Bitcoin Forum

I thought about this question when it comes to Anarchy.

How long would it take for majority to adapt to anarchy, that is start to follow rational non-aggresive principles. And majority of the destructive forces to be forced out of market by consumer choise?

That is if we were to start now?

Depends how fast people spread the word.

You don't "start" anarchy. You only start revolutions. You live anarchy.

If you suddenly tear down the current system of rules, you might just get a temporary bout of the kind of Anarchy people are programmed to fear.

You develop a workable anarchy by learning, step by step, to be more and more free and independent from the current system until the point when you realize that it has actually become obsolete for you. Meanwhile having full control over your money is a wonderful start ;)

ErisDiscordia is right, to be honest, the main issue people have ever had throughout history is how to stop others from controlling the flow of money and how it is traded etc. monarchs have been struggling with the idea for years and so have religions, it's only until now that I've seen a realistic method like Bitcoin capable of stopping it all.

As long as it takes until people learn how to look after themselves.

Anarchy would never ever ever work.  Human nature is not anarchical but hierarchical.   

Ahh, the human nature fallacy...gotta love it ;D

About 2000 years, that's how long it took to go from tribal feudalism to representative democracy.
People living back then might call our living conditions anarchy, if they knew what the word meant.

What's natural about tyranny?

I follow Darwinism (aka Science) - so, logically, humans are a kind of animal and our behaviour is a consequence of genetics.
I do not believe there is anything special about hierarchies, except as a description of one type of animal's social organization.
But the test is survival, and it seems that people survive based on their ability to raise children, rather than the ideology they happen to prescribe to at arbitrary points in history (unless that ideology limits/improves their ability to pass on their genes)

I would have to agree with you there; the animals which survive are those most adaptable, and humans aren't a whole lot if not the ultimate adapting creature.  I just don't believe we should identify something humans are doing, e.g. killing for gain, as something within human nature, while something else humans are doing, e.g. acting out of free will, as something completely unnatural; it would seem to me, if humans are doing it, it is within the nature of humans to do so.

Society can't even get along with Laws, it would be worse without them.

You mean like whats natural in predator animals killing others for fun?

that is completly natural as we can see. Only human behavior is not natural.

Nature is perfect and it has no errors. ONly error is human

Animals don't kill each other for fun, they kill each other for food.

Humans kill each other for fun and for materialistic gain, for the destruction of our home.  Having an elite group of sociopaths is a man made system.

We would still have the law of nature, the law of attraction, karma, what ever you would like to call it.  Do you really need the government to tell you not to kill people or can you fathom that piece of moral code by yourself?

Do you really need the forum policemen to tell you not to steal from people or can you fathom that piece of moral code by yourself?

Anarchism is not without laws; it's the only form of governance where everyone has to follow them, in fact.

Police are corrupt, you are corrupt, I guess the shoe fits.

Well, I do share the majority of the values a police officer would, so thank you.   :)

That's fine if they pick their hierarchies.

Anarchists don't advocate living without laws.

LoL. Human nature. You know what human nature is? It is ADAPTABILITY. We can be anarchic or authoritarian and all sorts of things in between. But don't you ever think this can never change, or is somehow programmed into us before we are born. We respond to environmental conditions and develop accordingly.

Yes - you do really need the law and the police to stop people being killed and robbed.  Couple of years ago in London there was a riot and the Police let it be known that they would only be protecting life - not property.  Within 6 hours, people were being burnt out of their homes, there was widespread looting and people were beaten to death in the streets within 48 hours.

That's the law of nature.  Our legal systems are a collective effort to have something better.

If you had a company in the marketplace providing protection, and they said they weren't going to fulfil their contractual obligations to protect property, do you know what would happen?  They would lose customers and go out of business.  Pity that the Police have no such obligations toward us and can pick and choose what and who they want to protect, isn't it?   It isn't for nothing that people say you have to be either rich or important to get justice in our society.  They are the only people the Police really care about because they are the ones who can kick up a stink through using either their money or friends in high places.  The rest of us?  we pay whether we like it or not.  Whether we get good service or not.

So when you see police out in force to protect the politicians, it's not such a surprise when you realise that they are the police's true customers.  The ones who pay their salaries.  They mostly don't care about the rest of us.

The important thing here is that we agree a police force is needed.  Your debate is as to the best way to provide it.  I've gone though this with myrkul last year and not really sure whats to be gained by going through it again but here goes. 

I live in Berkshire in a mixed Muslim/other area.  A large part of the Muslim community believes that alcohol should be illegal and that female circumcision should be legal.  A large part of the "other" group believes that alcohol should be legal under certain circumstances and that female genital mutilation should be illegal.  I don't like the idea of free competing companies being able to go to the Muslim community and "protect" men who burn alcohol shops and "protect" women that cut their daughter's clitoris off.  I can accept that they have these views.  I accept that they are the majority in this area.  But I prefer a national set of laws that reflects my values.

No, too inefficient.  How about a local set of laws you and your peers and their businesses all agree upon?  That way you're not getting in the way of people you've never met before, nor will stupid laws like "ban alcohol" or "cut off a lady's clitter" stretch very far.

You have no morality.

Female genital mutilation is an abomination.  The idea that the local majority can hire their own police force that will allow it disgusts me. 

You're making an assumption; I don't like it either, but morality is subjective, friend.  You have no right to force your morals on another.

I do.  So do you.  There are certain things like murder, slavery and child abuse that cannot be resolved within families as generally people are killed by spouses, are forced into unpaid labour by family members and most child abuse is done within the family.  You either say you are OK with wife killing, forced labour and child abuse or you say you have the right to enforce your morality on immoral people.

Bzzt, wrong.  You don't know how this "rights" thing works, do you?

Mike if you are editting my replies, the done thing is to write "...snip..." where you cut.

For the record, since its something you avoided answering, here is what you deleted. 

There are certain things like murder, slavery and child abuse that cannot be resolved within families as generally people are killed by spouses, are forced into unpaid labour by family members and most child abuse is done within the family.  You either say you are OK with wife killing, forced labour and child abuse or you say you have the right to enforce your morality on immoral people.

Is the price of anarchy is that we have to allow female genital mutilation?

Of course not; the reason why I cut off the rest of your reply is because the first two sentences is where you made an error.

Here's how rights work: you say, "I want the right to enforce my beliefs on you; I will extend this right to you if you extend this right to me."  Then I will either say, "Okay, this sounds reasonable, you can enforce your beliefs on me if you let me enforce my beliefs on you", or I will say, "No, sorry, I'd rather you didn't enforce your beliefs on me, therefore I will not enforce my beliefs on you."

Now, when you say, "I have the right to force my morals on another.  You also have this right," you've assumed a position of authority in which I have no say in whether or not you or I have this right.  This is not how a right works; you don't simply get to decide what rights everyone will have.

About female genital mutilation: you've assumed that you have the right to allow or disallow this.  People are perfectly capable of making these decisions; the point isn't to force people not to with the threat of violence, the point is to enlighten people with knowledge so they can make the right decision.  This is the difference between you, the authoritarian, and me, the libertarian.  I'm sorry, but I don't like your system at all; it does not encourage intelligence or liberty, it only encourages fear and obedience.

So you will allow female genital mutilation.  I assume the same logic applies to honour killings, bride burning and the like.

If that is what anarchy requires, then I don't see it ever "working."  

False.  I will not allow my child to have her genitals mutilated.  That's the point; it requires a rational society, of which you'd find no place if you will not even acknowledge when you're wrong.

As I said, you have no morality.  You don't want your child hurt but you turn a blind eye to a neighbour's child having her clitoris cut off without anaesthetic.  Disgusting.

False.  You have no idea what morality is, either, if you believe people can be with or without them.  Hawker, take my advice: take a class on philosophy, specifically on ethics.  It'll help.

Take care :)

As a military trainer I got to live in an anarchy or two. No one there liked it. Violence, poverty, fear. You know, utopia.

Wait - you are happy to allow female genital mutilation, provided its not done to your daughter, and now you want to go all happy-clappy about believing in people?

If this is how your vision of anarchy "works" you'll find that people won't allow it.  As I say, disgusting.

Personally I wouldn't. I would go out there and mutilate the shit out of these bastards and take full responsibility for what I have done.  ;D

What would you do? Go tell the government? Because it's their job?

That kind of stuff is YOUR responsibility if you think it's wrong. From treating your environment like it's the business of somebody else to keep it nice for you, it's just a small leap to treating your own life like that.

Of course you can't tolerate the idea of anarchy if the first things that pop into your mind when you hear "anarchy" are genital mutilation and blood-feuds.

Don't you trust people? And if not, why do you trust them to run a government? If people are not to be trusted, they should be kept from great power, not given it.

Your post perpetuates a common misunderstanding of anarchic philosophy. Anarchy is NOT a system, it's a rejection of centralization, with all that implies.

Anarchy works, every day, everywhere, right now. You did not ask my permission to post this thread, nor did I seek yours to reply to it. In all of your interactions with people (aside from those who have given up their individuality to become drones... err, public officials) you are acting on your own authority and mostly respecting their right to do the same. Anarchy is the NATURAL STATE of human interaction.

Wait, wait... one of your disagreements with anarchy is because under it, some people somewhere might be circumcising their daughters?

We already live in a world with practically everyone under the thumb of some government, and this already happens. I wouldn't be surprised if there was a government or two that mandated it.

How is anarchy worse in that regard?

Would you allow female genital mutilation?  If not, how would you prevent it if the majority of people in your area have chosen a protection service that does allow it?

To Anarchy to really work I think its gonna pass quite some time because the most of the people are on the level of consciousness for it to work.

I'm intrigued.

First, female genital mutilation is done by mothers to daughters.  Are you seriously saying you are going to break into Muslim homes and inspect vaginas? And based on what you find start "mutilating bastards?"

Second, what is the basis for your "trust people?" You think fgm and bride burning are carried out by robots?  These are done by people.

And how long is that?

Are we talking about years, decades, centuries or millennials?

Who knows, it could be decades or even millenniums. It all depend in what direction the human race will go. But all you can do at the moment is to improve yourself as a person and set a good example to the others, because the only thing you can change is yourself.

I am not personally obligated to right every single wrong in the world at my own expense.  Those who are concerned about this evil should apply their own resources and manpower to do something about it. While I might be said to "allow" some evils because I am not personally giving my wealth or time or efforts to fighting them, I would also be "allowing" you to use force to do something about it, because I certainly wouldn't stand against you.

Personally, if I'm given a choice, I would be a lot more likely to give my efforts and wealth to help people escape from jurisdictions where these things are allowed to jurisdictions where they are not, rather than to efforts to try to go in to use force to stop such wrongs, which I consider to be a little bit impractical and utopian.

No, the price of anarchy is that if you want to make this your cause, you do so yourself, at your own expense, and you recruit help through persuasion, not force.

Take Nazism in the 20th century, for example.  You want to fight it, more power to you, but drafting and taxing other people to do so was wrong.  Others might have seen it as evil but not as evil as, say, Stalinism.  Or may have felt there were better ways to combat it, or whatever.

Likewise with Islamic extremism in the early 21st century.

And many, many other causes.

Just because something is evil does not mean you have the right to use force to make other people fight it.

Good!


Personally, no - I'm actually a pacifist. I would break into Muslim homes and try talking to them reasonably, haha. Anyway, what is your alternative? Let government agents break into Muslim homes and inspect vaginas? Like I said before: if you don't like something in your environment or culture, you - yes YOU - that tiny, powerless, inconsequential existence, which needs to be protected and guided by authority (or so they say) are responsible for doing that. If you delegate this responsibility to some sort of higher power (God, government, etc) you have no business making moral judgements about - that's how I see it.


It's my choice to trust people. I find it makes for a more friendly, exciting and optimistic reality-tunnel than choosing to view people as crooked. Both are valid views, though and I'm not sure it's possible to definitely prove one or the other, so I'll just make my choice and take it with all that it brings. But notice, my position has consistent logic. I trust people to be generally good (with the limiting factor here being their cultural environment, which might turn any of us into sociopaths) and thus they don't need to be ruled over by an authority by force.

Your stance on the other hand, seems to be that people are NOT to be trusted by default and that is why they need to be ruled by force. By other people. Who are also not to be trusted.

Do you see the flaw in that?

If you are really convinced that people are crooked by nature, you should be supporting anarchy as this limits the amount of damage they can do collectively thanks to withholding the possibility of acquiring huge centralized power.

i had a long discussion with an anarchist and he seemed hell bent on converting me. to me, he just sounded like a crazy idealist. it just won't work.

you can give me one example of an anarchist society out of hundreds.. or thousands. i'd tell you that eventually they collapsed, probably because they were not organized enough.. while neighboring groups WERE organized. it's like saying "we don't want any guns," but your neighbor buys them all and eventually dominates you.

This is complete bullshit. Domectic cats kill mice often for fun without any intention to eat them, lions kill hyenas whenever an opportunity arises (not saying that they often kill their own kittens if they want to bang their mom), bottle-nose dolphins have been proven to kill porpoises without any purpose, even ants wage wars and capture slaves making them work against their will... ;D

What you're referring to is called a constitutional state where everyone is bound to keep the law and in which the power of state is constrained by the law in order to protect citizens from an arbitrary exercise of authority... 8)

Anarchy > working.
There is something in this title that bugs me.
How can you have a scale of "anarchy" working or not?

I'm still curious how are you going to make all people universally agree on these laws? Who actually adopts a law and what would happen to those who will be against the adopted law? ;D

Adaptability is not human nature, it is a trait of all living beings. Human nature is hierarchical because humans are social beings, i.e. tending to organize into hierarchical societies. And yes, it is programmed into us before we are born... 8)

House cats are true anarchists! ;D

Working... Probably more of being vast majority to be adapted...

Probably one scale would be for median to have have as good or better standard of living than in current society. If that's even achiavble. Which I have my own doubts...

This thread continues to be a great resource for common misconceptions about anarchy. Like this one, for example:


The idea of anarchy means, "no ruler", remember? A ruler might be anyone or anything, which enforces a given set of rules (laws). This means, that when anarchy suggests, getting rid of rulers, it suggests getting rid of universal laws. - a single set of rules being enforced on everyone in a given territory and opening up the debate to multiple, competing, voluntary sets of rules.

Look at it this way: in the past, there have been fought religious wars over the idea, that there simply can't be more than one religion (set of rules) in the same place. In the present, wars are fought over the idea, that here simply can't be more than government (set of rules) in the same place.

EDIT: just noticed this:


Adaptability = trait of all living beings. Humans = living beings => Human beings have the trait of adaptability. Right? As much as dislike Aristotelian either/or logic, I think his syllogism works within that framework.

The bolded part is what really interests me. I disagree with that statement and instead tend to subscribe to the 8 circuit model of consciousness (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eight-circuit_model_of_consciousness), which would argue that all we are programmed with before we are born is the ability to perceive and live in hierarchical social structures (2nd circuit in that model), but the actual approach towards these structures is programmed into us during periods of "imprint vulnerability", meaning the time, when that particular circuit of intelligence first kicks into action as we grow up and evolve as individuals. And it is programmed into us mostly by chance exposure to our environment. You can also create a controlled programming environment by using rites of passage (as many tribes still do). Or you can learn how to re-program yourself, which would be my preferred option.

On one level, this is beyond the scope of this discussion, because we're talking about the feasibility of Anarchy, but on another level it is deeply connected to the discussion and seems to me to be at the root of the ideological debate between, let's say "authoritarians" and "libertarians". Both camps seem to come from different assumptions: the first being that people have a fixed human nature, which is slanted towards selfishness, evil, and similar concepts and can not be changed. The second being that humans either are of a permanently good, benign and cooperative nature, or that their character is fixed only a little or not at all and is thus subject to influence from the environment.

