The Adventures of Urban Scout

The following stories about so-called anarchists come from completely subjective experiences that I have had (and a few others), with particular anarchists over a period of time. I do not mean to insult all those who label themselves as anarchists, but question the label when I have seen the culture or scene of “anarchists” act thusly.

In Your Face, Tre Arrow

My first experience with the anarchist scene came at 17 when I organized a monthly independent film screening. I approached the “Liberation Collective,” the center for political activism in Portland before the joint-terrorism task force intimidated them into oblivion, to see if they would host the event. They said they would, penciled it in on their calendar and I left. I made fliers. I invited people. Things you do when a venue gives you the green light. The night of the event I showed up a little early to set up the VHS video projector my buddy and fellow organizer Bill checked out from the Lake Oswego library. They said, “We have something else happening here tonight.” I told them, “No… You wrote it on your calendar..?” They looked at it. “Nope. Says right there, ‘Vegan Recipe Exchange Night.’” (Haha, not really, but something like that, you know) “This makes no sense,” I said. “I spoke with you, and you wrote it on there.” I looked at the calendar and saw that someone had erased my event and written over it. “Someone else must have written over it…” He said, “Sorry. Hey do you know about Martial Art?” I looked at him. “I took Taekwondo for a couple years, but everyone knows it sucks.” “No. I mean, two doors down exists an anarchist art collective called Martial Art. I bet if you asked them they would let you do it there.”

You can see what happened next. We moved in. Not intentionally, not literally, but indefinitely to Martial Art. We had about 8 months of screenings there, in the basement. We chose the basement because it had more of that “fight club” feel. We asked for donations and gave them to the anarchists to help pay their rent.

My singer-songwriter friend Nicholas released an album and, because we had a nice relationship with Alex (the anarchist who lived there the most?), held the release party there. This happened during the time of the 2000 election, and Nicholas and I heavily involved ourselves in the Green Party in Portland. Tre Arrow, who at that time people knew for his famous stunt of squatting on the 9 inch ledge of Portland’s Forest Service building, ran for house of representatives under the Green Party. We worked with him a bit and became good acquaintances. Nicholas asked him to play at his release party and he obliged.

I noticed Alex had a video camera out, taping the party. I thought that looked pretty weird, but whatever. Then during Tre’s performance, a masked anarchist came running out of the back and pied Tre in the face, only to dash out the door and down the street. Everyone looked confused. Some people laughed, thinking we had planned it out, others not so happy. Alex pretended indifference, but I know he staged it for the purpose of the video. What a fucking asshole. Tre wiped his face off and asked people to have love in their hearts (god he acted like such a hippie!). Than he finished his set. I never talked to any of those people at “Martial Art” or the “Liberation Collective” ever again.

Why did they pie him? It just seems so fucking easy. So fucking lazy. Though Tre tried to work the system, he still had better intentions than any fucking politician. You don’t see me running for office… or voting. But you also don’t see me pieing the nice guy in the face so I can show my friends the video while we all have a circle jerk. “Last one who comes has to eat it!” Don’t we have bigger fish to fry? Don’t you have more clever ways of fucking the system than pieing the nice guy on your turf? Ironically, Tre now sits in a prison cell awaiting trial for allegedly destroying logging equipment (though I believe the government had him framed), while those anarchists most likely still do nothing of interest.

Derrick Jensen and Laughing Horse Books

The first time I brought Derrick Jensen to Portland I made a deal with my friends at the Looking Glass Bookstore to sell his books. I have had a long relationship with the Looking Glass Bookstore; for years they donated one book a month for Mythmedia to give away as a prize at our independent film screening. Of course, I thought this looked like a great way to help pay them back, by bringing in business directly to them. Give support, get support.

At the event I saw some people set up some books at a table connected to the food table. I thought perhaps Disjecta, the venue where I held the event, had set up a little bookstore. When I asked and discovered that they did not come from Disjecta, but Laughing Horse Books (an alleged anarchist bookstore) I couldn’t believe they would have the nerve to show up and set up shop without asking the organizers of the event. I apologized to Looking Glass Bookstore, and had my Muscle Man (Tony Deis) kick those assholes to the curb.

