Ria Montana's Blog

Interview of Flower Bomb/Warzone Distro

Interview in Idioteq Magazine, September 2, 2024

Born in 2013, WARZONE DISTRO free zine project, stands at the intersection of nihilist, anti-civilization anarchy, and total liberation, bridging gaps between veganism, straight edge, and insurrectionary thought. WARZONE DISTRO is dedicated  to challenge the very foundations of oppression, wherever it festers, and in whatever form.

In our interview below, we delve into the radical philosophy driving WARZONE DISTRO, exploring how they blend anarchist and vegan ideals to craft a vision of true total liberation. We talk about the unique challenges they face in a world where even within anarchist circles, ideas like veganism and straight edge are sometimes sidelined, and how they navigate these contradictions with a relentless spirit.

We also uncover the rich intersections between human, earth, and animal liberation—showing how these struggles are not only connected but are in fact inseparable in the fight against the colonial and industrial systems of domination.

Dive into the full interview below.

Many people use terms like “anarchy” and “total liberation” in various ways, leading to misunderstandings. Similarly, the term “fascism” is often interpreted differently by different groups. How do you define anarchy and total liberation in the context of your work and activities? How do you navigate these differing interpretations?

Warzone Distro: Well, the way I (as well as close accomplices of Warzone Distro) see it, the term “anarchy” and “total liberation” are one in the same. I believe that once upon a time in the not too distant past the use of “total liberation” was necessary in order to push the concept of anarchy beyond its’ anthropocentric limitations. While anarchism is widely perceived as having its’ roots in working class struggle, it would be dishonest at best to disregard the ways in which the earth and non-human animal beings have also actively opposed oppression – in particular the colonizing domestication that aided the development of industrial society. With every forest that is destroyed to built highways and human-centric infrastructure, the wild resist this imposing authority to the death.

In terms of “fascism”, there are many people who use this term in many ways, and with different intent. For example for those who would accuse anti-civ anarchists of being fascist, I would ask them how industrial society itself doesn’t embody the tenants of a fascist worldview – a worldview in which humans are granted full supremacy over all other beings. Just as the social construction of “white”, was “human” not also manufactured for the purpose of creating hierarchical division?

Total liberation necessarily includes a critique of fascism, but also pushes that critique beyond its’ own anthropocentric limitations.

Your commitment to veganism is a cornerstone of your philosophy. How did your interest in veganism start, and how has it influenced your approach to anarchism and total liberation?

Warzone Distro: Personally, I was a very vague anti-capitalist and anti-statist prior to being vegan. But I became a vegan activist before I was active with anarchy. This experience allowed me to see both the limitations of liberal veganism, as well as the surprisingly large non-vegan, anthropocentrism in the anarchist circles that I associated with. I began Warzone Distro with the purpose of providing free reading material that bridged veganism and anarchy. Since this was not very common where I was, I felt like it was especially necessary and important. I was also able to see the hostility that existed between liberal vegans and anti-vegan anarchists and to be honest, I found it fucking absurd haha. Here are two movements who are both passionate against the imprisonment and domination of life, but somehow could not meet halfway due to what I felt was a misunderstanding of capitalism and the state. So advocating total liberation became my primary focus online and in the streets.

Given the holistic nature of total liberation, what strategies and themes do you explore in your zines related to veganism and straight edge? How do these align with your broader political philosophy?

Warzone Distro: At one point what I was most interested in was veganism and straight edge from marginalized perspectives. As a queer of color I found it frustrating to hear activists on all sides ranting about how “veganism is a white boycott diet” or how straight edge was for macho tough guys. Much of this shit was online, but sometimes it even spilled into local shows or events. I also came to realize right away that maple who claimed to be speaking in solidarity with marginalized voices, only supported marginalized voices who they agreed with. The moment I began discussing veganism or straight edge, my “marginalized voice” status was revoked haha. So I took it upon myself to connect with other vegan and straight edge anarchists of color and share their stories in these zines. Everything from Indigenous vegans (because yes, not all Indigenous people support hunting traditionally or culturally), to black and brown vegan perspectives, and straight edge perspectives from living in poverty and watching drugs destroy friends and families.

In the end total liberation doesn’t exclusively belong to any one race, gender or identity marker. Total Liberation is a reclaiming of ones’ mind and body from the colonial, industrial world that attempts to control and dominate each and every individual.

The intersection of different liberation movements is a complex topic. Can you elaborate on the connections you see between animal liberation, earth liberation, and human liberation? How do these intersections inform your work?

Warzone Distro: The intersections are as vast as there are social constructs invented to categorize, stratify and ultimately control us. Over the years I have met many different people in these movements, and I am always grateful to listen to their experiences and learn how they arrived at the conclusions they did. It is especially fun speaking with other vegan straight edge green anarchists because there are always underlying commonalities that can be observed in how we got to where we are. But there are also vast differences in experiences as well, which informs me that despite the identity-based categorization we’ve each been assigned, there is no monolith. At the core we are all individuals, unique and powerful. Just as there are intersections in those who we would also consider our enemies (black police officers, Indigenous fascists and so on). These intersections are a reminder that while mass mobilizations or groups can be powerful, the individual maintains a level of power too – like the individual who helps build the prison. Because without powerful individuals, industrial society, capitalism, the police force etc could not exist, let alone function. It is really just a matter of who we are as individuals, and what choices we decide to make with the power we each individually have.

Direct action is often seen as a powerful tool in activism. How do you view the role of direct action in achieving the goals of total liberation? Can you share some examples of successful direct actions that have inspired you?

Warzone Distro: It would be unfair to single out any particular successful (or unsuccessful) direct action as a source of inspiration. I am inspired by them all! Each and every direct action takes a level of courage that the State is designed to discourage. I feel direct action can mean alot of things to alot of people. And in my opinion, that is a reflection of how unique each individual is. I feel direct action is more than just powerful – it is the heart of anarchy in motion with every non-human animal who refuses to be caged, every weed that cracks the foundation of a paved road… direct action is anarchy as a lived experience rather than a mere theory in a book.

Promoting a philosophy as encompassing as total liberation can be challenging. What challenges have you faced in promoting total liberation through your zine, and how have you overcome them?

