Anarchy: a journal of desire armed. #37, Summer 1993 LETTERS, part one @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ _Have_something_to_say?__Write_us!_ We would like to encourage you to write us in order to continue this dialogue, whether you are sympathetic or critical of anarchist theories and practices. All letters will be printed with the auth- or's initials only, unless it is specifically stated that her/his full name may be used or that s/he wishes to remain anonymous, or the name already appears in Anarchy - as in the case of an author of an essay or creator of artwork published here. We will edit letters that are redundant, overly long, unreadable, excessively boring or contain threats. (Ellipses in italicized brackets [...] indicate editorial omissions.) Limit length to four double-spaced, typewritten pages. Address your letters to C.A.L., POB 1446, Columbia, MO. 65205-1446. The reality of social construction Anarchy, the debate concerning transgenerational sex continues in the pages of your magazine, as does the continued simplistic, reductionist and eminently ideological rhetoric from the supporters of a adult- child sex on the issues of power and consent. a recent letter from "an unrepentant pedophile" recycles some of the liberal individualist/unencumbered free will rubbish utilized as elements in arguments in previous issues by others who seem unwilling to accept the reality of social construction and the ubiquity of power relations. "an unrepentant pedophile" (hereafter a.u.p.) talks about the possibility of "allowing (children) to make uncoerced, fully informed decisions in all aspects of their lives" as though that were even a realistic possibility in our society. Children are subjected to adult authority, a.u.p. rightly points out, in nearly every facet of their lives: teachers, parents, babysitters, store owners, neighbors, police, through mass media imagery, etc. They are thoroughly conditioned to defer to such authority, their access to nearly every kind of material or ideational resource is defined and limited by adult authority, indeed, the very wants and desires they are able to conceive and subsequently the kind of consent they may generate are fundamentally shaped by the power exercised by that authority. To imagine that, given such a field of play, one can just point to the `consent' of the subaltern as a reliable and comprehensive indicator that no coercion, no power is being exercised is akin to stating that slaves who `willingly' acknowledge the superiority of their masters do so of their own free and unencumbered wills. In other words, there's no such thing as manipulated consensus. to be fair, a.u.p. does admit such a state of affairs might apply in the case of an adult engaging in sexual relations with one of her/his own children and thus make that situation more problematic, but i wonder how it is that a.u.p. can so readily make such neat distinctions between the power exercised by a child's parent and say her teacher, her camp super- visor, her social worker.... to some `anarchists' (perhaps i can count a.u.p. among them), this is a too deterministic picture of social reality. they are in fact often quite eager to condemn such arguments as `fascist' or `pessimistic'. in reply i reiterate my remarks from a previous letter: it's not my responsibility to stroke these liberal individualist `anarchists' and cater to their asocial notions of discrete and `free' individuals all running around in the world seemingly unaffected by other such beings, social structures, historical contexts, etc. power cannot be critically analyzed unless one is willing to be critical - to neglect the intricacies of social power, false consciousness/manipulated consensus and the limits structure places on agency is to engage in the worst and most dangerously simplistic kind of bourgeois liberal `theorizing'. x.m., san diego, ca. Too brainwashed Dear Anarchy, Lemme say that your magazine is something of a relief. It showed me that there is a significant anarchist network out there. Before I received the sample copy of your magazine (#33/Summer '92 "Abandoning Civilization") that I ordered I was not aware that there was a prevalent anarchist movement of any sort. Mainstream media doesn't like to talk about that sort of thing. Might start people thinking. I am what you could call a self-made anarchist and free-thinker. I grew up a very self-repressed child who believed that law & order was to everyone's benefit. Then I read Howard Zinn's revisionist A People's History of the United States for a high school history course (it was a very liberal prep school). History from the losers' viewpoint really opened my eyes. I rather rapidly swung to the radical left, becoming more or less a socialist and extremely sympathetic to anarchists but not actually one, in any case further left than the school intended to indoctrinate me. Thing was I had no real exposure to either socialism or anarchism except reading about them in Zinn. I only had a sketchy idea of what anarchists were about. The only reason I wasn't an anarchist was because I didn't think it would work. I started hanging out with different people, a few of whom were out- right anarchists, also self-made. I still had no contact with any significant anarchist movement. This is my freshman year in college and shortly after getting here the dam finally gave and I became a full-blown anarchist, deciding "Fuck it, I don't care whether it will work or not, I believe in anarchy!" Reading some Noam Chomsky helped me on my way, as well as my disgust with the pseudo-leftist liberalism of my college, Wesleyan University. They all have this ridiculous faith in the system, which I never possessed after