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September 2007

Volume 2

The Anarchist Savants y


Autonomy Through Knowledge

onthl M
&

Creativity

Fine Food & Bootiful Things


At approximately 8.00 pm on Sunday the 16th of September 2007, Mr Nino Xavier Connivens (Nin to his mates) passed away following a tragic accident on the roadside in Dunach. The accident happened half way between Talbot and Clunes in Victorias Central West. Unfortunately the local media has not reported this sad loss. Perhaps this is because Nino had lived in the Dunach area for his entire life and yet was hardly known by anyone. Being a loner who never went out during the day, he was never seen at the local Milk Bar, Pub, Post Office or Cafes and as such, simply remained an unknown recluse. One of the saddest things about his shy nature was that very few people got to spend time with him, to truly get to know him. Anyone who was lucky enough to do so couldnt help but be impressed by his humble personality and great wisdom. He believed fervently in living off his own local patch, getting the finest in food and supplies from his immediate surroundings. As one who was lucky enough to visit him on a regular basis, I had the enormous pleasure of witnessing the amazing impact he had on children. Their faces lighting up whenever they got to sit with him as he showed them the many beautiful things that surrounded him on the edge of the Dunach Forest. Nino lived simply and frugally and had a deep understanding of balance. He had watched the world carefully, over time, and understood exactly where a life of imbalance and excess could easily lead. One of his favourite quotes on this topic, was that of J.K Galbraiths in his book The Affluent Society: To furnish a barren room is one thing. To continue to crowd in furniture until the foundation buckles is quite another. To have failed to solve the problem of producing goods would have been to continue man in his oldest and most grievous misfortune. But to fail to see that we have solved it and to fail to proceed thence to the next task would be fully as tragic. home to enjoy it all, after a hard day of consumption, was the only thing that mattered! The driver had heard that the Talbot Farmers Market was the trendy place to be, and lets face it, the only truly beautiful things are human made or captured. Anyway, how was the driver, like the thousands of others that pour through the Dunach Forest once a month for the market, to know that Nino was a Barking Owl? How was the driver to know that Ninox Connivens is an endangered bird, just like the 20%* of all birds desperately evading extinction in their Dunach Forest home? Nino frequently lamented that human terrorists (sorry tourists) were conquering nature and that it wasnt hard to work out why. As an avid reader of Eric Blairs classic Novels, Nino knew exactly what Eric meant when he said, four legs good, two legs better * (A rate more than twice that of the National average)

IN THIS ISSUE
The greatest irony in Ninos passing is that the last thing that went through his mind before he passed away, was a car windscreen. The driver, returning home after a day at the Talbot Farmers Market, didnt stop after Nino bounced off the car onto the gravel verge. After all, it was just another dumb bird and besides, the driver had purchased a boot-full of Fine Food and Bootiful Things from around the town, much of it from as far away as Melbourne, South Australia, Queensland, New South Wales and China. Getting Fine Food & Bootiful Things (pg 1) From the Editor (pgs 2,3) - Why the focus on Nino? Somewhere Left to Go (pg 4) That Dream Called Freedom (pg 5) Beautiful Things You Wont See (Pg 6) The Underground Arts (pg 7) Perspectives On (pg 8)