Warzone Distro: Here on the colonized territory known as “america”, total liberation for many anarchists is mere “purity politics”. We live in a place where fast food is as cheap as the quality, technology is constantly developing more and more distracting gadgets and direct action is heavily discouraged by an ever-expanding State surveillance. So naturally many anarchists might be anti-racist, anti-fascist, but also anti-vegan, or sometimes just casually non-vegan. Prisoner support events or anarchist music venues are usually loaded with alcohol and drugs, to the point where being non or even anti-straight edge is common. As someone who is vegan, straight edge and a green anarchist, there are struggles within “the struggle” haha.

Overcoming this is complex, but also simple. Since Warzone Distro centers vegan straight edge green anarchist zines, it is also a source for other XVX anarchists to find each other. Whenever we table anarchist bookfairs or events we have an overwhelming response from XVX anarchists who are excited to meet us, and through our presence meet others as well. In this way a small but strong network is formed. Sometimes locally, sometimes globally.

The concept of intersectionality is crucial in understanding the multifaceted nature of oppression. Can you discuss the importance of intersectionality in the total liberation movement? How do you ensure that your work addresses multiple forms of oppression simultaneously?

Warzone Distro: Total liberation without intersectionality can never be a *total* revolt against authority. At the base of every form of oppression is an authority i. e, patriarchy, white supremacy, anthropocentrism, ablism etc. I (and close accomplices of Warzone Distro) feel that while anarchists should question, critique and see themselves beyond the very identity-based categorization assigned to us all at birth, anarchists shouldn’t disregard the very real ways identity and its relationship to forms of oppression materialize in each of our lives.

Music and art have always been integral to social movements. What role do you believe music and art play in the movement for total liberation? Are there specific artists or bands that have influenced your perspective?

Warzone Distro: 7 Generations, Trial and Gather were all huge inspirations because they pushed the boundaries of comfort with music, into something that encouraged listeners to challenge their perception of the world. I recently went and saw Earth Crisis and was reminded of how powerful this band really was and still is. I had never seen so many vegan straight edge anarchists of all different backgrounds in the same room, screaming the lyrics with the band. It was truely powerful! It was also a reminder of how music has forever been a powerful tool of resistance, going all the way back to indigenous people who danced and sang before defending to the death their lives when encountered by colonizers. While music can mean anything to anyone, I do believe music with anti-authoritarian messages that inspire an inner wild spirit in people can make a difference between passive anger and taking direct action.

The historical context of anarchism provides valuable lessons for today. How has the historical development of the anarchist movement influenced your approach to total liberation today? Are there particular events or figures that you find especially inspiring?

Warzone Distro: It is hard to say, only because there is unfortunately instances of historical revisionism and suppression of stories that center indigenous, earth and non-human animal rebellion. I think history can be helpful, but can also be used to craft portrayals of reality that support particular visions of the world, most notably intent toward control and domination. Therefore I am by habit sceptical of historical accounts in general, but gauge them contextually and individually. Instead I place value and emphasis on stories I hear first hand, here and now by listening to the experiences of those I happen to be interacting with. This way I rely least on history and more on present reality in order to inform myself and my theories of the world. With that said, I would be lying if I said I was not influenced or inspired however by historical events. Nearly every historical event that involved a bloody uprising, whether successful or not, has had value in informing my understanding of just how complex the world is. A few inspirational anarchists from the past that come to mind are Renzo Novatore, The Bonnet Gang (which were vegan and straight edge by todays standards by the way!) and Anteo Zamboni.

Looking to the future, how do you see the concept of total liberation evolving? What are the key areas that need more focus and action?

Warzone Distro: Most recently I interviewed some vegan, straight edge nihilist friends in the colonized territories of both so-called chile (specifically the Susaron 4 who are facing charges for arson against a meat factory) and mexico. In both places more emphasis on individualist, nihilist anarchy is placed in the context of Total Liberation. I see this as an evolution as I see an increase in the total abandonment of leftism, and more an embrace of anti-civ, anti-colonial anarchy. (both of these interviews can be downloaded from the warzone distro website)

I have however encountered the strange phenomenon of Total Liberation being used while excluding veganism. This is frustrating but honestly laughable. It isn’t a common occurrence, but nevertheless confusing. I guess some speciesists think the title “Total Liberation” sounds cool, but aren’t willing to express that total liberation in their own relationships to non-human animals – in particular those few that capitalism designates as “food”.

Balancing immediate action with long-term goals is a delicate task. How do you balance the need for immediate action with the long-term goals of the total liberation movement?

Warzone Distro: Short and simple answer is the incorporation of anarchy into daily life. Direct action being used when it is practical, conversations when more practical, and also importantly, anarchy as fun, and not necessarily a job, a duty or obligation, since obligation typically leads to its own form of rebellion haha

In our magazine, we often collaborate with artists who communicate similar values. Could you share your list of the most interesting and essential vegan straight edge publications from recent years?

Warzone Distro: While not focused on straight edge, I am aware of a book that will be coming out called “Veganarchism: Making Veganism and Anarchism Dangerous Again” put together by Nathan Poirier and Will Boisseau, cover art by a vegan straight edge green anarchist by the name of Baba Yaga. I am very excited about this book! It won’t be published by Warzone Distro but another distro instead, should out soon so keep on the lookout for that!

As far as Baba Yaga, they are a writer and an artist who creates some beautiful visual art that I am hoping to also see come out soon!

Books often provide deep insights into complex ideologies. Which books would you recommend to our readers who want to deepen their understanding of total liberation, anarchism, and related subjects?

Warzone Distro: Off the top of my head I would suggest “Enemies of Society: An Anthology of Individualist & Egoist Thought” as this book discusses topics relevant to total liberation (including a little into the lives of The Bonnet Gang).

Exploring new ideas often leads us to various media outlets. What blogs, online platforms, or other media do you find most valuable for exploring ideas related to total liberation, veganism, and anarchism? Are there any YouTube channels or video series you would recommend?

Warzone Distro:
In addition to your website I would say Unoffensive Amimal, Warrior Up, North American Animal Liberation Press Office, R-209 (vegan anarchy zines all in spanish!).
Warzone Distro also has a youtube channel that is in the process of converting some of our zines into audio videos.

Thank you so much for your time. Is there anything else you would like to add or any message you’d like to send out into the world? Feel free to share whatever is on your mind. Thanks again, and greetings from Warsaw. Take care!

Warzone Distro: Thank you for taking the time to make this interview happen! It’s always great connecting with like-minded people spread out so far away.

