Feeling comfortable with the word "anarchist".

[deisik]

As far as anarchy goes, though, I do see a new form of order coming from it in the sense of people being held accountable. I think that's what people think of when they say there should be rules, because if someone does something wrong, they must be held accountable somehow. The way I imagine anarchy would be a society that creates a form of accountability and order without the need of what we know as a government, which we know is a group of people who are placed in some moral echelon above everybody else (legal monopoly over force, etc, etc).

It may look very appealing indeed at first sight, but there're still a lot of hard questions, especially the questions regarding who will keep people accountable for their alleged wrongdoings ("they must be held accountable somehow"), who will in practice set the rules ("they say there should be rules") and so forth and so on... You will always end up facing the necessity of giving priviliges/power to one group of people before/over another. This will not be anarchy, anarchy in its true form means "each for himself and devil take the hindmost", which is self-destructive and thus not viable in any human society...

[1714906551]

1714906551

[Mike Christ]

As far as anarchy goes, though, I do see a new form of order coming from it in the sense of people being held accountable. I think that's what people think of when they say there should be rules, because if someone does something wrong, they must be held accountable somehow. The way I imagine anarchy would be a society that creates a form of accountability and order without the need of what we know as a government, which we know is a group of people who are placed in some moral echelon above everybody else (legal monopoly over force, etc, etc).

It may look very appealing indeed at first sight, but there're still a lot of hard questions, especially the questions regarding who will keep people accountable for their alleged wrongdoings ("they must be held accountable somehow"), who will in practice set the rules ("they say there should be rules") and so forth and so on... You will always end up facing the necessity of giving priviliges/power to one group of people before/over another. This will not be anarchy, anarchy in its true form means "each for himself and devil take the hindmost", which is self-destructive and thus not viable in any human society...

False; the entire point of anarchism is to completely decentralize lawmakers.  You, and the people you're participating life with, lay down the laws you agree upon, usually involving "don't kill, don't steal, don't rape" et al following the non-aggression principle, and if someone steps out of line, they are punished by the people who have agreed to instill those same punishments upon themselves if they were to break these laws.  Anarchism is clearly defined: non-hierarchical relationships in government and business.  At any point in time that you present a scenario within anarchism that requires a ruling class and a ruled class, follow these steps:

1. Stop
2. Take a breath
3. Discard the idea

It will save you and I a lot of time.

[Akka]

As far as anarchy goes, though, I do see a new form of order coming from it in the sense of people being held accountable. I think that's what people think of when they say there should be rules, because if someone does something wrong, they must be held accountable somehow. The way I imagine anarchy would be a society that creates a form of accountability and order without the need of what we know as a government, which we know is a group of people who are placed in some moral echelon above everybody else (legal monopoly over force, etc, etc).

It may look very appealing indeed at first sight, but there're still a lot of hard questions, especially the questions regarding who will keep people accountable for their alleged wrongdoings ("they must be held accountable somehow"), who will in practice set the rules ("they say there should be rules") and so forth and so on... You will always end up facing the necessity of giving priviliges/power to one group of people before/over another. This will not be anarchy, anarchy in its true form means "each for himself and devil take the hindmost", which is self-destructive and thus not viable in any human society...

I disagree, the very fact that we have a society proofs that groups humans are indeed capable of organizing them self and build structures that enable a society.

Let's go with an extreme example. Say upon tomorrow the state would cancel all laws on murder and from there on killing someone would go completely unpunished. Would we have chaos and random slaughter on the streets?

No, (at least not for long). The solution is simple. People don't want to be killed, so very quickly kinds of retaliation bonds would form. "If someone of us gets killed we strike back".
Soon they would realize that when someone of one ring acts out on someone of another ring they would be stuck in a vicious circle. So rings agree to punish only the first responsible person.

