Very clear and spot-on interview with Peter Lamborn Wilson on what he calls the Technopathocracy of modern society: complete disconnection, lack of community and Internet-mediated insanity, and the Intentional Community as the solution. Right on. He makes the incredibly salient point that “dropping out” of Internet culture now is the same as “dropping out” of the mainstream in the 60s.

(Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)

(Arthur: Peter Lamborn Wilson [aka Hakim Bey] on the intentional community)

Brilliant, odd and strangely engaging.
For some reason, I have never tried to find out what Hakim Bey looks like or who he really is. His work seemed to say enough without me wanting to know who was behind it.

He did an album of spoken word material with Bill Laswell (and his usual suspects) called <i>TAZ</i> that’s definitely worth hearing.

thanks for posting this! very found of your blog and perspective, keep up the good work young radical!

i could listen to p.l.w. for hours. this is a really fantastic set of videos. though i do question the effectiveness of simply “dropping out” of modern society…

it seems like a great idea on the surface, but who’s going to do anything to make society better once we’re gone? are we really not supposed to care, or should we just watch it burn? do we abandon our friends and family who don’t want to take such a radical stance against the panopticon of control/consumer society? instead of doing anything to help our communities, we would be abandoning them (unless,of course, they decided to come with us). perhaps i’m misinterpreting this, but it seems like it could easily be taken as an irresponsible cop-out, not a radical gesture.

either way, thanks for the post! something to consider.

I love listening to Wilson speak. His critique of technology is an excellent counterpoint to prevailing conventional wisdom on technology and communication. There is a real soul destroying character to capitalism, and PLW does a great job of making it human.

He’s a great story teller. And we are sorely in need of stories. Every time I see something new by him I get out the notebook and start writing down references. He provides powerful counterpoints to the narrative of capitalism = most natural human system possible, as well as vulgar Marxism.

However, there’s a real limitation to his analysis. Notable is his support for intentional communities (which he admits have a middle class in character) as THE main solution, as well as his claim that one has to be an academic to know about labor / radical history.

Still, though, excellent stories, lots of hidden history. One of the smartest guys it has even been my pleasure to hear speak. Despite the lack of tenable answers, he’s great at calling bullshit.

PLW in NYC last winter:
http://blacksungazette.com/?p=51

Brilliant - thanks for this.

i find his interview very pessimistic .. as he said internet community is modern community, but from this statement to saying that we pay for this option out of our own pockets to help the police beat our self up .. it’s way to much.

if it was for this than we shouldn’t pay for anything as it will help others grow bigger than us ..

i wonder how much other like him and how many others agree to his way of thinking.

I totally agree with him, what’s going on is now is disconnection.  Man I’m sending this video to my friend, this is an awesome. 

I like technology, but I think it’s ruining our social lives and community.  Think of this, if we didn’t have all these machines and technology, we would have more jobs and less pollution.

A lot of people are like zombies now, they don’t have a clue what’s going on.

Thanks for posting this video, the guy is awesome!