Just because we believe in “no government” does not mean we believe in “no boundaries.” “No boundaries” turns into, “we can do and take whatever we want.” This leads to the sense of entitlement we see so often. So like black-clad neo-hippies (”It’s all good man”), so-called anarchists continue to waltz all over anyone in their path. It looks completely narcissistic. They would rather protest and create more dissension than create a mutually supportive relationship. They go straight for the gun rather than a handshake. I have a boundary; I don’t like it when people insult me. If you insult me, I will not make you a friend. All humans have boundaries like this. Other-than-humans have boundaries like this. Especially ones who do not engage in oppressive relationships where abusers and masters get to set the boundaries for others. This shows us that most anarchists’ mentality lacks understanding of indigenous social technologies. They think that “Fuck the System” means, “Fuck All Systems.” It doesn’t. Many systems work in a non-hierarchical manner. Mutually beneficial relationships we see in nature all the time, even between predator and prey.

A handshake, even with a CEO, can benefit the community of life. As long as if by “shaking hands” you mean “working together to dismantle and rewild.” I can feel comfortable shaking hands and making a deal with a CEO if the deal involves dismantling civilization and re-encouraging biodiversity (though I have a hard time seeing any way for that to happen). For example Looking Glass Bookstore refers to a business that sells books. Nothing really anti-civilization in that, unless you leverage the sales of anti-civilization literature. Of course, Looking Glass Bookstore operates as a family business, not some mega-corporation. But I could use Barnes and Noble to the same effect. So you can deal with companies in civilization as long as you leverage them to the advantage of the natural world (against civilization itself). So when I say shaking hands I mean rekindling supportive, mutually exclusive relationships for humans and other-than-humans alike. That builds community.

All quality relationships happen through courtship. If Laughing Horse had come to me and said, we’d really like to sell books at the Derrick event, I would have said, “I already have a bookstore. Perhaps we can find a way to work together in the future?” Because I already have the niche filled with personal relationships at Looking Glass Bookstore, I don’t need what they have to offer. If they wanted to have a relationship in my community, they need to court me first. If I didn’t have a pre-existing relationship with Looking Glass Bookstore, I may have taken Laughing Horse up on their offer. I mean, they espouse anarchist values… At least I thought they had real anarchist actions. Well, now I know better. Instead of created a relationship they destroyed one before it ever began by crossing my boundary without asking, without apologies.

It works with speakers too. If I want to bring Derrick Jensen to town, I need to court him. Find out his fees, possibly match or give him more than he asks. Pay for his travel, food and hotel. Make sure he remains protected against barnacles that try to attach themselves to him while in Portland. To really make a quality relationship, you give people what they deserve and then some. As we see with the predator/prey relationship, the predators actually give back more to their prey in the end than they take. The same works for any kind of relationship building.

Thirsty For Some Zerzan

I went to see my friend John Zerzan speak at Reed College a while back. First off I noticed that he had no water. Not in a cup, not in a bottle. Nothing. This guy will talk for a while, he’ll need water. I learned while working as a production assistant in TV commercials that most people will say no when you ask them if they’d like water. Instead of just getting him water, like I should have done, I asked him aloud in front of everyone so the organizers who may have forgot would remember. “John, would you like some water?” I asked. “Oh, no thank you.” He replied. I looked to see in the organizers would jump up and bring him some. No one moved. I got a little irritated.

John showed us a cool video someone made that includes an interview with him. Afterward he plugged some of his books that he set up on a table and some issues of Green Anarchy Magazine. He said, “I’ve got some books over here for sale. I know you Reedies are real rich.” Now, you could take this several ways. Immediately the Reedies bodies locked up defensively as if to say, “How dare you mention our privilege. We would throw it all away if we could!” I wondered how John had meant it. In my head I heard him say, “I know you Reedies come from wealthy backgrounds and can afford to support me.” I didn’t see anyone buy any books from him, but I may have just missed it during the mingling afterwards.

At this point John and I had only spoken over the phone on his radio show a few times, and I felt excited to meet him in person. Afterward I approached him and said, “Hey John! Urban Scout.” He replied, “Oooooh. Nice to meet you.” We shook hands. He said, “Thanks for coming. Yeah. Hey, could you give me a ride to the bus station?”

