners. So don't just say, oh, I want to get better at running, cause that's crap. Be like, OK, set goals for yourself. I wanna run a marathon. You know, that's a big goal. But that's a life goal for a lot of a lot of runners is that's a serious goal or a I want to have a personal. Right, those are those are good examples of goals and those are things you can. Work for and then you. You know you're satisfied when you reach it, hopefully. And so basically Group One is things that are very arbitrary. That's basically your necessities. Now you go to work, you exploit it for your surplus labor. It's not hard in the sense that they said that these things have access. You just have to work for them. It's a little different than proving the people whose their life kind of revolved. Around that and we obviously see that. Your upper middle classes don't have to worry about that, the lower. The classes you. That's a little bit different, but we tell his arguments from within your like middle class is. That's like a large portion of your population. Especially in the developing or in the developed world. So we essentially see that life is now put into first, which is minimal effort. And third, which is never ending hedonistic and disappointing. Second is basically your your hard hard long term goals which are now taken away. And places that are replaced with arbitrary goals that aren't really fulfilling and they cause neurosis and psychological breaking. So that's that's a big part of the argument for. Is the fact that we have surrogate activities and not true? Realization of the power process, which is what freedom. Is all about.
Brady: So what do you then personally think that? It would take to. Have your notions and your way of viewing the world be something that is? Widely adopted. Do you think that that's a notion that is conceivable?
Jay: Ted Kaczynski actually mentioned this, and I have the quote here Theta. The big problem is that people don't believe the revolution is possible and it's not possible precisely because you may not believe it is possible to a large extent. I think the eco anarchists such as primitivists. Movement is accomplishing a great deal, but I think it could do better. The real revolutionaries should separate themselves from reformers, and you think would be good if a conscious effort was being made to get as many people introduced to the wild into the wilderness in a general way. I think what has to be done is not to try and convince or persuade. The majority of people that we are right. As much as trying to increase tensions in society to the point where. Things start to. Break down to create a situation where people get uncomfortable enough that they're going to rebel. So the question is, how do you increase? Those tensions, I don't know. And those are type of sense. These words during an interview that I will have. Links down below. So I can tell you it's not really convince people what's right. It's more like don't convince people you're right. Show them the situation they're in. Sucks that. And there's a difference there. Because you may not prove them, you're right. But you might show them. Ohh man there's issues here. I don't like it. I want to change it.
Brady: I mean, that's how a lot of mainstream. Like leftist organizations, do that as well. It's not even necessarily like you said. Yeah, and not about proving to somebody that communism. Is correct in a sense because the easiest way to get somebody aligned with your beliefs is just to show them that what they are in currently. Isn't good for them, right?
Jay: Yeah, I would agree. You know, you mentioned leftism, you and I. You know, one of our first episodes was, you know, critiquing our issues with the leftism. And let me tell you, if you're, you know, like a. You know, an average anarcho communist or Marxist. And you read industrial science feature, which I recommend you do even if you don't agree, just to get a different perspective, you're going to be very shocked. By the fact he. Says leftists are over socialized and neurotic freaks. He is not a leftist, but he's also not a right winger. He thinks matter left isn't basically anything post Bolshevik revolution. Is full of a bunch of like. Reformists and it kind of conflicts, liberalism and leftism, unfortunately, and a lot of his arguments, I don't necessarily agree with, but he thinks that people I I guess you can say, like me and Brady. He received the issues here should not be conform ourselves to like PC culture, because while we should fight injustice, the bigger issue is fighting technological. Society and people consider because ensky to be. A, A traditionalist or a social darwinist. But he critiques social Darwinism and traditional society in his new work, anti tech revolution. It's more or less if you. Let's say I'm against, you know, I'm against homophobia. I'm against homophobia, right? But if the if the society then says, OK, we'll legalize the marriage and provide free, free operations to all trans people, right? And protections for them. That's great. But that now that might now pacify. Me and I won't know because now I'm playing by the rules of the society and that just capitalism and technological industry can continue even if there's no homophobia or no transphobia. So you have to fight outside of the values in which the society proposes, like, you know, destroying the electric grid.
Brady: No, no, that's a very interesting perspective and I think that it's one. That's going to shock. A lot of like you said, your average anarcho communist or your average Marxist who listens to this. But like Jay said. If you don't necessarily have to agree with these ideas to gain a better understanding of the conditions in which you live, right? Because not every single. Well, obviously, like you, you have your Marxists, right? And a lot of Marxists read anarchist literature even though they don't necessarily agree with it because they want to gain a better understanding. So you can do that same thing with. With Kaczynski's ideas and with more anti tech ideas doesn't necessarily mean you have to adopt those ideas. But I do think that when you read into them, you're going to realize that.
Jay: A lot more.
Brady: Of it is true than might make you comfortable.
Jay: Yeah, I would agree. I mean, his, his, his critiques. I wouldn't totally agree with in terms of leftism because I do believe he, he conflicts it with. It's more or less that we shouldn't make concessions in terms of social justice because he thinks we should find injustice postal apps. He he does believe that. And so I see that to an extent. And that's not I'm not saying, you know, if I see someone boring so much for being transferred. Yeah, I must stick up. For him. But it's that the main core of your argument should understand that. These these. The reasons these exist is because of the conditions that we exist in. If you just try to reform it away, you're not really changing anything. You're not fixing the world's issues. To speak. So don't take the.
Brady: Well, that's kind of how we talk. That's kind of how we spoke in the last episode about fascism and anti fascism and you can you can, you can. The fight. Your street thug, but you're not ultimately changing capital, right? You're not preventing the state from adopting fascist tendencies. It's it's the same exact thing. It's just apply it with not only in economic situation or a social situation, but with humanity. With your humanity.
Jay: I would agree, I mean. I mean type is in sleeves. Writing was really interesting in the sense that it's he writes in a way that's supposed to shock you, and but it's also he paired it with his actions and that's a big difference. It's I don't want to say, oh, he's like lemon. But you know, a lot of reasons. People listen. Lemon is. Yeah, he had good theory. But I don't think her got stuff. You know what I mean? If you can get stuff done and you have good theory, you're unstoppable and you will never die because you'll be immortalized in time. And that's evident kusinsky like this essay I just referenced. Earlier that you know. That the acolytes of Kaczynski, the fact that he's been in prison for as long as he has and he's considered a terrorist yet. People still follow him. Not from a religious point of view. Like, you know, imprisoned, radical religious people, Islam, Christianity. You know, I don't want. To go into. That, but it's not a religious position and it's not a political one. It's all human existence. And that's the difference in the fact that he's able to go down. In history that way.
Brady: And you, you're even talking about this with me yesterday, but. Basically, you kind of want to tell the story of Kaczynski saying that he's looking. For his Lenin.
Jay: Yeah, he there is. He has contacts with a lot of people who believe in his ideas. He says that right now we live in such political turmoil. There's all these groups that are. Fighting for unreasonable things and fighting with each other and fighting the system. And he's not calling for left unity or anything idealist like that. But he believes there needs to be an intelligent. Dedicated leader who can come out and print structure to the resistance and be like, OK, we all disagree, but you don't ******* listen to me. We're gonna get **** done. That's what he thinks is necessary, and he's looking for that person. But he doesn't. Then that person exists. Which is interesting.
Brady: Just knows, ma'am. Somebody listening to this right? Be that person.
Jay: And basically said, if you're stupid. And if if you write. Me a letter you're probably too. Stupid to lead the revolution, so oops. Whoops. What's that one up?
Brady: Good thing I haven't written a letter.
Jay: I yeah, I think this is actually a good place to end it. I do believe that we should follow this up with another with another episode and maybe less about consisting more about theory and practice and stuff about anti tech. Cause I think that would be a worthwhile episode.
Brady: Oh yeah. No, I'm totally down. I could talk about this forever, so I I'm totally down to it up.
Jay: Oh yeah. I mean, this is. Going to be our. Longest episode. It's gonna be our longest episode just looking at. The time, right? Now about hour and 2 minutes.
Brady: So this has been episode five of the critical of Capital podcast. Hope you guys have a nice day.
Uncivilized Podcast
Welcome Back!
1,016 views
Aug 26, 2019
Many great returns! Brady and Artxmis are finally back with the rebranded Uncivilized Podcast. In this episode, they explain what happened to the Critical Of Capital podcast, and how they have changed since its run. Also in this episode, the Amazon forest fires are touched on, as well as the public view of the anti-tech position. It's great to be back, we can't wait to hear from you! We appreciate all the past support and hope we can continue providing good content for you all.
Brady: Hey everyone, this is episode one of the newly reworked On Civilized podcast. We are uncivilized and unapologetic, just going to hand it off to art.
Artemis: Hey, guys. So we apologize for what seems to be forever now that we've been inactive, there is just a bunch. Of stuff going on in the back. Around we didn't have an editor for a while. In both Brady and I felt we were kind of lost with where the project was going. So we basically shut it down without much of an announcement, and then we attempted creating the wildness collective, which was a sort of like theorist. Hopefully it was going to be coming. It was going to be something bigger than. The critical capital podcasts, but it never really came to fruition. So essentially what we have now is a synthesis of both the Wellness collective and. Critical of capital. So I'm yeah, I'm gonna reintroduce myself. And then Brody will introduce himself for those who. Are new here. Because the both he and I have shifted in our own ways. I used to go by Jay. But I go by art or Artemis now. I'm an ex Marxist. I've essentially dismissed myself of that label, but I still have plenty of marketing and influence. Especially within the concept of history, the state and the analysis of capital comparison that can be made as sort of the jot commit sort of way in which he abandoned Marxism but still had a Marxist analysis, so to speak. I'm largely also influenced by people of Kaczynski, Edward, Abby, of Max Turner and people of that nature, less so of like Zerzan or the Kevin Tucker sort of anarcho primitivists. I've also sort of gone into Sergey Netgear's conception of like what a revolutionary is from his work, the Revolutionary Catechism. And I'm basically the lead writer and editor of the writing branch of this project, which is just. Found on medium. We're hoping to design A website for that, but that's basically where I'm at now and I'm you know, I'm trying to get this off the ground with Brady and what we're hoping for is sort of a project that has the. The podcast side of it here and like I mentioned already, is the writing side that we find on medium and we want to get a website and it would kind of have this sort of journalistic sort of aesthetic to it.
Brady: Yeah, definitely. I'm gonna keep mine pretty simple. I'm still an anarchist. As you guys know from before our old videos. I'm I'm a former Anarcho Communist and most recently post left anarchist. I'm a pretty heavy advocate for rewilding and anti work positions. Like art already said, Kaczynski and Kamat are some of my biggest influences. I also really like zerzan's work. I'm a pretty staunch anti fascist activist. And I strive to improve myself in that capacity even more. And to be honest, I really don't have any ideals or hopes for the future. Just want to break ****.
Artemis: I mean, hey, that's where that's basically where we're all. Getting that with the you know the. The Amazon is on fire. The world is falling apart green.
Brady: Yeah, a lot of crazy **** has happened. Since we've been gone.
Artemis: What the hell? The last thing we were going to record for critical capital was our take on Eco Fascism and the Christchurch shooting, but the episode never got finished. On the editorial side. Of it. So it kind of got stuck. In development hell.
Brady: That was a good one too. That was a banger we we were pretty. We were pretty worked up about that. I was hoping that we'd be able to get that out for everyone. But we're going to bring that same fire back to the uncivilized podcast we've got our routines in order. We know it's going to be going on, and we're going to bring you guys some good content. So that's the plan.
Artemis: So we can kind of shift gears a little bit. So I kind of want to talk about uncivilized and. Where I hope for it. And I've kind of written an introductory piece on medium and we will have that LinkedIn, the description, and I've already mentioned it's sort of the combination. Of critical capital. Which was to some extent sort of more of our ultra left or post. Just sort of design or thoughts and then wound this collective what's much more mainstream primitivism, neologism, that sort of stuff? And I kind of think that since main Brady have developed this project as a whole as well from the critical capital too, well in this collective. Now uncivilized. And there is we. It's not just us too. We, you know, we have someone who designs their thumbnails, who might be taking up the editing job and people that we generally talk to about ideas who will help us move forward and making sure what we're talking about is both. Reasonable and applicable to a general audience, and so even though you guys don't get to see them and they don't necessarily want to be named, the are a big help for. Both me and Brady.
Brady: Yeah, much love to everyone who's been helping us out since the critical of capital days. We always appreciate it. Everyone that shares our videos that subscribe to the channel keep doing that cuz we. Want to come back better than we were even before?
Artemis: And not only that, but we also have an Instagram page that I believe is up or still in the works.
Brady: Yeah, there was a situation with the Instagram page that I've resolved. So as time goes on, by the time this video is up, it will already be out and we'll have it. LinkedIn, the YouTube channel about and in the description of every video. So you guys can. Stay updated on when videos are going to be out topics, stuff like that. I work a lot so I don't always have time to record, but on my breaks. I can. Throw up a notification post on the Instagram. To keep you guys informed.
Artemis: Yeah, and actually, I'm looking at her YouTube channel right now. We're at 245 subscribers in the last video was nearly six months ago. And that was the episode. 8 with a conversation with Jacobi. And what we'll be doing now?
Unknown Speaker: That's crazy.
Artemis: What we'll be doing now is. Reorganizing it that this will be the first episode, not sort of episode 9. So it's going to be in Italy. Different series, so to speak. So while it has spun out of critical capital, this sort of message. While still similar is also separate from what critical capital represented. So you will see that we are on civilized episode one, episode 2, etc.
Brady: Yeah, and we're. Going to keep all those videos up just because. I think the topics that we talked about, the things that we were. Passionate about back then? Many of those things were still passionate about. We've just changed our direction and I still want to have that content available for other people to look at to kind of get an idea of what we're about.
Artemis: And moving forward, I will definitely well, critical capital had this. I feel like it it towards the end sort. Of let that community aspect. And what I'm hoping for is plenty of feedback. On what we're doing, if people want laundry episodes, shorter episodes, if they want specific topics to be talked. About they can always. Comment follow us or talk to us on Instagram. Either our separate accounts or the page for this podcast on anything like that. I want to know, I want to hear the feedback and I know Brady does as well and not only that, but if you feel you have something to talk about, not just a topic you can suggest. But if you want to come on to the. While we may not approve of everyone. We are still open to talking to you about coming on because it is a big part of building a community in which people can feel they aren't alone and what they are believing in what they're seeing in the world.
Brady: Definitely, yeah. Every comment that we got on our videos, even though we didn't get many back on the old stuff because of obviously our our outreach that we've got currently, I still liked all the comments even from people who are just starting to get into our ideas who didn't necessarily agree with us but thought what we were talking about was interesting. It's cool. It gives us a reason to keep going. We just want to start connecting with everyone, show us, show us what you want to talk about. Let us know your opinions. And we're never afraid to have a conversation.
Artemis: And that also goes for the writing arm. I'm definitely open to obviously recruiting people who are, you know, what you can say are, like, consistent writers, members of the writing branch. But if you also have something you've written that you think is applicable to what we're preaching, so to speak, then I have no issue either uploading. It for you. Or finding a way to have you upload it without being. Been a member of the media. Page in the. Medium side or the platform is hopefully only temporary because it's really not the best for formatting and uploading can be a bit of a bit of a pain if you're not associated directly with the the publication. So we're trying to figure out a website as well. It's all stuff that's going on behind the scenes.
Brady: Yeah, definitely. And I'm sure art would appreciate any help with the writing side, because I don't think I've said this on the podcast, but I'm not much of A writer. I have a really bad ADHD and. Writing things out, I just can't do it. So I'm sure or would appreciate.
Artemis: Ohh yeah and if anyone. Is good at designing websites. As well, we're open to that.
Brady: Yeah, definitely. Just any ways that anyone listening to this podcast, this episode could think of. Helping us, even if you don't think it's going to be a lot, I'm sure it would mean a lot to us. Just let us know if you have any suggestions or anything that you could help us out.
Artemis: Yeah, and. Moving forward, I kind. Of want to touch on some of. The things that have been going on. Is with the the Amazon rain, you know, wildfires, the melting of major glaciers and things like that. It's, I think. And this is a personal belief I know is shared about some people in our circles is. That now is the time to start capitalizing on these ideas to make sure that people do you know that we can get a foothold in people's minds. And I think that's something that the movement in general, the anti tech movement so to. Speak is lacking. Is like a sort of public appeal, but I think that. The recent events, especially the radical global ones or global environmental issues. Are good to be capitalized upon, but the issue is. As historically it's always done as liberalism is really beating out the more radical concepts and that includes, you know, obviously Communism, eco fascism, anti industrialism, anti tech, primitivism et cetera. And I'm not one to actually believe the collapse is coming by any means. I'm not one of those people, and I don't think we should rely on it naturally just happening. Because we cannot guarantee it's happening while we are seeing drastic environmental degradation, that does not mean it collapse is coming because we've seen humans push. The environment to its. To its maximum and it we're still here and we still have a developing civilization. It might just slow it down. So I don't think that we. Should depend on a collapse, but rather depend on. Tough situations that allow us to get. Intellectual property into people's. Minds and to capitalize and to create situations, so to speak.
Brady: I definitely agree. I think one of my main criticisms of if I could. Say our movement. As anti tech people. Is that we're really good. In times like this of explaining or. Making it very well known that we're angry. But we're not. Not as good at explaining why we're angry and getting other people to understand why we're angry. It's not just about the person shouting the loudest. It's about getting the most people to listen to your message, so I think we really need to get better. At not only posting our messages about the ice caps melting, about the the fires in the Amazon, but we need to explain the connections between industrialization and industrial technology and the global connection that that has to these natural disasters.
Artemis: I agree.
Brady: Yeah, definitely.
Artemis: And I think not just that, but that the reformism of things like the Extinction Rebellion, the green, the green, New Deal, how these things are just. Again, liberal policies that are really just trying to hold off the inevitable or trying to make the collapse look a little bit nicer. To think that we're doing all we can when in reality it's almost bare minimum.
Brady: Yeah, it's just like with any. Any medication that's meant for treating symptoms and not curing. You can reduce the the symptoms of. Impact that we have on the environment and what's currently going on, but reforming is not going to change anything in the long run. And I feel like that's so obvious that we shouldn't have to say it, but I guess not. And that's that's pretty sad, to be honest.
Artemis: I agree and. Not only that, but how often people. And I can get split on this and I understand it's sometimes that people are willing to jump. The idea that. The the, the the wildfires are natural and. To some extent, they. Might be right. Fires happen. They are in a nutshell, part of a healthy. A healthy environment, but we know that the President of Brazil has been endorsed. You know deforestation or removed limitations on environmental policies, things of that nature and has made remarks against indigenous people. And there is a lot of evidence to. Show that it's that. It's human caused and if it's not entirely human, caused human causation. Is a part of it. And that goes for a lot of environmental issues. But I think that we can make the mistake of automatically assuming something is. Quote a natural occurrence. Or it's as bad as people say, because I do think to some extent. Part of the environmental issues we're facing are not as bad as they're. Publicized to be in that we shouldn't involve victim to that, we should look and do our own personal research. That's not to say that we don't have an environmental issue, because that would be in there to say, but to say it's to 20 years. That the world is not, and that's obviously not what these scientists are saying. And the media blows that up for political purposes. And that's just something I personally hold, and I know a lot.
Brady: Ohh yeah.
Artemis: Of people disagree.
Brady: Yeah, definitely. And it's just a way to try to delegitimize our legitimate concerns about the direction that our species. Not only has taken since the Industrial Revolution, but it's continuing to take. We're just plotting along the same course. I don't know. Like we hear these things all the time about all these natural disasters, hurricanes, this this recent fire, and it's a lot of people who are, as we were talking about earlier, more prone to reformist action pushing this narrative of. Obviously, solar panels, other green technologies, electric cars as a probable solution to our problems. And like I was saying earlier, I think we need to push back against that a little bit more.
Artemis: Especially, and I understand that people, especially people that hold radical environmentalist politics. Sort of more subjects and perhaps falling into the to believing that is because we want to believe it. On the basis that it legitimizes our claims. But you can also. Understand that the issues might not be as big, but also understanding they're still devastating, or especially with the way Libra. Endorse environmental assistance or programs is. Really not that effective. It's in. It's in the way of, you know, plastic straws of the issue. It's not systemic.
Brady: Oh yeah, definitely.
Artemis: So I'm.
Brady: We we see that all the time, the plastic straws, solar panels like oh, if we just built more solar panels then we wouldn't need to rely as heavily on coal and on natural gas fracking destroying, destroying the environment, causing massive earthquakes and the further shifting of fault lines. Like I saw earlier this year. A news story on Oklahoma and how Oklahoma has had a record number of earthquakes related to natural gas fracking and the pushing of the fluids that they use to extract the natural gas out of the earth into the ground. And the state government of Oklahoma basically recognized that fracking was the cause of these natural disasters, but all they did was increase regulation on the amount of fluids being able to be pumped into the ground, not stopping it. So it's just. It's crazy. We're living. We're living in a crazy time.
Artemis: And it's also important to bring up going back to the Amazon, deforestation is a lot of the deforestation is an expansion for both industrialism and for agriculture. McDonald's was is a major link to that and this was linked back in like 2017 when we found out about this is. Like which companies? And it's crazy. And so now that we're seeing such a like a larger push for that since Bolsonaro, I hope I'm saying that right has come into power. I can't remember what it what the percentage is, but it's several football fields like in our are being burned.
Brady: Yeah, I've heard. I've heard the same thing. And one thing that I also thought was pretty interesting that I saw a connection made on somewhere online. I don't remember exactly where I saw this, but. Not too long ago, a group of indigenous tribes people in that area that the original fire started and had one a court case. In the Brazilian courts to stop, I think it was either industrial soybean farming or. Animal agriculture farming, stopping them from being able to take over more of their lands to plant crops and a lot of people were making the connection between that victory in the court case to these fires, and I don't want to be conspirator. Conspiratorial but. At this point, looking at everything that's been happening recently with that case and then these fires, I think it's something that. We should. At least have a look at.
Artemis: Yep. And actually according to the IN P/E, more than 1 1/2 soccer fields of Amazon rainforests are being destroyed every minute of every day. Is the statistic which is unacceptable.
Brady: Yeah, it's it's wild. Yeah, the only the only like. Mainstream groups that have seen trying to combat that is funny enough, Greenpeace. Greenpeace has a pretty big. Organizational structure in Brazil and they basically just get laughed out of their courthouses in Brazil and stuff, so. I mean, I don't know. I'm pretty torn. I'm not a huge fan of Greenpeace, but it seems. Like they're doing something right.
Artemis: Of course, a broken clock is right twice a.
Brady: I guess you're not wrong.
Artemis: But I also what's interesting is people, vegans. While I understand where they're coming from. Are too quick to jump on if you don't eat meat, you're going. To save the rainforest. Like, no, that's simply just not true, because that is the expectation that everyone will stop eating me. That everyone will move to a plant based. Diet in that. A plant based diet. While it is true, takes up less space to think that it's going to sustain the large population that we have. Is, I believe, statistically like impossible to be environmentally. Sustainable, right. But now if now they would playable and now they say, oh, well, now you can have a sustainable garden.
Brady: Oh, I completely agree.
Artemis: But you can't expect that from everyone. That's just an unexpectable reform, and these reforms, you can't guarantee the last forever as well. You can push for social change. And I do think personal responsibility is a big part of it. But it is not the solution. It is a systemic issue which lies at the technological, economic basis of society, not our diets primarily.
Brady: And I think the last thing that I'm at least going to say about the Amazon for now, we might delve into it a little bit further in later episodes. I thought this that was pretty interesting. Amazon rainforest trees have the highest profit margins out of almost any product created. Currently, even higher profit margins. The cocaine I saw on a YouTube video where one Amazon rainforest tree. I believe it was $50.00 but for some reason the number 200 comes to my mind, so I'm going to go with 200 to be just be a little bit more safe with it. One Amazon tree can be sold for $200.00 and be turned into $20,000 worth of wooden products. So I think that's something that we also. Need to need to be very clear about is that it's not just an issue with, not just an issue with animal agriculture. It's just an issue with capitalism. If I'm going to be completely honest, capitalism and our reliance on producing massive amounts of commodities to fill whatever need or reason why we do those things. But yeah, that's the last thing I want to say on it.
Unknown Speaker: And not and not.