Anyway, let's keep the discussion going, this is providing me with an excellent framework for an article I am planning to write about human nature and anarchy :)

Ok, there's no ruler, no universal laws anymore, and so why do you think there will be a new shiny set of rules everyone on the block agrees upon? People are different and even between two people you will get a disagreeing minority... ;D

I think it is evident from my post that adaptability is not something specific to humans only but inherent in all living beings. It is not a trait of human nature which distinguishes it from other creatures (the context was about what makes human nature so peculiar), that's all 8)

In short, you'd better stop nitpicking  :-\

There is no universal law now.   Where is the world ruler and his/their laws that we all have to follow?

We currently have competing law providers that we are "contracted" to.  I use contract loosely of course, because there is no such thing.

Why should a law provider be bound to a certain patch of land and no other law providers be able to operate in the same territory?  If we had competition we could make actually choices about what we deem to be good laws and if we don't think our provider is doing a good job, we can end the contract and pick another law provider, without having to go through the hassle of emigration.

I think what you are doing is ignoring human reality in pursuit of a dream species.  People are not trustworthy by default.

Right now its a legal requirement for schools and doctors to report female genital mutilation or signs of it like girls being prevented from having sports lessons or medical examinations.  So the government does inspect vaginas and it does prosecute anyone who does it.  Quite rightly too.  

The anarchist position does not make sense.  If you believe it is immoral to cut a girl's clitoris off, then wittering on about "Her dad has his own protection force and they are OK with it" is bullshit.  Either you enforce the moral standard or you support the damage done to the victim.

I'm enjoying this discussion, I don't mean to insult or offend you, hope that is clear :)


Now I get what you're saying. Yes, I agree that if we consider "human nature" to be something which sets humans apart from other living beings, then adaptability is not it.
Neither is forming social hierarchies, though - you can observe that sort of behavior in primates, packs of wolves, elephants.


I don't see this as a dualism. Like "universal set of rules means everything sucks" and "no universal set of rules means everything is great". What I am saying is that if you have lots of options to choose from, you're more likely to find one you like and agree with, compared to a situation where you have only one set of rules forced upon you.

To be honest I don't come at this from a moral "what is right" perspective at all. Instead I tend to look at it from a pragmatic, process-oriented perspective. What is most likely to yield positive results? (yes, positive results is a moral value-judgement as well)

EDIT: response to hawker


But that's like, you know, just your opinion, man.  ;D

Seriously, I won't try to persuade you that the statement of "people are not trustworthy by default" might not be true, you seem to have made up your mind about that and that's OK.

I might try to persuade you to think about the possibility that even if that statement is true, the implications of it are still better served in anarchy than in the present situation.


I sympathize with your conviction in moral ideals. But you see there is a problem with this approach, don't you? Who gets to decide which moral standard to enforce? It's quite easy for most people to agree on an issue like genital mutilation (but still it exists...), yet other issues are less clear. And don't forget: people are NOT trustworthy. How can we trust them to set and enforce the right moral standards, then? Seems to me, they'd be enforcing crooked standards - which seems to be going on today. I'd just argue that it's mostly because the system (environment) has corrupted the individuals occupying its seats of power, not because the people in the system are inherently crooked.

I realize I probably won't convince you of anything, there's no need to. I'm just typing out my thoughts. Maybe someone will enjoy them.

I don't understand where you're going...  8)

According to your own logic there should be no "law providers", otherwise at the end of the day you will get where you started at, i.e. you will have a new ruler and a new set of rules... ;D

Surely that is the problem with the whole concept of anarcky "working?"  It forces your lack of morality on people who disagree with you.  And you have no right to do that do you?  Mike Christ's position on female genital mutilation is that its fine provided its not done to his daughter.  My position is that its an abomination.  I see no reason to allow Mike's or anyone else's sunny indifference to human suffering to be the limit of what laws we make and enforce.

I would say language sets us apart from the animals.  Animals have no ability to communicate with each other in any meaningful way and so must act mostly on instinct to survive.

This is completely untrue with humans, where we discuss things, we arbitrate between people with disagreements, we make rules, etc.  We are not in the same state of nature that other animals are in and it is incorrect for people to say, "oh, this is human nature".  It's not.  Most people have no interest in dominating others so how can it be human nature?  It's like saying killing is human nature because some humans like to kill others.  Or raping is human nature because some people like to rape.  etc

I said there is no universal law.  Already we have competing law providers (called governments) that are tied to particular areas of land.    

You will have competing law providers in the same area of land.  There is a high demand for security and law and order and many entrepreneurs will be willing to provide it.  The reason they don't now, is because the government has a monopoly and forbids it.  It does this because it's good to have a monopoly on the provision of force in a geographical area.  Allows you to extort your victims.   It would be too expensive, in a competitive setting, for one company to build up the necessary force to dominate everyone else.  The profit margins would be too slim and the company would go bankrupt before it even got close.

I still don't see much logic behind what you say. Ultimately it doesn't change anything from where you start and instead of one "law provider" you get by the choice of majority another with brand new laws and some part of the population disagreeing with them... 8)

What does this all have to do with anarchy? ;D

There are options which cannot be given on an individual basis, so whatever you try (and say about it), there will all always majorities and minorities. You just can't make all people happy, some will always envy other... ;D

Sounds a lot like what's happening to western governments right now.

P.S.
So most likley it will happen then.

I never said anything to the contrary. Actually, it was my argument against anarchy in another debate about it. In any hierarchical structure there are always those who subdue and those who are subdued. And no trace of anarchy, right? ;D

 ::)


No, it means I look out into the marketplace and I see law and security provider 1, law and security provider 2, etc.  Just like I see ISP 1, ISP 2, etc.  I then look at the deals that they offer and then how much it costs and make my choice based on that.  

The difference, of course, between free market providers of law would be that they would not be my rulers, just as ISP companies don't rule me.  They are trying to get my custom with the best possible deal they can offer me.  I get to choose.

Can you imagine what it would be like if there was only one ISP in the entire country?  Do you think they would offer a good deal?


Are you sure that you know what anarchy is?  It doesn't mean chaos.

As with animals killing only for food, this premise is also false. The neocortex of dolphins and killer whales (which are, strictly speaking, also dolphins) is more developed than that of a human. Actually, they do communicate in a meaningful way with each other and show patterns of cooperative behaviour which are simply impossible on instinct

Right.  They tax, borrow money, and print like crazy and they still struggle so I don't know how a private company could manage to do it.


Seriously?  Where are their advanced societies?   Do they have underwater cities?

As I can see, you're desperately trying to get away with what makes your idea look not so bright as you would like. You forget to mention that there are other guys picking up in the marketplace and if my choice doesn't match theirs, I will have to resign myself to their choice, right? ;D

I have already answered a question like this one. What you refer to as "anarchy" is correctly called a constitutional state... ;D

Orcas live in family groups which are considered the most stable of any animal species (and actually more stable than human families), where knowledge (hunting techniques, vocal behaviors) is specific for the family and passed across generations. They are nomads and like nomadic people they don't need cities... 8)

By the way, ants and termites do have "cities" ;D

Like you have to pick the same ISP as everyone else?


No.  No government.  Constitutional state requires a government as far as I know.  Who else is going to enforce the constitution?

I am perfectly OK with the idea of an elected parliament deciding which moral standard to enforce.  Its complicated choosing who to elect to make laws but the idea that you have to allow female genital mutilation because choosing law makers is complicated is absurd.

In case you are wondering, I do enjoy your thoughts.  I very much doubt you believe its OK to allow female genital mutilation, bride burning or honour killings even in mainly Muslim areas where the private "protection force" would never intrude on a Muslim home.

Ultimately it makes no difference, it's all six of one and half a dozen of the other... 8)

And it may turn out that I don't want to pick any... Should I be deported, disenfranchised, euthanized or what? ;D

Who ever is going to enforce the laws in a stateless anarchic society if there is no universal consensus about what's right and what's wrong? ;D

People can choose who they interact with. They can choose common mediator/security firm for their contracts... Etc...

I think we have found the most basic point in our disagreement: morality.


Forgive me if I am making the wrong assumption here, but you seem to think that there can be one universal morality, which can and should be applied to everyone. I disagree with that notion.

I am arguing from a difficult standpoint, because to me "anarchy" has positive associations and "morality" has negative ones, whereas it seems to be the opposite way for most people. It's tough explaining why I think this is the case, without further delving into the 8 circuit model of consciousness I mentioned before.


Nobody! And that's the good thing about it :) it is the responsibility of you and everyone else, who has strong opinions about what is right and wrong. It just seems a much effective way than the current delegation of this responsibility to agents of a monopolistic institution, which is prone to corrupting its agents anyway with the allure of money & power.

That's not even a fair question.

Male "mutilation" goes on all around me. By not voting to prevent it, or using guns to stop every doctor who engages in it, I'm allowing it? I actually have an obligation to go out and prevent all crime outside of my personal sphere?

Now if the question was meant as, would I allow my female children to be circumcised, then the answer is no.



The same way I would now if I were living under a government that allowed or mandated it... effectively, I wouldn't. If I found it too egregious (and honestly I've found no compelling reason to look into the gory details of the activity) and couldn't persuade others to stop, I would simply have to move.

How is anarchy worse in that regard?

So now you are looking for the best method of subdueing those who don't share your ideas about anything?  ;D
As I remember, we were talking about anarchy, not oppression, right? 8)

So each for himself and devil take the hindmost? 8)
That's what I like most about anarchy and above everything else... ;D

That is one possible interpretation. This loops back to what I was saying about "human nature" and the different ways of perceiving it.

If you think, that people are selfish and crooked,  it makes sense to believe in this interpretation. But at the same time you need to explain how handing the reins of government to these selfish and crooked people helps improve the situation.

The other way of looking at it is to perceive the other evolutionary strategy, the one who is so often overlooked in face of "darwinism" and social darwinism: symbiosis/cooperation.

Today most people believe in evolution. And evolution is being described as a process of random mutation and natural selection.

There is a meme in our culture, which equates the "natural selection" part of the equation with "survival of the fittest". But this misses the whole picture. Survival of the fittest is a survival strategy employed mainly by predators. Much of the rest of nature employs the "survival of the most useful" strategy with a great degree of success. In fact, the more evolved and complex a biosphere is, the more of this second type of strategy you can find in there.

So to answer your question: no, not each for himself and devil take the hindmost. I don't like that idea.

What I like instead: everyone together with anyone, taking personal responsibility. Have a problem that people are starving? Go take your friends and feed them. Worried that they're uneducated - go educate them! That sort of deal :) But it's easy for me to have faith in such a scenario, because I am what can be described in terms of (sorry for bringing this up again, but it's such a useful model) the 8 circuit model of consciousness as a "neophile". One who has received an imprint from his environment saying that the world is an OK place, new things are amazing and people can generally be trusted unless they've been corrupted somehow. :)

My approach is about closing the experiential gap between decision and consequence. The further away we are from the consequences of our actions, the worse decisions we do - from pragmatic AND moral standpoints. Look at people, who eat meat every day, yet have great trouble even watching a video from one of the chicken factories.

It needs to feel like YOUR responsibility. Not some unelected panel of "experts". Alternatively you can elect to just don't give a fuck, but you don't need government for that, do you?

In this case the laws you mentioned earlier (what is it you?) are not laws but nothing more than rules of decorum at best. Law by definition is a system of rules which are enforced by some institution with the purpose of penalising disobedience ;D

This comes right back round to where we started.

Think of the governments as companies that produce and enforce the law.  Law providers as such.

If you look at the world as a whole you can see, right now, there is no universal consensus.   We live in an anarchic world populated by what amounts to protection rackets.  

How about instead of these rackets you have several companies that offer security and you can choose which to go with?  One of these stipulations of these companies will be, for example, we will provide you protection from being murdered but if you murder someone then by the terms of the contract you must go to arbitration and accept the judgement.  It's through this process that the laws that you live under are formed.  The company has incentive overall to provide laws that are to the best benefit of the majority of their customers.

Imagine that if these companies that produce law and protect people are 1) No longer confined to any particular territory and 2) They have to attract customers rather than forcibly extracting money from them.   Then you have the same anarchic world where these companies have to interact with each other but customers are free to choose who they want to go with and what level of service they want.   The companies have great incentive to co-operate with each other.  In fact much more so than governments of today, because governments of today can steal vast amounts of money and force people through threat of jail to obey them and kill for them if necessary.   Those dangers don't exist in a voluntary society.

There is a very simple explanation to this. These people may be selfish and crooked, they may even be inveterate villains (like Hitler and the crew), but they have the same trait in common, i.e. lust for power which can be satisfied only through organising people around them. If they are clever at that, they understand that their own ambitions can be fulfilled to the full only through making lives of the people around them better (be it a family, a city, a state, whatever). Even if you are as greedy as Midas, your greed can only be fed up to the limit if you are constantly giving back 8)

You overlook a simple logical inference here. If some living creature is not a predator then it is preyed upon, i.e. the rest of nature is prey to your predators (by definition), so it inevitably falls victim for the second time, now to that survival of the fittest strategy... ;D

The present system embodies the moral standard that we all share and it is effectively preventing female genital mutilation in the West and reducing it in the Middle Eastern states what actually function as states.  Of course in places like Sudan and Somalia where there is anarchy, almost all girls get their bits cut.

That's how anarchy is worse.  It removes the legal mechanisms for controlling aberrant behaviour.

You can't take responsibility for other people's lives. Indeed you can help them, but ultimately it is their choice what to do with their lives 8)

So your view is that quaint customs like female genital mutilation, bride burning and honour killings are A-OK in your anarchist utopia because we have "delegated" the right to stop them.  Of course I am sure you accept it will be unpleasant for the victims but at least you feel that we will be "free."

Having the right to live a decent society is important to me.  It seems to me that anarchism is simply taking that right away.

Actually, what you suggest boils down to having several states in the borders of one... ;D
I don't think this is ever possible, but if it were, one of these "states" would eventually crush all the others and usurp the power. What would stop it from trying? 8)

In any case this is not anarchy... ::)

You ignored my question about those poor ones who either refused to choose your "law provider" or chose the wrong "benefactor". Should they give in to the majority or what? Should your "laws" then be applicable to them or they shoud be in reservations and concentration camps as soon as possible?  ;D

I don't think it works this way...

I feel like hawker summarized the overarching theme of criticism:


I think we're not that far apart in what we want. But we have different views on how such things are to be achieved and probably also different definitions of a "decent society", as well.

I view it like this: NOBODY can guarantee you a decent society. Anarchy just gives you the option to try and go ahead and help create such a society. Government doesn't guarantee a decent society - I feel like it just stands in the way of such an endeavor by its very nature. And I suppose it's hard to deny that if government indeed does start destroying society instead of helping it, it is much harder to stop or change its course than to stop any other individuals or groups.

The only thing harder to change would be the underlying culture, which is the source of both - the genital mutilation and government. IMHO the two of them are not that far apart. One cuts off parts of your genitals, the other rapes your butthole  ;D

Well I'm glad this discussion is polite and fun. This topic is hard to debate, because neither the side claiming anarchy can work, nor the one claiming it can't work have any sort of evidence to support their claims and thus must rely on highly subjective stuff like "what is human nature" and "what do I like in society".

But you can't deny the fact that on the whole we're living better today than a hundred years ago and still better than a thousand (or even ten thousand)!  ;D
From your position (corrupted power with people crooked and selfish here and there) it would be hard to explain... 8)

Actually not at all. I'll just say that we're better off in spite of there being government, not because of it. The improvement of life conditions has been arguably due to technology, not politics.

