Fifth Estate 348, Fall, 1996 Add to the Bookbuilder

As President Clinton delivered his nomination acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention (DNC) talking about “a bridge to the 21^st century,” a half a mile away Chicago police were raiding a building housing anarchists from the Active Resistance Counter-Convention (ARC).

The Corporate Power tower is dragged by its victims. Later, following a rebellion, it is transformed into utopian scenes of anarchy. — photo/Susan Simensky Bietila

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According to David Brower, the ecology elder “archdruid,” the Clinton administration has done more harm to the environment than either preceding right-wing Republican presidents. For instance, Clinton’s signature on the infamous salvage rider bill allows extensive clear cutting in America’s forests such as Northern California’s Headwaters and Cove/Mallard in Idaho.

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When eager crowds pushed through the turnstiles of Detroit’s North American International Auto Show last winter, they had the look of fans at a championship game or dreamy-eyed kids thinking of presents under the Christmas tree. Although all of them must have been aware, at some level of consciousness, of the carnage, property damage, and pollution these icons of fantasy and desire create, they were there to ooh and aah the futuristic concept cars and the latest models.

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The FE staff and friends celebrated our 30^th anniversary at the Cass Café in April, not only bringing in people from as far away as California, Maryland and Philadelphia, but even a picket by two very entertaining old-fashioned stillborn-again Jesus freaks who drew even more irreverent Cass Corridor types into our vortex of sin. Favorite FE covers and FE memorabilia were displayed, including a judge’s gavel that some enterprising ‘60s staff member stole from a courtroom and turned into a hash pipe. People danced to the music of Detroit’s Ghost Band, and enough money was raised to keep this ship afloat. Thanks to Chuck Roy and the Cass Café staff, to the Ghost Band, to David Furer for the music mix, to Julie Herrada, and to unnamed others for their help in making it a success.

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“...If one has courage and daring without benevolence, one is like a madman wielding a sharp sword; if one is smart and swift without wisdom, one is as though riding on a fast mount but not knowing which way to go.

“Even if one has talent and ability, if one uses them improperly and handles them inappropriately, they can only assist falsehood and dress up errors: In that case it is better to have few technical skills than many.

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Born London, Jan. 7, 1920; died, Weston-Super-Mare, N. Somerset, May 7, 1996.

Albert Meltzer was one of the most enduring and respected torchbearers of the international anarchist movement in the second half of the twentieth century. His sixty-year commitment to the vision and practice of anarchism survived both the collapse of the revolution and civil war in Spain and World War II. He helped fuel the libertarian impetus of the 1960s and 1970s and steer it through the reactionary challenges of the Thatcherite 1980s and post-Cold War 1990s.

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“They’re in there for us; we’re out here for them.”

—IWW slogan

On May 15^th the California State Supreme Court returned Geronimo’s request for a new trial to a lower court. This is good news because at this level his lawyers will be able to present new evidence showing Geronimo’s innocence and the FBI cover-up. A former Black Panther Party member, Geronimo has spent 24 years in prison, making him one of the longest held political prisoners in the world. For more information, contact the Geronimo support committee: PO Box 781328, Los Angeles CA 90016; (213) 294–8320.

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Deep in the wilds of central Idaho is a wild bunch of pissed-off people. No, not militias! We’re people resisting the destruction of one of the last untouched forested areas in this country.

Welcome to Jack Squat, summer 1996, the year activists reclaimed a logging road in the contentious Cove/Mallard timber sale area. Visitors gawked when they approached the Jack Creek logging road in July.

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June 24, Quebec’s national holiday, St. Jean Baptist day, is usually an uneasy combination of healthy fun and not so healthy flag Waving. This year’s celebrations in Quebec City, the seat of the provincial parliament, turned hotter than usual.

Following the traditional outdoor concert, people flowed into D’Youville Square, the hangout of punk and countercultural types in the city, joining others already there.-Cops began making arrests, provoking resistance from the crowd. Bricks and bottles began to fly.

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The text which begins on the following page is excerpted from Beyond Bookchin: Preface for a Future Social Ecology, a new title co-published in fall 1996 by Black & Red, Detroit, and Autonomedia, Brooklyn. Its author is Fifth Estate staff member David Watson.

In Murray Bookchin’s extensive writings on ecology and anarchism spanning four decades, he has tried to take us beyond Marx toward a more fundamental critique, a holistic rationality, a deeper freedom. He is recognized in many anti-authoritarian circles as an anarchist luminary and elder of significant importance to the extent that some identify themselves as “Bookchinites.” Under the watchword of “coherence,” Bookchin has sought nothing less than the full explanation. But David Watson’s latest book shows that Bookchin’s work ultimately falls far short of its pretensions, and thus fails to guide us toward the promised “pathways to a green future.”

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a review of

More Out Than In: Notes on Sex, Art, and Community, edited, by Rachel Kaplan and Keith Hennessy, Abundant Fuck Publications, San Francisco, 1995, 100 pp., $5

Get out your scissors for that standard Map of the Possible! There have been some bold scouting parties for a world of liberated desire the last few years, and some of the boldest have just put a book out on their discoveries.

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a review of

Woman of Valor: Margaret Sanger and the Birth Control Movement in America, Ellen Chesler, New York, Simon and Schuster, 1992, 639 pp.

Chesler obviously admires and empathizes with early twentieth century feminist and birth control advocate Margaret Sanger, but portrays Sanger honestly, showing how her personal faults and foibles affected what she was trying to accomplish, and how her strengths allowed her to accomplish so much.

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Murray Bookchin must be getting cranky in his old age. Upon reading his latest broadside, Social Anarchism Or Lifestyle Anarchism: An Unbridgeable Chasm, I was rudely smacked in the face by déja vu. Evidently Bookchin is beating a dead horse, trying to breathe life back into an old controversy within the anarchist movement that dates back a century.

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Fifth Estate Letters Policy

The Fifth Estate always welcomes letters commenting on our articles, stating opinions„ or giving reports of events in local areas. We don’t guarantee we will print everything we receive, but all letters are read by our staff and considered.

Typed letters or ones on disk are appreciated, but not required. Length should not exceed two double-spaced pages. If you are interested in writing a longer response, please contact us.

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Dear Fifth Estate:

As an Earth First! sympathizer and subscriber to many deep ecology principles, I read David Watson’s How Deep Is Deep Ecology? with great interest. I learned a tremendous amount from it. His criticisms were penetrating and well taken. I also appreciated the tone of sympathy despite profound differences.

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After looking at the latest jam-packed issue of Factsheet 5, PO Box 170099, SF, CA 94117, “the magazine of record” for zines, it doesn’t seem like anyone should worry about the state of autonomous publishing. Still, a number of stalwart anarchist publications have either ceased publishing recently or are appearing much less frequently (like us?). Anarchy: A Journal of Desire Armed hasn’t printed an edition since December 1995 and even then didn’t get issues out to all its subscribers.

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ANARCHY OR CHAOS by George Woodcock

Written as World War II raged around him, Woodcock’s brief history of anarchism is filled with youthful enthusiasm.

Lysander Spooner, 124 pp. $9.50

THE REVOLUTION OF EVERYDAY LIFE, by Raoul Vaneigem

First published in France in 1967, this book complements Guy Debord’s Society of the Spectacle which appeared the same year. The main programmatic statements of the Situationist International, these works played a large part in the gestation of the French 1968 May events.

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