Artemis: Not just having and creating those those, you know those items, those commodities, it's the ability because of industrialization to make it possible to make those because there's no way and a personal artisan based economy, a feudal or whatever could sustain the amount of commodities being made. At the level that they are. And it's interesting, you mentioned the Amazon tree, like the profit margins and everything, it's that that reminds me of Carmont's critique of the Gotha program, where he said labor is not the source of all wealth, but nature. Nature just is is just as valuable. Or is one of the main sources. Is equal to that of Labor. So I think that's interesting that you brought that up. It just reminded. Me of that because that is true, because without the nature, so to speak, right, the natural resources, especially that of the limited resources or possible limited resources like trees. Is how important they are to the economy and people. Want to ignore that?
Brady: Yeah, that's something that I had never even thought about before, but it's it's pretty staggering. But yeah, I mean, this is probably going to be the end of our first episode. We're hovering around 25 minutes. Is there anything else that you wanted to finish out on?
Artemis: I just want to say moving forward, I I definitely want to push the Community and you know, obviously this episode was a little weird. It was kind of an introduction and talking primarily about ourselves, uncivilized and the Amazon rainforest. And that's just because coming back, you know, we only have so much we want to put into our reintroduction episode. But moving forward, we definitely want to have episodes that are focused. Around just a few concepts that are, you know, not too long that people can digest quickly like on the right to work or school, or if they're just sitting around. So moving forward, you know suggest topics you know don't be afraid to get. Involved, cuz that's what this is about.
Brady: Yeah, definitely. I want. I want to hear from as many people as possible, and I'm sure you feel the same way. Just, yeah, get involved. Let us know what you think. If you have any issues with things that we're talking about, let us know as well. Like I said earlier, we're always down for discussion and we're not afraid of debate, so. Yeah. Other than that, this. Has been episode one of the Uncivilized podcast and I hope you all have a nice day.
#11. A Talk With Popular Front
792 views
Apr 7, 2020
We finally got Jake Hanrahan from Popular Front, a conflict journalism project to talk about Turkish jail, internet politicians, and more.
Brady: Hey everyone, how's it going? This is episode 11 of the Uncivilized podcast. I'm Brady artist here, and we also have a special guest. I'll let him introduce himself.
Jake: Hello mate, my name is Jake Hanrahan. I'm a independent journalist and documentary film maker.
Brady: So you all ******* know, Jake, we don't have to sit here and suck *** ****. You all know. You should go follow him. If you don't watch his **** on YouTube, we love it. But yeah, we were just kind of. Yeah, no worries. We were just planning on having kind of a chill conversation. We're all stuck inside with the ******* flag of 2020, so just gonna ******** around and see what happened. I think art had some questions to. Start out right away.
Artemis: So there's, you know, one thing that's always kind of interested in me is, and I feel like I remember watching some of your Instagram polls get this that, you know, people is like, how do you get into? Or what is your advice? Again, the consulate, journalism and your advice is I love. That you just.
Jake: Don't. Yeah.
Artemis: Don't do it. So I'm wondering, you know, given that advice, how did you get into it and why did you? Get into it.
Jake: Yeah, sure. I mean, I I do feel bad about saying that sometimes, but it is probably the best advice. I think I can give. I I say like it doesn't pay well. You know, no one really cares about what you're doing, and it's very dangerous. And you could die. You know what I mean? So it's really, you know what I mean? I love it. Like I do love it, but it's very it's not for it. Look, I tell people don't do it, and if they do still do it, then it's like I get it. You really want it to do it? That's fine. Like probably that's they're the ones are gonna make it. But my advice is honestly, like, I get people saying. Well, I'm thinking about going into conflict journalism and it's like, no, man, this is the kind of job that you have to really. Go all the way. I think you know what I mean.
Brady: Yeah, absolutely. Like, I know I remember growing up like being in the like. Early, early high school. I'm from a really small town in the Midwest. That was *******. Destroyed by all the various economic crashes. Methamphetamine, heroin. Remember, just sitting in class watching like back when vice was really popular seeing you on there and and never seeing the world. It was one of those things where I was like, damn, I think I want. To be a ******* conflict journalist. The **** out of here.
Jake: Yeah, it's. I mean, it definitely for me it it like helped me see the world like I think before I started working at Vice. I've only been out of the country like four times and that was like on shift holidays to like Spain. You know what I mean as a kid. So it was great for me. You know, I travel all over the Middle East and Eastern Europe and and everything. So it was great. But for me getting into it. UM. I taught myself so I didn't do uni when I left school, when I was 15 or so. I know 16. I left school and I, you know, I went to a shift school. Like I didn't get any qualifications. I just ****** around. And so I left school with nothing, man. And like, you know, I was working at a boxing gym and then, you know, I had all these jobs. I was working as a labour on a building. Like, you know, like and they call it low skilled here. I hate that term. It's not low skilled work. It's just work where you don't need a ******* piece of paper or whatever. It's not really a career. You know what I mean? Like doing all that like warehouse jobs and blah blah. But like, I knew I wanted to. I was always good at English. You know what I mean? And I always read a. So I was like, I wanna do something and you know, and I was good at writing. I mean, I don't write that much these days because of the docs and the podcast, but that is my main thing, like writing, you know, so I did that and then I was, well, I I said I did that. I was based while I had. All these ****** jobs I was like freelancing. You know what I mean? I was pitching articles to newspapers and. Long story short, eventually I started to get picked up and people saw my. Work and then you know I did. I got a little bit of a buzz, like around myself and then vice news like happened basically. So it was always vice and I was writing stuff for Vice, you know, conflict kind of stuff anyway. But, you know, just from from afar, obviously, you know, like, analyzing what's happening or interesting stories no one knew about. So then I seen VICE News. And I was like, that's a bit of me like. I need to ******* be there. You know what I mean? And I ended up just, you know, through the people I was waiting for advice. I got hold of the e-mail for the the new guy, like the head of VICE News, who was starting it in the UK, Kevin Sutcliffe. And he was amazing. And basically I just emailed him was like, look, here's my work like my written work. But I wanna come and work for you. Do ******* anything research. Or whatever, and then eventually, you know, I came in and. He he met me and. After like I don't know, I felt like it was gonna go nowhere. And I remember I was on a building site and I got his ******* call and he was like, are you gonna work for us then? Or what? And I was like what? Like you can give me some work. And I'm like, yeah, come on then. So I just quit and I was like, **** it. I'm off, and that was basically how it all happened, man. Like after I started at VICE News like within a month I went, I was making my first doc, which was. Crazy to me. You know what I mean? So off the back. Of that. Luckily, people quite liked my work and I guess like watching me do my **** whatever. And then, you know, I got more opportunities and and that was that man.
Brady: Yeah, I mean like, like I was saying earlier like those are probably the ones that stuck out. To me the most. Like watching all your conflict **** in Greece and and all over the place. I was like, damn, this guy is this guy is ******* getting in it. He's not. He's not doing some ******* documentary about, like, like ******* crack heads in Chicago. This dude's in in the middle. Of a ******* riot in Greece right now. Like, what the hell happen?
Jake: Yeah, I was. I was quite reckless as a kid. Like, I was like what, ******* 24? When I started at voice 24. 23 yeah, 24 just turned 24 when I started the voice news and I was *******, I don't know, man. I I mean to be honest, like I look back now and I'm like, I don't know how you didn't die, man. Like I was. I was too reckless. To be honest, you know what I mean? For me, it was just like this is a big chance. I've gotta do everything. You know what I mean? And I I don't know. Just I was like, gotta get to the front. Gotta gets close to the action, blah, blah blah. Now I'm like, definitely a lot more relaxed and calm and. I don't you know there's risks that I took back then that I certainly wouldn't take now, you know what I mean? I'm I'm 30 now and I'm like thought that like I'm not doing this or not going there, but back in the. Day I was like. Send me anywhere. You know what? I mean, yeah and.
Brady: I was gonna ask you, like, what was your? What was your craziest experience and and and? Your travels, but I'm pretty sure I already know the answer to that. I'll just, I'll just ask this. What the **** was Turkish prison like?
Jake: Yeah, yeah, that was definitely the weirdest thing, man. I mean, it was. Like medieval in something like you know.
Brady: What shock dude? What a.
Jake: Yeah, but it. But in others, like, you know it wasn't. It wasn't as bad as you would think. You know what I mean? It's if people were like midnight Express. I was like, it's not quite midnight Express, man. You know what I mean? It really wasn't. But it was pretty ******* terrifying. You know what I mean?
Brady: I I remember hearing you talk about this and somewhere I don't. I don't know. It was a long time ago, but did you ever meet some some crazy ***** side of Turkish prison like some some ******* jihadists or anything like that?
Jake: Yeah, yeah.
Brady: Or did they have you pretty?
Jake: No, no. So we were in four different jails, 4 different prisons. So we we got moved around all the time because, you know, one caught, you know we're in anti terror. So like anyone that doesn't know, like just just. I just wanna put this out there. I'm not terrorists, but then we were filming with PKK militants. And, you know, we're making the documentary cause there was an uprising or whatever you wanna call. It was going on there. And obviously we got arrested and they they charged us for terrorism. But you know, I was like, man, I'm just making a film. Like what the **** like? But you know how it is. So I mean, yeah, we was in, like, towards the end. Like initially it was all like, like solitary, you know, cause we're like terror suspects. So you have to be in solitary. But in a Dana prison that was a prison for ISIS fighters. So they charged us with being members of ISIS and the PKK. Which I was like. What they were members of neither. And if we were, that wouldn't make sense. They're fighting each other. You know what I mean? But, like, you know, it's *******. Crazy man and and then we ended up like, you know I. This prison. So then when we got deported, we were in a deportation prison, right? It's like a holding prison while you wait for all the stuff to go through. And that's when you're in main flow. So you're with everybody, you're not in isolation. And that was ******* nuts, man. There was all these Chechen jihadis because they were getting deported as well, because they'd been caught coming across the border from Syria. To Turkey to get their wounds sewed up or whatever, or they needed a couple days off. They needed to collect something so they'd been caught on the border in Turkey. Obviously was like, right, we're sending them back. So we was in jail, man, with all these like. Chechen jihadis like ISIS fighters, there was some al Qaida guys and then there was all these, like refugees, like ******* Afghan refugees who were just trying to get out of wherever trying to get to Europe, man. So these Afghans we were like, really, they were really nice and like, we hanged out with them and they kind of protected us. And also there was FSA. Right as like original FSA like the actual rebels, everybody called the jihadis rebels now, like Al Nusra. Like, no, they're not ******* rebels, they're jihadis. But they they're like secular rebels, were in the jail with us. There was about 20 of them and one night like these, ISIS guys like wanted to ****. And kill us. And like they tried to get in our room like, and then luckily we were like, in with all these FSA guys like smoking and drinking coffee and they were just protected us based and we're like we're *******. We're the rebels like you came to our country and, like, tried to kill everybody like. And now you're here trying to kill this guy like, no. Like, it was so sick, man. They were so good to us. You know what I mean? Yeah, the whole thing was mad mate. Only until I got out that I really realized like we got very lucky there. You know what I mean? Like these guys wanted. So so one of the Afghan lives that we were friendly with. He he spoke perfect English. He was an interpreter, and then he, you know, made his way to Europe. Obviously, he'd been abandoned by which other Western state had used him. And he had perfect English, like absolutely perfect English. And anyway, I managed to like smuggle my Skype name to him before we left. And he rang me when he got out and like, he was like, oh, I'm sorry, man, I didn't tell you. I didn't want to scare you, but. All those guys were like plotting to cut your head off in the shower. I was like, wow, thanks. And like, they made us a knife when we were in there, they made a knife out of a teaspoon. They sharpened the handle and they glued the like the teaspoon bit into a lighter and they wrapped it all up. It was actually really good, like little prison Shank. And they kept that in our room with us like we slept in the room with the Afghans. And they were like, like, yeah. Like, we need to protect you guys. And now I realize why I was like, **** man, like, yeah, boy, it's such a crazy experience, man.
Brady: Ohh ****.
Jake: But honestly, it was, like, almost good for me, you know. I mean, I feel like. It was good like reckoning for me to realize, like, wow. Like, you're not indestructible. You can die. You can get captured and and you know, and I was in jail with, like, my two best friends even before this happened. You know, I mean, like, we were very close. It could have. Been a hell of a lot worse.
Brady: Yeah, I totally get that. And I think I guess maybe for for me and art, it's a little bit harder to understand that sort of grounding because we're both both young like I'm, I'm 21, art as art as 20. So I think we're both still at that kind of stage. Where we're like. Redacted, we want to go do redacted because. **** it. Like, why not? Like we're we're young. Nothing can happen to us. So that that definitely makes sense that you kind of that you kind of had that moment out of. All that but holy ****, man, you're sitting in prison. I don't never plan on seeing myself in. Turkish prison. But if if I were to be in a Turkish prison and I start seeing white dudes with ginger beards, I'm *******.
Jake: I'm running away. I was ******* like there was the weirdest thing. There was one guy he had open bullet wounds in his arm. And like there was two of them, actually they so they've been. Shot and they were coming across the border obviously to get treatment in Turkey, so and they got scooped up and we were just sat there like smoking, watching TV. There was like a TV room in the the deportation jail, and they're just like these Chechens with ******* opens, like bullet wounds that were seeping puss like it was so ******* gross, man. And like this one of them had, like, this weird. ******* metal thing in his arm, like some makeshift ******* like thing to help his bones or whatever. Like I just remember sitting there and then there was a advert on the TV with like a woman without a veil on. And they were like like. For TV to be played, I was sitting my best mate Phil. I was like where the **** are we? Man like this is crazy, and if you could, if you looked out the bars, there was like a football court nearby the prison and you could see like random kids playing football. Like it was just. I was like, what the ****, like, gets out. You know what I mean?
Brady: Yeah, that's *******. That's ******* nuts. I couldn't even imagine I could not.
Jake: Yeah, it was hell, man. Honestly, like when I was there, I was. I mean, I wasn't a brave guy in that jail. Trust me. Like, I mean, the only thing we did do, like we we wouldn't. You know, we all kept pretty quiet like, you know, there's we were like, look, let's just keep quiet. Like, you know what I mean? We we gotta ride this out. But I was definitely ******* scared. You know what I mean? I was *******. Joke man like.
Artemis: Oh, I would have been ******** myself *******.
Jake: Yeah, I was. For like.
Unknown Speaker: Yeah, I don't care.
Brady: How big of a man you are? Dude, that's I don't care how big of a man you. Or if you think you are, you're in a ******* Turkish jail with ISIS fighters plotting to cut your head off. In the shower like Nah.
Jake: Ohh mate I I was ******* terrified mate.
Artemis: I'm sorry.
Jake: Like I was like every day we're gonna. Die like I'm sorry.
Artemis: But if I see a ************ with open bullet wounds, I don't care how tough you think you are. Not tough anymore.
Jake: You're right. Sanctions are a different breed man like there is no such thing as like a tough British guy because Chechens exists. You know what, I. Mean it's just crazy, man. They're so.
Brady: Yeah, they're like.
Jake: Like that.
Brady: They're like my life is perpetual pain like.
Jake: Yeah, and I.
Brady: When you can do nothing to.
Jake: Love playing like?
Brady: Me that will.
Jake: Yeah, like they love it, though. Like like there's, I mean, I know some churches and they're ******* so much fun, but like, they just love like, the most brutal ****. You know what I mean? Like as if to be like, well, something bad goes on good. You know what I mean? It's good because it's a test. I'm like no man. I just don't want bad things to happen, you know? What I mean, I just wanna be chilled.
Artemis: Your wife?
Jake: So, the the weirdest thing was the main guy. That was like trying to cut out. He'd planned to cut our head off. He spoke perfect English. And he was like talking to me one day. And this is how ******* dark that prison was the bottom. So on the top layer, all the men were locked up, and then apparently there was another layer underneath like another floor where all the women and the jihad, these kids because some of them were coming across the border with their kids. So they were all in prison below us, right? And then one of the prison guards one night, he he brought all the kids up to the guys upstairs. So like their dads in the jail with. Us and the kids are underneath and then so all their kids came up. Only the men and the the male children. You know what I mean? Cause they're all *******. You know, very don't like women doing anything. So all these jihadis had their kids. And I was like, sat with this jihadi and his kid like, offered me like a sweet. And I was like ohh thank you and like talking to his little boy. And and I was thinking like this ************ was planning. To cut my head off like I. I can't believe it. Like you know what I mean.
Brady: I guess you will slap this.
Jake: His hand was like can I shake his hands like?
Brady: ******* kid and I had the chance.
Jake: Yeah, shake his hand. That's my son. Like I was like cool man. Like what I mean? Obviously, I knew he was like ISIS, but sometimes you just don't. You know, when you're in that situation, it's different. Like there was one night, a kid cut his. Christ, like this jihadi boy, cut his wrist. He was Somalian and I remember sitting next to him. Breakfast like, and he had, like, none of the guards came for him or did anything for him. It was actually the Afghans from our room that, you know, fixed him up and he had these, like ******* bed sheet wrapped around his wrists. Like torn up, you know, like his bandage. Yeah, I remember, like, offering him a cigarette. And he looked like he was dying like he looked like he was nearly dead. Like all the life had drained out of him and he was just quiet and like, you know, the jihadis are not meant to smoke and for a minute he was like, **** it. He smoked the cigarette and we just sat there smoking. And quietly. And it was almost like, you know, for a minute we weren't. We weren't enemies. Do you know what I mean? It was like you're ******. I'm ******. We're both young. I mean, this kid was like 20, you know? And I was 25 at the time, and I was like, it was just almost. It was like we're both ******. We're just human. And in a way like that ****. Kind of. Taught me a lot. You know what I mean? Like not I have any. Any emotional like I don't feel anything for like ISIS. People **** them. You know what I mean? But at the at the same time. I understand how. I don't know. He, he. Perhaps he perhaps didn't want to be there. I didn't want to be there and it would. The whole thing was just like what a sad situation. You know what I mean?
Artemis: I mean, that's what I've noticed is that when you get into these these situations of, for lack of better word, dehumanization, or these dehumanizing environments, it breaks you down, that you sort of have to see a human inside of someone else. Obviously, the people that wanted to cut your head off is one thing, but it's another that you know, he attempted suicide and now you're showing. The level of empathy to him even now.
Jake: Yeah, exactly. And The thing is, yeah, he was like none of the other guys would talk to him because obviously it's a sin to commit suicide. Right, like in in Islam and like their militant version of. It as well. So they were just like complete. He was a complete pariah because he tried to kill himself. So in the end it was just and I was. I was just complete pariah because I'm this ******* white kafar kid. You know what I mean? In jail and like and I've been filming with the guys that have been killing them, you know, so they obviously hating me, but so they, me and him were just sat there and it was just like, yeah, man, we're just too *******. 22 lost kids right now, you know, like enemy, not prisoner. Just 2-2 guys and that was quite, I don't know, it's just weird, you know, it's just a weird experience to have that sometimes. I think it's good. It's good for your good for your soul. I know that sounds lame, but it is. You know, it's good to realize that she.
Brady: Yeah, no, it makes sense. I mean, if if I even had an experience like 110th, the intensity of that, I would feel the exact same thing.
Jake: It's intense. That's the word. It's like, even though it was certain nothing was happening, it was so ******* intense. You're right. The whole thing was like, just so mad, mate. Like it was 11 days in total. And it felt like ******* a year.
Unknown Speaker: Shut all.
Brady: That happened in 11 ******* days. I haven't. I haven't.
Jake: Just about to ask.
Brady: ****, I haven't done **** in 11 days.
Jake: But every day there was something nuts like you. Like one of the funniest parts was like our friend, like his friend who were locked up with Russell. He was like teaching us how to ship, you know, because there was like a hole in the floor where you had to ship it and remember, like in the middle of this stressful situation in solitary, he's just bending down, like, not naturing, but just showing you, like, this is how you do this and. And that just always like just makes sticks in my mind, is like the absurdity of the situation of how funny.
Brady: To teach the white guy how to.
Jake: Shift know exactly like these ******* idiots don't even ship properly. Like ohh, it was so funny, man.
Brady: Like toilet.
Jake: Yeah, yeah, exactly. Right. We when we got into deportation jail, there was one toilet was a western one and no one was using it. And I was like, ohh **** yeah, I'm getting on that. That was amazing.
Artemis: I was about to ask. I was just say how long I was like maybe like. A month and then you said 11 days.
Jake: No 11 days here. It wasn't ****. The thing is though, we didn't know when we were getting out. Like the guards were telling us, we were going to be there for seven years. You know, they were playing tricks on us and like, yeah, you just got sentenced to seven years. So we were like, this could go on, you know, when you don't know when you're gonna get out like ohh man that uncertainty. Is hell. You know what I mean.
Artemis: ****, that's crazy.
Brady: Kind of kind of have another question. I'm not sure how much. You'll be able about this, but. Do you have anything anything in the world? Is there anything that we should be looking out for? Obviously don't get into, don't get into specifics because you don't want to give it away, but is there anything exciting that we should be look?
Jake: Sorry, you broke up looking out for in what respect?
Brady: Oh, sorry, my internet's probably ******* ******** itself right now.
Jake: No worries.
Brady: Like I know you probably can't get into. Into specifics with any of this at the moment, but is there anything exciting that? We should be forwarded. To you from you in the future.
Jake: Ohh yeah. Well yeah. But because of Corona, everything's ****** so. I had all. These plans, man like there was a TV channel was talking to us. There was an online. Media was talking to us about doing a Popular Front like documentary series, you know, like and it was all looking pretty ******* good. And because of the platform, you know we as you know we have it like no corporate ******** kind of let kind of thing. We had a lot of control, like almost complete control. You know what I mean? So it was looking like this is gonna be excellent. And then all of this happened, man. So yeah, it's, I mean, it's a bit of a ******* pain. I mean, we're meant to be in Chile right now filming the the, you know, the the guys. Crashing there a lot of anarchists fighting the government and stuff, so that didn't happen. Yeah, man. Like a lot of **** has gone wrong because of this, but I am writing a book right now which will be out on zero books. I'm sure you know them guys.
Unknown Speaker: Ohh yeah.
Jake: So I'm. I'm writing a book for zero about basically. So, you know, when I got arrested, the reason was because we were filming with the youth militant wing of the PKK and they were rising up in their city. And you know, it became like teenagers fighting. What is NATO's second largest army? And often because we got arrested.
Brady: Yeah, those are the the YDGH.
Jake: That's right. The YDG H. You had to get hashed. The Patriotic Revolutionary youth movement. So, like, because we got arrested all our footage. Taken and we couldn't make the the documentary what we wanted to make and let me tell you, that would have been the best documentary anyone has ever made about, like on the ground with the PKK, like the access was Unreal, Man, because I was the only ****** there, you know, we were the only like Westerners there at the time. And I had already made one documentary with them and some of them already knew me from that. And like they let us in a safe house like we just had the most mate we had the most insane access. And because it was the youth, like there was no PK like higher UPS or commanders to tell them, hey, don't let them do this. They were just kids at that point. So they were like, yeah, come and see.
Brady: So like, hey, you wanna?
Jake: Us doing this.
Brady: See my ******* rocket launcher, dude.
Jake: Like literally, they were like walking down the ******* street with like rocket launchers and ****. It was so crazy, man.
Artemis: Ah, that's great.
Jake: Yeah, and but also it was like a very compelling story because, you know, they were telling this story of how we're sick of this. We're rising up and they really, really thought they were going to win and it was like, boy, there is no chance you're gonna win this, you know. It was very sad. And then you know, I'm not on their side or anything, but I'm certainly like, feel for young men that are just angry and, you know, wanna do something to kind of free themselves from an oppressive situation. So it was very sad because nearly everyone we spoke to is dead now. So I was like, you know what? We can't. I actually have the footage now, but our our court case is still ongoing. Like 3, what? Five years later, it's still on. Going so we haven't actually been formally sentenced yet, so and that's probably gonna happen this year, but so in the meantime, I was like, you know what? I'm gonna write a book about everything that happened. Not about me, about them. So it's like, imagine the doc, but it's a book, so it's gonna be a book about, you know.
Brady: Ohh, I'll have to ******* check that out.
Artemis: Saying I'm gonna get my. Hands on that.
Jake: You should. I should have finished it by now, but I've had a lot of work to do with with shop in the front, so it's hopefully I'll finish it like within a month or two and should be out. By the end of the year, I hope.
Artemis: That's awesome.
Jake: Man, I'm looking forward to it.