I'm willing to concede, that maybe government has been necessary throughout history, because there was an absence of other forms of organization. But now that it has gotten us to the point, where we have the INTERNET, its usefulness has expired. We can now manage our affairs much more efficiently on a p2p basis. Bitcoin is in the process of proving this right now :)

Yes, it surely was technology and scientific progress that directly changed our lives for the better today, but nothing could be further from the truth than to say that it was in spite of there being government, especially that which finances science and all... 8)

Ironically, the development of what you call today Internet was financed by the government you're now blaming for being crooky and selfish... How come? ;D

Of course government has also produced some new and useful technologies, too. It doesn't surprise me, since it routinely uses up 30 - 50% of the resources of the whole economy (as measured in GDP), it is bound to do SOMETHING useful, probability theory dictates that  ;D Actually, who knows how many more inventions there would have been, if these resources would have not been tied up in government and thus things like financing a bureaucracy, social spending, and war. Hey, war! Wasn't that the reason why the government invented what we now call the internet in the first place? I hear that they didn't want to have a single point of failure in their organizational structure, which could be taken out with a nuclear attack by the Soviets (or whoever else). Also the government didn't turn the internet into what it is today. I am willing to argue that it was precisely the relative freedom from government censorship and regulation which brought forth many wonderful things, which we now use via the web.

To be honest, right now I don't feel like the discussion is going anywhere, we're just bringing up circumstantial evidence supporting one claim or the other.

I'm at a loss about what to say. I just want you guys to entertain the notion, that anarchy might not be an impossible utopia, after all :)

But of course, you're free to do what you want ;)

Ok, I have just one last simple question to ask... ;D

If you think that government (any government for that matter) is corrupt and all that, it would mean that it makes people lives worse. So, is it all in all a relative evil (i.e. without government our lives might have changed from bad to worse) or an absolute one (i.e. without government our lives would have changed beyond any doubt only for the better)? Take your pick! 8)

If I have to pick from just these options, I'll pick the first one.

I am a Discordian. I am forbidden to hold absolute dogmas. I only deal in relative catmas (http://discordia.wikia.com/wiki/Catma) :)

Which is just a complicated way of saying that of course I don't know the truth. But I have strong suspicions :)

Could we continue to the point where you agree that dismantling a government could wreak havoc? 8)

i just had a long discussion with an anarchist last night.. and i still don't quite understand his ideology. i think i've narrowed it down to him thinking that government is the root of all problems. i, on the other hand, think that government is only part of the problem. the main issue is the nature of man. if you set rules, many people will play by them.. but many other people will not - and those are the ones who are rewarded. by decentralizing government, i don't see how this makes the situation any better.

One can argue that the "human animal" has, historically, been organizing tribes hierarchically. However, there was no social meta-hierarchy tying all those "tribes" around the world together under the same system. Which is what we have now. It's called global industrial civilization and it is killing our habitat.

As I understand it, "anarchy" is not about the negation of real human sociality. You can project a "topology" into human sociality and call it "the natural tendency to be hierarchical." That's not what "anarchy" is "against." "Anarchy" is about negating the ultra-large-scale singleton social hierarchy that sucks up all humans into this unsustainable and violent Zerg Swarm that's headed nowhere very fast.

It's fine. We'll probably not figure it out in time and just disappear like every other monkey civilization/zergswarm on this planet.

It's all way too complicated. Give up like I did and let's play satoshi dice.

Move to a hippy commune, live all the 'anarchy' you want...Otherwise you are just inviting trouble with your anti-government dissidence.

If we deny government and state as being the embodiment of that "ultra-large-scale singleton of social hierarchy" what should we do about multinational corporations (many of them being more powerful than some states), which are another incarnation of high-rise social hierarchy? It doesn't look that we can get away with them so easy without wrecking the world economy...  8)

yeah, i don't even know how i'd be able to help the cause even if i were an anarchist... maybe try to force my opinion on everyone? and when they don't agree, just say "people just misunderstand the meaning of an anarchy."

i only know one thing for certain; being an extremist doesn't really solve problems, and i prefer to stay in the middle.

Every single person hailed as "spiritually enlightened" has said something along these lines. The middle path. Live in the present, where you actually are -- not your thoughts. Etcetera.

I fucking hate these people. Extremism, mental self-flogging and pretending you can "help save the world" while not causing 1000x misery to everybody else along the path of your tiny mind trying to figure out something that's so big....... is so much more fun than looking like a lobotomized happy retard that stares into the world and keeps babbling that this moment is all so breathtakingly beautiful blah blah blah blah

hate my line of thinking if you will. i just find it an endless pursuit in trying to change other people. i will work with myself first.

if someone tries to piss me off, i prefer to just not let it get to me than trying to obliterate them. that's the better route.

extremism in any form is just ignorance to me. especially with people in society. the more you are against someone for whatever reason, the more you can see your hypocrisy in all of it. if you are absolutely against the idea of government, go live in the forest or off the grid. that's the best way of showing your example to others. at the very least, it's a lot better than trying to jam your ideology down someone's throat.

I actually said so in my very first post this topic:


I never suggested the forceful and instantaneous removal of the government. I support growing alternatives from the bottom up - like Bitcoin. Hopefully one day there will arise better ways of doing things than the current system.

Let's not forget, that while we may disagree on what should replace this system/how we should improve it, I think we can agree that the way it is behaving at the moment is detrimental to most people and the biosphere - alternatives should be considered and solutions searched for.

Exactly.

The basic problem as I see it is that governments are no escape from the nature of man.  They will not somehow lift us up and out of what we are.

Taking a line from the Declaration of Independence - "to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed" - we see an attempt to deal with the problem of the nature of man.  Basically, we have rights, and people want to infringe them.  Great idea: establishing an institution to defend against such threats.  So for example if you become a threat to my rights, I have the right to defend myself, and my neighbor and I have the right to band together against you.


Suppose my group of people banded together to defend our rights starts oppressing you, infringing your rights.  This is how decentralization helps: you also have the right to defend yourself, to join together with others to do so, etc.  Basically there would be no problem whatsoever with you and I, in the same territory, belonging to competing institutions that defend rights - you could call them governments if you want.  And it would be a very good way to protect ourselves, to prevent any of these institutions from becoming oppressive.  It's a fantastic "check and balance."

That is why any legitimate government should allow people to secede.  Rather than forcing people to accept its rights-securing services, it should permit people to decline to participate and to participate in competing service providers.  The reason governments as we know them don't allow this is because what they really want, rather than protecting people's rights, is power.

if you banded with a group to take my rights away, and i have 3 guns to go against your 1,000 strong.. then i'll only fall under your power. if i group up with someone else, and i only have 2 hands and 3 guns to offer, then i won't be joining forces on my own terms, but instead i'd be at the whim of the guy who has more influence.

so that means i have only a few choices as an individual:

1) allow the aggressor to dominate me in every way (especially economically).
2) sell myself to another powerful group, which would dominate me since i'd only be 1 strong.. i'd be agreeing to their terms if i wanted protection from them.
3) run away and give up my possessions

To me, extremism is when people say, "Look, just leave us alone; as long as we don't violate anybody else's rights, don't force us to live by your laws," and the response is to force them to submit anyway.

Take drug users for example.  I have never used an illicit substance in my life.  The people that I have known who have done so really have experienced quite a bit of damage in their lives.  But none of them has ever done any damage to my life.  The damage in my life comes from people who ruin the economy, people who take my resources and use them to fund wars and projects I don't believe in, people who destroy thriving markets and replace them with failing government monopolies, people who inflate the currency supply....  Those people are infringing my rights, but drug users never hurt me.  Extremism would be if I supported the drug war.

if your opinion is that "death, chaos, and mayhem are much more fun and interesting than being peaceful and finding one's own happiness," then that is your opinion. you sound like a sociopath.

What do you mean by a temporary bout and why wouldn't this be a state (condition) of anarchy? 8)

What you just posted is a great argument against monopoly governments.  Decentralization makes the threat you are describing smaller.

Right now we are all facing basically only options 1 and 3 in response to oppression.  If everybody suddenly faced option 2, then the oppressing institution would suddenly lose a lot of support and become a lot smaller - making it easier to defend against.

I do not like the gangsters who run my state government.  But I would love to have them actually stand up and defend me against the gangsters who run my federal government.  That would be a valuable service they could perform for me, and I have a better chance of defending myself against the local state gangsters than the powerful Washington gangsters.  Then my city or county gangsters could defend me against the state gangsters, and my local neighborhood could perhaps stand up to the city gangsters.  This would be fantastic for freedom and prosperity!  It wouldn't solve all of the world's ills, but it would certainly give us a fighting chance that we do not have now.

I'm not accusing you of provoking disobedience or organizing acts of resistance... God forbid! ;D

i am not for centralized governments. i know what the problem is, i just don't pretend that i have the answer.

what you say doesn't change the fact that there'd be more civil wars/fighting in an anarchistic society. by saying "anarchy is like or similar to government" it doesn't prove that it's a better option or even a solution. it's just a different way of doing things.

government is and will always be corrupt, but it's the people in government that are causing it.. not government itself.

I agree with pretty much everything you say until you get to secession.  It's a nice thought, but other than granting exit visas (i'm sure that's not what you mean), there are just no practical ways to implement that without wrecking the whole system.
If i'm understanding you correctly, there would emerge multiple city-states & even house-states in the middle of a country state?  How would that work?
(maybe i misunderstand what you mean by "secede")

If you want my view on this, I think that at any moment throughout human history this system (this here actually refers to different such systems for obvious reasons) has been behaving in a way that was detrimental to some and at times even to most people. There's no doubt about this. Although it is never too early to search for alternatives and solutions, today is not really the worst day... ;D

I don't believe this would be the case.  Most of the wars of the past century, at least, would have been eliminated if the subjects could secede.  One reason I am pro-anarchy is that I am anti-war.

It would work just fine, as long as people respect rights, and as long as no central institution stops people from defending their rights.

In the case of the "house state," how would that not work?  They would be free to go about their business - free to "institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness" (another quote from the U.S. Declaration of Independence).  There is no reason that any other state should compel them to be members/subjects/"citizens".

The basic question is - can you and those who want to cooperate with you defend your rights without compelling others to support your cause?  Or must you use force - must you compel participation and support?  My contention is that when you start compelling participation, you become the very problem you are supposedly trying to fight against: you become rights violators.

i'm not sure how that changes things. if you are suggesting that the entire world should transition to anarchist systems, which we have no example of, then there would absolutely be power vaccums, which would lead to war. i'm sorry, but that's just the nature of man... to dominate the weaker.

i do believe most people prefer to peacefully keep to themselves - but they are the ones who are eventually dominated by the few who try to seize the spoils.

Is there some reason people can't defend themselves against oppressors without having to oppress others to do it?

I see everyone talking about states and governments and their wrongdoings but what are you going to do with multilevel multinational corporations? Are they a secondary goal or not a target at all? Could it be that we're all missing the villain of the piece? ;D

Yes - war requires cash so to win, you have to use force to raise the cash.  Voluntary donations are OK but the real money is in protection rackets and kidnapping.  Or at least that's how it worked in Ireland when I was growing up.  From what I see in places like Syria and Iraq, nothing has changed.

I'll start off with a few house-state problems:
1. Roads.  The roads are built and maintained by nation-states, and house-states will, by necessity, use them.  Since the house-state doesn't pay taxes to the country-state, the country-state now has to devise an awkward & costly toll system.  And an enforcement system, different from an existing enforcement system, to enforce the laws regarding "home-staters."  For instance, i think i make an awesome drunk driver, and as a free individual, i don't wish to be penalized for simply being a potential road hazard.  As long as i don't do any actual harm, i should be free to do as i choose, amiright?  Then a State Thug pulls me over  & wants to penalize me.  The problems start.

You can see endless similar problems sprouting up.  The reason large societies are able to function at all is the universality of standards.  English, for instance, is far from being an ideal language. But if everyone talked in their own, custom tongue, communication would be impossible.

Sorry for veering of on seemingly disjointed tangents, but i see so many problems.  Sort of like granting every cell in your body complete autonomy, and expecting to stay alive.  And even get better for it :D

it's moreso resources than cash, but i overall agree. you need at least some sort of competitive advantage to beat someone, and resources are a main component of that.


that's the problem.. who will invest in infrastructure? the one who does that will have all the power because they control access to trade. if say i am a large supplier of apples.. all i'd need to do is provide some money and maybe allegiance to whoever the fuck owns the roads, and they will ensure my transporter will be safely escorted. that creates an advantage for me over my competitors. i will gain more money and power, and continue the process until i'm filthy rich and everyone else is poor. they are then economically disarmed.

let me reiterate.. herein lies my point: government is a problem, but the nature of man is THE problem. if you remove government, you still have the nature of man.. which is to dominate others.

simple solution
don't remove the goverment, change it :)

altough not as simple as it may seem  ;D

yeah, solution is simple in theory but impossible by practice. that's the only way things will work, and it's impossible to get everyone to play by fair rules.

i brought my previous point up to an anarchist and he responded with "give everyone guns, they will protect themselves... and all incentive to break rules will dissolve" sorry, but that kind of thinking just doesn't fit the bill for me - it's just too convenient.

oh yeah, he also told me that there should be nonprofit/donators to fund infrastructure because people are just inherently good... wtf? i really do try to understand the anarchistic view on things, but none of it makes sense to me. it's just too extreme and relies too much on idealism.

I could go on at great length on this subject.

First off, I will say that anarchy on a grand scale was probably impossible prior to the existence of the internet. (For the record, the government did NOT invent the internet, but they did finance the development of the backbone structure {DARPANET))

The problem with an anarchic worldview prior to the 'net was speed of communication. That problem no longer exists. The largest part of our lives are anarchic to begin with, but that too is something of a digression.

Why would decentralized government be better?

First off, it's not an anarchic principle, but it is related. What you posit is usually called "minarchy", and it is better because it eliminates a huge amount of power being concentrated in few hands. That's the short version.

A better idea of it would be this. In a small to medium community, it is likely that those governing, however they got their power, would know most if not all of the people they govern. This takes away the depersonalization that allows massive wars, as all but the most callous do not send people they know off to die for money. (all wars are economic at root. Again, something that requires a great deal of elucidation. Don't take my word for it, just accept that I view it as axiomatic for the nonce). This lack of depersonalization means that they are far more likely to be responsive the needs and wants of the governed than a monolithic central government in which the "people" are at best an abstract, and at worst (most cases) viewed as a disposable resource.

Anarchy takes this a step further, positing that an individual will act in their own interest, and that it is in their own interest to not piss off their neighbors constantly, nor particularly to aggress against them. Obviously, there would be exceptions, and this is where communication comes in. Ostracism is the preferred method of punishment for most crimes among the majority of anarchists I have encountered, and we are rather extreme about it. You make restitution for your crimes, or you literally do not get to interact with ANYONE. With proper communication, this can spread for a rather large, if not global, distance. It provides a rather strong incentive for someone who has transgressed against his neighbor to settle the issue.

Utopia means "no place". I have yet to meet an anarchist who is utopian, even in the sense of Sir Thomas Moore's book. It was far more communist or socialist than anarchic, but that's neither here nor there.

What we instead posit is that men can live among one another, peaceably, with rather minimal rules that are generally agreed upon, and that differing groups with different ideas can go their own way WITHOUT INTERFERENCE so long as they are not forcing anyone else to do as they do. Those with the better ideas will win the day, for the most part, as they will be emulated. Again, communication is key.

It is my considered opinion that most of those opposed to anarchic experiments are not afraid that we will fail, but rather the opposite. Because if we succeed, we demonstrate that humans do not need kings. The ideas will spread.

As for dismantling a government overnight, yes, it would cause chaos. It has, many times. BUT!!! the afflicted regions always recover. Usually pretty quickly. The times of most freedom are those times just after a failure of government, and people spontaneously organize themselves. Some lead, some follow, some go their own way, but they find a way to survive. We are a tough and adaptive species.

