Anarchy Is For Everyone

[dianna]

http://occupypowderkeg.files.wordpress.com/2011/11/dont_spread_anarchy.jpg

an·ar·chy
ˈanərkē/

http://media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/4b/df/c4/4bdfc4616b150d6b1330c87f7da3b799.jpg

the nonexistence of government. The theory became popular in the 80s punk/hardcore scene, but for the most part has since faded away. Mostly seen today when posers write it on their books and bags and anything else they can find to write on. its rare to find a true anarchist anymore, but they're out there, and when they talk about their beliefs, no one listens to them because they're "crazy" and the world "needs" structure. Contrary to most belief, Anarchy does not HAVE to be chaos (although it usually is)

True freedom, equality and peace can ONLY exist in a perfect and untainted state of anarchy. [from urban dictionary]


Introduction

Anarchism is the political philosophy which rejects (and supports the elimination of ) compulsory government or compulsory rule, and holds that society can (and should) be organized without a coercive state. This may, or may not, involve the rejection of any authority at all. Anarchists believe that government is both harmful and unnecessary.

Philosophical Anarchism contends that the State lacks moral legitimacy, that there is no individual obligation or duty to obey the State and, conversely, that the State has no right to command individuals. However, it does not actively advocate revolution to eliminate the State, but calls for a gradual change to free the individual from the oppressive laws and social constraints of the modern state.

The term "anarchy" is derived from the Greek "anarchos" ("without ruler"). Up until the 19th Century, the term was generally used in a positive manner, to describe a coherent political belief, and it was only later that it became used pejoratively (to mean something akin to chaos).

Anarchism is related to Libertarianism (which advocates maximizing individual rights and free will, and minimizing the role of the state) and, in particular, to Libertarian Socialism (which advocates a worker-oriented system that attempts to maximize the liberty of individuals and minimize the concentration of power or authority), with which it is all but synonymous.

There is no single defining position that all Anarchists hold, beyond their rejection of compulsory government or "the State", and proponents may support anything from extreme individualism (the political outlook that stresses human independence and the importance of individual self-reliance and liberty) to complete collectivism (the political outlook that stresses human interdependence and the importance of the collective). Thus, there are any number of diverse schools of thought within Anarchism, some of which are summarized in the Types of Anarchism section below.

History of Anarchism

Humans lived for thousands of years in societies without government, according to Anarcho-Primitivists. It was only after the rise of hierarchical societies that anarchist ideas were formulated as a critical response to, and rejection of, coercive political institutions.

The "Tao Te Ching", written around the 6th Century B.C. by Lao Tzu, encouraged many Chinese Taoists to live an anarchistic lifestyle. In ancient Greece, Diogenes of Sinope (a Cynic) and Zeno of Citium (a Stoic) argued (in opposition to Plato) that reason should replace authority in guiding human affairs, and envisaged a free community without government.

There were a variety of anarchistic religious and political movements in Europe during the Middle Ages and later, including the Brothers and Sisters of the Free Spirit, the Klompdraggers, the Hussites, the Adamites, the early Anabaptists, the Diggers and the Levellers, but none had much widespread influence.

Modern Anarchism arose from the secular thought of the Enlightenment, particularly Jean-Jacques Rousseau's arguments for the moral centrality of freedom.

Even though he did not used the term himself, the English political philosopher William Godwin (1756 - 1836) developed what many consider the first expression of modern anarchist thought and formulated the political and economic conceptions of Anarchism. Godwin opposed revolutionary action and saw a minimal state as a present "necessary evil", which would become increasingly irrelevant and powerless through a gradual process of reform and enlightenment. He also advocated extreme individualism, proposing that all cooperation in labour be eliminated.

Edmund Burke, in his "A Vindication of Natural Society" of 1756, advocated the abolition of government, although he later claimed it was intended as a satirical work. Thomas Jefferson (1743 - 1826) spoke of his respect for a society with no government, such as he saw in many Native American tribes, and Henry David Thoreau was another influential American with Anarchist sympathies.

The Frenchman Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809 - 1865) was the first self-described Anarchist, and has been called the founder of modern anarchist theory (as has Godwin). Proudhon proposed what he called spontaneous order, whereby organization (sufficient to maintain order and guarantee all liberties) emerges without central authority, and the institutions of the police, monarchy, officialdom, organized religion, taxation, etc, disappear or are reduced to a minimum. He published his "What is Property?", in which his famous accusation "Property is theft" appears, in 1840.

Later in the 19th Century (sometimes called Anarchism's classical period), Anarchist Communist theorists, like the Russians Mikhail Bakunin (1814 - 1876) and Peter Kropotkin (1842 - 1921), built on the Marxist critique of Capitalism and synthesized it with their own critique of the state, emphasizing the importance of a communal perspective to maintain individual liberty in a social context.

Around this time, there was also a spate of acts of violence in the name of Anarchism, such as sabotage and assassinations, as well as industrial actions and strikes, intended to further spark revolution, but these actions were regarded by many Anarchists as counter-productive or ineffective.

In the 20th Century, Anarchists were actively involved in the labour and feminist movements, in uprisings and revolutions such as the Russian Revolution of 1917, and later in the fight against Fascism. Working Anarchist communes have been established at Cristiana in Denmark, Catalonia in Spain, and the Free Territory in Ukraine, among others.

Types of Anarchism

Philosophical Anarchism is the view that the State lacks moral legitimacy, that there is no individual obligation or duty to obey the State and, conversely, that the State has no right to command individuals. However, it does not actively advocate revolution to eliminate the State, but calls for a gradual change to free the individual from the oppressive laws and social constraints of the modern state.

Philosophical Anarchists may accept the existence of a minimal state as an unfortunate "necessary evil" (usually considered temporary), but argue that citizens do not have a moral obligation to obey the state when its laws conflict with individual autonomy. The English philosopher William Godwin (1756 - 1836) is usually credited with founding Philosophical Anarchism, and is often called the father of modern Anarchism.

Individualist Anarchism (or Libertarian Anarchism) holds that individual conscience and the pursuit of self-interest should not be constrained by any collective body or public authority, and that the imposition of democracy leads to oppression of the individual by the majority. It has been argued that Individualist Anarchism tends to emphasise negative liberty (i.e. opposition to state or social control over the individual), whereas Social Anarchism (see below) emphasises positive liberty (i.e. the achievement of potential and fulfilment of human needs by society). Individualist Anarchism, also unlike Social Anarchism, is supportive of property being held privately, often in a market economy, although some hold that any surplus should be given away.

William Godwin (1756 - 1836) advocated an extreme form of Individualist Anarchy, proposing that all types of cooperation in labor should be eliminated. One of the earliest and best-known proponents of Individualist Anarchism,

Max Stirner (1806 - 1856), proposed an extreme egoist form of it, which supports the individual doing exactly what he pleases, taking no notice of God, state or moral rules.

The American version of Individualist Anarchism, such as that of Thoreau, Josiah Warren (1798 - 1874) and Benjamin Tucker (1854 - 1939), has a strong emphasis on non-aggression, individual sovereignty and the labour theory of value (that the values of commodities are related to the labour needed to produce them). While all supported private property and free markets (causing some to consider them pro-Capitalism), some, like Tucker, called themselves Socialist, and were vociferously anti-Capitalist.
Within Individualist Anarchism there are different forms including the following:
Mutualism is an anarchist school of thought, largely associated with Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809 - 1865), that envisioned a society where each person might possess a means of production either individually or collectively, with trade representing equivalent amounts of labour (the labour theory of value). Mutualists support markets and private property in the product of labour only insofar as they ensure the workers right to the full product of their labour. Some commentators suggest that Mutualists are more concerned with association, and so are situated somewhere between Individualist and Social or Collectivist Anarchism.

Free-Market Anarchism (or Anarcho-Capitalism) is a more extreme form of Individualist Anarchism that attempts to reconcile Anarchism with Capitalism, and it forms part of the broader movement known as Libertarianism. It advocates the elimination of the state; the provision of law enforcement, courts, national defense, and all other security services by voluntarily-funded competitors in a free market rather than through compulsory taxation; the complete deregulation of non-intrusive personal and economic activities; and a self-regulated market.

The Belgian-French economist Gustave de Molinari (1819 - 1912) is considered the single most important contributor to the theory, although the American Murray Rothbard (1926 - 1995) is perhaps its most outspoken proponent, and in general its popularity was centred in the United States.

Agorism is an extreme form of Anarcho-Capitalism and Libertarianism, developed by Samuel Edward Konkin III (1947 - 2004) and building on the ideas of Murray Rothbard (1926 - 1995), which takes as its ultimate goal a society in which all relations between people are voluntary exchanges, a completely free market in an underground or "counter economy" in which the State is redundant.

Social Anarchism is a broad category of Anarchism independent of, and in many ways opposed to, Individualist Anarchism. It emphasizes social equality, community, mutual aid and the communitarian and cooperative aspects of anarchist theory and practice. At its heart is the idea of Libertarian Socialism, which aims to create a society without political, economic or social hierarchies. There are several sub-categories within Social Anarchism:

Collectivist Anarchism (or Anarcho-Collectivism) is the revolutionary doctrine, spearheaded by the Russian anarchist Mikhail Bakunin (1814 - 1876), that advocated the complete abolition of the state and private ownership of the means of production, which would instead be owned collectively and controlled and managed by the producers themselves. The revolution was to be initiated by a small cohesive elite group through acts of violence which would inspire the mass of workers to revolt and forcibly collectivize the means of production, and the workers would then be paid based of the amount of time they contributed to production. This wage system, and the idea of collective ownership (as opposed to a complete rejection of ownership) are the major differences between Collectivist Anarchism and Communist Anarchism (see below). Bakunin was vociferous in his opposition to Communism and state Socialism, which he regarded as fundamentally authoritarian.

Communist Anarchism (or Anarcho-Communism) proposes a free society composed of a number of self-governing communes, with direct democracy or consensus democracy (as opposed to representational democracy) as the political organizational form, and related to other communes through federation. The means of production would be collectively used (as opposed to collectively owned) so that, rather than receiving payment for work done, there would be free access to the resources and surplus of the commune.
Anarcho-Communism stresses egalitarianism (that all people should be treated as equals from birth) and the abolition of social hierarchy and class distinctions that arise from unequal wealth distribution, as well as the abolition of Capitalism and money.

Early Anarchist Communist currents appeared during the English Civil War (1642 - 1651) and the French Revolution (1788 - 1799). Peter Kropotkin (1842 - 1921) and Emma Goldman (1869 - 1940) are perhaps the best known Anarcho-Communists, although the Frenchman Joseph Déjacque (1821 - 1864) was an earlier example.

Anarcho-Syndicalism is a early 20th Century form of Anarchism, heavily focused on the labour movement. It posits radical trade unions as a potential force for revolutionary social change, replacing Capitalism and the State with a new society which would be democratically self-managed by the workers. It seeks to abolish the wage system and private ownership of the means of production, which they believe lead to class divisions. Anarcho-Syndicalists often subscribe to Communist or Collectivist Anarchism (see above), and the movement is more of a workplace organizational structure than an economic system in and of itself.

The German Rudolf Rocker (1873 - 1958) is considered the leading Anarcho-Syndicalist theorist, and his 1938 pamphlet "Anarchosyndicalism" was particularly influential.
There are any number of other, more specific, forms of Anarchism including:

Religious Anarchism: a set of anarchist ideologies that are inspired by the teachings of organized religions, including Christianity, Buddhism, Judaism and Neopaganism.
Anarcho-Pacifism: a form of Anarchism that emphasizes the complete rejection of violence in any form and for any purpose.

Anarcha-Feminism: a synthesis of radical Feminism and Anarchism, which specifically opposes patriarchy as a manifestation of a hierarchical society.
Green Anarchism: a form of Anarchism that emphasizes the protection of the environment.

Anarcho-Primitivism: a form of Green Anarchism that believes civilization and technology inevitably lead to inequality and must be abolished.

Eco-Anarchism: another subset of Green Anarchism that argues that society is best organized into small eco-villages of no more than 150 people.

Autarchism: a philosophy which holds that each person rules himself, and no other, and rejects compulsory government and supports "private capitalism".

Insurrectionary Anarchism: a revolutionary theory within the Anarchist movement, which advocates direct action, violent or otherwise, and informal organization.

National Anarchism: a movement which attempts to reconcile Anarchism with nationalism.

Analytical Anarchism: a form that uses the methods of Analytical Philosophy to clarify or defend anarchist theory.

Epistemological Anarchism: an epistemological theory, advanced by the Austrian philosopher of science Paul Feyerabend (1924 - 1994), which holds that there are no useful and exception-free methodological rules governing the progress of science or the growth of knowledge.

Anarchism Without Adjectives: a movement which emphasizes harmony between various anarchist factions and attempts to unite them around their shared anti-authoritarian beliefs.
http://www.philosophybasics.com/branch_anarchism.html

[norman]

In all of that, the words " community " and " family " don't appear once.

[christian]

In all of that, the words " community " and " family " don't appear once.


In all of that, nowhere do you find anything against community or family, nothing that prohibits these things.

There's been a good article on Activist Post recently, called Global Resistance and Rising Anarchism - The New Politics of the 21st Century (http://www.activistpost.com/2013/12/global-resistance-and-rising-anarchism.html), where the author did use the word 'community'!





"Yet, what does this all mean? Why does it even matter? This global resistance is extremely important as it reveals to the elites that their façade of democracy and consumerism is falling rapidly apart in the face of lagging economies, high unemployment rates, and a political class that is more concerned with its own personal needs rather than that of the people who they have charge over. It shows the people that they can and must fight back against the current political, social, and economic systems if they are to survive, that they can create new communities and new institutions that don’t rely on the current systems of power and are organized horizontally rather than hierarchically."

[norman]

In all of that, the words " community " and " family " don't appear once.


In all of that, nowhere do you find anything against community or family, nothing that prohibits these things.

There's been a good article on Activist Post recently, called Global Resistance and Rising Anarchism - The New Politics of the 21st Century (http://www.activistpost.com/2013/12/global-resistance-and-rising-anarchism.html), where the author did use the word 'community'!





"Yet, what does this all mean? Why does it even matter? This global resistance is extremely important as it reveals to the elites that their façade of democracy and consumerism is falling rapidly apart in the face of lagging economies, high unemployment rates, and a political class that is more concerned with its own personal needs rather than that of the people who they have charge over. It shows the people that they can and must fight back against the current political, social, and economic systems if they are to survive, that they can create new communities and new institutions that don’t rely on the current systems of power and are organized horizontally rather than hierarchically."


Firstly, I think the elites were well aware the model had a sunset coming. The 'resistance' has been multi-culturally softened up for decades and finally diluted to beyond Homeopathic obscurity in a technological form of Anarchy.

I think about the numbers quite regularly, and how they matter. So far, I've not seen a critical count that was worth calling a recount over. The ball park scales of the numbers are still depressingly easy to glance at and understand the problem is huge.

It's no less depressing, in the mid term, to detect that prolonged dire poverty has a slightly less techno-anrchistic effect and slightly more of a group building effect.

Personally, right now, in 2013-14, I wouldn't put energy into broadcasting an idea of Anarchy at all. There's more than enough Anarchy already, but it's not "our" Anarchy, it's an imposed Anarchy via our very dysfunctional relationship with modern technology - that from the beginning, we adopted by consumer grazing it as if we found it lying on the ground looking like packets of sweets having been dropped on the planet by Aliens ( There's a whole other post in that ).

An antidote to bring us back down off the Trip we've been on is what I'd like to see. Anarchy, really won't help do that, right now.

[Milneman]

Philosophical Anarchism contends that the State lacks moral legitimacy, that there is no individual obligation or duty to obey the State and, conversely, that the State has no right to command individuals. However, it does not actively advocate revolution to eliminate the State, but calls for a gradual change to free the individual from the oppressive laws and social constraints of the modern state.

