Primitivism has got to go.

[Yuppie Grinder]

So there's a trend on revleft to flirt with primitivism. I find this intolerable.
I could write about the theoretical bankruptcy of primitivism, about how it is removed from material reality, about how genuinely revolutionary movements are concerned with the emancipation of the working poor, not reorganizing society into a utopia along your own weirdo ideals even if it comes at the expense of most of the human race, but I'd be mostly preaching to the choir. What I want to know is why anyone thinks primitivism is a more tolerable tendency then anarcho-capitalism or whatever.
Not long ago primitivsm was restrictable, but since a few members of the BA have been flirting with primitivism that seems to no longer be the case.
Seeing as it is no meaningful way leftist and not concerned with the emancipation of the working class but instead a wild vision of utopia that would mean the deaths of most of humanity if implemented, I don't see why primitivism should be tolerated.
Besides all that, it is literally the single stupidest ideology ever conceived.

[hetz]

It's just that no one cares about primitivism except for a dozen people on the Internet.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

I'd say it depends on the primitivist. From my perspective they come in three main flavours - wrong (but refreshingly so), plain nuts or disgusting.

[Let's Get Free]

Personally, I don't love or loathe primitivism, I just think it's totally irrelevant and get mildly annoyed when people bang on about it.

[Avanti]

i was

an anarcho-primitivist

around year 2005-2008

primitivism

and green anarchism

are identifying

technology

as sources of alienation

i still agree with that

but i think

we cannot

get rid

of technology

the river flows

in only one direction

instead

the next step

is anarcho-technoprimitivism

hunter-gathering

in the

cybernetic culture

join together

contradictions

and

create music

[Ravachol]

So there's a trend on revleft to flirt with primitivism. I find this intolerable.
I could write about the theoretical bankruptcy of primitivism, about how it is removed from material reality


I sincerely doubt you could given the rest of your post...



about how genuinely revolutionary movements are concerned with the emancipation of the working poor, not reorganizing society into a utopia along your own weirdo ideals even if it comes at the expense of most of the human race


Which has nothing to do with 'primitivism' of whatever variety but whatever.



What I want to know is why anyone thinks primitivism is a more tolerable tendency then anarcho-capitalism or whatever.
Not long ago primitivsm was restrictable, but since a few members of the BA have been flirting with primitivism that seems to no longer be the case.
Seeing as it is no meaningful way leftist and not concerned with the emancipation of the working class


Good. Leftism is an anticommunist disease. As for the 'emancipation of the working class', who cares about that. Communism is and always has been about abolishing the proletarian condition, not generalizing it through some moralist act of 'emancipation' and calling it 'socialism' or whatever. Think of it what you will but primitivism (and i don't even know what you're referring to as there's a lot of stuff that falls under that broad banner) is solidly communist in that regard.


but instead a wild vision of utopia that would mean the deaths of most of humanity if implemented


Again, this has nothing to do with 'primitivism'. If you had bothered to read the various threads that have sprung up about the topic (or care to browse through my posts) you would know this.



I don't see why primitivism should be tolerated.


I'm sick and tired of having to point out how stupid the anti-primmie reflex here is, I'm not even a primitivist (though I'm not dismissive of all its influence).

But hey, if people wanna restrict me for being sympathetic to it, go ahead, I'll fuck right off. Whatever happened to genuine inquiry about a current of thought, to reading up on what something entails before commenting? The level of debat on revleft never was that high but its been falling and falling as of not so long ago to the point any kind of productive discussion is just people rehashing soundbites.

I guess Stalinism, endless threads about the diaries of Enver fucking Hoxha, advocating working prisoners to death and ratting out anarchists to the cops is all perfectly acceptable, just as long as you don't piss on the idealist worship of 'technological progress'.

[Avanti]

saying that

primitivism

is pretty cool

ismail

is an awesome book

and it is a simple

ideology

you can explain it

in less

than 5 minutes

and people

will get it

primitivism

also got

amazing aesthetics

it's

a special thing

looking at a bearded man

with dreads

wearing ragtag clothes

having tattoos

all over his face

carrying

a little child

in a cloth

[anarchomedia]

I don't know much about primitivism but after the rev aren't we morally obligated to let people experiment with their own ways of doing things? If you think it is a bad idea, feel free to say so but if in the end they think your advice is faulty what could you possibly do about it?

[Comrade #138672]

If a Primitivist can defend his stance, then let him do so. It might be somewhat reactionary, but it's better than most reactionary ideologies.

[Thirsty Crow]

I don't know much about primitivism but after the rev aren't we morally obligated to let people experiment with their own ways of doing things? If you think it is a bad idea, feel free to say so but if in the end they think your advice is faulty what could you possibly do about it?
This is probably a caricature of primitivism (though to what extent, I have no idea), but consider this: are people morally obliged to let some groups experiment with sabotage and wholesale destruction of the existing infrastructure in order to bring back the golden age of the hunter-gatherer society?

And if they think my advice is faulty, I can think of a number of things people could do, none of them really pleasant if they would pursue concrete action.

[Will Scarlet]

I don't know much about primitivism but after the rev aren't we morally obligated to let people experiment with their own ways of doing things? If you think it is a bad idea, feel free to say so but if in the end they think your advice is faulty what could you possibly do about it?
People can go live in a forest now if they want to. Just that they would die pretty soon.

[DDR]

If a Primitivist can defend his stance, then let him do so. It might be somewhat reactionary, but it's better than most reactionary ideologies.

It is not, in order to work, to go back to the hunter-gatherer "life style", a huge chunk of the human population must die, and that's plain genocide. Pritivists not only should be restricted, but also banned and punched in the face.

[Avanti]

It is not, in order to work, to go back to the hunter-gatherer "life style", a huge chunk of the human population must die, and that's plain genocide. Pritivists not only should be restricted, but also banned and punched in the face.

all human beings

die

sooner or later

the question is

how many

human beings

are really

alive?

[Jimmie Higgins]

What I want to know is why anyone thinks primitivism is a more tolerable tendency then anarcho-capitalism or whatever.

Personally I don't think so. I mostly agree with Gladiator that it is practically irrelevant - probably the only place where it is having an impact (a negative one IMO) is within some casual anarchist circles.

I think anarcho-capitalism and primitivism come out of some of the same sort of general social situations and I think both appeal to petty bourgeois concerns about capitalism: a general pessimism (if not outright fear) towards working class struggle and mass movements on the one hand, a hatred of the conditions of the present capitalist society on the other. So one blames the capitalist state only, while the other seems to blame technology/"society" and neither seem to see how class order and class relations are ultimately the determining factor in why the states we see are they way they are and why technology, and so on are used and developed in the way they are/were.

I think these ideas have gained some ground recently because of the lack of class struggle, worsening ecological destruction, and a misunderstanding of why the USSR was shit. In this last case, these ideas seem particularly geared around explaining away the problems of the so-called socialist countries with a simple, "without a market you get..." and "well any technology leads to...".

I find primitivist ideas unconvincing at best and pretty disconnected (if not just misanthropic) at worst. It misses the mark as to where we should focus our struggles both in terms of who we want to rally and what is the target.

[Comrade #138672]

It is not, in order to work, to go back to the hunter-gatherer "life style", a huge chunk of the human population must die, and that's plain genocide. Pritivists not only should be restricted, but also banned and punched in the face.Are they really saying this?

[Jimmie Higgins]

Are they really saying this?I've never really met many hardcore primitivists, so my understanding is 2nd hand and impressionistic, but if someone was totally against technology, modern technology and relations allow for much larger populations and so without modern technology, for example, Los Angeles and Las Vegas couldn't really have much of a population.

[l'Enfermé]

ratting out anarchists to the cops is all perfectly acceptable,
Yeah shut the fuck up about that already. What would you rather have Greek communists do with anarchist hooligans and provocateurs that throw molotov cocktails at worker's demonstrations? Club them to death? Put them against the wall and shoot them?

You have to ask yourself how lousy and fucking worthless Greek anarchists are when their fellow "leftists" prefer dealing with the cops than them and the most obsessive anti-Stalinists like me(my anti-Stalinist is pretty much akin to a mental disorder) defend Greek Stalinists against Greek anarchists.



just as long as you don't piss on the idealist worship of 'technological progress'.

Huge leaps in life expectancy, the eradication of infant mortality, safe abortion and birth control, electrification, mechanized agriculture, vaccination, the radio, the telephone, computers, the internet, laser and fiber optics, space travel, nanotechnology...all this is sheer idealism! Yes, of course!

Do you even understand what idealism is?

You're terrible.

[Tavarisch_Mike]

My impression of revleft and primitivists goes something like this: A (or some few) primitivists present their stands. Abunch of other users argue against them which results in a shitstorm.

So Im not that sure that primitivits are favored at all.

[DDR]

Are they really saying this?

How would you support 7 billion people on the planet without farming, plowing, toiling the soil, etc? How would in a primitivist society a handicapped person, e.g. Down Syndrome, survive? What's gonna happen to those people with chronic sicknesses? So yeah, primitivism kills :D

[Grenzer]

I haven't read any primitivist stuff so I can't comment on it too much, other than the "rewilding theory" which is real lulz worthy. Ravachol isn't a primitivist, that is obvious, and I think before entirely dismissing what he's saying it should be examined more closely.

Although their conclusions are bizarre(and in my opinion, wrong to varying degrees), it should be obvious that their goal is the same as ours(or at least what ours should be): the abolition of class society. They reject the trap of falling into the left wing of Capital, and that alone already puts them ahead of the Stalinists, Trotskyists, and others. They might draw the wrong conclusion, but they are probably much closer to where they need to be in many ways than the formerly mentioned.

Borz, there is a point about messianic faith in technology. No one is denying that most technology can have a positive effect, but the point is that many people have an idealistic conception of technology; they view technological progress as an idealized abstract of reality, a linear progression from primitive to advanced that necessarily coincides with a progression from worst to best. We pretty much just embrace new technologies as soon as they come along without really considering in detail the impact that they will have, and how their negative impact could be negated. It's just a fact that modern technology has, physically speaking, led us into worse lifestyles. To what extent this is due to the technology alone rather than the capitalist mode of production is debatable, however. So no, Ravachol's assessment of prevailing attitudes towards technology is not rooted in idealism. If you look at what he said, he has never disavowed technology; he's only acknowledging that the primitivist critique of technology may have some merit and substance to it.

Another thing that seems to be particularly problematic among the commentators here: primitivism is not a homogenous political current. Even Jimmie's well written post, while avoiding the sensationalistic hysteria that primitivism seems to evoke in many people on here, falls prey to this to some extent. When we Marxists think of primitivism, I get the impression that we have a tendency to instantly conceptualize the most disagreeable forms of primitivism and portray that as the norm.

I think the real question here is how many of the people spitting venom at primitivism have actually bothered to read any theoretical writings in that milieu. I know I sure as shit haven't, and I'm willing to be that most of the people on here haven't either. Everything I know about primitivism comes from Wikipedia and I realize it's pretty fucking dumb to make a judgement based on that alone.

[Sasha]

Yeah, what ghost bebel ^ said
One does not have to agree with the unabombers goals nor tactics to appreciate his writings on technology being deployed as spectacle.
We have a clear restriction policy of anti-civ primmies that advocate the forcible destruction of medical advancements. That doesn't mean you lot get to break our the torches and pitforks (or should I say machineguns) everytime a user advocates sustainable perma-culture as an alternative to industrialised agriculture or (quite marxist concepts) like the abolition of the working class (by which is meant an end to work, not mass murder)

Seriously, how did primitivism suddenly became the new technocratism around here?
Can I coin the term "the leftwing of Ford'ism" for you lot?

[anarchomedia]

This is probably a caricature of primitivism (though to what extent, I have no idea), but consider this: are people morally obliged to let some groups experiment with sabotage and wholesale destruction of the existing infrastructure in order to bring back the golden age of the hunter-gatherer society?

And if they think my advice is faulty, I can think of a number of things people could do, none of them really pleasant if they would pursue concrete action.

As a matter of self-defence if they try and sabotage our infrastructure and so on of course they can expect war in return. I don't imagine they are mad enough to do that, they'd get pasted - 'don't bring a knife to a gun fight'. I imagined they would go and take over a national park or something and otherwise expect to be left alone.

[black magick hustla]

some aspects of primitivism to me are interesting cuz' some of it is like a bastard child of ultraleft theory. basically there was this guy cammatte who was a very smart bordigist and militant of international communist party who grew really cynical cuz' he thought capitalism has reached "real subsumption" which meant workers were completely dominated both in physical and psychological/sociological space (as opposed to formal subsumption, which was domination through economic/physical mechanisms, but left the resistant culture of the proletariat more or less untouched i.e. read about french culture in the turn of the 20th century). may 68 didn't become a revolution and it probably fucked with cammatte's head. Then a guy called John Zerzan and another one called Fredy Perlman discovered this guy and then created more or less the theoretical background for the more sophisticated sort of primitivism. I think some of it is interesting if you don't take their political conclusions too seriously, especially how class society is seen as deeply entrenched in the creation of the division of labor. there is also the david jensen/daniel quinn type of primitivism which is a bunch of honkeys that love their dreads, new age, and drum circles, dont bother

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

Why are "life expectancy" and "space travel" held up as such universal goods? Especially when both are enjoyed primarily by a very specific class of people - hint: it's not the people sewing our sneakers.
Like, sending some goddamn PhD asshole to the moon interests me about as much as the eucharist.
Similarly, moving air and pumping blood 'til 90 isn't necessarily bad, but it hardly seems relevant. Talking about "life expectancy" in a way that isn't purely quantitative, we could probably fit the actual amount of time people in post-industrial societies spend living within a couple decades. The big difference seems, to me, to be hours spent staring at screens, riding the bus, drinking the pain away, and developing anxiety disorders under florescent lights.