E D I T O R I A L
Why the Focus on
The natural forms of behaviour, which arise from humanitys inmost nature, are today constantly interfered with and crippled by the effects of Economic Exploitation and Governmental Guardianship. The consciousness of Personal Responsibility and that other precious good that has come down to humanity by inheritance from remote antiquity: that capacity for sympathy with others in which all Social Ethics, all ideas of Social Justice, have their origin, develop best in freedom. That was Rudolph Rocker writing about what he saw developing around him in the 1930s. His wise words are very simply saying, that inside each and every one of us, we have a deep inherent understanding of what is right and just, and that the only true way for us to bring out that understanding, to grow it and learn to trust it, is for us to be free, free from economic manipulations and free from government interference. Importantly, when we believe that our social relationships include far more than just the human, when we begin to include plants, animals and the earth around us, we are able to extend what we know to be right and just to that which sustains us, nature and our environment. The current religious promotion of Tourism in the Central West of Victoria; has at its core, both elements of economic manipulation and government interference, and precisely because of this, it lacks any sincere social understanding. We need only to read local newsprint to see the massive amounts of dollars available for Tourism Promotion, dollars dangled by State and Federal Governments in front of the obedient Increased Tourism is an issue that conflicts with our inherent values, but before we look at why, lets expand a little further on what has been said so far, by going back in time to an era when society did stand up for what it believed to be inherently true. Between 1801 and 1844, massive numbers of people left the countryside in England for the cities. Forced off their lands by government legislation, they became human fodder, meeting the demand for factory workers. They worked 15 hours a day for bare minimum wages. Before long, children as young as 4 years of age were also compelled to work, and all this happened under the guiding economic light of the government of the day and business. The and myopic eyes of our community leaders. Its not hard to comprehend just why these simplistic manipulations are working. If as a society we see something that conflicts heavily with what we know to be right and just and we do nothing about it, then we become a society whose inherent values erode over time. Worse still, if we do nothing about an issue because we fear the loss of some personal benefit, then we rapidly become a society without a conscience.

Nino?

exploitation of children was one of the last straws and so the people, right across the land rebelled. They went on strike, they withdrew their labour across wide industry sectors, they boycotted products, they sabotaged and went on go slow campaigns, in short they stood up for what they believed was just and right against the draconian economic practice and government legislation of the day. Through that, they won many new rights, rights that much of the wealthy Western World enjoys today. Enter 2007. Massive numbers of Asian people are being forced off the land and into the cities. 1 in 3 children in Asia live in abject poverty, they are not educated because they spend their long days working, producing large quantities of cheap goods for export to rich Western Countries. Between 20 and 50 men in China lose their lives every single day in coal mines that produce fossil fuel energy, energy that underpins Chinas manufacturing sector, industry that produces cheap goods for export to rich Western Countries. No doubt the Asian people are being continually indoctrinated with economic ideology from government and business in an effort to convince them that this is all happening in their best interests. What does our deep inherent nature; our understanding of social ethics and justice, our long held beliefs about whats right and just, say about this situation? Rudolph Rocker believed in the 1930s that: The ever growing power of a soulless political bureaucracy which supervises and safeguards the life of humans from the cradle to the grave (the nanny state) is putting ever greater obstacles in

E D I T O R I A L
Why the Focus on
the way of unified co-operation between human beings and crushing out every possibility of new development. Just as for the various systems of religion, God is everything and Human nothing, so for this modern political ideology, the state (and its economics) is everything and the human nothing. And just as behind the will of God there always lay hidden the will of privileged minorities, so today there hides behind the will of the state (and its economics) only the selfish interests of those who feel called to interpret this will in their own sense and to force it upon the people. (Words in brackets are the editors additions). In other words, the state and its economic ideologies have succeeded in driving a wedge, an economic wedge deep into the inherent social ethics and social justice values that our societies once held in the highest of esteem. The Asian origin of much of the cheap products on our supermarket and hardware store shelves attest to that. Economics is king, and just like God, its invisible hand will fix all before us, all we need to do is worship it and trust it, let go of our concerns and keep on consuming. Enter Tourism. : We know that 50% of all global fossil fuelled vehicle traffic movements are related to Tourism. (Source UNEP) : We know that in Australia, cars are responsible for 21% of all Greenhouse Gas Emissions and yet, amazingly, car based tourism is being promoted like there is quite literally, no tomorrow. (Source TEC) : We know that Tourists generally use twice as much water when on holidays as they do when they are at home and as a consequence produce twice as much wastewater. (Source UNEP) : We know that continually increasing noise pollution from Tourist cars, buses and recreational vehicles causes distress to wildlife, especially in sensitive areas and impacts heavily on already threatened or endangered species. (Source UNEP) (For a full list of beautiful things you wont see around Talbot in the next 10 years if tourism continues, see page 6). : We know from 19 of the worlds most eminent biodiversity scientists that; due solely to human activity, the earth is facing a catastrophic loss of species. Estimations are that approximately 30,000 species go extinct each year, an extinction rate of about 3 per hour. The scientists are warning that, because biodiversity loss is essentially irreversible, it poses serious threats to the quality of life of future generations. (Source: The Independent 2006) : We know that with increased Tourism we get increased development (often poorly planned and land intensive), increased population, land clearing, construction, consumption and waste. (Source UNEP) : We know that when we add the Greenhouse Gas Emissions from the transport of products sourced for the Talbot Farmers Market from as far away as Melbourne, SA, QLD, NSW and China to the massive quantities pouring out the exhaust pipes of visiting tourists, it equates to nothing more than madness. (Source Common Sense). : We know that Tourism increases low paid service jobs, increases real estate values, increases rates and decreases Local Government Services, turning potentially self sufficient communities and natural environments into nothing more than tourism theme parks. (More on this in later editions). If we look deeply into our natural