Ok I can buy that. But what if you abstract that to any authority....oh oh.

1. Who determines moral legitimacy of any principle?

2. Anarchy seems to indicate that there is a sense of moral legitimacy in every human being. Am I correct here?

3. If I am correct that every individual seems to have a sense of what moral legitimacy is, can you explain how an anarchist explains that everyone has the same sense of moral legitimacy?

4. If, for example, we say that this sense of moral legitimacy is a result of natural selection, what purpose from a purely random process does moral belief have? If you believe it is totally random, then no matter what you believe, moral belief, or any belief, has any significance in terms of random selection. You can't even legitimately believe in random selection.

5. If you believe that moral legitimacy isn't a result of natural selection, again...why do we all seem to have the same sense of morally legitimate ideas? If you say we've learned them from our parents, who taught our parents? If you say society, where did society learn them from? If you say aliens, where did the aliens learn them from?

6. And finally...what is the organizing principle behind all anarchistic belief? Does not an organizing principle of anarchy not seem to be radically counter-intuitive?

Just askin. :) Love the post!

[DeDukshyn]

I'm good to go for responsible anarchy. I actually see this as an inevitability. We like to all say and think humans are "equal" -- but until there is anarchy (hopefully responsible anarchy) - there will be no equality among humans.

I am sick of having been a sheep, I am sick of seeing everyone and hearing a ba-ahahahah in my head. As long as we have any form of "hierarchy of perceived value" (aka formal rigid government or religion (a form of government)) there will never be equality. Pretending so is to lie to ourselves to make the truth hurt less.

All that said, the human heart needs a little more seasong en mass perhaps, before I would want to risk anarchy - en mass. But it certainly couldn't be worse that the way things are headed right now. My 2 cents ;)

[christian]

Firstly, I think the elites were well aware the model had a sunset coming. The 'resistance' has been multi-culturally softened up for decades and finally diluted to beyond Homeopathic obscurity in a technological form of Anarchy.

[...]

Personally, right now, in 2013-14, I wouldn't put energy into broadcasting an idea of Anarchy at all. There's more than enough Anarchy already, but it's not "our" Anarchy, it's an imposed Anarchy via our very dysfunctional relationship with modern technology - that from the beginning, we adopted by consumer grazing it as if we found it lying on the ground looking like packets of sweets having been dropped on the planet by Aliens ( There's a whole other post in that ).


The elites were aware, so they did their best to make us as weak and disorganized as possible. Not a place to start Anarchy from. But the changes comes fluently, the empowerment movement and the rejection of the old structures go hand in hand. Many people who are intuitively 'anarchists' wouldn't even bother thinking about that word. I don't think it's necessary to push this word, just the general idea of "my body and the fruits of my labor are mine, you or any government have no right over that" and "the individual must be empowered."

I think what's been imposed on humanity is disempowerment and manipulation, I wouldn't call that Anarchy.



what is the organizing principle behind all anarchistic belief?


Everybody is free to mind his own business, then people organize themselves freely in a very efficient and flexible way. But people have to build this up themselves, there is no short-cut. You can't "declare" Anarchy when people are not ready for it. "Declaring" Anarchy would mean "do what you want from now," so if people then say "we want rulers," then that was it with Anarchy.

The moral law in Anarchy boils down to "do not interfere with somebody's free self-determination." Hence, when someone interferes with you, you may stop him, that would be moral. That's what people came up with, it's not God-given, it's just the sentiment of Anarchists, I think.

[DeDukshyn]

Great questions!

Here's my take for fun: I'll start with two because it rather includes 1)

2)I believe there is a sense of moral legitimacy in all. Whether that is respected or not is another thing.

3)I think the diversity of humans is why the current control system are failing - they force us into moulds that are artificial, for the elite's own gain. Allowing the diversity of humans to shine will be anarchy's strength. In some there may be a pre-formed notion that if a person is allowed to think on their own - they will be morally bankrupt without exception - nothing could be further from the truth in reality -- we are programmed with this notion to keep the current control structures in place via this fear; we all know that we are controlled by being implanted with a fear we have not even experienced in reality, but will react to. Control is simple when you know the mechanisms.

4) I don't believe that a sense of moral legitimacy is determined by natural selection. There are very obviously many, many factors at work. This said number 4 isn't relevant for my response.

5) Foremost: Natural instinct. Like how a new mother cat just knows how to love and care for it's offspring.

6) Freedom for all. Equality for all. (explained a bit better two posts previous)


Hope that was at least entertaining if nothing else! :)



Philosophical Anarchism contends that the State lacks moral legitimacy, that there is no individual obligation or duty to obey the State and, conversely, that the State has no right to command individuals. However, it does not actively advocate revolution to eliminate the State, but calls for a gradual change to free the individual from the oppressive laws and social constraints of the modern state.

Ok I can buy that. But what if you abstract that to any authority....oh oh.

1. Who determines moral legitimacy of any principle?

2. Anarchy seems to indicate that there is a sense of moral legitimacy in every human being. Am I correct here?

3. If I am correct that every individual seems to have a sense of what moral legitimacy is, can you explain how an anarchist explains that everyone has the same sense of moral legitimacy?

4. If, for example, we say that this sense of moral legitimacy is a result of natural selection, what purpose from a purely random process does moral belief have? If you believe it is totally random, then no matter what you believe, moral belief, or any belief, has any significance in terms of random selection. You can't even legitimately believe in random selection.

5. If you believe that moral legitimacy isn't a result of natural selection, again...why do we all seem to have the same sense of morally legitimate ideas? If you say we've learned them from our parents, who taught our parents? If you say society, where did society learn them from? If you say aliens, where did the aliens learn them from?

6. And finally...what is the organizing principle behind all anarchistic belief? Does not an organizing principle of anarchy not seem to be radically counter-intuitive?

Just askin. :) Love the post!

[panopticon]

Anarchism, in all its varied flavours, is about decentralisation, cooperation and empowerment.

When a society is structured in a decentralised way then it is more difficult for it to be controlled by those who are so disposed.

Central to Anarchism is the encouragement/education of people to be active members of their community/society.

It is about empowering people, families and communities to be more self-reliant and not reliant on structural agents to provision goods, service etc to those individuals/families/communities.

Beyond this the various perspectives on Anarchism come into play and that is a discussion that would take years to deconstruct and analyse.

I personally think that Bookchin's (http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/bookchin/BookchinCW.html) Libertarian Municipalism (see here (http://www.social-ecology.org/1991/04/libertarian-municipalism-an-overview/) and here (http://www.social-ecology.org/1997/01/libertarian-municipalism-the-new-municipal-agenda/)) is an interesting approach for transition away from a representative democratic model but others disagree with me and that's fine.

The key things to remember is that Anarchism is about the empowerment of individuals and communities, the decentralisation of power leading to a lessening in the ability for control to be exerted and, in general though not exclusively, cooperation being used as opposed to competition (see Mutualism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutualism_(economic_theory))as an example, though it is not representative of all Anarchist philosophical positions).

Remember Acton: Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

-- Pan

[Zanshin]

I have heard it described that on a spectrum of forms of government the extreme left would be the abode of: military democracy (socialism by stealth), communism, fascism, nazism and any other state controlled centralization of power.
Conversely the extreme right would be reserved for anarchy being the lack of need for governance, as all people governed themselves.
Somewhere along that spectrum would be the Republic which still exists although the lights are on but no one is home.

Source: This quote by Theodore Roosevelt in his address at the opening of the Jamestown Exposition on April 26, 1907, as reported in Presidential addresses and state papers (1910).

Complete Sentence: It behooves us to remember that men can never escape being governed. Either they must govern themselves or they must submit to being governed by others. If from lawlessness or fickleness, from folly or self-indulgence, they refuse to govern themselves, then most assuredly in the end they will have to be governed from the outside. They can prevent the need of government from without only by showing that they possess the power of government from within. A sovereign cannot make excuses for his failures; a sovereign must accept the responsibility for the exercise of the power that inheres in him; and where, as is true in our Republic, the people are sovereign, then the people must show a sober understanding and a sane and steadfast purpose if they are to preserve that orderly liberty upon which as a foundation every republic must rest.

[donk]

Successful anarchy presupposes the ability to take responsibility of nearly all involved. Tall order until at least a generation or two after we stop getting programmed from birth.

I dream of a reality that we can get there though...and like Walter says: if you will it dude, it is no dream

[panopticon]

Ok I can buy that. But what if you abstract that to any authority....oh oh.

1. Who determines moral legitimacy of any principle?

2. Anarchy seems to indicate that there is a sense of moral legitimacy in every human being. Am I correct here?

3. If I am correct that every individual seems to have a sense of what moral legitimacy is, can you explain how an anarchist explains that everyone has the same sense of moral legitimacy?

4. If, for example, we say that this sense of moral legitimacy is a result of natural selection, what purpose from a purely random process does moral belief have? If you believe it is totally random, then no matter what you believe, moral belief, or any belief, has any significance in terms of random selection. You can't even legitimately believe in random selection.

5. If you believe that moral legitimacy isn't a result of natural selection, again...why do we all seem to have the same sense of morally legitimate ideas? If you say we've learned them from our parents, who taught our parents? If you say society, where did society learn them from? If you say aliens, where did the aliens learn them from?

6. And finally...what is the organizing principle behind all anarchistic belief? Does not an organizing principle of anarchy not seem to be radically counter-intuitive?


Interesting questions that could be applied to any system of societal construction.

Where does moral legitimacy originate and how does it propagate throughout society is the essence of your questions as I read them.

I think the way 'moral legitimacy' is defined in the OP is to say that individuals of a society convey legitimacy to the structural actors working on and through them and that the individuals also believe that these structural actors make use of appropriate levels of power/control in their governing. That's the essence of 'moral legitimacy' from a political science perspective as I understand it (which is how it was used in the OP quote).

From my perspective the understanding individuals have of the various structural actors moral legitimacy is part of the discursive dance of social norms that constantly evolve and are constructed then deconstructed, formulated and then challenged. There may be some areas that as individuals we agree on but others that are subjective and reliant on the cultural, social, political and philosophical positions of the individual and the society/culture in which they are either members of or come from.

-- Pan

[panopticon]

In all of that, the words " community " and " family " don't appear once.



Social Anarchism is a broad category of Anarchism independent of, and in many ways opposed to, Individualist Anarchism. It emphasizes social equality, community, mutual aid and the communitarian and cooperative aspects of anarchist theory and practice. At its heart is the idea of Libertarian Socialism, which aims to create a society without political, economic or social hierarchies.


The term 'Family' did not appear in the quoted material though it is usually viewed as a fundamental part of most anarchist philosophies. There are some who advocate a shared responsibility for the young and elderly (which is also part of most societies anyway) though the extent to which this shared responsibility is perceived varies.

-- Pan

[778 neighbour of some guy]

We like to all say and think humans are "equal"

I think this a good example of how things can be misinterpreted, imo were are equals as in having bellybuttons, but not equal as in all alike. What we ALL have in COMMON are our DIFFERENCES. No need to agree with me on this of course.

This is hilarious.

[QUOTE=dianna;770721]http://occupypowderkeg.files.wordpress.com/2011/11/dont_spread_anarchy.jpg

[Eram]

Hmm... I don't know about this one dianna.

I think anarchy leads to barbarism and stupidity.
Just look at all places in society were anarchy rules, like between companies and nations.

If there is no one to lead and educate...
How will people come to wisdom?

If not by some sort of structure, then by what?

An infant, thrown into the wild, raised by wolves will grow up without a developed intellect and other tools that one needs to live in harmony.


The individualist will to power leads to division. The universalist will to unity shows the value
and viability of our individualism.

[panopticon]

Hmm... I don't know about this one dianna.

I think anarchy leads to barbarism and stupidity.
Just look at all places in society were anarchy rules, like between companies and nations.

If there is no one to lead and educate...
How will people come to wisdom?

If not by some sort of structure, then by what?

An infant, thrown into the wild, raised by wolves will grow up without a developed intellect and other tools that one needs to live in harmony.


The individualist will to power leads to division. The universalist will to unity shows the value
and viability of our individualism.

This is a fundamental misunderstanding of what Anarchy means in this context.

Throw out what you have been taught by the MSM "Anarchy Bad it means people blow stuff up, kill at will, rape & pillage! Anarchists will kill you while you sleep and take everything you own! Anarchy bad". That's the rhetoric they've been using for over a century!

What it means in the context that I refer to is you get together with your friends and arrange who is going to drive who to the restaurant for dinner. That's anarchy. There's probably no-one telling you the required schedule, there's probably no-one saying "do this or else" (if there is then get out now!). You are just chatting with friends and decide to go out to dinner and someone says "I'll drive". That's anarchy. Nothing scary, nothing terrifying. Just normal human relations.

The removal of hierarchically structured layers doesn't mean "without obligations". That's another misunderstanding. What it means is there is no pyramidal system of governance.

When was the last time you chatted with your countries political leaders?

The removal of a vertical hierarchy does not mean no organisation, unless you are an individualist anarchist in which case it does hehehe, rather it refers to people being active participants in the governing of their community. There may, or may not, be direct consultation on everything (depending on how the social organisation is formed) but transparency on all activities is usually viewed as essential.

Personally I'm a social anarchist and I view that municipal councils and trade organisations (anarcho-syndicalism minus the revolution) are a possible means of transitioning into a less hierarchical society. In this way there is still a council but it is only one layer away from the community and directly responsible to the members of that community.

Essentially there's a flavour of Anarchism for everyone.

Have a look see and find one that works for you. :)

-- Pan

[DNA]

Robert Anton Wilson
I'm a libertarian because I don't trust the people as much as anarchists do. I want to see government limited as much as possible; I would like to see it reduced back to where it was in Jefferson's time, or even smaller. But I would not like to see it abolished.

[Eram]

Basically,

The problem with any system of government is that it depends on the level of consciousness for it to work properly.
If the overall consciousness of humanity is high enough, any system will do.
If the consciousness is low, no system will work as it is supposed to.


What it means in the context that I refer to is you get together with your friends and arrange who is going to drive who to the restaurant for dinner. That's anarchy. There's probably no-one telling you the required schedule, there's probably no-one saying "do this or else" (if there is then get out now!). You are just chatting with friends and decide to go out to dinner and someone says "I'll drive". That's anarchy. Nothing scary, nothing terrifying. Just normal human relations.

Hi Pan,

Do you think that if all governments would retire tomorrow that this would result in the picture that you painted in your quote, even if all people would take this anarchy model as a point of exit?
Is the consciousness level of humanity high enough to get this to work?

I'm an optimist by nature, but not to that extend :P

[panopticon]

Basically,

The problem with any system of government is that it depends on the level of consciousness for it to work properly.
If the overall consciousness of humanity is high enough, any system will do.
If the consciousness is low, no system of government will work as it is supposed to.


What it means in the context that I refer to is you get together with your friends and arrange who is going to drive who to the restaurant for dinner. That's anarchy. There's probably no-one telling you the required schedule, there's probably no-one saying "do this or else" (if there is then get out now!). You are just chatting with friends and decide to go out to dinner and someone says "I'll drive". That's anarchy. Nothing scary, nothing terrifying. Just normal human relations.

Hi Pan,

Do you think that if all governments would retire tomorrow that this would result in the picture that you painted in your quote, even if all people would take this anarchy model as a point of exit?
Is the consciousness level of humanity high enough to get this to work?

I'm an optimist by nature, but not to that extend :P

Um, yes.

I don't wait for a letter from the government for permission to go to a restaurant.
Nor do I receive written instructions from the department of infrastructure on how to get there...

Do you? :P

All joking aside, that's why I advocate a transitional process (as I said in my previous post) that involves a devolution of power away from a centralised structure in the vertical and a relocalisation of power within the horizontal.

In this way the money/control/power reinforcing mechanism of the Nation-State/transnational corporations and their 'legitimate coercion' can be circumvented through a more direct/participatory democratic model.