To the readers of this interview I say.. always remember, in one small way or another, we each built and continue to maintain this fucked up world – so in one small way or another we can also burn it down! Be the anarchy you wanna see, and make your wildest dreams come true

– Flower Bomb/Warzone Distro

Modern society’s brokenness has left humans longing to feel their innate connection with and compassion for others. The brokenness plague has turned humans against one another, such as efforts to save animals from harms inflicted by other humans. This can manifest in language distinguishing and ranking one group of humans over others with hopes to sway or shame others into compliance with a new norm. Consumer choices such as ‘cage free’ and ‘free range’ and ‘humane slaughter’ are rather obvious self-deceits, falling far short of the depth of unfettered compassion. Honesty reveals not even all humans going ‘vegan’ will suffice in ending civilization’s animal holocaust, as a much more copious change is needed to realign our lifeway to our untamed hearts. Some select tiny inroads attempting to reconnect civilization’s compassion disconnections, like using the words ‘companion animal’ not ‘pet owner’.  Yet these varieties of propagandized norms are wholly insufficient responses to the overarching crisis animals endure under the juggernaut of civilization.

In the case of humans with ‘companion animals’, some identify their ethos as animal liberationist, and rank themselves above ‘pet owners’. Yet the list of ways they may choose to justify their domination cuts deep. They may force or manipulate their companion animal to stay within certain physical boundaries, whether where to roam outside or where to defecate inside. To be quiet if disturbing other humans. To eat only what is put before them. To undergo modern medical routines. To be stripped of their ability and choice to reproduce. To have their friends and family taken away. To abstain from what the human deems to be destructive or violent behavior. They can be denied with whom they associate. In short, they are denied exertion of their free will. They have been conditioned and bred to give humans affection*, which entitles them to ‘part of the family’ status, yet they remain unfree under our control and authority over substantial aspects of their lives.

Would a human interact with a human companion in this manner? Why not? Speciesist subjugation reveals the incongruence within the divisive norm-pressuring mass illusion term ‘companion animal’. While humans may desire to have free relations with other animals, they must first be free themselves to naturally relate or co-exist fully free. Whether using the term ‘companion animal’ or ‘pet owner’, humans perform as a mere tool enforcing and propagating civilization until they liberate themselves from its bindings.

Despite sapiens’ religiously and scientifically reasoned superiority bestowing them dominion over all, we still intuitively revere all animals’ drive to be free. But within civilization’s ever expanding razed earth dynamics and conditions, this respect becomes deeply fragmented, stripped of wholeness, warped in truth. Broken respect becomes infighting fueled by the power of the norm, distraction from artifices of Leviathan’s covert and overt structures. Only with their end, with our nonsubmissiveness paired with recreation of our own free life, can our innate wild compassion, our primal companion lifeways, be fully and truly restored.

*See “Domestication & Affection: The Making of Pets” by Yi Fu Tuan

At about 30 minutes in we dive into the main topic with our guest Flower Bomb who is an anarchist writer that created Warzone Distro (http://warzonedistro.noblogs.org), a zine creating & distributing project focused on anarchy, insurrection, & anti-civilization. Check it out! All zines are available via PDF or you can request a zine package. Check out the MNtersectional episode #20 on Apple Podcast, Spotify, and Anchor! We aim to be lifelong learners so if you liked/hated/have feedback for anything you heard on this episode, email us at MNtersectional@gmail.com, dm us on Instagram @mntersectional, or message us on Facebook (search “MNtersectional”) and THANK YOU FOR LISTENING!!

Excerpts of Flower Bomb interview on MNtersectional, starting about 30 minutes in

Ashley- We just can’t continue on like this, but it sucks because I feel like things just are going to continue on like this.

Flower Bomb- … It’s essentially a death march, we’re leading up to death in this way that is just so beyond anything people could have imaged. But because we’re all doing it, it’s this coordinated collective thing. 

Ashley- … For those who aren’t super familiar with anarchy, do you want to explain what that is and how you were introduced to it?

FB- Yeah. It wasn’t any singular event, it was a combination of different experiences and different observations of the conditions that I grew up in. I guess that would be where those seeds of anti-authoritarian were planted. Before I even knew about the textbook concept and definition of anarchism, I had already been critical of authority, whether it was religious forms, or police, or even the monetary system of money and currency, I always questioned as a kid Why is it that people kill each other over this piece of paper, and why is it that adults will be the first one to say oh yeah, I don’t believe in santa clause or easter bunny or anything, but yet we believe that this piece of paper with a dead president on it has enough value to allow ourselves to be slaves to it and even kill ourselves for it. So these were some of the primary questions I was asking myself and trying to understand, as well as just understanding the difference between a life of poverty versus a life of not poverty where it seemed like a lot of people that were not in poverty didn’t know that poverty existed the way that it does, and to the awful level that it does. And one of the first things I started doing as I was going into my teens was I wanted there to be a way to communicate what I was seeing and thinking to other people. Because at the time I was under the impression that if only people understood the conditions that we were living in and we were all collectively surrendering to the idea that money is this powerful universal truth, maybe we’ll all wake up from it and maybe we’ll all unite together and overthrow this system. I would say that’s where it began honestly for me. And as I got a little bit older I realized there was such a thing as anarchism, and that there was an entire history of other people actively trying to organize workers to overthrow their bosses and overthrow capitalism. And then I got a little bit older and I realized that ever since colonization there had been people, indigenous people in particular, that were resisting colonization and resisting everything about industrial society altogether. And I think the deeper and the further back we go in terms of what was being resisisted, I think the more we start to see people on a collective level out of sight out of mind, this history, because they just think like that was way back then this is now, but everything about here is a reproduction of them on a much larger scale, and if anybody has any hope or desire to see these awful conditions we’re living in change, then I feel it’s important at the very least to discuss and communicate these things. So I started a zine distro in an attempt to do exactly that. I started that in 2013, Warzone Distro, because that was my way of acknowledging that we’re actually living in a warzone, and because we’re so used to it, we’re so used to the idea that a single person, a president, has the power to dictate all of our lives, or that an ideology based on a piece of paper with invisible value has the ability to control us and enslave us, this is not just living in peace, this a war. And so this distro represents my attempt to try to communicate these ideas and thoughts and histories of people that revolted against everything we’re experiencing. I very recently, maybe 2018, started writing my own texts, which is why I go by the author name Flower Bomb sometimes, really just communicating my own personal thoughts.

