John Zerzan: On Modernity and the Technosphere

Please Note: I now post to a new channel called Essential Dissent: tinyurl.com/yxz8ehks
Binghamton University; April 2, 2008
John Zerzan is a prominent proponent of primitivism (aka green anarachy).
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[@OVOCVideos]

I didn't have good audio for the questions, so I omitted them. No sense making people sit through inaudible portions. But in most cases you can infer the questions from the answers. I'm glad you enjoyed the video.

[@youliantroyanov2941]

so much hate sent to a man, who sees way more clearly than the most... regrettable... why are the best people in society vilified? how does that even work?

[@geenovatore3787]

+youlian troyanov who sends him hate? :

[@coolworx]

How does that work? “Truth is treason in an empire of lies.” ~ Orwell

[@heathermariegaming]

Because he's clearly stating problems that are unsustainable and people don't like his solutions.

[@erichimes5042]

John is such a damn cutie.

[@Alter_Ego247]

So are you Max.

[@esldave]

My Chinese student described Los Angeles "a small town" like a suburb of Shanghai; she said it as if the fresh air (of which there isn't much!) would be a bad thing. A mark of primitivism.

[@babyinvasion]

I came here because I study criminology and Adam Lanza looooved John Zerzan. So weird how the video started speaking about school shootings in detail! This is intense. I wish everyone paid attention.

[@vpatel12]

john z for president

[@JimmyR0b0t]

+Vinil Patel Great comment :D

[@brentisone]

very good man

[@MrLovethelife]

Thanks for the upload, was really fascinating! Wish he would come to London. Any chance you know what the questions were? If so could you please add them in the "About", cheers! :)

[@skstan1965]

43:00 John we do need an X, Y, Z, a blueprint, green anarchist groups, ways for people to tap into this, best way is to tap into the groups already out there, Zen, Yoga, Eco-activist, Temples.

[@hosseinturner3792]

Zerzan is certainly an interesting and insightful person, even though I strongly disagree with him on certain issues.

[@TheQuackingExodus]

Road Philosopher dick and balls.

[@prucotton792]

Indeed what? He is very hard to disagree with

[@maddoxcaiden3510]

i realize I am quite randomly asking but does anyone know a good place to stream new series online?

[@jeromebenedict2084]

@Maddox Caiden flixportal :)

[@maddoxcaiden3510]

@Jerome Benedict Thanks, signed up and it seems like a nice service :D I appreciate it !

[@EugenTemba]

Based anprimdaddy

[@MrLovethelife]

indeed, good point. I guess when it's on the internet we're too removed from the actual real life situation! ;) I'm not aware of any type of philosophy like Zerzan's in England....really wish i did!

[@mverobeach1]

lol. he said, "post-industrial, well its post-everything nowadays". I've noticed that too. Post-industrial, post-left, post-structuralist, post-modernist, post-feminist, Post-Honey-Bunches of Oats. Why is the prefix "post-" always needed for radical ways of looking at things? When did this phenomenon start?

[@peterfrancis9725]

You sit up there with your thoughts and make every word exact and pedantic, turd.

[@mverobeach1]

Peter Buksa Turd? LOL Well I think you're just a big doo-doo head!

[@liamoneill7139]

when the new orthodoxies began to be worshipped in the rational, post-enlightenment age. If people reached their conclusions through what felt like a rational pursuit, they can have serious difficulty accepting those viewpoints contain any irrationality. A lot of these post this post that ideologies actually retain a lot of the values they nominally claim to sweep away by adopting such general descriptions

[@kimfreeborn]

I was hoping for something along the lines of a Philosophy of Technology. It's not here.

[@samsteers8504]

Who is John Galt?

[@samsteers8504]

@Joanna d'Arc Wrong

[@crypto-radio8186]

John Galt was the psychopathic monster in Ayn Rand book, He advocated (She advocated) genocidal remove of poor people, Ayn Rand copied Adolph Hitler's train of thought. The poor and crippled should be killed, they are leeches .

[@olaftheodor]

To eric piteau; not sure what you mean by moral philosophy. no group of academics going to come up with a philosophy that everyone will agree with. people may come to their own conclusions sooner or they may be forced to change because of a collapse. the transition movement seems the best idea but seems to have come to a bit of a standstill. it's like an addiction, we keep wanting just one more. you talk about proper social policies? who is going to agree on what is proper. how can we limit the influence of the rich who have a vested interest in keeping things the same?the French revolution was based on having a new, modern rational way of running things. socialism and Nazism had rational modern proper social policies. you can't just hope for some new system to come along. the common flaw is control and all that requires. you've got to start thinking about what all these seemingly abstract ideas require before throwing them around. technology, civilization, enlightenment, none of them are neutral forces. they are radical and destructive ideals that we will kill the planet trying to realise.