Others have differing ideas on how to transition and that's fine.

I just think that the easiest solution is based within grass-root activism as a means of regaining control/power from those who have a vested interest in retaining it. The grass-root activism I refer to is based within the principles of community organisation found in Permaculture (see here (http://library.uniteddiversity.coop/Permaculture/Bill_Mollison-Permaculture_Two-Practical_Design_for_Town_and_Country_in_Permanent_Agriculture.pdf), here (library.uniteddiversity.coop/Permaculture/Bill_Mollison-PERMACULTURE_A_Designers_Manual.pdf) and here (http://library.uniteddiversity.coop/Permaculture/Permaculture-Principles_and_Pathways_Beyond_Sustainability.pdf), refer post here (http://projectavalon.net/forum4/showthread.php?65770-People-with-platforms-all-speaking-out&p=762799&viewfull=1#post762799)).

-- Pan

[dianna]

I like to think about the "everyman's" personal daily acts of anarchy ... which includes defining the concept of anarchy for ourselves ...

http://farm5.staticflickr.com/4060/4621797298_4b7b29261c.jpg
http://thecloud.crimethinc.com/pdfs/fighting_for_our_lives_lo.pdf



We dropped out of school, got divorced, broke with our families and ourselves and everything we’d known.

We quit our jobs, violated our leases, threw all our furniture out on the sidewalk, and hit the road.

We sat on the swings of children’s playgrounds until our toes were frostbitten, admiring the moon- light on the dewy grass, writing poetry on the wind for each other.

We went to bed early and lay awake until well past dawn recounting all the awful things we’d done to oth- ers and they to us—and laughing, blessing and absolving each other and this crazy cosmos.

We stole into museums showing reruns of old Guy Debord films to write fight foul and faster, my friend, the old world is behind you on the backs of theater seats.
The scent of gasoline still fresh on our hands, we watched the new sun rise, and spoke in hushed voic- es about what we should do next, thrilling in the budding conscious- ness of our own limitless power.

We used stolen calling card num- bers to talk our teenage lovers through phone sex from telephones in the lobbies of police stations.

We broke into the private pools and saunas of the rich to enjoy them as their owners never had.

We slipped into the offices where our browbeaten friends shuffled papers for petty despots, to draft anti-imperialist manifestos on their computers—or just sleep un- der their desks. They were shocked that morning they finally walked in on us, half-naked, brushing our teeth at the water cooler.

We lived through harrowing, ex- hilarating moments when we did things we had always thought impossible, spitting in the face of all our apprehensions to kiss unap- proachable beauties, drop banners from the tops of national monu- ments, drop out of colleges . . . and then gritted our teeth, expecting the world to end—but it didn’t!

We stood or knelt in emptying concert halls, on rooftops under lightning storms, on the dead grass of graveyards, and swore with tears in our eyes never to go back again.

We sat at desks in high school de- tention rooms, against the worn brick of Greyhound bus stations, on disposable synthetic sheets in the emergency treatment wards of unsympathetic hospitals, on the hard benches of penitentiary dining halls, and swore the same thing through clenched teeth, but with no less tenderness.
We communicated with each other through initials carved into boarding school desks, designs spray-painted through stencils onto alley walls, holes kicked in corporate windows televised on the five o’clock news, letters posted with counterfeit stamps or carried across oceans in friends’ packs, secret instructions coded into anonymous emails, clandes- tine meetings in coffee shops, love poetry carved into the planks of prison bunks.

We sheltered illegal immigrants, political refugees, fugitives from justice, and adolescent runaways in our modest homes and beds, as they too sheltered us.
We improvised recipes to bake each other cookies, cakes, break- fasts in bed, weekly free meals in the park, great feasts celebrating our courage and kinship so we might taste their sweetness on our very tongues.

We entrusted each other with our hearts and appetites, together composing symphonies of caresses and pleasure, making love a verb in a language of exaltation.

We wreaked havoc upon their gender norms and ethnic stereotypes and cultural expectations, show- ing with our bodies and our rela- tionships and our desires just how arbitrary their laws of nature were.

We wrote our own music and performed it for each other, so when we hummed to ourselves we could celebrate our companions’ creativity rather than repeat the radio’s dull drone.

In borrowed attic rooms, we tended ailing foreign lovers and struggled to write the lines that could ignite the fires dormant in the multitudes around us.

In the last moment before dawn, flashlights tight in our shaking hands, we dismantled power boxes on the houses of fascists who were to host rallies the following day.

We fought those fascists tooth, nail, and knife in the streets, when no one else would even confront them in print.

We planted gardens in the abandoned lots of ghettos, hitchhiked across continents in record time, tossed pies in the faces of kings and bankers.

http://wagingnonviolence.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/maydaycrisis-300x214.jpg

We played saxophones together in the darkness of echoing caves in West Virginia.
In Paris, armed with cobblestones and parasols, we held the gendarmes at bay for nights on end, until we could almost taste the new world coming through the tear gas.

We fought our way through their lines to the opera house and took it over, and held discussions there twenty-four hours a day as to what that world could be.

In Chicago, we created an under- ground network to provide illegal abortions in safe conditions and a supportive atmosphere, when the religious fanatics would have preferred us to die in shame and tears down dark alleys.

In New York we held hands and massaged each other’s shoulders as our enemies closed in to arrest us.

In Quebec we tore up the high- way and pounded out primordial rhythms on the traffic signs with the fragments, and the sound was vaster and more beautiful than any song ever played in a concert hall.

In Santiago, we robbed banks to fund papers of transgressive poetry.

In Siberia, we plotted impossible escapes—and carried them out, circumnavigating the globe with forged papers and borrowed money to return to the arms of our friends.

In Montevideo, in the squatted township, we built huts from plywood and plastic sheeting, pirated electricity from nearby power lines, and conferred with our neighbors as to how we could contribute to our new community.

In San Diego, when they jailed us for speaking our minds, we invited our friends and filled their prisons until they had to change their policy.

In Oregon, we climbed trees, and lived in them for months to pro- tect the forests we had hiked and camped in as children.

In Mexico, when we met hopping freight trains, we traded stories about working with the Zapatistas in Chiapas, about floods witnessed from boxcars passing through Texas, about our grand- parents who fought in the Mexi- can revolution.

We fought in that revolution, and the Spanish civil war, and the French resistance, and even the Russian revolution—though not for the Bolsheviks or the Czar.

Sleepless and weather-beaten, we crossed the Ukraine on horseback to deliver news of the conflicts that offered us another chance to fight for our freedom.

Tense but untrembling, we smug- gled posters, books, firearms, fu- gitives, ourselves across borders from Canada to Pakistan.

We lied with clean consciences to homicide detectives in Reno, to military police in Santos, to angry grandparents in Oslo.

We told the truth to each other, even truths no one had ever dared tell before.
When we couldn’t overthrow gov- ernments, we raised new generations who would taste the sweet adrenaline of barricades and wheatpaste, who would carry on our quixotic quest when we fell or fled before the ruthless onslaught of the servile and craven.

When we could overthrow governments, we did.

We stood, one after the other, decade after decade, century af- ter century, behind the witness stand, and shouted so the deafest self-satisfied upright citizen at the back of the courtroom could hear it:“...andifIcoulddoitallover again, I would!”

As the sun rose after winter parties in unheated squats, we gathered up great sacks of broken glass and washed stacks of dishes in freezing water, while our critics, sequestered in penthouses with maid service, demanded to know who would take out the garbage in our so-called utopia.

When the good intentions of liberals and reformists broke down in bureaucracy, we collected food from the trash to feed the hungry, broke into condemned buildings and transformed them into palaces fit for pauper kings and bandit queens, held the sick and dying tight in our loving arms.

We fell in love in the wreckage, shouted out songs in the uproar, danced joyfully in
the heaviest shackles they could forge; we smuggled our stories through the gauntlets of silence, starvation, and subjugation, to bring them back to life again and again as bombs and beating hearts; we built castles in the sky from the ruins of hell on earth.


Accepting no constraints from without, we countenanced none within ourselves, either, and found that the world opened before us like the petals of a rose.

[christian]

If there is no one to lead and educate...
How will people come to wisdom?

If not by some sort of structure, then by what?


Anarchy is not the absence of structure or leadership. It's the absence of impositions. All that you think is needed in a society can be organized, but freely and (then probably) in a transparent way, and it does not need to be imposed on anybody who doesn't want to take part in whatever it is.



I'm a libertarian because I don't trust the people as much as anarchists do. I want to see government limited as much as possible; I would like to see it reduced back to where it was in Jefferson's time, or even smaller. But I would not like to see it abolished.


Anarchists argue that if you don't trust people, how could you trust them with forming a government? In a sense it's the distrust of people in positions of power as well as the trust in their own and humanity's ability to thrive when free that is characteristic for anarchists.

[Eram]

Anarchy is not the absence of structure or leadership. It's the absence of impositions. All that you think is needed in a society can be organized, but freely and (then probably) in a transparent way, and it does not need to be imposed on anybody who doesn't want to take part in whatever it is.

Well said Chrtistian!

Here mandela (played by Morgan Freemand in the movie invictus) helps his fellow man to understand that reconciliation must be placed above "getting even" if a nation wants to be able to function.


JMAje0p5-YM

Would you call this impose" or leading the way?

What I'm saying is, that if you are to believe in evolution and rebirth, it is difficult to uphold the idea that all man are equal as in, able to reach the same level of consciousness as all the others currently allive.
The model of anarchy would work if all people are equal and able to reach a certain level of consciousness to be able to let it function right.

If Humanity is a phase of life that every soul goes through in it's journey to omnipotence, starting in the mineral world, plant world, animal world and working it's way up through the human world, then it would be difficult to get a system like this running properly.

I'd say, let the wise lead the way :)

[DeDukshyn]

Hmm... I don't know about this one dianna.

I think anarchy leads to barbarism and stupidity.
Just look at all places in society were anarchy rules, like between companies and nations.

If there is no one to lead and educate...
How will people come to wisdom?

If not by some sort of structure, then by what?

An infant, thrown into the wild, raised by wolves will grow up without a developed intellect and other tools that one needs to live in harmony.


The individualist will to power leads to division. The universalist will to unity shows the value
and viability of our individualism.

They way I see it, corporations and nations are consistently leading us into forms of barbarism and stupidity (how many innocent lives lost each year from wars based on lies started by "civil" nations?), but without our consent even. I see Pan has covered the rest of what I was going to touch on in his response so I'll leave this as is :)

[christian]

They way I see it, corporations and nations are consistently leading us into forms of barbarism and stupidity (how many innocent lives lost each year from wars based on lies started by "civil" nations?), but without our consent even.


Corporations and nations are just vehicles, not drivers. It's people (or beings) who act. And in a way, we do consent, if we go along with it without doing anything about it, that's silent consent.



Here mandela (played by Morgan Freemand in the movie invictus) helps his fellow man to understand that reconciliation must be placed above "getting even" if a nation wants to be able to function.

Would you call this impose" or leading the way?


I'd call that making a suggestion. People are free to go with it, reject it, or modify it.



What I'm saying is, that if you are to believe in evolution and rebirth, it is difficult to uphold the idea that all man are equal as in, able to reach the same level of consciousness as all the others currently allive.


Even if that is the case, I don't see any problem with that. People are all unique individuals, that's at the core of Anarchism. The equality is in their right to free self-determination as long as they don't interfere with others.



I'd say, let the wise lead the way :)


How about "let wisdom lead the way"? But either way, who determines who is wise and what is wisdom? Because we're all fallible, anarchists argue that it's reasonable to allow everyone to seek wisdom freely without being subjected to another fallible human that rules over his or her life.

[Eram]

Thanks for the crash course in anarchy you all.

There are many features in that approach the idea of utopia :)


Even if that is the case, I don't see any problem with that. People are all unique individuals, that's at the core of Anarchism. The equality is in their right to free self-determination as long as they don't interfere with others.

This seems to me to be the crux of the matter (my reservations about anarchy).

What if someone is to interfere with others?
murder, rape, deception, manipulation and so on...
How would a world where anarchy rules act to these kinds of manifestations?
Is freedom still in place when we put a stop on these acts?

Freedom is gained through understanding the laws of the universe (by which life is governed) and brings responsibility along with it.
Otherwise, we are slave to the impulses that the ego dictates.

To grant all people the freedom to do as they please is like telling my 6 year old to do as he pleases as well.

In the end, it is the overall level of consciousness of the people which decides whether a system like this would succeed and when I look around, I would say that currently, humanity is nowhere near this kind of consciousness (imposed by tptb or through shear ignorance).

[norman]

Oh, ok, I get it now................

Anarchy is billions of wolves and sheep deciding what they are going to eat for lunch.

[christian]

What if someone is to interfere with others?
murder, rape, deception, manipulation and so on...
How would a world where anarchy rules act to these kinds of manifestations?
Is freedom still in place when we put a stop on these acts?


Just like now, it depends on how people organize their legal system. Now, it's owned and regulated by the state, it's a monopoly. That could be handled differently. Anarchists agree that violations of your personal space and integrity are punishable, the details of how this could be organized more freely have been laid out by people like Hoppe, Rothbard, or Mises.

Luckily, I can refer to them instead of having to spell out the details here. :)



To grant all people the freedom to do as they please is like telling my 6 year old to do as he pleases as well.


I don't think all people are like your six-year-old. :cool:

The issue with how to treat children shows: The idea of anarchy is simple, its application is complex. I think a child is his or her own person as well, and if it feels mistreated, it should be free to go. If the child can make a living on its own, or if there's a (freely organized) institution that would take care of such children, there we go.



Oh, ok, I get it now................

Anarchy is billions of wolves and sheep deciding what they are going to eat for lunch.


Actually, it's more about human interactions. It's about each individual deciding freely what he or she is gonna have for dinner and no one stealing from each other or eating one another, for that would be punishable.

[TargeT]

Anarchy eh?

Anarchy (Anarchocapitalism) FAQ
60veZm9ZbyU

Practical Anarchy:
Cwet4s07DlU

Stefan Molyneux is probably one of my favorite speakers on this topic... enjoy!


everytime you roll through a stop sign (when no one is there), you are an anarchist, every time you help an old lady across the street, you are an anarchist.... picking up someone elses trash in a park? YUP, anarchist!

Anarchy (or Voluntarism) is un-comparably the best option for humans, especially in the technological age we are in now (where employment CAN be optional, if allowed via automation)

[Eram]

I don't think all people are like your six-year-old. :cool:



I'd argue that many people are worse then that :cool:



if you put 100 psychopathic inmates on an island and give them anarchy.... would it succeed?
if you were to imply anarchy on the world right now... would it succeed?

It still comes back to consciousness.
A certain level is necessary for it to be able to work and for the little I know about the idea of anarchy, this issue is not addressed properly.

Imo.... there would be an great deal of education and the raising of consciousness through other means necessary to come to the point that the world is only slightly able to embrace this model.


A funny and appropriate side note... I was the product of two parents who were part of the provo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Provo_%28movement%29) movement (I think you must have heard of that since you live in Germany?) and they raised me with loads of freedom to do as I pleased.
I can assure you that it did me little good and still today, I am fighting to overcome hindrance it caused me in my life.

The growth of ego needs to be addressed early on in life.
Balance is key!

[christian]

if you put 100 psychopathic inmates on an island and give them anarchy.... would it succeed?
if you were to imply anarchy on the world right now... would it succeed?

It still comes back to consciousness.
A certain level is necessary for it to be able to work and for the little I know about the idea of anarchy, this issue is not addressed properly.

Imo.... there would be an great deal of education and the raising of consciousness through other means necessary to come to the point that the world is only slightly able to embrace this model.


I think you're spot-on. If it would work right now, it would already be there right now. It's as simple as that. It's possible when it's done. It takes educated, responsible, and vigilant people.



