CONTENTS - ouroboros ponderosa

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A NOTE ABOUT CAL. PRESS/PALEO EDITIONS The publication of Elements of Refusal under the imprint of Paleo Editions by the Columbia Alternative Library signals yet another salvo from this new book publishing collective. This publishing project is dedicated to bringing to the discerning public not only the newest and most devastating critiques of the awful mess we call society, but also to keeping in print those "classics" which have lapsed into publishing oblivion. We welcome proposals for further hooks or pamphlets. No manuscripts, please. [f you have an idea, contact us at: C.AL. Press, POB 1446, Columbia, MO 65205-1446 Jason McQuinn l)aul Z. Simons John Zerzan Elements of Refusal John Zerzan Paleo Editions An imprint of the Columbia Alternative Library
i, II)l} Nl'W YUI k, Nl'W York 1'1 l-r\lIN!.,> tIl II'J'IIC,.\I 203 The Refusal of Technology 207 Anti-Work and the Struggle for Control PART THREE 217 245 255 261 265 273 297 301 310 The Promise of the '80s The '80s So Far Present-Day Banalities Media, Irony and "Bob" Afterword Commentary on Form and Content in Elements of Refusal Notes Author's Bibliography Index Appendix: Excerpts from Adventures in Subversion' Flyers & Posters, 1981-85 . I'I{ I 'TACh TO THE SECOND EDITION Ihis collection of offerings was published by Left Bank in 1988, and w,'111 out of print fairly quickly. I believe most of it holds up rather well, IIi part because of a totality that keeps giving us new evidence, on every li'vel, of its fundamental destructiveness. The magnitude of these "h,dlcnges, created by such a depth of peril and falsity, is the strongest IIlIpetus behind efforts to question every component of our truly Ii ightening reality. Unfortunately, stark reality has far more often brought the opposite response, based on fear and denial. More and more we are immersed in a postmodern ethos of appearances, images, and veneers. Everyone can feci the nothingness, the void, just beneath the surface of everyday routines and securities. How tempting, apparently, to avoid asking why, thus elevating the superficial as the only appropriate, indeed the only possible response. The fragmentary, the cynical, and the partial define an extremely pervasive postmodcrn stance-if such a cowardly, shifting outlook even qualifies as a stance. I! is hardly surprising that the high-tech juggernaut, embodying all the bereft features of the social order as a whole, rushes into this intellectual and moral vacuum with an increasing acceleration. I live in the Pacific Northwest, where I was born and where the final traces of the natural forests are being systematically eradicated. The vista of cloned humans looms, as we struggle to maintain some undamaged humanness in a blcak, artificialized panorama. The group suicide of techno-occultists at Rancho Santa Fe (March 1997) is too faithful a reflection of the desperation generated by engulfing emptiness. One of the would-be UFO voyagers spoke for so many others: "Maybe I'm crazy but I don't care. I've been here thirty-one years and there's nothing for me here." The first five essays in this volume, written during the mid-1980s, arc the basis for more recent efforts such as "Future Primitive" (1992) and "Running on Emptiness" (1997). The question of the origins of our estrangement is refused by a reigning culture that recognizes neither origins nor estrangement. I feel that this question must be explored, in the facc of this stunning, still-unfolding enormity: the entire absence of
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Page 35 and 36: AGRICULTURE Agriculture, the indisp
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Page 43 and 44: PART TWO
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';' AXIS POINT OF AMERICAN INDUSTRI
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THE PRACTICAL MARX Karl Marx is alw
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THE PROMISE OF THE '80s For many, t
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I ' THE '80s SO FAR " rom new lcvel
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,. MEDIA, IRONY AND "BOB" It is not
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Appendix: Excerpts from Adventures
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NUCLEAR MADNESS ... VIOLENCE AGAINS
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If it's humiliating to be ruled, ho
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CONTENTS - ouroboros ponderosa

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