"Against Greenwashing, For Dismantling the Technological System!"
On Saturday, April 26, the "largest event of solutions for the planet," the ChangeNOW summit, took place at the Grand Palais in Paris. Following the mock "Citizen's Climate Convention," 20 comrades from the radical anti-tech movement Anti-Tech Resistance took the stage to address the audience. Fists raised, they called for everyone to mobilize "physically" against the industrial system, the sole culprit behind the destruction of global ecosystems. Their aim was to denounce deceptive rhetoric and false solutions that claim to preserve life on Earth—when, in reality, they aim to preserve industry. For the speakers, the ongoing ecological disaster isn't an industrial problem but a matter of "choice."
For instance, Cyril Dion, a French intellectual and well-known eco-reformist who perpetuates the myth of a citizen-driven democracy, urges the public to "change the narratives" and "elect people who will change the paradigm." The goal is then to build small-scale wind farms, green the rooftops of smart cities, and make "measured and intelligent use of the internet."
However, technologies and other "green solutions"—besides failing to change the material impact of industry—can only be built and managed by engineers, heads of state, and multinational corporations: in short, technocracy. High-tech production is neither compatible with democratic principles nor with the Earth's habitability conditions.
Behind their use of the word "Revolution" lies the status quo. The utility of ChangeNOW is to keep citizens in a consumer role and sell them products that integrate seamlessly with the industrial system. Just look at the sponsors of this greenwashing festival. Cyril Dion and his associates don't condemn the technological solutions promoted by this summit. They don't firmly oppose the industrial mode of production. Thus, they employ the same strategy as industrialists to divert attention from the real levers of transformation: collective organization and offensive strategies against techno-industrial infrastructure. They are pawns playing the system's game.
"Technology cannot be transformed — only dismantled." conveyed the comrades in their speech before leaving the stage after 30 minutes of interventions before an attentive audience.
In February, ATR had already denounced the presence of Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo at the Counter-Summit on AI at the Théâtre de la Concorde. While ATR had been mobilizing for nine months against artificial intelligence (against the army and Thales at Cyberweek and an INRIA conference in 2024), the anti-tech activists pointed out the socialist technocrat's responsibility in the development of algorithmic video surveillance (AVS) in Paris and her positions in favor of the Smart City.
This anti-tech collective no longer relies on the state or the illusionists of ecology. They no longer believe in small symbolic acts of conscience, but in the need for individuals ready to take real, committed action and sacrifice to protect the conditions of life on Earth.
🎥 Here are recorded moments of our actions:
- https://www.youtube.com/shorts/f3ViC5a5zaE
- https://www.youtube.com/shorts/Dq1nbx0_pvI