At next there would be rings that offer investigative services (for ease we call the police  ) if a member is accused and the decision of a tribunal of members of the involved rings (lets call them court ). Soon we end up in a system that's not very different from ours today, but people can choose from different sets of protection and judgement or don't have it at all if they choose so.

Basically this works for most crime scenarios and there is no ruling class necessary for it to work.

[lumierre]

As far as anarchy goes, though, I do see a new form of order coming from it in the sense of people being held accountable. I think that's what people think of when they say there should be rules, because if someone does something wrong, they must be held accountable somehow. The way I imagine anarchy would be a society that creates a form of accountability and order without the need of what we know as a government, which we know is a group of people who are placed in some moral echelon above everybody else (legal monopoly over force, etc, etc).

It may look very appealing indeed at first sight, but there're still a lot of hard questions, especially the questions regarding who will keep people accountable for their alleged wrongdoings ("they must be held accountable somehow"), who will in practice set the rules ("they say there should be rules") and so forth and so on... You will always end up facing the necessity of giving priviliges/power to one group of people before/over another. This will not be anarchy, anarchy in its true form means "each for himself and devil take the hindmost", which is self-destructive and thus not viable in any human society...

I disagree, the very fact that we have a society proofs that groups humans are indeed capable of organizing them self and build structures that enable a society.

Let's go with an extreme example. Say upon tomorrow the state would cancel all laws on murder and from there on killing someone would go completely unpunished. Would we have chaos and random slaughter on the streets?

No, (at least not for long). The solution is simple. People don't want to be killed, so very quickly kinds of retaliation bonds would form. "If someone of us gets killed we strike back".
Soon they would realize that when someone of one ring acts out on someone of another ring they would be stuck in a vicious circle. So rings agree to punish only the first responsible person.

At next there would be rings that offer investigative services (for ease we call the police  ) if a member is accused and the decision of a tribunal of members of the involved rings (lets call them court ). Soon we end up in a system that's not very different from ours today, but people can choose from different sets of protection and judgement or don't have it at all if they choose so.

Basically this works for most crime scenarios and there is no ruling class necessary for it to work.

The "rings" may punish the person responsible but colleagues of that person would ofcourse not accept that he did something wrong. In their eyes, there is injustice and so they would also retaliate eventually. Anarchy would divide people and create conflict. The winners of which would rule the people and create democracy.

There will always be a difference in power and there will always be people who will try to rule others. Having complete anarchy would just reset our current political system to zero but the end point is the same. The problem in our society now are dictators, lack of transparency, and fiat currency. Slowly as we solve these problems, the shackles of slavery would be removed from the people. When we eliminate dictators, we let the people govern themselves although I do think that the democracy today should have limitations. Elected leaders should always have pemission from the people to do something. The leaders' job is to suggest and only apply what the people want. When we inforce absolute transparency, we could be assured that our tax goes to the right places. When we eliminate fiat currency, we remove the power of the government and banks to inflate our money supply. We prevent them from indirectly robbing us of our wealth from inflation. There is much to done to fix our political system today. What we currently have is a fake democracy where our leaders act as if they are dictators. We only need to fix the 3 things I have stated above. Sorry but going back to scratch is just ridiculous.

[Imerman2]

I don't mind calling myself an anarchist, because I look, think and act very differently from how popular culture describes anarchists. This might cause people to stop and think again

At that point I'm ready to explain the etymology of the word, how it means the idea of not having a single ruler/governor and doesn't have anything to do with chaos.

I had this written as a reply before I read all the comments, but had posted too son to post again so I copied it and decided to read the comments while I waited, I wanted to be the first to say it haha .

I think the word sounds powerful.  It's great when you act using the non-aggression principle as a guide in your behavior because then people can't have a reason to think you are a bad person, although they still may not like you, they just can't say you are bad.  Then they get confused when you say you are an anarchist and I always hope the contradiction between my behavior and their perception of the word anarchy will confuse them enough that they might rethink their ideas about it, even if it's just to the slightest degree.  Maybe if they think about it, I might recruit a few people just because I tell the truth, its has a powerful connotation so I take advantage of it.