Artemis: So, so then I have a question, you know, talking about the PKK. I was wondering then, could you maybe kind of? Our library, just a popular friend itself, and what I find most interesting is someone who's into grassroots conflict journalism, but also a an obvious anti authoritarian. You know straight to it. So maybe if you wanna because we've talked about you and your journey, but do you wanna maybe talk about what Popular Front is and isn't? Because I know a lot of people think, oh, why don't you get into activism? Like cause I'm not a *******.
Jake: So we have, that's a good point. We have a big problem with. We get a lot of. It's mainly leftists being like, what's your political position? And I'm like, what do you need to know my political position for this is grassroots conflict journalism. This is not leftist activism, you know, and I get a lot the the funniest thing is communists that are like, I'm very disappointed in you, Jake. I didn't expect you to have. This feeling or whatever or didn't expect you to report on this from them like they're so they think they're so important that when they come at you with criticism and I and I'm like, yeah, **** yourself, **** your criticism. I don't care. They can't handle it. They're like, criticize you like you have to listen, right?
Unknown Speaker: Well, and Jake.
Brady: What do you mean, Jake? You're not a Marxist Leninist.
Jake: And I I'm always saying. Like ****. Marxist cuck Lennon is like because I see it as authoritarian. You know, I've done my reading, bro. I've been reading about radical politics since I was ******* 18 years old. I was involved in, you know, like the ******* original. Chief Vendetta mask. **** like you know what I mean? Occupy and bro, I was into all of that ****, man. I was big into that activist ship back then when I was *******. 16 and I'm 30 now, man. I'm not having some ******* Internet Maoist to tell me what I'm meant to do. You know what I mean? I'm so. I mean, I find it funny. I don't. I don't get involved with it too. I just mostly mock it and so then. They're like you. Know he. He they try and cancel Popular Front all the time. And that to me is is. It's like a joke like no grown adults should ever take cancel culture. Seriously, you know what I mean?
Brady: Yeah, yeah.
Jake: If someone takes me. You're a communist. I go. OK, I'll think you're a fascist. I go. OK. Like because obviously I'm neither of those. So it's just funny to **** with people.
Brady: No, like, clearly we're not on the same same sort of platform level as you, but we we get that same **** too, just in a way smaller quantities. Like, I can't even tell you the amount of times I've been called a ******* a Nazi or. A ******* eco fascist and I'm.
Artemis: Like OK, I know.
Jake: Yeah, exactly. That's that's the way to beat this **** when someone tries to cancel you. It's so simple. You just go alright, whatever. And they go. Yeah, but I've I've said, you're this. Yeah, of course. But, but. But but but. But like when? Like when you show them it doesn't matter. Like I don't give a ****, then they lose their power. You know what?
Brady: Yeah, it's just a bunch of *******.
Jake: I mean, they completely lose it.
Brady: Just a bunch of like. Teenagers in the West who are trying to get social capital. The Internet. That's all it.
Jake: Is like Mark Fisher wrote an amazing amazing article exiting the vampire castle. Yeah, I think if you know, if he was around today, I'm almost certainly would have probably worked Part 2 to it, you know, like God rest his soul unfortunately killed himself. But you know, like I think so. But anyway so. My my only. Thing with Popular Front is I always just say our. Only like real hardened stance is anti authoritarian. Now I don't care if you're ******* left. Right. If you're an authoritarian **** you like I am vehemently against someone trying to oppress others and crush free speech and crush democracy and you know, I believe in direct democracy. I believe in like helping people out that are disenfranchised. And, but you know overall it I'm I'm a. Not like anti authoritarianism, you know, I I don't want the state in my in my affairs. And now you know if people want to say or Anna kiddie or anarchist. What, like you, do you mate? And I'll worry about what I'm doing because, like where I live and the people around me, we're not all on the Internet doing ******* isms and schisms and trying to do labels. People are just trying to get by. So that's why I think that. You know, I say community politics over Internet politics. You know, your ******* radical book club is never gonna solve the problems in my town where everybody is on heroin and using food banks. Some ******* ******** reciting Mau on Instagram and calling each other comrade on Twitter never gonna resolution.
Brady: We were just talking about this talking about this.
Jake: We're never gonna be resolved by that ********. Know so no, ****. Off and let me do me, you know. So that's how I feel. I care about poor people. I care about people getting crushed by authoritarianism. But I'm not about to jump into the ******* mental gymnastics. Of, you know, like loads of people had to. So like, why are you reporting on Hong? Kong they are. They're all liberal, mate. They're getting crushed by the CCP. I couldn't give a **** what they are. They're they're rebelling against an authoritarian state. What I meant to say, well, sorry, you know me, white guy in the West doesn't like the way your revolution is going, so therefore bad. Like it's hilarious. It's like it's ******* left wing. Colonial ******* mindset. You know what I mean? It's so.
Artemis: Yeah, what's funny is.
Brady: I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Jake. We're gonna have to cancel you for not. Being pulled pot gang.
Jake: Yeah, exactly right. Like **** you. But with.
Artemis: This kind of segues so I. Was just reading and you. Know God don't cancel me. I tossed it too, and it was about leftists on social media vying for social recognition, and that's bled so so well into this because I was going to ask you. Is, you know, you did a Twitter, you know, you did an interview with Jacobi with Eco extremism and nationalism, but then you also did a whole Twitter thread about, you know, individuals tending toward savagery of the wild, Wild West.
Jake: Yeah, I'm. I'm. Making it talk about its bro, I interviewed jail. Peter ******* crack 8 bumpers, bro.
Artemis: OK so. Then yeah, I was wondering then maybe if you know if you don't want to give away too much. You know, if this is something you want to talk about, but do you? How much of it do you think is is their claims in their communicates or things that they have done or do you think it's sort of claiming for propaganda purposes like certain actions that they've done? You know what I mean?
Jake: Well, it's interesting because I've been, I've been researching about them. For like 2 or. Three years now. And certainly the things in Chile and there's a few things in Europe were definitely ITS related. But then there's things like, you know, allegedly they killed a priest in Mexico, allegedly they killed 2 hikers. I tend to doubt that happened. And then there's just been a recent thing where two like tech millionaire. Pipes vanished and then were found like executed, and then they claimed that now I'm not sure about that, but certainly the way that they're franchising their attacks. And it's funny, you mentioned Natasha too. I was reading that literally this morning. I'm doing some research for the doc, but the way they like, franchised their attacks, it wouldn't surprise me if. Someone much like ISIS just did an attack under the banner of ITS you know what I mean. They don't necessarily have to talk to them. You know there there was. An ITS pipe bomb thing was planted in ******* Edinburgh like two years ago like in Scotland. And they were nothing. They had no conversations with the ITS in Mexico as far as I'm aware, and they just made it. And then we're like, yeah, I ******* hate this and that, and therefore ITS, you know. I mean, I just want to say as well I I think it's a ******* mental.
Artemis: Yeah, and I think.
Jake: Like I'm not sympathetic at all, but I am really fascinated in them.
Brady: Yeah, another way.
Jake: I said to they or the leader I said, why don't you just ******* kill yourself like you're all about this? You know, we we hate everything. Why don't you just kill yourselves like, and that sounds harsh. But he was like, that's a good question. And then we got some very interesting. Like talk, you know, we spoke a lot and there was one guy like, I actually quite respect this anarchist guy was like having a go at me. Like, why are you even making a doc about ITS? You shouldn't bring attention to. Them and I was like, Nah, man. Like I got some interesting stuff from them and frankly, like I think if something is dark and sucked up and they wanna kill people, whether you like it or not, it needs to be spoken about and put in the light.
Brady: Yeah. Oh, absolutely.
Jake: And if that one or two guys join them and do something bad, that is very unfortunate, but I, but certainly it's not my job. I'm not law enforcement, you know. That sounds callous, but that's true. It's not my job to enforce the law. It's my job to report what's going on. And certainly the law has no idea what's going on with groups like ITS, so maybe it will be good if we talk about it because right now they could be killing people and you. Don't know who's doing it.
Artemis: So, you know, I'm curious, man, if this is something you don't wanna talk about that schools, how do you even get in contact with what's? His name? The leader what? Was his name, how does?
Jake: Zale, yeah. Zale XALE.
Artemis: Somebody even how does someone even? You know, do you? Just e-mail the whole there all. Like to do.
Jake: An interview I mean at this. Stage I'm I've been doing this for. So like what? Like I've been doing this since I was 24 since I was 23. Really. So that's like, well, like seven years? And I'm known for looking at groups that are largely under reported. You know what I mean? So I think with Popular Front, with my work. I've made an effort to be like you don't know about this this conflict, and here's why you should. You don't know that this militant group is doing this because it's not ISIS. Whatever, but you should. About it, so I'm known for like kind of, you know, looking into those groups. So it's almost at a point now where I've already got connections. Do you know what I mean? It's like, right? How do I get to talk to them and talk to them? And I know someone that might know, you know, like, I know an extremist, an eco extremist, OK, he doesn't. ITS but I know that he was, you know, interested in her like. Or was it ultimate reducto or whatever they're called? So like, you know, how do you get from A to B? There's always a link. There's always someone that knows someone and you just you just honestly. Like I'm just very, like, dogged with it. You know what I mean? Like, that's probably the wrong word, but I'm just obsessed with it, you know. I mean, I'm very interested, but for me it's fun. You know, I'm like, this is really interesting. I'm enjoying this. So it's not a broad bother for me, so I'll just keep at it and blah blah. But research honestly, the short answer, just research. Do lots of research, like as much as you can. Yeah, I'm interested to.
Artemis: I'm interested to see your doc on them, because there's someone that I've admittedly been super on and off with because when I first found them, I was like I was the Kaczynski because I was a Kaczynski saying like, yo, that's dumb. They're anti revolution. I also bought into the fact. They're a government siop. Type thing and then I read the communiques and I I talked to someone we know. Happy for more zone. Who's he really enjoys reading, or they enjoy reading? And so I I bought the tosses and I read them and I was like, it's weird because it's kind of cute. The person you mentioned, I like equal extremism for the most part, except for when they get into that weird, satanic, unknowable, whatever the **** that thing is like. The idea that I enjoy what it is and that it forced anti civilization thoughts to kind of look at self in the face and. Be like, what the **** are you doing? That's what I enjoyed from a sort of to be for like a better, like a dialectical purpose that I don't agree with what they do, but I enjoyed that it. It's sort of. Points out a lot of flaws that anti Civ anarchism has, and I said their critique of primitivism is actually really interesting and it just falls into leftist issues, which is something Ted talks about, but. I think they. Took it further, but then they go about like it's one thing to be indiscriminate and, you know, targeting people that, for lack of a better word, are worthy of of an attack. And then, you know, maybe people get hurt and it's another to just start. ******* bombing people in the city. That they, you know, like the the bus attack that they did, said what the **** are. You doing like we we we. Are exhibiting the natural order of you know, the anti human. It's like what?
Jake: Yeah. Yeah, it's quite. Basically, they're just like **** you, dad. Times a. You know what I mean?
Unknown Speaker: And they even admit.
Artemis: That, and it's also they admit there's a weirdly social outcast that could get along in my school.
Jake: Right, like the funniest bit is when they write that piece about like killing someone and then like having sex in the forest. That for me was illuminated and I was like, these guys are ******* lunatic you. Know what I mean? Like.
Brady: Everyone you meet in high school or they'll.
Jake: But like when you read the bit about the Creek War, when you when you finish that, I realized like they put this in there or whatever to show that, like, that's basically what I mean. I know I didn't write all that, you know? I mean, it's like that's what they want. Like, they think that's fine. You know, like ****** and murdering pregnant women is like fine, like, no, I'm like, This is why I'm not like an anti SIV guy. I'm very interested in a lot. Of it, but certainly there are big parts of civilization. I very much like, you know. And that's not having pregnant women. Heads ripped off and I like my PlayStation. And you know what I mean?
Unknown Speaker: Well, I I'm sorry.
Artemis: But you don't have to leave this episode right now.
Jake: Yeah, but, but what? My point is, I think they're being this honest. So like I test act like they're so, so honest. And we're so honest because we wanna get rid of all morals, but they're not being honest. There's no way they don't love their Playstations too. You know what I mean for, you know, like like you from. And I'm sure there's they don't have Playstations. But you know what I'm saying? So I feel like they're being dishonest. Also like they talk about like liberation of like this and that and the wild, the wild is not all destructive. The wild like and I love nature. You know, I'm very interested in deep green ecology, and I think nature has I I don't wanna get too like weird and mystical. But there's something about nature where sometimes think like if God exists, it's that it's the world turned. You know what I mean? And it's it's animals and and that, like, there's something in nature you can feel, you know, like you're almost here, like, everything moving and that. And I don't know. There's something amazing about that.
Artemis: On that.
Jake: And so.
Artemis: Hold on. I was just. Never mind.
Jake: On continue. So I was just gonna say and then so to like then ITS act like. Everything that is anti save must then be brutally violent. I'm like no, there's so many amazing things about nature. Even the way, like a mother, looks after a child. It's just beautiful, you know, like and. And I just think they're very they're just very angry. They're very angry. And I just don't like it. I don't agree with it. And I think that. Honestly, I just think that they themselves are slightly lost and I told them this as. Well, I was like do. You know what the reason we they actually gave me, like, a frank interview was cause I was like, I think you're ******* disgusted. Like literally these words was like, you're disgusting. I just know this. I ******* hate you. And they were like, you know, because I was like, if these guys wanna talk, the big talk, they claim that they wanna kill civilians. And let's be real real. I'll be honest with them as well. And they were like, yeah, we appreciate that. Thanks like that we get it and in the end like what I spoke to a different guy before sale. And he was like, you've made me really think some things. And he was like, I hope we meet one day and I was. Like I ******* hope. We don't cause you probably, but like. But at the end of that, but he was very honest, actually, and he was. I just got the feeling that he was a little bit lost, you know. And I've been like, I've been so angry as a teenager. I've been lost in my own ******* mind, but I I feel like some of them are, like, very lost.
Artemis: Yeah, and. Yeah, and.
Jake: But one thing I wanna say sorry, I know I'm going on, but one thing I wanna say is the fact that everyone had a go at Aragon bang for even publishing a tyre on little black car tells me it was needed. How ******* dare some people try and destroy a ******* book. Like how dare you even report that? Like, how would you claim to be an anarchist and then try and burn books? Because it wasn't the ideology you like. And if you read the car, Sir, he's not saying this is great. He's going. This is how it is and. That's that, you know, like sorry.
Artemis: I'm reporting on the reality that. It's that is.
Jake: Right.
Unknown Speaker: Ohh, what's?
Brady: Yeah. And I mean like.
Jake: Happening and therefore you have to know.
Brady: That's one thing that happens with a lot of these people.
Jake: Rest in peace to Arab old man.
Brady: Yeah, rest in peace, Aragorn. That's one thing that I really notice with a lot of. These so-called anti authoritarian anarchists, and they know what they're against because they're angry, but they don't know why they're against it, because they don't even take the time to try to understand what it is that they claim to hate so much. So I that is definitely something I've noticed. As well. So it's it's interesting. To hear you say that.
Jake: Yeah, there's the more that in in Britain, it's different and it's definitely changed because of American influence. But certainly when I was younger there was and and again like I'm not like activist or anything like that, but I'm very interested in like anarchist theory because I you know myself I I'm very I I don't like so I've I've been playing my whole life. Like rules are rules. You know what I mean? And I ******* you know. So it's always something I've been interested in. And in Britain there's there's amongst the working class. Certainly when I was growing up, there's there's a natural anarchist nature. You know what I mean? And I'm more interested in that anarchism actually than now. What is overly politicized anarchism? And that doesn't mean anarchy is the definition. What I mean is people that are like just leave me alone. Do you know what I mean? Like, leave me alone. Let me get on with this. And unfortunately, the now hyper politicized. And a kiss, now an enemy of those people, because they're like, no, we can't just let you get on with what you want to get on with. We must tell you what's wrong. We must tell you what you shouldn't be doing. I had a ******* anarchist with an Emma Goldman quote on their timeline the other day. Message me and tell me by the way, someone you're following is making an anti-Semitic joke and I was like, are you like? What the **** ***? Like what? Like like what on Earth? What on Earth is going through your head when you do that? Now, obviously, I'm not saying. Like all cool, anti Semites are great. Like **** them, but it's like, really? That's what you're spending your time doing basically telling someone that someone they follow is problematic. It's like good luck with your ******* revolution, mate. The world is horrible and you're never gonna cope, you know. So like.
Brady: What do you mean you? Don't want to join my Black Flag. Book club, yeah.
Jake: Yeah, right. Like, yeah, it's. Just like it's tiring, man and and then they get so annoyed with you because like, I thought you were. On our side. And like this isn't about sides like you're really not looking at this properly. You know, I thought you were a comrade. Get over yourself, man. Like, if that's the way you're looking at. This is not a trend. This is about a way of life, of helping people not be sat on. You know what I mean? Like, this isn't a trend like it's it's very, very tiring to even see it.
Artemis: Yeah, so bat tracking a bit just. Because I I thought you made some. Good points talking about ITS. So when you talked about like and this. Is something I. Have this is my where I started the you know. Push away from ITS is I start having conversations with Julian Laner. I'm not sure if you're familiar. If you watch that episode, but one thing I find interesting is. That it's it's. Tries to be so anti left that they almost that they they they tend not to be weird. But the horseshoe theory that they go from you know you know the the primitivist ohh nature is beautiful it is all wonderful. You know what I mean? They idolize nature. They do the opposite. They idolize it for its violence.
Jake: Yeah, yeah.
Artemis: So there's like this inverse, so it's like it's sort of like the way I critique misanthropy as just this inverse humanism. It's like you're not that ******* radical. You just inverse the thought. That's not that cool.
Jake: Yeah, exactly.
Artemis: But say do that. And it's like, really, it's somewhere in the middle that you can understand that nature is unforgiving in many ways, but it's also very forgiving and beautiful.
Jake: It's yeah, exactly.
Artemis: Not it's not this weird ******* dichotomy you're creating, and they're enforced and and doing that, they're enforcing civilized ideology, which they. Hold again and. And they say oh, I'm anti morals. But here's my set.
Jake: Well, look, if if a ******* apple grows in a tree and you eat it, it's not gonna ******* kill you immediately. That's like helping you. You know what I mean? Like, not every there's strawberries or they got cyanide in them. I hope so. Like no, you know, like that's not how it works. You're right. Like nature gives and takes. You know what I'm saying? It's a balance that we need to get right. It's not destroy everything and it's not take everything. You know what I mean. The balance is, is and the idea of being anti morals is so ******* stupid to me like. You were a stone. You know what I mean? Like you're a psychopath. If you're like that, it's being a psychopath. Is not a political ideology and it's not something that you're proud.
Artemis: If we disagree, actually. Remember, and was it?
Brady: Yeah, yeah, I think we disagree.
Artemis: Was it a tacit tool? When they said the when the first with the whole first section about demonology and like worshipping Satan and the. The murderer. And then they had the I actually enjoyed this tizzy, brought in Freudian art types, which I'm kind of interested in. I don't believe it, but I find it interesting when they said the. What is it that they said? The Joker or the the the the arc type of the psychopath is like A is the is the antibody to modernity. Which is. Typically, when you study epigenetics, it's kind of true that like under certain conditions, you begin to see certain mental illnesses rise or be created because you don't see psychopathy before. Really, the industrial era, even before you know the oh, maybe we didn't understand it, so yeah, but it's still a documented thing that. We can understand. OK, we know. What they're talking about it it wasn't demons, it's skitzophrenia. But we don't see psychopathy or these sort of. This this sort of odd antipathetic murder sprees, really.
Jake: Well, I I. Would argue you do. I mean, what about *******, like Genghis Khan? If that was what I got with you.
Artemis: Yeah, I would.
Jake: I don't know what it is like killing out.
Artemis: I would.
Jake: Building mountains of bodies.
Artemis: I would just. Yeah, I would kind of separate. And there's. I'm not saying it didn't exist, but I'm saying the rights of those saying, you know what I mean. But I also disagree with people being power hungry and disagreeing with morality versus not being capable of empathy. You know what? I mean, but I think that gets into the whole psychology of. It which is super complex. And I'm not an expert.
Jake: Well, I know what you mean. I think I I kind of agree in a way that I think now with the industrial revolution and the hyper capitalist world, we have like so property is now rewarding in a way that it wasn't before. Do you know what I mean?
Artemis: Yeah, that's they like to.
Brady: I mean, that's how.
Artemis: Check your same thing.
Brady: You become a Fortune 500 CEO. You have to be that sociopath. ******* psychopath to to to not just survive, but thrive.
Jake: Exactly like you want.
Artemis: But it's only because it says and.
Jake: To be at the top, yeah.
Artemis: Then they see it's as old world to antibody. But it's rewarded. What the ****? It's hard. To tell me that.
Jake: Well, that's they. Don't know what they're talking about, really. Like if you read their communicates like big purple pros and they allude to things and they never quite like they're they're ******* cracked. They're like, it's like when you're 16 and you write your first ******* like, nonfiction. I mean, do you know how many bad like Tyler Durden, Esque rip offs I wrote when? I was 15.
Artemis: Dude, I'm there with you, dude.
Jake: Ohh men and like I mean if you read that ******** far right, there's a far right book called Harassment. It's the most embarrassing, badly written faith, Self aware but non self aware ******** I've ever read in my life and I had to read it for research. It's ******* hilarious. And it's like, that's not that far from ITS, you know, and in terms of the right wing ****, they're they're openly they were praising a temple of blood, which is happening wasn't.
Artemis: Yeah, we talked about that.
Jake: Like an atom often linked group.
Artemis: I'd be like ohh accelerationism I'm like.
Jake: And I asked him about that.
Artemis: Shut the **** **.
Jake: OK. They asked him about that. I was like, you're basically like allied with Nazis. And they was like, yeah, we don't care. Like, I saw what, you know what I mean? Literally was like I don't care.
Artemis: What's funny is if you umm, you. Know you've talked about this. I think in some of your Twitter threads. But when you look at and they don't, they don't like that dichotomy, but it's there, the old its when they were still into when they just had emerged from the radical out ELF and Alf.
Jake: Yeah, when they did the the, the letter bombings, they were talking to ultimate resistor again.
Artemis: Yeah, it's I. Find that stuff interesting because they were fusing. They were sort of like they're more pro Ted, but still anti left and anti revolution. They're into the the way they wrote, they would use gender neutral terms and there was something I could get more into with their communiques in the. They wrote, and then they're. Like, oh ****. Then they took this 180 and they're just the worst ******* direction. Cause when they when they fused all the different groups into wild and was it wild resistance, that's when you started that that's when their thoughts just went straight down the. ******* shatter and. I think when I got there I was like, OK, yeah, this. Isn't this isn't anymore?
Brady: The human species deserves to suffer, we. Are above humanity.
Jake: Yeah, it's like it's it's laughable. But like it's do, you know what it is that I asked that sail about this? And I remember because I wrote. Reporting this recently and he said. It's not out yet, by the way, but anyway, he said. He basically said like I was involved in, like, green anarchism for years. I was involved in anti, sorry like Luddite and like anti tech stuff for years and he was saying that like he realized and this is a sad realization which a lot of post left anarchists come to you know. And I read a lot of that kind of stuff cause it's interesting. But he was like, I realized, like, the revolution is never coming. You know, the these dreams are communists have. It's never gonna happen. The anarchist. It's never gonna happen. And I think through that, I mean, I know that sounds pessimistic, but come on, like, through that he realised and just became like. An angry, angry guy. You know what I mean? His ideology has basically wore anger.
Brady: I'm in that exact same spot, at least in my thinking, but I haven't taken that that direction to to anger. I've I've sort of started to rely on what little hope I do have in trying to and trying to build something not, not necessarily as like this is gonna be what brings about the singularity of anarchism. That just to make me feel better during my life, you know, like I realize this isn't going to create anything big, but it it makes me feel better. So that's why I do it.
Jake: Yeah, I mean, I I know what you mean. I for me it's like from the despair of realizing that, like, you know, this is always gonna be the way things are. I think you've gotta, like, have your own little victories in your life. Do you know what I mean? That doesn't mean that doesn't mean shoplift every day. It means, like you know, for example, Popular Front right now we're doing a fundraiser. Where we got loads of cool Popular Front stuff, you know, flags and militant stuff and whatever. And we're doing a raffle and you know, we've already raised £2000 and I'm we're gonna donate 100% of the money. The homeless charities now, that's our way of doing like little mutual aid, whatever. And in my town the the butcher and all the independent businesses have all come together and they're delivering free food to old people while this coronavirus is happening, none of them are political. None of them. I mean, they are in a way, but they're not like overtly political. None of them are socialist.
