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Featured articleTed Kaczynski is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Wikipedia community. Even so, if you can update or improve it, please do so.
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Current status: Featured article

Article is wrong[edit]

His brother David's wife, Linda, was the one who pointed out the writing style. She pushed for David to turn in his brother. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2605:59C8:10D6:5500:B043:648A:57E9:B7CB (talk) 22:09, 5 September 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Link to hoodie[edit]

Hi, could someone with edit rights please add a See Also to hoodies. The Unabomber was always depicted in hoodies. Thanks! Hannah1981 (talk) 22:43, 2 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Reword anarchist associations & add a link to 'External Links'[edit]

I think this paragraph:

He authored Industrial Society and Its Future, a 35,000-word manifesto and social critique opposing industrialization, rejecting leftism, and advocating for a nature-centered form of anarchism.(3)

(3) Gautney (2010), p. 199.

Should be changed to something like:

He authored Industrial Society and Its Future, a 35,000-word manifesto and social critique opposing industrialization, rejecting leftism, and advocating for people to view hunter-gatherer life as the ideal state of man.(3)

(3) "Technological Slavery, Volume One (2022) Theodore John Kaczynski". Fitch & Madison. Retrieved October 22, 2023.

I think you’re quite right in saying that a "positive social vision" is necessary. However, the social ideal I would put forward is that of the nomadic hunting-and-gathering society.

Or this footnote:

(3) Fleming, Sean (May 7, 2021). "The Unabomber and the origins of anti-tech radicalism". Journal of Political Ideologies. 27 (2): 207–225. doi:10.1080/13569317.2021.1921940. ISSN 1356-9317. Contrary to what Chase suggests, the Manifesto’s ideal of ‘wild nature’ was not an afterthought or a piece of rhetoric. The same idea of ‘wildness’ appears in Kaczynski’s 1979 essay, ‘Progress Versus Wilderness’, which was inspired by environmental historian Roderick Nash: ‘Wildness is that which is not controlled by organized society’.21 Chase overstates his case when he dismisses the green part of Kaczynski’s Manifesto as ‘a cynical attempt to win more supporters for his revolution’.22 However, the green interpretation is also easily overstated. The Manifesto is decidedly anthropocentric, in stark contrast to the biocentrism of Earth First! and other radical environmentalists.23 Kaczynski opposes modern technology not primarily because it has been a disaster for the planet, but, as he says in the very first sentence, because it has ‘been a disaster for the human race’.24 His ideal of wild nature includes ‘human nature’, and wild human nature is his main concern in the Manifesto.25 Further, in his later writings, Kaczynski advises anti-tech revolutionaries to ‘maintain clear lines of demarcation … from other radical groups’, including radical environmentalists and green anarchists.

Or this footnote:

(3) Kaczynski, "Industrial Society and Its Future" (1995), paragraphs 183–184.

183. But an ideology, in order to gain enthusiastic support, must have a positive ideal as well as a negative one; it must be FOR something as well as AGAINST something. The positive ideal that we propose is Nature. That is, WILD nature: Those aspects of the functioning of the Earth and its living things that are independent of human management and free of human interference and control. And with wild nature we include human nature, by which we mean those aspects of the functioning of the human individual that are not subject to regulation by organized society but are products of chance, or free will, or God (depending on your religious or philosophical opinions).

184. Nature makes a perfect counter-ideal to technology for several reasons. Nature (that which is outside the power of the system) is the opposite of technology (which seeks to expand indefinitely the power of the system). Most people will agree that nature is beautiful; certainly it has tremendous popular appeal. The radical environmentalists ALREADY hold an ideology that exalts nature and opposes technology.[30] It is not necessary for the sake of nature to set up some chimerical utopia or any new kind of social order. Nature takes care of itself: It was a spontaneous creation that existed long before any human society, and for countless centuries many different kinds of human societies coexisted with nature without doing it an excessive amount of damage. Only with the Industrial Revolution did the effect of human society on nature become really devastating. To relieve the pressure on nature it is not necessary to create a special kind of social system, it is only necessary to get rid of industrial society. Granted, this will not solve all problems. Industrial society has already done tremendous damage to nature and it will take a very long time for the scars to heal. Besides, even preindustrial societies can do significant damage to nature. Nevertheless, getting rid of industrial society will accomplish a great deal. It will relieve the worst of the pressure on nature so that the scars can begin to heal. It will remove the capacity of organized society to keep increasing its control over nature (including human nature). Whatever kind of society may exist after the demise of the industrial system, it is certain that most people will live close to nature, because in the absence of advanced technology there is no other way that people CAN live. To feed themselves they must be peasants, or herdsmen, or fishermen, or hunters, etc. And, generally speaking, local autonomy should tend to increase, because lack of advanced technology and rapid communications will limit the capacity of governments or other large organizations to control local communities.