Nino?

understanding of social ethics and justice, what we inherently know to be right and just, when we use that knowledge to look at what is happening around us, we dont need UNEP, TEC, IEA or a panel of biodiversity scientists to tell us that things are going pear-shaped. When things go pear-shaped, those in authority always doggedly hold on to their outdated beliefs, whilst trying desperately to maintain their authority by mass marketing their agendas, in the hope that this will guarantee the continuation of what they sold their souls for. In 1500, a man called Erasmus challenged the authority of the Earth is Flat brigade in a highly charged battle over their rigid orthodox beliefs. This was a group of individuals with quaint outdated ideologies, not unlike the proponents of the tourism and economic growth mantras of today. Erasmus said of them (words in brackets are editors additions): They will smother me beneath six hundred dogmas; they will call me heretic and they are nevertheless follys servants. They are surrounded with a bodyguard of definitions, conclusions, corollaries, propositions explicit and propositions implicit. (Look out for Eco-Tourism) Those more fully initiated explain further whether God (economic growth or tourism) can become the substance of a woman, of an ass, of a pumpkin, and whether, if so, a pumpkin could work miracles, or be crucified. They are looking in utter darkness for that which has no existence whatever. When we take personal responsibility for what is right and just, and when we make a stand against those things that we know to be inherently wrong, we attain freedom, freedom to choose a better path, freedom from false hopes and freedom from false saviours like those that we are led to believe exist, in utter darkness.