What the fuck? Reed College, a college full of rich kids (not derogatory) can’t scramble together a ride to the Bus station for a guest they brought up from Eugene. No water? No ride? I guess that means nothing to eat either, and probably a shitty fee for talking (though I don’t know the details). This man has legendary status in my book. His works have changed my life and he deserves respect and care. Thank goodness Willem had borrowed his mom’s car and driven us there. On some level it worked out better than had Reed College taken care of the ride because Willem and I got to take him out for a drink afterward and talk with him before he got on the bus back to Eugene. He never asked anything of them, only once he suggested that they support his works. Someone needs to do an infoshop on the proper way to court people and build mutually beneficial relationships, before they start bringing people to town.

Indymedia Anarchists

I brought Derrick Jensen to Portland again in December of 2007. I printed posters and posted them up around town, and my friends Theresa and Norris did the majority. I noticed the next day that someone had gone down Alberta and taken down most of the fliers. I lamented over this and thought it may make a good post for indymedia people. I wanted people to take up arms over this. Why would someone do this? A Greenie Hater? An FBI agent? I wanted answers and I thought indymedia would work to get a hot tip into what happened.

Boy did I make a mistake. After posting the article several anarchists (or perhaps just one reoccurring asshole posting under different names) started pledging to tear down the posters in “protest of the cover,” which I had placed at $15 tickets, $18 door. Many people think that cost looks to high, while many other feel the cost looks reasonable. Whatever you think, tearing down posters does not seem like a way of furthering any kind of anti-civilization thought.

Why not call me and ask if you can get in for cheaper? Why not offer to volunteer? Why not find a way to support the event and get in? When people get things for free, they take them for granted. People who put energy into something know just how much it ‘costs.’ People who get things for free have no understanding of it… People who will pay $15-$18 actually care. When I worked at Coffee People a gutter punk came in 5 times a day to trade in his change for bills. He made about $80 a day panhandling. I made about $62 in an 8 hour shift ($6.50 an hour and about $10-15 in tips). I don’t mean to say that everyone makes that much panhandling, but that pretty much anyone can scrounge up $15 for an event if they believe in the worth that the organizers put on it. This comes back to the entitlement mentality of anarchists, “I can go wherever I want, without having to contribute anything!”

Just because you put a high price on something, does not make you a capitalist. Capitalism does not mean “making money.” Capitalism refers to making more money than you need at the expense of others. High prices do not mean capitalism. For example, locally hand-made clothes have a much higher value than cheap clothes made by slave-labor in a foreign country. Why? Because the capitalist pays slave wages so they can lower the price to sell more clothes and out compete the non-capitalist who charges their worth.

Derricks Story

While all the indymedia bullshit happened, Derrick shared this story over at his discussion forum and he gave me permission to repost it here:

I used to have a tiny bit of sympathy for that position of people not being able to pay to get in, but I lost most of that when I did an event for an anarchist conference years ago where I didn’t get paid and they didn’t even cover my travel or anything. I paid my own gas to drive up. I paid for my own meal. I was hoping to sell some books to recoup some of the loss, but I sold precisely zero. Nobody even helped me clean up afterwards. So I’m cleaning up and muttering about the lousy cheapskates and the one person still remaining heard me, and said, “They’re really poor, and so don’t get too upset.” Okay, I thought. That’s fine. I asked where I could get a meal before I drove home. It was late at night, and the only place open was a bar. I went to the fucking bar to get a meal, and guess what I saw? All of those fucking anarchists with pitchers of beer in front of them. They don’t have money to buy a book, but they sure as hell have money for beer. And I’m sure pot, too. I’ve seen that so many times. It gives me zero sympathy for those arguments.

And there’s this overwhelming sense of entitlement. They somehow think that I don’t need to make a living, and they somehow think that just because Scout put in all the work of putting this together, that they should get to skate in for free. And where were they when it came to putting up posters? Oh, sorry, I guess they’re busy somewhere else. They have the time to take down the posters, but do they have time to actually work to promote the event? Of course not.