FB- … I associate with a lot of people that are anti-civ, but they really promote the hunter-gatherer aspect of that, and I am very critical of hunter-gatherer aspects of that for a lot of reasons… current society does a really good job of overpromoting the hunter-gatherer narrative when way back then what people ate was far more complex than just everyone was hunter-gatherer, that’s not true. There was a lot of foragers, but because foragers don’t need tools to pick berries off trees, you don’t see evidence of a lot of people were foragers, but you see bows and arrows and shit like that, it’s like everyone was hunter-gatherers, that’s bias, but that kind of information is used especially by the meat industry to promote meat as this natural healthy thing.

Ashley- … What do you think about different (kinds of anarchy)?

FB- When I first started out like I was talking before about being a teen and the whole everybody unifying together, that tendency of anarchism would be more considered leftist, which is more of a marxist perspective, and without getting too technical and unnecessarily academic, it is the idea that if we can educate the masses, we will then have the power, the masses, to overthrow the current system. So that trajectory of anarchism is largely considered leftism or collectivist anarchism. I started there, and I came to the realization that unfortunately a lot of that is very similar rhetoric to for example politicians that you see today. There is a lot of emphasis on very small parts of rebellion, there’s a lot of hopefulness going around. And from my personal experience, when I attempted to organize my hood, I realized that people are far more complex than what a lot of Marxist theory assumes people are, and it is not necessarily possible to organize everybody because the very act of attempting to organize people is actually a form of authority, because that assumes that people are incapable of coming to these decisions on their own. And if you try to take charge of trying to organize them, sharing information is one thing, but trying to get them join the movement and fight alongside you, that is something that has been done by even the US military, we see the propaganda of these things, and what I realized is I didn’t want to reproduce another system. Instead what I wanted to do was encourage people to think independently, to think as individuals, because it is at the individual level that these systems hijack and turn us into whatever the system wants. So it was from that point that I decided, rather than attempting to organize people I was going to do what I wanted to do as an individual to fight back against the system, and when people saw that, which is known as propaganda by the deed, other individuals realized that person could do it, that person could do it, that person and so forth. In other words people become their own agent in freeing themselves, rather than relying on an organization or a group or movement or politician, so on and so forth. That is what I consider anarchy, that is the act of reclaiming your life. Within academia that style of anarchy is known as individualist anarchy, or propaganda by the deed, which means don’t wait for the masses to be organized, attack now and let people see these things in action. Actions speak louder than words. So I would identify more as an individualist, which is why anything I do I do for myself, but I also know that the things I do have the power to inspire other people. But I don’t do things for other people, and I don’t do things with the intent of trying to organize other people because I realized all I would be doing is reproducing that role of authority. 

Ashely- … Most of the anarchists I know are also vegan. Do you know many anarchists that are not vegan?

FB- Yes, unfortunately I do, which is one of the reasons I stay so outspoken about veganism, especially once you start getting into the more anti-civ type. The collectivist and leftist type and the anti-civ type, are very different, and a lot of times they oppose each other. The leftist type are simply more traditional, they have difficulty extending their critique of capitalism to critiques of for example colonization, or a critique of agriculture, or a critique of specialization and these building blocks that create the authoritarian relations that we currently have. Leftists usually have a tendency to neglect extending that critique. And with neglecting that extension comes the neglecting of how nonhuman animals also suffer under capitalism as well. So a lot of nonvegans I know are leftists, or leftist types, but also the anti-civ anarchists fall into a very similar trap where they critique everything except for that speciesist relationship that we have with nonhuman animals. It’s interesting because they go so far with their critique, but then they attempt to fetishize and recreate a very past experience. How do you get to where you did without understanding that nonhuman animals are individuals just like us, who are fully deserving of an independent life free from human supremacy.  I feel like sometimes I’m at war with both left and with even people that I would relate to a lot, which also reinforces my own individualism, because I recognize that I don’t want to depend on the leftists or the anti-civs as a group, or as an organization or whatever. I want to continue to carry out my anarchy as an individual without having to rely on them because ultimately, we’re not totally unified. There’s fundamental differences in that, even if we did unify and overcome capitalism, we’re still going to be fundamental enemies if you’re going to continue hunting, and oppressing other animals. I feel like I keep my critiques as open and aggressive as necessary, because there’s so much aggressive push back against veganism, even within these circles which you would think, your critiquing forms of domination and control, but you’re not critiquing all the way. 

FB-… I have a theory about that. I think a big part of the reason why there is so much push back against the idea of being vegan, not only because the propaganda – flesh, secretions, meat and cheese and shit that we have everywhere in society- I think also it boils down to this division between philosophy and action. Because anybody can claim that they’re against oppression, and that they understand how authority works, and the logic of control and domination, but when it comes to actually doing something about it, that’s when you see people take three steps back. What distinguishes veganism from just a theory is that you have to actually change your life, you have to change your interaction with these beings. There’s a lot of anarchists out there, self-proclaimed anarchists at least, who think that veganism is just a boycott. It’s just a boycott. It’s just consumer politics. But if it was just a boycott, then it wouldn’t cause rupture within family, within friends, within work place. Veganism is powerful. You can point at animal rights protests holding signs and you can laugh all you want, but the fact that they uproot a cultural and traditional relationship to nonhuman animals, that stirs people up. Because when you go vegan all of a sudden everyone says you think you’re better than us, nobody wants to hear you talk about it, but everyone’s ok with fucking mcdonalds and burger king and big fucking meat billboards everywhere because that’s normal. Everybody is so conformist to this fucked up normality, but then you go vegan and you disrupt that, and you disrupt and challenge that mental comfort. And I think that is the primary tension between vegans and nonvegans, whether they’re anarchists, or communists, or socialists, is the fact that some people are more comforted by just being philosophers about action, and some people actually put that shit into practice in their own lives. And that’s another aspect of being an individualist, is that you take that action, you change your life on an individual basis.

