Are you an anarchist? The answer may surprise you (2000) • Hacker News Board

Re: Are you an anarchist? The answer may surprise you (2000)

#31

Post by woko » Sat, Sep 05, 2020, 1:10 PM UTC

feralimal wrote: post #2

Yes, apparently he died last week. The person said to be behind the phrase we are the 99% at the Occupy Wall Street movement. He was an interesting character. My question would be: do anarchists really work as professors at the London School of Economics? And Yale? Aren't you a 'system man' at that point?

> do anarchists really work as professors at the London School of Economics? And Yale?

I know a banker who is communist. It does not mean that he behaves like a communist in his actions, but he does in his words. From my perspective, he takes the best (or the worst) of both worlds: the quality of life of a very rich man who can afford living in the most expensive places and whatever leisure he wants, and the ability to punch down on the "lesser" people around him from his morally higher stand-point. Never under-estimate people's hypocrisy and cognitive dissonance, especially when what is at stake is exerting power over other people's lives. One can always find a way to rationalize one's crappy behaviour to try to lower the cognitive dissonance after the fact.

Re: Are you an anarchist? The answer may surprise you (2000)

#32

Post by spuz » Sat, Sep 05, 2020, 1:12 PM UTC

oxymoran wrote: post #11

“Anarchists are simply people who believe human beings are capable of behaving in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to.” My anarchist sympathies want this to be true but this is a demonstrably false fairy tale. Just look at how we treat the planet and other living things in the presence of lawful order. Why would you assume that we would act righteously in the absence of law? It is painfully obvious th…

> It is painfully obvious that we would act much worse under anarchy.

The article makes many points against this. It would be better to take those and refute them rather than simply saying "it's painfully obvious".

Re: Are you an anarchist? The answer may surprise you (2000)

#33

Post by torb-xyz » Sat, Sep 05, 2020, 1:12 PM UTC

oxymoran wrote: post #11

“Anarchists are simply people who believe human beings are capable of behaving in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to.” My anarchist sympathies want this to be true but this is a demonstrably false fairy tale. Just look at how we treat the planet and other living things in the presence of lawful order. Why would you assume that we would act righteously in the absence of law? It is painfully obvious th…

Anarchists obviously don’t think this will come about by itself, they simply believe that it is possible to organize society in such a way that the statement above holds true. Anarchists will generally argue that todays society prevents that from being the case (at least to a large enough degree).

The details of all this (strategies, how to make it work, etc) is at the core of a lot of anarchist theory.

Re: Are you an anarchist? The answer may surprise you (2000)

#34

Post by GreeniFi » Sat, Sep 05, 2020, 1:13 PM UTC

His obituary. An excellent read, even if you don’t agree with his world view.

https://novaramedia.com/2020/09/04/the-opposite-of-a-cynic-d...

Here is his series on debt on the BBC. Fascinating stuff if you are or have an interest in economics.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b054zdp6

Re: Are you an anarchist? The answer may surprise you (2000)

#35

Post by jacquesm » Sat, Sep 05, 2020, 1:14 PM UTC

cblconfederate wrote: post #5

feralimal wrote: post #2

Yes, apparently he died last week. The person said to be behind the phrase we are the 99% at the Occupy Wall Street movement. He was an interesting character. My question would be: do anarchists really work as professors at the London School of Economics? And Yale? Aren't you a 'system man' at that point?

Anarchists are not an alien species, nor is there an anarchistan yet. They live among us

I suspect that if an anarchistan would be created within a lifetime it would 'revert' to some other well known political framework, either a democracy or a dictatorship.

If there was an anarchistan in recent history it was a probably Somalia and even there you now find a regular government.

Re: Are you an anarchist? The answer may surprise you (2000)

#36

Post by DeusExMachina » Sat, Sep 05, 2020, 1:14 PM UTC

Funny how any ideology can take our common beliefs and say: "See? You are one of us".

I didn't know who this guy was until he died last week and was celebrated as a great thinker. I am not familiar with his body of work. But if it's along the lines of "all good is on my side and all bad is on the enemy's side" he was not a thinker. He was just an ideologue.

Re: Are you an anarchist? The answer may surprise you (2000)

#37

Post by jacquesm » Sat, Sep 05, 2020, 1:15 PM UTC

oxymoran wrote: post #11

“Anarchists are simply people who believe human beings are capable of behaving in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to.” My anarchist sympathies want this to be true but this is a demonstrably false fairy tale. Just look at how we treat the planet and other living things in the presence of lawful order. Why would you assume that we would act righteously in the absence of law? It is painfully obvious th…

I think it is written that way just to provoke you, and it seems to have worked.

Re: Are you an anarchist? The answer may surprise you (2000)

#38

Post by lucideer » Sat, Sep 05, 2020, 1:15 PM UTC

oxymoran wrote: post #11

“Anarchists are simply people who believe human beings are capable of behaving in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to.” My anarchist sympathies want this to be true but this is a demonstrably false fairy tale. Just look at how we treat the planet and other living things in the presence of lawful order. Why would you assume that we would act righteously in the absence of law? It is painfully obvious th…

> this is a demonstrably false fairy tale

Demonstrably how?

> Why would you assume that we would act righteously in the absence of law?

What is a demonstrably false fairy tale is that we don't act righteously when law enforcement is present. So asking what would happen in its absence seems irrelevant.

> It is painfully obvious that we would act much worse under anarchy.

Above you said it was "demonstrable" but now seem to be settling for saying it's somehow self-evident.

...

Fwiw I don't personally agree with the quoted statement, or rather I agree with only a narrow interpretation of it.

I don't think individuals are capable of behaving in a reasonable fashion in all situations without having to be forced to. I do think groups are capable of behaving in a reasonable fashion without external force, given certain conditions: anarchism in my mind is about local* law enforcement rather than external.

Self-regulating organisations are possible, the only real condition is the removal of external incentives for those organisations to misbehave.

*By "local" I just mean internal/within proximity to the individual

Re: Are you an anarchist? The answer may surprise you (2000)

#39

Post by geofft » Sat, Sep 05, 2020, 1:15 PM UTC

oxymoran wrote: post #11

“Anarchists are simply people who believe human beings are capable of behaving in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to.” My anarchist sympathies want this to be true but this is a demonstrably false fairy tale. Just look at how we treat the planet and other living things in the presence of lawful order. Why would you assume that we would act righteously in the absence of law? It is painfully obvious th…

That assumes that the presence of lawful order makes things better, which is sort of the whole question this article is about.

You can construct a pretty good argument that, say, absent the structures of "lawful order" around which large corporations grow, fewer people would be driving hours to work each day, drinking water out of plastic bottles, flying across the country on business trips, producing pesticides in Bhopal, piling up ammonium nitrate in Beirut, etc. I think most of us as individuals could lead happy and fulfilling lives and contributing to the advancement of humanity without any of that.

Re: Are you an anarchist? The answer may surprise you (2000)

#40

Post by JackFr » Sat, Sep 05, 2020, 1:16 PM UTC

scandox wrote: post #8

Most people do behave "decently" in this sense. However some do not. Under an open system, these outliers will eventually eat the decent. It strikes me this is likely the exact journey we have come on to arrive where we are. We have created a structure in which the monsters can eat a certain proportion of us in order that we may not be eaten.

> Most people do behave "decently" in this sense.

It’s even worse than that. Most people believe that they act decently. But to paraphrase Feynman, the easiest person to deceive is ourselves. No one (or at least vanishingly few) believe that they are the villain in their own narrative. And yet evil persists in the world.