I’ve had anarchists get furious with me (and in one case even threaten me) because I wouldn’t give them carte blanche to make copies of my books (the person had a friend at Kinko’s who would copy the books for free). It’s all very frustrating to me. I just don’t get it.

This is not a blanket dismissal of all anarchists. I’ve met many cool ones. I like John Zerzan, for example. And I’ve met some great ones at my talks. But there is a certain set that is just brimming with this sense of entitlement, that everyone OWES them the evening.

And I’ve said this to my friends, but I’ve not said it here, at least recently, but I’ve found that if I don’t charge for me to come do a talk, the organizers do a shitty job of promotion, and they treat me with disrespect. It happens almost every time. If they’re paying me, then they promote it, and they treat me well. Even when I do benefits now, I force the organizers to pay me something, just to make sure that they don’t forget to promote it.

Feral Blindness

At my Rewild Camp Portland a few so-called anarchist kids showed up. They mostly complained about how shitty Feral Vision, the green anarchy gathering, had felt to them. They told us the police showed up and scared people into leaving and the event fell apart. This one kid dressed in tight torn black clothes, classic black bandanna around his neck and perfectly placed cliche dirt smudges on his face. He began to talk about how he had prepared all kinds of lectures on infrastructural targets and the like. Than he began to talk shit on my friend, Derrick Jensen.

The conversation began because I mentioned Tom Brown Jr. and made a joke about how he drives a hummer, and it feels stupid that people care about that. They didn’t get the joke, but changed the sudject and said, “You know Derrick Jensen drives a hummer.” I thought the kid had made a joke. I laughed hard, knowing that the hummer rumor had turned many people off to Tom Brown Jr. But then I saw they meant it and I stopped laughing.

What a cool anarchist. He totally knew the inside scoop on Derrick Jensen, ohmygod, how cool! The accusation of Derrick driving a hummer works as a strawman, created by and for anarchists who have no real grasp of the anti-civilization philosophy. For example, I don’t see a problem with an anti-civilizationist driving a hummer. If Derrick did drive a hummer, so what? The first thing that comes to my mind reflects something Derrick wrote about toilet paper; don’t feel guilty about using toilet paper simply recognize that if you use toilet paper, you must make an agreement to take down commercial logging (ala Weyerhauser). Similarly, if you drive a hummer you have made the commitment to take down the automobile industry.

Tom Brown Jr. does drive a hummer. So what? To reach and teach the number of people he does, he makes a thousand trips to the Pine Barrens every year. The Tracker School destroyed several suburbans because the sand kicked up into the engine. The Hummer company heard of this and said to Tom Brown, “We will give you a free hummer if you put your name on the side of it.” So Tom Brown used the hummer company to leverage expenses for the Tracker School. His hummer reads “The Tracker” on the side of it and the Tracker School saves money. This works like a good example of working with corporations to leverage anti-civilization mythology and actions.

People also get on Tom Brown for training the military. I can’t help but think about how animist philosophy permeates everything Tom does, and having him teach empathy to the military probably works in our favor. Though I would never do it, I don’t knock it. I wouldn’t think any less of Derrick Jensen if he did his stand-up tragedy routine at a USO show in Baghdad. We need it all, everywhere.

Unfortunately we packed up the camp early and left the park. I wanted to stay and chat more with these kids but everyone else felt pooped. I never did get to hear about his alleged “infrastructural targets,” but the more I think about it, it appears it had more to do with looking/sounding cool than anything else. Later in the week a really nice anarchist showed up, not in the classic dirty black, and said that he had a great time at Feral Visions in spite of “the lack of solidarity from a few anarchists who got scared away by the cops.”

My Secret Anarchist Friend

I have a secret anarchist friend. He knows the people who attacked me on indymedia. We chat through e-mail from time to time. I have jeopardized our friendship and his position in that subculture by merely writing about him here. He sends me secret notes of solidarity and lamenting of the scene. This person shows me that not all anarchists act like assholes. But the fear and secrecy of our dialog makes it clear that the anarchist scene has major issues at least in Portland.

