Dreams [Paperback]

At a time when our culture systematically and consistently threatens all life, might there be means to resist and even overcome these deadly forces? Determined, rigorous, desperate, exacting, passionate lover of the earth and beauty, Jensen is determined that we accompany him as he examines, with the stated intent of undoing, every activity, theory, belief, assumption, illusion and delusion of this dominant omnicidal culture. He insists that we bear witness to our own destructiveness, ruthlessly and broken-heartedly face these patterns, and, finally, act and live on behalf of the earth. In his precise and painstaking investigation of what is real and true, Jensen sees the possibility that lies in thinking, again, according to the indigenous wisdom traditions that prevailed over millennia and gave more to the earth than they took.
Dare to read this book. Scrutinize your life and the culture. Change! Become a fierce ally of life and so open yourself to the guidance of dreams and the intelligence of non-human beings. Commit yourself to the vitality of all the myriad creatures - salmon, bear, caribou, redwood, frog, fungi, bat, bee, waxwing, whale ­ river, ocean, mountain, cloud and stone. Live ardently on behalf of the earth.

In Dreams, Derrick Jensen is laying the foundations for a new way of life, for a new society, for a new approach and for a new way of thinking and perceiving the natural world and doing it first and foremost with philosophy. We can't do anything without philosophizing about it first, just as the Europeans couldn't de-land the natives without first having ideas and concepts of private property, capital versus production, might makes right and patriarchy. And in doing so, Mr. Jensen leads the way to how we are to create a new world and to manifest these philosophies as we interact with the natural world and work to save it and defend it against the destructive forces of industrial capitalism and Western civilization.

Firstly, the book's title, Dreams, is indicative of this new way of thinking about our lives and experiences. The modern scientific view teaches us that dreams are meaningless, just random neuron firings of the subconscious. But Mr. Jensen points out by spending many pages describing and analyzing his own dreams and their meanings, that this is not true. Dreams are powerful tools and meaning filled lessons given to us by the land, by animals, by the stars, the galaxies, by supernatural forces and by those who inhabit other sides. Only after taking our dreams and their messages seriously will we then wake up and realize our own individual power, our own volition and realize our right to live in a natural world not polluted by giant chemical corporations, not denuded by logging companies, not raped, not scarred and not controlled by distant rulers for their sole benefit (think retail stores at your local mall and their far-flung headquarters in Houston or Dallas).

To start with an effective movement, there must be a clearly defined philosophical and intellectual thought to back it up before ideas are put it into action. This book is the starting point. A movement cannot go forward without a clearly defined direction. There has to be more than an underlying discomfort of the underclasses to make an effective movement. There must be thought before action. There must be vision and projecting before reality manifests itself. There must be planning before a new world can emerge. This book is that plan. There must be leadership. There must be organization. Otherwise, there is only ineffective chaos banging up against industrial civilization and getting nowhere.

For instance, the book clearly indicates that Western ideas of progress, and this is key, are clearly false and serve only those in power and those who already have money, industrialists and their bought-off politicians. The idea of progress itself is simply a philosophical tool designed by those in power to justify their right to rule over poor humans, over nonhumans, over trees, over native peoples. Each step of progress, says Jensen, is designed to deafen the rulers against the pain and suffering of those they exploit simply as a tool in order to exploit and torture more effectively thus rendering the torturers more power and material gain. By employing science, those in power claim to prove that nonhumans do not have subjective existence and neither do human beings for that matter, so it doesn't matter of corporations clear cut and destroy natural communities or rivers are polluted because the trees and wildlife that inhabit the destroyed forest didn't exist anyway, nor does the river and the fish.

Imagine you are running under a canopy of trees. You are naked. You are comfortable. You are thirsty. You bend down and take a drink straight out of the river. You are hungry, you bend down to take a root right out of the ground where you stand. You are sick, you have medicine on hand. You have your loved ones with you, those who have been with you for your whole life, your mother, grandmother, sisters, children. You are finally and at long last free. You are powerful. This is the heaven talked about in the bible and heaven is originally on earth. This is the future that starts with thoughts. This is Dreams. Read it out loud tonight under the stars, on the banks of the river to your loved ones.

When I read "A Language Older Than Words" I was floored. "A Culture of Make Believe" was amazing. "Endgame" was very unfocused, but enjoyable.
Since then, however, DJ's books have been becoming less masterful and more derivative.

"Dreams" is pretty bad. You know things are going to get rocky when Jensen claims that indigenous ceremonies in the Chiapas have the same mystical power as one of his paid speeches at a liberal college on the west coast and that if you don't "get it" as far as being able to directly talk with nature, well then it just can't be explained to you (ie: "I have this mystical relationship that you may never have, just 'cause").

Jensen continues to basically repackage his central thesis (which is sound, but exactly the same in every book) and inserts his oh-so prophetic dreams every six pages or so. I'm confused. Derrick, you've hammered it into our heads that the only reason that you aren't blowing up dams is that your "role" or whatever is writing these books. Why? If you're supposed to be writing propaganda, you've failed. The only people that read these books are anti-civ already. Is to strengthen the movement, to fill us with purpose? Well, then you failed because all I see is my friends sinking into depression and stunned into inaction. Really? Another 600+ pages of doom? And 30+ pages of footnotes? Do you have an editor?

What worries me is this: the Jensenites (Kieth, McBay and Jensen) are getting creepy. I can see it now: years from now, in our post-industrial utopia, acolytes of the Church of Anti-Civtology will sit around debating which allegory found in "Dreams" properly illustrates how to best wear your prayer shawl and whether or not "The Vegetarian Myth" is part of sacred canon.

I just want to clarify some things. I'm anti-civ. I organize with radical environmental direct action movements. I would love to see the collapse of modern insdustrialized civilization in my lifetime. I just think DJ should stop. Stop writing and start doing.