reading Zinn. They were all celebrating Bill Clinton's victory when I voiced my attitude: "Why? It's not going to change anything fundamental. We'll still have a culture based on democracy and capitalism (read selfishness) and a religion of materialist consumerism." (If you define a religion as a set of beliefs that provides a structure for viewing the world, that's what it is.) Although they claimed to see what I was saying, they didn't seem to see my point. They were too brainwashed. Which brings me to the other thing I wanted to say. Your subscription form starts off "Tired of being told...what to think?" but I don't see much mention of that theme elsewhere. The issue of free-thought, however, is one of the things that made me a full- blown anarchist. While it might be possible to develop a government that is not repressive (although I somehow doubt that), any govern- ment cannot exist without an ideology to justify its existence. I here note that I differentiate between a philosophy and an ideology. A philosophy is free-flowing, subject to question, non- dogmatic (like anarchism), an ideology on the other hand is a philosophy that has stagnated, it's dogmatic and conformist (like Marxism, which was originally not all that different than anarchism). Once a government has an ideology to justify its existence it must make sure the people under its control believe this ideology - in other words it's gotta brainwash them. Brain- washing means that there is no free thought on the part of the vast majority of the population, and if there is no free thought then all the other supposed `freedoms' we have (assuming that they genuinely exist) are meaningless. The issue is how to wake people up from their brainwashing. Oddly, the most brainwashed people tend to be the ones with the most power, with some exceptions. (This is not to say that the majority of people aren't brainwashed; they're just a little less brainwashed.) It occurs to me that even if a culture based on absence of authority, mutual and voluntary cooperation, respect for all, etc. is established there will be the urge to conform that there is in any culture. It won't be as bad as with a government, but people will still be pressured not to think too freely. Society has always actively participated in the brainwashing process, and I'm not sure that that is completely a reflection of government's nature, but possibly also of society's nature. The only solution is to include as a part of this culture the attitude that everything should be questioned, even one's most basic beliefs and convictions. I mean what's so great about freedom for all? It's just a concept of Western culture (even if it's only a ruse). Isn't it? Or does it have some deeper basis? The pressure to conform to society brings me to another point. In John Zerzan's article "Future Primitive" an idyllic picture is painted for us of the life of hunter-gatherers. While I am not disputing the facts Zerzan presents, there is evidence indicating that these people have a very different psychology than us. As products of capitalist culture we are raised to be individualists (even if it usually manifests itself in the form of selfishness, not free-thinking), but the hunter-gatherers, and many agriculturalists, are raised so that the individual is of very little importance. There is no pressure to act a certain way. It is instead ingrained deeply in the unconscious psyche to conform and obey the ruler (if there is one, which isn't always necessary). I don't know about you, but I don't find that particularly at- tractive. You aren't going to get free-thought that way. Then again traditional psychology could be completely misinterpreting things because of the selfish bias of our culture, and be unable to comprehend a truly anarchic culture. Hopefully your magazine will keep me from getting rebrainwashed while I'm at this institution of liberal indoctrination. I may well leave to keep that from happening and to hell with society's expectations. Peace, love, & anarchy, M.W., Middletown, CT. Don't trash the IWW Dear Anarchy, First let me say that I am very pleased with most of Anarchy. I really like most of the situationist stuff because it is important ideas that need to get out and you do a very good job in getting them out. That alone makes Anarchy an important part of the anar- chist press. The area that I do not agree with you is the IWW and the working class. To me anarchism is all about dealing with the oppressions of the people. Oppressions come in many forms, sexism, sexual oppression, racism, etc. The oppression of the working class is just as important as all the rest. Those of us who deal with the oppression of the working class are too often stereotyped as `workerists'. As a person who has been involved in working class struggles for 25 years let me tell you that I do not believe that the anarchist revolution will be just workers seizing their jobs. The paper that I have put out for 14 years, Bayou La Rose, proves the point. That brings me to what you said about the IWW and Earth First! [see Anarchy #34, p.68] The IWW is not opportunist for being involved in the ecology movement. First off the IWW was involved in ecology long before there was an Earth First! I have been involved in the IWW for 22 years and I have always viewed myself as a radical environmentalist. The first people I ever heard of taking radical actions to save the redwoods were IWWs in the late '60s and early '70s. Next, y'all always get down on us for only dealing with the working class but when we deal with other things we become `opportunists'. You cannot have it both ways. Next, from my viewpoint Earth First! people came to the IWW not the other way around. Next, there is no official alliance between the IWW and Earth First! What there is are joint members and support of common causes. I do not belong to Earth First! but I do support many of their actions and the joint work of IWWs and Earth First! in Northern Cal. I think it's very good. Though I am not a part of the Earth First!