Unknown Speaker: No, no.
Jake: None of them are anarchists. They're just normal people helping their community and that for me is where I've realized like. That's the most important politics, you know, and certainly I'll tell you now, a lot of these woke ************* on Twitter who act ostensibly woke, and they have big followings. I've reached out to them, but like, can you please share this Popular Front thing? We're trying to help the homeless. None of their ************* care, mate. Let me tell you that. And I think a lot of people wanna talk. And then when they see actual. Action happening? They're like, oh, ****. I'm actually not doing anything. I think they know that they're not. So my point is ignore them. Forget them. Just do your own thing, help your community, right help people and that's it.
Artemis: Yeah, which is weird because I used to be into this hard intellectual Internet like left communism, it's. Like ohh and but. It's weird since now I've university and I've met people who are putting themselves through college and they're like, dude, I work in a ******* factory and I don't have healthcare and I used to be anti union cause it's anti revolutionary and then I'm like damn does that really matter when people can't ******* afford to? Eat or go to the doctor.
Jake: Yeah, it's exactly exactly man. Like it's like we had the problem with Corbin in this country where all these ******* like yuppie W London like so-called socialists were were, like, loving him. And then I, you know, my friends, where I'm from. I'm not from London and I'm. From the Midlands. And like my friends are poor as **** here. And they're doing like 2 jobs and going to food banks. And I've said all this **** before, but it's it has to be heard. I don't care like that the the idea of some guy in London bringing about some like weird forgotten 80s type communist **** is not going to help them. And then all of a sudden, everyone, well, the working class are racist. It's like, no, mate. They're ******* struggling. They will vote for whatever they think is. Going to be better. And a guy that's going like, ohh well, let's do you know he actually I read his like the like. Come on the first though, and I thought it was great. But him and ******* McDonald and that scumbag Milne are like old school 80s. And nobody's relating to that man, no working class. But I tell you what, the working class care about here getting out. Unfortunately there is. There is very little working class solidarity solidarity left. They wanna make money and get the **** out of here and that's that's unfortunate. And that's the way it is.
Brady: I totally did that cause yeah, that's.
Jake: And like when people recognise that you only then can help.
Brady: Yeah, and that's exactly why I left. Where I'm from the the poor little community that's ravaged by drugs and people can't afford to eat. And schools are from 100 years ago. That was my goal. I I saved up enough money and I packed up my ******* car and I just laughed. I was like, I'm never. Coming back like **** this.
Jake: And why not? Why there's nothing wrong with that? You know, it's. I don't think it under communism. You'd be a class trader, which is, which is hilarious because in my opinion, under Communist, like real proper state communism, I do feel like it's it's oppressive because it's like, well, you're not allowed to have it. It's actually what, like, middle class. Electoral on the liberal side in UK do it's like you stay in your box, stay in your lane. You are not allowed to be more than this. You know what I mean? Under the guise of class trade. You're really saying is. You let us rule it at the top. You let the big people at the top stay here and you stay down at. The bottom and **** that. You know what I mean?
Artemis: Yeah, yeah. Which is it's so interesting because, you know, I went from. This very militant. Like chaotic primitivist sort of thing when I'm much more into like the creative rewilding and the beautiful, what it's it's like I'm less about collapse now. You know what I mean? Like, though, we need to bring about industrial collapse and. Moved more. Into this. Celebrate what the little collapses are in in what civilization is they really made a good point when your room gets. Dirty or there's a, you know? Flowers are growing where it's not supposed to be. That is civilization unable to to hold itself up. Those are examples of what he calls collapse. Instead of this you know big event, so to speak of. Like hmm, industry collapsing. So whether it's about instead of instead of a political program, it's just a. It's a practice about understanding what our critique is. And, you know, actualizing that in our day-to-day lives. And that could be some what could look indistinguishable from leftist, or I guess in your case was sort of apolitical altruism for electric. Better word, but it can also be like teaching people, you know their native flora and fauna and doing conservation measures. It doesn't the you know the Russian Revolution, but green in America or something?
Brady: Get the green flag.
Jake: Man, I I think that like you need, I wouldn't. I know. You mean it's not necessarily a political, but. I think if you just. Dream of someone like this is the capitalist system has done. I mean, even me, who's read up on all this ****. I got all ******* boring. Please **** ***. You know what I mean? So imagine a guy that works 40 hours a week in a ******* warehouse for **** money. He's gonna be like **** that. What you need to do is explain like hey man, like you're working hard as ****. You're not getting the money you should be doing. You're not valued in the society. How about we just join with us? We'll all try and make it a little bit better. And but you know that's the way to go. Not catch phrases, you know not isms, not like the Socialist Workers Party of the East Midlands. How about just like. The the the Group of lads that help each other out. Like, do you know what I mean? Like that is more what people need. Because when you start creating the isms and all of the niches and that. Yeah, but like on in theory they are. That might be a socialist idea and an anarchist idea, sure. But when you overtly make it about that, you just create a clique and you just create a little crew, and then you just you just degrade anyone. That's not it. Doesn't interested in that, you know, like I've said, people just want to be have a fair wage. Really. You know what?
Artemis: Or people want to be respected.
Jake: I mean they. Want they want to be respected?
Artemis: That's what it is.
Jake: They want pride in their work to be. Elected and I tell you, there's something fascinating happening with the coronavirus right now, like in this country. It's quite beautiful to within a week, I would say everybody realised or at least woke up to the fact that like, wow, all these influencers and and that mean absolutely ****. They mean nothing.
Unknown Speaker: Oh yeah.
Jake: And the the ******* NHS are heroes. You know what I mean? And and even our people stuck in man. I was in the ******* supermarket and I was chatting to the woman like, you know, working on the till. And I was thinking. Like WOW, we would be farked without these people. You know what I mean? Without bus drivers, without the bin men. And you know, it's actually everyone is suddenly paying attention to that now. And that's amazing, you know.
Artemis: Last year, these people were considered low skilled workers and that became essential. Real ******* quick.
Brady: Yeah, they went from low skilled.
Artemis: Yeah, yeah.
Brady: To being the only thing keeping the. Society from ******* eating.
Jake: Itself, exactly, man. When, when the threat of life comes in the the joy of entertainment rightly takes a backseat. And that doesn't mean I'm against art. I ******* love entertainment and art. And you know. What I do but but you know when there's a very serious problem it, you know, all the influences, they're not important, the kind of professionally offended. They're not important anymore and the pundits, no one cares. It's about real people doing, you know, keeping things chugging along, which is very good, you know. And for me, that's more real than any ******* book club. Or any phrase that has been tweeted out that that is what's. You know.
Artemis: Yeah, absolutely.
Brady: Yeah, I mean like I. I feel pretty much the same thing, especially. Here in the US. People have have sort of realized that like ohh yeah, the the cashiers at Walmart and the ******* the postman and the people working in the Amazon factories are are so essential. And if, if they even went on strike for one day, our country would ******* fall apart. But then our governments like, yeah, now we're continue to.
Jake: Like well, this is the problem.
Brady: Like get get bent.
Jake: Now we have already. I'm seeing. I sound like a big ******* wanna be intellectual here, but it is true. Not that, but what I'm gonna say like now we're seeing the spectacle coming in. Where now in in the UK, right every Thursday. Like I said to you guys, everyone claps. Thursday, which is nice to show the recognition, but I'm thinking please don't let that be all we do because we need to be out on the streets when this is over saying hey, government give these people better money, give them more respect, they need more. They've saved us. I really hope and and I'm very, very cynical. I think the second this is all over. It's gonna go straight back to celebrities. Hyper capitalism and reality TV and unfortunately. You know, it's gonna be. I remember when we loved the NHS, you know. Remember that like, it's. I really hope not. But we'll we'll see anyway. We'll see.
Artemis: Have you seen? Did you see the Twitter? There was some. ******* you know, influencer, celebrity thing. It it said the word virus and they crossed out the the VIR, so. Just at us, it's. What the **** is that supposed to do?
Jake: Oh my God.
Artemis: And then they're they're like. Sharing videos of each other, chaining like singing parts of a song together. And then one stuck in my.
Unknown Speaker: Oh yeah.
Artemis: There and there was this meme I saw. It was celebrities. I can't believe I'm stuck in my house that says their house and it's ******* Rivendell from Lord. Of the rings. It's like you're not affected by this and some. What is it? Some people are living on ******* yachts right now, and I've been seeing memes of. It's like ******* like Pirates of the Caribbean. It's like my coworkers.
Brady: Yeah, dude, it's gonna be it's gonna.
Artemis: Yeah, yeah.
Brady: Be ******* crazy like I was. I've been. I'm kind of a a nerd. I'll be honest when it comes to like, like politics and the economy and **** like that. Like, that's what I originally go to to school for was political science and macro. Economic and I've been watching this **** really, really closely. Like, you can ask our in our in our group chats. I've been like like, oh, ****, any minute now. The country's gonna fall apart. And I've been reading all of these articles from like Goldman Sachs, where they're predicting now, I believe the last one I saw was. 30 or 32% unemployment here in the United States, and next few months, which is. 5 to 7% higher than the at the greatest point in the Great Depression. And you know, if a big bank is saying that type **** is way worse than.
Jake: Yeah, yeah.
Brady: So it can. The United States is going to turn into Mad Max really soon here.
Jake: My my friend made a good point the other day and other than the economic collapse of 2008, he was saying that like it's very rare and I'm not a guy that's like **** America like, I mean I. I love I love the. Yeah, but like I also, I'm not I I. I don't see. I don't see countries as their government. You know, I love the I love Britain and I'm always getting slagged off. Like were you were ******* nationalist. I'm like, no, I ******* hate the government. I hate the nationalist ********, but I love our people and I love to go. But anyway, so like he said, like is this the first time in a very long time that America has been roped into all the like, oh **** moments. You know what I mean? Like, usually it's like. America, like murdering kids in the Middle East or whatever, but now it's like, no, they're in this with everyone else. You know what I mean? It's quite rare.
Brady: Either I would even take it further than that, though. It's not even like American in in an oh **** moment. It's like we're in a ******* jumbo jet that the engines blew up and we're ******* hurtling towards the ground, yeah.
Jake: Yeah, yeah. With no parakeets.
Brady: And we're just, we're desperately trying to pull. Yeah, we're just desperately pulling the ******* stick. We know we're gonna *******. But we're like, alright, let's make this ******* crash as gentle as we ******* can. Like like the dude that crashed into the Hudson River. To save all the people on. The plane that's that's like our only ******* hope now.
Jake: Yeah, yeah.
Artemis: But I want to point out. That to me, the politicians are going to be one of the few people that are in the community that. Of, for lack of better with the privilege, I suppose maybe that they can in this time they can allow themselves to do Community work or to organize people and. It's not going to be. Oh, this is the inner. Tests and This is why we need to. Abolish the state. But it's it's going out, you know, admittedly, I haven't done a lot of this, and that's my own fault. But I've done some. I've done work with soup kitchens and. I've done community cleanups, not on the scale that I. Immediately should, which is something. I want to get into this summer. But it's about going out there and. Helping let when this collapse if it does. Happen, you know, economic. Collapse or disaster, whatever it is, it's worth going out there and working in. Soup kitchens and. You know, getting out and knowing the people down your street. But The thing is, leftist or too scared to walk. Into a neighborhood that that is poor.
Jake: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Artemis: You have like marching morning, right?
Jake: Yeah, that's very true.
Artemis: I'm sorry, but if you're white and you come from a back book, you know, a bourgeois or petty bourgeois family. I'm sorry. I'm gonna have a hard time believing you can walk into a black community. And start ******* talking.
Jake: I don't. Yeah, I don't, man. No, not completely. Like you. You remember that ******* video from the DS? A conference where? The guys. Excuse me, that was a microaggression. Like, they can't. They can't even get through one ******* pull without keeping interrupting you telling me that's gonna pop that?
Brady: Yeah, dude. He's like, you need to stop.
Jake: You're gonna go into the get? No, but they're not.
Brady: You're triggering me. Yeah, it just reminds me of that, me and you know, of Peter Griffin and Family Guy when he was wearing. That says king of the black. It was Peter Griffin, but he was wearing one of the funny little Maoist hats and it's like.
Jake: Right, right.
Artemis: And it's so weird.
Jake: That's the problem right? With a lot of these like white liberal types from nice backgrounds, which is, you know, I'm not I I try. I try not to do this because I'm from like a kind of working class area. And I often come across as like **** the middle class. I don't want to be like that, but when they're using like all of their might to kind of they do this thing where I've noticed it right with black friends of mine. Where we're if we're in an environment where there's, like, very, like, white liberal woke types, they will then try and use my black friends as like a a pet. You know what I mean? And it's ******* racist as **** and they. Don't even know.
Artemis: That I'm not sure if you as someone.
Brady: Tokenism. Who is?
Jake: Has volcanism. Yeah, exactly. But like to the extreme.
Artemis: You know, and I'm not sure if you've ever experienced this or whether your, your, your friends have experienced this. And I hope not. But you know, I'll, I'll give my own example and you know, if this has been an online space and sometimes, you know, I had this when I ran it to TPUSA kids on my college. I'm a neurodivergent. I deal with dissociative identity disorder. I have fertile bone disease and I'm trans or gender non conforming and as a primitivist that ****** off leftists and right wingers a lot. So leftists always tell me I remember there's the the, you know, there's the joking DSA and prim protest you have.
Jake: Yeah, yeah, I thought they were real man.
Artemis: I was in that. Comment section.
Jake: I was like. What did they?
Brady: Think that do.
Jake: You know, like I felt.
Unknown Speaker: They are, yeah.
Jake: For it so bad.
Artemis: And so I I made a comment, they're defending it and a malice called me a self hating ******.
Jake: Right. OK.
Artemis: And then. But what's funny? Is like. If you're gonna press blue. They love you until. You disagree with them and. Holy ****.
Jake: Exactly, yeah.
Artemis: They go off. Yeah, if. You're you know, it's. Ohh, you're you're black, but you're not a you're not a my my niche version of communism. You're basically an uncle Tom. Did you know that?
Jake: Yeah, yeah. So right, because you're saying you don't have agency, you have to fit within this stereotype of mine, which is that, you know, they're they're like, **** stereotype. But it's like, no, you're creating your own by expecting people to always fall in line based on something of identity, which is why I have all. Ways always hated identity politics. You know what I mean? It's a you guys call it dirt bike leftism. But I mean, in the UK, we just we just call that like. Proper leftists, to be honest. Poor people not crying about jokes and you know, not not being like, wow, we're different because we're different colors.
Unknown Speaker: Sure. Yeah.
Jake: Like we like we we do that. But we do it as like, yeah, obviously we're different. You know what I mean? Like, let's joke about it. Let's not ******* cry every day, you know, once you recognize the problem.
Brady: You're not a revolutionary. You're not a revolutionary? Postmodern Trotskyist like you ******* try when you get.
Jake: Yeah, right.
Brady: Out of here.
Jake: Like, yeah, if if you're like, if your ideology only just fits on a Twitter bio, you're useless like. Just shut up. But this is again why? Like I think you know when people say, what's your political alignment? And I often say like, just leave me alone. Leave people alone like you know, like you're saying, like, if you're trans. Who gives a ****? Leave people alone. And that includes like certainly like, if someone's like, I'm gonna kill that trans guy, I'm gonna be like, I'm on the frontline against that guy. You know what I mean? But I'm not then gonna be like you're trans. So you have to do this, this and this. What the what do I know? You do whatever you want you.
Unknown Speaker: Know what I mean?
Jake: It's like, why can't people leave each other alone? Like, that's what I don't get. I got into.
Artemis: A I got. Into a really big debate, I pushed the memo was about LGBT gatekeeping, and I spoke against it cause. It's a *******. Nerdy that some LGBT people tell other LGBT people they're not LGBT, it's like, why the **** doesn't matter? And some girl, they're they kept pushing that. And you know, they're like, Ohh, ace, ace people a such, you know, in a romantic and and these other things they're not really LGBT and someone compared them to a turf, you know like your your rhetoric. Is is, you know it's, it's exclusionary. It's bad. You know, just simply, you know, maybe you. Should reanalyze it. And least did you just compare a POC trans woman to a turf? Like you know.
Brady: Get out of your fashion.
Jake: Like you know. What all of that? It's just boring. All of that talk is boring. It's snooze. It's boring. Just just no one knowing in the real life cares about that. I really, honestly believe that no one cares about them. Mike Microaggression firstly, is not thing. It doesn't even exist. It's it's like an invention. Do you know what I mean? And like it like Mike, what microaggression? Like, how are you ever going to survive a working class environment? These are the things you care about, boy. Jake growing up.
Brady: You don't understand.
Jake: Right. We got who? The ******* prick, you little ****. You ******* *******. Like you get slapped around the head. You know, like that's what it's like, man. That's in your family. You know what I mean?
Brady: Yeah, James.
Jake: And it doesn't mean they hate you or anything. It's a very. We I don't know, man. I grew up in my family. In the way. It's very like quite a harsh way of living to. Some people but. I think it's great and and I really think that they should take the positives. That because you can't bother someone like that if someone is poor and broke and they came from a harsh background, you can't **** them off with a ******* microaggression. Because they know what real life is. And they're gonna cry about something that's completely insignificant. You know what I mean? So, like you said, yeah. How are they gonna walk into the ghetto and then start helping people, you know? Because what have? They thought right.
Artemis: Well, first of all, they need to drop the white. Savior ******** cause another.
Jake: Yeah, exactly. They.
Artemis: That's not gonna fly, I know.
Jake: Funny, just got the white guilt **** like these people that are, like, loving that they, they're like, yeah, I ******* hate white people too. Mate, I like if. I said that to one of my black friends. Yeah, I hate myself. Be like, what the **** is wrong with you? Like you know what I mean? What kind of a loser?
Brady: That's so weak. It's funny when you.
Jake: You can't be helpful to anyone like that.
Artemis: Yeah, it's funny because I say it and then I realize other people I've seen people on Twitter, they thought I apologize for my privilege. I'm like instead of apologizing, why don't you use it? Put it to.
Jake: Good use. Yeah. What?
Artemis: Like there's this.
Jake: Shut up.
Artemis: There's this video you might have seen. It was. I can't remember who posted. It was big. On Twitter, Facebook. They were. They shoplifted and were given the food away to homeless people. Did you see that? It was like a month ago. That commentary well of. Course white people can get. Away with it like.
Unknown Speaker: Ohh God.
Artemis: Are you? Ohh God. Course all the people are coming to. White, of course.
Jake: Yeah, of course they are. Like what, you think that that homeless guy that got the food off him? Is gonna go.
Brady: Like yuck here, white, get out of here.
Jake: Sorry, but you use your privilege to get that. So I'm gonna have that. No, they're not. Because you know what? Real people don't give a **** about. That they like, keep your keep your hand sanitizer.
Brady: It's I'm sorry, but if you have.
Artemis: You should if you have privilege you.
Jake: Should use it. And then like exactly like. So what if they use that to get it? What they're doing a good thing, I tell you an example I had a guy message me. Yeah, we're doing this Popular Front ******* homeless thing and they had to go. So there was like an activist run soup kitchen. The kitchen and he was like, why don't you give the money to them instead of homeless charities? Well, firstly, because it's won by a bunch of like lefties that I don't even know. Secondly, they might steal the ******* money because again, there's no law regulating their anarchist thing. And thirdly, **** ***. I'm raising money for the homeless. Like why? Why are you finding a problem? Stop. Like you know what? I mean, it's boring. Like I said, it's boring. It's it's funny. Then people, I think you should. You know, I really, someone, someone had a guard like me and Robert Evans that, that journalist we we we were doing this podcast recently about the women in Rojava and their life on and off the front line. And you know, and and then this woman commented and was like, wow, how real and enter list and like, I could have got in a big argument with her. And I just said woke.com and it's like. Because even like what? Like you're being absurd. And it's like I am being absurd because that's the only way you should be spoken to. You're absurd. And you should be treated like that. I really believe that, you know.
Artemis: Yeah, it's and of course other people got upset. It's like, oh, you're missing the larger analysis and it's it's. But it's also. I know there's something. You want ************. Says oh, so you think it's OK to make transphobic jokes would be transphobic, and no one here saying that? By the way, no one is saying it's OK to just go out and ******* insult ******* trains. People watch people.
Brady: Absolutely. What I can't.
Unknown Speaker: Yeah, there was no.
Artemis: No one saying that it's about, it's about also being down to Earth and instead of maybe, you know, obviously we can be knowledgeable about transphobia and other like. But it's also a getting better about it in, you know, using the Internet as like a microphone to be upset rather than going out there, maybe, maybe. And of course like, yeah, it's a large. Conservative and maybe on Edge St. about certain things. Yeah, it's streaming. Let them gonna work. No, it's well. And admittedly like I hate the free market of ideas topic. But like admittedly, I was over there, I associate with some of the NSA members that are pro Bernie. It's whatever. I talked to him. There's a TP USA. So you. Know turning point USA and I *******. Up to him. And you know what's funny is this probably is because they have to be this way, but it's like, you know, I said, yeah, non binary, you know, soon immediately you asked me what my pronouns were, but then I. Wanna point? Out the USA, people didn't do that. I just, you know, just. Want to point that out there?
Jake: Yeah, yeah.
Artemis: That's thing, but it's like. You do. I think there are a bunch of. ******* idiots. And I think they support a racist ******* president. Absolutely do I? Do I gotta be friends with them? But can I talk to him?
Unknown Speaker: You can talk.
Jake: To anyone like what the **** that? That is free speech. Like, what are you talking about? Like I I hate the idea of deep platforming like don't talk to. I love Hitchens. You know, not not Peter. He's a ***** ** ****, but, like, you know Christopher Hitchens and you know, a lot of people nowadays, he would be, you know, Oh my God. He'd be cancelled till next week, but he was amazing because he he would get like a Nazi on his ******* show. And just find out what they believe in. And then just like make, like, destroy them because they're ******* ridiculous. That's good. We should I look if anything is. Like bad, you should be able to hear about it. Shouldn't be hidden away because then they just make their own little ******* syndicates in secret. You know what I mean? And and frankly, like I'm I'm of the feeling like if you're such a ******* baby that you need to have like trigger warning at the front of something. I I really think you just need to reestablish. Well, well, not not. I get it. Like, people don't want to be, like, upset about things. But you know what I mean? Like if you. Do you think that we shouldn't even be allowed to talk to people with extreme ideas? Like, what's the point in anything? It's that it's.
Brady: That's the thing. That's the thing, Jake. It's like like this, this conservative meme I found on. I don't know if it was Instagram or Twitter, and I thought it was really ******* funny. That literally pertains to that. It was like these same these same people that that claim that they are like prepared and are getting ready to fight a protracted war against the US Imperial. She and are too ******* afraid to order a pizza over the phone because they'll have an anxiety like it's so funny.
Unknown Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Brady: In truth, like.
Jake: Well, I I get a lot of Flack for saying that. Like, you know, I get called right wing because I believe that people should be strong and tough. And apparently that now in 2020, that's like a an undesirable trait. Apparently not. For me, it's not. I want the people around me to be tough, emotionally stable. And because I'm not you. Know what I? Mean like, you know what I mean?
Brady: I get it.
Jake: It's like. No one ******* good people around and that doesn't mean horrible or harsh or nasty. That just means like, yeah, people that got this **** together. We need leaders in this world, man, or we're just gonna get Trump. And you know, that's the idea. If you wanna be authoritarianism, then you need some strong ******* people around. Like, trust me, I've seen war man. The ******* when? When **** gets real nasty. All of this will fade within minutes. All of it will fade. You know what?
Artemis: Yeah, like I mean I'm, I'm.
Jake: I mean, the people in the billion retweets, they will become completely unimportant and all of that. Trust me, no one and the frontline. He's going, bro. Pass me that grenade and no one is going. Hey, man, it's not, bro. I reckon I identify. No one is caring about that, which I'm not saying they should. Of course, it's important to, you know, whoever you wanna be for. Z Zeiser I'm not doing. If you're he. Haw whatever. Fine, no problem. Whoever you wanna be. I'll address you as such. But what my point is like what is important is being like kind of ready for that ****. If it changes, you know.
Artemis: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jake: What I mean?
Artemis: I love the opinion, though, that I might kind of disagree that I think certain things like trigger warnings are good. Cause I think people. Misunderstand like for example. There's certain things that with people I associate with because they have, you know, they actually have or diagnosed with PTSD that certain images or or treatments, can you know what I mean?
