The Anarchist Cookbook
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The Anarchist Cookbook (ISBN 0-9623032-0-8) is a book written by William Powell. It was published in 1971 and was intended as a protest against the United States government over the Vietnam war. The book contains recipes and instructions for the manufacture of explosives, drugs, a number of now obsolete telecommunications hacking devices, and other controversial subjects. Despite the name, the book has no connection to the anarchist movement and is heavily criticized by most anarchists.
While The Anarchist Cookbook is legally available in the United States, the information contained in the book includes instructions that, if followed, may be against the law (see felony for more details). Because of this, access to the book is often restricted, with some bookstores refusing to sell the book to persons under 21 years of age. Authorities and munitions experts have stated that the instructions in the book should never be attempted by inexperienced persons. It has been suggested that the book contains errors and other problems that make it unreliable for use. Some believe the (questionable) rumor that the book was actually written by the FBI or some other branch of the US government, and that the dangerous errors in the recipes were put there to injure would-be terrorists. The book is treated more as a set of guidelines, or a book of ideas, than an instruction manual for terrorists. Part of this book has a martial arts section on street fighting unarmed.
Activists and spokespersons often see the banning of books such as The Anarchist Cookbook as a move against freedom of speech. The argument used in the defense of this and similar publications includes such statements as "guns don't kill people, people kill people." This can be interpreted as meaning the information contained itself in The Anarchist Cookbook is only dangerous in the hands of people who intend to use it. They also note that information on the same topics (including construction of explosive devices) is freely available at most libraries, and suppression of this book will not prevent such information from being obtained by people who look for it.
Other "underground" books have taken the basic premise of The Anarchist Cookbook and expanded upon it. Some of these books, including E for Ecstasy and The Big Book of Mischief, have been confiscated by authorities as "instruction manuals" for the manufacture of explosives and illegal drugs.
Real food cookbooks by anarchists are being published by groups including Infoshop.org (http://www.infoshop.org). Many of these cookbooks are vegan.
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Statement by William Powell regarding The Anarchist Cookbook
The author himself no longer approves of the book, and stated (links were not in original statement),
- "The Anarchist Cookbook" was written during 1968 and part of 1969 soon after I graduated from high school. At the time, I was 19 years old and the Vietnam War and the so-called "counter culture movement" were at their height. I was involved in the anti-war movement and attended numerous peace rallies and demonstrations. The book, in many respects, was a misguided product of my adolescent anger at the prospect of being drafted and sent to Vietnam to fight in a war that I did not believe in.
- I conducted the research for the manuscript on my own, primarily at the New York City Public Library. Most of the contents were gleaned from Military and Special Forces Manuals. I was not member of any radical group of either a left or right wing persuasion.
- I submitted the manuscript directly to a number of publishers without the help or advice of an agent. Ultimately, it was accepted by Lyle Stuart Inc. and was published verbatim—without editing—in early 1970. Contrary to what is the normal custom, the copyright for the book was taken out in the name of the publisher rather than the author. I did not appreciate the significance of this at the time and would only come to understand it some years later when I requested that the book be taken out of print.
- The central idea to the book was that violence is an acceptable means to bring about political change. I no longer agree with this.
- Apparently in recent years, The Anarchist Cookbook has seen a number of "copy cat" type publications, some with remarkably similar titles (Anarchist Cookbook II, III etc). I am not familiar with these publications and cannot comment upon them. I can say that the original Anarchist Cookbook has not been revised or updated in any way by me since it was first published.
- During the years that followed its publication, I went to university, married, became a father and a teacher of adolescents. These developments had a profound moral and spiritual effect on me. I found that I no longer agreed with what I had written earlier and I was becoming increasingly uncomfortable with the ideas that I had put my name to. In 1976 I became a confirmed Anglican Christian and shortly thereafter I wrote to Lyle Stuart Inc. explaining that I no longer held the views that were expressed in the book and requested that The Anarchist Cookbook be taken out of print. The response from the publisher was that the copyright was in his name and therefore such a decision was his to make—not the author's. In the early 1980s, the rights for the book were sold to another publisher. I have had no contact with that publisher (other than to request that the book be taken out of print) and I receive no royalties.
- Unfortunately, the book continues to be in print and with the advent of the Internet several websites dealing with it have emerged. I want to state categorically that I am not in agreement with the contents of The Anarchist Cookbook and I would be very pleased (and relieved) to see its publication discontinued. I consider it to be a misguided and potentially dangerous publication which should be taken out of print.
- —William Powell
In the late 1980s, a collection of computer text files were put together to form "The Jolly Roger's Cookbook." It was distributed through online BBS. This collection of unreliable files soon came to be known as "The Anarchist Cookbook." The actual Anarchist Cookbook, and "The Jolly Roger's Cookbook" often are confused with one another, due to people renaming the file.
Both of these manuals contain information for making drugs, one of which describes the procedure for making LSD. In both manuals, the "LSD Recipe" is completely false. They describe how to make a drug known as LSA (which is similar to LSD), but the process they both describe is not clean and, according to authorities and persons with experience in the field of drug manufacturing (illegal and otherwise), will yield a bad product.
Criticism by Anarchists
Most real anarchists condemn the Anarchist Cookbook as having nothing to do with the philosophy of anarchism and for giving anarchists a bad name.
CrimethInc criticized the cookbook because it was "not composed or released by anarchists, not derived from anarchist practice, not intended to promote freedom and autonomy or challenge repressive power--and was barely a cookbook, as the recipes in it are notoriously unreliable." They recently released Recipes for Disaster: An Anarchist Cookbook, which is meant to be a more appropriate guide for the anarchist movement, containing useful information on activism. While some of the tactics are illegal, including sabotage and vandalism, there are vastly different topics, including one section titled "Supporting Survivors of Domestic Violence.
The Movie
- In 2002 the movie The Anarchist Cookbook was produced using the actual book as a key to the plot. The plot of the movie is about a young honor student-gone-anarchist, Puck (Devon Gummersall) and his group of anarchist friends living peacefully in a Dallas commune until the nihilist Johnny Black (Dylan Bruno) shows up with the Anarchist Cookbook and completely destroys their way of life.
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See also
- List of banned books
- The Manual of Crime (An unfinished work in a similar vein on Wikibooks)
- Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold People that read the Anarchist cookbook.
External links
- The Anarchist Cookbook (http://www.infoshop.org/cookbook.html) (An actual cookbook)de:Anarchist Cookbook