A funny and appropriate side note... I was the product of two parents who were part of the provo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Provo_%28movement%29) movement (I think you must have heard of that since you live in Germany?) and they raised me with loads of freedom to do as I pleased.
I can assure you that it did me little good and still today, I am fighting to overcome hindrance it caused me in my life.

The growth of ego needs to be addressed early on in life.
Balance is key!


I think you're spot-on again. Nobody is an island, especially not in the circle of parents and children. If you as a parent don't take responsibility and don't act as a leader for your children, you're not doing your job. Not doing anything in order to do nothing wrong is not the answer.


-------


By the way, Stefan Molyneux, despite the interesting thoughts he comes up with at times, is super creepy when it comes to his take on family. He helped a lot of people to think for themselves, but he is also responsible for a lot of families breaking apart.

This is a quote from him:





"Deep down I do not believe that there are any really good parents out there - the same way that I do not believe there were any really good doctors in the 10th century."


More about Molyneux and his take on families is in this article from The Guardian: http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2008/nov/15/family-relationships-fdr-defoo-cult

[DNA]

I'm a libertarian because I don't trust the people as much as anarchists do. I want to see government limited as much as possible; I would like to see it reduced back to where it was in Jefferson's time, or even smaller. But I would not like to see it abolished.



Anarchists argue that if you don't trust people, how could you trust them with forming a government? In a sense it's the distrust of people in positions of power as well as the trust in their own and humanity's ability to thrive when free that is characteristic for anarchists.

Here is the bottom line, souls are of different ages. We all go through an evolution of sorts. And in my opinion we all do the worst of the worst in one life time or another. The more we put our self on a pedestal and act all holy and spiritual the more you really do not have a clue in my opinion. This is nothing personal and has nothing to do with any one individual.
Souls of different ages are going to go through some horrible stuff on both ends of the drama. There is no way to circumvent this from what I have gathered.

As such, I would rather some of these young souls have a series of checks and balances in place.
So, yes, I do appreciate a ahem, form of Government, albeit a much lighter and more hands off version than what we are experiencing here in the USA.

Here is a snippet of how I personally view anarchy in it's true form if folks were left to do what they might.
And the quote from Wilson is basically a guy who wrote books championing anarchy in his younger days only to realize this probably isn't the best idea.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGLk8BZ4Wqk

[Milneman]

From my perspective the understanding individuals have of the various structural actors moral legitimacy is part of the discursive dance of social norms that constantly evolve and are constructed then deconstructed, formulated and then challenged. There may be some areas that as individuals we agree on but others that are subjective and reliant on the cultural, social, political and philosophical positions of the individual and the society/culture in which they are either members of or come from.

What's that mean in plain english? :D

[Milneman]

Basically,

The problem with any system of government is that it depends on the level of consciousness for it to work properly.
If the overall consciousness of humanity is high enough, any system will do.
If the consciousness is low, no system will work as it is supposed to.


What it means in the context that I refer to is you get together with your friends and arrange who is going to drive who to the restaurant for dinner. That's anarchy. There's probably no-one telling you the required schedule, there's probably no-one saying "do this or else" (if there is then get out now!). You are just chatting with friends and decide to go out to dinner and someone says "I'll drive". That's anarchy. Nothing scary, nothing terrifying. Just normal human relations.

Hi Pan,

Do you think that if all governments would retire tomorrow that this would result in the picture that you painted in your quote, even if all people would take this anarchy model as a point of exit?
Is the consciousness level of humanity high enough to get this to work?

I'm an optimist by nature, but not to that extend :P

I'm not Pan, but couldn't resist. ;)

Not retire, but stop being interventionist, then it might...but that would also require what I'm beginning to see what some considering themselves as "anarchists" are just using "common sense".....and when I realized that point, then I realized...we're f*cked. lmao The only way this system will work is if you accept a system of thought that....well....its going to require a sacrifice that I think most people are just simply incapable of making.

I'm a Platonist. That's why I'm having a hard time wrapping my mind around this. That's it. ;)

[Milneman]

I just think that the easiest solution is based within grass-root activism as a means of regaining control/power from those who have a vested interest in retaining it. The grass-root activism I refer to is based within the principles of community organisation found in Permaculture (see here, here and here, refer post here).

On this we absolutely agree, Pan.

Where it begins to break down for me is where it starts to look like Menshevism. aka pacifistic marxism.

Otherwise, we're on the same page bro. :)

[dianna]

LOL, everyone on this thread is cracking me up! you guys are great! My intention on this thread was to give a basic working definition of anarchy (historically and in philosophy) (with a bit of sarcasm, i.e., the nod to "punk rock" culture) which can be argued "till the cows come home" -- but then make the definition personal --- my second post "how we are actually "anarchists" in our daily life" (if you follow the link, you will see what I mean ... )

would anyone like to comment on this? Would anyone like to just make a statement on how they are anarchists in their daily lives, or in their pasts and why they felt the need to not be conventional?

http://comicsbym.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/how-to-feed-inner-anarchist.jpg

[christian]

dianna, I think that pic is all about the idea that any laws written by man are always more "what you'd call 'guidelines' than actual rules," so never stop improvising, improving, and thinking for yourself!


b6kgS_AwuH0


I would rather some of these young souls have a series of checks and balances in place.


Anarchism does not mean that there are no checks and balances. For checks and balances to work, they have to be brought to life and kept alive by vigilant and intelligent people, that applies in any society. In an anarchist society, however, you wouldn't force or demand anything from "young souls," you'd just make sure that they don't run amok and offer them guidance.

[TargeT]

By the way, Stefan Molyneux, despite the interesting thoughts he comes up with at times, is super creepy when it comes to his take on family. He helped a lot of people to think for themselves, but he is also responsible for a lot of families breaking apart.

This is a quote from him:





"Deep down I do not believe that there are any really good parents out there - the same way that I do not believe there were any really good doctors in the 10th century."


More about Molyneux and his take on families is in this article from The Guardian: http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2008/nov/15/family-relationships-fdr-defoo-cult


I've got to say, that's as clear a "hit piece" as I've ever seen....

Molyneux stays very true to his philosophy of voluntarism and relationships that are not forced (ie tax payer & the state, parents and children fall under that too). if you have another link, I'd read it but that one is really just character assassination centered on one story with a very biased writing perspective.

besides, this portion of your post is basically the logical fallacy "add Homenon" and I'm not really sure why you ignored the message & went after the messager.....


so... back to the topic!







would anyone like to comment on this? Would anyone like to just make a statement on how they are anarchists in their daily lives, or in their pasts and why they felt the need to not be conventional?[/B]


I am a coward anarchist, I only do what I want when I know doing so won't cause any issues.

I run redlights and stop signs when there is clearly no one there, I ensure everything at work is caught up (ie i fullfill my position description) and take long lunches or leave early, I ride a motorcycle and skip to the front of traffic when safe to, ignore speed limit signs, ignore most signs, go to bed when I waNT and generally try to be my own person as much as possible.

[DeDukshyn]

They way I see it, corporations and nations are consistently leading us into forms of barbarism and stupidity (how many innocent lives lost each year from wars based on lies started by "civil" nations?), but without our consent even.

Corporations and nations are just vehicles, not drivers. It's people (or beings) who act. And in a way, we do consent, if we go along with it without doing anything about it, that's silent consent.
...


I actually have to make a distinction here, A corporation acts as a sole entity, it neither has morals nor ethics, nor any emotion. the "Corporation" was invented as it's own entity mostly to keep the owners and people who direct the corporation, safe from retribution in the case the corporation does harm en - mass. For example, if you get sick from a pharma drug - you sue the corporations, not any person -- all the peoples who made the decisions to bring a harmful or dangerous product to market are fully innocent and protected because all retribution falls on the corporation. Corporations and Political arenas are enablers of morally bankrupt policies, I will guarantee there would be no single person making these types of decisions if they thought they could be held personally accountable for their actions. Therefore the moral legitimacy of any corporation or political system, is in no way reflective of the moral legitimacy of the people inside these structures.

I do agree in a sense we "consent" by not doing ... what? Going to war with corporations and governments? Get rid of those and the landscape of "moral legitimacy" also changes drastically. My 2 cents ;)

[DeDukshyn]

...
if you put 100 psychopathic inmates on an island and give them anarchy.... would it succeed?
...


We do have Australia -- it succeeded quite well for a country that started off as a penal colony.

The irony is -- we all say we want freedom, we want to think for ourselves, we want our own choices in health care, in food, we don't won't large organizations spying on us t=or to control the trillions of trade dollars - "We want Freedom!" we scream here on Avalon. But the fact is we are not ready for that freedom ... look how afraid we are of it even, this is the programmed fear I referred to earlier. Without some form of Anarchy -- there can be no true freedom. To believe so is to believe a lie to alleviate the fear we are programmed with.

I do believe that Anarchy would work, right now. But perhaps we need still further tyranny and control before we can be at the place to truly appreciate a responsible form of Anarchy. As I stated in an earlier post, I believe it is inevitable, but let me explain. I believe one of two directions are inevitable -- either a complete tyrannical communist one world police state, or true freedom -- likely first the former will come into play if we don't stop it, and if we still have our wits about us, the latter will be the solution to the former. My 2 cents ;)

[christian]

By the way, Stefan Molyneux, despite the interesting thoughts he comes up with at times, is super creepy when it comes to his take on family. He helped a lot of people to think for themselves, but he is also responsible for a lot of families breaking apart.

This is a quote from him:




"Deep down I do not believe that there are any really good parents out there - the same way that I do not believe there were any really good doctors in the 10th century."

Molyneux stays very true to his philosophy of voluntarism and relationships that are not forced (ie tax payer & the state, parents and children fall under that too).

[. . .]

besides, this portion of your post is basically the logical fallacy "add Homenon" and I'm not really sure why you ignored the message & went after the messager.....


I did acknowledge the message and did commend Stefan for his achievements, so I'm hardly "going after him." You cited Stefan Molyneux as an inspiring thinker. I agree with that. The issue has been brought up how Anarchism relates to the concept of the family, and I find his thoughts on that are not too helpful. The article I quoted is certainly not the epitome of good journalism, but it does highlight the issue that Stefan's view on the family and his advice in that regard has caused more families to break apart than to communicate. I think Stefan is a very intelligent man, but he often seems to have very little heart or emotional intelligence.



the "Corporation" was invented as it's own entity mostly to keep the owners and people who direct the corporation, safe from retribution in the case the corporation does harm en - mass. For example, if you get sick from a pharma drug - you sue the corporations, not any person -- all the peoples who made the decisions to bring a harmful or dangerous product to market are fully innocent and protected because all retribution falls on the corporation.


There you have it. People create corporations, people create the environment in which corporations act as straw men, people acquiesce to that. Fighting a corporation or corporations in general is fighting shadows, as you say. We, the people, cast shadows.

[DeDukshyn]

By the way, Stefan Molyneux, despite the interesting thoughts he comes up with at times, is super creepy when it comes to his take on family. He helped a lot of people to think for themselves, but he is also responsible for a lot of families breaking apart.

This is a quote from him:





"Deep down I do not believe that there are any really good parents out there - the same way that I do not believe there were any really good doctors in the 10th century."


More about Molyneux and his take on families is in this article from The Guardian: http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2008/nov/15/family-relationships-fdr-defoo-cult


I've got to say, that's as clear a "hit piece" as I've ever seen....

Molyneux stays very true to his philosophy of voluntarism and relationships that are not forced (ie tax payer & the state, parents and children fall under that too). if you have another link, I'd read it but that one is really just character assassination centered on one story with a very biased writing perspective.

besides, this portion of your post is basically the logical fallacy "add Homenon" and I'm not really sure why you ignored the message & went after the messager.....


so... back to the topic!







would anyone like to comment on this? Would anyone like to just make a statement on how they are anarchists in their daily lives, or in their pasts and why they felt the need to not be conventional?[/B]


I am a coward anarchist, I only do what I want when I know doing so won't cause any issues.

I run redlights and stop signs when there is clearly no one there, I ensure everything at work is caught up (ie i fullfill my position description) and take long lunches or leave early, I ride a motorcycle and skip to the front of traffic when safe to, ignore speed limit signs, ignore most signs, go to bed when I waNT and generally try to be my own person as much as possible.

Hehe, there seems to some weird hypnotic connection between "anarchy" and "breaking the law". Anarchy never has and never will mean, to act in a way that breaks the law. Anarchy is self governance. A person can live in this society and still be an anarchist. The argument is similar to the one about love / fear. Some think that if you choose out of love, then you are stupid because you always choose against yourself. Choosing out of love and choosing out of fear very often lead to the same choice -- they are not exclusive, this is just some persistent perception of it.

The reason I am bringing this up is certainly not to pick on you Target , but to keep in everyone's mind that when we think of what Anarchy is, it's hard not to think of "breaking the law" because this is the only difference between Anarchy and forms of control - is the difference in actions so that breaking the law gets an unfair association with anarchy .. in fact, now that I think of it, this may well have been by design. Our social and political structures are incredible complex and very well thought out to maximize control.

[DeDukshyn]

...
There you have it. People create corporations, people create the environment in which corporations act as straw men, people acquiesce to that. Fighting a corporation or corporations in general is fighting shadows, as you say. We, the people, cast shadows.

I didn't create any government or corporation. And the few people that create them are not necessarily evil or wrong -- it is the idea that we have a legal entity allowed called a "corporation" that is the problem. How did this problem get created? By another soul-less structure called a "government" not by people. People now create corporations because it becomes the sole way to compete in big business, no people who start corporations really have any choice in the matter, but once a corporation is established, it enable moral bankruptcy in people. that would other wise would never exist at all.

You make it sound like it's all just people, but it's not, it's people, plus the ability of corporation to protect those people against any of their actions or policies. Sometimes a locked door keeps an honest man, honest.

But this isn't really the point of the topic, we are off a bit on a tangent :)

[christian]

we are off a bit on a tangent :)


Indeed. But you're really contradicting yourself. You say:





we have a legal entity allowed called a "corporation" that is the problem. How did this problem get created? [. . .] not by people.


Then you go on to say:





People now create corporations


I could also go at it from another angle, and quote this:





How did this problem get created? By another soul-less structure called a "government"


Then I'd ask you: How did governments get created, by whom?


-------


People creating institutions, corporations, or organizations virtually cannot be abolished. To abolish that, you would need either an institution or everybody on the planet would have to work towards this of their own accord.

It's not necessary at all to get rid of the idea of shared responsibility, as we have it when you sue a corporation. I think it's reasonable to have both, shared and individual responsibility. At the moment, obviously many criminal individuals at the top of many corporations are not being held accountable. There are many reasons for that, but it all boils down to the fact that we, the people, allow all this. We can stop it, if we want. To stop the atrocities that are going on, there is simply no need to abolish corporations in general. But if we would abolish corporations in general, this would not automatically solve our problems.

[panopticon]

if you put 100 psychopathic inmates on an island and give them anarchy.... would it succeed?
if you were to imply anarchy on the world right now... would it succeed?

It still comes back to consciousness.
A certain level is necessary for it to be able to work and for the little I know about the idea of anarchy, this issue is not addressed properly.


This has actually been addressed ad nauseum by the major Social Anarchist thinkers.

I am not very knowledgeable on the theorists that Christian mentioned earlier because they come from the libertarian right, anarcho-capitalist, position where I am more from a centrist to left-centrist position.

I have read a bit of Mises but found his arguments somewhat self serving, counter-intuitive and contrived. Not bad, there are some aspects that I've agreed with for a transition away from the present system however I advocate the removal of competition over capital as the central motivator for human interactions and, as best I know, that is in opposition to the market centric view of the right. (Please Christian correct me here because I've no understanding of Hoppe [outside of a cursory understanding of his view on 'covenant communities' which I see as being intolerant and unaccepting and little different from elitist 'gated communities'] or Rothbard's position on this).

Others think Mises ideas are great and that's really the beauty of Anarchism we can agree to hold different positions yet still be inclusive in our ideas of how to go about societal reconstruction.

While Molyneux is quite popular I find him a little bit preachie for my liking and, as he's also from the right, much of what he says I simply have a different view on. That being said I haven't listened to a podcast by him in a few years so might revisit his channel to see if he's changed his delivery etc.

I would like you to define what you mean by "consciousness" (you've used it a number of times), so I can respond better to your question, as there has been material written about consciousness within Social Anarchist literature (for example Kropotkin, Chomsky) however the way it is used may be different to yours.

For example:



Hence the prerequisite of an anarchist revolution is a period of consciousness-raising in which people gradually become aware of submissive/authoritarian traits within themselves, see how those traits are reproduced by conditioning, and understand how they can be mitigated or eliminated through new forms of culture...
...consciousness-raising is considered an essential part of any anarchist movement. For anarchists, its important to "build the new world in the shell of the old" in all aspects of our lives and creating an anarchist culture is part of that activity.
An Anarchist FAQ (http://anarchism.pageabode.com/afaq/index.html)

-- Pan

[panopticon]

From my perspective the understanding individuals have of the various structural actors moral legitimacy is part of the discursive dance of social norms that constantly evolve and are constructed then deconstructed, formulated and then challenged. There may be some areas that as individuals we agree on but others that are subjective and reliant on the cultural, social, political and philosophical positions of the individual and the society/culture in which they are either members of or come from.

What's that mean in plain english? :D

I take it this is a joke but just in case it isn't.


From my perspective the understanding individuals have of the various structural actors moral legitimacy is part of the discursive dance of social norms that constantly evolve and are constructed then deconstructed, formulated and then challenged. There may be some areas that as individuals we agree on but others that are subjective and reliant on the cultural, social, political and philosophical positions of the individual and the society/culture in which they are either members of or come from.

Definitions:

Structural Actors: Any form of organisation that acts from within the vertical axis of power and control on individuals/groups. This would include, but not be limited to, Governments, bureaucracies, Judiciary, high tier level NGO's (international NGO's could be used as an example of peer to peer). Add your own, there's heaps.

Social Norms: The accepted norms of a society that are formulated within that society through cultural, historical, philosophical, social and environmental factors. These are usually instilled in a person from an early age (via what is referred to as primary socialisation (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialization#Types)) though can alter over the life of an individual as understandings change within the society they are part of.

Discursive "dance" or process: The way in which individuals and societies discuss the various understandings of what is a social norm. These processes work both on and through the individuals in complex ways that alter the way in which as a collective the social norms are understood and constructed.

Not all social norms are accepted by all people and there was an interesting paper written a few years ago that showed that a committed minority group could sway the general consensus of a group/society. This "tipping point" for general acceptance of the new norm was when 10% of the population "agreed" (or at least ceased to disagree) with the minorities perspective.

The paper is 'Social consensus through the influence of committed minorities (http://arxiv.org/abs/1102.3931)'.

As a student of philosphy you will undoubtably find Freire's 'Pedagogue Of The Oppressed' of interest. In this he states:


To surmount the situation of oppression, people must first critically recognize its causes, so that through transforming action they can create a new situation, one which makes possible the pursuit of a fuller humanity. But the struggle to be more fully human has already begun in the authentic struggle to transform the situation. Although the situation of oppression is a dehumanized and dehumanizing totality affecting both the oppressors and those whom they oppress, it is the latter who must, from their stifled humanity, wage for both the struggle for a fuller humanity; the oppressor, who is himself dehumanized because he dehumanizes others, is unable to lead this struggle.
(Book downloadable here (http://www.users.humboldt.edu/jwpowell/edreformFriere_pedagogy.pdf))

Hope this helps.

-- Pan

[christian]

I advocate the removal of competition over capital as the central motivator for human interactions and, as best I know, that is in opposition to the market centric view of the right.

I don't use the labels "left" and "right" when I think about that at all, but you're right about the market centric view of Mises, Rothbard, and Hoppe. I don't think competition over capital can be removed without either institutionalized force, which in itself would seek a monopoly in the competition over capital, or without every person working towards that of their own accord.

Competition is perfectly fine with me, it's just when people's greed has no limits that problems arise. I think this is best kept in check if everybody checks him or herself and boycotts anybody who is not able to keep him or herself in check, also offering guidance to those.

[panopticon]

I don't use the labels "left" and "right" when I think about that at all, but you're right about the market centric view of Mises, Rothbard, and Hoppe. I don't think competition over capital can be removed without either institutionalized force, which in itself would seek a monopoly in the competition over capital, or without every person working towards that of their own accord.

Competition is perfectly fine with me, it's just when people's greed has no limits that problems arise. I think this is best kept in check if everybody checks him or herself and boycotts anybody who is not able to keep him or herself in check, also offering guidance to those.

Again, we don't disagree. We simply are coming at the same problem from different perspectives.

My view of implementation revolves around decentralised "communities" (for want of a better word though not necessarily living within close proximity as the term "community" implies, though they can, but at least within the same geographical area) that incorporate a combination of techniques as a means of becoming self-reliant. The creation of a local currency based on maybe Hour Credits (using, for example, the excellent Open Source modular Cyclos banking platform (http://www.cyclos.org/index.php) as a means of accounting until it is no longer needed -- that is until the understanding of personal responsibility has become a norm), the gradual adoption of localised food production (including a food redistribution program & if it's not practical for food to be grown by the group then a variation on community supported agriculture (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community-supported_agriculture)), water harvesting (where practical), individual/collective power supply (via any number of available approaches dependent on the location etc), creation of an association so a NFP Charity Tax concession can be claimed by the new "entity" (use the system against itself) and following establishment of the NFP Charity income redirection into the scheme for individual tax concessions, financial consolidation and group economic development. Then use a similar approach to that adopted by the Basque Mondragon Corporation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mondragon_Corporation) for business ventures run by the "community".

My view is not that the "community" locks itself away and removes itself from the broader society. In doing that only suspicion would follow ("your some kind of cult" etc). Rather the use of this form of horizontally structured approach would allow for differing levels of inclusion/participation from not only members of the "community" but also those who are not formally part of it.

That is part of my vision for a transition process...

Think long term and gradually produce the world we want to see.

-- Pan

[Milneman]

From my perspective the understanding individuals have of the various structural actors moral legitimacy is part of the discursive dance of social norms that constantly evolve and are constructed then deconstructed, formulated and then challenged. There may be some areas that as individuals we agree on but others that are subjective and reliant on the cultural, social, political and philosophical positions of the individual and the society/culture in which they are either members of or come from.

What's that mean in plain english? :D

I take it this is a joke but just in case it isn't.


From my perspective the understanding individuals have of the various structural actors moral legitimacy is part of the discursive dance of social norms that constantly evolve and are constructed then deconstructed, formulated and then challenged. There may be some areas that as individuals we agree on but others that are subjective and reliant on the cultural, social, political and philosophical positions of the individual and the society/culture in which they are either members of or come from.

Definitions:

Structural Actors: Any form of organisation that acts from within the vertical axis of power and control on individuals/groups. This would include, but not be limited to, Governments, bureaucracies, Judiciary, high tier level NGO's (international NGO's could be used as an example of peer to peer). Add your own, there's heaps.

Social Norms: The accepted norms of a society that are formulated within that society through cultural, historical, philosophical, social and environmental factors. These are usually instilled in a person from an early age (via what is referred to as primary socialisation (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialization#Types)) though can alter over the life of an individual as understandings change within the society they are part of.

Discursive "dance" or process: The way in which individuals and societies discuss the various understandings of what is a social norm. These processes work both on and through the individuals in complex ways that alter the way in which as a collective the social norms are understood and constructed.

Not all social norms are accepted by all people and there was an interesting paper written a few years ago that showed that a committed minority group could sway the general consensus of a group/society. This "tipping point" for general acceptance of the new norm was when 10% of the population "agreed" (or at least ceased to disagree) with the minorities perspective.

The paper is 'Social consensus through the influence of committed minorities (http://arxiv.org/abs/1102.3931)'.

As a student of philosphy you will undoubtably find Freire's 'Pedagogue Of The Oppressed' of interest. In this he states:


To surmount the situation of oppression, people must first critically recognize its causes, so that through transforming action they can create a new situation, one which makes possible the pursuit of a fuller humanity. But the struggle to be more fully human has already begun in the authentic struggle to transform the situation. Although the situation of oppression is a dehumanized and dehumanizing totality affecting both the oppressors and those whom they oppress, it is the latter who must, from their stifled humanity, wage for both the struggle for a fuller humanity; the oppressor, who is himself dehumanized because he dehumanizes others, is unable to lead this struggle.
(Book downloadable here (http://www.users.humboldt.edu/jwpowell/edreformFriere_pedagogy.pdf))

Hope this helps.

-- Pan

First lesson my philosophy teacher taught me was if you can't be understood with what you're saying, you're either trying to establish your reputation as a philosopher, or you don't understand what you're saying...so I'll take it you're establishing your reputation. ;) Thank you for clearing that up for me. :) :)

I see light at the end of the tunnel here Pan, but I think when I come out at the other end it's not anarchy that I'm looking at. It's personal responsibility, ownership of self, and responsible behavior in a community. The issue I have here I guess is...I'm sensing, maybe incorrectly, that moral relativism and anarchy go hand in hand...is that a fair statement?

[Milneman]

DeDukshyn,

Sorry buddy...lol I'm often at work thinking about things and have AHA! moments! So I'm sweeping a floor tonight and I have an AHA! moment about your post! ;)

I don't believe that a sense of moral legitimacy is determined by natural selection. There are very obviously many, many factors at work. This said number 4 isn't relevant for my response.

Ok, I can accept that. I can even agree with it! :) Except that....

Foremost: Natural instinct. Like how a new mother cat just knows how to love and care for it's offspring.

Ok now I think we might be in trouble. Natural instinct....is....what? Where does it come from for a cat?

[panopticon]

The issue I have here I guess is...I'm sensing, maybe incorrectly, that moral relativism and anarchy go hand in hand...is that a fair statement?

Moral legitimacy is to do with structures of control/power that exist in the vertical.
Anarchism is a horizontal model.

**UPDATE**

Only just noticed you said moral relativism sorry.

If you want to believe that morals are created external from society then go for it.
It's your right to believe that.
Many Christian Anarchists may well believe that, but it's nothing to do with Anarchism itself.

-- Pan

Just to add (without creating a new post) that there are many Christian Anarchists. Try this site for an indication:
http://www.jesusradicals.com/

There are also many who believe (myself included) that the early formation of the Church (prior to it becoming co-opted with structuralist tendencies) was that of anarchist collectives. The decentralised nature of the early church and its focus on assisting both those who were members of the kitchen table congregation and those who were not, shows very definite Anarchist ideals.

:amen:

BTW I'm not a philosopher. I work for a living. :pound: :hug:

[Milneman]

The best philosophers, like ourselves, do work for a living. ;)

Never did thank you for the apple. :)

[panopticon]

There are heaps of ways for anyone to research Anarchism if they're interested.

The links below are mainly to do with Social Anarchism so anyone who has any other stuff please add on:

The Anarchist FAQ has a section on religious Anarchism (focusing on Christian Anarchists):
http://anarchism.pageabode.com/afaq/secA3.html#seca37

A full copy of Volume 1 of the FAQ (over 4000 pages!) is available here:
http://libcom.org/library/anarchist-faq-v-1

The Anarchist library (with over 2000 titles):
http://theanarchistlibrary.org/

My personal favourite, The Anarchist Archives:
http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/

Then there's One Big Torrent which focuses mainly on Chomsky and Social Anarchist related material:
http://onebigtorrent.org/

If you want one really good read then try Emma Goldman's:
Anarchism: What it really stand for (dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/goldman/aando/anarchism.html).

An audio recording of the above essay read by Lee Elliott is available here:
https://librivox.org/anarchism-and-other-essays-by-emma-goldman/

For your convienience I've embedded it below :)

http://www.archive.org/download/anarchism_otheressays_0908_librivox/anarchismotheressays_01_goldman.mp3
Direct Link (http://www.archive.org/download/anarchism_otheressays_0908_librivox/anarchismotheressays_01_goldman.mp3)

A series of videos using the same audio with lots of piccies are also available on Youtube (though audio isn't a good as they added music):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7CvRzeyLWo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6NY6e3pcvhY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmfIJhnZkaU

Rather buy a book (for someone special this holiday season mayhap?) then try:
http://www.akpress.org

Anyone got any more?

-- Pan

[panopticon]

For those who might be more interested in understanding the history of Anarchism try Peter Marshall's excellent tome 'Demanding the impossible: A history of anarchism' (available for download from here (libcom.org/library/demanding-impossible-history-anarchism)).

He covers Daoism, Buddhism, Christianity, Individual Anarchists, Social Anarchists, Proudhon, Bakunin, Kropotkin & Goldman.

He even has chapters on Tolstoy (a Christian Anarchist who had a great influence on another bloke...) and Gandhi.

The concepts of non-violent civil disobedience Gandhi adopted he attributed in part to Tolstoy (and Ruskin BTW). This influence came from a letter Tolstoy wrote in 1908 to an Indian revolutionary and that Gandhi also read which is known as 'A Letter to a Hindu (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Letter_to_a_Hindu)' (originally in Russian but translation available here (http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/A_Letter_to_a_Hindu) or with Gandhi's introduction here (http://www.online-literature.com/tolstoy/2733/)).

-- Pan

[Mike Gorman]

The central 'problem' for Anarchy, which is nicely articulated here in glowingly social theoretical terminology (it would make a university sociologist purr)
is that it demands a certain level of sophistication, development, agreed upon definitions, tacit boundaries-the same problems that beset all social assemblies...like
people who enjoy control, imposing their will on individuals less able to physically defend themselves, stealth-mode psychopaths who manipulate folks of good will for their own ends.....
I believe in the underlying objectives of Anarchy, the pursuit of freedom (happiness if you like), the removal of vertical structures of central power-but I have little faith in the current development of people
to be able to sustain Anarchy authentically.

[TargeT]

I think Stefan is a very intelligent man, but he often seems to have very little heart or emotional intelligence.


this is also a failing of mine, so i suppose that's why I don't see it.


however, I would not call it emotional intelligence, perhaps emotional empathy; I have a very high level of emotional intelligence and (mostly) control, this causes issues when I relate to people and don't understand why they can't control their own emotions... even that statement seems a bit lacking in emotional empathy.

I think the few family's that were broken up by anarchy inspired ideas probably had fundamental issues present already... the article talks about a young man that removed himself from his family at 18 and cut communication off; how many families do you know out there that have members who wont talk to each other? This seems very common with out blaming a person or a philosophy, that is my main issue with the article.

I don't think anarchy will break up families at all unless there is a reason for it, I am a parent; I socialize with other parents, I know how domineering the parent-child relationship often is. Yes the parent-child dictatorship CAN be a benevolent one, but often is not. On the "light side" you have parents who live vicariously through their children and apply massive pressure on them to achieve and so many other situations, on the "dark side" you have abuse of ALL levels, physical, sexual, verbal, mental, and mostly this is done mostly for the benefit, comfort, and/or neurosis of the parent.

So, as a parent, it's hard for me not to see a lot of truth in Stefan's statements, ESPECIALLY here in the Caribbean where children are treated vastly different from anywhere else I have seen (and the violent crime rates show what happens when bad parenting is present).

If Anarchy theory causes people to break free from these families and seek professional help (this is a major part of the article that I took issue with, Stefan is a huge fan of therapy for childhood issues, the article insinuates that is not the case) something that Stefan encourages; then I think its a good thing that these young humans have broken free from their family structures, especially at 18+.



Hehe, there seems to some weird hypnotic connection between "anarchy" and "breaking the law". Anarchy never has and never will mean, to act in a way that breaks the law. Anarchy is self governance. A person can live in this society and still be an anarchist. The argument is similar to the one about love / fear. Some think that if you choose out of love, then you are stupid because you always choose against yourself. Choosing out of love and choosing out of fear very often lead to the same choice -- they are not exclusive, this is just some persistent perception of it.

The reason I am bringing this up is certainly not to pick on you Target , but to keep in everyone's mind that when we think of what Anarchy is, it's hard not to think of "breaking the law" because this is the only difference between Anarchy and forms of control - is the difference in actions so that breaking the law gets an unfair association with anarchy .. in fact, now that I think of it, this may well have been by design. Our social and political structures are incredible complex and very well thought out to maximize control.

I don't break the law to be an anarchist, I analyze the situation I am in and choose what I will do based on my judgement. "the law" (ESPECIALLY traffic laws) seems to assume that I have criminal intent and am stupid; since I don't, and I'm not; I do what I want when it won't affect others negatively (and ESPECIALLY when it will benefit others).

Re-reading my post in light of yours, I agree... it seems centered on breaking the law or rules; but that's not what its about. I am making decisions based on my own judgement of what is best for the situation; in the US this quite often seems to cause one to "break the law" but that is NOT the goal, good clarification!



I see light at the end of the tunnel here Pan, but I think when I come out at the other end it's not anarchy that I'm looking at. It's personal responsibility, ownership of self, and responsible behavior in a community.

in my mind, you just described anarchy, though I'd add in volunteerism.

[panopticon]

The central 'problem' for Anarchy, which is nicely articulated here in glowingly social theoretical terminology (it would make a university sociologist purr)
is that it demands a certain level of sophistication, development, agreed upon definitions, tacit boundaries-the same problems that beset all social assemblies...like
people who enjoy control, imposing their will on individuals less able to physically defend themselves, stealth-mode psychopaths who manipulate folks of good will for their own ends.....
I believe in the underlying objectives of Anarchy, the pursuit of freedom (happiness if you like), the removal of vertical structures of central power-but I have little faith in the current development of people
to be able to sustain Anarchy authentically.

I agree with you Galaxyhorse. Did the thread really make you purr? :suspicious:

It's why I would advocate a gradual transition approach. In that way the major problems you mention like psychopaths/manipulators and physical domination would already have played themselves out within that group and lessons learnt for future reference.

The other questions I would ask are:

If not now then when?
If not us then who?
Should we never try to change the way the system attempts to controls us?
Never challenge the authority that others claim over us?


We could wait the rest of our lives for others to be ready and then our children and their children could do the same.

Only through an active program of educated and understanding of how the system works can that time come into being.

This is what anarchists call consciousness raising.

What I must admit, and this isn't directed at Galaxyhorse, is I find it strange that there is a lack of faith in people mentioned in this thread. It's a recurring theme that seems to move between authors on this thread. "Oh, I agree with the principle but people aren't ready for it" or something similar.

I find that very odd, if not unsettling.

-- Pan

[TargeT]

I find it strange that there is a lack of faith in people mentioned in this thread. It's a recurring theme that seems to move between authors on this thread. "Oh, I agree with the principle but people aren't ready for it" or something similar.

I find that very odd, if not unsettling.

-- Pan

I believe that is a part of the "divide and conquer" technique used to keep people predictable and controllable. As I eluded to earlier in the thread most laws are written to make us think that the majority (if not all) of people have negative intent and are stupid, thus "the state" must protect you from them, and you from your self.

I think this lack of faith in the fellow man is an important aspect of why we are, at least in the "western" countries, as we are as a society (and it's hard to think that it's not intentional).

the funny thing to me is this: we don't need riots, protests, "occupy"; we need no social movements at all really... we just need to DO it, we may need an education campaign or two to get everyone on the same page, we definitely need to be un-indoctrinated (even those of us participating on this forum). This change could happen very quickly, I think the gradual approach will cause a lot of issues for the first 99 monkeys, but once the barrier is breached its amazing how quickly acceptance follows.

[christian]

My view of implementation revolves around decentralised "communities" [. . .]


I see! I like what you describe. If I were to categorize it, I'd say this is one way to organize a "community." The guys I quoted were looking more at how to organize it all on a massive scale. Of course, they don't address too much of the transition process. In that process, communities that experiment with different models such as the ones that you describe pave the way, I think. In reality, you'd always have communities with different practices.



There are heaps of ways for anyone to research Anarchism if they're interested.

[. . .]

Anyone got any more?


http://mises.org/

Although they often call it Libertarianism or the Austrian School of Economics.



I think the few family's that were broken up by anarchy inspired ideas probably had fundamental issues present already... [. . .] So, as a parent, it's hard for me not to see a lot of truth in Stefan's statements.


They most probably had issues before. But it's not only anarchist ideas cause families to break up. I'm particularly concerned with Stefan's eagerness to suggest to young people to just leave their families for good. No communication, no nothing. There was a very good article about Stefan's efforts in that regard recently, unfortunately in German (http://recentr.com/2013/12/die-sekte-fdr-von-stefan-molyneux-fuhrt-krieg-gegen-eltern/). It cites many examples of that behavior from Stefan and his wife, who is a psychotherapist. She has been officially reprimanded in many cases (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/toronto/therapist-who-told-podcast-listeners-to-shun-their-families-reprimanded/article4846791/) because she had given people the advice to shun their families in Stefan's radio show.

Maybe check out But *my* parents were really nice! or Escaping Your Family Step By Step from Stefan's show.

There he says stuff like, "There is no capacity for people to act rightly in the modern world and that’s why I know that parents are bad." Or, "Please send me a donation... it will make it a lot easier for you to confront your parents if you're acting with good integrity in your life in general." There are more quotes in the article of which I cannot find the English source right now, but here we go, this is re-translated from German:





They abused you by forcing you to behave in public.
They cared so little for you, they didn't even bother beating you.
People wanna tell you to repair your relationship to your parents, but this is impossible, a complete waste of time that's gonna drive you crazy. Because they hurt you when you were young, you cannot repair this relationship.



Or check out this snippet:





Caller: "Sometimes my dad shouted at our cat Fluffy when he was angry."

Molyneux: "I'm so sorry you had to experience this. What a monstrous, foul beast from the depths of hell. Your childhood must have been devastating. Tell me, did he ever shout at the cat in public?"

Caller: "Uh, no."

Molyneux: "I knew it! That proves he is not insane! He truly is a hateful, satanic demon who commits these unspeakable acts on purpose. I'm not telling you to defoo [leave your family of origin], but you'd be a complete loser if you didn't."


There are many quotes, articles, and videos that show that Stefan comes up with a lot of useful and inspiring ideas. But his advice in regard to family life is not that well thought out, in my opinion, it's just way too extreme.

[TargeT]

http://mises.org/

Although they often call it Libertarianism or the Austrian School of Economics.

To me it seems that libertarian-ism and Anarchists are nearly the same thing, in fact I can't think of an area where the two disagree.






I think the few family's that were broken up by anarchy inspired ideas probably had fundamental issues present already... [. . .] So, as a parent, it's hard for me not to see a lot of truth in Stefan's statements.


They most probably had issues before. But it's not only anarchist ideas cause families to break up. I'm particularly concerned with Stefan's eagerness to suggest to young people to just leave their families for good. No communication, no nothing. There was a very good article about Stefan's efforts in that regard recently, unfortunately in German (http://recentr.com/2013/12/die-sekte-fdr-von-stefan-molyneux-fuhrt-krieg-gegen-eltern/). It cites many examples of that behavior from Stefan and his wife, who is a psychotherapist. She has been officially reprimanded in many cases (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/toronto/therapist-who-told-podcast-listeners-to-shun-their-families-reprimanded/article4846791/) because she had given people the advice to shun their families in Stefan's radio show.

Maybe check out But *my* parents were really nice! or Escaping Your Family Step By Step from Stefan's show.

There he says stuff like, "There is no capacity for people to act rightly in the modern world and that’s why I know that parents are bad." Or, "Please send me a donation... it will make it a lot easier for you to confront your parents if you're acting with good integrity in your life in general." There are more quotes in the article of which I cannot find the English source right now, but here we go, this is re-translated from German:





They abused you by forcing you to behave in public.
They cared so little for you, they didn't even bother beating you.
People wanna tell you to repair your relationship to your parents, but this is impossible, a complete waste of time that's gonna drive you crazy. Because they hurt you when you were young, you cannot repair this relationship.



Or check out this snippet:





Caller: "Sometimes my dad shouted at our cat Fluffy when he was angry."

Molyneux: "I'm so sorry you had to experience this. What a monstrous, foul beast from the depths of hell. Your childhood must have been devastating. Tell me, did he ever shout at the cat in public?"

Caller: "Uh, no."

Molyneux: "I knew it! That proves he is not insane! He truly is a hateful, satanic demon who commits these unspeakable acts on purpose. I'm not telling you to defoo [leave your family of origin], but you'd be a complete loser if you didn't."


There are many quotes, articles, and videos that show that Stefan comes up with a lot of useful and inspiring ideas. But his advice in regard to family life is not that well thought out, in my opinion, it's just way too extreme.


interesting, I guess I've only cherry picked information from Stefan, I've never heard any of this before after years of randomly watching a video or two from him; I guess the old saying holds true here:

Everything in moderation

I think we are on the verge of needing another thread, I can think of a few counters that are irrelevant to the topic at hand here (mostly centered on my views of parents/parenting).

[DeDukshyn]

we are off a bit on a tangent :)


Indeed. But you're really contradicting yourself. You say:





we have a legal entity allowed called a "corporation" that is the problem. How did this problem get created? [. . .] not by people.


Then you go on to say:





People now create corporations


I could also go at it from another angle, and quote this:





How did this problem get created? By another soul-less structure called a "government"


Then I'd ask you: How did governments get created, by whom?


-------


People creating institutions, corporations, or organizations virtually cannot be abolished. To abolish that, you would need either an institution or everybody on the planet would have to work towards this of their own accord.

It's not necessary at all to get rid of the idea of shared responsibility, as we have it when you sue a corporation. I think it's reasonable to have both, shared and individual responsibility. At the moment, obviously many criminal individuals at the top of many corporations are not being held accountable. There are many reasons for that, but it all boils down to the fact that we, the people, allow all this. We can stop it, if we want. To stop the atrocities that are going on, there is simply no need to abolish corporations in general. But if we would abolish corporations in general, this would not automatically solve our problems.

I didn't clarify where I was talking about the creation of the concept of corporation, vs people setting up a corporation for use -- two separate things.

My entire point had nothing to do with whether or not people are behind these things - of course they are, my point is that a person driving a nearly impenetrable and nearly indestructible vehicle my be inclined to drive it far differently then a vehicle that is fully transparent and the operators can be held responsible, likewise a person hiding behind the mask of the corporation will make different decisions than he would for himself where he would have full accountability -- this in a sense creates two very different decision making motivations. My final point was that you have to draw a distinctions between people operating under protection of a corporation or other such entity, and those not - because their motivations for making decisions become not their own, but rather for the entity itself.

Certain situations cause people to act outside of moral decision making, not having retribution for action is one of them. In Anarchy, everyone is fully responsible for his actions.

[dianna]

http://libcom.org/files/imagecache/teaser/images/library/days.gif


Released in 2000, as one of Crimethinc.’s first published books Days of War Nights of Love began Crimethinc.’s polished slick design, delivering its messages with a high contrast, organic, cut and paste style.

The chapters are organized in a fashion that don’t have to be read in sequential order to make sense, making it an attractive book to the non-reader. Topics are arranged alphabetically which places contrasting themes in the same chapter.



Days of War Nights of Love was a book that I found on a merch table at a hardcore show. I don’t remember how much I paid for it or what convinced me that I should buy it. After the last band had played as I left the hall, even before the sweat on my skin had dried I knew I had a treasure.

Flipping through the pages of my new book I found the validation and expansion of the ideas that were already bubbling in my mind. From shoplifting to dumpster diving, Crimethinc. explained anarchist perspectives on work, gender, and domestication (and so much more). Telling us that our uncompromising and unquenchable desire for freedom is the fuel for the revolution. And I ate that **** up; driving me from the comfort of aloof nihilism to an outspoken advocate for social criticism.

Days of War Nights of Love does have its problems and shouldn’t be read as the gospel. Although the book presents some radical ideas and critiques of todays mass culture it can quickly become a dangerous self affirming lifestyle package for the disenfranchised. Crimethinc.’s writings have been critiqued for being written for the ignorant middle class, but there’s more to these pages then just a manifesto for the bored suburban hooligan.

In the interest of accessibility Crimethinc has made all of the chapters of this book available online as a PDF form free of charge. Also an anarchist collective, audio anarchy, has recorded an audio version, found with other interesting anarchist audio texts for free download on their website. ∆




http://www.daysofwarnightsoflove.com/images/option_pdf_up.gif
http://www.daysofwarnightsoflove.com

http://farm7.staticflickr.com/6006/6012707877_caf518b6e7_o.jpg
Raoul Vaneigem

[christian]

I didn't clarify where I was talking about the creation of the concept of corporation, vs people setting up a corporation for use -- two separate things.

My entire point had nothing to do with whether or not people are behind these things - of course they are, my point is that a person driving a nearly impenetrable and nearly indestructible vehicle my be inclined to drive it far differently then a vehicle that is fully transparent and the operators can be held responsible, likewise a person hiding behind the mask of the corporation will make different decisions than he would for himself where he would have full accountability -- this in a sense creates two very different decision making motivations. My final point was that you have to draw a distinctions between people operating under protection of a corporation or other such entity, and those not - because their motivations for making decisions become not their own, but rather for the entity itself.

Certain situations cause people to act outside of moral decision making, not having retribution for action is one of them. In Anarchy, everyone is fully responsible for his actions.


Your point in favor of banning corporations is pretty much like arguing to ban guns. It's not practical and not feasible, in my opinion. How would you abolish corporations? You could only do it through an institution/corporation where people are not really held personally accountable. It doesn't add up. That's why the solution is to allow all forms of institutions that people agree on, I think, and work on ourselves while being vigilant and offering guidance.

In Anarchy, people are responsible for their direct actions, of course. But what about indirect effects of actions? That'll always be there, imagine people altering their environment and thus affecting others. Or when they organize institutions, and people will always do that, then you have something like abstract management decisions. It's hard to pinpoint accountability there.

[risveglio]

http://mises.org/

Although they often call it Libertarianism or the Austrian School of Economics.

To me it seems that libertarian-ism and Anarchists are nearly the same thing, in fact I can't think of an area where the two disagree.



There are a couple popular jokes among anarchists

What’s the difference between a libertarian and an minarchist? Six months.

What’s the difference between a minarchist and an anarchist? Six months.

[giovonni]

will share this here ...

Robert Anton Wilson - Politics and Conspiracy ...

"A remastered/noiseless version of "Politics and Conspiracy"
from the series "Robert Anton Wilson Explains Everything" ...

From Wikipedia ~ Who is Robert Anton Wilson (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Anton_Wilson)

Published on Dec 13, 2013


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yS6JixCEotU

[risveglio]

By the way, Stefan Molyneux, despite the interesting thoughts he comes up with at times, is super creepy when it comes to his take on family. He helped a lot of people to think for themselves, but he is also responsible for a lot of families breaking apart.

This is a quote from him:




"Deep down I do not believe that there are any really good parents out there - the same way that I do not believe there were any really good doctors in the 10th century."
More about Molyneux and his take on families is in this article from The Guardian: http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2008/nov/15/family-relationships-fdr-defoo-cult


I've got to say, that's as clear a "hit piece" as I've ever seen....

Molyneux stays very true to his philosophy of voluntarism and relationships that are not forced (ie tax payer & the state, parents and children fall under that too). if you have another link, I'd read it but that one is really just character assassination centered on one story with a very biased writing perspective.

besides, this portion of your post is basically the logical fallacy "add Homenon" and I'm not really sure why you ignored the message & went after the messager.....


so... back to the topic!



