Has Bitcoin changed your political position

[Mike Christ]

i really do think the anarchists around here are actually people who want to live in utopian societies, but they use "anarchy" instead because that sounds more achievable.

I disagree; consider the goal of anarchism:

Anarchism is a political philosophy that advocates stateless societies based on non-hierarchical free associations.

It's a clearly defined method of governance based around as much freedom as can be possible; as said, it can only work with secular rationalism, but it's a realistic goal.  Utopian implies a society which is unobtainable, which is also perfect; this cannot be, since people are not perfect and so we can never expect for there to be a utopia; in my opinion, utopia is synonymous with dystopia, and the only way to achieve either is through very extreme methods, none of which I want to try, i.e. Marxism.  I really do encourage you to read about it and make an informed conclusion on it.  There will still be crime and war with anarchism, just a lot less; I don't believe this to be utopian, but it's certainly an improvement, I think.

how is that goal NOT idealism? what we all want is a free society that is not dominated by the powerful and rich.. but realistically, i don't think i can remember a point in history when this has been true. i would like the ideals of anarchism, but it's just not going to happen, especially with 7 billion people on the planet.

It would be idealism, if not for the (albeit very few) examples of anarchism occurring in reality; the best defense I have for the concept is this occurrence of Spanish anarchism.

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[Rassah]

Anarchism is for children and naive people... I don't believe in anarchism but I believe in communities. I believe in people working together towards a common goal.
The Amish society is a good example.

Yes, anarchists believe in communities and working together towards a common goal; what do you not like about it?

in an anarchy, there'd be communities of people working together for the common good. but then there'd be nothing to prevent communities of people working together for personal gain and power. i know someone will say "but what's the difference between that and the society we live in." imo, it's similar but if we are living in an anarchy, there will be nonstop wars and power struggles all over the world.

Don't forget, wars are extremely expensive, completely unprofitable, and require those waging war to be able to steal money to support said war. On the other hand, resistance (such as guerila warfare) is typically voluntary, is cheap, and is driven more by ideology and wish to preserve one's way of life, which has a higher incentive than war does. That's why USA is spending billions in Afghanistan, and getting nowhere.
If we had some sort of a financial system that allowed people to hold their wealth in private and in secret, maybe even having it password protected so that those in power who wage war can't seize it either as a tax or as a spoil of war, then wars likely won't happen often, if at all. Sure, there will be squables over land or territory, but even those are typically way more expensive than diplomacy and business negotiations.

[Rassah]

i really do think the anarchists around here are actually people who want to live in utopian societies, but they use "anarchy" instead because that sounds more achievable.

in terms of decentralizing government, i think that is a utopian idealogy. maybe i'm a little bit cynical, but there's just no fucking way it's happening. there are 7 billion people in the world, of which many are smart and "hungry" for wealth and power. there is no way we are going to get them to play fair. and the thing is, the way to climb to the top, is to manipulate the blind and ignorant... which is what present day republicans are doing with their white conservative base, and what democrats are doing with their "i'm poor, give me free stuff" base.

It won't be "utopian" in the least. There will still be social and economic conflicts, still be poor and hungry people, still be issues with crime, and still many of the same problems we have today. The biggest difference is that everyone will have to be responsible for themselves, and everyone will have a much wider choice of things to be responsible with, since services typically provided by government will likely be different when provided privately, and you'll have more options to choose from. There will also be way less waste of resources, since organizations that are not efficient will be forced to shut down, instead of continued to be supported with tax dollars "for the greater good," and change and new developments will be much more rapid due to fewer restrictions.

As for those people in power, combine the anonymity of bitcoin with assassination markets, where the more someone hurts people, the higher the bounty on their head grows (funded by completely anonymous donors), and you'll see people like that learn to behave very quickly.

Finally, it doesn't have to be a global thing that applies to all 7 billion people. We can still have countries "ruled" by anarchy alongside countries like North Korea. The difference will be that North Korea type countries will be rapidly falling appart, while the anarchy countries will be the richest and best defended (privately, and efficiently) in the world.

[Walter Rothbard]

If we had some sort of a financial system that allowed people to hold their wealth in private and in secret, maybe even having it password protected so that those in power who wage war can't seize it either as a tax or as a spoil of war, then wars likely won't happen often, if at all.

Best reason ever for buying a Bitcoin.

[ErisDiscordia]

Here's a thought concerning the concepts of "utopia" and "idealism":

Anarchy often gets dismissed as being an "idealistic utopia", usually followed by the espousal of the speakers opinion on human nature (usually crooked) and how it has no chance of working out, "because humans are xy".

Yet many people criticizing anarchy in this way hold the firm belief, that it is possible to create a central government, which will be benevolent in its actions, populated by people of good-will, working towards the greatest good for the greatest number, while resisting the temptation to abuse their positions of power and/or steal from the big pile of resources the government has accumulated...EVEN THOUGH all this has been tried countless times in many forms all around the world and it has failed over and over again.

Now if that's not belief in an idealistic utopia, I don't know what is.

[beetcoin]

obviously i'm not one of those people who think centralized government works. we are doomed either way, and no anarchy is going to save us.

[hawkeye]

Here's a thought concerning the concepts of "utopia" and "idealism":

Anarchy often gets dismissed as being an "idealistic utopia", usually followed by the espousal of the speakers opinion on human nature (usually crooked) and how it has no chance of working out, "because humans are xy".