FB- …We have to remember that the system, capitalism, industrial society, its laws are set up to preserve itself. And we recognize and understand that industrial society was built on enslavement, control and domination. So when we, in our noble attempt to try to change the system from within the system, we have to remember that this is a system that’s not broken, it was designed for control and domination. And when we try to change the system in any legal sense, you gotta remember that it’s not really ethics we’re talking about, it’s more about profit motive. If there is a profit motive for there to be a change in which whoever is being exploited can be liberated, then sure, the change might go through, because there’s a profit motive. But it’s very rare to see any sort of change within capitalism that is motivated by ethics, because everything about capitalism is death by design. When people realize that, as they have long long before capitalism and industrial civilization, and even currently now as you’ve seen with so many people taking action, when people realize that, they realize that there is no changing the system from within. There is only the illegal act of destroying it. And Ashely brought up something that was a very interesting conversation we had about hopelessness, and about nihilism and pessimism. I think that’s relevant because its like, well shit, if I attack the system, it will either kill me or it will lock me up. That is a very real thing, because the system has laws in order to preserve itself. So then the question on an individual level is, do I stay alive and do I stay with this limited freedom to be a wage slave, and allow this system to continue, or do I go out with a bang? Do I use my life as a way of saying Fuck you I will not allow the system to continue without some sort of disruption. And I think that’s what a lot of people, especially a lot of vegan anarchists, have been talking about with themselves, maybe with their friends, for a very long time. Do I destroy that slaughterhouse and deal with the fallout of probably being locked up for the rest of my life? Do I liberate those animals and deal with the possible consequence of the owner running out and shooting me because I am on his property, sabotaging his property? Do I deal with the consequences of potentially just liberating the animals, the puppy mills or whatever and burning those places down? It really just depends on what that individual is comfortable with. I leave it up to people to decide for themselves their own comfort, because I don’t want to be in a position to tell people what they should or shouldn’t do. People come to these conclusions on their own, and of course these decisions relate to our lives, our lives as in what lives the system allows us to have while we watch everything around us fucking die. 

FB- … Another aspect of it is that the system reinforces itself in every way possible disempowering the individual. The system is set up to make us feel weak. To make us feel essentially we are mindless children who need government, because without government we would just kill each other, or without jobs we would just all be homeless, without money we would just be misguided, without civilization we would just be barbaric. Oh my god we need the system, we need something to keep us in place. People have existed for years and years and years without any of this governance. And it’s ironic if you think about it because we have all this control, all this surveillance, we have all these fucking cops, and people are still getting shot, people are still getting raped, people are still getting killed by the cops, people are still getting sentenced to death through the courts that supposed to serve justice, and the government is not actually governing anything except for our freedom. Because everything that these entities are supposed to do they’re not doing, if anything they’re making worse. Industrial civilization is supposed to be this great wonderful thing. No matter how many great projects, no matter how many wind farms or whatever, the planet is still dying. It’s still dying because everything is still about money. Everything is still built against nature. 

FB- …On an individual level we are responsible for providing this entire system more people to become slaves to reproduce it. At the end of the day, there’s so much propaganda within industrial society that attempts to convince us that our choices are our own, that everything we do is really our own, but there’s so much of it that ultimately influences us. One of those things is having a family. You have a family, and you have these lovely kids, and your kids turn around and they say What am I going to do in this world, in this world full of plastic and fucking sky scrapers and cars that are going 60 miles and hours? And it’s like You go get a job and you produce another family. When you think about it you realize that all you are doing is becoming this mechanical animal that is reproducing in order to reproduce this system. Kind of in alignment with why I named my bistro Warzone Distro. Why on earth would I bring another being into a war zone? Because that’s exactly what this is. People can say I’m being over dramatic. They can say I’m being overly pessimistic. It’s like even if you have it good, even if you have a great job with a nice house and you don’t live in poverty, or you don’t even live near a hood, can you do it, can you really claim to be happy knowing that in cities there are people that are sleeping on cardboard to keep warm in the winter. There’s people that fill their jackets with crumbled up newspapers to keep warm or else they’ll freeze to death. It’s not just one or two or three cities, it’s everywhere. It’s global. And it’s getting worse. I don’t want to live in denial. I absolutely refuse to live in denial, because that denial is exactly what this system uses in order to make us feel like we’re individually weak. 

FB- …It is a form of individualist anarchy when you break and refuse to surrender yourself to the social and societal peer pressures, because society has a way of setting everything up where it takes  everybody’s individual power away, and pretty much makes everyone dependent on everyone else. In order to feel valid, in order to feel accepted, you depend on the norms of other people, the norms that other people are reproducing, that reproduce the system. So a lot of people feel influenced and coerced in so many different ways to have kids. And they have kids and they realize it’s an incredibly stressful situation, but now you’re part of the loop. And nobody’s ever gonna so Oh I regret having my kids. Because you don’t do that. You love your kids, you build this bond with your kids. You just kinda come to terms with I have you and I’m gonna take care of you, I love you. But nobody wants to question Why did you have kids? Did you really want kids? You had to work two or three jobs to raise these kids. It’s circular. Society reproduces itself by taking away individualism and turning us all into a collection, a collective, a commune of co-dependent people. 

FB- …It’s back to that philosophy versus action thing… I don’t consider my anarchy politics because if you think about how people relate to the word and the concept ‘politics’, it’s often just external, almost a hobby thing. You hear people say That’s just politics, I don’t talk politics. So the way that I understand and express anarchy it’s through a life. It’s a lifestyle. It is the life activity of rejecting and reclaiming myself, and also reclaiming myself from surrendering to all these institutions and ideologies that once turned me into a reproducer of politics. I think people are in the habit of being like Oh I used to be an activist, I used to be one of those, I’ve grown up and I’ve gotten old, and I’ve understood some things. They want to just quietly retire. So this was a job? This was just a hobby? This was just some external ideas that you had? This wasn’t your life? I think that is where you see the difference between the philosophers and the people that are actually putting forth these ideas putting them into action. 

Ashley- I’m curious if you have received push back from family or friends for your lifestyle.