[deisik]

False; the entire point of anarchism is to completely decentralize lawmakers.  You, and the people you're participating life with, lay down the laws you agree upon, usually involving "don't kill, don't steal, don't rape" et al following the non-aggression principle, and if someone steps out of line, they are punished by the people who have agreed to instill those same punishments upon themselves if they were to break these laws. 

How are you going to implement this in reality? Read Animal Farm by George Orwell to see how it would turn out in real life, provided we have started from scratch (and first of all excluded inevitable violence out of the equation at that). People punishing themselves or at least agreeing to take punishment or just agreeing upon anything, what? Where do you really come from? 

[deisik]

Anarchism is clearly defined: non-hierarchical relationships in government and business

You simply can't define it this way. Defining it in such a manner would require redefinition of both government and business which are hierarchical structures (meaning hierarchical relationships within them) by their own definitions. I thought it was evident...

[deisik]

At any point in time that you present a scenario within anarchism that requires a ruling class and a ruled class, follow these steps:

1. Stop
2. Take a breath
3. Discard the idea

It will save you and I a lot of time.

Why did you write this? Did you write these lines for yourself?
You appear to have not read closely what I'd written. This scenario is not within anarchism, it just proves why true anarchism is impossible in reality

It seems that you don't understand how human nature actually works. To keep true anarchy going for any significant amount of time you would need an exterior force that would constrain the manifestations of this nature (selfishness, ego-centrism, greed, etc). There's no such force save for the state (which itself is a converted form of the lust for power, another trait of human nature), which excludes anarchism by definition. I wrote about this previously and this is crucial for why true anarchy (universal equality between people) is impossible in principle unless we have aliens ruling among us...

[deisik]

I disagree, the very fact that we have a society proofs that groups humans are indeed capable of organizing them self and build structures that enable a society

Where did I state that humans are incapable of organizing themselves? Lions make prides, birds flock together, even wolves form packs and, yes, humans organize into societies. But these are hierarchical structures all throughout with those who subdue and those who are subdued. No anarchy, right? It just couldn't be any other way...

[deisik]

Let's go with an extreme example. Say upon tomorrow the state would cancel all laws on murder and from there on killing someone would go completely unpunished. Would we have chaos and random slaughter on the streets?

Come watch The Purge movie

Actually, criminal gangs and other organised groups with strong hierachy within them will instantly grab the power and soon begin fighting with each other, the winner forming a quasi-state with its laws, law enforcing bodies, penalty and tax systems... 
Still no trace of anarchy

[hawkeye]

Let's go with an extreme example. Say upon tomorrow the state would cancel all laws on murder and from there on killing someone would go completely unpunished. Would we have chaos and random slaughter on the streets?

Come watch The Purge movie

Actually, criminal gangs and other organised groups with strong hierachy within them will instantly grab the power and soon begin fighting with each other, the winner forming a quasi-state with its laws, law enforcing bodies, penalty and tax systems... 
Still no trace of anarchy

Well, if it's in a movie it must be true.

[beetcoin]

i too am against anarchy. when there's a power vaccum, where is a power struggle. it's just human nature. to think otherwise would be naive and wishful. if you mean by anarchist to mean an egalitarian/idealistic society, which is what i think some of the anarchy supporters here mean.

i don't really see it being much different from darwinism in the animal kingdom. some groups will be more hungry to dominate others.

[deisik]

Well, if it's in a movie it must be true.

Anyone interested in the actual efforts of establishing a stateless anarchist society could read about Nestor Makhno who unleashed plunder and outrage in his "Free Territory"...

[hawkeye]

Well, if it's in a movie it must be true.

Anyone interested in the actual efforts of establishing a stateless anarchist society could read about Nestor Makhno who unleashed plunder and outrage in his "Free Territory"...