In any case, sure, a lot of Primitivist theory is crap, and is rooted in some hella-problematic "noble savage" type shit. On the other hand, a critique of post-/industrial production shouldn't be so easily dismissed. This is especially true in the context of (re-?)emerging non-industrial technologies, for example, of high-density horticulture, which are neither "high-tech" nor anachronistic.

That this is conceptualized as against class struggle in-and-of-itself seems counter-intuitive to me. While there are absolutely primitivists who reject class struggle (as well as rejecting feminism, serious antiracism, etc. - the failure to critique this part of primitivism maybe says something about the politics of its detractors) it seems to me that rejecting the physical means by which the working class is reproduced as subject-of-capital ought to play a role in a politics that is concerned with the abolition of the working-class-as-such.

[black magick hustla]

and "space travel" held up as such universal goods? Like, sending some goddamn PhD asshole to the moon interests me about as much as the eucharist.

sometimes i think primitivists didn't have a childhood cuz' they don't have very interesting imaginations. even more ancient cultures dreamed about what is out there and flying out there to chill with the gods or whatever. i guess real subsumption has given everyone a brain aneurysm, even y'all anti-modernist modernists

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

sometimes i think primitivists didn't have a childhood cuz' they don't have very interesting imaginations. even more ancient cultures dreamed about what is out there and flying out there to chill with the gods or whatever. i guess real subsumption has given everyone a brain aneurysm, even y'all anti-modernist modernists

To be fair, I'm in to space travel, just not space travel exclusively for rich jerks and to the ends of abstract "science".
I think that making LSD widely available is a better solution to the problem of communing with god.
At the very least, I might start going to mass again if the communion wafers were laced.

[DDR]

Why are "life expectancy" and "space travel" held up as such universal goods? Especially when both are enjoyed primarily by a very specific class of people - hint: it's not the people sewing our sneakers.

So because not everyone has it we shouldn't care about it? Isn't it better to make it universal? I guess that the problem here is that the people doesn't see the main contradiction, capitalism. Capitalism is the one who steals the right of universal healthcare to those people, not the machines nor technology.

[zoot_allures]

It is not, in order to work, to go back to the hunter-gatherer "life style", a huge chunk of the human population must die, and that's plain genocide. Pritivists not only should be restricted, but also banned and punched in the face.
I'm not sure it's fair to suggest that primitivists advocate genocide. What they'd advocate is a massive reduction in the population. While there are certainly some nutters who support using genocide to achieve this, there are plenty who don't. (Obviously, this does depend on how exactly we define "genocide". However, I think we can all see a big difference between systematically exterminating billions of living people (the colloquial use of the term) and, say, "non-coercive" programs to significantly reduce birth rates (which may technically count as genocide under certain circumstances).)

Also bear in mind that many primitivists believe that at some point in the near future, civilization will collapse anyway. Reducing our numbers and living standards now would allow for an easier transition.

Anyway, in my opinion, primitivism isn't as damaging as anarcho-capitalism, fascism, etc, just because the primitivists don't have nearly as much influence. Hardly anybody takes them seriously, and that makes even the craziest ones tolerable to me.

[zoot_allures]

Are they really saying this?
The maximum number of people the planet could support if we returned to a hunter-gatherer way of life is, I think, about 100 million.

So we'd have to reduce our numbers by nearly 7 billion.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

To be fair, I'm in to space travel, just not space travel exclusively for rich jerks and to the ends of abstract "science".
I think that making LSD widely available is a better solution to the problem of communing with god.
At the very least, I might start going to mass again if the communion wafers were laced.

Should be both, in my opinion.

:ninja: < A person wearing a space helmet, while on acid.

[zoot_allures]

In any case, sure, a lot of Primitivist theory is crap, and is rooted in some hella-problematic "noble savage" type shit. On the other hand, a critique of post-/industrial production shouldn't be so easily dismissed. This is especially true in the context of (re-?)emerging non-industrial technologies, for example, of high-density horticulture, which are neither "high-tech" nor anachronistic.
Actually, quite a lot of primitivist theory about hunter-gatherer life is rooted in the anthropological and archaeological literature. Much of what the primitivists say on this point is supported by surprisingly strong (though often far from conclusive) evidence.

Their big problem is that they move from the academic question of how well modern civilization compares to hunter-gatherer life, to drawing up a program of future social change. I might decide that childhood is better than adulthood, and I might have very good reasons for believing this, and it might be sometimes useful to make these reasons known - but none of this means that I can just go back to childhood.

Similarly, returning to a Paleolithic way of life is simply impossible. I think there's an even deeper problem than the massive population reduction: we don't live on the same planet as our ancestors. Thousands of years of civilization have resulted in our world being altered in very significant ways. Today, these changes are accelerating faster than ever: given another few decades, the world will be several degrees warmer globally, there'll be massive loss of biodiversity, significant build-up of environmental toxins, etc etc. I don't see any reason to assume that the conditions that supported Paleolithic life will ever again be available.

[black magick hustla]

To be fair, I'm in to space travel, just not space travel exclusively for rich jerks and to the ends of abstract "science".


i kinda agree but idk a lot of stuff made in the name of "abstract science" that has no apparent utility people do it cuz its cool. i mean i fuckin study neutron stars and how they can turn into quark stars under the right conditions, i am not going to make the life of the working class easier by doing so but i can give u some wild ass conversation if u invite me to a beer

[Ravachol]

Their big problem is that they move from the academic question of how well modern civilization compares to hunter-gatherer life, to drawing up a program of future social change.
(..)
Similarly, returning to a Paleolithic way of life is simply impossible.

This. Exactly this sums up my critique of 'pure primitivism' (I don't count people advocating a pro-active stance on 'population reduction' as primitivists, as almost all primitivists have as their premise that the collapse of industrial civilization is immanent and mass die-offs are bound to happen if we continue on this path, and to be honest, with rising rates of crop failures as the result of global warming and the massive ghost acres that sustain the current sphere of reproduction this doesn't seem like doomsday literature.). Regardless of the debate whether a return to hunter-gatherer life is desirable (and to the millions living in the slums in the metropolises of Brazil, China and India it would be a qualitative improvement of life as both archaeological and anthropological evidence suggests), that simply isn't possible anymore. Whether the 'noble savage' myth held any truth to it or not, the garden of Eden has been raped and pillaged and a return is no longer possible.