FB- I’ve lost a lot of friends. It’s a weird way that I lost friends. I think a lot of friends become self-conscious because I am doing what I’m doing. I’m not just talking about these things. The way that I live my life. I don’t work. I don’t have a bank account. I don’t ever plan on working again. Don’t plan on having a bank account. I have a little flip phone. I try to engage with people more on a face to face basis than over the internet. I don’t have a bunch of social media, I have facebook. that’s it. I do the thing. It’s not like I’m out there being like I’m better than you. I’m literally just enjoying my life. I love my life. It’s not a duty. It doesn’t feel like an obligation to the greater good. I am having so much fun saying Fuck you to the system that is trying to turn everybody, including myself, into one of its reproducers. Some of my friends get uncomfortable because they still go to work. And they still maybe even have some ideas that maybe they would agree with me, but they feel uncomfortable being around me because every time they’re around me, they’re like What did you do today? Well I went out, I exercised, I practiced a little ??? and I’ll probably go out for a walk later. And it’s like, Oh, well I don’t have anything fun to talk about. I went to work. Ok, well how was your day at work? I don’t want to talk about it, you don’t want to hear that. You find out people will start contacting you less and less and less. It sucks, but I guess that’s the weird thing that happens. As far as family, most of my family know that I’m a terrorist. So they kinda keep their distance. They understand that being Christian nonvegans there’s not going to be a whole lot of conversation to be had that isn’t going to eventually lead to some of the things that I’m outspoken about. My mom is 100% supportive. vegan herself, reversed her type 2 diabetes. Even though she has difficulty with information because she doesn’t socialize much, she’s usually on youtube and know how youtube algorithms can feed information depending on searches and shit. Sometimes she’ll get some wacky ideas. Sometimes right wing shit will cross her and she’ll be like Oh yeah well what about that? And I’ll have to have a conversation with her. But other than that she totally supports me, because she was there with me, she raised me. I owe it to her to having the strength to raise me the way she did in the poverty that we were living in. So we have a great relationship, excellent relationship. As good as a mother and son relationship would be. 

FB- …The more you interact and the more you get out into the world, you observe and you listen, the more you start to understand generally speaking how a lot of these systems work. It makes sense to be vegan, it makes sense to be an anarchist. Honestly I wish I could just say I’m an anarchist and people would understand I’m vegan and this and that. But because there’s so many different interpretations and perspectives and histories related to these things, I have to be specific, but that’s ok because that’s where good conversations like this one come into play, where we actually sit and discuss the ways that we think. Because I think a lot of people are just so in a habit of just slapping on labels and making assumptions about what people believe and what we want to do. Because a lot of times people don’t want to talk about the problems in the world. 

FB- …I allow myself to be open to trying out different ways of living, and right now I’m happier than I was when I had a full time job, my own car, and my own apartment. I’m gonna be living out of a van soon, and whatever happens happens. Let the chips fall where they may. People are not comfortable with that kind of vulnerability, that kind of chaos. But I feel like I personally thrive within it. It’s exciting. You only get one life, why not fucking make it the best. Why not kick the system in the balls at the same time.

Jack: I agree with Katniss. And I’m tired all these excusitarians here believing technology wiill save the Earth, and us, while we go merrily along living and supporting a lifeway that is running roughshod over it. It’s hopey-ism on steroids. And extreme bad-faith. Or maybe it isn’t even that…most here seem to not care much about the Earth and our fellow beings beyond a self-centered humanism, only caring about our own damn species, and themselves, persisting at any expense to the rest of life. Who ARE you people here? Do you have hearts of stone? Earth’s biodiversity has diminished, since OUR industrial age, to less that 50% of what it was. We are in the midst of the 6th mass extinction (aptly named the Anthropocene-caused by humans and our ravinous ways), the oceans are dying, our rivers are polluted (oh…we treat our drinking water, so that’s OK- no matter the wildlife that has to live in its toxicity), less than 5% of the Earth has not been raped over by humans, we are clearcutting the once-wild rainforests, we enslave and murder 70 billion “food” animals yearly for mere titillation of tastebud, not to mention 5 trillion marine beings yearly, 45% of Earth’s aerable land surface is given oven over to “livestock”- for monoculture feed crops or grazing, and the list goes on and on. But noooo…. you people would rather argue here about how we can have 2X as many people, or more, and wax wonderful about how technology will come to the rescue, and lambast someone who tells it like it is- we ARE destroying the Earth and fellow flora and fauna in an all-out war on life. If you gave 2 shits you all here would have at least agreed with Katniss’ assessment of things instead of your knee-jerk reaction defending and rationalizing your precious human population. And how convenient to portray her position on population as fascist and racist…makes it easy to shoot the messenger.

Ria:  Thanks for speaking truth while under spurious zombie attack Katniss. Anyone who’s still humbly connected with Earth in the least, or at least not entirely succumbed to indoctrination of human supremacy, senses our species’ death march leading all over the cliff. Behind our exploitive/consumptive lifeway is our ethos that we are preordained with authoritarian control over the entire world. This is the ethos- that we are supreme over all other animals to the degree that we even deny our own animality and compassionate interconnection with animals and wild Earth too- that drives us to invade the homes of remaining free roaming animals and deplete them of their thriving autonomous life, for us to conquer both them and their home at our whim. By now many children sense it- our offsprings’ and even their own doom. They sense the obvious consequences of human disconnect from wild Earth deeper than free earth deniers, those indoctrinated adults regenerating and coercing a hegemonic culture of death upon the young and shame-pressuring free thinkers & feelers into silence.. For me and an increasing number of others, opening one’s eyes to the dystopia of human overpopulation has nothing to do with politics, but everything to do with being truly human amongst other living beings striving to survive as we ever encroach into and steal their homes and lives, driving them and us closer and closer to the suffering & mass die-off fate we’re bestowing on all, including ourselves. The true fascists are the ones encouraging the ‘perfect supreme species’ continued assault on Earth’s communities of free life. The mythology of ‘progress will keep us safe & happy’ has already caved in, yet the heartless zombies still wander earth, totally disconnected, attacking those who merely point out the most urgent & obvious reality in hopes of sparking the only awakening that can truly return a sustainable planet. PS Care about Earth? For all earthly beings & life, go vegan & stop breedin’ mf’s. And liberate and return wildness, Earth’s natural and only true state of thriving. 

“… As we capture, confine, control, cull and kill animals, we strip them of their freedom/wildness. No longer determined by their own nature and being, wildlife has been defined in relation to man-the-predator.

What does this… do to ourselves? We prey on each other, as in crimes and wars. We give up our freedom to think for ourselves and act independently and interdependently. We are no longer wild in the sense in which all animals were once wild, that is, self-regulated and interacting dynamically with a self-regulating environment. As we manage the environment, so we control ourselves following arbitrary social and political directives. We become civilized.