Anarcho-Middle-School-Cafeteria

This story comes from my friend Rebecca (AKA Silver Arrow) from the Rewild.info forums. Who shared this story with us:

Seattle Food Not Bombs had a benefit recently. As far as I know, people were willing to pay the $10 suggested donation; money was not an issue. But socially, the whole thing felt weird. Like a high school cafeteria. I have to conclude that Seattle “anarchists” (these days) need to get over their personal issues before they can even begin addressing larger ones.

At one point I opted to break out from the kitchen for a bit, and eat. I knew hardly anybody there, but I happened to get in line behind someone I had met before. I initiated a conversation w/ her, and she seemed to want to talk, but as soon as she had all of her food she said quickly, “Well it was great to talk with you” and whisked herself off to her friends’ table. That was a pretty obvious cue that she just didn’t want to have anything to do with me socially. So I looked around the room for someone else I knew, even slightly, and there was no-one. I found an empty chair at the end of a table, right next to a small group of people, and asked if I could sit; out of politeness-reflex they said “yes” and went back to their conversation. A couple minutes later a guy passed me a little illustrated flyer with an address/date on it. I said, “Oh, is this for a party?” He said, “Yeah, it’s to celebrate a new issue of her zine” (pointing to his friend). I said, “Congratulations,” and–oh, I don’t know–probably something about the way I said it (I believe it could be described as “warm and friendly”) caused them to freeze up awkwardly. As though being nice was just. too. mainstream. (I also should add here that I am a very “clean-cut” believer in anarchy. The way I see it, I’m “well disguised.” The way they saw it, I’m a schmuck because I don’t dress like them. Who’s the schmuck??!)

What I experienced at that table and in that food line was not anarchy. It was hierarchy plain and simple, and not only that, it was childish. Despite their “desire” (?) to be otherwise, those people are still very much shackled to hierarchy and hide behind an appearance, hoping nobody will have the guts to look any deeper. I wanted to get to know people, and they reacted with fear! What the hell do they have to hide? (Oh well, FNB raised some much-needed funds in the end.)

I think that there are way too many people who can understand anarchy in the abstract, but who cannot understand what it means to them personally and to their behavior. In anarchy, you fight from a feeling of love, not the other way around! So many people shit on the word when they use it as justification for being an asshole. It comes from mass media images, I think. Sure, anarchists are often angry, but an angry person does not an asshole make.

Anarchy Police

Coincidentally while writing this I received this e-mail from an anarchist who commonly contribues to Green Anarchy Magazine, whom I have never once spoken with:

Scout,
You and the other ‘primitivist’ bloggers are fucking douche bags. I’ll give you credit for having a sense of humor (as opposed to your bedmates Ran and Godesky), but then you err on that side. Trying to make rewilding just some new hipster shit is pathetic. You’re selling yourself and no one who will still be around in a few years will have bought it. Benefits for fucking fashion shows and dance parties? I imagine you might mean well, appealing to other hipsters or what-the-fuck ever, but you’re only making a mockery of yourself. Perhaps that’s your intent? Urban Scout is, after all, just a character right? Fucking PATHETIC. The rantings, daily affairs, and love life of a fringe blogger do not constitute a primitivist site. The sooner you realize that the better off we’ll be when the hype fades and y’all stop trying to co-opt valid shit.
For wildness and ANARCHY,

Meany McMeanpants, Anarcho-po-po

I don’t really know why someone would go out of their way to send a horrendous comment like this. I get shit like this from so-called anarchists all the time. He must really not like what I do. It makes me wonder if he sends e-mails like this to people who actually deserve it. People who have contributed to destroying the planet and furthering civilization.

And what constitutes his argument? That I don’t live ‘core’ or ‘pure’ enough. I blog, throw dance parties, dress in hip clothes, write about things seemingly (in their eyes) unrelated to primitivism (and therefore, totally fucking worthless!), and this somehow makes it look like I have co-opted “valid shit.”