I will say that a great many anarchists fall into the "all or nothing" mindset, and that is both foolish and wrong. Those of us who think, rather than just dream, are all about forming small independent communities and experimenting. What works, will be adopted by others. What doesn't will be discarded. Small organizations are significantly more ABLE to do this than large ones. Think how long it takes to turn a supertanker, vs. a skiff. I believe that serious anarchists (I am one) would be content if we could purchase a fairly small area, and divide it amongst the participants and just be left to do our thing. We would trade with the outside world, and amongst ourselves, and we would not bother those of you who wish to be ruled, save to talk about our own deal. The major difference between an anarchist and a statist is that the anarchist does not wish to force his views upon others who believe differently. We only want to try our way unmolested by your force. Belief in the non aggression principle is not universal among us, but it is very widely held. Given the disparate people who are anarchists, this is remarkable. I doubt very much that you would find nearly so widespread a belief in any single axiom among any other group of people. We are not your enemies. We are trying to advance the evolution of human society by peaceable means. It has been done on a small scale more than once, and generally successfully for a time. And unlike coercive governments, anarchists do not go to war to keep their adherents. If you don't like what we do, we invite you to leave us, and we mean it. Most of us will use violence only in self defense or the defense of our family, friends, and neighbors. We will not take your hard earned wealth and give it to those who won't work or use it to kill people in foreign lands. We simply think we have a better way of interacting, and we want to prove it. All that prevents us from trying is the fiat of governments. And even that don't work all the way.

If you want to observe a successful, functioning anarchic society within the United States, look to the rainbow society. I have lived among them. Their life is not the form I would want, but they are successful, and they want technology about as much as I want to be primitive. But they do little harm, nearly none, and they live outside of the mainstream altogether, only interacting with it by choice from time to time. Most people do not understand them, and fear them. I found that they would give you the shirt off their back if they thought it would help you, and expect only that you would do the same for someone else in need. There is no reason their system would not work in a technological society, except that most of you fear it.

So you implicitly suggest that all people share the same principles of life and moral values. It may be true for a small isolated group of people and your idea of ostracism and outlawry may actually work between them. But if you take some larger proportion of population and apply this principle among them you will see tensions arise and eventually you will end up with fractions denying and neglecting each other (if not fighting)... 8)

Well , you found the problem why all system/societies will eventually crumble and fail.
This damn ingredient called human is making a mess of everything.

Probably. But if they have their own spaces, like minded people will gather. They may even decide to form coercive governments. But if decentralization is common, and people have learned to be independent, those will be pockets.

Sorry, I've been up for close to two days. I'll revisit this later. It's something I have been thinking about and preaching for nearly 20 years, but right now I can't come up with a cogent response :)

The emboldened text is a biggie.  It's beyond logic to keep such assumptions, that's why they're always implied rather than stated.  There was a guy who made an entire nation dream of a world without commies, Jews and faggots.  How did man's inborn moral sense, the natural grasp of wrongs and rights, play into this?

What's interesting is the level of abstraction in these debates.  "The Government" is always assumed to be a distinct, immutable entity, separate from the ones being governed.  That allows a for a "bad guy" to point a finger at, but in reality it's a continuum -- from the president to the street sweeper on the government payroll.  The IRS agents also pay taxes -- it's a tangled mess.  There's simply no "other" to kill with fire here.

Actually, I'm just very tired. I didn't deliberately imply any such thing. As I said above, I'll revisit this when I'm more alert. Probably type something up offline over the next couple days. It's an extremely complex subject.

But what about economics? To sustain the achieved standard of life we need that tight hierarchical integration between people (ironically called division of labor) which most anarchists loathe as much as they are afraid of... 8)

WHY??? Why must you push those big shiny buttons when I'm dead!! (J.k). I'm going to eat. Then I'm going to sleep. Then I'm going to celebrate my son's seventh birthday.

After that, I'm going to start writing. Economics actually led me to anarchy (agorism), and I can answer all of the questions you and crumbs and several others have posed in great detail. This is my obsession. I have written about three quarters of a book called "anarchy is not chaos", and it addresses most of this. Unfortunately, right now if my wife yelled "Kevin!" I might not realize she was talking to me, or about me for that matter. Don't get old. You lose the creativity of insomnia.

So you decided to share with us some piece of crap thought here and hoped to get away with it, right? ;D

But of course! LOL

Would you do business with someone who used slave labor?

If not, and the other people you do business with agreed this was bad, the slave owner would either need to stop owning slaves or go out of business
If so, and the other people you do business with agreed this was bad, you put yourself at risk of going out of business along with the slave owner

I won't bother with a society which believes this is good for nobody wants to be enslaved, and a society which cannot grasp something as simple as empathy surely has no capacity to survive as anarchists for long; they're too busy installing a state.

Thus, the incentive of using slave labor is killed; the last resort is to ask the state to protect your slave-owning habits, but since that can't happen in a society of rationals, for what rational seeks a guiding force but his own, it's effectively squashed and business continues as usual.  Behold, ostracism.

Also: for the same reason that the rational does not need the state to dictate his actions, the rational has no need for a hierarchy of business; since every worker is equipped with the mental skills needed to run a business (it's kind of sad to note that they currently don't, despite 14 years of involuntary "education"), they can very easily form businesses together and share their wealth with each other as they see fit.  What good is a corporate empire on the local level?--it's just extra overhead for the worker, who gets what's left trickled from the top of the pyramid as our current system is now, and accepts it as he cannot see any other way to make a living, nor was he provided the skills required to see why it's screwing him over (though he will constantly complain about it to his peers) thanks to the corporate empire's bed buddy, the state, where there is no incentive to produce thinking adults via the educational system, merely productive ones.

isn't this wishful thinking? you're saying that nobody would own slaves because it's bad.. but you know what? the past is an indicator of the future, and throughout most of mankind's history, we've had slaves. in a dystopian society, which is what would happen under a worldwide anarchist government, i'm sure the few bad guys wouldn't mind owning slaves.

I have to confess that I can't say for sure if I would do business with the guys using slave labor (or some variety thereof) since I have never yet been there, but I definitely try to avoid people who knowingly sell stolen things... ;D

But it doesn't actually matter if I in particular would do business with them or not. I personally know many people who would buy stolen things without ever thinking whether it's good or bad. I have absolutely no doubts these same people would deal in with someone using slave labor without much remorse about it. And I have to admit that some of them would even be happy to employ some slave labor if there is an opportunity 8)

And they would do business between themselves whether I like it or not...  ;D

So, according to your logic, we should implicitly come to a conclusion that any state would authorize slavery because it is established by people lacking empathy and thus approving slavery... 8)

Do you know how this style of reasoning is called? ;D

I think you would agree there are many forms of slave labor starting from underpayment, so in a sense any businessman hiring people could be treated as a slave holder of a kind... If what you alluded to but didn't say directly were true, we would not have such activities as illegal drugs trade (remember Silk Road?), murder-for-hire, child pornography and the stuff like that (and yes, slavery too) ;D

They say that only some small percentage of population have mental skills needed to run a business and I have to agree with them. And even if you have these skills in you (among them not the last the trait which allows you to make people do what you want and how you want it, i.e. to be a dictator of some kind) you can't directly control a number of people beyond some limit. So, given the present depth of the division of labor, we really have no other options left but to build those multilevel corporate pyramids... As simple as that! ;D

Slavery is built into human nature and it's exactly the state which is constraining it. But the primary reasons for this are not empathy and all other such things but rather economic ones. The present level of technological development makes slavery obsolete because under present conditions it is an inefficient form of organizing human labor... 8)

Take any primitive society and they beyond doubt would have slave labor... Even ants have slaves! ;D

The reality is that near slave like conditions still exist in some cases in West. Often even with apperance of everything being right. And the victims might not even understand they are slaves...

I understand that slave like labour has been used atleast in some restoraunts here. That is for labour intensive stuff that can't be always automated.

On other hand for many things it's not just cost effective anymore. Farming, mining and so on, much cheaper to get machines...

That's what I'm talking about. You can take any successful businessman and after some harsh scraping you will get a slaveholder in disguise... ;D

Slavery is not anarchism.  Anarchism involves freedom and communal efforts as humanity.

Debt is slavery.

Surely there would be debt in an anarchist society?

Come the revolution and everyone will eat strawberries and cream! -- Willie Howard
After midnight It's all gonna be peaches and cream -- Eric Clapton

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/1f/A_Soul_Tormented.jpg

Until we grow past money.

How long that would take?

I think those of you, guys, who deem themselves as anarchists are terribly misusing the term... 8)
Considering what you say here (small isolated settlements, ostracism, communal efforts and all that nonsense) I would rather call you hippies... ;D

Or maybe an anarchist is just an age-worn hippie? ;D

It can take years but only a matter of hours to actually happen.

You're attempts at discrediting anarchism are futile.

I have already given my understanding of what true anarchism is ("each for himself") and been agreed with here... 8)
And that's what I really like about it! ;D

I don't know how you've misconstrued "no rulers" as "each for himself", but I'm happy to point you toward a job in politics if that's the kind of lifestyle you're after ;D

When we discussed female genital mutilation, your reply was "As long as its not my daughter its fine."  How is that not "each for himself?"

The Google guys are extremely successful.  Are they slaveholders?

There is no substance behind what all those guys say here, save maybe for one of them who did actually admit that anarchy can be considered as a condition where every man should stand for himself. Whenever they come across somebody who is not liable to their eyewash and cheap propaganda and who is able to show how perverted their logic really is, they always end up contradicting themselves or even resort to value judgments about their opponents... 8)

If they work directly with personnel (which I doubt) then yes, for sure. If you want someone in person, you can take Microsoft and Steve Ballmer or Apple and Steve Jobs where it will be more evident. It may be very well hidden under the tinsel of equality and all that nonsense, but nevertheless it is still there 8)

Though this shouldn't even be a point of doubt for you if you are pro-anarchy. From your stance any corporation is evil by definition... ;D

Not all anarchists are hippies, but I'm not so sure the reverse is true.

For the most part, anarchist support decentralization to it's logical extreme within a social context.

What about laws or you just happen to think there will be no need for them and ostracism would do better instead? It seems that those who identify themselves as anarchists can not even come to a unified opinion on anything between themselves...

Is this a true nature of Anarchism?

Atheists have this same problem; they can't even agree if they don't believe in God or if God flat out doesn't exist.  Communists can't figure out what's what, so there's 10+ different flavors of it; democrats and republicans just can't agree what the state should do or shouldn't do, though they agree it should exist.  These aren't definitive qualities; to be an anarchist can mean anything, just like being a capitalist, or a Christian, or American can mean anything, which is why it's not an accurate descriptor (aside from what it's ascribing) and no one anarchist seems to be like any other; the only defining quality of the anarchist is to want for the state to be non-existent, which is a conclusion you can approach from many angles.

Anyway, ostracism is just a form of punishment, just like imprisonment or the death penalty, which anarchists don't necessarily need to be for or against.  Law doesn't disappear; the only thing that changes is who creates law, which, as has been stated, involves decentralizing lawmakers ideally so every grown person can govern themselves.

This was sarcasm actually... But it has a point. The very nature of anarchism dictates that true anarchists should be the first among those who can't agree on anything in any constructive way... Otherwise, could we call it anarchism if those pretending to be anarchists would bind themselves by the rules of majority (if we first agree that every human is unique)?

Where are you getting this from!? :D

We call it anarchism when there are no rulers; nothing more, nothing less.  There's nothing about anarchism which dictates that they must be contrarian about everything, nor are they barred from agreeing with the majority, since they would be the majority if they were anarchists at all.

Ok, if the law is still compulsory for everyone, does it make any difference who specifically creates it? Actually, I don't see how this could potentially change matters in any substantial way beside what we have now. It would still be a six of one and half a dozen of the other...

There is no "the law"; you have laws which you agree with, and other people have laws they agree with, and if those laws are broken, you handle the aggressor in whichever way you've agreed on.

The difference is in, "Killing is immoral; therefore, I will not kill," and, "You're joining the military or you're going to jail."  Clearly your government doesn't have you best interests in mind, otherwise it would not have to be compulsory; you'd already agree with everything they do.

Look, you just substitute law for the rulers, right? If so, what difference does it actually make then? You either have to obey by the laws set by a ruler or obey likely the same laws set by someone else. Still don't get whether it ultimately changes anything...

Who do you believe is making the laws?  God?  Law is not a magical list in the sky that people are bound to follow; when you follow a law, you either do so willingly, because you agree with the laws, or you do so out of fear, even while disagreeing with the laws.

So what you say actually boils down to what I deemed as the only true Anarchy (and with what I entirely agree)... That is, each man is a law for himself and in himself. But this means in effect that there will be as many "laws" as there are people out there, since every man is unique and thereby is different from other people...

This is exactly what I'm telling you. My point is that it doesn't actually matter who sets the law, be it a petty tyrant, parliament or government (or any other group of people who are responsible for making the laws). What matters most here is that you have to obey the accepted law! So you either stick to my definition of anarchy (i.e. true Anarchy) or have to agree there is no place for it...

The most common laws rise to the top, with lesser laws, i.e. "Don't chew gum around me", tend to disappear as the person finds they're more inconvenienced by the law than if they'd just deal with it.  We generally agree on the same things: don't use aggression against me.  If we can consider our persons as our property, then we ask that no one bring harm to our property.  But if a person really wanted to enforce their no-chewing-gum law, then they'd have to do so in a way that did not conflict with laws against aggression, i.e. ostracize themselves, if nobody else found it an issue.  I think I prefer the company of people, myself.

And if you ever find a man who believes killing is moral and should be legal, let me know; I want to stay far, far away from him.


This is what you're missing: there's a difference between obeying a law willingly, and obeying a law unwillingly.  The anarchist society does not require you to observe any law unwillingly; the state, however, does.  This can only occur if you're not in control of law whatsoever.  When you say have to obey the accepted law, you're referring to the state; otherwise, if you agreed on that law, you wouldn't have to follow it; instead, you should obey the accepted law, which infers to anarchism.

Now I have to ask you the same question that I asked here and which was left unanswered. That is, what are we going to do with those people who did not agree on the laws in the first place? Should they give in to the majority or we'd better send them to concentration camps for subsequent extermination?

We started over 3 billion years ago and we are still working on it. 

So we can only hope we are done in 5 billion years...

I would probably accept the name hippie, but I doubt you'd identify me as such by my appearance.  I do use the CND logo a lot - does that count?

So now we have hippies in the thread... How long will it take for punks to arrive or would they rather  ignore us with contempt? I think punks with their strong anti-establishment views and the promotion of personal freedom would make perfect True Anarchy zealots...

Anybody?

I am (slowly) writing a rather long post on these subjects, but here's kind of a short form.

Those who will not conform in a given society would likely move, as they would find it impossible to interact with those around them. Those who aggress, on the other hand, would likely find themselves on the wrong end of a gun sooner or later. NOT just for "chewing gum" to use the previous example, but rather such things as robbery, rape, attempted murder, etcetera. Actual crimes.

I think you'll find that's another thing that most of us (anarchists) subscribe to: For a thing to be a crime there absolutely MUST be a victim. Defining something as undesirable (by whatever criteria) doesn't make it a crime in the anarchist's philsosophies. The idea is that like minded people will tend to cooperate and accommodate one another. This in itself will lead to a greater decentralization as people have a lot of disparate ideas on how to interact with one another and disparate goals as well.

No matter what form of social organization exists, there will always be a small element that defies it, and an even smaller element that is operating with ill intent. Anarchism seeks to reduce the opportunity for the truly criminal, whereas statism generally just tries to make it so PETTY crime is difficult, while openly rewarding truly large criminal enterprises, such as wars. Criminals are opportunistic parasites. All societies depend on the productive to exist. Anarchism both removes the incentive for parasitic activity and punishes it harshly by default, whereas the statist model, particularly democracy and communism, openly reward it. Not openly as in a stated goal, but more along the lines of "the best place to hide something is in plain sight".

So you are actually in favor of concentration camps and barbed wire. Why in the first place would those who disagree move anywhere if they are in their own right? Moving on "their own accord" when the majority makes the life of the minority unbearable is not much different from forced evictions. That is what is actually meant by "finding it impossible to interact with those around them". The law and the state behind it seem to be by far fairer here. At least they don't tell between whether you like it or not...

Quoting this to stress this important point.

Besides that: great post Biomech! Please finish your book - "anarchy is not chaos" is something I might name my own book about that subject  ;D

I often find myself pondering the possibility, that maybe government and hierarchical power structures have indeed been inevitable and indispensable in achieving the level of organization and technological advancement we have achieved. Maybe. But this is why the internet is such a powerful and transforming invention. Thanks to its decentralized nature it allows for ways of organization and information flow, which have been impossible until now.

Now that we are equipped with tools to handle most if not all human affairs in a much more efficient, decentralized way, the old institutions can start to fade into irrelevance. Of course they won't just fade, they will be dragged, kicking and screaming, into the dust bin of history  ;D And it will probably take generations.

You keep saying "the laws" like there's just one list of laws that everyone must follow; you've yet to understand how this works.

Lets do an exercise: name your top 5 laws you'd like to live by.  I'll list mine:

1. No murder
2. No thievery
3. No rape
4. No physical abuse, aside from defense
5. In other words, no acts of aggression

So lets compare this to the punishment you've listed:


If people willingly go into concentration camps, they'd be lunatics; to get people to get into them requires force, which violates my 4th law.  If I violate my 4th law and manage to kill people in attempting to get them into the camps, I'd violate my 1st law, as well as "exterminating" them would violate this law as well.  If I profited from this law-breaking, I'd violate my 2nd law; and I won't get into my 3rd law, as that's rather disgusting.

These punishments require me to break my own laws; I would then be a criminal.  Assuming I've broken the world's most common laws, I'll never be able to interact with popular society again; I would have to either willingly subject myself to their punishments (which likely will not include death, for I'd otherwise never see the point in it), or continue to live as an outcast until someone, who can spare the blow to their reputation by killing a man, puts a bullet in me.

If you think about it, how would you get away with crimes against humanity?  The excuse of "We're doing it to take care of criminals!" doesn't fly with anyone who is halfway awake; just look how that's working out with America and "terrorism".

Punishment works like this: if you interact with the person who has violated a popular law, you then become known for conversing with criminals; people don't want to do business with you then, lest they appear as criminals as well.  To stop this, you refuse to interact with the person, and if they're violent, ready to protect yourself if need be, or call the local hired protectors to do it for you.  The violator can't get a job; his employer, nor his employees, don't want to work with a criminal, so the violator can't make any money to make a living.  The law-violator eventually subjects himself to whatever punishment that would satisfy his peers, or tries to find an area that is more accepting of his type, if that exists, and so lives in his own personal hell.  If the violator was dangerous enough, and people agreed that he needed to be killed before he killed another, so he would be.  If they'd like to waive or reduce the punishment for the killer, that's how it goes.

There is nobody who "didn't agree on the laws in the first place" since there's no single law-system to agree upon; you have your beliefs in justice, other people have theirs, and if your beliefs clash with other people's, either they or you must adjust.

I don't know if it was impossible.  It's just that government is an easy way of solving problems not requiring much thought.  Or at least it appears that way on the surface, of course, when you look closely you find it to be incredibly inefficient at best.

So it might be that government has allowed people to be somewhat lazy in some regard and not explore alternatives to problems.  Much in the same way that believing in God means people don't have to seek true answers to questions about existence.  You could make the argument that if this is the case, then government has actually stagnated human progress.  In it's absence we would have been forced to be much more creative in finding solutions to problems. 

I would always be very hesitant to claim that government was a necessity at any point in time. 

According to Merriam-Webster Online, anarchy is "a situation of confusion and wild behavior in which the people in a country, group, organization, etc., are not controlled by rules or laws"

By that definition, I feel like it would be impossible to call a working thing "anarchy."

Yes, semantics are fickle; one word can hold a hundred different meanings (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/run?s=t).  In the context we're speaking of here, we refer to the political philosophy of anarchism, not the synonym of chaos, which can be briefly summed up as a society revolving around voluntary interaction:


This is why I don't like anarchism; not because I disagree with the philosophy, but the word is beyond repair, so much so common dictionaries fail to define it properly; here's dictionary.com's take on it:

oh I am very hesitant about claiming that. What I've written above is the maximum praise I am able to give government. It is and always has been a primarily reactionary force, debilitating peoples ability to think and act creatively and independently.

Why should I bind myself in any way by listing any laws? When you interact with people you rely primarily on your instincts, not on however short a list of laws. Our social nature has already given us everything to talk or do things with other people. In fact, these laws you refer to are nothing more than just a formal expression of that social nature of humans...

Oh, I like this doublespeak you, guys, stick to here! I used the reference to concentration camps as a metaphor only. In real life it would mean something along the lines of "finding it impossible to interact with those around them" and "finally having to move somewhere". And you didn't exclude psychological abuse from your list of rules... How come?

Now you confirm in your own words that anarchy as you see it doesn't in fact differ very much from what state actually is all about. If we clear away the verbal husks of what you say here, we necessarily come to a system where majority would suppress minority in any possible way... How's that different from what state does?

Here in Australia, and I think this true for much of the Western world, people go to government now to solve almost any problem.   Just about whatever it is, the first thought is always "what can we get government to do".  

Because of the abstract nature of government, people don't realise what they are really saying is "what can we force people to do, and pay for, to solve x".  

Forcing people to do things at the point of a gun is always easier than trying to negotiate and figure out solutions to problems.   It just has many unintended consequences because fundamentally, people generally resent being forced to do things.

Problems are more significant than ever but people just aren't making the connection to the near constant application of force on society.  

This really makes me think twice about reporting potholes.  Thanks.

And there is somekind of penalty probably involved if you go and fix it yourself... Atleast on paved roads...

yeah :D
they have paid professionals to do so, so a sloppy job from a guy who never did this before wouldn't be very helpful :D

Oh noes! I can't possibly imagine living in a world with no government where certain bad people would no doubt try to steal from me and hurt me to help themselves! So therefore, it's necessary to submit to certain bad people who are the government who steal from me and hurt me to help themselves!

Statism = Logical failure

Considering we are already 99% of the way there (no one uses a gun to force you to brush your teeth or post on this forum ect...) it should be easier than one might suspect to bridge the gap on that final measly 1%.

It's you who logically failed here. You pay some bad guys and they defend you from other bad guys out there. Because of the economy of scale, you actually end up paying much less than you would have to pay without a state behind you. So your imagination wasn't actually deceiving you...

David Friedman makes a pretty good argument against this. If you look at the police in big cities where they have many more officers and much larger budgets you actually see less satisfactory service than police in smaller cities. According to what emperical evidence is available on this subject, it would appear to have INVERSE economies of scale, i.e. smaller police forces provide more satisfactory service than larger police forces.

Or maybe larger communities make people worse? And on other hand size of community increase production... Don't know if there is any large cities with many smaller police forces.

What you say, well, what David Friedman (who is him?) says may very well be true. I didn't say that every state would be perfect, but, firstly, you can't deny there is such a notion as economies of scale or that they actually work. Secondly, there is a law of diminishing returns which further complicates things. And thirdly, big cities require more officers and larger budgets not only because they are bigger (this is beyond discussion for obvious reasons) but primarily due to a wider range of specialized services they demand (i.e. more fine-grained division of labor)...

The entire problem with the police as it currently exists is all to do with incentives.

The facts are that the government is the police's customers, not us.  The government are the ones that pay the bills and give the orders.  That means it's in the best interests of the police to serve the government.  And this is exactly what you see.   The police are far more concerned with protecting government officials than protecting citizens.  They are more concerned with handing out fines than solving crimes.

The police as an organisation cannot be sacked by us, because we aren't the ones directly paying the bills.   Taxes go into general revenue, and of course are compulsory, and the police are then paid out of that.

The police have the same problems as any other forced monopoly.  There's just no real incentive to supply good service because they don't have any competitors.

That's why you get some officers that want to do a good job and serve the public, but it's like any other public service organisation where they are overwhelmed by those who don't want to make much effort and at some point they get sick of doing more work than most of their colleagues and/or get frustrated.

Such logic is primitive (don't take it personal or as an offense)

Even if government is police only customer, this doesn't change anything really. Government is interested in defending its citizens, otherwise they won't be able to collect taxes just because citizens will not have the money to pay them with. Police is just a tool among many others that government has at its disposal. We can debate endlessly whether they are good at their work or not, but this doesn't change the lay of the land...

Wow thats a mind fucking paradox right there. How can it defend you AND tax you? Isn't protecting you from people who would take your property away from you against your will part of defending you?

You would have to pay something to somebody for defending you, even the most impenitent among anarchists admit it. Why would they want to defend you for free actually? If you have never thought about this, think about it now, it doesn't require much effort to understand such things...

To hope for something out of nothing is the most popular form of hope

By this logic rape is the same as consensual sex because they both involve the transfer of semen for the purpose of procreation...

you have to pick someone to provide you with defense but it can be anyone in the whole world != you have to pay organization X or else organization X is the one you will need to be defended from.

Often you don't have choice at all. At other times you have to choose between two or even more evils. And only sometimes you are free to refuse from making your choice altogether... In short, stop trolling

with the state you have no choice, you either pay the state or you get locked in a rape dungeon to be sexually tortured for years. in a free society you can chose to purchase defense from anyone in the world who is providing that service. saying these are the same thing is like saying the ADT home security is just another mafia protection racket.

Im going to give you the benefit of the doubt and say that you are are the troll because the alternative of you being legitimately unable to understand the difference between these two arrangements has even less pleasant implications.

You may call it various vile names, but to me, it is all six of one and half a dozen of the other (as I said earlier). Now, as I can see, you successfully got rid of that mental paradox that had been chasing you. So why would you, in a free society, need to purchase defense in the first place?

I will have to quote this for future reference , and I promise I will try understanding it in the morning , when I will be able to think clearly about sex.

So if its all "all six of one and half a dozen of the other" than would you agree with the statement that ADT home security is just a particular brand of mafia protection rack

For protection against people with dangerously high time preference.

Didn't quite get what you mean here, but aren't these wicked people the same bad guys that the state should protect us, good boys, from?

The state cant protect you from "bad guys" because "bad guys" just infiltrate the state and use it as a force multiplier.

But no im not talking about run of the mill "bad guys". most bad guys are self interested and care about the future. in a free society you wouldnt need to purchase protection from them because they can be controlled through threats of social ostracism.

who you need physical protection from are people who are both "bad guys" but also live only in the moment and dont care at all about the future. these people can not be controlled through threats of ostracism. these people have to be physically subdued while they are in the process of rampaging. fortunately this is a relatively small cross section so protecting yourself from such a small group of people would be relatively inexpensive, also you could just chose to carry a firearm instead of buying protection.

also i just cant let this slide. what you are saying here is that a situation where you have no choice of who to pay and the person you pay says "either pay us Y amount of money or else we will hurt you" is exactly the same situation as being able to chose to pay any one of a thousand agencies where the agency you chose says "either pay us amount Y or else someone other than us may hurt you." Is what i quoted up there is you claiming that these are functionally identical situations? i just want to be clear on that point.

Thanks. You just agreed with me.

codified law is unnecessary in non defective humans. Not much you can do about psychopaths except to avoid them and defend yourself where the need arises.

But governments absolutely NEED psychopaths in order to function. Thus the need for laws.

An undisputed right of exit. No anarchist, whether in a commune or walking the earth, would claim you as his property. No government, ever, has failed to do so.

In Pennsylvania, they wait till it's big enough to swallow a car whole. Then they call it fixed.

Human nature is self destructive.

Up to this point I thought you were serious.

Look at the tax rates. LOOK AT THEM. There is no way in hell it would ever cost me that much to defend myself, my family, and my property. If I blew off a thousand rounds a day in practice and installed prison level security, it wouldn't cost that much.

And that's merely monetary. In "the land of the f(r)ee" it is literally impossible to be alive without committing pseudo crimes that are considered felonies.

when ever people make categorical claims about human nature, they are almost always talking about themselves.

I agree, but I also believe it's difficult to escape this bias, as people rarely experience any life but their own; only ~18% of the population are both intuitive and highly empathetic, who can easily walk in the shoes of another human being.  It's better to just discard the argument of human nature, it rarely provides any insight except "Humans do this and therefore it's in their nature," which we were aware of even before the argument was presented.

You clearly have no idea how much value is taken from you in the multitude of ways that the government takes value from you, and greatly overestimate the cost of defending yourself in a free society.

Hmm, haven't relatively large anarchic communities already existed? For example, those in the regions of Catalonia and Aragon in Spain, 1936.

and how long did they last? just a blip on the map. i don't know what the solution, but if you have an anarchistic society, you're probably not going to be as well-organized as government run states.. which means they will come for your ass and use you and your resources up. it's just an extremist, one-size-fits-all ideology that is just wishful thinking to me.,

Oh, they were pretty well organized alright. In fact, in many ways much better than the government they had. Take a look at the 6 part BBC documentary "The Spanish Civil War". You have to understand, this wasn't chaos and "survival of the fittest" we're talking about, it really was a well organized society... it just so happened that it had no central government, and still worked.

are you talking about the movement that lasted for 3 years? the movement that ultimately gave way to francisco franco? i'm not really well-versed with the history of anarchy in societies, but it seems like they usually don't last very long.

Yes, the forces of Francisco Franco eventually won the Spanish civil war, leading to the dictatorship. But my point is, it didn't fail because of a lack of internal organization. It, as well as other similar movements throughout Europe (in Greece, Italy, etc.) in the period immediately after the Second World War, failed due to external attacks. In Spain mainly because of the Fascists and Communists, in other parts of Europe they were "liberated" (read "slaughtered") by the Allied forces.

i guess you agree with me then, because i think if 1 country were to go anarchistic (and they are surrounded by state-run governments), an external force (neighboring country) would come in and invade them.. which has happened in the past. i don't think just arming every man and woman with a gun is going to get the job done.

Well, I suppose it depends on the situation. Sorry in advance for the following scenario, I know it will be offensive, but sadly it seems to me to be how things work:

If we're talking about a third world country most people never heard about and have nearly no contact with, that were to try this, I suppose external forces would have an easy time directing the propaganda to paint them as a target, for whatever reason. And unfortunately, some people would probably protest against it, but to no avail.

Now imagine a relatively rich country were to try this, say Iceland. I have a hard time imagining propaganda would work so well in this case, particularly if the transition to anarchy was a relatively peaceful one to begin with. Then again, this may be a little overly optimistic.  ::)

that's a valid point. but if your end goal is to have all nations (especially the western/developed ones), then that really shuffles the cards. i really do think that smaller groups vying for power would form, and the rules we know today (whether they are good or bad) probably won't exist... even if you are a well developed country. if iceland were the only ones to turn to anarchy, i think they would be fine. i think it would actually be a pretty cool idea.. an experiment, if you will. a lot of libertarians, i'd assume, would move there to live.

Secular rationalism; it's easy to conquer an isolated anarchist community, it's very hard to conquer oneself.

as far as public infrastructure, i think private companies will create roads.. but then you'd have toll roads everywhere. and since men are not created equal, one guy might climb to the top of the ladder and own all the roads. what happens then, when he charges you exorbitant fees?