Jake: Yeah, yeah. No, you are right.
Artemis: So I think.
Jake: No, no, totally, totally.
Artemis: Those are important. But then I think that it people can misuse those that I've noticed. How often they get misused in online circles, left leftist or not. They see them all over. It's not even a political thing. It's it's just a I think it's just a I don't know what the right word is, cause I hate. Being like, oh, it's a weakling thing, because I think it's so much more than that. You know what I mean? But I think it gets. Misused in. Online circles because people. Don't know what triggering is. People that claim to be triggered and people that are triggered it is.
Unknown Speaker: But it's like.
Artemis: That's that is actually a mental, you know, it's a, it's a psychological term to refer to people that, you know, phenomenon that can trigger. Flashbacks and and, you know, psychotic episodes and things like that for me. Like the did certain stressors can cause me to switch or, you know, blackout and stuff. Sorry but I'm. Gonna be like, don't say certain **** or don't show me certain **** because. I don't.
Jake: Yeah. No, that's fine.
Brady: And I mean like.
Jake: But but it gets used in. The sense of like. Don't let this guy speak on this platform because someone, somewhere might be triggered, and that's when it's like, you know, some people say that to me, well, you might really upset and I was somewhat like, you know, life is hard and people get upset.
Brady: Yes, exactly.
Jake: You know, like, I really. And that sounds callous. And and frankly, I don't give a. See where I'm from? You get told like, don't be a ******* *****, man. And I think more people need to hear that. And apparently that makes you right wing now, but honestly, you're never gonna survive if you. If you really like that ******* scared of the world. You know what I mean? And the right wing are the worst for it. Like they're there. That's what's so funny. Then the guys are going on about snowflakes. They are the biggest ******* *******. You dare be against them?
Unknown Speaker: For real?
Jake: They are. Been crying and they don't like free speech that we want free speech. No, you don't. You just want to be able to say what you want. And then you want to shut everybody else down.
Artemis: You you want to be able to say?
Jake: The N word like that. That's yeah. And and exactly the ******* the the big ******* wimps out here, man.
Artemis: It's funny, like I look here, I want to be able to say the N word, but people are acknowledging me that transsexual people are indeed worthy of human rights.
Jake: Yeah, I'm not having that. Yeah, you're gonna call a woman. Ohh like.
Artemis: It's what is. What is that one meme that says I believe in voluntary transactions and relations. Someone should be respected. But you want me to use they then **** no, I won't.
Jake: Yeah, exactly. Right. Like a libertarian. That is like, well, I just want to murder every Jew, but I don't. Know what I want? Small government.
Brady: But yeah, thing I.
Jake: And I want to be allowed to do what they want. Yeah, but that down got I'm an unknown.
Brady: Want government for is the military?
Jake: Ridiculous, man. It's ******* dumb. I'm gonna have to go. I just realized we're ******* battery is about to die.
Artemis: Oh, you're good.
Brady: Yeah, no worries. We were just talking about how we we probably need to wrap it up. I think we both got **** to do. But yeah, thank you so much for *******. Coming on if. You're ever free again. We would love to. Have you, on this great conversation?
Jake: Alright mate. Thank you so much, man. And here's here's to getting cancelled for all of this, boys, let's go.
Brady: ******* hop on the cancel train.
Unknown Speaker: Yeah, you don't know.
Jake: Yeah, man. Whatever you are. Let's get cancelled together.
Artemis: Yeah, one last thing before this is over as a, you know obligation is you know pentel and cola passed away yesterday or today. **** him, thank God. And if you don't think these, you know, eco fascist, you're. A ******* idiot people.
Jake: Mate, I got so much **** for that.
Unknown Speaker: I saw that.
Jake: I don't run that **** today. People like. Actually actually not fascist, but when he's like writing about it openly saying that that's what he is. Not that. Alright, cool.
Artemis: Nationalistic population control.
Jake: That guy, man.
Artemis: I wonder why. I've heard that before.
Unknown Speaker: Well, yeah.
Jake: I never heard anyone else come up with that.
Brady: So thank you all for stopping by. Thanks again to Jake. We're gonna plug all the Popular Front shift, the raffle, all that good stuff. Just send us the ****. Kind of links. We'll plug all of it.
Jake: Thanks lads. Thanks for letting me on. So find what you're.
Brady: Doing man awesome. We appreciate it, man. Thank you so much. So yeah, this has been the end of episode 11, and I hope you guys all have a great day.
#13. On The "Rightprim" Question
1.01K subscribers
783 views May 29, 2020
We're back to angrily discuss "rightprims," eco-fascists, and others in their vein people who align with Ted. Oak Journal:
https://www.oakjournal.org/ https://www.instagram.com/oakagainstcivilization/
DISCLAIMER: Our podcast does NOT condone or support acts of terror or violence. This podcast is meant to serve as an educational platform for political theory, and nothing more. Please do not use these videos as a confirmation for any illegal activity you may take part in. We condemn those who take part in violent and destructive behaviors.
Brady: Hey everyone, this is episode 13 of the Uncivilized podcast. I'm Brady art is here as well, and in this episode we're going to be discussing something that we really wanted to to put off and talk about other things. We've got many people that we want to come have come on the podcast. Many topics that we want to discuss. But this is just. Sort of come to the proportions that we need to discuss it. We're talking about ******* right. I know all of you. Anyone who is listening to this podcast right now, I've had experiences with these *************. Their Ted profile picture with the ******* laser eyes and their ******* Waffen s s BIOS on Instagram. Twitter. Whatever ******* websites you use to talk about anything, these ************* are there. They talk about Mr. Uncle Ted shed and they talk about ****** the mailman and all this other ******* stupid ********. I'm just gonna let art take it away before I get ******* angry.
Artemis: So Brady and I just before recording this, he was just complaining so. You know what this is my idea. But I'm also the person that does not want to. Do it and that's that's I think that's where we're both kind. Of at is that this is. A trend that's extremely like. Internet based and then you start to see intersect with like. Eco fascism because. That's what it is, we won't deny.
Brady: Yeah, absolutely.
Artemis: It like right we? Primitivism, right. We're primitivism, eco, nationalism and eco fascism. And while those labels don't have concrete. Historic trends to them, so to speak, to really point down to what they are, they all sort of intersect. And so far that they they tape the ante left. Anti left wing ideology of primitivism and they run. With it in. The wrong ******* direction and not dude, they just they go off rails and it's horrible because instead of maintaining these sort of what we say, you know. You know what? You know, reject the dichotomy, fight for autonomy. They say, you know what? I read that in the manifesto by Kozinski. I read the 1st 2 paragraphs and now I know what. I'm talking about. Yeah, and. It feeds into their pre-existing. You know, biases and beliefs that it it just sends them down this ******* rabbit hole of basically just becoming Adam. Often bootleggers and it's ridiculous.
Brady: Yeah, no, you see the meme like I've even made one of these to **** *** some of my friends that are communists, like the NPC meme. Where the communists starts reading Isaac. If they get to the header that says the psychology of modern leftism, and then they get angry and stop reading it the the eco fascists take it in the opposite direction, where they read through that passage. They stop there and they go, Oh yes, I love Hitler. Now like that that's literally. All they do, it's the dichotomy of the left hoid and the ******* eco fascists that are both. Making Kaczynski's works, and I think you would agree with me, art, the issue isn't sort of analyzing Kaczynski's works and looking at them from multiple different lenses to to learn more about theory or understand these sort of processes deeper. That's not the ******* issue. It's when you stop at only reading Kaczynski's works. And you treat him as this ******* idol figure, like these eco fascists do. Like both you and me, we started out as pretty big Ted stands and obviously not like these ******* eco fascists that have their their laser eye profile pictures and. Talk about us.
Artemis: Actually you did have one of those. Remember that the.
Brady: OK, I did. I did have that at. OK, thanks for ******* outing the art, all right? I may have had that at one point, but I wasn't one of these ************* talking about the Ted shed and saved the bees shoot refugees ***********. There's and another thing that needs to be clear here. There's so many different tangents I could go off on, so I'm might sound a little ******* delusional right now because this **** really ****** me off. But it also needs to be stated that we are not leftist. I don't know how many videos we have to make. Furry **** on ******* leftists for you ************* to understand that that's not who we are. Before making this episode, I asked our a genuine question. Like, has there been an episode that we've made even back when we were critical of capital whereby didn't **** on leftists in some aspect? I know every episode of this podcast. We have **** on leftists and it genuinely couldn't think of 1. I'm just ******* fed up with this ****, man.
Artemis: And it's it. It's funny, too, because they come into our I think it's really more evident on our Instagram page and comment sections where we post, we posted a few anti fascist images. There's one with the Luddite smashing a a machine that has the American flag, the hammer and sickle. And I think it has the the Nazi flag or some sort of fascist symbolism.
Brady: Yeah, it's a swastika.
Artemis: And then Brady made a. A A core graphic, it's an eco extremist against fascism, I think. Is that what it says? And then people just were like, what do? You mean anti fascist? What is?
Unknown Speaker: This leftist ******** or it's like it.
Artemis: Well, if you're not, if you're not leftist, then why is art trans? It's like, what the **** does that mean?
Brady: What does that mean?
Unknown Speaker: Good. You would you would.
Artemis: Be eaten by your tribe? No, no, I don't.
Unknown Speaker: I don't think so, I don't think. That's how that works.
Brady: Yeah. No, it. And it's the same. The worst part about it is it's the same like 4 ******* messages that we get. It's either ******* it's eco terror, .14. 88 with a ******* picture of Ted with swastikas over his eyes and like smoking a cigar or something, saying like why no fascism question mark or calling art a ******* ****** or some **** like it's the same ****. It's it's not even. Money, like I I would understand if they had some sort of like a cunning line that they could use against. Us but it's. The same ****. And I I don't think. I've talked about this to art much, but I have to block so many ******* fascists that try to get in contact with our Instagram, try to join our community. I think we need to say it again. You ************* are not welcome here. You're ******* stupid. You add nothing to critical thinking or the adaptation of theory to fit. Modern modern material conditions. You're ******* stupid. Go live in Alaska. ******* shoot yourself. I don't care. Go, go do something.
Artemis: Else and what's even better is that because we maintain what some people call progressive ideas, for example, not hating brown people.
Brady: No, I'm a ******* leftist because I don't hate Mexican immigrants that are ******* dirt farmers. I'm such a ******* commie, guys.
Artemis: Or that thinking, for example, that trans people, you know in which I am one is. You know. Shouldn't just be ******* killed and cannibalized, you know, that's wow, it's leftist.
Brady: Apparently that. Dude, I'm. I'm literally a ******* Trotskyist.
Artemis: And it's it's ridiculous because Brady and I are egoists. I don't typically use that label because it gets.
Brady: No, wait. You can't say that word. If Kevin listens to this, we're going to be called Nazi. Don't say that word.
Artemis: Oh, I forgot about that I forgot about.
Unknown Speaker: That flow.
Brady: By the way, **** Kevin Tucker.
Artemis: And like I was saying. You know we're we're individual where our analysis is aimed mostly at the individual, but we don't hold up this dichotomy of individualism and collectivism, but rather that we see there are cultural, societal, economic factors that influence how individuals relate to one another, which is called historical materialism. But that doesn't…
Brady: Ohh God. Not the word, not the word.
Artemis: It doesn't make us leftist, and if it does, then. Oh my God, I am a Stalinist.
Brady: If understanding history and the material conditions required to make certain movements possible or make certain historical phenomenon relevant makes me a leftist, then you might as well just call me ******* Joseph Stalin like, yeah.
Artemis: And another thing is and I think a reason this has become a problem in that insofar that right prims or in cells or eco fashion. And you know what? Whatever you want to. Call them have are this sort of way. Is the lack of critique of political economy and so far that they say. You know, if you listen to Marx, if you have Marxist influence, if you have anything related to communism in your ideology, you're leftist. It's this dogmatic. Sort of like. US versus them mentality. It's not quite what I'm looking for. But you know what I'm saying? That it's if. You have anything in common. You are a leftist.
Brady: What you critically analyzed history through a lens that isn't ******* tainted by white power. You're a ******* Jew. Like, OK. Oh, my God. Like I I. Ohh, this this **** just gets so.
Unknown Speaker: And then.
Artemis: Old and the reason I bring that up is because they fail to understand. Maybe the language that we use or the background that we come from, that they associate us with people that use similar analysis, which is historically been leftist, but that doesn't make us ourselves leftist. If we're using a point of analysis, again historical materialism, you know the analysis of capital and its functions in society. That doesn't make us leftists. That makes us correct is what it.
Unknown Speaker: What it does?
Artemis: But and I think they fail in Ted falls into this too. He he's a ******* idiot when it comes to critique. Political economy. Because he thinks that, he said. I think it was an anti tech revolution or his recent publication of Technological Slavery where he said global capitalism, if you could even call it that. And he constantly says **** about capitalism that like you can tell he doesn't know what he's talking about. It's like 8th grade level social science, social studies understanding. And so I think this is a trend. And here's The thing is, by him doing so, his ******** followers fall into the same problems. Because, he says we shouldn't worry about capitalism, we shouldn't worry about XY and Z. They refuse to analyze it, and because they refuse to analyze it, they don't understand historical development. You know what I mean? And in so doing, they failed to understand that you can take from Marxism, from leftism, from communist ideologies, and still maintain a correct position. So I think that's kind of the issue. Right wing primitivism. That's the source of its problems on one hand, and on the other, it's cause you have these personal biases that are typically that of the right saying, nationalism, xenophobia, racism, sexism, transphobia, they're pro capitalism, things that are typically associated with the right. Or even with centrism. And it feeds into that. Those pre-existing biases and beliefs, and and in there. And because Ted is very. You could say, rationalistic about things. How can I say this? I'm kind of losing my train of thought a bit, but that they. It they fall into this sort of loop, I would say. And because Ted is so centered on anti tech, right and he is very. Oriented in this sort of 1 lane. You know one lane analysis that the that he refuses to look outside of it. His followers also refused to. And because he's oriented against technology unless so civil. Nation they are unable to look outside of a civilized analysis. Does that make sense?
Brady: Well, yeah, that's exactly what it is. Their analysis that they that they claim to uphold is ultimately civilized. Like I'm sorry when the when the technological grid goes down, when the the global networks of production disappear. Your ******* white pride isn't going to survive either. Like these ******* uh, these ******* people just just drive me nuts and. No, no, we won't have a ******* right prim on to discuss this either. You guys can go **** yourselves.
Artemis: And here's another thing too. Is on race, and this is going to be something that **** and I know it's gonna **** a lot of people off is the topic of, say, white power or white? White politics, you could say. The fact that that is a completely. Modern phenomenon that is post feudalism. So the last 300 years and you wanna talk to me about me being civilized. Your your your thing is an entirely born out of industrialism, that sort of white nationalism. Like, yeah, did there. That's not saying, you know, forms of xenophobia in proto racism didn't exist. But we know for a fact if you have any sense of history, racism didn't exist until late feudalism and into capitalism because the feudal nations didn't have the same, did not have the same sense of identity. So it's been only like maybe 500 years of the idea of whiteness versus, say, blackness, so to speak. These sort of social constructs, which they are, I hate using that phrase cause it's a buzzword or buzz phrase, but they are and so in maintaining this sort of. But that's not the right word. But this I'll say it this tribalistic identity they feed into civilized dichotomies, and another issue they have is they think civilization, the ethos, the ethics, the moralities that will follow, say, post collapse will look the same they did before. Which made zero sense, not none at all. It's like you're telling me that America, especially let's say, let's, let's go this far. Certain leftist and liberal. Uh geographical centers right are going to just lose those those ideas. Just all of a sudden. No, that doesn't.
Brady: Yeah, they're all going to be they're all going to Sig Heil as soon as the electric grid goes down.
Artemis: And it's not. And I'm not denying that certain ethos are related to the mode of production because that would make me not historical materialist. But these things don't certainly go away. That's not how that works. They don't. It's they don't exist in a vacuum and that they can just disappear. Those things will have long term effects on the social relations and the social norms and moralities that exist, post collapse. And so I think people upholding. Either left wing or right wing morality. That's where they fail, as you know, and this is something left wing and right wing primitivists. Fall into instead of a sense of individuality and fluidity, which is what marks a non industrial life, especially in non agrarian life, is the idea of fluidity. You know, and The thing is, industrialism and civilization whole, but especially industrialism brands, brings about this sort of stasis. This static identity among all people, for the most part, unless you're going through a stage of a simulation in which that's kind of different for certain groups, for the most part, the sense of identity is static. And so people uphold static morality and static identity, and they don't realize they're falling into a civilized industrial worldview. Which is ironic, because they they call Brady and I. You know, modern, modernistic, postmodern. Over socialized, that's my favorite one. The Ted phrase over socialized.
Brady: You guys are domesticated now let me explain my my why my white identity is the most important thing to me.
Artemis: And and and. What's funny is they claim that my transness is connected to being over socialized, but they literally they they don't support that claim. They they just makes no.
Brady: Sense. Yeah, I.
Unknown Speaker: You know.
Brady: Just this sort of idea that they have the the same recycled opinions and ideas because they haven't read past the psychology of the modern left and the ISAF like you're just ******* wrong. I know Art said this earlier. You're just wrong. I I've had so many arguments with these people where, like you did with the militant. One cell that we will not name where when you try to tell them that that not continuing to advance anti SIV or anti technologist thought and just sticking on Kozinski. Is a waste of ******* time and you might as well just shoot yourself then. That's that's literally when they call us leftist or they call us domesticated for having a podcast and over socialize, for trying to spread new and and and thoughtful ideas in relation to this sort of movement against technology or whatever the **** you want. To call this. It just blows my mind.
Artemis: And here's the thing going on. They're going back a little bit, talking about, like, survivalism because. We had, we. Had a field recording before this, so I can't remember if I mentioned in the last one or this one. The idea that someone messaged and they're complaining that we have feral meme on and not him because he thinks that he can provide more. And I was like, what do you even want to talk about? He said survivalism and living to our ideas. I was like.
Unknown Speaker: Literally what would that?
Artemis: Provide people. Most people would like to do that. But they don't. So what? What does that provide? Like what are you saying? Most people. If you wanted to say live by your ideals, you would go live in the woods. But that is the such at hand and. And hamming. Then ********. And he's buying into it. The dude has internalized it.
Brady: What you you use a phone, but you're a primitivist ******* checkmate, ****.
Unknown Speaker: This is.
Brady: ****, that's.
Artemis: What I thought it was like. If you want some living, your ideas literally throw the throw your phone away.
Brady: Right now, don't stop uploading ****** ******* Nazi.
Artemis: Talk about this.
Brady: Ask pictures and videos on Instagram. Me ******* loser. Yeah, and and that that was funny.
Artemis: Using ******* fascist imagery and then saying I'm not a fascist.
‘Why won't you let me on? I really don't care about your stupid ******* leftist. Over socialize podcast but I really wanna come on please. So I'm not mad. I'm just gonna make 3 posts about it. I want people to listen to me because I have good ideas about black people and shooting squirrels, please.’
Artemis: I'm not going to lie. And the more I think about it and I had this stuff the other day, is this thought this sort of worship of Kaczynski is literally? The psychology of leftism. If you just put right. Wing in it or? Or Kozinski Heist, or Kaczynski, Iism or Kozinski. And, thought Kozinski and psychology is a projection of your insecurities with women and minorities.
Brady: And to your thought. Yeah, you guys worship Karl Marx. Well, you guys worship Karl Marx, so let me spend the next three hours ******* explaining why Ted Kaczynski is the greatest man ever.
Artemis: Or live, and anyone who's successful in having social skills as a leftist, you know. If you're with people outside of your demographic, you might as.
Brady: Ohh yeah absolutely.
Artemis: Well, be Joseph Stalin.
Unknown Speaker: You couldn't let him.
Brady: Why you don't spend 12 hours a day on 4 Chan? You're ******* over socialized, you idiot.
Artemis: And I think that's the issue again, there's, I keep saying that's the issue. I'm certainly realize there's probably a lot of. Issues here I can make a list.
Unknown Speaker: Ohh, there's so ******* many issues.
Brady: This is why my brain. Feels ******* scrambled every time I want to say something. I think of it, and then there's like, four other things that pop. Into my head like. It I I just can't do it.
Artemis: And I think and I think. Again, a lot of. This goes back to this, it's this way. Of explaining leftism, I. Think it's garbage like it's actually. OK, I'll rephrase that. It's like 5050, right? I believe it. It's that he makes a lot of overstatements and inserts his own projections into it. You know what I mean? So for example, like we all know, for Pete's, a failure with women and that's why he says.
Brady: Oh yeah.
Artemis: Feminists are insecure and they feel that they're not as good as men. He makes these statements, but he doesn't support that right like he just. Makes that statement and. Anyone who's anti feminist or has certain misogynistic beliefs, they just it clicks with it again.
Unknown Speaker: I hate women too.
Artemis: Yeah, it feeds into this. Their pre-existing biases. And so for, you know and it you can contrast this with me and. City, who tried to sort of brain kazinski an ideology into leftism by just saying, oh. Well, that's liberalism. That was our like its use that that's a certain type of leftist. That's our type of leftist.
Brady: Oh, yeah, yeah. But the hashtag, not us.
Artemis: Hashtag not her leftism. But and then I you know and over timing, Brady would have a lot of conversations especially with our, our, our someone who does a lot of. Our editing, Gavin. And also our thumbnail editor Ben, we also had a lot of conversations with them about leftism and what we stood for, and we eventually realized we don't really fit in with leftists.
Brady: Like like at all. What surprise and.
Artemis: In fact, I think I. It's funny leftist **** on me the same way right winger **** on me. It's like, oh, you're trans in a primitivist. You can't do that. Or did you?
Brady: You ******* hate trans people. Yeah, it's.
Artemis: So funny how. Often people like you know, like New York. Brady will get the same ******** from left wingers and right wingers, and we're not just, you know, we were not condoning like third position as them like that term because that's that's literally just fascism. We just call ourselves non political isn't the correct term. But we mean.
Brady: Anti political.
Artemis: Yeah, anti political post political if you want to throw another.
Brady: Yuck, yuck.
Artemis: Term and.
Brady: We don't need another post term. Keep that to Twitter.
Artemis: And so anything like that. But we it's funny that if we did. They should say are we probably not leftist at that point, because we're definitely not right wingers by any stretch of the word, even though know how much how much leftists want to say we are or that we're eco fascists or that the difference between primitivism and eco fascist negligible, which is the dumbest ******* thing I've ever heard because I want to I.
Unknown Speaker: Want you to.
Artemis: To I want any of these people to meet and actually go fast. Just talk to them and talk to me and tell me. That we're anything. Alike cause we would probably both want to kill each other, so no, we're not. We're not the same. But the issue. That I'm trying to kind of get to here is, since me and Brady have sort of gone through this leftist phase and by Phase I meant that was a majority of Brady's political. Life I would. Suppose right?
Brady: Almost exclusively almost exclusively.
Artemis: Yeah. And I went. Through a I admit I went through like a far right phase before I knew what far right was. I was a strasserist and then I went left wing and then I went to my left wing phase and so I think it's because we've had exposure to these ideas and that we can objectively view them like, OK. Here's this thing, Mark said. That's really smart. But he also said the **** about communism, and I'm not gonna lie, do that kind of ******* sucks. So we're. Not going to take that, and I admit, you know, there's sometimes that people like Ted who kind of fall into you, could almost say the right wing of political spectrum and a lot of what he said is good.
Unknown Speaker: Good morning.
Artemis: We've been objectively take from different. Positions and still maintain a correct and enhance our own ideas right? For example, the fact that we can take from say the situations international from marks from I don't know. Jacque comment, you know he did end up becoming a primitivist essentially later in his life. But the fact for, you know, he is a good example actually like jacquette. I hope to God I'm pronouncing that correctly, that he was someone who was a Marxist. He did. In a tense amount of work with the Italian Communist Party before eventually realizing. The the logical conclusion to his ideas to a lot of Marxist trends is to be anti civilization, to be anti technology. Does that make him a leftist? No, he just incorporated. A A historically left wing analysis.
Brady: It's called being correct.
