Anarchy Radio 04-28-2020

Anarchy Radio 04-28-2020

From Anarchy Radio

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Mutual aid projects flourishing, wildlife re-emerging. "Wild Ideas" (NYTM 4/19): animals point to a better world, which we are desperate to see..Only 9% of Britons want return to "normal" life; want the cleaner air, sense of community, etc. to continue. 5G is not safe, cellphone tower arsons spreading across Europe. Global drought worst sine 1200. Sudden collapse of ecosystems likely. Fantasy video games, magic feed denial. But revival of human voice (phone calls). Industrial disas- ters, excesses go on. Samsung adds hand-washing app to smartwatches for those too dumb to know how to wash hands. Resistance news.

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[editor's note from thecollective]
We wanted to share a message that John Zerzan wrote to Anews back in June and a response:

"Good-Bye to anarchistnews.org from JZ"

"Finally the stink of the anews project has become too much for me. There was the acceptance of the ITS lets-murder-passersby. Now the who-could-condemn -sex with -kids, the great applause to that from the (anonymous of course) anews posts. Meanwhile Aragorn! asks, 'when did you accept reality? (accept defeat).' Could there be more definite gifts to our enemies? No more Anarchy Radio for theses cynics of surrender, who somehow call themselves 'anarchists'(??) Don't fucking touch Anarchy Radio broadcasts."

- John Zerzan (source: https://anarchistnews.org/content/anarchy-radio-06-11-2019-word-anews-jz )

This is a message from JZ back in this June that falsely accuses Anews of associating with ITS, sex with kids, and calls out Aragorn!. At this point, it’s getting pretty old reading comments from anonymous people thinking Anews is acting "childish" (see comments related here: https://anarchistnews.org/comment/10856#comment-10856) and that Anews is seemingly the problem, and not the kind of comments directed at Anews from people like John Zerzan.

While JZ’s critique is so bad that it doesn’t even deserve a response (thecollective did respond though[1]) – let’s quickly get some facts straight here, since people still don’t seem to understand it. Anews has never been associated with ITS and to claim such is basically doing the states job of attacking anarchist projects. This is just a smear from a very popular anarchist, that unfortunately other readers and anarchists will then go on to perpetuate, until it becomes a believable folklore digested by readers because some famous anarchist said it (if it hasn’t already become such).

Next up, John Zerzan calls the people behind Anews pedophiles. Again, this shouldn’t even need to be said, but they provide absolutely no further explanation. What are they even talking about? As a reader of Anews, I assume they are talking about the Heresy Distro text that was shared on Anews previously about a short text from Wolfi back in the 1980s. So, Anews has sex with kids because they shared a text that did a terrible job at trying to critique Wolfi, someone who isn’t even associated with the Anews project. At this point in John’s sentence, I feel like it’s almost as bad as trying to have a meaningful conversation with your drunk obnoxious family relative around the dinner table. Their level of critique is below zero, but again they’re a famous anarchist who is saying this, and unfortunately group think is a thing. Why does John Zerzan think it is okay to attack anarchist projects like this? It’s not okay and really fucked up.

And finally, John Zerzan makes up a personal attack against Aragorn! who other than the podcasts, I believe has publicly stated that they’ve tried to distance themselves from the Anews project over the years. So, now John is critiquing someone who has tried to distance themselves from the project because they seem to have personal issues with Aragorn!... I listened to an old Anarchy Radio and was just plain shocked to hear John talk, well actually almost YELL about Aragorn!, like that is some real deep hostility there and as usual, they offered up nothing of an actual critique. Now that Aragorn! has passed John Zerzan has started submitting their podcast to Anews again. We are going publish their submissions, but also wanted to include this brief note about exactly what has been happening.

On a personal level, I’ve really enjoyed John Zerzan’s ideas and writings over the years. I grew up reading them, have written to John before, got a postcard and some emails, called into Anarchy Radio and chatted, and overall found the conversations to be stimulating and enjoyable. However, the kind of stuff listed above is a giant turn off and has really made me think twice about things. No we all don’t have to get along, but at least have a solid critique and not just slinging mud at other anarchists and their projects like you’re on a middle school playground because for some unknown reason you don’t like them.

