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Libertarianism, Anarchism, and Society with Voluntary Self Governance

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  • AManFromEarthAManFromEarth Let's get to twerk! The King in the SwampRegistered User regular
    edited April 2012
    Well, the consent of the governed is given through the voting process, the various checks and balances, and the ability to recall and provide oversight of government officials. It isn't a perfect system, but in 150 million years it's the best system we've come up with and probably as close to perfect as we'll ever get vis-a-vis consent.

    The difficulty comes when those systems break down (such as the undue influence that money and business has on the US and UK governments). But there are also systems in place to course correct should enough people actually show up and demand that change.

    Frankly, libertarians and anarchists get on my nerves because their arguments invariably can be boiled down to the idea that they know what's best and so theirs should be the force in charge. That's why a close reading of any proposed system of anarchy always has institutions of authority, they're just designed to be ruled by the proposer.

    It is also why, as the libertarian streak in the GOP has grown their policies have become more and more self serving. It is antithetical to democracy and the whole of the enlightenment.

    This is an argument for tacit consent. It seems that you are maintaining that as long as I'm not doing those things, I must be consenting to what my government is doing, right? Think about it this way. I don't consent to the fact that in California, a constitutional amendment was passed banning gay marriage. I voted in that election. So what, that was it? I now consent to the law because my side lost? That means I have to consent to laws that I don't agree with. But then it's seems I'm consenting to things that I don't consent to. In fact, I'm not allowed to NOT consent to those laws. Because I'm forced to by the government. You may say there's no better alternative, but I don't think that you can, in good faith, argue that we actually consent to our government. Again though, I don't think that's a bad thing. Frequently people don't know what's best for them, and in that case, I don't give a shit what they do or do not consent to.

    Also, J, that might be weird. All I know is that when I tend to argue in good faith in order to strengthen weak arguments against a position people tend to yell at me. So I have to always remind people that I don't hold these beliefs, I just think that it's always good to pit your arguments against others so that the overall result is a more well thought out position.

    That's a fundamental misunderstanding of both my point and the way the government is set up. Let me try to clarify.

    It is an argument for active citizenship. The price we pay for living in a democracy is constant vigilance, it is every citizens duty to pay attention and speak out. Informed dissent is imminently patriotic.

    If you don't do anything to make your dissent known, then yes, you're giving your tacit consent to something. Democratic governments have to assume they have the consent of the governed through elections and, to a lesser extent, polling.

    TL;DR you don't get to complain about your voice not being heard if you're not speaking up.

    AManFromEarth on
    Lh96QHG.png
  • _J__J_ Pedant Registered User, __BANNED USERS regular
    Iskra wrote: »
    The community that wants to live peacefully? Most likely will choose to abide by the rules.

    The dude with his small well armed militia? He's probably not going to surrender the advantage that he has by nature of his superior force just because the community asks him really really nicely to not translate his military superiority into vast material wealth and comfort by shooting people in the head.

    End result is, the people who have the advantage in force will exploit that advantage at the expense of everyone else. And since "everyone else" is composed of those who felt the lacked sufficient force to eke out an advantage, they get steamrolled into slavery or mass graves for their precious land and resources.

    This is one of the virtues to The State having a monopoly on force. When an armed malcontent decides that he does not want to play by the rules, the police / military can move in and stop him.

    Without such a police force or consolidated center of power, the armed malcontent gets to slaughter all the pitchfork-toting hippies.


    We don't have to portray this problem in terms of guns, either. When a person has an idea for how to manipulate people, they can infect the minds of their neighbors and coerce them into behaving in a way that suits the needs of the individual who discovered how to control people.

    As I understand it, that is one of the myths anarchists tell of how The State came to be.

    Which is kinda funny when you think about it. Once upon a time everything was awesome, and then someone came up with an idea for The State, and they took over the happy anarchists.

    But, don't worry, anarchy can still work. Just ignore that story we just told you about how people can overcome anarchist communities and erect States.

  • LucidLucid Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    _J_ wrote: »
    _J_ wrote: »
    Again though, I'm not an expert here. And this isn't even a position that I agree with, so don't rake me over the coals here.

    Can I point out that the majority of substantive arguments made in this thread, on behalf of anarchism, are made by persons who are not anarchists, and do not maintain anarchist beliefs?