I like a lot of what Molyneux says and especially love some of his videos; "Story of Your Enslavement" being a classic, but I would be interested on knowing more about him. There are some pages dedicated against Molyneux and FreeDomainRadio on some sites, including anarcho-capitalists sites. It has been hard for me to tell at this point if they are legitimate problems or if some kid is just pissed because his hot ex-girlfriend moved on after Molyneux made her realize she could do better.

[risveglio]

A little off topic but the below book is about the not so wild west and how most towns were successful with little or no government. Definitely a good read for Americans who mostly think the west was chaos.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/0804748543/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_S_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=PGE2J3U6CRLO&coliid=I2Z4EQYSG4I0DE

:focus:

[DeDukshyn]

I didn't clarify where I was talking about the creation of the concept of corporation, vs people setting up a corporation for use -- two separate things.

My entire point had nothing to do with whether or not people are behind these things - of course they are, my point is that a person driving a nearly impenetrable and nearly indestructible vehicle my be inclined to drive it far differently then a vehicle that is fully transparent and the operators can be held responsible, likewise a person hiding behind the mask of the corporation will make different decisions than he would for himself where he would have full accountability -- this in a sense creates two very different decision making motivations. My final point was that you have to draw a distinctions between people operating under protection of a corporation or other such entity, and those not - because their motivations for making decisions become not their own, but rather for the entity itself.

Certain situations cause people to act outside of moral decision making, not having retribution for action is one of them. In Anarchy, everyone is fully responsible for his actions.


Your point in favor of banning corporations is pretty much like arguing to ban guns. It's not practical and not feasible, in my opinion. How would you abolish corporations? You could only do it through an institution/corporation where people are not really held personally accountable. It doesn't add up. That's why the solution is to allow all forms of institutions that people agree on, I think, and work on ourselves while being vigilant and offering guidance.

In Anarchy, people are responsible for their direct actions, of course. But what about indirect effects of actions? That'll always be there, imagine people altering their environment and thus affecting others. Or when they organize institutions, and people will always do that, then you have something like abstract management decisions. It's hard to pinpoint accountability there.

Silly, When someone shoots you with a gun you can't sue the gun. :) Not remotely the same. What if your only action legally allowed was to be able to sue the gun, while the trigger puller walks away? This is what corporations (as legally defined) allows to happen.

To fix the problem with a corporation is to abolish the "sole entity" concept and make each person who makes decisions in the company, responsible for those decisions. Suddenly, the business and economic landscape would become much more "moral" and "ethical", as people wouldn't be able to keep suing "guns" (corporations) instead of holding the perpetrators responsible.

[christian]

When someone shoots you with a gun you can't sue the gun. :) Not remotely the same. What if your only action legally allowed was to be able to sue the gun, while the trigger puller walks away? This is what corporations (as legally defined) allows to happen.


People did sue gun makers. Without success though. Anyways, I meant that both weapons and corporations are instruments for people and that banning the instrument doesn't go to the root.

The problem that individuals in corporations are not accountable as they should be is due to our legal system, not due to the existence of corporations. The accountability of people within corporations could be handled differently.



To fix the problem with a corporation is to abolish the "sole entity" concept and make each person who makes decisions in the company, responsible for those decisions. Suddenly, the business and economic landscape would become much more "moral" and "ethical", as people wouldn't be able to keep suing "guns" (corporations) instead of holding the perpetrators responsible.


Exactly. You wanna sue a corporation over something this corporation does? This should affect the people who are responsible for that particular thing that the corporation does. That's really just common sense, and it's not applied today because the legal system is corrupted.

[DeDukshyn]

When someone shoots you with a gun you can't sue the gun. :) Not remotely the same. What if your only action legally allowed was to be able to sue the gun, while the trigger puller walks away? This is what corporations (as legally defined) allows to happen.


People did sue gun makers. Without success though. Anyways, I meant that both weapons and corporations are instruments for people and that banning the instrument doesn't go to the root.

The problem that individuals in corporations are not accountable as they should be is due to our legal system, not due to the existence of corporations. The accountability of people within corporations could be handled differently.



To fix the problem with a corporation is to abolish the "sole entity" concept and make each person who makes decisions in the company, responsible for those decisions. Suddenly, the business and economic landscape would become much more "moral" and "ethical", as people wouldn't be able to keep suing "guns" (corporations) instead of holding the perpetrators responsible.


Exactly. You wanna sue a corporation over something this corporation does? This should affect the people who are responsible for that particular thing that the corporation does. That's really just common sense, and it's not applied today because the legal system is corrupted.

I think you see my main point now. I don't see guns as making people do bad things because unless in war (that's a different topic) the gun trigger puller is responsible at the time it shoots someone, with a corporation the "gun" is the one held responsible -- this causes the people directing the corporation to act in way he would otherwise not. Yes people are ultimately responsible for what happens as decision need to be made to make them happen, but when you take away that "responsibility" - it creates a situation where no one is responsible for resultant actions, thus changing the behaviour of the people. So there is a difference between those acting as a person and those acting as a gun - the latter which cannot be responsible for a crime.

Thus I felt a distinction was needed here in my original post on the topic. Not that you were wrong - but just that a distinction was needed.

[Zanshin]

Christian and De Dukshyn,

You are both addressing what I perceive to be the crux of the whole 'commercial redemption' movement.
We have the power to hold people accountable for their actions without the limited liability protection of their corporate role.

In a word - affidavits. Only a real wo/man can sign an affidavit and any of us can write one and have it witnessed.
The only way to rebut an affidavit is point for point, under unlimited commercial liability and penalty of perjury.

If a corporate employee receives an affidavit in their role as a corporate officer, will they rebut it for the boss on their own unlimited liability?
Can a corporation rebut an affidavit?

An unrebutted affidavit stands as truth in commerce evidencing the agreement between the parties. [failure to rebut means agreement]

That private agreement can then be used as evidence in the courts.

Speaking from experience, corporations and their employees (including govt. departments) never respond to affidavits (not sufficiently to count).
Using this agreement by non-response is where the remedy lies.

The people still hold the power.

[Delight]

I came across an article that was shockingly sad and I guess many have seen it. It regards a family isolated in the bush in OZ for 4 or more generations. They are retarded humans. The level of primitive devolved savagery is stark. The misfortune of the people looks raving mad.

There is absolutely no reason we should expect people without learning to be able to function. Humans do not have the animals capacity to do what they do to stay healthy. It is a price paid for "independent" capacity. Humans cannot "just go wild". We forgot wilderness tribal natural beingness to become individuals? I doubt anarchy would be an interest for birds.

Apparently without education of basic hygiene (and incest is unhygienic), humans suffer. Just look at how the casualty rate in the Crimea was so high before Florence Nightingale's team arrived? Look at how purpural fever killed mothers after delivery when doctors did not wash hands between patients? Too few germ exposures is also a neglect to challenge the immune system. Only intelligent people can afford anarchy IMO.

Anarchy cannot work without self responsibility and basic knowledge. The kind of anarchy that is happening in pockets is one where people know how to stay out of the way of "the artificial matrix" and use Universal law to effect the present through the mind/heart/intention etc. practices we have seen all around.

I feel I had a taste of anarchy at it's best when I was in my late teens to late 20's. It was a GREAT time in Atlanta in that we had public transportation and the rents were low, scool costs were low. I am lucky.

A group of us were living anarchically by not having "teachers< authority figures , rules". We kind of just were able to cooperate? Not city wide or even neighborhood anarchy, It was personal Free behavior. We just went our way under the radar. It worked for us. Now it might take more funding as money seemed less a concern? We were all quite broke until some got "real jobs" such as nursing, teaching, social work.

In retrospect, we each assumed we would have jobs and we always were doing some kind of work. There was a value for participation in community activities (one friend was a voluntyeer in a Mennonite social service like Vista or the Peace Corps). We were neither outrageous or sedate. We as a group of friends "lived the way we wanted" and did all the sex, music, drugs etc. of that late 70's early 80's time.

Our life style was based in certain hygeines...like we knew about Birth Control, about cleanliness, about eating well. We did not rip people off. We did not sabotage one another. That was a legacy of growing in "good enough" families so we were workable in relationships and we were all into learning, study, creativity, being "contributive".

No one I know personally has ever been in jail, beat up by police, hounded by agencies, harassed or ANYTHING. Some are inventors. I am sure this is no accident. We grew up knowing how to use the laws that we never called laws. it was just an unspoken sense of I am responsible and I will be left alone when I insist. Just don't go looking for fights. They come if you request the strife out of rage fear and defense. I love this factor.

My boyfriend was from Greece where he had butted heads in a Junta and was in house arrest for 5 years. He had a "socialist" philosophy when I knew him that was anarchistic. It had to do with consideration and consciousness. Maybe it was because we were all interested in metaphysics too that the "experiment" in anarchy worked.

My long time friends are still doing their life just fine, being self sufficient (no welfare) and being smart and having friendship supports. My latest close confidants all KNOW that we cannot expect to have something in the physical BEFORE we have it in the INvisible.

I notice the story from Australia and feel sad at the ignorance so well demonstrated. Neglect and ignorance is stupid, nasty, ugly and unnecessary IMO. The Australian family may become a poster family for the need for stricter social monitoring? I hope NOT.

However, If people do not have a useful "structure" for health and humane actions and are set loose from knowledge of reality and an ethic based on reasonable principles, they may end up being barbaric. (two favorite words combined becomes the HYGIENE OF ANARCHY).

[panopticon]

I came across an article that was shockingly sad and I guess many have seen it. It regards a family isolated in the bush in OZ for 4 or more generations. They are retarded humans. The level of primitive devolved savagery is stark. The misfortune of the people looks raving mad.

There is absolutely no reason we should expect people without learning to be able to function. Humans do not have the animals capacity to do what they do to stay healthy. It is a price paid for "independent" capacity. Humans cannot "just go wild". We forgot wilderness tribal natural beingness to become individuals? I doubt anarchy would be an interest for birds.

Apparently without education of basic hygiene (and incest is unhygienic), humans suffer. Just look at how the casualty rate in the Crimea was so high before Florence Nightingale's team arrived? Look at how purpural fever killed mothers after delivery when doctors did not wash hands between patients? Too few germ exposures is also a neglect to challenge the immune system. Only intelligent people can afford anarchy IMO.

Anarchy cannot work without self responsibility and basic knowledge. The kind of anarchy that is happening in pockets is one where people know how to stay out of the way of "the artificial matrix" and use Universal law to effect the present through the mind/heart/intention etc. practices we have seen all around.

I feel I had a taste of anarchy at it's best when I was in my late teens to late 20's. It was a GREAT time in Atlanta in that we had public transportation and the rents were low, scool costs were low. I am lucky.

A group of us were living anarchically by not having "teachers< authority figures , rules". We kind of just were able to cooperate? Not city wide or even neighborhood anarchy, It was personal Free behavior. We just went our way under the radar. It worked for us. Now it might take more funding as money seemed less a concern? We were all quite broke until some got "real jobs" such as nursing, teaching, social work.

In retrospect, we each assumed we would have jobs and we always were doing some kind of work. There was a value for participation in community activities (one friend was a voluntyeer in a Mennonite social service like Vista or the Peace Corps). We were neither outrageous or sedate. We as a group of friends "lived the way we wanted" and did all the sex, music, drugs etc. of that late 70's early 80's time.

Our life style was based in certain hygeines...like we knew about Birth Control, about cleanliness, about eating well. We did not rip people off. We did not sabotage one another. That was a legacy of growing in "good enough" families so we were workable in relationships and we were all into learning, study, creativity, being "contributive".

No one I know personally has ever been in jail, beat up by police, hounded by agencies, harassed or ANYTHING. Some are inventors. I am sure this is no accident. We grew up knowing how to use the laws that we never called laws. it was just an unspoken sense of I am responsible and I will be left alone when I insist. Just don't go looking for fights. They come if you request the strife out of rage fear and defense. I love this factor.

My boyfriend was from Greece where he had butted heads in a Junta and was in house arrest for 5 years. He had a "socialist" philosophy when I knew him that was anarchistic. It had to do with consideration and consciousness. Maybe it was because we were all interested in metaphysics too that the "experiment" in anarchy worked.

My long time friends are still doing their life just fine, being self sufficient (no welfare) and being smart and having friendship supports. My latest close confidants all KNOW that we cannot expect to have something in the physical BEFORE we have it in the INvisible.

I notice the story from Australia and feel sad at the ignorance so well demonstrated. Neglect and ignorance is stupid, nasty, ugly and unnecessary IMO. The Australian family may become a poster family for the need for stricter social monitoring? I hope NOT.

However, If people do not have a useful "structure" for health and humane actions and are set loose from knowledge of reality and an ethic based on reasonable principles, they may end up being barbaric. (two favorite words combined becomes the HYGIENE OF ANARCHY).

Thank you Delight.

Your personal story was very interesting and I personally commend your spirit.

It might surprise you but I agree that these are things that many people who talk about "change" either ignore or gloss over.

Just to clear up a couple of things though, this extended family group (3 generations from what I've read) were not isolated.

They had neighbours who reported that they heard nothing untoward (though reported that were surprised they hadn't heard the sounds of children playing/laughing).

It was a wilful act on behalf of the adults to deliberately avoid examination.

When the adults sensed they were about to be investigated by the State based Department of Family and Community Services they would shift State.

The males appear, from what I've read, to have all been working (some for the local council) and while the children were both physically and emotionally abused (most, if not all, were sexually abused), living in squalor, suffering from malnutrition and with some being reported as cognitively impaired, I haven't come across any reference to them being at a 'level of primitive devolved savagery'.

A duty of care was undertaken by a number of people from the public (eg. bus driver, teachers), in reporting to the appropriate officials, and it is represented as being a lack of response to these concerns/reports submitted to the FaCS which permitted it to continue.

Not only were the children victims but the adults were too. They had been bought up in this environment and they had all been abused when they were children.

It is a multigenerational failure to protect the weakest members of society which has led to this tragedy.

It is a story of power and control being transferred between generations and instilled as appropriate behaviour.

Truly an appalling situation for those involved and in this instance I view them all as victims (I assume the Grandfather was also abused in New Zealand).

For those interested in the Australian references here are the articles I'd read on it:
Children removed after generations of incest (www.smh.com.au/nsw/children-removed-after-generations-of-incest-20131206-2ywrt.html)
Secluded hills hid a family's darkest secret (http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/secluded-hills-hid-a-familys-darkest-secret-20131206-2ywps.html)

If this is a different story to the one you're referring to Delight (I hope not!) please point to the right one.

-- Pan

[panopticon]

the funny thing to me is this: we don't need riots, protests, "occupy"; we need no social movements at all really... we just need to DO it, we may need an education campaign or two to get everyone on the same page, we definitely need to be un-indoctrinated (even those of us participating on this forum). This change could happen very quickly, I think the gradual approach will cause a lot of issues for the first 99 monkeys, but once the barrier is breached its amazing how quickly acceptance follows.

G'day Target,

I view that it is the social movements that bring things into the mainstream.
They bring it into the consciousness of the population.
The concept of the 1% is now firmly entrenched within the Western world and it will take years of media re-indoctrination for that to be overcome by them.
Social movements point to the questions, they ask "Why is this happening?".
It's not necessarily their purpose to offer up solutions (the Occupy Movement is a good example of this).
This is how people learn certain things and (yeah, I know someone going to be a smart arse here) how the discourses that surround us and work through us change.

There are many levels and layers to how money, control and power operates and I think social movements are a key tool at our disposal on a very unlevel playing field.

It's certain change will occur. On that we can all be definite.

Just what sort of change will it be?

-- Pan

[panopticon]

My view of implementation revolves around decentralised "communities" [. . .]