Artemis: Again, I didn't do it just comes back. To please be correct. But it you know it also means not being dogmatic in your anti leftism because you need to know what leftism is. Being leftist does not mean being a good person being leftist. I you know, and this is something I think Ted really tries to say. But he doesn't say it very well. In the eyes of most people, especially in his original industrial site, in his future is that leftism. Is a collectivist. It upholds A dichotomy of leftism and individualism, and it buys into collectivism, right? And then it serves serves a purpose within civilization. And if you read the systems need a trick that Kaczynski wrote and that leftist helped push civilization to a more stable position. Industrial society to a more stable position and that it helps counter and attack and assimilate. Ideas that could be. Counterintuitive to the industrial system? Or that can assist it? So for example, instead of arming? Say black folk, right. So new Africans in America will take them some new Africans instead of arming them and helping them have self determination, they want to assimilate them. And to say the communist system, the industrial system, and I think that's what marks someone like a leftist out that, you know, wants to assimilate the black new Africans into society versus me and Brady, who say no because we're individualists oriented. So to speak. That we're not looking to assimilate, we're looking to liberate and those are not the same thing.
Brady: I think.
Artemis: I don't know what anyone tells you.
Brady: I think the issue is with both left wingers thinking that we're right wing and right wingers thinking that we're left wing. It's the fact that we aren't beholden to a party form or a party line, or a unifying message or unifying sort of identity that we can. Take things like you said about commit, who just right, just just completely correct takes and completely correct analysis. We can incorporate those into our own beliefs. And I think that makes a lot of people who are. I hate using this word now because I've heard it thrown at me so many times. They're over socialized or domesticated people who are following these, these strict party forms and party lines and the same messaging they have to be clear and concise in their support of the singular message. It makes them uncomfortable that we're that we're able to do that. That we promote doing that. So that's why the lefties think that we're ******* right wingers, because we think some things Ted said were correct, like that nationalists are ******* idiots. And we also think that Marx was correct in historical materialism and these people, it ******* messes with their lizard brains. Like ohh they like something that we like. But they also like.
Unknown Speaker: Something that we don't. Ohh God hurts my.
Brady: Brain and I think that's something that really needs to be tackled for any sort of of anti tech or anti Steve movement to be successful. It's that we need to really promote that idea of incorporating certain aspects of different analysis or ideology into our own movement to to ultimately be more successful or more palatable for people.
Artemis: And I wanna backtrack a little bit, cause I did mention this. The idea of like different ethos, uh, returning to a pre industrial way of life, which is something that. Like Ted stands really pushed as well. Trans people, gay people, black people. Multiculturalism couldn't exist before. Industrialism, which all those things. By the way. Existed, you know, like the idea of, like, multiculturalism. There was existed, right? It didn't operate the same way because capitalism is multiculturalism in multiculturalism in a different way than, say, feudal, city city urban centers did. They was different. Versus, you know, Transness presented itself differently in, say, certain indigenous circles before pre Colombian indigenous societies. Versus, say, the modern American LGBT community, right? Those are different, and that's how history works, right? Things transfigure in relation to their conditions, work.
Brady: It's almost like materialism is incorrect.
Artemis: That's what we're saying. We're not saying be a Marxist, not saying be.
Brady: We're saying don't be a ******* idiot. Read a ******* book, you ******* morons.
Artemis: And So what? Yeah, technology is not going to just ******* disappear. And so ether, there's not gonna be. And so that sounds kind of post civilization any but the ethos that, you know, some ethos and moralities and ethics that exist now will transfigure or some will exist fairly similar to how they do now. Any sort of post civilization post industrial world, especially in places that are more urban versus those that are more rural, which historically tend to be progressive versus conserve. Negative the you know, the urban centers tend to be more progressive, and that doesn't necessarily mean industrialism, but places with more multiculturalism and trade, and the influx of capital versus rural areas because they don't need to be more progressive, so to speak, because it just doesn't typically suit them until they need. Needed to be assimilated. Into more industrial urban centers. So say, like I hate talking about collapse, but this is a figurative for the kazinski fans like say, like post, post your Kozinski and Vanguard Revolution somehow ******* it somehow happens. Are you gonna tell me that like, say, Chicago is gonna have this like? Oh, Siv Chicago's gonna have the same morality. ******* Roman feudalism did. No, shut.
Brady: The ****? Oh, absolutely.
Unknown Speaker: Got it.
Artemis: Like, yeah, Will, will, will certain groups probably face certain issues going forward. Yeah, we'll we'll certain groups have certain issues going forward in a communist society. So it's like the like break from this utopian thinking, so to speak, this sort of dogmatic we need to pamper to certain groups. To be correct, which is which, you know, right, prims feed into like their white nationalism and leftist feed into this sort of humanism. And and they both fail on the basis that they have to appeal to a certain group rather than appealing to to truth, quote UN quote, uh or to to reality. You know what I mean? They have to see to. This like. These preconceived notions that they typically already have, and then they politicize them, and that's where it gets really ****** when people politicize their person. Pre-existing biases and then again they read into certain groups or or authors and ideas that only reinforce what they already believed, which is why I think Ted's anti leftism, though it's not necessarily incorrect if you don't already have an exposure to leftism, it's don't probably make you come out. A ******* weirdo. To be honest.
Brady: Yeah, absolutely. I think that's where the major distinction lies between people who come from sort of left wing backgrounds like we did or. Yeah, I guess the left wing background because I still rejected leftism before I became like anti technologist. I was a post leftist versus a right winger where like a post leftist or a leftist, reads Kaczynski's critique of leftism, and they can sort of. Applied to their own real world feelings and experiences like I could, uh, because of this of the circles I was involved in while I was a leftist, I could say, yeah, I did notice this actually. And I didn't like it, whereas the right winger comes through and reads that and goes ******* idiots. I'm a Nazi now.
Artemis: Or it just reinforces, like, even if, say, like kids to use like anti nationalist, anti conservative but then. Even though like. Yeah, I agree with them. They still uphold the same ******* idea. As those people. Or they say, oh, we can still work with them like someone we argued with. They're like, oh, we can still work with fascist and then kill. Them later I was like, when is that hit ever worked?
Unknown Speaker: Please point me to an example of that ever working because here's.
Artemis: Here's the thing to say. You say we shouldn't work with leftists, cause they're over socialized, but you're going to art, you're going to fight. With their exact opposite. Over which are essentially the conservative over socialized right winger.
Brady: The socialization. Horseshoe theory.
Artemis: Basically like and. That's something that I've talked about with Brady and others before. That's sort of that. There's there's over socialization of, like, leftism. And then there's almost the counterpart. That's like the conservative over socialization, almost, and it's less stable than that of the over socialized leftist and it over socialized left, doesn't serve more of a purpose. But there's still like, the idea of being. Civilized into the conservative aspects of civilization, that's that's a reality. Like, how is fascism? How is working with fascism any better than working with leftism? And if if you want to maintain this strong anti tech cause, it's the idea. It doesn't. At all lies. And they're like and then they're like, oh, we can learn survival skills. You can also read. A ******* book or.
Brady: Or you could just go outside.
Artemis: Go outside instead of making excuses for having *******, you know, collapse atarian. **** the what is it? White genocide, 1488.
Unknown Speaker: Like that. So I. Know he. It's it's not that I agree with him. It's that he has some good survival ideas, you know? And he he read Kosinski one time. He only read the 1st 3 passages about leftism.
Unknown Speaker: I think I got enough from that.
Unknown Speaker: You know, I think it really, I think it benefited him. It's not. That bad guys.
Brady: No, honestly, one thing that I'll say though. Is, I think. People that are sort of starting to get into this tendency, that art and I follow, if you come from a leftist background or. Even a right wing background if you wanna stop being wrong, I would highly suggest this is gonna make a lot of people cringe, but I'm sorry. Read some ******* zarzi. Please dear God, read some ******* stars and we all understand that he is an idealist. But please just read a little bit of Zerzan and you'll you'll come out with a much greater understanding of why we hold the positions that we do. If you want to call us quote. UN quote progressives. It's because of that sort of background that I. Had in relation to. To gender identity and the the modes of production and ******* time. Anything that person talks about, it's sort of given me this perspective that I have now, so please just read some. Suzanne, I'm begging you.
Unknown Speaker: Please, I'm begging you, please. Or and I will say it again, I think everyone should read.
Artemis: Oh, here it comes, read marks. Read Oracle materialism. Read capital. Please read.
Brady: The truck has time to read capital. Holy well, I guess not. We do because we're still under the the coronavirus lockdown, but.
Artemis: And all the people that. Yeah, if you have time to tell me that trains people over socialized and you have time to go out and, you know, write about shooting squirrels, do you have time to read capital? I know you.
Unknown Speaker: Do I know?
Artemis: You do because not doing anything else.
Brady: I'll be honest, I haven't even read ******* capital, but I still understand historical materialism, so if you. Don't want to do that. You don't have to. Just just read a few books by someone other than a right wing figurehead or Ted, please.
Artemis: It means also not buying into dogmatism and book worship, but also being able to go outside and experience other world. World actually works because trust me, you're white, green, white power **** that ain't gonna fly.
Unknown Speaker: It ain't gonna work for 10 not one minute. Uh, no.
Unknown Speaker: Ohh yeah.
Artemis: Like how is that? Gonna benefit anything. And how does that? Even work into your. I guess they because they buy into the whole. Non industrial life will buy into a more like homogeneous society, but then you're like dude, the ******* like even the Assyrians, right? One of the OR the uh. The Sumerians. It's excuse me. For the oldest civilizations, we're ******* not homogeneous, so especially now we're that we already have non homogeneous societies that say what they're just going to. ******* one group's gonna disappear. What they're gonna have is. Ohh. What is it? Helter Skelter gonna break?
Unknown Speaker: Out when the power.
Brady: All the ******* are gonna go to Montana.
Artemis: Dude, I'm sorry if the race were if the race war. Breaks out white people aren't winning, they're not winning.
Unknown Speaker: They're not. They're not gonna win. I'm sorry.
Unknown Speaker: It's not gonna happen.
Brady: It's funny though. These same people that reject, reject, sort of historical materialism and the idea that certain trends and identities evolve with material condition. We'll then talk about whiteness as it has evolved throughout material conditions and throughout time. I just find it so ******* ironic, and I know these people are being serious, but it seriously sometimes does drive me to want to commit suicide, so please stop doing this.
Artemis: I think I think this is a good point to stop because I'm pretty sure Brady's gonna have an. Aneurysm. And I'm gonna so.
Brady: I I might I might. So I we're going to end off this episode here. **** Nazis. **** fascists. Free to ******* book. Get mad in our DM's. You can send me hateful messages if you want. I I'll just delete them or if they're really funny, I might screenshot them and show them to art so we can laugh at you.
Unknown Speaker: One more thing.
Artemis: One more thing is me having my pronouns in my bio does not make me a leftist. I want to make sure that's understood, cause I was told that and.
Brady: Shut the **** ** left, Lloyd.
Artemis: Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. My identity made me about this. I forgot. For not wanting to be respected, makes makes me a Marxist.
Brady: Thank you. Everyone for joining us today. We, like I said, we really didn't want to talk about this. We have plans in the works like Art said earlier. We're gonna have Julian ****** on in the future if you know anyone that would be interested in coming on. That has a lot of knowledge in a specific field or topic, or if you're one of those people, message us on Instagram. That uncivilized podcast or shoot us an e-mail? Just get in contact with us somehow. We'd love to have you on. Thank you for joining us all today and have a great ******* day besides.
Artemis: One more thing PS on the way out, we will throw the link in the description, but I was recently featured in a anti SIV journal Oak Journal. It was really great.
Brady: Oh yeah.
Artemis: I had a great time writing for it. It just came out of. About 3-4 weeks ago, I think now whenever this goes up, that might be a bit different in the actually are accepting submissions, they have an Instagram page that I can also link in the description. Their submission deadline is June 30th, and if you have questions, message them. I intend to be included in that one as well. I would definitely order one and and support it, cause they're a great journal. They do audio interviews as well for people that enjoy doing that rather than having to, you know, use their eyes and read. So I would definitely support them and I'll make sure to link to their Instagram and their shop in their website in the description for those that are interested.
Brady: You ******* have a good day.
#29. Interview With John Zerzan
Anarchist author John Zerzan joins us to talk everything primitive. It was an absolute pleasure having you on John!
Anarchy Radio: https://johnzerzan.net/radio/
Some of Zerzan's books for purchase can be found here: https://feralhouse.com/?s=Zerzan+
List of books (and his website): https://www.johnzerzan.net/books/
Zerzan's works on Anarchist Library: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/category/author/john-zerzan
Artxmis' new zine, "Plastic in Utero: a journal of anti-civ anarchy reborn from the compost of wasteland modernity" is out now! $3/copy OR trading for zines, stickers, etc.
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CHAPTERS:
00:00 John Zerzan
04:07 Toward A Different Anarchism
13:42 A Diversified Turf
23:49 Ecological Mania
35:42 Green Anarchy
47:21 When Tides May Turn
1:00:20 A Newer Enslavement
1:08:03 Past And Future + Ritual
1:20:52 Plugs
Brady: Thank you for joining us on another episode of The Uncivilized Podcast. I'm Brady joined as always by Artemis and as well today by Emmanuel. We also have a special guest here with US, John Zerzan. You all know who he is, but we just want to get a little bit more in depth with him. And I'll let art start it off.
Artemis: So John Zerzan, anarcho primitivist at one point, everyone knew him as like friend of John Kaczynski, but I think. The one at least that follows. This platform knows that John's a little bit more than just a. Couple of labels thrown on to him so. John, first of all, thank you for coming. On and dealing with all the tech issues that ensued just prior.
Zerzan: Oh, thank you. Thanks for your patience.
Artemis: So we gotta say, ever since this show started, some like 4 year, four, almost five years ago now, people been asking, well, when's John come to come on? When's Zerzan didn't? And and it's. Well, it's it's happened and we want to say thank. You for doing so.
Zerzan: My pleasure. Yeah, it.
Brady: Is it is a great honor for us to talk to you as as young people and as anarchists who have been reading your works for. For me, about five years now, I know art has been interacting with things that you've written for longer than I have. Art is actually the one who introduced me to things that you've written. So yeah, thank you so much. For joining us.
Zerzan: Good deal. Good to be with. You guys.
Brady: Thank you. And I just wanted to start it out pretty simple. Who is John Zerzan and what brought you to radical politics?
Zerzan: Well, basically a writer, and I've been around so long that you know, you can have a long odyssey if you're given the time to, you know, to embark on. And of course, I came of age in the 60s, so that was it continues. To be a A. A force. I guess you might say. In my life and my outlook and that my Union experience was formative. At that time as well, it was. You know, this do-it-yourself anarchist, small a anarchist. Union of white collar workers in San Francisco that was cooked up at the time and was very much a learning experience, anti authoritarian experience and well, I left that I was in the Department of Social Services, City and County of San Francisco for almost five years. And after that. I more or less started in grad school and my interest was. This unionism, the history of unionism, the role of unionism as a kind of. Carceral institution disciplinary institution and the kind of foucaultian sense. And that's what led right into the question of technology actually in terms of the earliest. You know the industrial revolution, the textile industry, basically in England and the. Labor struggles there, or the struggle to proletarianized people. Into the factories. And Mark said it's so completely wrong, it doesn't radicalize people that domesticates people. That was the meaning of it. And so. You know then if you, it seems to me this is something I disagreed with Kaczynski about. If you pull the thread of technology as a social question, you get to the question of civilization. You get to see, well, things like, what is domestication, where does it come from? And you know, then slowly, you know, you can have a critique of industrialism. Industrial society, you know. All of that historically. Available, you know. And and anyway, just over the years. I guess kind of deepened into the moved over into the question of civilization. What's its basis? You know, what drives? What is it fundamentally and where is it going? You know? So that's. I've been able to work on questions like that over the years.
Brady: Yeah, yeah. And I know for me specifically, and I believe that art and Emanuel both have the same experience. Was that your work specifically? Obviously reading things like industrial society and its future brought me away from my social anarchist beliefs being an anarchical. Communist towards being more of an eco focused anarchist and now I just call myself a small a anarchist. What brought you specifically away from leftist tendencies and radical politics to your more civilization focused anarchist beliefs?
Zerzan: Well, you know, early on, I just. From my direct experience, the left was not. You know, it's funny, the leftist groups in San Francisco in. The Bay Area where. And the unions that were at least as hostile to us this. This do-it-yourself union, which had a very unradical name, social Service employees union SU not, not any kind of. Radical moniker but. That they were, they were always opposed to independent action. They were always opposed to autonomy and they wanted to massively everything and, you know, into the proletarian. Collective and you know that that was I was originally very originally in San Francisco days in the 60s and Maoist. Because they were very militant, they just jump off into the street and start fighting with the cops. And that's I was. Very angry and militant and so forth, and I've gravitated to that. But very quickly I began to see that, you know, in practice it was very conservative. It was not adventurous or militant, really. Just wanted to round everybody up and have them sign a contract and then they aren't locked into the unions and. Seemingly without any understanding, but Unionism began as or functions as. Not even understanding that locals of any union are the property of the international. I mean basic definitions like that. They don't seem to really waste their time with these kind of shadow battles of locals, of whatever union it is trying to break out of, that not realizing that. Again the. The the local is the property of the international property of the headquarters, the the Union. So you know basic stuff like that was fundamentally against any kind of breakout. And they never got that. So I was anti left from the get go in in a sense. Not that that was any thorough analysis or complete analysis but. Had to cope with. That all the time. As a union organizer for this kind of crazy anarchist union. And we were. Trying to set fire, so to speak, every day. Make trouble every day and try to destabilize the whole system from within. That was our point of view.
Brady: Absolutely. And I mean that is actually kind of interesting to hear because for me, starting out in radical politics around the 2016 election, I had just turned 18. Years old, I was very active in the political scene in Minneapolis and I started out with the many groups that were aligned with the IWW and it was the same thing that I started to notice that during the time when the police would show up and try to disrupt our organizing for me, it was noticing that the people aligned with I. UW waving red banners were very passive and. I would see. Kids my age showing up, waving these black and red flags, never having seen one before and solid black flags. And I would ask them, who are you? These kids were always the ones who are out at the front. They were fighting with the cops, they were fighting with fascists in the street and when they told me they were anarchists, I really didn't know much about it. Those days on it, it definitely hooked me. So yeah, I'm thank you for explaining your perspective.
Zerzan: Yeah, that's that's very, very similar. You know in the 60s I was very, very dimly aware of the anarchist thing. I mean it, it didn't come from reading Bakunin or whatever, but I was. I was looking. For it and the closest thing I found was the Wobblies. And like you just said, very passive the 60s. Pass them by. They were doing their their little archaic union thing, and that was it. I mean, they weren't involved in anything except that, you know, they they had their syndicalist hobby, such a throwback at, you know. But I thought, well, maybe that's the a source of radical stuff. Authentic stuff, but it wasn't. That's not where it was. In fact, that's The funny thing about the 60s. It was so overrun by different kinds of Marxist leninists, namely Maoists. It's a one or anything not done in terms of fighting. With with a rigid, stupid ideology like that, it's it's almost as. If everybody was sort of an anarchist, but nobody used that term and and everybody most cutting edge radicals in a way we're we're very much. In in in those sects one way or another, you know that's that's who called the tunes and. So Despite that there was, there was a lot of a lot of breakout stuff. You know, there's all kinds of struggles all over the place. So you know in many ways.
Brady: And I think, Emmanuel, you had a question right.
Emmanuel: Yeah, going off. What we were just saying, do you think that there is any use today in today's world for participating? Allying with or advocating for these sort of traditionally leftist structures, do you feel that they're just complete impediments and misuses of anti civilization energy?
Zerzan: You know that can get tricky. I I don't have any hesitation. What I would say exposing or denouncing that framework or that orientation but. Well, let me put it this way. There's a struggle one block from where I'm sitting here just around the corner from our. Place an eviction struggle the. Tons of cops showed up Wednesday, July 5th. The Black family was being evicted and there were a lot of young militants trying to block the way and it was pretty hairy for a while. I mean a bunch of armed pigs, and there was nobody got arrested, actually. And there was just a little bit of pushing and shoving. But you know, that's. They then they withdrew, having erected fences around this little house, which is the eviction site. And what I'm getting at is the main orientation of these kids who look like anarchists to me. I mean, that just blows my mind. That's so ridiculous and offensive to. And yet there they were. And they know. Who I am, they were. They're very friendly. To me. Mostly, although I stopped by like I guess it was last night or the night before. And this one guy, the first thing he said was I'm a communist. So I just ignored him and I I was chatting with some other people. Well, the one guy anyway. I mean others wanted to, you know, chat with me and stuff. And it was very nice young folks, but I still can't as much as I support that struggle. And I do all the way in more ways than one actually. But communist. Are you ******* joke. OK. I mean, you know, it's, but it's not the. Main thing I mean that's another large. Question for us, I think you. Know what is going on? Something brewing? Well, what flavor is it or what? What the hell does it? Does it sound like these days? And I think what I'm getting is and I don't have any. Scientific report on this. I don't even do social media, so I I know various people in various places, but I I could be wrong and that is AP and ARCO primitive is in green anarchy. That's whatever you want to call it. That's what's going on and that's what's catching on. And we'll see, you know, but. Blocked from here. It's kind of not that going on, it's just some strange. Thing that you know should have been buried. How many decades ago?
Emmanuel: I think there's. Definitely a lot of people out there that have. Great intentions and want to exercise their. Their power to change the. World and they might not have. They might not have yet encountered. Well, I mean to say that they're they're stuck in these old leftist structures and they don't realize yet that they're able to to do these things and be even more effective when they're not. Bound by those by those structures and rules.
Zerzan: No, I think you're right. That's well put. I'd say there there's a good radical energy and. But you know, and people, maybe you're implying this as well. People go through different changes. I did. You know, if I was originally some kind of Maoist in the 60s that didn't last long, you know? I was pretty turned on by that initially like I said, but. You know what you can. But live and.
Artemis: Yeah, you mentioning kind of like the you said, you know, AP green anarchy. And this has been on my. Mind a little bit. Is I would say anti civilization. You know, it really grew. And we're gonna get to it during the time of the green Anarchy magazine. And I think we probably all agree, really, went into a rut for some some time period, particularly before. Our our radicalization and just before the the years of 2020, right 2016 ish time. But I would say it's kind of growing back and it's it's flourishing in. Certain ways, because now you have people that say ohh I'm anti civilization but they don't mean anarcho primitivist. Which is really interesting. The anti civilian has diversified and it leads to really weird arguments. I think like you'll have like egoists and nihilists, right, like the war. Zone people who? Are anti Sir, but they're not. Primitivists or you just like?
Brady: I would say I even. Sit under that umbrella as well.
Artemis: Yeah, like or you have like post civilization. But there's also a move from people to be like, well, and, you know, primitivism is not really anarchism because XYZ usually. Ohh well, it's ablest, it's authoritarian, it's racist. How do you respond to those things? And do you think the differences between. All these different anti save ideas are actually meaningful, like what is your what is your take on kind of the development of anti SIV in. Recent years.
Zerzan: Well, you're right to say there's all kinds of variations, you know. For example, Wolfie Land Stryker comes to mind as I would say he's anti self light. Because he doesn't want to get into one thing that. I guess I'd say maybe people closest to my. Tangent have been inspired by and that is the record the anthropological record. The long story of Hunter Gatherer band society life. And how significant that was? That changed my thinking when I discovered that stuff in the 80s, it changed my my whole thinking. But if you and some people would even say that's ideological in the sense of that's a rigid thing, you're totally dependent on. On the anthropological archaeological literature, I don't think it is because I think you'd have the same. Maybe the same Tilos the same goal, even if that didn't exist. For example, face to face community real direct. World, you know, completely decentralized. Kind of set up I. Mean that's. Whether or not you know anything about the anthropology, if that's what you want, who cares about the anthropology? You know what I mean? Even though it is there. As a touchstone for many of us, you know the actual stuff, the actual existence of that and how it operated, what it what it implies you know for. The future?
Artemis: And I I find it interesting too is well, you know, they always say, well, you all you just wanna go back to something and it's gone, right, that's gone or. Or even the taste. Oh, it's not. It was never a. Thing right? But what's? Funny is, even your your work future primitive. You're not saying we're going back to anything. It's, you know, it's. It's also just starting this whole idea of forward and backward. Right. I think it's in your. Your notes from the age of pandemics, you even say we need to get off this. This train of history or something to that regard. I think you're quoting Walter. Benjamin, if I remember correctly. So like this idea that we're going back to anything just doesn't line up with what primitivism really is about. So I wanted to ask in relation to my last question, do you have sympathies for non primitivist projects or energies that are existing now? Do any come to mind? Cuz I know on your show anarchy radio. You talk about the Greek anarchists quite a bit and what's going on in in Exarchia, even if they're not explicitly primitivist, are there other anarchist energies you're sympathetic to?