    We've had a few anarchists pop in, say some crazy things, and then pop out. Yet we've maintained a discussion by means of, primarily, it seems, devil's advocate posts.

    That's weird, right?

    If you'll allow me to play devil's advocate, I'd argue that it isn't weird if the purpose of discussion is to examine different points of view rather than convince PA to form our own anarcho-collectivist compound off in the backwoods of Arkansas.

    I see these boards as a sort of informal debate club, so people playing DA doesn't strike me as odd as it possibly should.

    I didn't mean "weird" in a bad sense. It's just that, usually, we have genuine arguments on both sides.

    In this thread, however, we have crazy people, Devil's Advocates, and then everyone else.

    I like it, and it's a fun argument to watch play out...but I wish we had some true believers in anarchism who could actually articulate coherent arguments in defense of their beliefs.

    I think part of it is that the anarchy/libertarian posters in this thread still haven't gotten past the righteousness phase, in terms of argument. I mean, sometimes it's prudent and even necessary to step outside of what you deem to be the most believable ideology or system. It seems these posters are stuck on the being right part, it's almost personal that their beliefs are being challenged as such.

    Lucid on
  • _J__J_ Pedant Registered User, __BANNED USERS regular
    Lucid wrote: »
    _J_ wrote: »
    _J_ wrote: »
    Again though, I'm not an expert here. And this isn't even a position that I agree with, so don't rake me over the coals here.

    Can I point out that the majority of substantive arguments made in this thread, on behalf of anarchism, are made by persons who are not anarchists, and do not maintain anarchist beliefs?

    We've had a few anarchists pop in, say some crazy things, and then pop out. Yet we've maintained a discussion by means of, primarily, it seems, devil's advocate posts.

    That's weird, right?

    If you'll allow me to play devil's advocate, I'd argue that it isn't weird if the purpose of discussion is to examine different points of view rather than convince PA to form our own anarcho-collectivist compound off in the backwoods of Arkansas.

    I see these boards as a sort of informal debate club, so people playing DA doesn't strike me as odd as it possibly should.

    I didn't mean "weird" in a bad sense. It's just that, usually, we have genuine arguments on both sides.

    In this thread, however, we have crazy people, Devil's Advocates, and then everyone else.

    I like it, and it's a fun argument to watch play out...but I wish we had some true believers in anarchism who could actually articulate coherent arguments in defense of their beliefs.

    I think part of it is that the anarchy/libertarian posters in this thread still haven't gotten past the righteousness phase, in terms of argument. I mean, sometimes it's prudent and even necessary to step outside of what you deem to be the most believable ideology or system. It seems these posters are stuck on the being right part, it's almost personal that their beliefs are being challenged as such.

    I find it strange that some people treat their ideas / beliefs like baby kitties, tucked safely in a box under a warm blankie, lest someone disrupt them.

    I'd think persons would want to battle their ideas / beliefs against others.

    It's like pokemon. If you just keep your idea in your pokeball you're doing it wrong. If you don't let them out to battle, they never get a chance to grow or develop.

  • LoserForHireXLoserForHireX Philosopher King The AcademyRegistered User regular
    Iskra wrote: »
    You still do not seem to have answered the fundamental question of how society regulates itself without somebody having a monopoly on force.

    I mean, if in an anarchist society I really like my neighbor's house, and I kill him and move in, what happens? Presumably if I do this enough times other people collectively go 'this sucks' and come deal with me.

    The problem is that this isn't fundamentally different from what the state does! You're just talking about people determining what force is and is not legitimate on an ad hoc basis, rather than institutionalizing that decision by means of government.

    Well, I think that the notion is that the community together would essentially figure out "the rules." Then it would be the case that you would opt in to those rules in order to get certain benefits, such as the protections of those rules. So you give up the ability to bash other people over the head and in return no one can bash you over the head either.

    You may think that this looks a lot like our society does today. There's one difference though. You get a choice. You can choose not to participate. You can't do that in any country today. You can't just say, "nope, don't want the protection" in Kansas. The government doesn't allow that. This is the fundamental difference between a group that determines itself and one that doesn't.

    Again though, I'm not an expert here. And this isn't even a position that I agree with, so don't rake me over the coals here.

    Sure but see, who's going to opt in and who isn't?

    The community that wants to live peacefully? Most likely will choose to abide by the rules.