-IWW group, not always agreeing with them. Next, you keep hounding the "One Big Union" idea. Let me say that all within the IWW do not see this the same way. I believe that the One Big Union is the organized solidarity of the working class, not just one organization. I believe that most IWWs both past and present see it the same way. The fact is that the IWW has worked in solidarity with many other labor organizations throughout its history, the AIT being one such organization. The IWW is rather different than other left and anarchist organizations because the true organization did not come out of some book or `ism', rather it came from the experiences of ordinary workers. That is why it never really fit into anyone's correct line. You call its goals totalitarian, but that is a slam. Why is it that we workers must always suffer under the control of ideological elites who tell us that we cannot control our own lives? The IWW stands for worker-selfmanagement, direct action and rank and file control. Is it not authoritarian to tell workers that they cannot organize their own organizations and control their own lives? If workers cannot control their own lives in your new world who will be their new masters? You? I don not say that the IWW is the only way workers should organize. I also belong to WSA-IWA and the International Class War Federation. It may even come to be that workers organize outside of all these groups. What is important is that workers organize and struggle against their oppression and control their own struggle. If you cannot see this then maybe you should rethink your anarchism because if it leaves out working people then who does it include? I don't say you need to promote the IWW, just please quit trashing it. Outside of your anti-IWW words you put out a great paper. Leave the mud-slinging to the politicians and let us unite in the fight against all oppression. for the well-being of all, Arthur J. Miller Bayou La Rose POB 5464 Tacoma, WA. 98415-0464 Jason responds: Absurd accusations I never said or implied that the IWW is "opportunist for being in- volved in the ecology movement." It was the methods employed in initiating its involvement with Earth First! which I termed `opportunist', and they clearly were. From what I could observe, the IWW's `alliance' with Earth First! was undemocratically ma- nipulated by a relatively powerful faction of the organization which suppressed dissent. As far as I have seen as an outsider (though I admit I'm not an avid IWW watcher), this manipulation was never acknowledged from within the organization through its public voice, the Industrial Worker, despite the fact that many people, myself included, found the tactics and rhetoric used in announcing the `alliance' to be distasteful. However, this is merely one incident (of which I happen to be personally aware) of what Gianni Collu and Jacques Cammatte term `racket' behavior - which seems to be all too typical of most permanent organizations including leftist ones. I had no desire to single out the IWW for special criticism on this point. It just happens that I mentioned this incident in the footnote of a review dealing with anarchy and ecology. Then an IWW member wrote to com- plain, so I explained my position in a little more detail in re- sponse. However, each time I get another letter on this subject, the writers refuse to deal with my actual criticisms. Instead they accuse me of (or at least imply that I'm guilty of) all kinds of absurd things I have never said, like your suggestion that maybe I really want to be workers' "new master"! And since when does my original criticism of the "One Big Union" slogan mean that I "keep hounding the `One Big Union' idea"? You seem awfully sensitive about this! You may personally believe that "One Big Union" means "the organized solidarity of the working class," but that gives me little comfort. During the revolutionary years in Russia, many supporters of Lenin believed that the "dicta- torship of the proletariat" only meant the power of the proletariat and not the power of an elite over the proletariat. Their naive belief did no one any good regarding a slogan that explicitly contains a threat of totalitarian intent. Why should anyone think that a slogan like "One Big Union" means one big workers' self- organization, when it is far more likely in practice to result in one big elite-controlled organization. You ask, "Why is it that we workers must always suffer under the control of ideological elites who tell us that we cannot control our own lives?" I ask why people allow themselves to suffer under the influence of ideological elites who tell them that they must join their organization in order to do so! Bulgarian anarchists Hello anarchist friends, The Federation of Anarchistic Youth (F.A.M.) in Bulgaria numbers over two hundred people from a few localities. Our federation was established in June 1990. Here are our highlights of actions in the last three years: 1990 -June 11-18, barricades in the streets of Sofia against the elec- tion manipulations from the political forces. -July 3-Aug. 5, participation in "City of the Truth" against the communist president Petar Mladenov. -Nov. 7, demonstration by the monument of Lenin, against seventy years to beginning of the Bolshevik terror. -Nov., participation in the demonstrations against the Communist government. 1991 -January, demonstration at the USSR embassy against Soviet violence against Baltic countries. -May 1, meeting with over three hundred participants -June 2, procession in Sofia to the monument of Christo Botev, the first Bulgarian anarchist and national hero, who perished for the liberation of Bulgaria from Turkish power in 1876. -June 26, picket at Bulgarian DS (State Security) and subscription for Radionov and Nuznetzov, two young Russian anarchists who were arrested in Moscow in Feb. 1991. -Oct. 19, demonstration at British embassy in Sofia and presen- tation of a petition requesting release of all poll tax resistance prisoners. 1992 -May 19, anti-military rock concert at the Ministry of Defense for radical changes in Bulgarian army, reducing the time of military service and introducing an alternative civil service for con- scientious objectors. The Federation of Anarchistic Youth in Bulgaria wants to be in contact with anarchistic groups and organizations all over the world. If you like send us your periodicals, magazines, newspapers, newsletters, booklets, badges, cassettes with alternative music and other anarchistic materials. Our new address (temporary): F.A.M. c/o Antonio Grozdev 18 Nikola Slavkov Street Et. 3, Ap. 6 Sofia 1463 Bulgaria Southern California anarchist gathering Greetings, This is daren down here in San Diego giving you a report on the affinity so cal anarchist gathering that happened here in balboa park sept. 18th-20th so here goes. On friday night between 9 & 10 everyone shows up at the park & we all head on over to Soho cafe to go on an artwalk. There was a bit of confusion going down university ave. since people were walking well ahead of others who were postering leaving them exposed & unprotected which we quickly solved, going down park blvd. some lady confronted us about putting up these anti-amerikkkan posters & scurried away to call the cops on us! So we walked back down where we started along the back streets attacking a church, throwing around trash behind a post office, & bashing a mcdonalds drive through intercom along the way. Back at Soho we talked (well bragged actually) about what we did who broke what window then divvied up all the out of towners amongst the locals for a place to crash & left feeling good about the success of the first time in anyone's memory that the entire anarchist scene in so cal did anything as a group. Saturday morning on the 19th after eating breakfast so kindly provided by the riot grrrl's in north hollywood we conducted a meeting for the creation of a regional organizing web collective first thing we talked about was the artwalk the night before how we were lucky no body spent the night in jail since we were such a large & highly visible group of people & that if we should ever do this again we should be more prepared & more organized. It was decided that the Web zine should be produced by every group in the web, i.e. long beach would have for two months then san diego, u.a.f., etc. We were only able to squeeze in a couple of workshops on squatting in so cal, hemp before the show. A total of two bands flaked out on us so for a couple of hours after fire fighters for christ played who by the way are the only existing anarcho punk band in san diego we basically had to have an impromptu open mike free for all before a couple of jock hardcore bands played, oh ya & fire fighters for christ played preety dam good considering they were only a couple of weeks old. Food not bombs! Long Beach served vegan food for all the gatherers. The owners of cafe chabalaba made a big stink over some graffiti that some of us made which was kinda funny since there was already graffiti all over the bathrooms & the sidewalk. I guess they decided to single us out as the ones to clean it up since they didn't like it that the band we booked for them was bumping all over the tables, oh well. After the show we moseyed on up to the park's organ pavilion, everything was set with the dj as far as the rave went but he didn't have any equipment & the guy who was supposed to bring it didn't even bother to call us to let us know he couldn't make it which really sucked considering we had a lot of people waiting around for nothing. Sunday the 20th Anarchy drum parade & general wrap up was all that was started at 1:00 even though it was supposed to start at 12:00 but you all know how good of a reputation us anarchists have of being on time ha! We banged our pots & pans through the tourist section of the park yelling "Boycott Columbus Day!" which was kinda neat seeing the expressions on people's faces after seeing our black flags fluttering in the wind. "Oh look honey, real anarchists, take a picture before they get away!" We met up with the super sonic samba school on the other side of the park at pepper grove & then marched downtown to the pig whoops police station leaving behind some markered slogans. I thought the best part of the parade was these japanese tourists running out of mcdonalds asking what this was all about & then having to explain what anarchy meant, figure they'll have something interesting to tell their friends back home I guess. Then Food not Bombs had a potluck dinner at my house along with what was left of the gathering that didn't leave early. All in all the gathering was a real success, a lot was accomplished though some of the wymyn felt kinda left out of the meeting which of course was talked about & I hope solved. About 30 to 40 people were in attendance (depending which time of day you bothered to take a head count). Also by the time you read this we are organizing a black block at U.C. San Diego on the 30-31st to try & stop the administration's attempts to shut down the che cafe co-op, I'll keep you posted as to what happens with that & if anyone wants a copy of the first issue of the so cal web zine you can get it from Food not Bombs at p.o. box 4472, Long Beach, CA. 90804-0472 & you can of course con- tact us at our new address: SDAF POB 2111 San Diego, CA. 92112-2111 What introduced culture? Dear Y'all, John Zerzan has once again provided a fascinating contribution for Anarchy readers to ponder over ("Future Primitive" and the "Postscript," #33 & 34), not that Feral Faun isn't anything to sneeze at. I was absolutely stimulated by Zerzan's frontal attack on the myth that life has always been organized around hierarchy - work, patriarchy, anthropo-centrism, et al - that I just had to throw out a few comments and questions. The most recurring question that comes to mind after reading the main article is: what stimulated the need for `culture' (or art, language, and symbolism as Zerzan defines it)? I don't think he ever really deals with this although he does brilliantly point out that culture was developed/introduced to manage conflict and tension. But what was the source of the tension? Obviously, people in these various `communities' had ideas about reorganizing life around agriculture or male domination but why did tension occur? For there to have been tension, there must have been refusal of these plans of domination. If there was no refusal there would have been no need for implementing means of control and thus no need for `culture'. Zerzan asks this question but never offers a possible explanation. Let me suggest that maybe `culture' arose as a strategy for organizing refusal of the introduction of hierarchical organization around agriculture (and along with it work, patriarchy, ecological domination, etc.). Let's imagine - after all isn't this all about making hypotheses - that small groups of people in each of these groups attempted to assert domination in one or many of these ways but were suddenly confronted with the sudden appearance of verbal intonations that allowed one person to communicate and coordinate with others their rejection of these new ways. At the same time, others began to symbolize the threat to their way of life by carving or drawing as a way to engender outrage and revolt. It is possible to read "cultural artifacts" from these time periods as the use of symbols and language for defending their ways of living. Besides, to attribute the creation of culture to the forces of domination seems to give the forces of power and control too much credit for innovation and creativity. After all, does not domination - or the systematization of death - feed from the ingenuity and creativity of the living? To say that the forces of domination devised symbolism and culture is the equivalent to saying `entrepreneurs' succeed because of their own creativity and not the endless `creative' work of people which the entrepreneur then turns into the means for keeping them working. Their only innovation is using our creativity to keep us working. I am surprised that the possibility that `culture' may have been introduced as a way to fend off threats of domination never appears in the article, considering that Zerzan has spent years demonstrating and circulating our forms of refusal and autonomous struggle. Sure, these cultural activities may have become institutionalized as the means of control (as in the Venus figurines) but that does not preclude its constant reconstitution for purposes of struggling to defend their way of life. Zerzan offers us a concrete analogy to what he and others have been talking about for a while - creating new ways of living in the present that transcend work and other hierarchical forms of control. However, I'm puzzled as to why he does not draw a connection to new ways of living that already exist in the present, other than the last vestiges of these communities that attempt to do the same. After all, the title of his article is "Future Primitive." I think this is our greatest challenge: to demonstrate that we are already reorganizing the ways we live now in fulfilling, pleasurable ways. This is what Feral Faun, David King's letter, and Neal Keating's review of Outwitting the State all seem to suggest in issue #33 (way to go!). This also raises a disappointment I felt reading the "Postscript." My hope that he would return to examine such "futures in the present" was dashed as he laid out his blueprint to the day after the cataclysmic, `quick' revolution. While I completely agree that we need to destroy the domination of agriculture, work, etc., he completely fails to mention even one single example of struggle or Temporary Autonomous Zone that both refuses and transcends these forms of organization. Instead we find ourselves "obviously being held hostage by capital and its technology, made to feel dependent, even helpless, by the sheer weight of it all, the massive inertia of centuries of alienated categories, patterns, values," which all suddenly will be overthrown - by what?! If we are indeed so powerless, living "the whole canvas of damaged, alienated reality," surely Zerzan's own blueprint itself is highly unlikely. This does not even account for his assumption that everyone will have to grow food and that all cities will need to be leveled while we all wander the earth as nomads, as if we are not already capable of transforming cities into something beyond "life-destroying monuments to the same basic needs of capital." That some people may want to do some or all of the things he describes does not mean that we will all want to do them. To assume so would be to impose yet another form of domination upon us. Within the popular uprisings he mentions there are "strong feelings of joy, unity, and generosity" as well as a transcendence of racism, sexism, and "a sense of festival." But so do a countless number of other activities also exhibit many of these char- acteristics that illuminate future ways of living around our needs and desires rather than around work and domination. The challenge for us is to find or create them, and that is not easy if one has been raised on the left or anarchist fare of the myth of capitalism's all-powerfulness. Maybe we could introduce a frequent section about "futures in the present" such as bolos, free spaces, or temporary autonomous zones to learn from, get excited about and inspired by. We could further discuss the rapid rise of underground clubs /hangouts around the US, squats in Europe that are expanded into "community centers," self-publishers, hackers, cyberpunk sci-fi, scamming, so-called "informal sector activities," `community' and pirate radio, traveler hospitality networks, `hammocks', `slackers', electronic networks, refusal of work, free spaces being organized in the universities, etc. In jubilee, Robert Ovetz POB 49814 Austin, TX. 78765 John Zerzan replies: Division of labor I don't presume to have all the answers to questions occasioned by "Future Primitive," but here's a stab at responding to the two you raised, Robert. Very basic is the question, why the descent into symbolic life, what stimulated the need for culture in the first place? I can't see an explanation that doesn't involve division of labor as its fundamental, "bottom line" factor. As specialization evolved, with glacial slowness and unforseen consequences, so did a tendency, after time, to compensate for the erosion of non- symbolic modes. This compensation involved such steps as ritual, myth, and art, culminating in agriculture. With the arrival of domestication, a process whose first cultural step was apparently language reached fruition; the will to dominate had, from "very trivial causes acting without interruption," as Rousseau put it, completely altered our relationship to nature and to each other. Over a couple years, tiny changes were cumulative and somehow institutionalized; an unintended path to civilization, with its horrors and its culture that supposedly redeems it. The same division of labor that is overlooked today as an uninteresting banality, or fantastically developed, irreversible fact of (alienated) life. Secondly, and not unrelated, is the question, why not provide a look at "new ways of living," at least one example in the here-and- now that "both refuses and transcends" domination? The short answer is that there is none. While some living arrangements or ex- periments are more pleasant than others, none escapes the defining hold of a world never more alienated than today's. There is no place to hide, no way to pretend that life can co-exist with the global contagion in health or fulfillment. To argue otherwise is to argue in favor of the system that degrades and destroys. "Advanced Meaning" Let me express that I am extremely gratified to see an ongoing debate between S.C. and John Zerzan surrounding Zerzan's "The Catastrophe of Postmodernism." There is a debate, should be one, and I think this is one of the best I have read so far. I hope to attempt to commence not a rebuttal to either side in the present argument, but begin work on what I term a theory of "Advanced Meaning." Before I do, a word or two about `anti- intellectualism', which the commentator D.D. in Anarchy #34 makes a point about, as have others. Just let me say that I have been trained as a philosopher. During my stints with various `communist' organizations, I have encountered heavy anti-intellectual feeling. Oppression knows no bounds and government repression of intellectuals is one of its main features. Now I also agree that nothing gets done by armchairs, nor does muddling the facts by "mental masturbation" prove to be a revolutionary course. However, a good pitch for anti-intellectuals would be somehow to show an advancement beyond sheer intellectualism, and give physical evidence of how we can overcome "intellectual stumbling blocks." Because the last thing we need is Professional Revolutionaries telling us artists, etc. are not serving the `revolution', like what happened in all the Soviet and Sino-Communist Blocs, including Cuba. Having said that I must confess that I am not expert at all in the Poststructuralist mode of thinking. But I have been both a participator as well as a critic of Postmodernism. I plan to go beyond Postmodernism in my attempt at advancement. Possibly an `intellectualism' which makes use of real simplicity in its linguistic/semantic/philosophic approach would help. I must admit that I am no brighter in economic understanding for having read Habermas. Marx's economic writings, though long and tedious, are centered on very simplistic formulae; that Capitalists of all persuasions "make their grand living" by surplus value, or profit, which is garnished from each dollar made by each worker. The whole of all economic theory (any worth considering) rests upon this simple relationship; and look at the damage this `secret' of the Capitalists has caused! Life may not be simple itself. In fact I am convinced that it is pretty complicated, but approaching an understanding of life itself can start with simplicity. Much has been said of words. Radical pm-ers even sometimes insist on obliterating language itself, or creating new languages. We must stand at present realizing that both of these things have already been accomplished by the bourgeoisie. The obliteration of language is for totalitarian purposes. The new languages created can actually be used against the control experts. The former statement can be proven in Orwellian terms. Abstract concepts, for many, many people, mostly