***

[1] (here is the letter to JZ from thecollective, previously shared as comment on Anews)
Open letter to JZ from thecollective

On the butt hurt accusations over the years…

After years of accusing us over email that we weren't posting your stories because we had a problem with you, you now are broadcasting that the problem is that we're posting your episodes.

Let us clarify something for you. Your show is called Anarchy Radio. Our project re-posts and posts stories by, for, and/or about anarchists, frequently whether we agree that they're anarchist or not. We do not ask permission from the people we re-post for a number of reasons, perhaps most significantly because if it's online, then it's open to the world, by definition. We also don't ask permission because we stand by the anarchist ethic of decentralization and support having more forums for discussion, *especially* of things that are by, for, and/or about us. For example, if it had been possible to post this response on your website, then we would've put this open letter there. As it is, here we are.

If you are serious about not wanting anarchists to talk about your show, then you are certainly free to change the name of your broadcast, and perhaps stop calling yourself an anarchist as well. No one has coined "wild primalist yet," I expect.

seriously? you're stirring this old drama up again? i know that the that the main goal of this site is to foster petty internet drama and create divisions, but are y'all really that bored and lazy? or does it stroke your ego that much to read anonymous bad mouthing of people you don't like over and over?

who's doing that? jz, for posting his stories here again? jz, for talking empty shit about people on his radio show again? or you, for not accepting the post for setting context for jz, and moving on?

where does this shit talking begin or end, and who are you, anonymous poster, to be complaining about anonymous shit talking?

how about you instead post something about this episode of jz's podcast that is interesting, or thought-provoking, or any reason at all to listen? why not celebrate what you like, instead of weighing in in a conflict you apparently find useless?
just a thought.

"Who is doing that?" Anews is. That's who. Did you not even read the collective's note?

It begins, "We wanted to share a message that John Zerzan wrote to Anews back in June and a response:"

What do the words '...back in June' mean to you?

Idiot

That's a good goal to have. What's your goal....to get noticed on the internetz?

Weird and funny that KT has a very active Twitter feed, which I did not know, after his "Suffocating Void" piece. Weird also that he is obsessively repeating Woke-101 talking points like a college freshman who just took their first seminar class. Seriously? I am old enough to remember when KT was warning about IdPol being a distraction from more substantive anti-civ issues. Has he changed his mind about things, or is this some kind of appeal to the IGD, CrimethInc, etc. crowd? Green anarchist entryism?

He had a column on IGD and he recently was on sole cast. I think they use him as their non threatening anti civ contributor. It’s sort of sad.

Him and Zerzan are glued to their screens. It's all theory with both of them. It amazes me how many respect these two yet neither of them do anything by way of living the way they espouse.... nowhere near. Anyone can research and write and waffle on as these two can do but live it... live even communally in an intentional community and live off the land... they don't even do that... frauds is basically what they amount to. At least, Ria Montana does land restoration but these two are no more than writers!

This is a thing that annoys me about them too! I at least like that authors like Bellamy have a real grounding in ecology and practice what they preach. While JZ and KT are all rewild or fuck you without any actual follow through. I think it’s important to listen to those who actually practice what they preach.

as much as i find both JZ and KT to be tiresome, repetitive, and boring, the proposal that those who "practice what they preach" have more authority to critique modernity is some bullshit zero-sum capitalist logic. it's the same line of reasoning that proposes that if you don't have a positive alternative, then your negative critique is thereby undermined, if not dismissible altogether. critical analysis should stand on its own. deciding that there's a flaw in someone's analysis because they talk or write a lot about something without doing much to help implement it IRL is intellectually lazy. if you don't want to engage with their ideas, just say so. but if you want to find the problems and contradictions in JZ's and KT's ideas (and there are plenty), then you need to rake them over those coals, because they are idea men, not rewilders.

What would be more informative reading a book about running from someone who runs everyday or someone who spends most of their life never actually running? All of these people are living under capitalism and they all have the option to live closer to their beliefs. I’m not gonna absolve them from criticism because of capitalism. They’re literally making their living peddling an ideology they aren’t really making attempts to practice.

If you think either of them make a living from selling books, you are sadly mistaken. They both have jobs.

And do go on and tell us all how to live "closer to our beliefs" under totalitarian capitalism. You must be an expert in this, right? Or are you just another talker?