[@edclear9215]

Anarchy is not incompatible with technological advancement, quite the opposite really. The greater the technological advancement, the greater the possibility of worldwide anarchy. For when machines do the work, we humans can do what we really should be doing, enjoying life rather than struggling to live. Certainly as things are, technology is used against everyone, but that is abuse of rather than the inherent nature of. Certainly when people are out working 8 - 12 hours per day, relationships suffer, and superficiality takes place of depth and actual connection. We're going to continue the technological age until we reach maturity, and let's face, we are at the baby stage. So let's find the balance, rather than just fall over and never get up again. We are completely interdependent, with our own kind, and more so, with nature as a whole. That's all we have to realize, then we'll begin to act accordingly. What we need is anarchy, and that will have to be everyone agreeing at once. Just as John Zerzan pointed out, mass shootings are a consequence of the lack of proper care for the mentally unstable being allowed to wander the streets pumped full of mind altering drugs. This whole society is mentally unstable. People seeking power is a mental aberration, a delusional state. So there's work to do with one another for one another. Technology used as it ought to be used is an advancement of our own power, just as building an eco house is a huge step up from living in a cold damp draughty hovel with only an open fire for heat/cooking. We can all live in a perfect home, grow and produce our food locally, enjoy world travel. First step is to get beyond the delusion of ownership. Then we'll develop real clean technology; some of which already exists, much of which is as yet suppressed due to the need for profit. Money is an extension of ownership, and money is another form of control, of oppression. Without ownership or money those interested in developing what technology are not restricted by the limitations of money, of resources. It's the same as everyone having free clean electricity, that would lift every restriction from your own life in the way of heating, cooling, eating, etc. Before taking the first step tho, we have to wake up to what we are. Is it human nature to be selfish, to be so self centred that we are actually a destructive force to ourselves as well as others and the very planet which gives us everything necessary for our life. Just consider any disaster or emergency, people drop what they're doing and rush to the aid of others. So why can't we be selfless all the time, acting for one another with one another. That is what real co-operation is about... giving. When you give, someone gets. When someone gives, you get. So on one is left out, there is no lack, there is no better than you, me first, etc. So are we ready for a new way of life, where we all live with one another, for one another? Are we ready to let go of all forms of control, of domination, of destruction?

[@mindthesynapticgap4909]

Radlib

[@Twobirdsbreakingfree]

Ed, you're mistaken. You can't have technology with anarchy. Technology can only be produced in a tightly controlled, enslaved society, as people need to be moulded into nerds and specialists and technicians from a young age, and domesticated for such technologies to be manufactured. Your long-winded comments are based on a fallacy that is obscuring your vision and making you incapable of seeing the solution.

[@blake763]

I find the issues interesting, but I just wanted to comment to say that oil is not rapidly running out as Zerzan said around 34 minutes. We have more oil than ever because we keep finding more. As fossil fuel use increases, our fossil fuel resources counterintuitively increase as well.

[@Dezzreck]

yeah it's not like fossil fuels will ever run out or anything...

[@blake763]

You have a rather low reading comprehension don't you?

[@whatabouttheearth]

but population has grown from 1 billion in 1800, to 2 billion in 1900, to 7.5 billion now....plus our information technology has expanded in ability and accessibility. I dont think there really is a difference except population, hyper stimulation and modern advanced information technologies. our perception of some events in human civilization are bloated more than what is real due to that change in media, population and information

[@edwardlouisbernays2469]

@ed clear: The problem isn't as simple as going into the wilderness, as someone has claimed ownership of every inch of this planet. Nor do we have to take a step backward to what was. A tribe is a city, just a small version. Really? And what State Mental Asylum did you escape? Is this why you Love the American 'Way?" #From the time Europeans arrived on American shores, the frontier-the edge territory between white man’s civilization and the untamed natural world-became a shared space of vast, clashing differences that led the U.S. government to authorize over 1,500 wars, attacks and raids on Indians, the most of any country in the world against its indigenous people. By the close of the Indian Wars in the late 19th century, fewer than 238,000 indigenous people remained, a sharp decline from the estimated 5 million to 15 million living in North America when Columbus arrived in 1492. The reasons for this racial genocide were multi-layered. Settlers, most of whom had been barred from inheriting property in Europe, arrived on American shores hungry for Indian land-and the abundant natural resources that came with it. Indians’ collusion with the British during the American Revolution and the War of 1812 exacerbated American hostility and suspicion toward them. Even more fundamentally, indigenous people were just too different: Their skin was dark. Their languages were foreign. And their world views and spiritual beliefs were beyond most white men’s comprehension. To settlers fearful that a loved one might become the next Mary Campbell, all this stoked racial hatred and paranoia, making it easy to paint indigenous peoples as pagan savages who must be killed in the name of civilization and Christianity.