Anyone interested in government systems can read up on Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, etc,etc...

Funny how your guy doesn't seem to have the infamy of these other guys...

[deisik]

Anyone interested in government systems can read up on Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, etc,etc...

Funny how your guy doesn't seem to have the infamy of these other guys...

I don't quite understand where you're going...

If you want to say that Hitler et al are inveterate villains all over and Makhno is not their match then that was not really my point
In fact, he was just a local guerrilla leader who didn't succeed much (unlike those other guys), anarchy aside...

[Dreamweaver]

i too am against anarchy. when there's a power vaccum, where is a power struggle. it's just human nature. to think otherwise would be naive and wishful. if you mean by anarchist to mean an egalitarian/idealistic society, which is what i think some of the anarchy supporters here mean.

i don't really see it being much different from darwinism in the animal kingdom. some groups will be more hungry to dominate others.

That argument does make sense and I always saw that as a reason to not even consider anarchy of any form. Tho I'd propose that there be a new power structure that relies of voluntary interaction rather than one monopoly over force and so on. Those who align with anarcho-capitalism may argue that multiple competing entities that provide law and justice could be a viable option. I'll admit that businesses may WANT to exploit workers and customers, and they may try, but amidst healthy competition people could always leave said company for another, or even begin their own.

[dank]

At any point in time that you present a scenario within anarchism that requires a ruling class and a ruled class, follow these steps:

1. Stop
2. Take a breath
3. Discard the idea

It will save you and I a lot of time.

Why did you write this? Did you write these lines for yourself?
You appear to have not read closely what I'd written. This scenario is not within anarchism, it just proves why true anarchism is impossible in reality

It seems that you don't understand how human nature actually works. To keep true anarchy going for any significant amount of time you would need an exterior force that would constrain the manifestations of this nature (selfishness, ego-centrism, greed, etc). There's no such force save for the state (which itself is a converted form of the lust for power, another trait of human nature), which excludes anarchism by definition. I wrote about this previously and this is crucial for why true anarchy (universal equality between people) is impossible in principle unless we have aliens ruling among us...

The exterior force exists, it's called nature, karma, god, love, truth, whatever you'd like to call it.

Anyways, there are aliens among us, so it's all good.

[deisik]

Why did you write this? Did you write these lines for yourself?
You appear to have not read closely what I'd written. This scenario is not within anarchism, it just proves why true anarchism is impossible in reality

It seems that you don't understand how human nature actually works. To keep true anarchy going for any significant amount of time you would need an exterior force that would constrain the manifestations of this nature (selfishness, ego-centrism, greed, etc). There's no such force save for the state (which itself is a converted form of the lust for power, another trait of human nature), which excludes anarchism by definition. I wrote about this previously and this is crucial for why true anarchy (universal equality between people) is impossible in principle unless we have aliens ruling among us...

The exterior force exists, it's called nature, karma, god, love, truth, whatever you'd like to call it.

Anyways, there are aliens among us, so it's all good.

My pick would be nature. Sorry, but the nature lurking deep down inside a human being works against anarchy. So you have to choose some other exterior force which would override nature...

I'm not that sure about aliens out there (or here), but do you actually mean they are all inveterate anarchists?

[dank]

Do you see packs of squirrels killing each other for acorns?  No, this is nature, where EARTH's resources are shared and rightfully owned by no person, but earth.

Nature is the perfect balancing force of the universe.  If someone wants to try and gain power over people, let nature take them out.

Take your antifreedom agenda elsewhere.

[Hawker]

Do you see packs of squirrels killing each other for acorns?  No, this is nature, where EARTH's resources are shared and rightfully owned by no person, but earth.

Nature is the perfect balancing force of the universe.  If someone wants to try and gain power over people, let nature take them out.

Take your antifreedom agenda elsewhere.

You do see packs of Chimpanzees killing and eating one another.  That also is nature.  We humans are a lot more like the chimps than squirrels.