working class, or more appropriately the words that define abstract concepts, like Democracy, Communism, Capitalism, Socialism, Justice, Truth, etc., - `abstract' because they denote social and supralocal concerns, have been rendered meaningless through abuse. I have found great confusion with words like these. Like "Freedom is Slavery" in 1984, "Democracy is equated with the Capitalist System, wherever that system is. "Bourgeois Democracy" is twisted into a form of democracy when nothing could be further from any original definition of democracy, which would have to be rule by majority, and extensions even from that. We are taught in school that Greco- Athens was the "first Democracy." But it is easily proven that Athens was an oligarchy, rule by an elite Senatorial class. So doublespeak existed in the Ancient World. Must we fear long-term definitions? No, not if they correspond to something real! C.L.R. James, in one of the most important documents of the 20th Century, State Capitalism and World Rev- olution, scientifically proved, using informal logical progres- sions, that what was `Communism' in the Soviet Union was actually Capitalism by definition! The State, or Communist Party there sat back in the Soviet Legislative power buildings and got rich from surplus value. Also, they `updated' Marx's own works to create new meanings from different concepts. Should this be allowed? Can we change meaning so easily? Is this the same as a poetical `cut-up' from Brion Gysin? So many words in our languages are absolutely meaningless at this point of history that, as Zerzan admits, we are faced with a `postmodern' situation. Many words now mean the opposite of what they originally meant. Nothing is more dystopian than the 1984 scenario which exists all over the world now - totalitarianism is here now, well advanced. We are the "last humans" if we don't find a basis, a simple fundamental, that a world revolution can move on. Secondly, I claim that some of the new languages, like computer languages, can be used against control. For instance: INTERNET is a computer linkup that makes available the free transmission of ideas and information through computer networks. The danger lies in its being coopted by the control agents who run the big-business computer companies. Also, the "Symbol-languages" being used to literally talk to apes and dolphins are just revealing that an entirely new perspective of our world can be opened up by such communication. This will help us in our search for advanced meaning. Any word, or group of words, cannot originate from anything else than a concept or group of concepts. Concepts originate in the minds of human beings (probably animals too). Most actions/effects toward or on the world originate as concepts. There are `spontaneous' actions, such as slapping a child for something not approved by an adult, or even another child, but these actions are simultaneously constructed in the mind's `eye'. They cannot be divorced from biological processes which occur rapidly but are surely brain-functions. The mind acts itself concurrently with the body to produce a gestalt of objective/subjective conditions for action to take place. The pattern is mind=conception=action. This relation is not behavioristic, it is scientific in the original meaning of that word - verification of facts by observable and/or somehow provable principles. This basic pattern, provable in many ways, can be the launching pad for an advancement in human ontology. Harking back to Habermas, I learned more about economics in one of the best works on a different but related subject: John Logue's Toward a theory of Trade Union Internationalism. This work, available through Kent Press, in Kent, Ohio, is a shining example of using intellect to arrive at important conclusions. It is trimming excess mentality in order to get to the point. But it is not unintellectual in any way. In other areas, I have learned some things from the intellectually crowded writings of Albrecht Wellmer, especially in the area of debate on Postmodernity, namely The Persistence of Modernity. I can see where there is little time for smooth academic debates in a time of increasing revolutionary fervor. But it is true that a real threat to the ability to create a mass movement (desperately needed now) is the manipulation and desiccation of original conceptual language by those abusers of power who are presently in power all over the world. I plan to continue my political activism while at the same time attending to the intellectual pursuits of art and this "advanced meaning" philosophy I think can be developed. Anyone interested can contact me at the address below. I truly feel this will be an integral part of our `informed' revolutionary progress: a formulated, or reformulated, theory of communication developed from the trialectic I have proposed exists in all natural perception of the universe. Let's be present for the revolution, but be present informedly, or we run the risks of allowing our minds to be controlled by the tricksters and ruinators of language and communication. Gerry Sinfou 691 Kearny Avenue Kearney, NJ. 07032 Way confused Yo Anarchy, Thought of y'all today when I saw your rag reviewed in the Toronto Star. [...] The last Anarchy I perused was the one with the positive adult/child sex `evidence' article. A friend, who was sexually assaulted as a child, was quite angry at what he sees as a persistent failure on your part to discuss power relations in your `pro-sex' rants. I don't have the article with me to refer to, but I was reminded while reading it of something Fag Rag-ger Charley Shively wrote in his essay "Boy Lover Bakunin" about Bakunin's relationship with Nechayev: "As in so many man/boy