The Unabomber

In Ted Kaczynski’s essay ‘Industrial Society and its Future’, otherwise known as the Unabomber’s manifesto, he was concerned with the amount of dependence our society puts on technology. He said the industrial revolution created “psychological suffering” for the human race and would cause severe damage to our world in the near future. Kaczynski was a radical and an example of someone who resorts to violence as a way of getting his message out in the world.
Because Kaczynski hated the government so much he felt he had no choice but to use violence to get his point across. But, it seemed like Kaczynski was opposed to technology and the violence and isolation it could lead to, so there must have been a reason he fell prey to his own opposition. Although Kaczynski denied insanity, he clearly had some type of antisocial personality disorder as well as schizophrenia, which led to the use of sixteen bombs throughout his life killing three people as well as injuring twenty three others.
Some bombs are used for psychopaths with a need for control, for others they’re used merely as weapons. For the Unabomber they were used as an attention getter, something to make people know who he was so they would listen to his manifesto. This made him dangerous, but not crazy. His ‘craziness’ ended with his paranoid personality, leaving his behaviour and actions solely on his shoulders. So how right was he in his quest for the world’s attention and was there another way to get it besides using violence on innocent people who did not share his views in life? Kaczynski said no, that if he hadn’t used the bombs people would have merely read his essay once, then forgotten it forever.
Technology was used as a way to help the Unabomber with his mission, which is a little ironic because of how against the progression of technology he was. It actually also helped his point about society becoming threatened by the growing dependence on technology, and as a result the lack of reliance on the people. By using his bombs, he could control the government, while also fulfilling his ultimate goal of getting the attention of society.
Though it is not clear why Ted Kaczynski felt the way he did, it is clear that while he wasn’t insane, he was delusional in his attempt to control the government by using irrational and unethical means to make his point. Although we can relate or recognize Kaczynski’s arguments we cannot morally as an individual or as a society condone it. Resorting to violence is never the answer and like it is seen with the Unabomber can only end badly leaving you alone, imprisoned, or worse, dead.