That's a terrible business model :P  Nobody would drive if you charged to drive on them, and then how would businesses get consumers?  The point of roads is to lead to business, not to charge for the privilege.

I'm not suggesting an American libertarian, or anarcho-capitalist system here. The examples I gave were of real anarchic movements, that is, without hierarchy. Infrastructure was still created and maintained, without the need of anyone in particular owning it.

Yes; I believe the Spanish anarchists followed a communist model.

Shh, don't mention the C* word... that will scare people away. :P

But yes, I believe they were anarcho-communists and/or anarcho-syndicalists, though having nearly nothing to do with the Russian form of communism, which I guess was little more than an excuse for a totalitarian state.

well how else would the people who create the roads make money?


im curious as to how that would work? how would roads be created then, if no one owned them? who'd put the money out to get them built? if businesses pooled their money together to build roads, they would start complaining if someone who did not use any of their services or goods used the roads.. because that'd be freeloading.

Think about it ;D  Who profits from there being roads?  Who has the greatest incentive to get them built?

Well, the people themselves did all that. And that's not how it would work, but rather how it did work. Read up on it (or watch the documentary)... it seems like you would be surprised at what people can do, if they put their mind to it. :P

I've already pointed out why there wouldn't be toll roads everywhere.  In fact, out of all the business models available for roads it seems like the worst one available to me.  But then I am looking at it from a business standpoint.    Not a position where I'm freaking out about the possibility of "no govt, no roads".

If you have a road you want to encourage throughput on it.  Otherwise, what's the point?


Like the way that shopping centres which maintain the roads and parking spaces in their car park complain about freeloaders, you mean?

It doesn't matter to them because the costs of maintaining them are so small compared to the profits they make.  They don't want to scare away potential future customers by complaining about the "freeloaders".

Well, I've been looking at the wars of the past few decades fought by the big powers, who have the biggest armies and biggest budgets ever and it looks to me like the big guys are consistently losing to small, ragtag, well-armed people of these countries.

There's a famous quote a Japanese military person remarked about the possibility of invading America in WW2.  He said it wasn't worth it because there would be a gun behind every blade of grass.  That it would be impossible to hold.  I'm paraphrasing but it was something like that.

On mobile so can't embed sorry.
http://youtu.be/NKERC6F7mSM

Whitest kids you know - anarchy.

I think anarchy is not the answer, I think a change of the people that we have in govt from millionaires to actual politics, sciences and social science majors in the office.... People who actually have a clue instead of puppets being fingered by corporate interests.

And anything over 15% in taxes is ridiculous.

If you had the power to help that, you'd be an anarchist :P  You don't get the state without the corruption, sorry.  It's either or.

i didn't read why you think toll roads wouldn't be everywhere.

and also, who builds the highways between towns/cities? the businesses too? so the amount they want to contribute is voluntary? someone's going to feel like a party is not paying their fair share, and there would be dischord. how would that get settled?

i don't get how you got to the "costs are so small compared to the profits they make." road maintenance is probably not cheap.

ancient tribal groups were anarchistic, and they killed/dominated each other until there was one ruler. great nations came as a result.

The party feeling discord makes it public that the persons in question aren't putting in their fair share.  People respond accordingly; if they care, the persons get a bad rep, and if they don't care, the persons don't.  If you get a bad rep, it gets harder to function around people.  If you get a good rep, it gets easier.

I'm just going to leave this here:

http://www.silentconspiracy.net/2013/11/how-to-fix-society/

What prevents them from being controlled through threats of social ostracism right now? Do states explicitly prohibit ostracism or make you keep connections with bad guys? Unless you provide strong evidence confirming your position, I would think there is nothing that would constrain my desire to stay away from the dregs of society. And don't say that those bad guys are government themselves (this would make your argument circular)...

What are you going to do with them, provided they don't get to killing anybody? Should they be shot in sight, put to jail, sent to reservations or left alone really? Would you have to use violence towards thieves, for example? In short, will there be a judiciary, penitentiary and law enforcing systems, or you would rather stick to lynch law alone without official trial according to the established order?

It's very simple really. I just don't believe that in the situation you describe here you will actually have that option of free choosing between a thousand agencies. In some weaker states, you often have to pay local criminal gangs besides officially established taxes so that they would just leave you alone. Your situation could be even worse than that if it ever came to reality, because you might actually end up paying many "agencies" ab invito...

Oh sorry, it was actually in another thread, I got mixed up.  Here it is

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=343866.msg3846210#msg3846210


Highways between towns, assuming there is enough traffic to justify it, could be funded in various ways.  Maybe the big transportation companies could do it to ensure their goods get where they want.  Another example of profits exceeding maintenance costs.  They could be funded by advertising.  Or the big roads themselves could be some form of toll road if nothing else.    These are just a few things that I can think of.  I'm not in the business of roads so there is probably some idea that I am not even thinking of.  

I think road maintenance is probably a lot cheaper without all the state bureaucracy costs.  And the fact that it is a monopoly so let's face it, those road guys don't have to put too much effort in like any public service department.  

I don't know about where you live but here they dig up perfectly good roads and repave them just to make sure they use their budget for the year so that the budget isn't cut the next year.  This is what happens when you have perverse incentives.  

Yes, laws are needed to defend you from such psychopaths as well. And to defend them in some degree from lawlessness and outrage. That's why we need codified law as well as trials and lawyers. Even if we don't need written laws to do things with other people, we need law when we do things to other people...

Right? Are you kidding?

I hoped you would read and understand what I had written about the doublespeak you are using again here. But, it seems, to no avail. Why should I ever search for an exit if I am in my own right? So, minority under your rule would just have to walk away somewhere. Is this what you mean by an undisputed right of exit? And you have the right to emigrate, so government doesn't claim you as its property, either publicly or implicitly (I'm not speaking about slave states here for evident reasons). Your point is void...

I don't deem it purposeful to answer seriously to posts that are nothing more than sheer trolling. You missed the real culprit here

Your taxes are used in a myriad other ways (pensions, health service, utilities, roads, etc), it is strange that you forget to mention such things or just hope that I would miss them. It is suicidal for any government to tax more than 50% of your total income (actually the optimal number is far below this). You would lose incentive to work if they would require more under normal conditions...

I have already answered almost the same assertion in my previous post... If you don't believe me, Google is your friend, go search for the Laffer Curve. I'm afraid that "in a free society" you will often have to give everything you possess and sometimes even your life. I have a strong feeling that anarchy proponents here have never seen what real life may look like...

I have often wondered about what motivates people to support the existence of the state. Not in a "it is necessary, but I would welcome it if it wasn't" way, but in a "I don't want it to be unnecessary" sort of way. As I search for the answer, over and over again I find this:


REAL LIFE.

The assumption, that the bearer of said opinions knows what is REAL. What real life looks like. What human nature really is. They know these things. Here come the generalizations, but I feel that it's mostly the same type of personality. Someone, who views himself as a rational realist, assessing the cold hard facts of how human nature works and how life really works and not turning away from the harsh truths. Unlike those starry eyed dreamers and idealists. It's a way of "one-upmanship", a way to feel superior and validated. Hey, I'm not judging, we all do these things in various ways :)

What strikes me as weird about this stance is the refusal to acknowledge a blatant problem in this approach: if it is true and life is nasty, brutish and short and human nature is selfish, violent and treacherous, how is the creation of an institution with the legal monopoly of initiating force not going to make things any worse? The selfish and treacherous people you need protecting against will suddenly turn into benevolent protectors, as soon as you give them a monopoly on force?? I don't see any evidence to support that. I do see lots of evidence pointing to the contrary direction: that said monopoly on force tends to attract the sort of people who are the most dangerous to others when in power, it corrupts them further and even corrupts the occasional honest idealist finding themselves there.

Very simple really, just a few words. Because it becomes profitable. When you don't have a monopoly of power you have to compete with someone else for it, and so you are predetermined by your position (liable to failure) to strip everyone around you of everything they may happen to have. Almost the same happens when warfare begins (external competition for power), government begins plundering their own population in an effort to retain the power with any means available. When nothing threatens the monopoly of power, it becomes profitable in the long run to turn into "benevolent protectors"

I think no one here idealizes state...

Thanks for your reply. I think I see your point.

Quite a scary conclusion (bolded) you're reaching there. We are reduced to hoping, that the entities in power recognize this and indeed turn into benevolent protectors. Also there are other factors, besides external threats, which might turn them towards looting their citizens, like greed, corruption, lust for power & wealth etc.

While I agree, that the monopolization of power is most profitable (for those in power), I would imagine that better cost-effectiveness (if that would be what we're really after) would be achieved through competition.

No one is arguing in favor of creating nation-states.
They already exist.
Everywhere.
Almost the entire habitable surface of this planet is divided among such nation-states.  Arguing in their favor would make as much sense as arguing in favor of death -- it already happens, and coming to a consensus that "death ain't no good" won't decrease its scope by a single soul.

If the entities in power don't recognize this (let's assume this) and turn to looting their citizens, they usually wind up as they ended in 1789 in France, as an example. So in the end the power is monopolized by those who are not only able to grab it in the first place, but also able to hold it long enough, which is impossible without becoming a "benevolent protector"

Real competition for power (or rather struggle) always leads to its monopolization while ineffectively and wastefully spending resources and human lives, with the winner usually extinguishing all substantial resistance afterwards. Do you really think anything has considerably changed since Ancient Rome?

school

So the cause for today's anarchism popularity lies in the fact that modern anarchists were forced to hobnob with bad guys in school... And now they're trying to get rid of their youth complexes through sticking to anarchism and just can't help dreaming to bring ostracism upon their implacable "friends". Could I ever assume anything of the kind?

I guess I have only one more question: is it worth debating this? Or have you already made your mind up?

Whom is this question aimed at?

If you ask me, then what should I have made up my mind to actually? Personally, I like the idea of the only true Anarchism where each man stands for himself and is worth what he's actually worth, no strings attached. I surely despise this glamor hippie version that so many admire so much here, with all their doublespeak and that crap about ostracism...

No.
You don't. They will tax you for TEN YEARS if you renounce your citizenship. Here in the US, that is. Yes, some other countries actually allow their subjects to permanently leave.

But I was referring to right of exit from the organizations. If I declare that I am no longer a subject of the United States of America, then I will be ignored for the most part, taxed as if I were, and then jailed if I refuse. On my own land. Even if I am self sufficient. If I object in more than words, I will be shot and killed by the "police" (thugs is a better word, but I don't want to be that insulting. To thugs.) If I want to have no part of some ridiculous, dangerous boondoggle that my rulers have decided upon, I have no choice. If I want to have weapons, I have to seek their permission. If I want to run a business, I need their license. If I want to drive, I need their license. If I want to BREATHE, I likely commit a crime in their "codified law".

There is no doublespeak here. I do not hold two contradictory beliefs without question. I question everything, and after many MANY years I have come to the inescapable conclusion that government in it's current and historical form is untenable if we are to have a long term future.

Anarchy specifically means "without a king". Society will always be organized. Anarchists are seeking to change it to a more bottom up societal model, rather than top down. WE never said their would be no rules, we said no RULERS. Your side is the one who keeps claiming that we need rulers.

I am saying you are wrong, and I say that all of society EXCEPT government and the few stray criminals they don't suborn disprove you. People do not run amok simply because there's no cop in sight. It's just like the other religious arguments. If you are gonna run amok because there isn't a cop, or no god, or no king, then you are going to run amok when there is too.

And as to MY argument being circular, bullshit. I never once tried to claim that government was any different than any other organized mafia except in their perceived legitimacy. They act by the same means for the same ends, and they always have. The only technical difference I see is that other organized criminals are amateurs by comparison. You don't get half the population defending the exploits of the Crips or the Bloods, but look at the Demopublicans and Republicrats!

I didn't say that you should renounce your citizenship. In my post I was talking about emigration as you can see. How can they actually tax you if you are beyond their reach? Or has the US government already forbidden its citizens to leave the territory of the USA? I heard quite the opposite, that many are trying to get into the USA, either legal or illegal...

Ha.  I was going to say stop feeding the troll, but hopefully people can see through deisik's deception.

You are advocating monopolized theft, murder and slavery.  If someone is going to do any of the three to me, I'd rather it be an individual I'm facing, not an army of a parasitic body.

And nobody needs to worry about defense if A) they have a gun or B) aren't scared of death.

And when the government arrested me for scraping the shake (crumbs) of weed off my car floor and testing it for cannabis, they were doing so to defend me?  Is that what you're saying?  From whom, myself?

Oh, really?

At first you said that those who didn't conform in a given society would likely move as they would find it impossible to interact with those around them. After that you tried to refute my claim that in anarchy we would necessarily come to a system where majority would suppress minority, with a reference to an undisputed right of exit. As I got it, you were referring to those who would be in the minority as they would have a "privilege" of leaving, right?

Doublespeak (as per Wikipedia) is language that deliberately disguises, distorts, or reverses the meaning of words and is used to trick or deceive people. You say about people who don't conform that "they would likely move as they would find it impossible to interact with those around them". In simple words that means that the life of those who disagree with the majority would be made as unbearable and intolerable so that they would have to move somewhere, thereby realizing their "undisputed right of exit". As you may guess, I don't see much difference between such "relocations" and forced evictions...

What is this if not doublespeak?

I'm running out of ideas on how to help you understand this fundamental difference.  If people hate you enough to not want to interact with you, you have no right to force yourself on them.  That's just how society works; you play by the rules or you get shut out.

Here we go again...  ::)

I think that answers my question, though. Thanks for taking the time.

I have already explained everything in one of my earlier posts. Also, you said it yourself that if my beliefs clash with other people's, either they or I must adjust, so there is still no room for voluntary change if that was your point. When you have to adjust to something against your will, this is coercion under any name...

Of course that's voluntary; you don't have to conform if you don't want to, you just gotta figure out how to survive without other people.  Nobody is forcing you to do that.  What do you believe is a voluntary interaction?  And don't tell me there are none; you're participating in one right now.

Look, you seem to be contradicting yourself here. At first you said that "either they or you must adjust". Maybe, now you are going to argue that anything you do against your will, you do voluntarily? I always thought it is called coercion when you have to do something without your own accord. Should I quote the definition of the word you posted earlier or you can take a look yourself?

No; if you want to participate in that society, you must adjust.  If you must understand programming to create a program, are the developers of programming languages coercing you into learning them?

Why should I adjust, or rather, why minority should adjust in the first place? If we have to, then it is not much different from what state actually does. Are you still missing my point?

No, I understand your point: both anarchism and the state are forms of government.  I think we've established this point already.  Can you address the point about the state being involuntary and anarchism being voluntary, please?

I don't quite understand what you mean here by the state being involuntary and anarchism being voluntary. If you point is that the minority would walk away somewhere if they disagree with the majority, I don't think this relocation will be by their free will and on their accord. Actually, they will be coerced to do so by the majority. It happens daily in life even without state and its laws. But exactly the introduction of state in the form of the law allows to break this otherwise circular argument...

You are describing panarchism not anarchism. Also most anarchists are pro law, we imagine a society that has plenty of laws. We just imagine that those laws are provided in a competitive marketplace so that they can improve with time for the same reason that microprocessors get faster every year and cars get better gas mileage every year. So if you dont like the laws that you are presently governed by than you dont have to move away, you just change service providers.

Lets say you're at a friend's party, and you don't like the party but you also don't want to leave.  Are the party-goers now coercing you to leave?

I just paraphrase what others are saying here. But what you say has also been described somewhere earlier in the thread. What if I just don't want to pick up any of the "law providers"? If I don't choose any, would I be outlawed? If not, then it simply doesn't make any sense to choose any "law provider"...

At a friend's party I won't be in my own right by definition, so this example is not worth considering at all in the first place. Whatever answer I may give, I will be either logically wrong (correct answer with false reasoning) or factually wrong (correct logic based on false premises). Choose a better example...