    The dude with his small well armed militia? He's probably not going to surrender the advantage that he has by nature of his superior force just because the community asks him really really nicely to not translate his military superiority into vast material wealth and comfort by shooting people in the head.

    End result is, the people who have the advantage in force will exploit that advantage at the expense of everyone else. And since "everyone else" is composed of those who felt the lacked sufficient force to eke out an advantage, they get steamrolled into slavery or mass graves for their precious land and resources.


    (I realize this isn't your personal position on the matter, so I'm not attacking you here. Just pointing out why this is incredibly unstable, and will end poorly every time.)

    I think that this isn't really as forceful an argument as everyone believes. So let us say that we have three people. A, B, and C. A has a gun, and B and C don't. A is also hungry, and has no food. B and C both have food. You think that the most likely scenario is that A simply goes and kills B and C or enslaves them and takes their food (thereby making B and C starve). It wouldn't occur to A to trade with B and C? Maybe offer them protection in exchange for food? Then A can't simply just kill B and C, or he doesn't get any food, and B and C have a good reason to accept A's offer, because it ends up that they might need protection. I think that it's plausible that this would happen at least once. Okay, now we have D. Now D is short sighted, and doesn't give a shit about killing people. He wants to just kill B and C and take their stuff. But A is protecting them, and since D doesn't want to die, he's frightened off.

    See, while you accuse the anarchist of thinking that everyone is full of sunshine and rainbows you seem to hold the idea firmly that every single person is a total fuckwad who wants nothing more than the murder his neighbor and steal his stuff. Now, honestly, I think that most people are just fine and dandy working with others for mutual benefit. I think that the people who just want to kill other people and take their stuff are rare, and usually driven to do so by some need, and the inability to fill that need any other way. I think that the number of those rare people who just want to kill, rape, and murder are probably smaller than the people who are willing to defend themselves and their neighbors. Most small communities are more than a little anarchic, and they seem to not have rampant problems with theft and murder. Most people are able to get along well with their fellows.

    In the end, no one has the "advantage in force" over everyone, and people who might have the advantage in force are plenty willing to work with others for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that it's just in their self interest not to go around murdering everyone they can get their hands on. I mean, think about this. Is the only reason that you haven't murdered someone purely because you're afraid of the government?

    "The only way to get rid of a temptation is to give into it." - Oscar Wilde
    "We believe in the people and their 'wisdom' as if there was some special secret entrance to knowledge that barred to anyone who had ever learned anything." - Friedrich Nietzsche
  • BehemothBehemoth Compulsive Seashell Collector Registered User regular
    You still do not seem to have answered the fundamental question of how society regulates itself without somebody having a monopoly on force.

    I mean, if in an anarchist society I really like my neighbor's house, and I kill him and move in, what happens? Presumably if I do this enough times other people collectively go 'this sucks' and come deal with me.

    The problem is that this isn't fundamentally different from what the state does! You're just talking about people determining what force is and is not legitimate on an ad hoc basis, rather than institutionalizing that decision by means of government.

    Well, I think that the notion is that the community together would essentially figure out "the rules." Then it would be the case that you would opt in to those rules in order to get certain benefits, such as the protections of those rules. So you give up the ability to bash other people over the head and in return no one can bash you over the head either.

    You may think that this looks a lot like our society does today. There's one difference though. You get a choice. You can choose not to participate. You can't do that in any country today. You can't just say, "nope, don't want the protection" in Kansas. The government doesn't allow that. This is the fundamental difference between a group that determines itself and one that doesn't.

    Again though, I'm not an expert here. And this isn't even a position that I agree with, so don't rake me over the coals here.

    Well, this seems to be mostly a result of the fact that protection is something that is very difficult to give and take away. Unless that protection is in the form of just handing the person a gun, anyway. It's the public good problem, which is one of the things that economists generally believe the government has to have a hand in or it just doesn't happen. You don't get national defense without someone collecting taxes and organizing it, because if people don't pay (free ride) then nobody will want to pay and it doesn't happen. National defense is the most obvious, but this is also a problem with public safety things like lighthouses.

    (Incidentally, they've fully explored the lighthouse thing on the Planet Money podcast. First they discovered that merchants in port towns used to build lighthouses without government intervention! Take that government! But then they found out that towns would only build lighthouses near their harbors, and there were still hundreds of dangerous reefs and whatnot that wouldn't have lighthouses without government intervention.)