Thinking about ways of not reproducing the material structure that is so bound up (both historically and in its technical composition) with class society and how to conceptualize this in the wake of ecological disaster is really important I think. Unless you're part of the 'left wing of fordism' (thanks for that Psycho :p) and believe that SCIENCE! will find a cure or 'more solar panels, more turbines' is a substitute for a qualitative change in fundamental human relations and the way these are reflected in the material organisation of our society, communists should take such a critique seriously.

That is not to say this can be a programmatic thing, like many primitivists do. Besides, programmatism has always had a very problematic relationship to communism as the real movement, and it has both lost its historical momentum anyway. As I pointed out in another thread, there are non-primitivist critiques of civilization such as those (http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/wolfi-landstreicher-barbaric-thoughts-on-a-revolutionary-critique-of-civilization) by Wolfi Landstreicher (http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/wolfi-landstreicher-a-critique-not-a-program-for-a-non-primitivist-anti-civilization-critique) and even some origins to be found in Bordiga (http://libcom.org/library/human-species-earths-crust-amadeo-bordiga) (see here for Bordiga (http://libcom.org/library/murdering-dead-amadeo-bordiga-capitalism-other-disasters-antagonism) on the relationship between capitalism and its material composition) as a predecessor of Camatte (http://www.marxists.org/archive/camatte/index.htm).

[hetz]

That doesn't mean you lot get to break our the torches and pitforks (or should I say machineguns) everytime a user advocates sustainable perma-culture as an alternative to industrialised agriculture or (quite marxist concepts) like the abolition of the working class (by which is meant an end to work, not mass murder)There's no alternative to industrialized agriculture. You can't hold progress back.
And communism isn't about ending work as such.

[Flying Purple People Eater]

I don't give a fuck about so-called 'primitivist theory'. I don't want to live in a jungle with a rag and club to defend myself.

Tolerance only goes up to here, folks.

[Os Cangaceiros]

I thought this was pretty interesting:

http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/ted-kaczynski-the-truth-about-primitive-life-a-critique-of-anarchoprimitivism

Good ol' Teddy

Anyway, I prefer futurism and technophilia to primitivism ;)

[Sasha]

There's no alternative to industrialized agriculture. You can't hold progress back.[ tell that to the industrialized agriculture sector, they are doing a fine job holding progress back. case in point; http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/19/a-simple-fix-for-food/


And communism isn't about ending work as such.
i thought it was about the abolition of class, expropriation of the ruling class and the end of work because of work for the proletariat seems like way better ways to achieve that than just shooting some bourgeois and pushing almost everyone into fordist slave labour under the whip of a bureaucratic class.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Although their conclusions are bizarre(and in my opinion, wrong to varying degrees), it should be obvious that their goal is the same as ours(or at least what ours should be): the abolition of class society. They reject the trap of falling into the left wing of Capital, and that alone already puts them ahead of the Stalinists, Trotskyists, and others. They might draw the wrong conclusion, but they are probably much closer to where they need to be in many ways than the formerly mentioned.In what ways? Having ideals doesn't mean much if they can not be realized.


Borz, there is a point about messianic faith in technology. No one is denying that most technology can have a positive effect, but the point is that many people have an idealistic conception of technology; they view technological progress as an idealized abstract of reality, a linear progression from primitive to advanced that necessarily coincides with a progression from worst to best. We pretty much just embrace new technologies as soon as they come along without really considering in detail the impact that they will have, and how their negative impact could be negated. It's just a fact that modern technology has, physically speaking, led us into worse lifestyles. To what extent this is due to the technology alone rather than the capitalist mode of production is debatable, however. So no, Ravachol's assessment of prevailing attitudes towards technology is not rooted in idealism. If you look at what he said, he has never disavowed technology; he's only acknowledging that the primitivist critique of technology may have some merit and substance to it.But this fetishization or abstraction of technological development is what crude primitivism does in reverse! Technology can't be seperated from the processes in which it is developed, controlled, and used. So "technology" by itself is neither progressive or regressive, but entangled with the relations of production in a society.


Another thing that seems to be particularly problematic among the commentators here: primitivism is not a homogenous political current. Even Jimmie's well written post, while avoiding the sensationalistic hysteria that primitivism seems to evoke in many people on here, falls prey to this to some extent. When we Marxists think of primitivism, I get the impression that we have a tendency to instantly conceptualize the most disagreeable forms of primitivism and portray that as the norm.Then is it impossible to generalize or find a common link?


I think the real question here is how many of the people spitting venom at primitivism have actually bothered to read any theoretical writings in that milieu. I know I sure as shit haven't, and I'm willing to be that most of the people on here haven't either. Everything I know about primitivism comes from Wikipedia and I realize it's pretty fucking dumb to make a judgement based on that alone.Bookchin is a good starting place for a critique. I also don't know the ins and outs of all the various groups, but as far as I can tell it seems to have more in common with induvidualist (and liberal) trends within anarchism than with the class-based revolutionary tradditions and trends. It seems to have more historically in common with resistance and revusion to industrialization by rural populations and academics than in working class struggles.

And so as far as a responce to capitalism it seems most of the time that "avoidance" or "induviudal struggle" are the approaches of Primitivists: lifestyle communes outside the market or the actions of dedicated groups and induviduals.

The general failing IMO seems to be a lack of sense of what forces in society can actually reorganize society to create the chance of a different kind of life (leading to some favoring ideas of just an imminent collapse of capitalism, rather than actual confrontation with - and destruction of - ruling class power). Like I said in my earlier post, I think this is attractive now because class struggle has been low and so there is pessimism regarding class struggle. But ultimately, the only way that can see a primitivist lifestyle as viable is if working class people destroy capitalist power and reorganize society. This would allow people to live "autonomously" as they please in communes (or, and I think this would be the more popular option for most) or cooperativly in a re-organized and democratic/collectivly run technological society.

Either that method or just waiting for capitalism to collapse by itself are the only potential ways this lifestyle could happen - and some seem to view this as the route. But then, it's not really a revolutionary set of ideas anyway, just a sort of determinism and I think history demonstrates that capitalism never just "collapses" and so we're more likely to get fascism or something first in an ailing capitalist system - and fascism would also probably result in resistance on some level by workers so what of primitivism then? It doesn't seem to offer much of value in terms of class struggle, the working class, or even effectivly resisting (except limited and induvidual) the negative impacts of capitalist development.

[Ravachol]

There's no alternative to industrialized agriculture. You can't hold progress back.


