ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN Fredy Perlman

168 Pages·2017·2.1 MB·English

ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN
FredyP erlman
ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN
Fredy Perlman
Black and Green Press @ 2017
PO Box402
Salem, MO 65560
ISBN: 978-0-9972017-4-1
Printed in Canada on recycled paper.
Originally published in October 1992 by Phoenix Press,
London.
CONTENTS
IntroducKteivoinTn:u cker IV
SeleBcitb liography vm
AnythiCnagn H appen 1
TheP urpoosfeB lac&k Red 13
IA ccusTeh iLsi berUanli versity
ofT erroarn dV iolence 23
TheR eproductoifDo ani lLyi fe 36
RevolitnS ocialYiusgto slavia 61
TenT heseosn t heP roliferation
oft heE gocrat 86
ProgreasnsdN uclePaorw er 93
Anti-Semiatnidst mh eB eirut
Pogrom 101
TheC ontinuAipnpge aolf
Nationalism 120
Introduction
Civilization has a tendency to repeat its own mistakes.
This makes Fredy Perlman's insights about civilization
increasingly relevant today. This book of his essays, original­
ly written between 1968 and 1984, and published by Phoenix
Press in 1992, is a case in point.
Fredy Perlman (1934-1984) is among the most impas­
sioned and articulate writers that anarchism could have asked
for. While he was aligned with anarchist perspectives, he
opted not to weigh himself down with the label. He famous­
ly stated that "the only -ist name I respond to is 'cellist.'"
Despite his reluctance to use the word, Fredy has been one
of the most influential writers on anarchist thought, particu­
larly anti-civilization, green anarchist and anarcho-primitivist
strands. His monumental Against His-Story, Against Levia­
than gets my recommendation for one of the most important
books ever written.
The nine essays in this book are linked to Fredy's earlier
Marxist-leaning critiques, his Situationist-inspired move to­
wards the "ultra-left," and initiate his critiques of civilization
itself. As Mo of Phoenix Press succinctly described the spec­
trum covered in these essays in the Phoenix edition:
The changes in Fredy s analyses, from Marxist econom­
ics to an anti-industrial perspective, produced contradic­
tions which the reader will have to resolve because Fredy
died in 1985. It seems Fredy was too busy developing new
ideas to go back and modify his earlier ones.
IV
Introduction: Kevin Tucker
According to Lorraine Perlman's memoir of Fredy's life,
Having Little, Being Much (Black & Red, 1989), it was a trip
to Alaska in 1971 that turned his eye directly towards Prog­
ress and industrialism: the core drivers of modernized civili­
zation. The civilizer's hatred of the environment itself became
a central theme of his work, most evident in the final three
essays of this book.
Yet all of his work is driven by a fierce and fiery passion
to attack the core of political power. Not content to advocate
a party line, these essays refuse to cater to weak liberal agen­
das as they assault the power-hungry aspirations of the left.
Within the radical milieu, Fredy glimpsed the same form and
function of the State. Always critical of the ideologue, there's
cautiousness and reluctance towards the revolutionaries
throughout that is as insightful as it is correct. These essays
have a progression in thought and critique, but you can see
that the underlying impulse: a consistent and innate refusal of
the power-hungry politicians and their games.
While anarchism has significantly incorporated these
trajectories, the same practices persist. Not just within anar­
chism, nor in the leftist milieu, but in society as a whole. This
is why an essay about socialist Yugoslavia (a nation that no
longer exists nor are its remains socialist) and a 1969 letter
about professors being fired from their University remain rel­
evant. 'Progress and Nuclear Power' was written in response
to the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant leak in 1979.
Today, the 2011 meltdown of the Fukushima nuclear pow­
er plant in Japan continues leaking and intensifying. While I
write this, North Korea and the United States are engaged in
threats of nuclear warfare between Egocrats.
'Anti-Semitism and the Beirut Pogrom' is an essay I find
necessary to circulate again and again. I don't think anyone
can consider that situation resolved. With the current glob­
al wave of reactionary populism, 'The Continuing Appeal of
Nationalism' takes on a new sense of urgency.
This book takes its name from the title of the first essay. It
is the most Situationist inspired text in terms of content and in
v
Anything Can Happen
terms of when it was written. You can feel an infectious sense
of hope in what might come next.