I see! I like what you describe. If I were to categorize it, I'd say this is one way to organize a "community." The guys I quoted were looking more at how to organize it all on a massive scale. Of course, they don't address too much of the transition process. In that process, communities that experiment with different models such as the ones that you describe pave the way, I think. In reality, you'd always have communities with different practices.


Exactly! That's the joy of it all.

There are way to many people who think on the macro, who say "this is how it will be" and not very many who say "I don't know what it will look like in the end exactly but this is how I reckon we might start".

I view it all as an organic process with certain things being adopted and others rejected. An evolutionary process in a way. Though not wanting to label or restrict it maybe I shouldn't have said that!

I know there's a long way to go. I know the path will be hard.

That's why I base my ideas for a transition process within nature.

I view the "community" as a guild (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permaculture#Guilds) (as used in Permaculture) and the economic/political/interactive processes as zones (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permaculture#Zones) (for example the wider population that interacts regularly with the community being classified as zone 3, the casual interaction with the community as zone 4 and the non-interactive elements as zone 5).

I came to Anarchy from Permaculture over a quarter Century ago and was greatly influenced on this journey by many writers. One of the most influential, strange as it may sound, was Einstein. His article 'Why Socialism? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Why_Socialism%3F)' got me on the path and from there I found common ground with Permaculture that led to Social Anarchism. Einstein's article is available here (http://monthlyreview.org/2009/05/01/why-socialism).

Just to add. The questions asked at the end of Einstein's article were the ones that sent me on my journey:


How is it possible, in view of the far-reaching centralization of political and economic power, to prevent bureaucracy from becoming all-powerful and overweening?
How can the rights of the individual be protected and therewith a democratic counterweight to the power of bureaucracy be assured?


-- Pan

[dianna]

You’re Barred: Cocktail barman attempts citizen’s arrest on Tony Blair in London


21st Century Wire says…

In these troubled times, a ‘feel good’ story like this is most welcome, especially when it features Tony Blair. This cocktail barman deserves a Nobel Peace Prize, but only after a round of drinks – on us…

http://21stcenturywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/1-Tony-Blair-Arrested-Jail.jpg




What began as an ordinary Friday night for a barman at an upscale London steakhouse ended on a more dramatic note after former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair entered the establishment.

Twiggy Garcia, a barman at London’s trendy Tramshed, apparently thinks about much more than just mixing cocktails.

Ever since visiting a website devoted to arresting Blair, Garcia said he has “fantasized” about making a citizen’s arrest against the former premier for “crimes against peace” in Iraq.

“I had been waiting for the opportunity after seeing the website arrestblair.org, and it just so happened we were in the same place at the same time,” Garcia explained to the Independent, a British daily. “I believe Blair is responsible for the mass murder of Iraqi civilians after taking our country into an illegal war.”

The website offers a reward of 8,500 pounds to anyone who can “arrest” Blair.

Garcia explained how his “heart rate increased” when he learned of Blair’s “eerie presence” in the restaurant, before he saw his opportunity to arrest the former Labour leader.

“[Blair] was sitting at the head of a table upstairs with about eight other people eating dinner. I think he was out with his family and a few friends,” Garcia said. “I went over to him, put my hand on his shoulder and said, ‘Mr. Blair, this is a citizen’s arrest for a crime against peace, namely your decision to launch an unprovoked war against Iraq. I am inviting you to accompany me to a police station to answer the charge.’”

Blair, 60, who earned the nickname ‘Teflon Tony’ for his uncanny ability to deflect criticism, performed some verbal gymnastics on the bartender as he twisted the discussion to the situation in Syria, where a years-long civil war continues unabated.

Garcia said Blair “kept changing the subject and talking about Syria” before advising him, “I think you should be more concerned about Syria.”

“I didn’t expect him to start debating with me. I think he actually believed the lies that were coming out of his mouth.”

At this point, Garcia realized the debate was coming to an end when one of Blair’s sons “went to get the plain-clothes security from downstairs.”

“I decided to get out of there sharpish... I quit my job there and then,” Garcia explained.

A spokesman for the former PM told the Independent, “There is nothing to report here apart from the fact that Mr. Blair did offer to discuss the issue. That offer was declined and the individual walked off. Nothing else happened. Everyone is fine and they had a great time.”

Twiggy Garcia is the fifth person to have made an attempt to arrest Tony Blair, who is now serving as a Middle East peace envoy.

“It will keep people from forgetting he is a war criminal,” the bartender said, explaining his motivation to attempt a citizen's arrest on the British statesman. “I hope one day he faces his charges in The Hague. People seem to think those laws only apply to Nazis and African warlords.”

Tony Blair continues to be hounded publicly by activists who say he is to blame for the hundreds of thousands of deaths caused by the war in Iraq, which is still suffering violence today following a nearly nine-year military operation begun by the US military in March 2003.

Critics of Blair’s decision to join the United States in the military campaign against Iraq point to the so-called Downing Street Memo, a record of a meeting in July 2002 between British intelligence and the office of Tony Blair that some say is the 'smoking gun' that proves the former premier followed Washington into war despite bad intelligence.

The memo, quoting Sir Richard Dearlove, director of the UK’s foreign intelligence, revealed that Bush wanted to remove Saddam Hussein, through military force, “justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD.”

However, “intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy.”

Then-Foreign Secretary Jack Straw informed Blair that “the case was thin. Saddam was not threatening his neighbors, and his WMD capability was less than that of Libya, North Korea or Iran.” Straw then suggested that “we should work up a plan” to produce “legal justification for the use of force.”

Today, one of the many tragic consequences of the war in Iraq, which has transformed into a sectarian battle between Shia and Sunni militants, not to mention outside terrorist forces with ties to Al-Qaeda, has been an unstoppable wave of violence that continues to leave thousands of innocent victims in its wake.

http://21stcenturywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Blair-arrest.jpg

Twiggy Garcia (photo, above), a barman at London’s Tramshed Steak House, interrupted the ex-PM Blair during his meal and asked him to come down to the local police station to answer to accusations of international war crimes. The citizen’s arrest was made, but Blair refused to go to the police station. Rather predictably, the highly unpopular spineless politician proceeded to do what he does best – to slither his way out of discussing the issue directly, while pressing the panic button for his private security to come bail him out of a nervous situation.

It was a bold move by the young barman. Knowing his employer might be in hot water, and that he’d probably be asked to resign, barman Garcia quit his job that night. Impressive, to say the least.


http://21stcenturywire.com/2014/01/21/youre-barred-cocktail-barman-tries-citizens-arrest-on-tony-blair-in-london/

[dianna]

The People's Voice: Twiggy Garcia Interview -- Tony Blair Citizen Arrest


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghiVfL6LfTU

[ExomatrixTV]

Michael Malice: Totalitarianism and Anarchy | Lex Fridman Podcas:

R5rNoV1Qy_Q


Emma Goldman - Anarchism:

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For nearly half a century, Russian emigrant Emma Goldman was the most controversial woman in America, taunting the mainstream with her fervent attacks on government, big business, and war. To the tabloids, she was "Red Emma, queen of the anarchists," but many admired Goldman for her defense of labor rights, women's emancipation, birth control, and free speech. Learn more about EMMA GOLDMAN including where to watch the full film here (https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/goldman/).

[ExomatrixTV]

Michael Malice Explains Anarchy To The Jimmy Dore Show:

VCfxxIElmZM
Podcaster, author and agent provocateur Michael Malice recently appeared on The Jimmy Dore Show to discuss his dedication to anarchism, the two-party system, the breakup of the Soviet Union and the comparative ways propaganda is disseminated through a population in totalitarian vs democratic states. Jimmy and Americans’ Comedian Kurt Metzger engaged in a wide-ranging conversation with Malice touching on all these topics and more.

[ExomatrixTV]

Why You Should Take The White Pill - Michael Malice | Modern Wisdom Podcast 575

z0SNYGIc5vM
"The complexity of the truth is inconvenient for both sides."

Michael Malice is an author, political commentator & podcaster. The 1900s saw some of the worst atrocities in human history. Evil was abound and the bad guys were on top a lot, with the Soviet Union being one of the most brutal examples. Given this, what reason do we have for hope in the modern world? Expect to learn just how brutal the Soviet jails and gulags were, the torture methods used to extract confessions, how the Western Press were complicit in covering up Russian crimes, the incredible heroism and ingenuity used by people to get through the Berlin wall, why the bad guys don't have to win, Michael's justification for there always being hope and much more...


00:00 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=0s) Intro
02:13 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=133s) Do the Public Know Anything About the Cold War?
07:20 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=440s) Michael’s Message of Hope
12:35 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=755s) Why is Cynicism So Prevalent in Society?
19:02 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=1142s) Why Ayn Rand’s Speech is Important
24:39 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=1479s) The Inability to Foresee Consequences of Communism
32:12 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=1932s) Political Philosophy at the Start of the 20th Century
39:53 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=2393s) Fundamental Philosophy of the Soviet Union
41:50 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=2510s) The dark side of Scientism (https://bigthink.com/13-8/science-vs-scientism/) & Technocracy (https://technocracy.news)
52:40 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=3160s) Marxism’s Goal of Global Communism
1:00:57 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=3657s) The Most Brutal Aspects of the Soviet Union
1:08:46 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=4126s) Who Was Walter Duranty?
1:13:07 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=4387s) Soviet Tactics to Arrest Innocent People
1:22:03 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=4923s) Soviet Methods of Torture
1:33:10 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=5590s) The Importance of the Berlin Wall
1:40:42 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=6042s) Reasons for Hope
1:53:09 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=6789s) Our Present Fight Against Evil
1:53:21 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=6801s) the moment a book gets summarised
2:02:47 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SNYGIc5vM&t=7367s) Michael’s Experience of Writing the Book

[grapevine]

:bump::bump::bump:
Noam Chomsky - Anarchism I

Anarchism isn't about rioting and chaos but about autonomy and self governance. We don't need to be controlled by a government that doesn't have our best interests at heart.

This is a fairly old but still relevant video featuring Noam Chomsky, who puts it quite well:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_Bv2MKY7uI&ab_channel=Chomsky%27sPhilosophy (7:33)

One of the comments underneath:

"@powerpigs8531
Anarchism is mutual aid, cooperation and the truest indicator of human intelligence. Anarchism is total freedom but it isn't about chaos, destruction or mayhem because total freedom means a big responsiblity to yourself and everyone or anything around. It's a society of intelligent people that understand this concept cooperating together in the absence of government hence why it's the truest indicator of human intelligence. I agree with Noam Chomsky, anarchists are just people who take this seriously."

[shaberon]

Anarchism isn't about rioting and chaos but about autonomy and self governance. We don't need to be controlled by a government that doesn't have our best interests at heart.


On this, I don't really look at the "freedom" aspect as per the comment, but, as the negation of "-archy", meaning prevention of a privileged ruling class, the main examples being:


Hereditary Monarchy

Oligarchy


Because the old world definition of monarch includes "person who has our best interests at heart", an anarchist argument is not necessarily the same as an anti-monarchist one. Removal of monarchy is a communist policy. Those are just alternate forms of government, not a direct approach to "best interests".

At a basic level, I offer to sacrifice some amount of "freedom" in exchange for the benefits of collective labor. In actuality, such labor has to be protected, for which I would say the main job of any government is in protecting labor from exploitation. While making an "anarchist" argument as per the above, I still conclude that a method of governance is essential.

[grapevine]

I still conclude that a method of governance is essential.

I agree with you, shaberon, but not the governance that we currently have. It would be diffcult to maintain an anarchic run country, especially with marauder countries continually trying to take over or invade, but we could do a lot better.

Apologies for snipping much of your comment - the bit about removing the monarchy being a communist policy was intriguing because the USA has never been a monarchy and is not communist and when Oliver Cromwell ruled England it wasn't communistic.

[norman]

Anarchy's big weakness (fatal fault ) is that it's blind to an intelligent adversary.

All the other man made governance systems are crap at seeing it too, but with anarchy it's completely and deliberately designed out of it's own conception.

In case some haven't noticed yet, we have an intelligent adversary to deal with, as a pressing priority.

[Delight]

I am no expert on anarchy. The idea of the self organizing collective is what I think about. What really infuriates me at the moment is shown in the fires in California. Citizens of California have wanted the governemnt to accomplish certain important objectives like sufficient water for fire fighting. The people are NOT heard/ respected/honored.

The Government deliberately subverts the people who are capable of IDENTIFYING what is most IMPORTANT to living in california (and Everywhere we live, we have these horrorific leaders!).

I want to see the END of the capacity of government beurocracy and politicians to subvert human ciollective organization of Life in communities. What I cannot understand is how to move out of the stranglehold of government.

I do not think any people who are at all aware, want constant undermining of standards that we ALREADY KNOW are what is needed. wwell, I say "we" but this we is

1. Reasonable
2. Open to constant new information
3. Heart centered
4. Able to comprehend patterns (and able to change mind).
5. Able to communicate with others authentically.
6. Creative
7. Alligned with the humility that we are fallable, there is a higher source of awareness we can access, there is the NECESSITY of alligning to SOURCE.

How do we leave this system? I love hearing people talk about systems that SERVE us. I think anarchy is my choice WHEN the anarchists are like the qualities I described.

[palehorse]

tough topic to discuss..

I discovered that I had been an anarchist my entire life, the funny thing was analyzing my own social behavior. I never went along with the crowd following the rulers/leaders and blindly believing in what they promise, I always questioned everything about the system and I never went along really, my parents was very often pressuring this issue because they knew I was not like most people, many issues in the school, and bla bla bla..

So, I am an anarchist today, I behave like one, I didn't fabricate that personality on me, this is who I am and to be frank I love that, specially in the times we are living. I do not promote anarchism anywhere, because I know how people behave when they hear this word, somewhere in the 19th century (i guess) the meaning of anarchism was changed forever, and not for good, so when people hear the word they promptly associate it with chaos and riots and punks ass people. I have an uncle he got a phd in veterinary, the professor type, we were talking about anarchism and I could not believe the way how he sees it, he is one example of those who fell into the trap and were brainwashed into believing things.. but anyway most people are just like him they see anarchism as something very bad, while the truth is the opposite.

Also notice that there is several different types of anarchism, like anarcho capitalists, crypto-anarchism, market anarchism, leftist anarchism, queer anarchism (rofl), green anarchist, anarcho pacifist (lol this is absurd), religious anarchist (dangerous type extremists, including the Buddhist and Jewish ones), all these variants of anarchism is 100% BS, because anarchism rejects authoritarianism, capitalism, censorship, coercion, organized religion, imperialism, state, supremacism, totalitarianism, and so on just to mention a few.. and what we see today this BS anarchism in the alternative media is exactly the original anarchism mixed with the anarchism rejections, so it is misleading, DO NOT LISTEN to anarchists from the alternative media, they are either controlled opposition or worse part of some nasty agenda.

Be careful with syndicates too, because it leads to libertarianism socialism even when they claim their visions to be something post-capitalism, in the end is all about taking control of production and distribution, and you need workers to do that, since they reject any political ideology and political parties, but that put someone in control of this strategy and centralize power in the hand of few and their collaborators, anarcho syndicalists very often uses strike actions, sabotage and boycotts on the many institutions out there, the ultimate goal is to build the idea of worker's self management, which is an illusion in my opinion, you can't run a country like that, but a small community can self manage that way, I had seen that myself no leaders, good harmony among the residents.

So to wrap up the idea of anarchism, in my very opinion there is the need of a very basic form of government, to take care of all the basic infrastructures, politicians should NOT be motivated to get into politics by money, in fact a position in government should not be a well paid job, and public servants should never have any sort of authority over people's life, also free market should be the only way to exchange goods and services, not this taxable madness we have today, see I am not saying everything should be free, I am saying the government should never have a slice of the cake, because they are parasites, they do nothing and take the biggest part of it.