    It's the same thing with justice, if you think about it. If someone can just "opt out" of the justice system, then they're free to commit crimes and get away with it. If some people can just decide the rules don't apply to them, then the rules are meaningless for everyone.

    Also, we discussed it earlier in this thread, but you can pretty much opt out of government and society. If you're making little enough money, the government won't bother you about taxes. If you go live in the middle of the wilderness where you're not benefiting from public infrastructure, nobody will bother you about anything! Unless you cause a fire or try to build a dam or do something that will effect other people, of course.

    iQbUbQsZXyt8I.png
  • AManFromEarthAManFromEarth Let's get to twerk! The King in the SwampRegistered User regular
    Well, the consent of the governed is given through the voting process, the various checks and balances, and the ability to recall and provide oversight of government officials. It isn't a perfect system, but in 150 million years it's the best system we've come up with and probably as close to perfect as we'll ever get vis-a-vis consent.

    The difficulty comes when those systems break down (such as the undue influence that money and business has on the US and UK governments). But there are also systems in place to course correct should enough people actually show up and demand that change.

    Frankly, libertarians and anarchists get on my nerves because their arguments invariably can be boiled down to the idea that they know what's best and so theirs should be the force in charge. That's why a close reading of any proposed system of anarchy always has institutions of authority, they're just designed to be ruled by the proposer.

    It is also why, as the libertarian streak in the GOP has grown their policies have become more and more self serving. It is antithetical to democracy and the whole of the enlightenment.

    This is an argument for tacit consent. It seems that you are maintaining that as long as I'm not doing those things, I must be consenting to what my government is doing, right? Think about it this way. I don't consent to the fact that in California, a constitutional amendment was passed banning gay marriage. I voted in that election. So what, that was it? I now consent to the law because my side lost? That means I have to consent to laws that I don't agree with. But then it's seems I'm consenting to things that I don't consent to. In fact, I'm not allowed to NOT consent to those laws. Because I'm forced to by the government. You may say there's no better alternative, but I don't think that you can, in good faith, argue that we actually consent to our government. Again though, I don't think that's a bad thing. Frequently people don't know what's best for them, and in that case, I don't give a shit what they do or do not consent to.

    Also, J, that might be weird. All I know is that when I tend to argue in good faith in order to strengthen weak arguments against a position people tend to yell at me. So I have to always remind people that I don't hold these beliefs, I just think that it's always good to pit your arguments against others so that the overall result is a more well thought out position.

    Vanilla ate my response, let's try again:

    Tacit consent is a thing, but only if you're not giving out active con/dis-sent. That's who democracy works. The price of true democracy is CONSTANT VIGILANCE.

    When you don't like a law it is your duty to speak out against it, take action to lobby your representatives or even run for office yourself. If you're just sitting at home being mad at a law but not doing anything about it, you're giving tacit consent to that law. That's the way it works.

    Of course the government cannot always operate only by consent, that would never work, but just as it is the government's duty to do its best to provide for the common good, it is the citizen's duty to ensure that their government is following through.

    Lh96QHG.png
  • JepheryJephery Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    Iskra wrote: »
    You still do not seem to have answered the fundamental question of how society regulates itself without somebody having a monopoly on force.

    I mean, if in an anarchist society I really like my neighbor's house, and I kill him and move in, what happens? Presumably if I do this enough times other people collectively go 'this sucks' and come deal with me.

    The problem is that this isn't fundamentally different from what the state does! You're just talking about people determining what force is and is not legitimate on an ad hoc basis, rather than institutionalizing that decision by means of government.

    Well, I think that the notion is that the community together would essentially figure out "the rules." Then it would be the case that you would opt in to those rules in order to get certain benefits, such as the protections of those rules. So you give up the ability to bash other people over the head and in return no one can bash you over the head either.

    You may think that this looks a lot like our society does today. There's one difference though. You get a choice. You can choose not to participate. You can't do that in any country today. You can't just say, "nope, don't want the protection" in Kansas. The government doesn't allow that. This is the fundamental difference between a group that determines itself and one that doesn't.

    Again though, I'm not an expert here. And this isn't even a position that I agree with, so don't rake me over the coals here.

    Sure but see, who's going to opt in and who isn't?

    The community that wants to live peacefully? Most likely will choose to abide by the rules.