Obviously, there is nothing idealist about this statement at all. Progress!



And communism isn't about ending work as such.

Not with you lot no.



Anyway, I prefer futurism and technophilia to primitivism ;)

You've obviously never worked in tech....

Besides, I've pointed out that drawing upon the primitivist critique isn't the same as 'living in the woods in a mud hut with a club' (which isn't what primitive life looked like, as it spans from hunter-gatherer tribes to semi-sedentary pastoral villages). Besides, what Ted writes is very influenced by his ideological (despite how he tries to frame it) misgivings.

But whatever, let the earth be converted to a field of steel, let only the soft humming of endless racks of blade servers fill our ears and only the soft blinking leds on dashboards illuminate our eyes. Let smoke fill the heavens and let us self-manage our conveyor belts, our all-encompassing nanotech, let us combat alienation through social media. Can't stop progress!

I'm done here, if people are genuinely interested in engaging, open up a new thread in theory with a different tone and intent.

[Philosophos]

Whoever is a primitivist should go to a therapist... If the primitivist is going to die from a disease that only the "bad chemical medicines" can cure what is he going to do? I suppose his love for nature is going to surpass his will to live....

[Jesus Saves Gretzky Scores]

Who on here acts like a primitivist? I've never seen it.

I really don't hate primitivists, but I'm definitely not into living in the wilderness and doing whatever a primitivist would do outside of hunting and gathering. Seems pretty boring. My other problem is that some of them want to reduce the population to about 3 thousand, just so we can have primitivism. The idea that technology is somehow the worst thing about the world is just beyond me. Call me crazy, but I think there can be a mix of progress and environmental protection.

[GoddessCleoLover]

Anyone who advocates reducing the population from seven billion to one hundred million is at least flirting with genocide. I suppose one could just pray for famine or a pandemic. All three alternatives seem about equally dismal. Perhaps I am exhibiting my Marxian bias here, but such folks don't qualify as leftists by my definition of that term.

[zoot_allures]

Whoever is a primitivist should go to a therapist... If the primitivist is going to die from a disease that only the "bad chemical medicines" can cure what is he going to do? I suppose his love for nature is going to surpass his will to live....
Most primitivists argue that a significant portion of diseases are caused by civilization. It's totally compatible with primitivism to say that modern medical technology is required to solve such problems, but that these problems would be much less likely to emerge in the first place if we had a hunter-gatherer lifestyle.

This is grounded in fact. As the structure of society changes, patterns of disease change with it. This is quite obvious really: we've all heard how obesity, heart disease, etc, are "first world" pathologies; we all know that better standards of hygiene played as big a role in disease reduction as did medical technology. But such changes have been happening all throughout human history - for example, infectious diseases increased with the Neolithic Revolution, and then again once we started organizing into big, complex cities.

(Given this point, I think it's better to focus not on how well medicine handles diseases, but just on life expectancy. Hunter-gatherers certainly have lower life expectancies than people in modern, developed countries. If we look at civilization as a whole it becomes much murkier - life expectancies declined with the two big revolutions I mentioned above - but clearly, modern technological civilization provides a far longer life, at least for those who have access to its benefits.)

I'm sure there are a lot of primitivists who reject modern medicine. They just don't have to. Most primitivists probably live in modern houses, wear modern clothes, walk on modern pavements, etc. With a belief like primitivism, there's always going to be a great degree of tension between ideology and action. It's a problem we all face to some extent: as anti-capitalists, do we completely refrain from participating in the capitalist economy?

[Thirsty Crow]

I'm sure there are a lot of primitivists who reject modern medicine. They just don't have to. Most primitivists probably live in modern houses, wear modern clothes, walk on modern pavements, etc. With a belief like primitivism, there's always going to be a great degree of tension between ideology and action. It's a problem we all face to some extent: as anti-capitalists, do we completely refrain from participating in the capitalist economy?
This represents a real issue only when you equate "action" (political organizing as communist minorities within the class) with "lifestyle", which is far from being productive at all. And in the end this kind of an argument ends up in simple moralism which is absurd since it posits that if I strive for a classless and stateless global society I should drop out and go live in the woods lest I be tainted with the life of buying commodities and being one in fact.

[zoot_allures]

This represents a real issue only when you equate "action" (political organizing as communist minorities within the class) with "lifestyle", which is far from being productive at all. And in the end this kind of an argument ends up in simple moralism which is absurd since it posits that if I strive for a classless and stateless global society I should drop out and go live in the woods lest I be tainted with the life of buying commodities and being one in fact.
I was using the term "action" in a general sense. You could replace the term "action" with, say, "behaviour". I wasn't talking about "political organizing" or any specific like that.

I don't argue that you should drop out. I was simply pointing out that just because we're against x and would like to see it disappear, it doesn't follow that we have to avoid engaging with x. I made this point in the context of the relationship between primitivists and modern medicine (see the post I quoted).

So it's not a real issue. It's quite trivial in my opinion.

[black magick hustla]

Anyone who advocates reducing the population from seven billion to one hundred million is at least flirting with genocide. I suppose one could just pray for famine or a pandemic. All three alternatives seem about equally dismal. Perhaps I am exhibiting my Marxian bias here, but such folks don't qualify as leftists by my definition of that term.

nobody does that. most primitivism is pretty academic and anthropological imho. simply makes a very compelling case that brutal class society is tied to the agricultural revolution. it's hard to not entertain the idea that brazilian un contacted people are doing better than their counterparts in the favelas.

[Ravachol]

This represents a real issue only when you equate "action" (political organizing as communist minorities within the class) with "lifestyle", which is far from being productive at all. And in the end this kind of an argument ends up in simple moralism which is absurd since it posits that if I strive for a classless and stateless global society I should drop out and go live in the woods lest I be tainted with the life of buying commodities and being one in fact.

Yes and no. Tbh I think the classical 'ye be impotent lifestylists' argument is as flawed as the whole 'drop out, tune in, dive dumpsters' crowd. I'm highly skeptical about most political 'action' in general but we have to keep in mind that to some degree, we have a minor influence on reproducing particular behaviors and structures within our own daily lives and, more importantly, with the antagonist structures we produce or seek to produce.

[#FF0000]

total collapse

rewild or die

[Art Vandelay]

Call me crazy, but I think there can be a mix of progress and environmental protection.

This, I've just never understood why it has to be either or.

[Ravachol]

This, I've just never understood why it has to be either or.