love relationships, the boy is seldom a servant; indeed the man more often than not becomes the slave of the child." Granted, that's an analysis of a power relation, but it doesn't strike me as a particularly radical one and it doesn't deal with the very real ways in which adult men wield power over, in this case, children. I also think you're way confused - that is, Jason personally, elsewhere in the same issue - when you write of "anti-sexual abuse" as (one of?) the most pervasive forms of sexual abuse in `our' civilization. I understand what you mean by "anti-sexual abuse" but it seems like that term implies that there's such a thing as "pro- sexual abuse," as if all forms of abuse are not anti-sexual. And I'm going along with you here by using `sex' to denote an absolute good, although I do think that attitude should be questioned. But for the sake of argument, let's agree on two points: (1) sex is inherently liberatory, absolute good, positive end in itself; (2) there's no such thing as "pro-sexual abuse." To further clarify point (2), let's say that sexual abuse may be (`pro-') sexual for the abuser, but can only be anti-sexual for the victim(s). If we can agree on those two points, I have a hard time imagining how you can defend your use of the term "anti-sexual abuse." The distinction I would make between forms of sexual abuse is between physical abuse (i.e. violence) and psychic or mental abuse. Underlying both of these is the desire to control. I would put forced sex into the same category as spanking a child for masturbating, or playing `doctor' or whatever, and I would put emotional manipulation for the purpose of domination (other than in the context of mutually agreed upon S/M playfulness) in the category you put "anti-sexual abuse" into. I would also argue that while a distinction has to be made at some point, I see physical and psychic violence on a continuum. To put it another way, I feel that as pro-sex anarchists we should be anti-(sexual abuse) rather than anti-(anti-sexual) abuse on the one hand and anti-((`pro-') sexual abuse) on another. That may seem overly semantic, but the language we use affects the way we think and our ability to express our thoughts to others, and especially within a society in which all forms of sexual abuse are so wide- spread and sexxx is one of the biggest capitalist commodities around, we need to think before we talk about fucking liberation.[...] Li-ber-a-tion, T., Newmarket, Ontario Jason comments: The power of confusion Please excuse me if I suspect that your sexually assaulted friend isn't in actuality more worried about our failure to condemn child- ren's free sexual expression than he is about our alleged "fail- ure...to discuss power relations." The bottom line with the most of our critics seems to be that if we don't categorically condemn sex between people with some arbitrary difference in age, or sex per se before some arbitrary age, then we're the hopeless dupes of evil child molesters! As soon as people can calm down enough to start talking in non-absolutist terms about the subject, we'd be happy to deal with the question of power in more detail. As it is, however, that's a bit like asking a person you're clubbing to discuss the power relationships between people, when what s/he really needs to do is somehow convince you to stop clubbing her/him. As soon as people stop clubbing us with transparently authoritarian demands, the discussion of more subtle power differences will make a little more sense. I have to admit that "anti-sexual abuse" is not a very good term for the pervasive social problem I wanted to point out, although I don't agree at all with your reasons for disliking the term (nit- picking reasons at best). Since issue #33 appeared, I've decided that "sex-negative abuse" is probably the best term I'll come up with for it. Though no one will ever get public funding to study the question, I'll wager that in this country sex-negative abuse is more prevalent than what is usually termed sexual abuse, though it may well be less virulent on other continents. How many children were (and are every day) physically punished in some way for sexual behavior, intimacy or nudity? The question is simply not asked by `official' researchers. Still less has research been done on the mechanisms and techniques massively used to condition children to avoid and fear sexual contact, intimacy and nakedness, or even the sight and feel of their own bodies. I don't think there's any need to agree that "sex is inherently liberatory, absolute good, positive end in itself" as you say. At least, I don't think anything is inherently liberatory or abso- lutely good in itself. One might want to defend the freedom to eat if there were anti-eating zealots running around. But that wouldn't mean that we would thus have to think eating was inherently liberating or an absolute good. Neither do I think there is a need to worry that people are suddenly going to go around calling sexual abuse "pro-sexual abuse." You seem awfully squeamish about your terminology here. It is possible to be raped while feeling turned- on sexually just as it is possible to be abused while feeling sexual about the involuntary abuse. It does not make one any less a victim of assault whether one is physiologically aroused or not. Though people heavily conditioned to think of sex as dirty may well feel more personal guilt if there is some element of physiological excitement present. (And for those people waiting to pounce on my comments, no, I'm not suggesting that people enjoy being raped or abused, except, of course, when the terms `rape' and `abuse' are themselves abused for some ulterior sex-negative purpose, i.e. con- senting statutory `rape'.)