It is interesting to think about what goes into becoming civilized. Looking at the word itself tells us many things, not only about what we have become but also about why there is no future for wildlife. To be civilized, we struck a bargain with the city-state, the civitas of ancient Rome that gave us the word ‘city’ and its derivatives. In exchange for self-regulation (freedom), ‘we’ received certain rights and privileges- the right to own property, to vote, to receive legal protection, and so on. We became polite, policed, and political, which is the same thing as being civilized, for these words are based on the Greek polis (city-state), whose structure the Romans imitated when they founded their civitas. We became civil citizens, that is, tamed city-dwellers. We allowed ourselves to be policed by placing ourselves in the position of children in relation to parents, that is, we became civilians belonging to the city-state… Civilization and wildness do not mix. Civilization would fall apart if it tolerated freedom (self-regulation, wildness). Wildness cannot assimilate civilization without being consumed by it.

…Wildlife has everything to lose whether it is ‘allowed’ to remain where it belongs (in the wilderness) or whether it is taken to reservations. If it remains, it will eventually lose its habitat under the demands for space of a growing human population and gradually die off. If it is taken to reservations, it will lose its wildness, its self-regulation…

This is a non-future for wildlife. If we manage to stop destroying the earth, it is likely that most land surfaces will someday look like the US and much of Europe with their concentrated production centers, densely populated cities, tentacular suburbs, and endless expanses of tarmac, covering what was once the wilderness. There will be the usual abundance of pets which will add a predatory threat to the remaining ‘wildlife’. There will be zoological ‘gardens’ and aquariums, national parks and sanctuaries where, for a fee, ‘wild’ animals can be viewed. Everything else will be pre-served in museums, in special collections of dead – and extinct – species. The image of once living, free-ranging animals will be preserved as motifs on T-shirts, cups, trays, towels, calendars, greeting cards, etc. The sonf of birds that will awaken one in the morning will be recorded and broadcast over the radio, or captured on cassettes such as the ‘Audible Audubon’ that one can take into the surrounding man-made environment. Popular television series like National Geographic Specials, and speciality shows in which organized, scientific information abounds, will be the closest approximation people will have of the natural world. Many people will miss the wilderness. Everywhere, those who do will scramble for whatever land remains, yearning to return to ‘the simple life’, in direct contact with living trees and flowers and animals but, above all, in search of self-regulation and control of the quality of their lives. Multitudes will support all kinds of conservancies in an effort to preserve their treasured ‘natural’ heritage for their children’s children.

How to determine the ground rules for the new conservation ethics necessary to accommodate the animals invaded by civilization has been under consideration for a number of years…

(pp 155-157)

We, earth’s evolved serial killer ape, perhaps in effort to soothe the reality of our harms out of shame, fear or even more altruistic feelings, are juggling with ‘The Way’ to change our ways. In the context of today’s heady scientific culture, logic is used to provoke mass mind shift, such as in the writings of Daniel Quinn, Peter Singer and Tom Regan. Some still attempt to inspire mass spiritual change, such as Deepok Chopra, Will Tuttle and Deb Ozarko. 

In Beyond Hope: Letting Go of a World in Collapse, Ozarko concedes that it’s too late for mass human change to undo the damage we humans have wreaked, releasing us from any nature duty to amend our harms, calling us instead to turn inward to liberate our Soul from our dystopian culture ensnaring us. She flirts with yet essentially gives up on humans’ symbiotic place in animalistic wild community, on innate interconnection with Earth (p. 11). In lieu of wild compassionate actions impelled through connection with earth’s life grounded in togetherness, Ozarko focuses on the inner world of Soul, for our inspirations to be self-centered. Wild beings are otherized, with option to redeem our harms to them. 

The deepest truth is that we too are wild beings, we are them, a part of the wild community of life, with our wildness not so much dormant as denied. Whether we realize and return to our ecological roles, our wild reverence and role remains, just in a void. To turn inward is to disconnect from our primal compassion. Opening ones’ wild as a part of the wild community is to engage our animal compassion, to compel our symbiotic wild action.

While Ozarko’s way of Soul is living in the present, it is not as a member of wild belongingness. She sees the self’s Soul as humans’ true identity from which joy, life and peace reside. This thinking gives humans an easy way out of connection that inspires deep healing, the kind of atonement action naturally flowing from our species’ harms. She eloquently paints an accurate picture of our harms, yet her Soul solution is futile without enlivening our animal beings to reconnect and reengage with wildness. Retreating into Soul is unlikely to inspire nature warrior action, more likely to serve as a mere escape and further disconnect like standard new age ethos. Accepting earth’s reality inspires stronger re-embracing, re-becoming our reconnected selves; any less ensures marching lock step, some with a calm aura, within the death machine path we took.

In reintegrating with wild life as the whole is struggling and dying in end times, we still find meaning, have real impact felt by many. The reconnection needed is not between our individual Soul and body, but between our primal being and the beings of so many wild others. Focusing on our own Soul has been tried for thousands of years, and does nothing practical for wild others, nothing even deeply knowing others, nothing changing disinterest, distraction, avoidance, denial and ignorance. Focus on Self is achieving nothing more than ‘activating presence’ in a world humans continuingly kill. ‘Live fully, Love hard, and Let go’ is fine if you’ve earned it through hands on caring for earth, but not for disavowing nature’s cries while feigning individual happiness. Knowing this is the only way to live with truth and security of your essence.

Beyond Hope is an embrace of religious doctrine and dogma. ”Ultimately, my greatest desire for this book is to break the cycle of samsara once and for all so that we never incarnate among such lunacy again.” Ozarko refers to Gaea as a purposeful deity deploying seismic and volcanic activity against the harmful humans that annoy “Her.” She offers “near death” phenomena as evidence for her supernatural “Soul” conceptualization. This type of belief system is along the lines of Derrick Jensen’s tale of salmon giving him permission to eat them so long as he’s earned the privilege through his actions to save them.

Primal Soul is a wild community connectedness. Dropping supremacy of inward Soul seeking is essential for dropping supremacist excuses for our harm. If Gaia had agency to heal herself, she’d have had agency to prevent the harm we’ve caused. Yet both the agency and responsibility to atone for our species’ harms is within us, even if the final outcome is less than a return, more of a new indigenous thrivingway that calls the wild community to celebrate life. Our eternal Soul is not a supreme force of god, but all life has a striving toward togetherness that brings forth the contentment and happiness lost to our unnatural speciesist supremacy, our Soul disconnect from wild others..

Ozarko’s well elucidated description of ecological collapse is raw truth, and there’s no hope for returning all that we’ve killed. Collective cultural suicide of ourselves and killing of so many others mounts. No doubt. So while our civilized predatory killingway ravages onward, do we turn inward to find our lost joy, or respond to our lifeway’s atrocities with compassion in action, while we seek forgiveness from our wild relations? ‘The Way’ is grounded neither in science nor religion, but restoring thriving with wild compassion.

