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

theanarchistlibrary.org

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

#311

Post by username90 »

boomboomsubban wrote: post #299
username90 wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you pay the same amount of tax as you do today if you weren't forced? Do you believe others would? Do you think that having taxes to pay for school and roads is unreasonable?

The principle of voluntary association addresses these issues. If your needs and wants were actually considered, you would be more willing to pay taxes.

That is nothing more than wishful thinking. There is a reason unions has to force its members to pay dues and not just live on donations.

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

#312

Post by bloudermilk »

username90 wrote: post #283
boomboomsubban wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you only make reasonable choices because you are forced to?

Would you pay the same amount of tax as you do today if you weren't forced? Do you believe others would? Do you think that having taxes to pay for school and roads is unreasonable?

Of all the hypotheticals, taxation has to be the most incongruent with anarchism.

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

#313

Post by PaulAJ »

Enginerrrd wrote: post #233
oblio wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don't have to behave better in the presence of authority, they are forced to, that's kind of the point of authority :-)

That's funny, I see people behave badly even with the authority all the time. In general though, most people behave mostly good. The ones that behave badly probably would under any social construct. The people I know that got into trouble with the law were the same ones with antisocial tendencies in grade school. I don't believe that the threat of government enforcement really encourages a significant proportion of e…

This is all about Dunbar's Number; the number of people you can "know" in the sense of having stable social relations with. Its about 150 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbar%27s_number).

A society smaller than this can be effectively self-policing because everyone keeps track of how everyone else behaves. No money, police, laws or prisons are required because everyone knows what everyone else thinks of their behaviour and wants to stay on the good side of the community that they depend on. So its not a problem.

Once a society grows past Dunbar's number this system breaks down. You see people you don't know misbehaving, but they don't suffer any downside because nobody knows who they are. When you have to deal with people you don't know if you can trust them, but you do know that if they rip you off you won't have any comeback. So the communal trust breaks down and you start needing police, courts, laws and prisons.

In short, anarchism and "primitive socialism" are nice, but they don't scale.

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

#314

Post by username90 »

bloudermilk wrote: post #312
username90 wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you pay the same amount of tax as you do today if you weren't forced? Do you believe others would? Do you think that having taxes to pay for school and roads is unreasonable?

Of all the hypotheticals, taxation has to be the most incongruent with anarchism.

That is my point. I strongly believe taxation is absolutely necessary for a good society. This part should have been addressed in the article but he skips over it completely.

If you believe that every human should receive education and healthcare and be protected from criminals then you aren't an anarchist.

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

#315

Post by nickthemagicman »

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #209

I have never believed in anarchism, as I don't believe that "human beings are capable of behaving in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to". But with COVID-19, I am seeing more proof than ever. In my country (but I guess it's the same in most, except perhaps some Nordic countries) bars, pubs and discos only reduce seating or close indoor spaces when forced to by law, in spite of the evidence that they c…

What you mean is people need to be forced to do what you think is reasonable.

As you think their reasons for doing things are irrelevant.

This kind of thinking leads down a scary road because who is the arbiter if what is reasonable?

10 years ago it would have been reasonable to consider that marijuana is dangerous as all the experts and legal system backed that up.

They were wrong.

So you have to leave room for people to be unreasonable because sometimes they turn out to actually be the reasonable ones.

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

#316

Post by ClumsyPilot »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #173
ClumsyPilot wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "> Just look at how we treat the planet and other living things in the presence of lawful order" On the contrary, it' and indictment of the current law system, it has utterally failed to protect the environment and other living things, where-as anacistic organisations, charities and protest movement have done a lot for the environment. In fact they are the only ones that have done anything at all. If a given CEO da…

> anacistic organisations, charities and protest movement have done a lot for the environment. In fact they are the only ones that have done anything at all. This is not true at all. Protecting the environment isn’t just about actions like planting trees and buying up the occasional extra property parcel to dedicate as a land reserve. It requires government scale regulation to impose negative consequences on people a…

I am just making a narrow argument that the current system is responsible for the environmental damage lock, stock and barrel.

Do a mental experiment - imagine the only form of corporation we had was a cooperative, limited to 10,000 employees. Would you expect environmental damage to increase?

I feel it takes large, hierarchical organisations, where the decision-maker is very removed from the consequences, to create this level of environmental devastation.

Now imagine we went through the 70-year long history of environmental protection and did a score:

Proactive environmental action by the government /proper authority is evidence that the current system is working, 1 point for current system. If a government only acts after mass protests or public outcry, I take that as a point for the anarchic system. If there is mass outcry, and still no action, take it as two point for the anarchic system.

If we did the score we'd have to face the fact that most of environmental laws are only on the books because of some form of public outcry or protest.

You are free to argue that anarchism would be disastrous for our standards of living or crime rates, but specifically on the point of environment, it would probably do a lot better.

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

#317

Post by baddox »

dTal wrote: post #284
baddox wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How are the human beings in government able to behave in a reasonable fashion without being forced to?

Parent addresses this explicitly: >not because politicians are any better than the average person, but because they tend to have at least a bare minimum of education, access to advisors, some positive incentives -the next election- and no high stakes on the decision like, say, a bar owner

The “no high stakes” part is what’s the most interesting to me, but unfortunately in US national politics I think it tends to not be true. For a single bar, sure, but for massive corporations and industries there is far too much intermingling of private and political incentives.

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

#318

Post by clairity »

badmeasure99 wrote: post #305
Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #209

I have never believed in anarchism, as I don't believe that "human beings are capable of behaving in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to". But with COVID-19, I am seeing more proof than ever. In my country (but I guess it's the same in most, except perhaps some Nordic countries) bars, pubs and discos only reduce seating or close indoor spaces when forced to by law, in spite of the evidence that they c…

Measuring our capacity for anarchist living in a cutthroat capitalist society is sort of like comparing an apple with a black hole. You can come up with some vague emotional colors where they can seem similar, I mean they both exist, can be represented on paper starting with base geometrical shapes, but further analysis of their composition and parts reveals a lot of differences. It’s not a given that bars and salons…

there's no world with humans in it that's devoid of power and coercion, so the premise of anarchism is irretrievably flawed. can it inform how we live in a power-filled and coercive world? yes, but not to any extreme.

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

#319

Post by luckylion »

GrantSolar wrote: post #293
Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #209

I have never believed in anarchism, as I don't believe that "human beings are capable of behaving in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to". But with COVID-19, I am seeing more proof than ever. In my country (but I guess it's the same in most, except perhaps some Nordic countries) bars, pubs and discos only reduce seating or close indoor spaces when forced to by law, in spite of the evidence that they c…

>In my country (but I guess it's the same in most, except perhaps some Nordic countries) bars, pubs and discos only reduce seating or close indoor spaces when forced to by law, in spite of the evidence that they cause lots of outbreaks. >The government recommended remote work whenever possible but many companies just ignored it in spite of having many workers that could perfectly work remotely, and just implement it…

What would the anarchist alternative be, provided everybody still needs to eat. Let's keep money as a simple placeholder for value. If the reasonable people wouldn't open the clubs, how would they make money? Okay, their landlords are reasonable as well, and don't charge rent. And their grocery store gives them food for free?

How would they determine who is so reasonable they get the reason-treatment of free food even if they provide no value themselves (no parties in their club etc).

A lot of anarchism sounds like some magical communism, where everything just works out, there's no conflict whatsoever and the (in communist countries) usually authoritarian governments wouldn't be required. If only one would let the people be free, they'd be happy, sharing, caring and all around nice people by themselves.

I get the fundamental appeal, I'm sure it can work in very small, very homogeneous groups (like a religious sect, or maybe a tribal group that has not or only been recently contacted). But at scale, and in the real world, it sounds naive.

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

#320

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

> For thousands of years people lived without governments. In many parts of the world people live outside of the control of governments today. They do not all kill each other. Mostly they just get on about their lives the same as anyone else would.

I hate to focus in on just one point, but protection from violence is really a core part of most people's demands from governance, and this description isn't true. Warfare is extremely common in societies without governments; the exact rate varies widely, but there are many known societies where 20-25% of adult men can expect to die fighting a war.

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