Hope has itself become a boogeyman amongst anarchists.
To a certain degree, I understand. And I think Fredy would
have as well. Within anarchist circles, hope has mistakenly
been equated with naivety. I think Fredy certainly would have
agreed that it isn't.
Its hard to shake the idealism that the phrase "anything
can happen" seems to steep in, but when faced with the reality
of a world tom by Egocrats, shaped by the false notions of
community in the guise of nationalism, when acts of repres­
sion and genocide are justified by victimization; "anything"
might not always be seen positively.
And that's where the realness enters.
We have stepped onto new turf of the world that we cur­
rently live in; but only in terms of scale. Our problems are
old ones with more technologically-driven consequences. As
Fredy traces the repetitive and repressive history of civili­
zation in Against His-Story, Against Leviathan, as he charts
the path of conquest and colonizers in The Strait, he never
forgets that what cannot be destroyed is the undercurrent of
resistance as old as �ivilization itself. This wild spirit remains
alive: against all odds, against all circumstances. We may not
know how this beast, this globalized civilization, will end. We
may not know what lies ahead or what Leviathan will try to
suffocate. We may presume the worst, but it doesn't make it
true.
We do know what is happening. We know what has hap­
pened.
And we know we can resist it as others always have. Re­
sistance means remaining untethered to the conventions of
revolutionaries. It means staying clear of organizational rigid­
ities and ideological platforms. If that wild spirit has not died,
then the weaknesses of civilization will be found in the kinks
in its armor. In the mistakes it has made and will continue to
make. This is how we locate the vulnerabilities.
Most crucial among them is that enraged, impassioned
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Introduction: Kevin Tucker
piece of each of us that refuses to be tamed. Fredy had a gift
for essay writing. He was articulate in his anger and drive.
This, in itself, is inspiring. If we refuse to domesticate our
passions as wild beings, then maybe hope isn't such a bad
thing. It might seem implausible, but it is the spark that re­
minds us that we aren't dead yet. We aren't crazy.
Perhaps anything can happen.
We, like the earth and all its communities, may be held
captive by civilization. But we can also be very fucking dan­
gerous.
I would like to take a moment to thank Lorraine Perlman for
her steadfast and diligent work on this project. Without her
exemplary effort, it certainly wouldn't be what it is.
For wildness and anarchy,
Kevin Tucker
Spring 2017
vii
Fredy's Bibliography:
• The New Freedom: Corporate Capitalism. Self­
published in New York City, 1961 (91 copies).
• Plunder, A play. Self-published in New York City,
1962; Black and Red (Detroit), 1973.
• Roger Gregoire & Fredy Perlman, Worker-Student
Action Committees. France May I968.
Kalamzoo, Michigan, 1969
• "Essays on Commodity Fetishism", Telos, Buffalo,
NY, Number 6, Fall 1970.
• The Reproduction of Everyday Life, Black and Red
(Detroit), 1969.
•The Incoherence of the Intellectual: C. Wright Mills'
Struggle to Unite Knowledge and Action, Black
and Red (Detroit), 1970.
• (with Lorraine Perlman) Manual for Revolution­
ary Leaders (attributed to Michael Velli), Black
and Red (Detroit), 1972.
• Letters of Insurgents (attributed to S. Nachalo & Y.
Vochek), Black and Red (Detroit), 1976.
• "Progress & Nuclear Power: The Destruction of
the Continent and Its Peoples," Fifth Estate, April
8, 1978.
• "Anti-Semitism and the Beirut Pogrom," Left Bank
Books (Seattle), 1983.
viii
• Against His-story, Against Leviathan! Black and
Red (Detroit), 1983.
• "The Continuing Appeal of Nationalism," Black
and Red (Detroit), 1985.
• The Strait (Vol. 1) "Book of Obenabi. His Songs,"
Black and Red (Detroit), 1988.
• The Strait (Vol. 2) "Book of Robert Dupre. His
Tales," Incomplete and unpublished.
About Fredy:
• Lorraine Perlman, Having Little, Being Much: A
Chronicle of Fredy Perlman' s Fifty Years, Black
and Red (Detroit), 1989.
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