I agree that someone's ideas are not wrong simply because they don't enact them (that's literally a logical fallacy), but what annoys me about KT in particular is that he is so maximalist in his positions that he even hates on people who do gardening, CSAs, and things like that because he sees that as unacceptable compromise. So what is left over is not much more than literally jumping into foraging. And so I see him as not living up to his ideas not simply because of issues in his life (not everyone is in a position to do everything they think ought to be done because of a thousand different random circumstances), but because the position he advocates is nigh-impossible. And it would be one thing if he advocated an ideal and congratulated people for taking small steps, but instead he dunks on gardening as "domestication" while giving TV show reviews on Twitter.

For sure I can agree with him on a fundamental level about anti civ stuff. That doesn’t mean though that I regard him as a useful font of knowledge on the subject vs others who I think practice what they preach.

Its ironic that the armchair intellectuals who stay at home end up being the greatest revolutionaries of all.
It makes me feel so powerful to know that my abstract domestic intellectual meditations did more than any uprising or defence of barricades.

shows but refuses? I rarely hear him in debate. Bellamy has tried but JZ gets personal usually about others not the person debating him. KT does the same. JZ had some interesting stuff many years ago. These days he's on repeat mode. And how he talks out of both sides: calling mainstream 'news' crap yet referring to it when it fills his own agenda. Callers who have tried to debate him get politely shoved off as he HAS to continue reading articles! He wonders why no one calls in? He knows why: he will shut them down one way or another saying Please call in next week.' He's manipulative in that way. And why ANews continues with having Zerzan on here is another equally mamipulative ploy as it agitates people negatively!

and plenty do, then having this prod/opportunity to point out problems continues to be useful. obviously, people who already know should feel free to skip right over these threads, right?

with regards to leviathan. Alan Watt has some excellent stuff regarding civilisation being a scientific agenda ending in global totalitarian fascism using long tried and tested means of subjugation. Yes, there is esoteric material etc which all adds to an interesting mix which has so much in common with Perlman and anti-civ thinking in general. However Alan Watt appears nowhere on the anarchist or anti-civ 'milieu?' I hate that word.

Lewis Mumford was talking about this before this self-absorbed liberal hippie superstar.

There is a definite intersection between Watt's zen consciousness and the psychological society of anach individualism.

Only individualistic before they realize they're part of yet another cultural niche of the upper middle class.

Individualism also involves not falling into some socio-demographic aggregate, but living by your own principles and virtue. Imperatives make people imperious but also imperialist.

Yes, though by thecintersection I meant the few unique "middle-class" with critical thinking who have taken acid which, hah, any "working-class" person, immersed in their basic materialistic libidinal socio-economic preoccupations, are unlikely to make use of, or if they do, they are usually neo-nazi skinheads, drinking beer and acid, and going on purges beating up homeless non-workers, cleansing their neighbourhood. Oh, and don't start saying " Not another hippy-dippy "Timothy Leary" flower-power love your enemy fantasy. I'm talking about like black-widow spiders on acid making the most perfect cobweb net, so therefore a perfect individual, the King of the individuals, as I am ;)

Can you point me in the direction of Watts' writing in this vein? Thanks in advance.

out the same old script. And yes, I would be interested in your response. As you have no calls at the moment, this is a perfect time for you to provide your response. Yes, temperature rises before CO2 increases. And, given the complexity of weather, how convenient the focus is on one tiny tiny part of that complexity and it just so happens to be crested by humans too! The UN, Gore et al have a couple of plans: Agenda 21 and SMART everything including even more industrialisation, particularly the surveillance of energy use as the 6-7 billion 'useless eaters' are taking the resources from the likes of Bill Gates et al and they can't have that! I'm surprised they've not asked JZ to join them in their de-population, climate, health, resource capture, modern slavery scam. Maybe JZ reckons they make offer him a place anyway come the culling?

https://us-issues.com/2018/09/13/empirical-evidence-shows-temperature-in...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Owm25OHGglk

never has. Also, JZ appears to believe that 'pandemics' or 'events' are never planned that it's just the hidden of civilisation! He never mentions the huge impact of private organisations such WEF, WTO, CFR, UN, World Bank, Bank of International Settlements and so on; instead he singles out a very small number of nihilists and egoists never global oligarchs. His script is so narrow these days. He may like the Club of Rome and Maurice Strong though as both want global culling. Maybe JZ has got into the whole paedophilia thing as he is now submitting his show again to a promoter of such material according to JZ himself?

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