A failed attempt to get Ted K to wax autobiographically

The letter attempt that was never responded to

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

My name is Theo Slade. I have been fascinated by your political theories for how to bring about revolutionary change. And I was sorry to read of your hospitalisation, knowing how the finishing of more books is still a valued compassionate pursuit of yours to help other anti-technology revolutionaries.

The reason I’m writing to you is that I found out a photocopy of the Truth versus Lies proof copy you donated to Michigan University had been uploaded to archive.org in 2018, and has been fairly widely quoted in the media. It’s incredibly easy for a book to be published online now anonymously, for instance many students will print out textbooks from files online to save money.

So, I put a call out for volunteers, and a group of us have been working on typing up the book, so that it can potentially be printed and distributed without all Beau’s handwritten annotations, and that the handwritten note at the beginning is typed up and neatly formatted.

I reached out to Fitch & Madison Publishers who I would love to see publish the book and they explained how they helped enforce your copyright, as well as how you had named Susan Gale as your copyright heir.

As we’ve almost finished typing it up now, I really wanted to get your feedback on what we’ve done so far, so I briefly uploaded the book to an unknown Amazon account, in order to send it to you, but your publishers sent a cease and desist email before the book could be printed. So, I’m not sure whether amazon will still fulfil the order now I’ve unpublished it. But, if not, I’ll try to send a proof copy next, which will have a watermark over the cover and a different barcode.

I have also sent you a book I edited together, mainly for your own curiosity, which is a compilation of video transcripts from all the most viewed videos about your life including tv-series scripts, documentaries and video essays.

I put it together in the hope of encouraging you, if you haven’t already and feel well enough, to write a short autobiographical essay or book, touching on key moments in your life. As it would be useful to have your perspective, from the point of view of a person reflecting on his life. Or finally, I hope it may encourage you to make any final updates to your book Truth versus Lies and allow a clarifying window into your personal & political philosophy.

In terms of distributing the book, I hoped since a photocopy version is already online anyway, that you might gift your permission to the group of us who re-typed it up to put the text online for free on The Anarchist Library, which already hosts many of your essays such as Hit where it hurts & Morality and Revolution.

In terms of publishing the book in print, I hoped you might entrust in us the option to redact those sentences and quotes which have prevented publication in the past, due to potential libel and copyright, so that it can have the furthest possible reach, being sent out to radical bookstores everywhere, while signposting where to search for the full text online.

It has always been my intention that this would be produced with your approval and input and I would be very interested to hear your views on the above, and any other information or issues which you feel are important to the work.

Yours Sincerely,
Theo Slade

The book gifts

• Truth versus Lies (Original Draft)

• The Unabomber in Motion Pictures

  • Manhunt; Unabomber

  • Unabomber in his own words

  • Were the Unabomber’s Predictions About Technology Correct? By JRE Clips

  • The Unabomber: The Devastating Use of a Brilliant Mind by Biographics

  • Running to Do Evil by Stephen J. Dubner

  • The Philosophy of the Unabomber by Sisyphus 55

  • Ted Kaczynski (Unabomber) - Mental Health & Personality - MMPI Results by Dr. Todd Grande

In hindsight

I attempted the respected frenemies approach, where I didn't bother him with my harsh feelings about him. I just included generalities about how I'm willing to accept that he probably relates to himself and many of his goals as compassionate. If I had been coldly critical, the letter would have looked something like this:

Dear Mr. Kaczynski,

My name is Theo Slade. [I’m one of those dirty pro-technology, green anarchists, but for the last few months] I have been fascinated by your political theories for how to bring about revolutionary change. [In order to better understand the arguments that lead people down paths like this and so the best counter-arguments for pulling them out.]

I was sorry to read of your hospitalisation, knowing how the finishing of more books is still a valued compassionate pursuit of yours to help other anti-technology revolutionaries. [Although I mourn for the future creative souls who will get lost down the rabbit hole of more and more rigidly dogmatic political theory, where they begin to believe it's only worth reading the way a few authors view the world, so they can say they have simple answers to almost all life's questions.]