Zerzan: Well, yeah. I mean generally all those struggles, all that. The attacks on the system, I mean the and when I was in, I was only there once but. At Exarchia, we didn't have any clashes about ideas. I mean they they were fine. They weren't. They did not put much stress on it. But yeah, that's that's good stuff. I mean, they they were. They were down, I mean. And I, but yeah, I I I don't think even now they. You know, identify it in that way. I mean, they wouldn't. They wouldn't use their language for one thing, but. Yeah, I mean, that's the thing. It's otherwise you're. You're not a part of anything. You know, if you're not aware of what's going on and trying to strike a blow in whatever way you have. You know, it's got to include that. It kind of reminds me of people who used to say, and I don't know, maybe sometimes they still do say. Well, how come you? Never talk about capitalism, you know. Well, it's it's understood it's implied because we're anti capitalist. But that's just with starters you. Know that doesn't. There's, you know, if you've got nothing much new to add to the critique of capitalism, well, why, why stick there? You know, because it's a well, basically, it's a deeper problem than that, fundamentally. Mm-hmm, you know. Yeah, I I love to. I am not doing that much these days, nor is anyone else, but you know, actually speaking in public and meeting people and going places. A lot less of that right now for various reasons, but I always really enjoyed the hell out. Of that.
Emmanuel: I would add on to what is there, Adam. Was saying about. Anti capitalism that to me, in my own personal discovery throughout the course of my life, that anti civilization is just anti my anti capitalist urges like applied at A at a deeper level because I feel like when I was very young I didn't even have the the language to articulate. Articulate what it's like to exist in this war. And I ran into leftism because that was. A more crude expression I would say. And then when I became familiar with that, I discovered his short fallings. And then from there that's how. I reached anti civilization.
Zerzan: Well, yeah. Well, we're hugely different in age, but it's the same deal. You know, I I couldn't. Couldn't put it better.
Artemis: Find it interesting that. Like, I mean, leftism on purpose has set itself up as like we are the radical solution, whatever subset of leftism like you know, whether it was Maoism in the 60s or democratic socialism now or whatever it is like, well, we're the radical ones, anyone that's not us, they're the reactionaries, right? So they're excluding any other possible route of liberation. If you're not a leftist, you're basically the right cause. I think all of us have gotten this, and like when you're like, oh, I'm not. I'm not left. They're like, are you right wing? It's like. No, it's like, so you're. Like a fascist, you're like, where are you? Where are you getting that? I'm not. Quite sure where. You're putting those together from, you know, because they. They literally can't conceive of. Of an of a. Tendency or thought pattern outside of what's been prescribed and laid down for them.
Zerzan: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Just as you say, it's it's pretty much automatic. Cruise line. Well then, then, then you're on the right, of course. I mean, that's just so silly.
Brady: Kind of on the the vein of talking about, if you have any sort of support for non primitivist projects, have you heard of by any chance more militant eco anarchist groups like Eco platform in Ukraine or other groups inside of northern Syria and Iraq? What are your opinions on? On those groups.
Zerzan: I'm not very well informed on that. What I have? Found out is is kind of. Dated, I think in terms of. Stuff like that.
Brady: OK. No, that's totally understandable. There's not. A whole lot to. To read on them, we've been trying to get them on, but obviously eco platform in Ukraine is dealing with the a little bit bigger or more pressing of an issue than. Talking to us.
Zerzan: I guess so, yeah, see.
Artemis: Yeah, they're they're an explicitly green anarchist. They kind of seem. To have like a. Some blends, you know, they're obviously they're going through some, so they don't have the best ability to exploit. Elucidate ideology, but there are kind of somewhere between, like social ecologist and anti civilization. They're also vegan or like animal rights, it's hard to tell because some. Of their stuff. Is obviously in Ukrainian. When you translate it, you're only getting whatever Instagram or whatever platform tries to translate it as. But yeah, there is like these people, they. Fly the green anarchist flag and they're involved in the Ukrainian struggle. It's actually really intense to think about.
Zerzan: Yeah, you can find all kinds of combinations. I mean the thing in Turkey still blows me away. The the final call from prison changed the party line. To book Anism I was in Istanbul. Just kind of right after that, that sort of switcheroo happened and. These kids were saying, oh, yeah, now it's books on plot, you know, with on the banners at the marches and stuff like that. And and I thought you they were kidding me. They're just driving me. And they showed me the footage, I mean. And then I found out. No, that's that was exactly what happened. He just. Changed his thinking. And you know, by the way, they would have hung him years ago, except they were. Turkey was trying to get into NATO. I think that's the reason why he was still alive, but still is alive. But I mean, he really guessed that from this rigid, Marxist, Leninist weirdness to. Social ecology. I mean, not that I I have a big critique of social ecology. You know, as you may know, but still that's kind of amazing shift, right?
Brady: It's a step in in. The right direction for sure.
Zerzan: Yeah, it's, it's a yeah.
Emmanuel: We know that you have written about the topic of hope before of hope versus despair. We were wondering. How people should engage with what is commonly referred to as climate anxiety, or, as Artemis prefers to call it, climate angst, this impending feeling. Of wrongness when it comes to the environment, because everyone can see to some degree regardless of the many distractions that are present in our society. There's a very particular negative feeling when you see things that are terribly out of shape in the environment, things that have been cornerstones of human psychology for. Hundreds of thousands of years and that has a certain effect. On people, we believe when it comes undone, do you have any beliefs on how this, how these? Emotions can be addressed or how they can be used for good.
Zerzan: Well, it's it would be hard to believe that there wouldn't be this kind of disquiet. Whatever you want to call it. I mean it's. Things are going. Things are turning out so horribly, so fast, and it's just an ever faster clip. And not only the environment, it's the. The rate of mass shootings, you know, that brings it home, perhaps even closer. What's happening in society. You know the physical environment aside, if, as if you can separate them and you can't, I don't think. But you know, there's every reason to be. You know, getting more shook up all the time by how fast it's going. And I guess and obviously the technology which is deforming everything, you know, being so decisive, so fast with the whole chat bot AI, you know? Machine generated thinking so-called Knoll that coming on in. A hell of. A rush and not in the past week. You can't. I mean heat, heat alone. Global overheating is just galloping. All these things are accelerating. So I mean, who could? How could you find somebody who's not aware on some level, of maybe the totality of all this **** that's going down and which is nothing but the pathological? End zone of civilization. It's all crumbling. It's all failing. What part of it? Is there to miss, I mean, you know, tell me what part is stable or much less healthy. So of course it it just jams on people all the time and. It you know, and I think the only. You know the necessary first step is to understand how that happens, why that happens. You know what's behind it then? Then you feel perhaps. Less anxiety in the sense of not having a place to put that you know not having no, not having the understanding of it. You gotta start with that. You do. Do you know what's going on? Do you know why? You know, **** like that. That's the basic stuff, and if you can, if you can get somewhere there, I think that that's an antidote to anxiety. It looks it doesn't chase away the reality, obviously not. But I mean, at least then you have a fix on it. You kind of, you're not just bewildered by the complete. You know, feeling powerlessness or something like that, if you can name it and understand it, then you can take up arms against it.
Brady: This is something it sort of in relation to the climate anxiety topic, at least for us at uncivilized. We spend a lot of time dealing with so-called eco fascists or other far right groups who claim to advocate for anti civilization, sometimes even primitivist. Ideas. well-being far right individuals. Helps how? How do you think that that has tended to arise out of things like climate anxiety? How does that make you feel to know that something some ideology like that is becoming far more prevalent today because of climate change and industrialism in industrial society?
Zerzan: Well, the opportunism there is is obvious and it's I think it's fairly simple to disentangle. That you know that game that they're playing. You know? Yeah, at least far right. People were all. Quoting Kaczynski and so forth. But you know that's that's an obvious game. I mean, that's just such a it's a pathetic effort and. I mean, I don't know how far it's going. And so it could be. Miss Gauging that but. You know, again, it's it's kind of simple to point out that the absurdity of that. You know, just that I mean, so this ideology means what you. Know so how? Can you tack that on to this kind of authoritarian crap that you're trying to? You know, what does it have to do? With your racism. And and all the rest of it. It's just a bad fit. And people, you gotta figure. Given the chance, they'll see right through that kind of baloney.
Artemis: Yeah, I mean the. The Part 2 is like they don't see how their conception of whiteness and like control and race is entirely a product of civilization. Like they just cannot conceive of the fact that they're walking contradictions about, and we've had people early on when we were still, we were branded as critical of capital. For we've been uncivilized. We had fascists follow us and be like, you know, we're like with you guys, right? And all this, and we've done. Before and our social media, we're like we're not with you like I'm trans, right? I'm like, we're openly like we're just not with you and they just can't get it through their thick ******* stalls. That they just they're they're idiots and it's insane to me that they, you know.
Brady: And one thing I want to add on as well is just as as early as last week, we were asking our community fielding questions and we had a couple of far these far right individuals that we've been dealing with for years, say something as silly as to be uncivilized as to understand the Jewish agenda and it it. We've spent so much time talking to these people that I could turn blue in the face, but, and I know a lot of them are listening now. So if you have anything you'd like to say to. Them specifically, please feel free to.
Zerzan: But and it goes back aways. I remember I got a letter from Timothy McVeigh before they executed him, of course, saying that same thing. They were in the same camp, we got the same enemy. You know, we we're we're actually comrades, you know. They didn't bother to reply, but. And you know, they want to believe that they want to have. You know, they're they're trying to have their racket go further. And how do we reach people? Well, we. You know, and of course the Nazi Germany. They did that, they they, deray and the other green characters they were peddling that and they made some headway with that, you know, it dropped it of course, because it was. There was no basis for it, but. And you know my cousin and I, when we we were doing a kind of speaking tour in. Oh, it was more than 10 years ago, but I'll tell you the first question. The very first. Twice at least twice this happened anyway. In Austria and Germany, we we do our rap and they'd say, Nazi said that, wow, I mean, that's so ******* infuriating, you know? You haven't learned anything in almost a century. I mean to to fall for that. Like ohh yeah. Well, that's right. We're a bunch of American Nazis. We're we're here to. Tell you the same thing that the Nazis said. I mean, it's just so brainless that you don't even know where to start. I mean it. It was so frustrating. But you know, if you take a few seconds, well. You can just. Demolish that or, you know, deconstruct that. And in a few seconds and point out how stupid that remark is. But that's what they would start up with, because that's that's they've heard it before.
Brady: No, absolutely. And I'll say that's one of the things that when we started this project when we started becoming more critical of technology and civilization and all the like, it was one of the most frustrating things for me, speaking with people who used to listen to our show when we were overtly leftist and listening to their. Conversations and seeing their conversations about us after our transition. Remember, we were talking one day about how we we made this post to try to differentiate ourselves from the the far right people who are starting to come into our community and filter through. Talking about how we were eco militants against fascism and the amount of right wingers in the amount of left wingers both arguing that you cannot be an eco militant and be against fascism was kind of mind boggling to me now they they both had the same exact position and could both be so wrong in the exact same way.
Zerzan: That's incredible. Let's see. You will get for starters sometimes. You know, it can be frustrating to hear the same. Wrong headed stuff, but. It's to me, I've one of my things. I try to remember is that's only for starters. That may be the first line, and of course you're saying you you some people just stick with it no matter what you say. But a lot of people, I think I have this feeling anyway from my limited experience you can get past that. Really quickly with some people who are not, you know, rigid ideologues who are never gonna. Or not likely to to wake up. But you know when you answer. You know, in a friendly way and that's that's it. Then you move on, then you're past that.
Artemis: I gotta say you're. A lot more patient than we are. I mean, maybe it's. Since you got the experience, but we get really. You just ******* quit. We just get so tired of it.
Brady: I I have no patience for people anymore. My brain has been ruined. I can't do it.
Zerzan: I don't believe I know what you. Mean. Yeah, it can.
Brady: I'm just a very angry person and the world has made me this way.
Zerzan: Yeah, they're right.
Artemis: Yeah, I think too. It's it's just interesting that, you know, people will say late now late primitivists are called eco fascists. And what I find important and. You'll know who some of everyone. Here is gonna know who I'm talking about. That Jamie, the anthropologist that lives in Alaska, him and I have been talking a little bit. And what I find interesting is the more that other anarchists want to exclude us. From anarchism and from the rat, from the green movement, whatever. You want to. Call it. They realize they're actually sitting ground to the eco fascists who are going to monopolize in those spaces because as fascists do, and they did this in Nazi. Germany, they did. It in Italy, they they tape real problems that people have and they twist it right. Oh, you're poor. Our countries in shambles. But it's not because, oh, here's the actual structural issues, right? Ohh, it's the Jewish agenda. It's the deck in it. W it's queer. People. You know what? Name and with environmentalism. The more you dissuade people from what is the I mean we all believe it. So like the the threat idea that civilization is the problem. If you remove us our platform, you try to. Get rid of us and say we're fascists. That only gives the fascist. Themselves more ammo. So they're actually doing. The the the grunt work for. The eco fascists themselves, when they try to exclude. That's, and that's the ironic, yeah.
Zerzan: Good point.
Emmanuel: Communists have never cleared the way for fascists before, have they? I don't think that's ever happened.
Zerzan: It couldn't happen, right?
Green Anarchy Magazine
Artemis: And so I guess I wanna get a little. Kind of get back. To your history a little bit and you know my scene. Classic neutral just came out heavily inspired by the Green Anarchy magazine. I was hoping maybe you could talk about because I think most people are gonna know what it is. But could you talk about how? That came about because if I remember the IT. Was called the green. Anarchy Collective, the core group of editors. And I have some serious questions about green energy, but that's my first one is what was the background and how did it come together?
Zerzan: Well, this somewhat mysterious anarchist upsurge started in year anyway, and this was kind of a hotbed of it, I guess. Eugene OR it just kind of came out of nowhere, you know? That's people are still scratching their heads. Where did it come from? And then where did the scenes come from? I guess is that. It's part of the question but. And June of 1999, six months before WTO in Seattle, there was a standard issue demo. Ah, some of you know this. It won't take forever with it, but. It was the time when things were starting to cook up in various places. In fact, it was announced during this demo. Which I didn't attend. I thought of just one more boring demo that anarchist had broken into the London Stock Exchange. Anyway, chair went up as I found out later and the the guy in charge was kind of a slimy character who. Said, well, this has been a wonderful demo. See you next time. You know kind of break up, you know, go home kind of thing. Well, instead, people went to the nearest bank. About 1/2 a block away and started breaking. The windows what? And the ride went on for four hours, and the cops at one or two times. One or two parts of the afternoon were chased out in her hail of rocks. It was amazing the pigs were on the run. It was really a day out of nowhere. Absolutely no one thought that was gonna happen or planned that or anything like it. I was having coffee with my daughter and I smelled the tear gas and I heard a racket in the background and I got on my bike and there it was this roving group. Went from downtown back to the Whittaker neighborhood here anyway, that's. And at that time. These these smaller scenes started up like Black Cloud Messenger was one. I love that name, black clad messenger and one was disorderly conduct started up. The main guy was doing that had been busted for disorderly conduct like five times already. He was a real black black guy. And he was. He's ready to, you know, get out there in the streets. And so anyway, that's. These things kind of coalesced into, you know, sort of bigger project, GA, which went from 2000 to 2008. And petered out like things did. You know the, you know, things started to slow down and disappear. And then Eugene, you know, after Seattle, which again six months later. And there were a number of anarcho liberals up there were afraid that the eugenics were going to show up and **** things up. And you might say that's exactly what happened anyway. So, but you know, it ran its course. We had a core group of four. Editors all the way through. Well, at times there were more. Editors than that, but. By 2008. Most people have left Eugene because of the heat and and just because of the entropy, you know the that time was past. It didn't rain its course and the things slowed down all over the world, you know. In Europe anyway as well, so that was. The end of it.
Artemis: And I asked. Why did you when everyone else moved? Why did you say?
Zerzan: Well, you know, I've been here a while. I moved back to Oregon in the early 80s, so I've I've been here and. I was part of the East Blair Housing Co-op and that was a very interesting 15 years of my life. I was part of that. You know, so I had to. And I lived in the Whittaker and you know, that was where I wanted to be. I wasn't going. To move back to California. And you know, I was born in Oregon. I was born up in Salem, so. You know, some people, this is what happened in Eugene, wasn't that people came. From all corners. And just to jump into things in Eugene, a lot of people were local, but some weren't, you know, so they went back to wherever they were from. I remember from from Denver he he just split, went back to Denver or wherever, you know. But so there was some of that they they weren't really. You know what you'd call residents, I guess. They worked for a while, you know for sure.
Zerzan: And they were there for the most interesting part of it to from. From 8 from 98 to 99899 to up until 9/11/2001.
Artemis: So did was there just a convergence that you said the core, the core for editors? Was it just a convergence of this energy or were you? I'm curious, did you all develop and then arrive at the same idea? Or were you guys? Co mingling and the ideas developing within that group and the green anarchy. Came out of. That because I know there's also like. I don't know. Some hearsay about like what was it? The dude that ran green enters just in the UK got matches. He thought you guys took it or. Something like that. I forget what? The controversy of.
Zerzan: That is well, no, it as far as I remember the the only issue one of the UK Green Anarchist people. Had started Green Anarchy magazine G8 had actually started it from a grant from her first, and he was he was much more of a leftist than the other UK GA people were and. He he did, I think two or three issues. This was not the GA we're talking about. This is in the 80s.
Artemis: OK.
Zerzan: OK. And he saw it being taken over by by the Primitivists, you know, by the Green Acre people, you know, and the four of us that ended up as the last editors were pretty much there from the beginning and when. He gave it up. I remember, Rotten said to him in no uncertain terms. You know what we're gonna do with this magazine, don't you? It It ain't gonna be nothing like your orientation. You got that? So don't hand it over with it to come back and say you were kicked out or you were tricked or whatever. No, but that's what he. That's what. He tried to. Volvo towards the end of the run of. Of RGA. So you will you kick me out. You it was. It was a cool. You took over. No, no, no. He was still part of the thing. He was always sort of, you might say, outvoted, because nobody was leftist in GA in our GA circle by that except him. So he stormed off and quit, but nobody threw him out. Remember saying, hey, you don't have to. Leave. You may be in. The minority here in terms of thinking. But nobody's kicking you out. And then then he went around forever for some years now, he's kind of he's a friend of mine. I guess you'd say now. But yeah, he was constantly bad mouthing us for that. That's not at all what happened, though. So I guess that's.
Artemis: That's just interesting cuz green anarchy. I mean, like I said, for my scene and for other people. I mean, it's just so important, you know. Yeah. And so. What was the importance of green Anarchy magazine for you? How did it help you develop your ideas? Cause I think we all know when you write something, you put it out there and people will either agree with it or disagree with it. It forces you to engage with your own ideas. You're not a you. Know you're not just thinking to yourself. So what was the importance and what did you learn from your? Line with green anarchy.
Zerzan: Well, that dialogue is always the challenge. You know, we all want to think we're. We're open. We we want to grow in our clots and otherwise, you know. And I think it's. Not always easy, you know you. You don't want to be. Guilty of ideology formation or, you know, becoming an ideologue. But no, that's always the danger. It just is, you know, and if you. You feel like wherever you're at, it's, you know, probably a pretty sound position. You know, you want to defend it, you want to, you know, have some good arguments with people, but. You know, where do you draw the line? I mean, we had trouble with that at times. You know. Like disputes with people, you know, if you like, the old saying goes, if you have a printing press, then you're the one who has the freedom of the press, right? Well, if you do a magazine, if you're the editor editors, you get to have the last word, so that was always tempting. To just put something in, I was probably more guilty of it than anyone. Some article that we wanted to have it out there, but we didn't agree with it. So maybe it's better not to put in your editorial comment, but I was not. Always respecting that I would write something in poor **** on it if I if I thought it was lousy and I probably should have just waited and let people decide, you know, without the the thumb on the scale, so to speak. And you know, these are both things you have to sort of, you know, navigate. You have to just try to figure out the best way. For it, and there were disputes even among our group. I mean, I would say of of what I think of as the core for people too were and they're very good friends of mine, by the way, were. A little less. Anti left and two of us were more, more and more strained about that, you know, so you know, we were always having good fights about stuff.
Artemis: Very cool. I appreciate that. That history is just so, so interesting to me. Just cause I looked at the journal that I mean when people say primitivism. Ohh it's it was never relevant what? I mean, you know, being in. The news the like you said. The Eugene or anarchists, right like that was big stuff. And then, like, great anarchy, being as you know, big as it was in terms of circulation, this idea that green anarchy or anarcho primitivism, was never relevant or that is just this dead end is, I mean, that's historic, that you're lying to yourself. If you believe that you know. So I think great energy is just so.
Brady: Cool. Well, yeah, it.
Zerzan: I mean, it might have been that way. I mean, it was just a hell. Of a pleasant. Surprise, I was one of the people that probably had more of a. Hand in the money part of it. You know, trying to pull it together with the needed funds. And I remember thinking. We had gotten to the point where it was $3000 to print each issue. It was $3000 to mail each issue and I thought to myself, what the hell are we doing? We don't have any money. Where is this money coming from? So right then, I knew it was coming in. People wanted the damn thing. And you know, so hey, something. And that means it's being supported. You know it was getting around and and free to prisoners that there was a great big chunk of it that went to prisoners. A lot of prisoners wanted it. So you know there it. Was very cool.
Emmanuel: We know that civilization has developed independently across the world. Looking at this development from where we are now, it appears that regardless of how historical events could have unfolded, the tendency is always towards further domestication. Every revolution has worked to accelerate this tendency. In that sense, it seems impossible to imagine humanity could follow any other path, since civilization appeared. Would you say that civilization or domestication is comparable to a natural force such as gravity or plate tectonics, which is? Basically impossible to withstand with human power. Or in other words, do you view civilization as something that must resolve itself through the historical process of growth and collapse as opposed to, like individual human efforts?
Zerzan: Well, I I try to keep in mind. One of the central things are themes of Freddie Perlman, for example, against history against Leviathan. All through that book, for example, he points out, there's always been resistance. To Levius and there's always been people fighting against it. You know that. The tide has been running the wrong way that with even with resistance, we know who's who's been winning and what's been happening to. Non domesticated people on this planet, but you know that the struggle goes on and he's. It's it's salutatory to to keep that in mind too. You know that the the fighting over and so that's. I mean, there's all kinds of grounds for pessimism, you know. Undoubtedly, you've gotta be rational about facing up to what's going down. You know, where? Where are we at? Where where are our strengths and. You know, that sort of thing. But but it you know, as as Freddy pointed out, it's. It's always there.
Brady: And to kind of tie into that I want to say for me personally I would say since 2020 I've been dealing with a lot of apathy in terms of my radical politics since the energy from the George Floyd Uprising died down, I spent a lot of my time growing up in Minneapolis, and when that was happening. Was living in Phoenix. I really thought that when that was happening that there was no turning back, that that the tide had shifted, especially in in my home state in Minnesota. But seeing what was happening around the country and around the world, I thought that there was no turning back. But since that time, since things have died down gone back to the the same normal, that has been the problem. Forever has made me very apathetic, I'm sure. Since you've been in the the realm of radical politics like you said since the 60s, you've dealt with a lot of apathy. How do you deal with?
Zerzan: Well, things come. And go, you know, they ebb and they flow. And if, if especially if you're lucky enough to have been. Around for some of the more interesting times. You can use that. I mean, I always marvel at how. Well, almost everybody's younger than me of. But you know, if you came of age in the 80s or something like that, man, I had to lecture of of. Ending up in California in the Bay Area, Berkeley in the. High of the 60s and I went from. Stanford to Haight Ashbury. And so forth, you know and and that. I guess I've always been temperamentally. Oriented by that or inspired by that or something, or or even you know what you know in terms of the the upsurge in the late 90s and. And I remember Henry Kissinger. He was, you know, Doctor Strangelove, of course, but he was also a realist. And he said during the height of that, you know, these things were getting enormous from. Told to Quebec City Prague General there were 300,000 people in the streets in Genoa and the computers were flying out of the windows and the battle was raging. That was six months before 9/11, right? It was getting hot and heavy and he said and paraphrasing here. But he said if that movement. Joins up with the. What's going on in the global S? The resistance there, if that ever connects, we're going to be in a world of hurt. And fortunately for him, the tide turned, you know, and then that kind of faded away. But he could see if it goes much further. This is really gonna be on. You know, and so maybe the next time it really is going to be further on much further down the road. I think people will see. More easily with with more clarity. What is really at stake and how fast it's going. How how fast the whole? Atmosphere and and the. You know, eco destruction and the mass shootings and everything else. It's getting worse by the minute. It doesn't take much to grapple with that. Or at least. You know, you get the anxiety from that, but to have more than that, you gotta be able to. You know, connect the dots. So that means what that means. You gotta get rid of this ******* death machine, which is civilization before it kills off everything.