Yet many people criticizing anarchy in this way hold the firm belief, that it is possible to create a central government, which will be benevolent in its actions, populated by people of good-will, working towards the greatest good for the greatest number, while resisting the temptation to abuse their positions of power and/or steal from the big pile of resources the government has accumulated...EVEN THOUGH all this has been tried countless times in many forms all around the world and it has failed over and over again.

Now if that's not belief in an idealistic utopia, I don't know what is.

You beat me to it.   People who believe in governments seem to believe that they are the way to a utopian system.   And they continue to beg and plead with the government and keep hoping that "we just need someone good to get in".

[hawkeye]

Many people are scared by the name anarchy I think.  They don't realise that much of their lives are already anarchic. 

[Mike Christ]

Many people are scared by the name anarchy I think.  They don't realise that much of their lives are already anarchic. 

Decentralized governance sounds safer

[Mageant]

Many people are scared by the name anarchy I think.  They don't realise that much of their lives are already anarchic.  

Decentralized governance sounds safer

I prefer the name Voluntaryism.
This also more positively defines the goal. Namely that all interactions should be voluntary.

The name "anarchism" only defines what it should be not (no ruling hierarchy).

[snakebit]

Many people are scared by the name anarchy I think.  They don't realise that much of their lives are already anarchic.  

What alot of people don't understand is: Chaos ≠ Anarchy. Real Anarchy would be infinitely better than this shit storm of a mess.

[Mike Christ]

Many people are scared by the name anarchy I think.  They don't realise that much of their lives are already anarchic.  

Decentralized governance sounds safer

I prefer the name Voluntaryism.
This also more positively defines the goal. Namely that all interactions should be voluntary.

The name "anarchism" only defines what it should be not (no ruling hierarchy).

I like that one; let's roll with voluntaryism

[Rassah]

So... VoluntoCapitalism? Or VolunterioCapitalism? 

[hawkeye]

Maybe we should get a professional marketing company onto it 

[beetcoin]

the thing is, if you want a "real" anarchist society, you'd need a central government or force to ensure that nobody gains too much power and influence on society.. which kind of defeats the purpose, doesn't it?

[niothor]

Well , in the last 23 years we changed the ruling party with every election and just got in deeper....
There are countries in this world were you can't change your political position , because it's only one.

For instance , the ruling alliance here is made out of:
 1) social democrats
 2) liberals
 3) conservators
 4) union for progress

So , skipping the fact that i don't get how you can rule with both 3 and 4 views , quite the mess isn't it?

[Mike Christ]

the thing is, if you want a "real" anarchist society, you'd need a central government or force to ensure that nobody gains too much power and influence on society.. which kind of defeats the purpose, doesn't it?

So you're saying, the only way to have a society without coercion...is to be coercive?  You're going in circles here; you're recreating what we already have.  Any reason in particular why people can't simply reject coercion?

[freedomno1]

From Skeptical Keynesian
To Anti Keynesian
Not sure where that goes in politics anti-neoliberalism to transitional socialism ?

[ErisDiscordia]

Many people are scared by the name anarchy I think.  They don't realise that much of their lives are already anarchic.  

What alot of people don't understand is: Chaos ≠ Anarchy. Real Anarchy would be infinitely better than this shit storm of a mess.

Oh yes, that's a big deal. Our cultural operating system has connected Anarchy to Chaos by simple association, by saying it over and over again. Kind of like "freedom and democracy" is a widely used phrase. So let me point out, that if it is "Anarchy AND Chaos" and "Freedom AND Democracy" this logically means that anarchy is NOT chaos and freedom is NOT democracy. Otherwise the words in the sentences would be redundant

The whole discussion surrounding anarchy is always so weird. People saying we can't live without rules and then claiming in Anarchy there would be chaos. Even though they themselves are living proof that people are absolutely obsessed with creating rules. Of course there would be rules in Anarchy. There would just be a lack of an universal set of rules, applicable to everybody (except those with the means to bribe the system) and enforceable by a central authority with the legal monopoly on the initiation of force. That's all. Oh an maybe, just maybe, having 100s of different kinds of something is preferable to having only one of it. You know, like, central point of failure kind of thingy. And a little something called "diversity" - I just had this incredible thought, that maybe not everyone is exactly alike. 

[Mike Christ]

Oh yes, that's a big deal. Our cultural operating system has connected Anarchy to Chaos by simple association, by saying it over and over again. Kind of like "freedom and democracy" is a widely used phrase. So let me point out, that if it is "Anarchy AND Chaos" and "Freedom AND Democracy" this logically means that anarchy is NOT chaos and freedom is NOT democracy. Otherwise the words in the sentences would be redundant

The whole discussion surrounding anarchy is always so weird. People saying we can't live without rules and then claiming in Anarchy there would be chaos. Even though they themselves are living proof that people are absolutely obsessed with creating rules. Of course there would be rules in Anarchy. There would just be a lack of an universal set of rules, applicable to everybody (except those with the means to bribe the system) and enforceable by a central authority with the legal monopoly on the initiation of force. That's all. Oh an maybe, just maybe, having 100s of different kinds of something is preferable to having only one of it. You know, like, central point of failure kind of thingy. And a little something called "diversity" - I just had this incredible thought, that maybe not everyone is exactly alike. 

We fear most what we misunderstand