    The dude with his small well armed militia? He's probably not going to surrender the advantage that he has by nature of his superior force just because the community asks him really really nicely to not translate his military superiority into vast material wealth and comfort by shooting people in the head.

    End result is, the people who have the advantage in force will exploit that advantage at the expense of everyone else. And since "everyone else" is composed of those who felt the lacked sufficient force to eke out an advantage, they get steamrolled into slavery or mass graves for their precious land and resources.


    (I realize this isn't your personal position on the matter, so I'm not attacking you here. Just pointing out why this is incredibly unstable, and will end poorly every time.)

    I think that this isn't really as forceful an argument as everyone believes. So let us say that we have three people. A, B, and C. A has a gun, and B and C don't. A is also hungry, and has no food. B and C both have food. You think that the most likely scenario is that A simply goes and kills B and C or enslaves them and takes their food (thereby making B and C starve). It wouldn't occur to A to trade with B and C? Maybe offer them protection in exchange for food? Then A can't simply just kill B and C, or he doesn't get any food, and B and C have a good reason to accept A's offer, because it ends up that they might need protection. I think that it's plausible that this would happen at least once. Okay, now we have D. Now D is short sighted, and doesn't give a shit about killing people. He wants to just kill B and C and take their stuff. But A is protecting them, and since D doesn't want to die, he's frightened off.

    See, while you accuse the anarchist of thinking that everyone is full of sunshine and rainbows you seem to hold the idea firmly that every single person is a total fuckwad who wants nothing more than the murder his neighbor and steal his stuff. Now, honestly, I think that most people are just fine and dandy working with others for mutual benefit. I think that the people who just want to kill other people and take their stuff are rare, and usually driven to do so by some need, and the inability to fill that need any other way. I think that the number of those rare people who just want to kill, rape, and murder are probably smaller than the people who are willing to defend themselves and their neighbors. Most small communities are more than a little anarchic, and they seem to not have rampant problems with theft and murder. Most people are able to get along well with their fellows.

    In the end, no one has the "advantage in force" over everyone, and people who might have the advantage in force are plenty willing to work with others for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that it's just in their self interest not to go around murdering everyone they can get their hands on. I mean, think about this. Is the only reason that you haven't murdered someone purely because you're afraid of the government?

    Guess what though. In your example A has become the government of B and C. You've just illustrated why and how governments form in the first place.

    Jephery on
    }
    "Orkses never lose a battle. If we win we win, if we die we die fightin so it don't count. If we runs for it we don't die neither, cos we can come back for annuver go, see!".
  • AManFromEarthAManFromEarth Let's get to twerk! The King in the SwampRegistered User regular
    _J_ wrote: »
    Lucid wrote: »
    _J_ wrote: »
    _J_ wrote: »
    Again though, I'm not an expert here. And this isn't even a position that I agree with, so don't rake me over the coals here.

    Can I point out that the majority of substantive arguments made in this thread, on behalf of anarchism, are made by persons who are not anarchists, and do not maintain anarchist beliefs?

    We've had a few anarchists pop in, say some crazy things, and then pop out. Yet we've maintained a discussion by means of, primarily, it seems, devil's advocate posts.

    That's weird, right?

    If you'll allow me to play devil's advocate, I'd argue that it isn't weird if the purpose of discussion is to examine different points of view rather than convince PA to form our own anarcho-collectivist compound off in the backwoods of Arkansas.

    I see these boards as a sort of informal debate club, so people playing DA doesn't strike me as odd as it possibly should.

    I didn't mean "weird" in a bad sense. It's just that, usually, we have genuine arguments on both sides.

    In this thread, however, we have crazy people, Devil's Advocates, and then everyone else.

    I like it, and it's a fun argument to watch play out...but I wish we had some true believers in anarchism who could actually articulate coherent arguments in defense of their beliefs.

    I think part of it is that the anarchy/libertarian posters in this thread still haven't gotten past the righteousness phase, in terms of argument. I mean, sometimes it's prudent and even necessary to step outside of what you deem to be the most believable ideology or system. It seems these posters are stuck on the being right part, it's almost personal that their beliefs are being challenged as such.

    I find it strange that some people treat their ideas / beliefs like baby kitties, tucked safely in a box under a warm blankie, lest someone disrupt them.

    I'd think persons would want to battle their ideas / beliefs against others.