Brady: You think we have enough time for these people to learn or do you think that they're going to come to this conclusion on their own like. All of us have. Do you think it's something that's going to stare them in? The face. How do you think that that's going to go?
Zerzan: But you'd think so. You'd think so, but it's frustrating as hell. I mean, I wonder how much worse does it have to get before you start questioning things instead of freaking worrying about Trump every 5 minutes or ******** like that?
Brady: Ohh Biden fell down the stairs again, everybody.
Zerzan: Yeah, so who knows? You know, who knows? It's it. Just keep getting worse. People get more drugged out or you know it. There's certainly no guarantee. It might just keep getting worse until it's it is past the point of no return, but I tend to think there is going to be there's something going on. I think right now I'm getting this from quite a few people and I'm I've. Been guilty of. Being too hopeful, I admit it, but. I think something is brewing. And maybe we're gonna see. More of a wake up sooner than later, I don't.
Artemis: Know actually my note, I had a note I was going to say you're you're known. As the optimist. I think a little bit, you know cause on your show again I mean if you Radio One of the first things whenever you interview someone you say what do you see right now what are what are you hoping for what? Do you notice? And so I wanna ask what, what energy are there energies that specifically come to mind, things that you see, maybe there's things you don't wanna talk about cause you know confidentiality, yada yada. Yada, but are you?
Brady: Yeah. Don't incriminate it.
Artemis: Are you are, are you in this moment optimistic about anything?
Zerzan: Well, I maybe I could just put it this way, I don't. I don't want to slam the door on possibility. I don't want to rule it out. There are all too many people doing that, you know, and it not. Not just to this month or something that's been going on a little while too, people just throwing the towel. Well, you're stupid if you think we do anything about it, you know, well, why do that? Why slam the door on possibility you don't know what's gonna happen. And I always go back. One thing I go. Back to is. The movement of the 60s and I do not want to live in the past. I'm not interested in. In that very much, you know really at all, but. That came out of nowhere. That global, the movement of the 60s, whatever you want to call it, it just it took off fairly suddenly all. Over the world. Nobody saw that coming. The Marxist waiting for the economic crisis. There was no economic crisis. It was the movement of relative expansion, the economy, relatively speaking, was doing fine. You know, relatively speaking, leaving out large groups of people. 1st But yeah, there there was no economic crisis, and yet, you know, it's wow, who saw that coming?
Artemis: There's a convergence of so many different disparate energies.
Brady: I guess I'm still very interested in in this topic because I would say being all of us are members of Gen. Z and I would say that there is a lot of nihilism. There is a lot of pessimism just generally in the general population, but especially so in. Radical politics and radical green politics. If there's something that you could tell. People like us from your time. Since the 60s, for those of us who feel like we have lost hope, I will admit I am one of those people who I I believe that there isn't much that we can do. I try not to be pessimistic, but I feel like it's it's been wired into my brain because of everything that I've seen since I've been growing up. What would you tell people like me in terms of? Why we should keep our hope.
Zerzan: Well, maybe one thing. It seems to me there is. A revulsion against the technology, and I've I've talked to some students about this here for example. And we we had the same experience. This is like a cell phone addiction. You know, smartphone addiction and other forms of this. Same reaction. This is empty. It's time wasting. I realize that it's just scrolling is my life and it's so stupid. It's just one a waste of time. And the second thing always followed. But I'm addicted. I am hooked. I know it's a desolate ******** thing. But here I am. So you got the two things. There's the understanding, but there's not any break. And but there are signs of that. You know, there's some. There's this group here. Quit social media. The club at the University of Oregon or that the. The Light Night Club in Brooklyn. The kids there. Still, anything up on you basically and possibly more than that, but you know some signs and you always and maybe this is falling off a little bit, but the detox thing especially in summer time camps where kids go and they don't have any devices. Why would people do that? I mean, what's Gee, isn't that the most wonderful thing on? Earth then to have. All this emoji I. Know it's like a disease. You need to you need to go quarantine from that. So it's not like people really love it. And the ads I think are so preposterous. I wonder how anyone cannot see the blatant ******** involved, like the connection. It's all about connection. We are connecting every connecting connection. We've never been so disconnected. There's never been so much isolation and loneliness. You you there's a hundred studies a day. You can read about that or articles or testimonies. Everybody has that. That's the condition of this horrific. Techno zone that we're all in. We're all in. We're we're all even forced. Well, we're forced to. You can't have a job without a cell phone, right? So where's the freedom of choice? You know, in other words, I guess I'm a little hopeful in the sense that. It isn't that everybody believes in the **** they don't. No, they just don't. But yet yet what is happening? Not much. OK, so, but at least there's the disaffection.
Brady: Do you think that that this connection is by design or do you think that it's just the natural progression of? The way that our society is structured.
Zerzan: Well, yeah, it's. It's built in. It's built in like. The you know. Bowling alone, that Putnam book that came out it. Was in the 90s already. You know the breakdown of all these communal ties or clubs or fellowships or, you know, civic groups or bowling leagues or whatever. People are just more and more isolated as the technology. You know, takes over more and more and more. Ohh, you know people are just left sitting there alone, staring at the screen, the little screen or the big screen one screen or another screen and and that's ******* life. The people are gonna put up with that forever. Well, then they are, and then we're ******. But I don't see a rosy future for that. It's just too toxic and empty. And yeah, you know, unsatisfied, unhealthy.
Artemis: I mean, as I've talked about with my classroom, you know, and I wrote about it in, oh, number five. And I've talked about it on your show, John. It just like seeing my. Kids were my you. Know where my students. I call them my kids. It just like they are. They seem so like lost. Like when I we didn't unit on media bias in which first of all this idea that students because they're raised around technology this idea of the digital native that kids are raised. Therefore, they should understand it is a load of ****. I hate it and it's it's negligent because it believes students students are built to learn through technology. No studies show technology at best doesn't facilitate learning and at worst hampers it. Big *******. But like we did the media bias unit, part of it was how much phone use do you have most phones today? They have an option. It's tracks what your screen time is. My screen time is about 3 to 4 hours a day. Most of it is like podcast or project. Related just the nature of it. But then I have kids saying. 678910 hours and I'm like, holy ****, that's your whole day and some of them were like ohh only two hours. I'm like, that's cool. What do you do like ohh? I go set my computer. I'm like, oh, oh, OK. You know, and like what sports are you doing or or what clubs are you involved in? And there just aren't any like the ones that are in sports. It's, I mean, yeah, they're off their phone during the sport time. But then as soon as they're. They're on it, you know. And it's just. It I mean it. Depresses me, seeing it cause I'll say. Was this what my teacher saw me like when I was in high school, cause I was pretty bad. Before I came around to primitivism and I still struggle, which is I think a lot of primitivists that are younger like I grew. Up around it. I'm addicted and I'm anti tech but I can't get off of it which I think in our case is harder because you know it's there and why it's bad. But you're still stuck in it like primitivism. It's not like a religion where it's like, solves your problems, right? We still have to struggle because we're all still. People born into this context and it's it's hard for me to see it, but then you know the Luddite club and hearing you talk about. That and was the quick social media was. That the guy. That called your show that one time. Dads hearing dads. Talked about it was was awesome and I I. Appreciated him knowing that people that are, I mean I'm only 24, right? So the age between the difference between me college age kids and those in high schools really not that different. I was born in 99. It's just hard, but. Then you also realize it's because the. Have you heard? Of the term iPad generation. It's the idea of that. Kids, particularly 2000, would you guys? Say like 2005. One is like these kids are raised on iPads.
Brady: I would say it's even later than that. I would say probably about twenty 2012 to 2015.
Artemis: True, like. Yeah, around that time. You know, when you're in a restaurant, you just see a kid with an iPad or a phone in front of them. And the parents don't even acknowledge. Them cause it's a way. To just. Shut the kid. Up because they don't want a parent. Yeah, you know, and So what does that do to a kid we know, like Steve Jobs, Steve Jobs? Ohh, now I'm blanking all the other names but Steve Jobs, right? He was. I'm loving my kids have an iPad. I mean, he's the one that helped design it and he doesn't want his kids to have it. I mean, shouldn't that tell you something about why you shouldn't let your kids have them? Yeah, like.
Zerzan: Yeah, I guess he's not the only one. I placed a tick guy who knows how poisonous The thing is.
Brady: It's like the classic drug dealer don't get high on.
Artemis: Your own supply. Well, yeah.
Brady: They acknowledge it for themselves and for their families, but they they push it on everybody else.
Emmanuel: I'm very concerned for how these children are going to. Turn out.
Artemis: Right.
Emmanuel: I feel like it, I feel like. I feel like it's very comparable to how. The effect of drugs on a developing brain versus these artificial connections, I feel like. Even more so than our current generation of Gen. But these toddlers right now are going to be even less socially capable.
Brady: Yeah, and. And we see it's a large enough problem in, in our generation with people not understanding how to have social connection outside of outside of their screens or the Internet or even work. So I agree with Emmanuel completely that I think we are going to see a lot of things happening in the next 10 to 15 years. And I I don't know how.
Artemis: Well, it's going to go.
Speaker ?: My dad.
Artemis: This got really ******* dark, really.
Zerzan: Yeah, it makes you wonder. I mean, I I did a lot of childcare in the 80s here in Eugene. When I moved back here and spent a lot of time with one boy in particular. Single parent deal. Video games. This was before cell phones. You know, but. Couldn't get him to do anything. He was glued to the video game thing and his mother wanted him to play soccer to the team, to soccer and he would. Almost immediately, fake an injury, so he had to come off the field and anything to, you know, he wanted to just do the video games nonstop. And it was so frustrating because he was a healthy kid, you know, and bright enough and everything. And anyway, my point is, one day he put the video game down, never touched it again. Then he got into I was in the in the weight room in those days, still. But anyway, he he got it. He got interested in that. Became kind of a jock, a very successful, young, athletic kid. Really, really. Something like the opposite of it, you know, spindly couch potato kid who didn't want to do anything. But I know. That's harder to see today, though it wasn't so immersive back then, you know, far from it, you know. You know, it's already the 80s that that was just barely a laptop kind of stuff. You know, the personal computer just started that started in the early 80s. You know, that was that was new then. So I mean this wasn't much along the path from then and of course it totally took off later as. We will know.
Brady: Oh, absolutely. Now every child in their pocket has more computing technology than what was required to send the first rocket to the moon. So we can see how things have changed so much just in. The last 40 years.
Artemis: I mean, what is that? I was just. Talking to Jason Rogers the other day. We were on the phone and she. Said, you know, like think about. It and it came out a couple of years ago, like millennials and Gen. We don't have. I mean, people say what? Do you do for fun? Ohh, I watch Netflix. Watch TikTok. It's like no. Like, what do you do? What are you doing with this? You are. It's kind of the whole, you know, situationist. It's life has become representation of consumption right? It becomes the commodity form. And I think social media and and TV streaming have the are are like one of the higher representations of that, would you? I'm not as situationist educated as you are, would you kind of. Like with that well.
Zerzan: Yeah, I mean and you could take it even further, because historically in industrial society's future, which I understand, it was actually written in the 70s, you know, toward the beginning that he's talking about hobbies as surrogate activities that people need hobbies because they don't have any real substance or freedom in their lives. They have to resort to hobbies. Now, as you just said, don't even get the hobbies. I mean, there's no room for hobbies. Even the further step of estrangement, you know.
Artemis: And so I guess I want to. Return a little bit. Back then, we only have a. Couple of questions left, returning kind. Of to the we haven't talked so much into the theory of primitivism so much, but I've. Been reading a book. Called inside the Neolithic, mind by Williams and Pierce. Are you perhaps familiar with that? Book no.
Zerzan: No. OK, so it.
Artemis: Kind of explores the relationship and they get a. Little weird with it. Like they think like. The the cosmology of all these different cultures, regardless of where they are, kind of rooted in neurology and how the brain is structured. It's very interesting, but they have this idea that basically the root of domestication and depression, shamanism, ritual. It it. Well, it all goes back to ritual, and that's some you've talked about early on. Is this idea like the shaman? Who wanted to prevent show how great their power over there was over nature was, oh, I want the orat and I need this animal. I need this animal and the more and more animals. Well, if you have 1000 goats. And so there's the other guy. It doesn't seem as cool. So they need to tame the. Rock right? Because now that's a powerful animal and you're building structures to honor the animals. So it's interesting to. Me that like. Your idea also of time and how everyone now is ohh we don't have time for anything. You've kind of been talking about. This idea. Since like I don't know really like the 80s and 90s, right? Like that's where you're writing. And people are starting to come. Around to a lot of that. And so it's interesting. But really, the the root of. Everything, at least in at least in what's called, you know, the Fertile Crescent and partially they kind of argue the Western Europe is rooted in religion. And so I find that. Interesting. Do you have you? Has your conception of the the notion of origins, which I know is important, and why you dismissed post modernism? Have your ideas. To radically changed in. That regard, or are you less interested? Than my new. Details, but more so the larger picture.
Zerzan: What you been thinking about? Sasha Ingles work as I see it anyway, has a place in this kind of discussion. In other words, how do you get to the domestication? What kind of thinking or practices? Leads up to that. You know, that's one way to put it anyway, and my emphasis is more on the. You know, most basic social institutions, starting with divisional labor, for example, but he's looking at it more. You know, he talks about iteration and repetition and how. Even gestures can become somewhat refined or predictable, or. Leading on to language forms, which which? By nature are repetitive. You know we use the same letters and the same words in whatever language, but. How that's the deeply domesticating thing. Before you get to any plants around. As I understand it anyway of. And I find that really interesting. Kind of a more abstract way of looking at it than. I have I. Guess, but maybe a a real step forward.
Artemis: We just as you know, we just had Sasha on that episode, so if anyone. Wants to listen. To that, this should be it. Should be Sasha's episode then this one in order of upload. If nothing goes in between, but I highly recommend listening to that as well as reading plant anarchy or any of the other words Sasha has done. Cuz I'd say he's breaking a lot of new ground in terms of like the notion of origins and. So to speak, where it all went. Enrolling so.
Zerzan: Yeah, yeah, I too wouldn't recommend the. The the latest thing the your podcast with him, I found that really helpful.
Artemis: I appreciate that. Did you 2 have any other questions? Because I've been kind of dominating it recently.
Brady: Honey, I I feel like that a lot of my questions have been answered. I do see that we have one more though that we've got on our list. So I will. Ask it where is primitivism and anarchism going? What advice do you have for those seeking resistance?
Zerzan: Ohh, I think we can help. The thing along. You know. Is as civilization or late civilization if we. Want to call it that? Presents itself ever more starkly. Ever more clearly, you know, hard to. That's why what we're seeing, you know and. The fruits of it, I think we can help that along, you know, help deepen that picture. This doesn't happen by accident. This is not some coincidence. There's a there's quite a trajectory and a logic and a neurologic to. Through domestication, which is, you know, it's the art of civilization, and it just keeps increasing. The control is all about control. It was from the start, and it is right now trying to increase its control. And what? What does that leave us with? And you know. How can you avoid the rejection? You know, how can you not come to a conclusion that well? My mind fairly unavoidable. You've you've got to. Get rid of it. It's it's so fundamental that and, you know, tie these things together. Isn't hard to do, I think, but of course access is is hard to do. You know we struggle with. We've got some really outstanding publications and podcasts now, but. You know you routinely kept out. Of the picture I. I thought, you know the death of Kuszynski, what, 2 weeks ago or whenever it was was it would be an upsurge, you know, like the question. Well, was he? Right. You know the so-called manifesto is that relevant or? No, there was almost nothing. And you know, I'm not saying this is a big conspiracy or something, but you know, there it's not quote respectable. It's not. It's not the latest gossip about Trump or you know it. It's not part of the picture, so. That's the giant obstacle, and we got to try to tackle that on a sort of practical basis somehow, you know, to to change that. They introduce these things into the conversation with society. I don't know what's gonna happen, though? I mean, I just, I don't have any. There's no easy answer in my view.
Brady: To kind of. End things off on a light note. I just want to say it sounds like Emanuel might have one more question for you, but talking about Kaczynski and yourself, I just want to let you know that in Phoenix, AZ in 2019, I was kicked out of an Extinction Rebellion event for handing out printed off copies of your essays and industrial society. In its future, they didn't appreciate that from me at all. They they called the police on me and they escorted me out of their event.
Zerzan: Geez, well, I remember that.
Artemis: That was funny. I didn't believe you. When you called me like I was. Print out printed anti skid material and they didn't. They didn't like that. And of course, leave it to the leftist to. Call the police. On people they don't like. I mean, that's so ******* typical. Yeah, truly.
Emmanuel: Alright, so my question was anarchism tends to be very secular historically. Do you think there's any value in constructing, not necessarily constructing, that sounds very artificial, but creating a some new form of spirituality for people when it comes to. How we interact with our environment.
Zerzan: Well, a pleasant surprise to me continues to occur and that is. I was talking just a very few days ago from 20 something. Kid from Pittsburgh. And we were sort of talking about latest. Forms in writing or you know what is? Do you have a different? Style or take or something like that. I guess I was saying something about how I think. I've gotten more. Spiritual for one of a better word in some of my later latest writings and. And I was wondering, is he gonna kinda. You know, turn up his nose at that. And he was down. And this is a heavy duty. You know in punk bands and you know, just look like a, you know, very good typical black box sort of anarchist guy. He was delighted to hear that. So we didn't. We didn't have too much chance to try to flesh that out a little bit more. But you know. You you find that I was very hesitant to kind of explore that or to think about that. Because I think. Well, that's not going to go over. That's you. Know the whole. Past history of anarchism, especially in the 19th century, I suppose, was very materialist, and it wouldn't sort of the way and you know, and you don't you don't bring up that kind of stuff. Well, that's not so much the case, and we shouldn't be afraid of going there, in my view.
Emmanuel: It seems to me that. If we are. Trying to rewild in some way and rediscover the sort of mindset that our very distant ancestors had. Then that would involve A reanimation of the world and an abandonment of this purely materialistic. Mindset, which I believe is a direct, direct philosophical development that leads to the exploitation of lions.
Zerzan: Yes, yes.
Artemis: I mean, I would even say like. Your piece in uh. Plastic here I keep self plugging. I swear it's not. On purpose. A lot of people really, really liked it and you said, you know, you've been writing and it kind of more spiritual form. And I would say your work, your peace, poverty was awesome, and our editor actually said I read this Steve and Zerzan parts, and I'm really into it. I like bridging the gap between religion and primitive life in general. If a part of being primitive is being quote simple and easier, it should seem that spirituality comes easier too. For those partaking in it insofar as transcendence and stuff like that. There's a lot more realistic than it may be for people in an artificial world, so this idea of realizing that there is A and you use the term Aboriginal wholeness before wholeness or anything like that, the sense of the unity. Yeah, like the the sub, the notion of subject and object should dissipate in a sort of spiritual sense, right? Like we should feel. A sense of unity with the world around us. What do you call that animism and an anthropological sense or not, like I consider myself secular, but I, as I say to people, I live as if animism is. Right. Oh. You know, and so I think like that's so important and you know some people like ohh, that's just Willy nilly. You're just larping, right? As a hunter gatherer, it's like. Well, yeah, because I wanna. Be well, maybe they were on to something, but that's just me.
Zerzan: Well, yeah, and there's the anti work part of it too. I remember. I think it's the last line of news from nowhere that I think that's a very wonderful book by Morris. You know, and he. He's sort of projecting or predicting. Hoping for out as he put it a a time of rest. Time of. Fellowship, I think is the word to use it. Ohh there there you. You know why work? Why not beauties in the unbuilt world? You know the you know that intimacy, that communion with the with the original world.
Artemis: Yeah, I actually just got a copy of never work, which I didn't realize. But you're in it with Taylorism and Unionism, I think. Is the essay name I just got. It in the mail today.
Zerzan: Yeah. Ohh yeah. That, that piece, that's kind of a stretch, it's. It's not, it's not fundamentally anti work, but it's, you know, it's a little historical study.
Artemis: So it's by I always forget what you say.
Zerzan: OK.
Artemis: Is it detritus, books I. Always forget you. Say their name.
Zerzan: I always say detritus, but I could be wrong.
Artemis: Ohh yeah to try this but yeah I just got that in the mail from Abraxas who ordered copies of the. Scene I'm self plugging again. Oh no.
Zerzan: Right.
Brady: Well, I think I I think that's about all we have for you, John. We we really do appreciate you stopping by as people who have all read your works for many years, being able to finally talk to you as very interesting, especially as. We really don't get a chance to speak to people who have had such a large impact on our political development and our radicalization. So it's been really nice to speak to you and we really do appreciate. You stopping by to talk to little old us.
Zerzan: Old me.
Speaker ?: Thank you so much.
Zerzan: I really enjoyed the dialogue.
Brady: Of course, of course. And do you have any theory or book recommendations and where can people find you and support your work?
Zerzan: Well, go to the radio show I had this past week off because my sound guy Carl was out of town, but I'm going to jump back on it. Tuesday night on kW va.org ohh kwvradio.org. If you just go to kW VA, you get the Korean War Veterans organization.
Brady: We'll link both. How about that? Well, thank you so much for stopping by and hopefully we'll get to talk to you again sometime in the future.
Zerzan: That would be great. I'd appreciate it.
Brady: Of course.
--- Misc. ---
Uncivilized Podcast seeking transhumanist
https://anarchistnews.org/content/uncivilized-podcast-seeking-transhumanist
Thu, 07/27/2023 - 19:08
ArtxmisGrahamThoreau
Uncivilized Podcast seeking transhumanist
We at Uncivilized Podcast : https://www.youtube.com/@uncivilizedpodcast (soon to be on RRS + Spotify) are hoping to do more debate-style content going forward, alongside our regular content. I'd be chiefly interested in one or two anarchist transhumanists to come onto the podcast for such a debate. I would imagine this to be 1-2 hours long with pre-decided topics of discussion, but mostly informal, though I am open to a more formal style. I'd really prefer the transhumanist to be not a capitalist, which I find most anarcho-transhumanists to be.
I hope this forum brings suggestion of people to reach out to or to grab the interest of an anarcho-transhumanist. Hopefully without being flippant, the person or people we'd have on would ideally be those with their own projects, writings, etc, in order for there to be a better common understanding. On our end, we obviously have Uncivilized Podcast as well as an upcoming side project from Brady and Gavin. There is my zine and own writings, too. The obvious choice is William Gillis and while I am open to having him on, I am seeking input from other individuals that others would see as being open to such an option of conversation/debate.
Tl;dr... Seeking non-capitalist anarchist-transhumanist to come debate some anti-civers (not all of us are primmies!) on a podcast sometime.
Reach out to artxmisthoreau[@]gmail.com or tmwg1995[@]protonmail.com
[1] Spanish Colonial Horse and the Plains Indian Culture
[2] Toby Blackstar Discusses Funeral Customs in Native American Communities
[3] Sacred Giving, Sacred Receiving, by Joseph Bruchac
[4] As an advocate of the deconstruction of the ‘Human’ or of ‘Humanity’, my reference to human use is only to help those of Marxian and LTV heritage understand my point. Material or actual use may be other ways to express the same idea.
[5] Spanish Colonial Horse and the Plains Indian Culture
[6] The Comanche Empire by Pekka Hämäläinen
[7] PARKER, CYNTHIA ANN by Margaret Schmidt Hacker
[8] ibid
[9] ibid
[10] Sheppard, Brian Oliver. “Anarchism vs. Primitivism.” The Anarchist Library, 2003, theanarchistlibrary.org/library/brian-oliver-sheppard-anarchism-vs-primitivism.
[11] Perlman, Fredy. Against His-Story, Against Leviathan , Red and Black, 1983, p. 33.
[12] Anonymous, Anti-Left Anarchy: Hunting Leftism with Intent to Kill, 2017.