Somewhere Left to Go
The Left is lost in its own affluence and the Right is bulging at the seams with private smugness. The New Left or the Aspiration Socialists abound. Some of them were practising radicals a few decades ago when they had something to fight for, like a larger slice of the pie. As with all actions based on fear or greed, once the monster is sated its host can settle back into complacency until it believes it might lose something to another host or worse still, miss out altogether. The Right doesnt suffer from aspiration, with Darwinian theory tucked under one arm and free market economics under the other; it knows what it stands for. Survival of the fittest, profiteering, human exploitation, environmental destruction, it marches arrogantly forward. The politics of fear and greed are back in town in a big way which is why the Right have been on a roll. They promise ever increasing net worth and the offer of security against it being stolen by any global threat they can dream up. With their finger firmly planted on the pulse of human predictability, they hide behind their contrivance by contemptuously stating that; the people always get it right at election time. The New Left tags along like a junky, its desire for the consumption fix easily overcomes its guilt. It goes cold turkey occasionally, just long enough to paint a banner and go for a walk with its fellow addicts. The New Left has a voice, its just that it doesnt want to use it too loudly. As reformists vainly attempting to put a human face on hierarchical capitalism, the only path they can really take is the expansion of their own pretentiousness. God of course makes an appearance in both camps. On the Right, he has an open channel through which his word with all its patriarchal connotations, can be communicated. On the Left, as the helper of those less fortunate, the matriarchal hand of top down charity, through which she allows them to assuage their varying degrees of aspirational guilt. The two camps fight as if their really is some great distinction between them. They engage in never ending arguments over minutiae, focused primarily of course on welfare, healthcare and education, the three factors used to pacify the radicals way back when. It was different then, with a small group of haves and a large group of have nots, the distinction was supposedly clear. These days the water is muddied by a large middle group, the think they haves. The sales pitch has been easily swallowed; greed successfully forging the mistaken belief that the banks expanding net worth is really theirs. With every incremental step up in the utopian belief of ever increasing net worth for all, the middle ground moves further from the equally utopian concepts of public welfare, healthcare and education for all. Make no mistake; the capitalist system has no room for either. The widespread realization of this is yet to dawn and the Left as nothing more than an impotent reformist player has nowhere to go until it does. The arguments over what the Left should do are incessant. Should they continue with reform or adopt revolution? The knowledge of the outcome of both already exists. Reform means hierarchical modification, a shifting of the deck chairs, whilst revolution, bloodless or otherwise ushers in a new hierarchy. Either way, power remains centralised amongst an elite few. Communism after all was nothing more than state based capitalism. The hierarchical economic growth model, of which both camps are proponents and society followers, is through resource depletion, environmental destruction, population growth, global conflict and warming, placing civilisation as we know it on the edge of imminent collapse. Leadership is frequently touted as the only solution, with governments being called upon to reform or regulate their industries and societies or employ new technologies to overcome the problems. We see nothing more than the myopic reliance on top down solutions complete with their own agendas and flocks of followers. Will the day ever arrive when they finally get it? The answer lies in the individual and it will become evident only as a result of consequence or self awareness. The former, if it happens, will be forced and may well arrive too late for most. The latter will only occur when each individual understands the capitalist system for what it truly is, actively works to dismantle it and learns how to pass on, by example, new found knowledge to future generations. It is tempting at this point to believe that we cannot work on dismantling a system we rely on for our very survival. As humans, we shy away from confronting what we believe to be irreconcilable differences. Confronting them means making a choice, so its much easier to hide behind the rationalisation that we will initially be a small number of dismantlers, outnumbered by many potential opposers. When we begin to confront the irreconcilable differences however, we discover that there really is somewhere left for human kind to go, a place of freedom, a destination that is embedded deep in every one of us, a place where autonomy and unity combine. All we need is the courage to leave the outdated Left and Right behind, to wallow in their nostalgia.

That Dream Called Freedom


Or as Stokely Carmichael so eloquently once said of the West: I often ask myself whether or not the West believes that the third world really loves them and thats why they have obeyed them. But its clear that they feared them. The west with all its guns and its power and its might came into Africa, Asia, Latin America and the USA and raped it. And while they raped it they used beautiful terms. They told the Indians, were civilizing you and were taming the west. And if you wont be civilized, well kill you. So they committed genocide and stole the land and put Indians on reservations, and they said that they had civilized the country.

Mr President, I have a question about Western Democracy?


The dream, that dream called freedom, which is uniquely a part of Western Democracy . Put your hand on your heart ladies and gentleman, for this statement encapsulates just what it means to be a patriot of Western Democracy. Oh, and as an aside, its what most infuriates those of us who have just asked for a bucket! Why is it that Western Democracy has the arrogant belief that freedom or its pursuit is a unique concept of the West? Why is it that the West believes that freedom has only been invented in the relatively recent and brief history of the West? The opening statement shows nothing but contempt for the millions of people who have died over thousands of years fighting for that most elusive of human desires, the right to be free, frequently against those with imperial ist aspirations from the West. Amazingly, the Founding Fathers of the USA, those that escaped tyranny in Europe, immediately set about creating their own tyranny in North America. As Joe Bageant, the celebrated American writer puts it: It was Christian America that practiced genocide on the Red Indian and chopped off the feet of black slaves so they could not run away from their appointed duties building the City on the Hill. Chopping off their feet was practical, sane, clever even. We are all richer now for our ancestors cleverness and sanity. Right now its a dusky semitic people and their oil that occupies our cleverness.

