We, the editorial team for FC Journal, started this whole project without any obvious direction to go. We had no editorial position, no theory–nothing, really, except for our intuition, common sense, and sweat.

But we didn’t need an editorial position to see that there are some real problems with the modern age. We all feel the spiritual destitution, the underlying anxiety that characterizes the city, the melancholy of our day-to-day lives. We all see the headlines threatening one of many disasters industrial technology is creating for us: climate change, anti-biotic resistance, species extinction…

But when we go out into the wilderness, everything changes. That underlying anxiety disappears and our lives are reinvigorated with purpose. Our blood rushes every day with some surprising problem to solve. And Nature, with Her great trembling mountains and her rolling thunder, reminds us of our insignificance, and we can’t help but feel awe. In the wilderness, we have freedom.

But where do we go from there? How do we respond to this industrial age? This issue explores the group of responses that has generally been dismissed as absurd. Even the name for these responses is supposed to be an epithet: luddism. Named after the 18th century mill workers who smashed machinery in revolt against the Industrial Revolution, contemporary luddites are also refuseniks, rejecting the industrial age and venerating, in some way or another, the wild spirit it orders and destroys.

Contained herein are all the rejects and rejectors of industrial society, from Europeans living off the grid to a graffiti artist coloring in the colorless walls of cities. We looked at each of these stories with fascination and, seeing their enormous diversity, we felt free to also reject industry and beat out a path away from it. So we’ll adopt an editorial position soon enough. But for now, enjoy with us the beautiful and tragic lives of the luddites.

Editor’s note from download page: