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Pëtr Kropotkin and Mutual Aid

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Re: Pëtr Kropotkin and Mutual Aid

#71

Post by [deleted] »

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #70
_0ffh wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd like to point you to a detailed rebuttal of this claim in text [1] and video [2] form. Wikipedia should not be anyone's only source. [1] https://springtimeofnations.org/2021/04/yes-ancaps-are-anarc... [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJb2-bsWP6Y

Having an obscure historical claim to a word commonly associated with people who you disagree with is the best kind of Technically Correct, but not great for communication. I was mostly trying to point out that there are disagreements about what "anarchist" means and avoid confusion.

[deleted]

Re: Pëtr Kropotkin and Mutual Aid

#72

Post by mellavora »

sershe wrote: post #67
bxjx wrote: post #3

"Conquest of Bread" had a huge impact on my politics. It cut through the capitalist realist narrative that we're all in economic competition and that capitalism is the only sane solution. It made me feel like another world is possible. I changed my life to pursue these other possibilities ever since.

Of course it's possible, it existed before capitalism and had tons of mutual aid and resilience. It's called "subsistence farming". Without surplus extraction + capital accumulation, it was always stuck at low equilibrium where everyone is poor. See e.g. [1] Also as a side note I don't discuss here, anyone quick enough to band together and abuse the mutual-aiding community was easily able to do so, hence feudalism, o…

I agree with your point that strong "mutual aide"/kin institutions often (but not necessarily) lead to low economic growth.

And clearly surplus extraction + capital accumulation (leading to productive investment) strongly enhance economic growth.

However, capitalism in its current form of all-consuming consumerism, a system that must eat everything including itself, I'm not so sold on.

Just finished reading the Laundry Files (Atrocity Archives/Charles Stross) thanks to a recommendation on HN. One of the terrible beasts mentioned in the book is a creature that eats all the information in its universe, rushing the universe to entropy death.

The analogy to bottomless consumerism is too obvious in my mind for me not to draw it.

Re: Pëtr Kropotkin and Mutual Aid

#73

Post by greenie_beans »

bxjx wrote: post #3

"Conquest of Bread" had a huge impact on my politics. It cut through the capitalist realist narrative that we're all in economic competition and that capitalism is the only sane solution. It made me feel like another world is possible. I changed my life to pursue these other possibilities ever since.

haha, i submitted a pdf for "capitalist realism" yesterday: https://files.libcom.org/files/[Mark_Fisher]_Capitalist_Real...

Re: Pëtr Kropotkin and Mutual Aid

#74

Post by _0ffh »

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #70
_0ffh wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd like to point you to a detailed rebuttal of this claim in text [1] and video [2] form. Wikipedia should not be anyone's only source. [1] https://springtimeofnations.org/2021/04/yes-ancaps-are-anarc... [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJb2-bsWP6Y

Having an obscure historical claim to a word commonly associated with people who you disagree with is the best kind of Technically Correct, but not great for communication. I was mostly trying to point out that there are disagreements about what "anarchist" means and avoid confusion.

> I was mostly trying to point out that there are disagreements

I've got a feeling you hit the nail squarely on the head there! =)

I didn't quite catch your meaning.

Re: Pëtr Kropotkin and Mutual Aid

#75

Post by none_to_remain »

Andrew_nenakhov wrote: post #48

For some weird reason, people misunderstand the concept of anarchy, always using this word as a synonym for 'chaos'. In fact, anarchy is a theoretical and highly organized society that relies not on leadership and coercion to function, but on all members of society, who are educated and know their duties. For some weird reason, people believe it to be impossible, but we clearly see it happen in many circumstances, es…

>who are educated and know their duties.

I think every ideology would work if everyone was simply obedient to the duties imposed on them by those ideologues.

Re: Pëtr Kropotkin and Mutual Aid

#76

Post by [deleted] »

notpushkin wrote: post #25
rvense wrote: post #2

Sidenote: That's a really weird way of writing his first name. While the Russian does have a letter that visually resembles ë (unicode: ё), it is not a variation of the letter e as this transcription suggests, but invariably pronounced something like 'yo'. The name is pronounced "Pyotr", and of course corresponds to Peter, by which name Kropotkin was also known. I've no idea where this spelling comes from, but it's l…

I'd say Pötr would be a (technically) correct transcription, although it looks super weird. On pronunciation: “Pyotr” is most close, if you use the “y” just to note that the “p” is soft and not as a separate sound – i. e. “Pjotr” would be incorrect.

[deleted]

Re: Pëtr Kropotkin and Mutual Aid

#77

Post by mananaysiempre »

rvense wrote: post #2

Sidenote: That's a really weird way of writing his first name. While the Russian does have a letter that visually resembles ë (unicode: ё), it is not a variation of the letter e as this transcription suggests, but invariably pronounced something like 'yo'. The name is pronounced "Pyotr", and of course corresponds to Peter, by which name Kropotkin was also known. I've no idea where this spelling comes from, but it's l…

Of all the choices[1], I’ve always been partial to the ISO 9 / GOST approach with Czech/Slovak-style diacritics (either version), even though those same diacritics make it impractical in most ASCII contexts. Just now I went to check the table and learned it actually prescribes ë for ‹ё›. Huh.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanization_of_Russian#Transl...

Re: Pëtr Kropotkin and Mutual Aid

#78

Post by wan_ala »

socialismisok wrote: post #41

I never thought I'd see the day Kropotkin made the front page here! You love to see it!

It could tie into how neoliberal establishements are failing and people are looking for alternatives (which could be the reason that nazism is suddenly more popular). But yeah, I was pretty suprised seeing this post.

Re: Pëtr Kropotkin and Mutual Aid

#79

Post by mftrhu »

_0ffh wrote: post #55
pastacacioepepe wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not my definition, it's the Wikipedia definition. Where does yours come from? Also would you answer to my initial request to explain how transactions can be voluntary in a capitalist system where most people dont own property, the means of production.

Even the very same Wikipedia article you quote admits that central characteristics of capitalism include competitive markets, private property, property rights recognition, and voluntary exchange. Neither National Socialism nor Fascist corporatism had strong protection of - competitive markets: markets where heavily regulated and great parts of national production and ressources where directed and allocated by the go…

Oh, you probably meant "state capitalist". The definition of that fits to a tee.

> State capitalism is an economic system in which the state undertakes business and commercial (i.e. for-profit) economic activity and where the means of production are nationalized as state-owned enterprises (including the processes of capital accumulation, centralized management and wage labor). [...] Other examples include Singapore under Lee Kuan Yew and Turkey, as well as military dictatorships during the Cold War and fascist regimes such as Nazi Germany.

Re: Pëtr Kropotkin and Mutual Aid

#80

Post by pixl97 »

abeppu wrote: post #64
incompatible wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I heard (of course) of anarchism a long time ago, but I always wrote it off as impractical: since without government, there's nobody to stop somebody from starting one. However, this may be incorrect, but it does require a population that is always willing to fight against the formation of a government. I think now that anarchism is practical, at least for a population of committed anarchists, and in the absence of h…

> It was in Le Guin's novel "The Dispossessed" that I first read a convincing account of such a society It's been a minute, but _was_ The Dispossessed a convincing account of such a society? From what I remember, the protagonist encounters academic gate-keepers who effectively control who gets to do teaching and research or what gets communicated to the main planet, centralized systems choose things as personal as wh…

On your last sentence I like saying this as follows "Humanity still hasn't found a way to deal with people that don't mind a large piece of a small pie"
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