Just because I don’t wear rags, dread my hair and bathe once a year does not mean I have co-opted valid shit. Just because I use mediums other than essays to encourage rewilding and anti-civilization thought does not mean I have co-opted valid shit. It means I use the ‘means’ I use. Because that looks foreign and impure to anarchist sub-culture, they think it means it does not represent anarchy. This shows how anarchists have conflated anarchist values with anarchist culture. In terms of co-opting valid shit, I would say that yes, what I do looks to me like polishing the turd of anarcho-primitivism. Their ideology does not match their culture. Or more accurately, their culture has carried with it civilization’s memes of ideological purity. Because I don’t like the aesthetic nor behavior of those in that culture, I continue to expand and create more than one sub-culture of rewilding.

Judgment, guilt and martyrdom thrive in civilization. When we first learn about the destructive nature of civilization, we feel guilty for having played part in it, we judge ourselves for having to continue playing a part in it and we martyr ourselves out of guilt and judgment. This leaves little room for having fun. As Daniel Quinn says in his autobiography Providence, “Who can live with a light heart while participating in a global slaughter that makes the Nazi holocaust look like a limbering-up exercise?” When people live in this guilt, judgment and martyrdom culture they really don’t like it when they see people who share the same beliefs but seem to have all the fun in the world.

As I have said elsewhere, I take this stuff so seriously that I know I need to laugh at myself or I will seize up and misdirect my anger at those who do not deserve it. I don’t believe in purity. I believe in living. I practice and encourage rewilding. I don’t martyr myself nor judge people for their lack of purity. Using the tools of civilization to dismantle it does not mean hypocrisy because I don’t claim a purist lifestyle. I live a fully technological lifestyle and I use those tools to rewild. I don’t believe in purist morals and so I don’t judge others.

These same anarchists constantly attack my friend Jason Godesky for the same reasons. His passion involves learning to adapt animist mythology and role playing games, encouraging psychological rewilding. I love his work and support him in it. Though many anarchists judge his work as having no impact or not going far enough. We have to start somewhere. To the purist, we cannot make baby steps, but must someone transport ourselves to a new, fully functional culture in one second. Of course, it doesn’t work that way, so nothing happens. Purity creates a road block. As a side note, this purity not only exists within anarchist culture. It formed one of the main reasons I don’t involve myself in the Tracker community either.

If I used their purist rationale, I could equally attack them for their own lack of purity. For example, many of them make zines printed on paper! They kill trees! Those fucking assholes! I mean, they attack me for using a computer, but they obviously do. What makes them somehow more ethically pure than me? Even if I wouldn’t do the things that other anarchists do, such as having dread locks or writing a zine, doesn’t mean that I don’t support the work they do or that I judge them for it. I may not work with them, but it doesn’t mean I put down the work they do. That would make no sense and waste my time. Pointing out their hostility towards people for no reason, now that makes a little more sense. I wish people spent less time judging other anti-civilizationists and more time practicing anti-civilization philosophy.

In Defense of Anarchists

Every scene out there has assholes. Not every scene out their claims a certain kind of belief system. Anarchist thought gives anarchist culture its name, and yet we see little thought happening in anarchist culture. This means to say that the culture of anarchists or the anarchist scene has little to do with anarchist thought and value. And so… What use does the label have?

Saying, “I have anarchist values, but don’t call myself an anarchist”, sounds rather like saying, “I practice spirituality, not religion”. The message & connection without the institution. I find it interesting that the majority with whom I have spoken that don’t label themselves as anarchists have more in common with actual anarchist thought and practices than those who directly identify and participate in the anarchist institution.

We have all experienced abuse in civilization. I understand the actions of anarchists empathetically. I once dressed in all black and projected my hate onto everything. I had suicidal thoughts everyday. All I could do to stop the hatred of myself involved projecting it onto everyone else. I drank all the time. Drinking heavily worked as self-medication to not feel the grief and suffering. These people merely reflect the symptoms of people fed up with and wounded from civilization. I equate that mental state with a form of insanity we call grief. This does not make their actions okay. It simply works to explain why. If we know why, we may know the next step, a way of helping them release their grief and move through the insanity so they can start helping us put up fliers instead of tearing them down. If these people have actually chosen anarchy for the philosophy and not just another scene to express hatred, then maybe we can turn the tides of the scene and help them recover from civilization and support us and each other.