Because what is identified as 'progress' (regardless of political color, apparently) is such a meaningless abstraction that it is usually identical with the notion of 'industrial and technological expansion', never questioning the fashion in which this happens, the material base upon which this happens, the type of social structure that gives rise to particular technologies (and demands for some! ie. the societal 'demand' for the nuclear bomb could only be the product of a particular type of society), the very composition of technologies (ie. the structure of the fordist factory reflecting the division of labor it entails, it makes no sense outside of that context) and the fact that this identification of the notion of 'progress' with the extension and expansion of the material community of capital has in itself become identified with some utilitarian 'good'.

Its telling that many leftists are very capable of analyzing how social structures reflect social relations, yet are blinded when technical structures reflect those in turn. And among those who do, they are capable of seeing how urban geography reflects class society (ie. the famous example of the restructuring of Paris by von herrhausen in the wake of the various insurrections there) but not how this is the case for all technology.

Another good text on the matter (theanarchistlibrary.org/library/dave-antagonism-jacques-camatte-and-the-new-politics-of-liberation)

[Os Cangaceiros]

You've obviously never worked in tech....

Besides, I've pointed out that drawing upon the primitivist critique isn't the same as 'living in the woods in a mud hut with a club' (which isn't what primitive life looked like, as it spans from hunter-gatherer tribes to semi-sedentary pastoral villages). Besides, what Ted writes is very influenced by his ideological (despite how he tries to frame it) misgivings.

But whatever, let the earth be converted to a field of steel, let only the soft humming of endless racks of blade servers fill our ears and only the soft blinking leds on dashboards illuminate our eyes. Let smoke fill the heavens and let us self-manage our conveyor belts, our all-encompassing nanotech, let us combat alienation through social media. Can't stop progress!

I'm done here, if people are genuinely interested in engaging, open up a new thread in theory with a different tone and intent.

Nope, I've never worked in tech. I will admit to enjoying some forms of technology, though.

I guess that primitivism's primary value is in it's critique of technology...? (Although I'm critical of several of primitivism's claims, some of which seem to be based on specious claims about human psychology). I don't see how it offers any real solutions, though. Where did it go wrong? The Neolithic Revolution? When you trace society's problems back to an event that occured before ancient Mesopotamia, you've got problems. Conscious human effort isn't going to turn back the hands of time.

Of course, sometimes primitivists says that the claims of "genocide" etc are unfair, as they think society is going to collapse anyway and that the genocide will happen whether people like it or not. If that's the case then I don't even see the point of primitivism. If society is just going to crumble regardless then there's no point in holding any sort of persuasive ideology, unless you just want to ping your rants off groups of ideological sycophants (ironic that I say this on Revleft).

[Ravachol]

Nope, I've never worked in tech. I will admit to enjoying some forms of technology, though.

I guess that primitivism's primary value is in it's critique of technology...? (Although I'm critical of several of primitivism's claims, some of which seem to be based on specious claims about human psychology). I don't see how it offers any real solutions, though. Where did it go wrong? The Neolithic Revolution? When you trace society's problems back to an event that occured before ancient Mesopotamia, you've got problems. Conscious human effort isn't going to turn back the hands of time.

Of course, sometimes primitivists says that the claims of "genocide" etc are unfair, as they think society is going to collapse anyway and that the genocide will happen whether people like it or not. If that's the case then I don't even see the point of primitivism. If society is just going to crumble regardless then there's no point in holding any sort of persuasive ideology, unless you just want to ping your rants off groups of ideological sycophants (ironic that I say this on Revleft).

The point most primitivists make is that efforts can be made to reduce the horrific impact of the industrial collapse (by reducing our current dependency upon industrial civilization and preserve what is still left of the planet in order to be able to utilize it to survive in the absence of the material base of industrial civilization) and to experiment with ways to form different kinds of communities which are a) capable of surviving in the absence of industrial civilization b) won't end up reproducing what led to the thing in the first place.

[soso17]

It just sounds like the Georgia Guidestones to me…creepy.

[bcbm]

i'm glad some brave souls are finally taking a valiant stand against an ideology that saw its 'hey day' when some of its adherents smashed windows in seattle and torched some ski resorts and gmo farms a decade ago. and with no understanding of it at all at that. bravo you champions of the proletariat.

[Flying Purple People Eater]

The fuck? Environmental protection!? Hunter-gatherer societies were some of the most ecologically destructive biological collaberations in the history of the planet! Within a thousand years, they'd basically wiped out every fucking megafauna on earth!

Dumb primmies.

[Ravachol]

The fuck? Environmental protection!? Hunter-gatherer societies were some of the most ecologically destructive biological collaberations in the history of the planet! Within a thousand years, they'd basically wiped out every fucking megafauna on earth!

Dumb primmies.

I don't know whether to feel pity or amusement...

[hetz]

tell that to the industrialized agriculture sector, they are doing a fine job holding progress back. case in point; http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com...-fix-for-food/ (http://www.anonym.to/?http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/19/a-simple-fix-for-food/)Of course they are. It's a well known thing that a lot of food gets destroyed because of price manipulations and such.
What I'm saying is that you can't go back from industrialized agriculture to previous primitive forms of working land, because that would lead to starvation.
And I know even from personal experience that you can't grow much without "chemicals" ( if only fertilizers ). A lot of stuff will also fail without persticides/herbicides etc.


i thought it was about the abolition of class, expropriation of the ruling class and the end of work because of work for the proletariat seems like way better ways to achieve that than just shooting some bourgeois and pushing almost everyone into fordist slave labour under the whip of a bureaucratic class. According to Marxism there is no proletariat in socialism.
Again, Marx or anyone else never talked about ending work, they talked about freeing the man's creative potential, emancipation in every sense of the word, not stopping production and other activities.




Obviously, there is nothing idealist about this statement at all. Progress!What are you talking about? Marx and others clearly showed that capitalism was progressive in contrast to earlier forms. I don't see what that has to do with idealism. Obviously industrialized agricultures is an improvement in comparison to 18th century ways of working the land.


Not with you lot no.What?

[Danielle Ni Dhighe]

I was an eco-anarchist back in the late 1980s, but even then I didn't see primitivism as a solution.

[Luís Henrique]

i am not going to make the life of the working class easier by doing so but i can give u some wild ass conversation if u invite me to a beer

Does this not make the life of the working class easier?

To me good conversations make life easier, yes.

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

it's hard to not entertain the idea that brazilian un contacted people are doing better than their counterparts in the favelas.

It becomes easier if you look at the numbers of people leaving the favelas for the jungle, and conversely.

The latter beats the former hands down.

Luís Henrique

[A Revolutionary Tool]

I didn't even know there were any primmies here, let alone administrators here that flirted with the idea. Why we should even care much and actually ban them, idk. I think a small sect actually believes in genocide.