The reasons being the above is a far more accurate point about his philosophy in the manifesto to include. And the point about nature-centered form of anarchism is very misleading.

Ted later acknowledged he "knew very little about anarchism" and only "described FC as 'anarchist' because [he] thought it would be advantageous to have some recognized political identity.":

(Added 2016) In 1995 I described FC as “anarchist” because I thought it would be advantageous to have some recognized political identity. At that time I knew very little about anarchism. Since then I've learned that anarchists, at least those of the U.S. and the U.K., are nothing but a lot of hopelessly ineffectual bunglers and dreamers, useless for any purpose. Needless to say, I now disavow any identification as an anarchist.

--"Technological Slavery, Volume One (2022) Theodore John Kaczynski". Fitch & Madison. Retrieved October 22, 2023.

Also, the original footnote source doesn't really evidence anything about Ted's supposed nature-centered anarchism, the author just writes about the rarity of anarchists using terrorism as a tactic:

Activist formations like the Earth Liberation Front (ELF) have been targeted by the FBI and named “ecoterrorists,” even though ELF is really just a marker for any group or individual ecoactivist (Earth Liberation Front, 2009).

Since these activists claim to be motivated by concern for the environment and go to great lengths to ensure that their actions do not harm and threaten human and animal life, it is inaccurate to characterize them as nihilistic or terroristic, as compared to anarchists like “Unabomber” Ted Kaczynski(1) or Alexander Berkman.(2) According to Avery Starr, sabotage, as a tactic, focuses on “disruption when other options appear ineffective or impossible,” and is not aimed at inflicting violence, especially on people. For groups like the Animal Liberation Front and ELF, the term ecotage has been used to describe a brand of self-defense (the defense of animals and the environment) that aims to “move beyond” civil disobedience but remain nonviolent. As Starr (2006) points out, while such tactics have become controversial for today’s militants, sabotage has been used by progressive movements throughout history, from labor struggles in the late nineteenth century to the antiapartheid movement in South Africa and antinuclear power activity in Germany and elsewhere (64–65).

(1) Kaczynski identified himself as an anarchist, although he distinguished his tactics from those of other anarchists. See “the Unabomber Manifesto” (1995). Accessed May 12, 2009. <http://www.ed.brocku.ca/~rahul/Misc/ unibomber.html>.

For the same reasons as everything said above, ideally the series tag 'green anarchism' should be deleted or replaced with 'terrrorism' series. As ex-anarchists like Mao and Individualists Tending to the Wild aren't similarly stuck with the label.

Finally, I recommend adding https://www.thetedkarchive.com/ to External Links because it's a massive information resource on Ted that's been up over a year. It has all the essays the anarchist library has which is linked, plus a lot more, including essays written for newspapers, letters, etc. Ishkah (talk) 16:38, 15 January 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Name pronounciation[edit]

His last name is a traditional Polish name and is pronounsed KaCHEENskee not kə-ZIN-skee. Could it be a mistake in the article? (and may be some other sources were mistaken too?) Sorry, not a native speaker here - just wanted to discuss. Anarions (talk) 21:04, 16 February 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Hey Anarions,
You’re right that his last name is pronounced KaCHEENskee in Polish. This article uses the English pronounciation (kə-ZIN-skee) of his name, as he was born and lived in the US. Dantus21 (talk) 00:08, 18 February 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
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