Could I expect you throwing some light on what you meant by the state being involuntary and anarchism being voluntary?

Sure, it goes like this:

The State: "Pay your taxes or we will fine you.  If you refuse to pay your fine we will jail you.  If you refuse to go to jail we will use force against you.  If you continue to resist, we will kill you.

The State-less: "Chip in if you want to."

The State: "Go to your assigned school or we will fine your parents, jail them if they refuse to pay, and kill them if they refuse to go to jail."

The State-less: "School's good, I think I'll go."

The State: "We're going to war with a neighboring country.  If you refuse, we will draft you.  If you refuse to be drafted, you will be jailed.  If you resist arrest, you will be killed."

The State-less: "We're being invaded; we should defend ourselves."

The State: "Homosexual marriage is illegal; if you disobey, you will be fined yadda ya."

The State-less: "I couldn't care less."

The State: "We're going to medicate the public water system.  If the cities resist..."

The State-less: "Only you should decide what goes in your body."

The State: "You don't like your tax money wasted so you can be spied on?  Too bad."

The State-less: "Privacy is a good thing; let's agree to a right of privacy, and certainly agree to never fund agencies to spy on us."

The State: "We can't profit from these plants; illegal, fine, jail, etc"

The State-less: "Weed stinks, please don't smoke it around me."

The State: Ideas so good, you'll be killed if you don't comply.

The State-less: These ideas are good, therefore I'll go along with them.

And lastly:

I never said that state would not be engaging in compulsion and coercion. These "features" are inherent to it, that's what makes such an institution a state. My point, actually, boils down to two things which I expand on in detail below

Firstly, state is just a somewhat embellished form of exploitation and expropriation that one small group of people promotes towards the rest of population. Why that group of people would ultimately have to restrain themselves from looting the population, I had explained in my posts before

Secondly, states evolved naturally from the initial condition very close to what you call here anarchy. Because of the universal character of this phenomenon throughout the world, I find it very dubious that anything like anarchy has even a remote chance of materialization or persistence in reality

You have a point here, but you do realize that there is such a thing as "progress" exhibited by human history? The argument that something can not be, because it hasn't been before is a weak one. I think bitcoiners are more liable than most to understand ;)

Your first point is ludicrous: you're asking an entity with the power of God to constrain themselves.  Chances are, as they always have, they will say, "No, now pay your taxes and stop complaining."

Your second point lacks insight; the state can only exist if the general population is blind enough to believe in it.  Never before in history has information been so readily and easily available, with people having so much more free time; likewise, the number of liberty-minded people is ever increasing and libertarianism is gaining a lot of traction.  The state can only exist so long as it is deemed necessary; as many of man's inventions have become discarded, so will the perceived need for ulterior governance.  Simply because rape has occurred all throughout history doesn't mean it should be an accepted norm.

If you are referring here to human nature, I don't think it can be changed or will change any time soon. Neither do I think that it's worth trying to change it because what we already have by now (in regard to our nature) isn't that bad really. I'd rather go for a step-by-step change of the existing system and evolving it into something else than total demolition or dismatling. And this most likely wouldn't be anarchy as it is drawn here..

History has shown it multiple times that this power is not as almighty as it pretends to be. You either don't history to such a degree that go down to making such dumb assumptions, or think I don't know history to such an extent that would take what you say here seriously...

Though it can very well be that you're just intentionally trying to obfuscate and confuse matters as you did before...

While it may look appealing, what you say here is actually nothing more than pure blah-blah-blah... "Show me the code"
I don't believe neither state nor in the state. It is evil by its nature and its origins. But between the two evils I involuntarily choose state, the other being back to caves and all that shit...

I'm not stating anything about "human nature". Just observing historical facts.

I'm actually also in favor of step-by-step change of the existing system but I suppose in a different way and in a different direction. My vision would be one of alternatives springing up and step-by-step making the old institutions more and more irrelevant until they finally fade into well-deserved historical obscurity :)

Agree with Mike that expecting people who have been given (close to) absolute power with (little to) no control mechanisms or personal responsibility for damage & failure...expecting people in that position to voluntary constrain themselves and become "benevolent protectors" seems very naive to me. And they say that anarchists are a bunch of idealists. How about believing in the Utopia of creating a government, populated with benevolent protectors, which not only try but also achieve the greatest good for the greatest number..? Wow, some crazy shit, right there!

You know, choosing between the evils of the state and "going back to the caves" - are you aware this is your imagination presenting the situation as a false dichotomy? Truth is, neither you, nor me, nor anyone else, no matter how much they might claim they do...we DO NOT know what exactly would happen in the absence of government. Believing it's going to be "back to the caves" says much more about your mind, than about reality or "human nature" or any such thing. But I think we have established quite firmly, that you do believe to know these things, so I don't expect you to concede this point :)

Where are you living really? I don't even need to appeal to actual history and times long gone, though the most evident proofs are there (1649 in England, 1789 in France, 1917 in Russia and again in 1991). Just look around yourself, look at Egypt where the absolute power was overthrown in a matter of few months...

Please stop making value judgments about anyone here

These are extreme cases. I don't know what is beyond state, I can only give you a scale where at one end we have the caves and at the other the state. Anything in between is just a transition from one to the other. I thought it was pretty evident...

I claim no allegiance to any nation-state ;)

Well what you are talking about are revolutions, you know the forceful removal of the current entities in power and their replacement with new ones. With new rhetoric. And sometimes even the mechanics of how you're being ruled over. This has never changed the fundamental underlying fact that there is a centralized structure, with monopoly on legal initiation of force and you have to pay taxes to it or face punishment. The way to remove THAT, seems to be by gradual evolution. Sort of how collectivism and totalitarian tendencies slowly creep into governments bit by bit, just the other way round :) But that requires cultural change, because I posit that government is a consequence of the collective cultural operating system. And let me tell you, we probably won't get much change there if we remain convinced of ideas like "human nature is fixed and can't be changed". Unless people actually choose to be more free as their goal, all of this talk doesn't make any sort of difference.


And here I am trying to tell you the whole time, that MAYBE it's not that conveniently simple and evident.

It was no more than sarcasm...


Oh, now you seem to be backing off... Whatever, but this does prove that you were outright wrong about "people who have been given (close to) absolute power with (little to) no control mechanisms or personal responsibility for damage & failure". In fact, Gaddafi ended very badly...

Unless you provide some substantial evidence, something which is beyond that wanton and non-obliging maybe, I have to stick to the facts which stand as I have described them in my post you answered...

Well, at least you agree with us on the nature of the state.   

Since the state is evil should not alternatives at least be explored?  Are we truly stuck with evil?  Or does the evil wish us to believe that we are stuck with it?

As I see it, the feasible alternative is very simple and clear, but it is not what you, anarchists and those sympathizing you, would probably love to hear. Nowadays, it is much easier and less troublesome to emigrate than it was even 50 years ago. The more national economics will be intertwined in the future as it is happening today, the more transparent national borders will become. So my point consists in making states peacefully compete for their human resources by means of providing better conditions of life for their population...

In fact, this process is already unfolding right now

For those that don't believe anarchy can work, look at what the anarchists achieved up to and during the spanish civil war.


Take a look at what CNT are achieving globally.


And most important - talk with an anarchist...

Anarchy is the true future of mankind.

I think you need to talk to the people who lived 50 years ago and ask them just how easy it was to emigrate compared to today.  My parents and grandparents told me stories where they would almost pay you to emigrate (from England to Australia).  Not the case today.  Today the process is much more arduous.  

No passports 100 years ago either.

Besides I mentioned earlier.  If you are not happy with your security service provider (Govt) why should you have to move hundreds or thousands of miles, give up your job, your local community etc and go into an uncertain situation when you could have a situation where it is as simple as changing your telephone provider or ISP?   It just doesn't make any sense.

You hit the nail on the head. Those unwilling or incapable of looking after themselves will never embrace or even understand Anarchism because they basically see the state as their meal ticket.

To paraphrase Upton Sinclair, it is difficult to get a man to understand something when his survival depends upon his not understanding it. That's why hardcore statists are constantly pushing food stamps, obama phones, and other free goodies. They want you dependent.

How to bring about Anarchism? First, you need to get yourself self sufficient. Once you achieve self sufficiency in the areas of food, shelter, transportation and defence, help others do the same. Share information and ideas, things like Bitcoin for example. If enough people do that, my hope is that the state will gradually and naturally begin to fade away. The main idea is to get people self sufficient and off of food stamps.

But in my experience, the best way to turn around a liberal is to take them to a shooting range. Not only is learning self defence fun, but it plants a seed of doubt in their mind and naturally gets them to question necessity of the state.

That's how I see it being done: winning over hearts and minds, one person at a time.

You talk about particulars whereas I talk about the whole picture. We shouldn't take some single cases, we should look, before all, at the average level. The globalization right now moves masses of people around the globe, just take a look at the number of foreigners in Europe...
 

So this in effect would mean that you couldn't actually go anywhere...

I disagree that the unwilling and incapable see the state as their meal ticket. The majority of nations in the world have no or very limited welfare systems.

On the other hand the majority of nations in the world support the economic elite and keep the divide between rich and poor as large as possible. The "elite" certainly see the state as their meal ticket.

I would hope that hearts and minds would work but as long as anarchists are branded as mask wearing extremists trying to undermine "the system" then one person in a life time might be a realistic goal.

If you want anarchy, take away the rich nations', tv, newspaper, internet once you've removed the media you´ll remove apathy and the poor will wake up to how shit their lives really are and start doing something about it.

There is also the problem that WE anarchists have a tendency to distance ourselves with the political process as it serves a system that we don't agree with. A few more of us need to exploit the system and participate in what THEY call democracy and try to instigate change from within.


 

I talk about what already works now if you are not happy with the state you happen to live in. You, instead, are trying to sell a pig in a poke, something which is simply not here today and probably will never be. No one urges you to go into an uncertain situation or whatever. Such things are usually very well prepared for before taking the actual step. And nowadays it is much easier to do, provided you are actually into it...

Though I didn't expect that you would like this alternative, which was pretty clear right from the start

The point is that you and I should not support the use of force to compel people to have just one government in an area.  It's as immoral for governments to claim a monopoly in an area over defense and law and order as it is for the mafia to have territory and force everyone within it to pay protection money.

When your neighbor says he wants to secede, you shouldn't be among the ones opposing him.  Nor should you reply by saying it is impractical.  He has that right, and it should be respected.  Nor should you reply by telling him he'll have to move.  That's just wrong - he and everybody else should have the right to secede, collaborate together to form new governments (rights-protecting institutions), or whatever they want, as long as they are not violating anyone else's rights.


The problem with your alternative is that it's immoral to make that the only choice.

I didn't get the emboldened part. Please explain

Also, I don't think we can apply ethical categories (such as being moral or immoral) to governments or states. It is proper as well as better, in my opinion, to rather judge them on the effectiveness and expedience scales. Mafia which has territory and can force everyone within it to pay protection money is called, yes, state...

Another point that I don't quite understand. You seem to erroneously assign me as the true culprit here whereas, actually, it was exactly my alternative of moving to another country in the first place that was torn to pieces and thrown out of the window. May I hope for a bit of objectivity here? Is it immoral too or what?

Ethics, i.e. moral philosophy, is a rather big subject; there are many concepts within it, but if you don't understand it naturally, you'd probably respond better to an argument of practicality, as ErisDiscordia pointed out (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=361628.msg3888193#msg3888193).

Anyway see here (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_rule) if you're interested; Walter's pointing out that, if you do not want someone else to force their political philosophy onto you, you shouldn't do the same; to do to others what you would not want to happen to you is immoral, for it is inconsistent and requires one group of people (even if it's just you) to have special rights over another, i.e. the state in microscopic view.

That part about not supporting the use of force I understood pretty well (and likely would agree to it). I didn't get what had been meant by (not) compelling people to have just one government in an area. They usually already have just one government in the area, why then should we compel them to in the first place? What did I get wrong here?

Regarding my answer to an argument of practicality vs morality, I think I have already given an answer in one of my previous posts.  In my opinion, we shouldn't apply ethics framework to governments or states, that is, we shouldn't measure them by moral standards, but rather stick to effectiveness or expedience criteria...

Moving is not immoral, but when people want to secede, telling them they shouldn't be allowed that option because moving is good enough is wrong.

Though this may look very true, I wouldn't take this logic as definitive. Actually, there are many other ways you can instill your political views or philosophies onto your opponent (this thread can be a good example of this), even without sticking to force, if this was your point...

without moral standards you have no criteria by which to judge what is and is not effective. should a government protect people from harm? if so than arnt you making the claim that people shouldnt be harmed? if so than why shouldnt people be harmed?

I would like to allow an arbitrary number of governments in my area, but this is illegal.  If anyone attempts it, they will face coercion (government force).  As someone else mentioned, this should be just as legal as picking a competing ISP.

That's what I mean by compelling people to just have one government.  If they try to start another, they will be forcibly put down as a "rebellion."  And 99% of the population seems to think that this is good and ethical.  But clearly this is the exact opposite of freedom.

Okay, what metric shall we use for effectiveness?  I would say we should use freedom/liberty as our metric.  That again gives us anarchy, succeeding at 100%.

The selection of the metric that you're going to use to measure "effectiveness" is going to be, inherently, a moral issue.

But I was just proposing an alternative for making people's life better without first dismantling state. Where did you get this as being the only choice if it was an alternative to another choice? It was exactly me who was deprived of this alternative in the first place as being non-existent. And now you say it is immoral. What is immoral actually?

It's not necessarily about dismantling the state.

The state, as it currently exists, provides certain services, principally protection.  All we are saying is that for all of those services, people should be able to either continue to use the state or use other services that people provide in the market and not have to pay the state.   That then allows people like yourself who want the state to continue to pay for it, and people like me who don't want the state to use other services instead.  

The equivalent is going from a telephone monopoly which existed in most countries initially, to the current situation where you have a choice of providers.   People who want to continue to use the initial government telephone service can continue to do so.

Protection is just another service offered by the market.  There is no reason it should be a monopoly any more than money should be a monopoly within any given territory.

One thing I woiuld propose is instead of having general taxes, they should be individually itemised.  You are paying a certain amount for the police service, a certain amount for water etc.  Then people can choose which taxes they want to pay.  Which services they want.  And competitors should be allowed to offer alternatives.   Of course, were this to happen, government services would have to improve markedly to compete.  Unlike the current situation where they have a monopoly and don't really have to worry about their customers all that much.

Now I see your point. Just couldn't imagine that people would ever want more than one government (as you confirm yourself). Though it's still beyond my understanding how there could possibly be more than one government at the same time in the same area. If this is not what you actually mean here, aren't elections what would go for "picking a competing ISP"?

On the whole, I agree with your idea, something along these lines has likely already been taking place. But there are functions which simply can't be privatized or demonopolized, since duplicating some public institutions would be equal to creating another state inside or alongside the original one (that's what mafias are permanently trying to do). I think that would wreak havoc as it happens when organized crime is able to snatch some power from the state. In short, power demonopolized is no longer power, so what you say in essence amounts to abolishing the state...

Please could you give more cogent reasons why you think that without moral standards we can't assess the efficiency or performance of the state?

People shouldn't be harmed not because it is immoral to harm them (I talk on behalf of the state here), but because this could render state less efficient in terms of some objective metrics. In short, the powers that be are interested that the governed wouldn't be harmed. It just happens that these things coincide here (though not accidentally) and this coincidence is often used to say that at least some moral principles are not alien to state. This is false

Actually, there are many objective metrics to measure the efficiency of the state existing nowadays for this very purpose. Economic growth as one of the most evident and encompassing example of such a metric. Also, how are you going to define freedom/liberty in more or less objective terms and would it be a moral issue then?