[Os Cangaceiros]

The point most primitivists make is that efforts can be made to reduce the horrific impact of the industrial collapse (by reducing our current dependency upon industrial civilization and preserve what is still left of the planet in order to be able to utilize it to survive in the absence of the material base of industrial civilization) and to experiment with ways to form different kinds of communities which are a) capable of surviving in the absence of industrial civilization b) won't end up reproducing what led to the thing in the first place.

I see. Are there any examples of primitivists actually setting up a non-industrial, non-sedentary "intentional society"?

Personally I've always that primitivists don't actually care that much about "humanity". Certain radical ecologists have kind of contributed to that image, like the founder of Earth First calling humans a "disease", for example. I've always perceived the goal of radical ecology and primitivism to keep this little green ball a'spinnin', and humans are secondary to that equation. I don't know what good the earth is if we're not dominating it, though! :drool:

Technology is a complicated issue I think. On the one hand, people in power use it in repulsive ways, with mechanized repression and surveillance and everything else. But at the same time I think techology is really fucking cool, honestly. It hit me a while ago, actually, when I was reading and article about the Nazi concentration camps, then jumped to the wikipedia article about a certain soda brand. Like, in literally split seconds, I jumped from reading about Nazi war crimes to reading about the marketing history of a major beverage company. How much work would it have been to do that back 30 years ago? You'd have to go to the library! :scared: Now I can feed my brain with unlimited raw data endlessly from the comfort of sofa. I actually do think that's progress.

Another news story I read recently was about how breaking down an infant's genetic code at birth can give insight into every possible health problem that child is likely to expect during the course of it's life. I'm amazed by that kind of thing, I'll admit. What humans have created impresses me greatly. The level of complexity that society operates on is astounding.

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

the Nazi concentration camps [. . .] wikipedia [. . .] a certain soda brand [. . .] in literally split seconds [. . .] that's progress.

As illustrated here, technology, in its current unfolding, creates a continually shrinking discursive space wherein cola, genocide, and the internet become interchangeable objects in relation to the only subject that speaks: CAPITAL.


:scared:

[GoddessCleoLover]

We wouldn't be having this conversation but for internet technology. I suppose we could try to do a message board via smoke signals but imagine the level of deforestation required.:lol:

[Flying Purple People Eater]

I don't know whether to feel pity or amusement...
How about feeling mistaken.

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v479/n7373/images_article/nature10574-f1.2.jpg

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_tGHzOEp3UKA/SxA2DEhzfzI/AAAAAAAAAyg/cvliJu83LR0/s1600/JOHNSON_2009_MegafaunaCollaps.jpg


The Neolithic Age, or New Stone era, was a period in the development of human technology (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technology), beginning about 10,200 cal. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiocarbon_dating#Calibration) BCE according to the ASPRO chronology (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASPRO_chronology) and later in other parts of the world.

As you can see, almost every single large animal had it's population continually decimated just up until the first signs of Neolithic culture began to sprout. I hope I don't have to explain how destructive removing such important parts of the biosphere as grazers in a small amount of time can be for the rest of the environment (imagine: the destruction of millions of species of excrement carried autotrophs, and their predators!).

Now I'm not defending the clearly reactionary neolithic societies in the least. While the oppressive 'farm-control' that created farm society was despicable, the stupid hippie myth of the original Hunter-Gatherers being environmentally conservative is absolute nonsense.

[Os Cangaceiros]

As illustrated here, technology, in its current unfolding, creates a continually shrinking discursive space wherein cola, genocide, and the internet become interchangeable objects in relation to the only subject that speaks: CAPITAL.

I don't even know what that means, but OK.

[Yet_Another_Boring_Marxist]

I don't know whether to feel pity or amusement...

Actually I study Enviromental Science at the college level and I can confirm that what he is saying is correct

[Luís Henrique]

As illustrated here, technology, in its current unfolding, creates a continually shrinking discursive space wherein cola, genocide, and the internet become interchangeable objects in relation to the only subject that speaks: CAPITAL.

That's just foolish.

Such "continually shrinking discursive space", if we must retain the elitist phrasing, is created by capital, not by technology.

On the other hand, what is wrong with a "continually shrinking discursive space"? It seems way better than a continually expanding silencing space.

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

How about feeling mistaken.

Evidently, hunter-gatherer level primitivism is inconsistent. Silex chipping is a high-level technology that initiates the continual shrinking of the discursive space.

We ought to do it with our own bare hands.

Luís Henrique

[hetz]

As illustrated here, technology, in its current unfolding, creates a continually shrinking discursive space wherein cola, genocide, and the internet become interchangeable objects in relation to the only subject that speaks: CAPITAL.
U wot m8? :laugh:

[Thirsty Crow]

As illustrated here, technology, in its current unfolding, creates a continually shrinking discursive space wherein cola, genocide, and the internet become interchangeable objects in relation to the only subject that speaks: CAPITAL.


:scared:
I'm pretty sure that it was not CAPITAL that spoke through the keyboard used by Os.

Really, this kind of bombastic rhetoric mistifyies more than it clarifies.

[zoot_allures]

How about feeling mistaken.
I don't see how that demonstrates that s/he's mistaken. Firstly, the claim that humans were responsible for the decline of megafauna is still debated - there's some evidence that it was due to climate change. But let's accept that it was due to humans.

Ok. So what? Biodiversity loss in the modern period is far greater - in fact, it easily matches the rates of mass extinction events. We also pump toxins and pollution into the environment, we've introduced tons of invasive non-native species to various regions, and we're forcing the most rapid and destructive climate change the planet has ever seen.

So yes, I'd say that hunter-gatherers were "environmentally conservative", at least compared to us. Modern civilization is an extreme case, but complex societies often cause environmental degradation (which sometimes plays a role in their collapse).

Also, maybe I've misunderstood the graph, but "fire onset" 14,000 years ago? Humans have been using fire for over 100,000 years at the very least.

[Ravachol]

Actually I study Enviromental Science at the college level and I can confirm that what he is saying is correct

I'm sorry mr. specialist man, I didn't know I was doubting that. My comment was directed at how he completely missed the point I've been trying to make. But nobody here is interested anyway so it seems. But hey, I guess we're much more capable at preserving species nowadays than in hunter-gatherer times, even if such a conservationist goal would be the whole point of the critique I outlined (which it isn't)!

I'm amused at the lengths people on this board go to in order to maintain technology is structurally neutral.

[Luís Henrique]

I'm pretty sure that it was not CAPITAL that spoke through the keyboard used by Os.

Moreso, if Virgin Molotov Cocktail is right, then his very utterance,


As illustrated here, technology, in its current unfolding, creates a continually shrinking discursive space wherein cola, genocide, and the internet become interchangeable objects in relation to the only subject that speaks: CAPITAL.

must have been capital's voice speaking. If, in the other hand, it wasn't, then evidently capital isn't the only subject that speaks - even through the internet, aka the current unfolding of technology.