Rewilding Resources

Bringing Back the Bush; the Bradley Method of Bush Regeneration, Joan Bradley

Bringing Nature Home: How You Can Sustain Wildlife with Native Plants, Douglas Tallamy

Walking on two legs: a pathway of Indigenous restoration and reconciliation in fire-adapted landscapes
Worldwide, Indigenous peoples are leading the revitalization of their/our cultures through the restoration of ecosystems in which they are embedded, including in response to increasing “megafires.” Concurrently, growing Indigenous-led movements are calling for governments to implement Indigenous rights, titles and treaties, and many settler-colonial governments are committing to reconciliation with Indigenous peoples and to implementing the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Yet, despite growing recognition that just and effective conservation is only possible through partnerships with, or led by, Indigenous peoples, decolonizing approaches to restoration have received insufficient attention. However, reconciliation will be incomplete without Indigenous-led restoration of Indigenous lands, knowledges, and cultures. In this article, we introduce the concept of “walking on two legs” to guide restoration scientists and practitioners in advancing the interconnected processes of Indigenous-led restoration and reconciliation in Indigenous territories. As an action-oriented framework
articulated by Secwépemc Elder Ronald E. Ignace, “walking on two legs” seeks to bring Indigenous knowledges into balance with western scientific knowledge in service of upholding an Indigenous stewardship ethic that is embedded in Indigenous ways of relating to land and embodies principles of respect, reciprocity, and responsibility. Grounding this discussion in the context of fire-adapted ecosystems of western Canada and unceded and traditional Secwépemc territory, Secwepemcúl̓
ecw, we argue that walking on two legs, along with principles of reconciliation, offers a pathway to uphold respectful relationships with Indigenous peoples, knowledges, and territories through Indigenous-led restoration.

Anon 1– (On the covid fascism coming our way)– The end is near! What do we do? I don’t know what to do. I need to do something but what. Where do we run to? Can we even prepare for what’s coming?
J- Good Q’s. I hear you. I don’t know either. It’s driving me crazy, this fucking hyper focus on “cvid#$@!”. While the animals and the Earth are absolutely screaming for relief from the virus of our ways.
A1– So true. It’s so agonizing.
J- We are stuck in the prison of our knowing
Anon 2- We have to keep hacking away at this, and try to get people to wake up to what they are doing with all this covid fascism
J- It’s much deeper than waking ppl up to the current machinations. Our entire Western global civ is completely dysfunctional and anti-life, Earth, and animals.
A2- I think we definitely need to work on ourselves in addition to planting seeds with others. we’re all participating in the system to some degree
J- Yes, for sure. But what does working on ourselves really mean? I think it means facing our illusions about the system in the first place. 

Later J & R discuss
R- The people who tolerate listening to the civ critique, even take a moment to agree with it before tuning it out again, aren’t truly even facing it, and here’s why. It’s too much to truly face, like people who ‘love animals’ while eating them. Their baseline for contentment excludes civ’s harms. Once you take that hard look at civ for what it truly is, a look so hard you cannot place it into your mind’s denial, your baseline for contentment is forever obliterated. You never again can be relieved of the burden of just knowing it.
J- Like I said, we are stuck in the prison of our knowing. But what’s the fear of really knowing? You and I do, and we survive it. It’s not like knowing means you have to immediately give up everything and starve to death. There will be transition back to our native natural ways. But first it takes that admission that the whole of civ at its core is the problem and it must be abandoned. It cannot be merely tweaked. 
R- And those who do acknowledge our earth ‘crime’ play all kinds of mental gymnastics to relieve the burden of ultimate speciesist supremacy, like ‘permaculture is the sustainable way forward’.
J- Yes, speciesist supremacy, and as you have so aptly have dubbed it, it’s Civ Welfarism. Which is as oxymoronish as “humane slaughter”. Ppl do not want to recognize the deep philosophical (if you will) contradiction fundamentally rooted in civ. They want to think we can have that lifeway, but tweak it so it does only the ”good”. But it’s like you can’t simultaneously laugh and frown at the same time. The consciousness behind civ will always carry with it the mentality of human supremacy and the forces of disconnect and destruction that cannot be distilled out. The laughter in civ is a self-delusion, and a false story, while all the crying goes ignored, save for the lip service to it, in a protestation that we really do care, despite every indication that we do not. Every being on Earth, except for humans, will readily attest to that. They scoff at us, and our eons-long empty promises. And they rightly say the only way out is to leave civ behind and join them. Do we have the courage to listen to their wisdom? 

Just as we adapted into our trap, we’ll have to find a way to adapt out of our trap. And adaptation transitions can be… tense.

In an online vegan group a dynamic discussion-debate arose challenging that vegan thinking is crudely shallow and misbegotten, steeped in popularized consumerist culture, so hypocritical that it falls short, so short that a strong animal advocate rejects donning the word as it is not redeemable, being deeply flawed from the very origins of its conception. Robustly astute counterpoints ensued, but the conversation haunts me, mainly because I do see how mainstream vegans overlook and excuse their needless harm to wildlife suffering and dying via their embrace of plant agriculture, this disastrous expanding global project of ‘progress’, and technocratic, consumeristic and speciesist supremacy. Yet I resist giving up my fight against vegan’s quandaries any more than I give up my fight against this globalized society’s earth-slaughtering lifeway. Motivated by the spirit of ‘vegan’, I sense a calling to continue pushing it toward its deeper essence. It’s the same resistance, same calling I sensed when I was two years old refusing to eat fish because I knew they were animals. It’s the same resistance many young children, pre-indoctrination, enact when they put their bodies on the line to protect and cry out against enculturated adults killing other animals to eat them. Vegan’s first focus on ending exploitation of animals as food is grounded in a visceral human primate repulsion to both inflicting suffering upon other animals and putting their corpse in one’s mouth. That is the starting point. That vegan stands strong within this kill culture is peremptory to ending it. Civilization’s infrastructures have reeked complex conundrums not immediately solvable by anyone, vegan or otherwise. But vegan and those ensnared in predatory culture are not to blame. Vegan’s primal cry is a primary catalyst to escaping the killingway, even when so many of us get lost in the haze of killing’s confusions.