[@bogtrotter5110]

John, the solution is simple. Begin to live the life you espouse. Get out of Eugene and into the wilderness, while there is some left. You can only be happy in the kind of life your two and one half million year genome requires. And that ain't the city.

[@edclear9215]

The problem isn't as simple as going into the wilderness, as someone has claimed ownership of every inch of this planet. Nor do we have to take a step backward to what was. A tribe is a city, just a small version. So idealistic fantasy is not the answer. What we need is to adjust the focus, find the balance. Technology aids our lives, just as a stone axe did for those many millennia ago. It is the use of technology, it is our whole relationship with such, and it is our whole relationship with this planet which needs to be addressed and acted upon. Technology can actually bring about anarchy as it will free us from the many delusions we suffer at present, ownership of land and resources, enslavement in the form of going to school, then into a job, then into the grave. All we need do is co-operate with one another, co-operate with our environment. That way we will maximize the benefits of having a mind!

[@ericpiteau50]

I agree with the problems. But I don't see how it will be possible to solve them without science and technology. The population is too great now to just expect everyone to go back to the land. The issues are political and philosophical issues, and will only be solved with moral philosophy and proper social policies.

[@MyDenis0]

hahahaah the basic natural inclinations got us where we are now, these same natural inclinations will get us back..

[@bogtrotter5110]

The population is too great? Yup, that is THEEE number one problem on planet earth and yet we blame all else for our predicament.

[@RichRich1955]

Silly to think billions of people could become hunter/gatherers now. The wild animals would be wiped out in a month and people would start eating each other. Zerzan is a fraud. He sells what it takes to sell books and make some money.

[@RamiroEloy1997]

Trust me there's PLENTY of room. Everyone just lives in cities now due to mass farming, mass manufacturing and dependence on money.

[@centuryt7043]

Irony Man: He has the ability to hold anarcho-primitivist views while using eye glasses and a microphone. Special powers include cognitive dissonance, willful ignorance, and depression.

[@MrLovethelife]

Anarcho-primitivism, generally speaking, does not argue for a sudden or a personal boycott of technology. It agrues for the transition towards a more sustainable/primitivist way of doing things, without a state or governance. Although a personal boycott of Civilization can be done (and i recommend it, even from this youtube comment ;) ) isolated eco-villages or personal privileged choice will not stop capitalism and mass society. Hence why Anarcho-primitivists, remain agitating! Whilst it's a lovely thing to do, ultimately it's almost useless. Does that make any sense?

[@centuryt7043]

MrLovethelife Nothing would lead to more oppression, fear, ignorance, suffering, and inequality than giving up society as we know it and transitioning to a more primitive state.

[@MrLovethelife]

CenturyT If the transition was carried out with authority, then yea absolutely it would be terrible. The transition could only really happen after an anarchist revolution of some description. Stopping of work, production and mass society as we know it. I argue that our current society is full of oppression, fear, inequality etc .It's already happening. Civilization and capitalism is built on these traits. That's why a sustainable, horizontal transition is needed, before the entire system collapses just like it always does.

[@MrLovethelife]

CenturyT Darwin did not mean survival in the fittest in that sense, as in everyone against everyone. SOTF was all about the weakest dying off kinda thing. There's heaps of evidence that shows that co-operation between animals is needed for their very survival. From penguins keeping each other warm, from birds living amongst lions for mutual benefit etc. Just read about symbiosis and then you'll see it happening everywhere in nature. Anarcho-primitivism has already been practiced and it's pretty much been the only sustainable way of doing things. In Paleolithic times it's thought that there was no war (only individual disputes), little disease, almost no work and a full community that lived in harmony with the earth! Hmm capitalism that is destroying the globe at rapid rate where competition, war, greed is a common occurrence or anarcho primitivism...... I know which one i prefer the sound of! :) If you ever get the chance, maybe you already have, i recommend going camping in the wild! It's amazing.

[@MrLovethelife]

CenturyT I wouldn't go as far as saying violence was rampant, especially in the grand scheme of things. Mainstream anthropology reveals that primitive societies were often egalitarian with a communist nature. There are still examples of these structures today. I recommend reading stone age economics, i think you'll be in for a surprise.