I don't think so. And if, nevertheless, you are going to insist on this, please provide some convincing evidence for your assertion or give strong reasons why measuring the "effectiveness" should necessarily be a moral issue...

I keep misreading the topic as "How long would it take for Anchovy to start working?"

That's an easy one, the little blighters are lazy - they never work

Yes, exactly.  I fully support the people around me continuing to keep their existing government if they choose, so long as that institution stops compelling everybody in this territory to be its citizens/subjects.  They can keep their flag, national anthem, Congress, courts, Presidents, etc.  They can keep their schools.  They can even keep their wars.  What they can't do, morally, in my opinion, is force everybody to belong to their "jurisdiction" simply because they live here.  Other people within this region should be able to belong to other organizations with different courts, Presidents, etc., or even none at all and arranged differently (perhaps they want a king, as an example).

All they have to do is just respect each other's rights to life, liberty, and property.  Imagine if the Republican and Democratic parties were each governments.  Each citizen picks whichever one they want.  If you commit a crime against another citizen of your party, your party handles it in the way they deem appropriate.  If they commit a crime against a citizen of the other party, it'd be handled by collaboration between governments: extradition, etc.  So, if you are Republican and murder a Democrat and the whole world witnessed it on television, the Republicans probably hand you over to the Democrats to face justice.  But if you are Democrat and have an abortion, the Democrats don't hand you over to the Republicans, because while the Republicans have outlawed abortion, the Democrats have not.

Now generalize it: instead of two parties/governments, allow any arbitrary number of them.  Allow people to create new ones as they see fit.


No, in elections (as we know them), you are picking the government that other people will be subject to.  What we want is for each person to be allowed to pick their own government.  Example: when George W. Bush won in 2000, it was immoral to force everybody to be subject to his government; people should've been allowed to be under a competing system run by Gore instead, if that's what they really wanted.  (Personally I'd pick neither.)

Part of the whole point here is that power, as we know it, is wrong!

You should have the power to defend your rights to life, liberty, and property.

You shouldn't have the power to compel people to go along with your ideas.  So, for example, you think everybody should abstain from alcohol.  Great - persuade people instead of outlawing it, because nobody should have the power to outlaw it.  It shouldn't be a matter of voting on who gets that power over everybody, because nobody should have it.

It's no good merely taking turns at tyranny.  Tyranny has to be eliminated.

The problem is this: if you decide to use economic growth as a metric, then you are setting up economic growth as being valued more highly than other factors.  Say some people would want equality over economic growth.  Either way, this is a moral decision.

The basic principle is this: the ends (your metrics) don't justify the means.  So some system might result in more economic growth, but that doesn't mean it's right to force it on people - maybe they value something else more highly than that economic growth.  Or some system might result in better equality, but it would be wrong to force it on you or others who believe economic growth should be paramount (just an example).  Or maybe reducing traffic deaths is the number one goal, or childhood obesity.

When you justify using force to force people to be part of your system, you are justifying tyranny.  Even if your system is measurably great in some way, or many ways.  The ends (greatness in economic growth or some other measure) do not justify the means (infringing the right of other people to their life, liberty, and/or property).

How is that different from what we have right now on an international level with the difference being only that your parties/governments (i.e. states) are distributed across the globe? But in today's world, where you can fly from any inhabited area to any other within several hours, even this limitation is actually losing its significance...

As I said above, the system you promote is already here. Though it may look very different from what you likely dream about, but the staples are present there. And even if you prefer to remain neutral you can secede and fly to Antarctica which has no government and is considered politically neutral...

Otto von Bismarck once said that "Die Politik ist die Lehre vom Möglichen", which can be translated as "politics is the science of achieving the possible". It may be better to persuade people to abstain from alcohol instead of just outlawing it (in fact, I have no doubts that what you say is true), but it would require so many resources (human, financial or whatever) that it would actually be more damaging in other parts than useful in just one. So outright outlawing alcohol may actually turn out to be the best option available, taking into account all possible consequences and effects...

Your appeal only makes sense when it is directed to a human being for whom there exists a moral scale (i.e. by which he can tell that some decisions are more moral than others). But it would not be my decision to set up economic growth before equality. State would be interested in equality as long as it has some influence on economic growth if it decides to prioritize that metric...

You just can't draw out a morally justified decision from an entity which doesn't have morality inherent to it

It is our moral judgment that we erroneously extend on state which is beyond morality. You just can't attach your idea of means not justifying ends to state, whether you like it or not. It would be equal to saying that it is immoral when one animal kills another. Such judgments are simply inapplicable here...

My basic argument is that there is no way you can justify infringing on someone else's rights to life, liberty, and property.  So yes, I can say that no ends justify those means.

I and all my fellow subjects should be able to secede without having to leave.

Isn't that you imposing your morality on other people?  For example I am opposed to animal cruelty.  Is it your argument that people who are cruel to animals that they own should not be prosecuted?  What gives you the right to dictate that?

If a homophobe claims gays should not marry, but the gays say "We should be able to marry, to tell us we can't marry is immoral", are the gays now imposing their morality on the homophobe?

Anyway to answer your question: you begin by claiming the other person has no morality.  You then assert your own morality as the only morality in existence.  You can then easily dictate what is and is not moral. ::)

You say that state is evil and should be liquidated, you probably think that this would be moral and justified. If state hurts you somehow (even through taxes which you deem excessive or not justified at all) or somebody else for that matter, you would obviously pretend that this is immoral... How come?

Actually, I'm not justifying anything just as I don't try to justify predator hunting some prey. It simply doesn't make sense (beast cannot be held guilty in the first place)

Correct.  That's how civilization works.  A minority agitates for a moral cause; they convince enough people to have the law changed and society advances.  For example, that's why we don't have slaves.  In a free market slavery would still exist.

Its also how we reduced things like female genital mutilation and animal cruelty. 

So yes - I am all for imposing morality. 

Telling you to keep your hands off of that which isn't yours and not to harm others is an imposition of morality to you?

Well that says it all. You're one of those people who feel entitled to impose your will upon and take what you'd wish from others by force.

I am opposed to animal cruelty.  I don't care who owns the beast being mistreated and I don't care that no humans are harmed - I want the abusers arrested and prosecuted.   

Under these circumstances, telling me that I should "keep your hands off of that which isn't yours" is imposing your morality on me. 

Once upon a time, wars were fought because of the idea, that there simply can not be more than one religion in one area  :)

Isn't believe that there is exist or should exist private property a moral one? Someone could believe that everything belongs to everyone and as such it would be immoral to keep others from it.

What is the advantage of having a few governments beside having no government at all (the only true Anarchy)? And wouldn't this advantage (provided there is one) work even further toward just one government?

It's not about having a few governments.  It's saying people like you can have rulers if that's what you want.

The rest of us say that we want competing service providers to provide those services that the government currently claims a monopoly over, because we don't want rulers.

I probably wasn't clear in my posts, but that boiled down is what I mean.

You can pay for these people and all their cronyism and overseas trips and bailing out their friends etc etc since you are eager to have rulers.  And that's fine.  Me?   I'll pass.

You can choose to be a slave if you wish in a free society.

Well no, you won't.
Cronyism, overseas trips, bailouts -- this stuff is replicated as soon as it's torn down.
Case in point:  Ukyo, of WeExchange fame, is flown to Cyprus and bailed out by his crony Danny, the CEO of Neo & Bee.
One sentence covers all the events you dislike so much.

I am in for the only true Anarchy. Actually, any stateless society pretending to be an anarchy but forbidding implicitly or explicitly the true Anarchy would be nothing more than a fake, a state in disguise...

No - it's just me insisting other people should not impose their morality on me or on anyone else.  That's all.


By all means prosecute them.  I support their right to defend themselves from you.

The alternative is you imposing your morality.  Since you're okay with that, you should have no objection to other people "imposing their morality" by telling you to butt out.  In your view, they are just as justified as you and you have no way to justify imposing yourself.  In their view, you are clearly in the wrong, and you still have no way to justify imposing yourself.

Very good insight.

(I would even go so far as to say that government is a religion.  It expects a lot of blind faith.  I simply don't share the beliefs others have in the efficacy of government (as we know it) and want them to stop imposing their religion (state) on me, even though they think it's just "culture" or whatever.)

Either people have more rights to their property than you do, or everybody has a claim to their property and a say in how it is to be used.

If everybody has a claim to property, then nobody has more claim than the owner, and thus no justification for overriding the owner's beliefs about how the property should be used.

If anybody has a right to control property, it's the person who has gone through the process of acquiring ownership.  Otherwise, nobody has that right.

Neither possibility justifies the state.

Ah - true Scotsman anarchy!

Yes of course it is a religion! Why do you think the Communists were so violently anti-religion? They, like all monotheistic religions, simply can't stand competition by definition.

The Cosmic Grandfather of Christianity has been replaced by the Big Brother of the government. A deity much more fitting for the materialistic age, it seems much more "real" and tangible, even to the point that people forget it is a myth. Big Brother is an even more vicious deity than the Cosmic Grandfather, because where the latter would threaten you with eternal damnation after death and demanded about one tenth of your income, Big Brother routinely takes over half of your income and makes your life living hell while you're still on earth! Of course, the omnipotence and benevolence of both of them has to be taken on faith alone, as has to be the claim, that without them, life, creation, order and all that is good, could simply not exist. To deny this is blasphemy and courts punishment from above and ostracism from all around. Better be careful! You might get burned at the stake, or thrown behind bars for not having the right morals.

They don't have a right to defend themselves.  Rights are legal creations and no-one has created a right to abuse animals.

Someone could be wrong.  Rights are legal creations that reflect the moral judgement of society.  If a society deems animal abuse or female genital mutilation wrong, there is no point talking about "rights" to private property or to family privacy.  The behaviour society deems unacceptable will be punished.

Walter, I must keep my eye on you. You may be of help, later.

My belief is that we  must make anarchy, by making government services not as convenient as private services. In same way that file sharing made music and movie services more convenient than government-sanctioned legal services, despite file sharing being illegal. We need tools to replace government, and must make them work in a way that makes them impossible to destroy by governments (make them decentralized like bitcoin), and make it easy for people to use anonymously. In short, the only way to compete with government monopoly and make it go away is to create powerful tools that make the gray market much easier for businesses and people to work in.

Have you a concrete idea how what private services you would use to prevent animal cruelty?

If you have to ask this, you're not getting the point of "personal responsibility". YOU are the private service that prevents animal cruelty. Any questions?

So you would like the enforcement of animal cruelty rules handled by a vigilante service?

The problem with vigilante services is that they often result in people being killed under dubious circumstances.  We had a man beaten to death for paedophilia here in the UK recently who it turned out was just unpopular with his neighbours. 

Your idea would mean that if I think someone is being cruel to an animal, I get a weapon, force entry to his home and then make a decision as to what punishment is appropriate.  Since I would have him at the end of a gun, you can see the potential for problems.

I can't see that as being more convenient than calling the police.

If we take such a position as a starting point, couldn't we come to what we already have there, i.e. state? I mean that we delegate some functions to someone or to some entity, and thus we are laying a basis for building a hierarchy here. Isn't it what state is all about and could there be such functions which are best served when they are at the top of the hierarchy ("the only true provider")?

This is of extreme importance to understand.  Point being, the law makes no difference; if you have a principle against animal cruelty, you are not cruel to animals.  If you do not have this principle, you don't care.  Either way, there have been laws against animal cruelty for a long time now, and the animals are still treated cruelly.  The fact that PETA exists at all is enough evidence that the law is meaningless; nothing can replace knowledge and empathy, which is the only way animal cruelty can ever be resolved.  If the state is the sole, or among, the solutions to animal cruelty...what are they waiting for?

Hawker doesn't want to prevent animal cruelty, he wants to harm the people who are cruel to animals; little does he know, this is the societal behavior that contributes to producing the people who are cruel to animals in the first place.  It's a horrendously vicious cycle that can only be brought to an end with knowledge and, for our less-empathetic friends, abstinence from the use of violence.

Orders prohibiting people owning animals prevent those people abusing further animals.  The system isn't perfect but its a lot better than nothing. 

Your fundamental problem is that as long as you are ok, you don't care what happens on someone else's property.  That's fine.  Just be aware that you do not have to right to impose your rules on other people.  If we vote to prevent an abuser from owning animals, then that person has no right to own animals.

Professionals with black clothing and silenced weapons, I hope...

There are private charities that check on animals and secretly confiscate ones that they see are abused, providing them with sanctuary, rehabilitation, and new homes. They publicly document their animal's abused state online to show everyone that animals they take were abused, and they had right to save them. When old owners try to sue them, they show pictures to public and to court to prove they are right to save these animals, and win cases every time. I know of one that does this for livestock, and one that does this with ferrets. This could be done with private courts, too. This needs no law, this only needs people's popular opinion. Opinions change, and ethics evolve. I hope they will continue to evolve for better.


We have people all over the world jailed for paedophilia, who are just some people the neighbors or police did not like. So what is different?

Or you teach them empathy by explaining how it is wrong to induce pain on another living being, for it is your being.

So your ideal society is one in which people get killed by "Professionals with black clothing and silenced weapons" hired by anyone who thinks they are cruel to animals.

And you think killing someone is no different from a jail sentence.

A lot of anarchists come across as morally confused.  They talk about freedom but want to impose their own views on other people in a totally undemocratic way.  Your idea of being able to have people killed without trial if they are suspected of being cruel to animals is an extremely good example of this moral confusion.

I'm almost ashamed to do this, because it is such an obvious retort:


The nature of the job remains: forcing your moral standards on other people with violence. I find it hypocritical enough to force someone into your moral standard, not even doing it yourself, but delegating others to do it for you just brings it to the next level.

Note: I am not judging whether animal cruelty or any other such thing is OK with me or not, that is besides my point here. My point is (as it always has been in this thread) to get people to take personal responsibility for their beliefs and values. A tall order in a culture where it's standard to just adopt standards from figures and institutions of authority. We are a sad, sad culture of people, who would trust the word of "experts" more than their own judgement :(

That is a logic error.  All forms of society, including anarchy, involve forcing your moral standards onto other people.  I am opposed to female genital mutilation and I am happy with the present system where people who do that to a girl are named and shamed in court proceedings and their children can be taken into care.  Anarchists say that female genital mutilation is a personal moral choice of the parents and that they should be left get on with it.  So no matter what you do, you are imposing your moral choices on other people.

Once you accept that logic, you have a decision to make.  Do you want everyone to face the risk of mob law?  That often misfires.  For example, in Wales, a paediatrician was driven out of her home because the locals thought paediatrician is a synonym for paedophile.  Or do you want a system of courts whose approval is required for any violent acts and a system of police who are trained to use violence in a minimal way.

Given that choice, any sensible person will choose to have police.  Its not hypocrisy - its a sensible way to deal with a real problem.

No, that's not human nature that is hierarchical (patriarchical). This is the nature of the citizen, but a citizen is not a human. A citizen is a collectivist. A human lived in a stateless non-patriarchal community, for several hundred thousand years. The last 10'000 years only were the epoche of the citizen, the hierarchist, the collectivist, the idiot.

I always thought that collectivism was another word for social nature of humans, individualism being the opposite. If the ancient man hadn't been a collectivist, he would soon have been eaten by predators. I think it is exactly due to collectivism in the first place that we managed to survive as a specie during those wild times...

Before the humans were collectivized, they lived in self-sufficient, egalitarian communities within Dunbar's Numbers.
Collectivism (state/nation/church) is the perversion of these natural collectivs/communities.

Paleolithic communities were egalitarian; there was no hierarchy (which is translated as „holy reign“), no domination, no rulers, no chiefs and no warfare violence, as archeology revealed and social science explains.
http://gerhardbott.de/das-buch/summary-in-english.html