Luckily for the Aborigines in Australia, they too would be honoured with the best the West had to offer in civilisation. Today, as far as the Australian Democratically Elected Government is concerned, the civilisation process directed at the Australian Aborigine remains incomplete and probably wont be finalised until the race is civilised into extinction. And so this is the freedom that the West invented and is now attempting to distribute around the remainder of the world, with arrogance, hypocrisy and pride. Is it any wonder that the remainder of the world is getting just a tad upset?

Beautiful
Yo u
Talbot and Dunach
Grey Goshawk Vulnerable Spotted Harrier Near Threatened Squared Tailed Kite Vulnerable White Bellied Eagle Vulnerable Australian Shoveler Vulnerable Blue Billed Duck Endangered Freckled Duck Endangered Hardhead Duck Vulnerable Musk Duck Vulnerable Australian Bittern Endangered Great Egret Vulnerable Intermediate Egret Vulnerable Nankeen Night Herron Near Threatened Inland Dotterel Vulnerable Brown Treecreeper Near Threatened Diamond Dove Near Threatened Black Eared Cuckoo Near Threatened Black Falcon Vulnerable Brolga Vulnerable Whiskered Tern Near Threatened Black Chinned Honeyeater Near Threatened Painted Honey Eater Vulnerable Crested Bellbird Near Threatened Speckled Warbler Vulnerable Diamond Firetail Vulnerable Hooded Robin Near Threatened Pied Cormorant Near Threatened Swift Parrot Endangered Bailons Crake Vulnerable Painted Snipe Vulnerable Lathams Snipe Vulnerable Pectoral Sandpiper Near Threatened Wood Sandpiper Vulnerable Barking Owl Endangered Powerful Owl Vulnerable Glossy Ibis Near Threatened Royal Spoonbill Vulnerable Little Button Quail Near Threatened Growling Grass Frog Endangered Brown Toadlet Endangered Mountain Galaxias Listed Under Victorian Fauna Gaurantee Brush Tailed Phascogale Vulnerable

Wo n t

See

in

the

Things
FUTURE

Nino

Underground Arts

Perspectives
The STaTe of The auSTralian environmenT
(1996 STaTiSTicS - updaTeS in fuTure ediTionS) Land
: Only 6% of the Australian continent is arable. : Approximately 54% is grazed, leaving 40% which is too arid for agriculture. : Degraded land, which totalled 1 million hectares in 1900, had risen to 25 million by 1990. : Approximately 1/3 of Victorias irrigated land is saline.

Water
: One third of Australia has limited run off whilst two thirds occurs in Northern Australia. : The Murray Darling system drains 1/7th of the nations water but its flow is less than one days flow of the Amazon. : Approximately 80% of Australia is totally dependent on underground water. : Inland water use is greater than supply and therefore unsustainable.

Forests
:Of Australias original forest cover of 244 million hectares, only 61% remain and only 5% is untouched or pristine. : As much clearing has occurred in the last 50 years as did in the previous 150 years. : Australia has lost 3/4 of its tropical rainforests.

Biodiversity
The proportion of vulnerable, endangered or extinct animals is as follows: : 5% of higher plants : 7% of reptiles : 9% of birds and freshwater fish : 16% of amphibians : 23% of mammals : Australia has lost 18 of its 197 mammals, the worst rate in the world.

Anarchist Savants Monthly


PO Box 43 Clunes Victoria 3370 Editor: Andrew Stretton andrewpstretton@yahoo.com.au Layout / Graphics: Kristin Rule info@theunconventionalcellist.com Research: Thomas Hink Published: Monthly Contributions at Editorial Discretion Out of courtesy and respect, please contact us prior to publishing or using any of our material. Printed on 100% Recycled Paper.

Pollution
: At 4.19 tons, Australias per capita Greenhouse Gas Emissions are the fourth highest in the world. : Between 1970 and 1990, Australias energy use rose 37% with a consequent rise in CO2 emissions of 25%. : Australias solid wastes of 618 Kilogram per head is much higher than the OECD average of 513 KG / Head.

Source, CSIRO Melbourne

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