Really, this kind of bombastic rhetoric mistifyies more than it clarifies.

The misuse of the word "interchangeable" is the key to the mystification, here: the market sence of "interchangeable" - which is to say, tradeable in the market - is smuggled under the surface of the actual use of the word as a mere synonym of "replaceable", creating the appropriate background for the appearance of "CAPITAL" in the conclusion.

It does other things besides mystifying, though. It creates a discursive space in which resistance or lack thereof are semantically equivalent.

Luís Henrique

[Jesus Saves Gretzky Scores]

I think primitivist is going replace liberal as the new Revleft insult.

[The Douche]

Whole lot of people seem to be talking about me in this thread but nobody bothered to tell me it was going on.

I am not "flirting with primitivism", because I am no longer a teenager first finding out about radical political theory, I am a big boy now who has made up his mind about this kind of stuff. And yes, my politics are influenced by people like Camatte, Zerzan, Perlman, and Jensen. Yes, I am anti-civilization, and I would consider myself closer to most anarcho-primitivists than to most of the posters on this board.

And as I said in an off board discussion related to this thread, if you think that communism means bunkers and high productivity levels then the only cure for your ailment is a bullet in the brain.

[hetz]

This thread actually isn't about you.

[The Douche]

This thread actually isn't about you.

Ok, good.

[Ravachol]

What other users on revleft 'flirt with primitivism' then, AND are in the BA? :blink:

[Drosophila]

And as I said in an off board discussion related to this thread, if you think that communism means bunkers and high productivity levels then the only cure for your ailment is a bullet in the brain.

I can agree with this part but the rest of your post seems kind of odd. Tell me: why can't there be a balance between individuality and societal organization? I really don't see why the response to "let's build a glorious society full of factories and manual labor" needs to be "let's stop using technology and go back into the forests." I get the feeling that you don't hold this view, as I've seen you say things that I'd agree with in the past (like the abandonment of 'labor' as we know it), but the views of most anarcho-primitivists really don't make sense.

[The Douche]

I can agree with this part but the rest of your post seems kind of odd. Tell me: why can't there be a balance between individuality and societal organization? I really don't see why the response to "let's build a glorious society full of factories and manual labor" needs to be "let's stop using technology and go back into the forests." I get the feeling that you don't hold this view, as I've seen you say things that I'd agree with in the past (like the abandonment of 'labor' as we know it), but the views of most anarcho-primitivists really don't make sense.

I think primitivism and the anti-civ position are good critiques, and valuable, but primitivism, as ideology, is problematic. I don't really want to live as a hunter-gatherer (though I would prefer it to life as a prole), but I recognize that certain things are related to technology (alienation) and that our current course of industrial development (organized under the open capitalism of the west or the so-called socialism of the Marxist-leninists) is unsustainable and will result in the destruction of the land base.

I'm on my phone, and the issue of anti-civ politics is very complicated, so my reply is a boy lacking, I know.

[Thirsty Crow]

I but I recognize that certain things are related to technology (alienation)..,
Can you explain briefly how primitivist criticism (or other related approaches) conceptualize the relationship between technology and alienation (and particularly the notion of alienation itself)?

[Avanti]

I think primitivism and the anti-civ position are good critiques, and valuable, but primitivism, as ideology, is problematic. I don't really want to live as a hunter-gatherer (though I would prefer it to life as a prole), but I recognize that certain things are related to technology (alienation) and that our current course of industrial development (organized under the open capitalism of the west or the so-called socialism of the Marxist-leninists) is unsustainable and will result in the destruction of the land base.

I'm on my phone, and the issue of anti-civ politics is very complicated, so my reply is a boy lacking, I know.

both the

anarcho-primitivist

dystopia

and the

anarcho-primitivist

utopia

will be realized

by

capitalism

enter

the cyberpunk era

vast urban sprawls

surrounding

glittering gated communities

where the docile middle class

the capitalists

and their

babylonian overlords

are hiding

from the rage

of the mob

millions

of small groups

fighting for survival

in the slums

marking their identities

by dreads

shaved heads

piercings

telephone wires

scars

tattoos

rites of passage

NeoTribes

hunter-gatherers

in

the cybernetic

landscape

dumpster-diving

urban garden farming

theft

myths and legends

hiding from

the fascist death squads

and the drones of Babylon

life will be short

but

it will be exciting

[The Douche]

Avanti, your ideas often seem relevant to the discussion, and I get the impression that we may come from similar positions, but your writing style is in no way conducive to having a conversation on a message board, and I know I'm not the only one who feels that way.

[l'Enfermé]

Yes, yes, vast urban sprawls, techno-shamaninsm, neo-tribes, Babylon, gated communities, and so on, we heard it. Aren't you getting bored?

[bcbm]

What other users on revleft 'flirt with primitivism' then, AND are in the BA? :blink:

the douche and myself are the first ones that spring to mind but i havent been hanging around too much so maybe some other ba members have come to their senses

[Ravachol]

the douche and myself are the first ones that spring to mind but i havent been hanging around too much so maybe some other ba members have come to their senses

Yeah but you haven't been around too much and the board has gone downhill ever since bro

[Ethics Gradient, Traitor For All Ages]

I'm concerned that this deviation will damage our credibility as revolutionary catalyst. This must be addressed by the internet bureaucracy asap.

[Jesus Saves Gretzky Scores]

What's BA?

[The Douche]

Can you explain briefly how primitivist criticism (or other related approaches) conceptualize the relationship between technology and alienation (and particularly the notion of alienation itself)?

The relationship between technology (or more accurately, civilization) and alienation is pretty well expressed in the city. Cities are filled with all these things and resources that we have no access to and cannot use. Not to mention that many modern cities are designed to split people up and control crowds (the same goes, especially, for low-cost urban housing projects). There is also the issue of the limited amount of colors used in cities, which limits emotional reactions (with the exception of advertisement, which of course is an attempt to manipulate human emotion). And of course there is the issue of surveillance in the cities.

Technology itself can be quite alienating in that it mediates, so heavily, the way that we interact. How many times have you heard somebody say "I wish I had a picture", after a crazy night at the bar or a fun concert or whatever? That shit is just crazy to me, like, you lived the experience, what is more real than that? But people can't see things as real without that mediation of a picture/video or whatever.


This article by Zerzan is decent, and talks about the way mass alienation in our world is sort of masked by drugs. (http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/john-zerzan-the-mass-psychology-of-misery)

And I would say Perlman's "Reproduction of Daily Life" is good as well.

[The Douche]

What's BA?

Board Administration.

[Jesus Saves Gretzky Scores]

Board Administration.

Oh, that's what I thought. Thanks.