    It's like pokemon. If you just keep your idea in your pokeball you're doing it wrong. If you don't let them out to battle, they never get a chance to grow or develop.

    This illustration, while awesome, assumes that everyone wants their ideas to grow or develop. If you think you're right, you're not really motivated to grow on.

    Lh96QHG.png
  • IskraIskra Registered User regular
    _J_ wrote: »
    Iskra wrote: »
    The community that wants to live peacefully? Most likely will choose to abide by the rules.

    The dude with his small well armed militia? He's probably not going to surrender the advantage that he has by nature of his superior force just because the community asks him really really nicely to not translate his military superiority into vast material wealth and comfort by shooting people in the head.

    End result is, the people who have the advantage in force will exploit that advantage at the expense of everyone else. And since "everyone else" is composed of those who felt the lacked sufficient force to eke out an advantage, they get steamrolled into slavery or mass graves for their precious land and resources.

    This is one of the virtues to The State having a monopoly on force. When an armed malcontent decides that he does not want to play by the rules, the police / military can move in and stop him.

    Without such a police force or consolidated center of power, the armed malcontent gets to slaughter all the pitchfork-toting hippies.

    RIght, I guess that's what bothers me the most about this whole discussion. I can get behind the sentiment that currently many states have issues with corruption, and often don't effectively represent the will and best interests of their citizens. Obviously that's true in varying degrees in different states, but its a discussion worth having.

    When someone comes in and says that the entire problem is "the monopoly of coercion and force maintained by the state", my first thought is that that is exactly how it should be.

    I mean what are the possibilities? I can see 3 cases potentially

    1) Monopoly of violence by a state
    2) No violence (and unicorns and ambrosia for all)
    3) Plurality of "legitimate" sources of violence

    1) is the "statist" solution. 2) is fairyland. And 3) is absolutely fucking terrifying. It's literally might makes right, with no rights for anyone beyond what you can personally establish through the firepower of your faction. How anyone can see this as an improvement, or a stable solution is baffling to me.

    Look at the proposed anarchist solution to the coal miners battle. The miners are getting massacred, and instead of going to some authority which the citizens have established as arbiter of justice and law to stop the killing, the solution is apparently to go get MORE dudes with guns and earn your rights through literal bloody warfare. Who is going to come in and be these "reinforcements" for the coal miners? I'm sure as hell not going to throw myself and my family into the meat grinder against an enemy with superior firepower to temporarily win rights for another group who I have no guarantee will reciprocate. For all I know they might want MY coal mine too while they're at it.

    A plurality on the legitimate use of force is what most people call a civil war. Or I suppose since there's no state here, tribal warfare. Things might work all peachy in times of abundance, but the second one tribe feels like they can get more of a scarce resource through the use of force they absolutely will. This is literally the entirety of human history in a nutshell. And if the anarchist solution to this problem is to bring in more people with guns on your side, you can see how this very rapidly devolves into a particularly bloody brand of chaos, which eventually gives way to Somalia style warlords.

  • poshnialloposhniallo Registered User regular
    Behemoth wrote: »
    You still do not seem to have answered the fundamental question of how society regulates itself without somebody having a monopoly on force.

    I mean, if in an anarchist society I really like my neighbor's house, and I kill him and move in, what happens? Presumably if I do this enough times other people collectively go 'this sucks' and come deal with me.

    The problem is that this isn't fundamentally different from what the state does! You're just talking about people determining what force is and is not legitimate on an ad hoc basis, rather than institutionalizing that decision by means of government.

    Well, I think that the notion is that the community together would essentially figure out "the rules." Then it would be the case that you would opt in to those rules in order to get certain benefits, such as the protections of those rules. So you give up the ability to bash other people over the head and in return no one can bash you over the head either.

    You may think that this looks a lot like our society does today. There's one difference though. You get a choice. You can choose not to participate. You can't do that in any country today. You can't just say, "nope, don't want the protection" in Kansas. The government doesn't allow that. This is the fundamental difference between a group that determines itself and one that doesn't.

    Again though, I'm not an expert here. And this isn't even a position that I agree with, so don't rake me over the coals here.

    Well, this seems to be mostly a result of the fact that protection is something that is very difficult to give and take away. Unless that protection is in the form of just handing the person a gun, anyway. It's the public good problem, which is one of the things that economists generally believe the government has to have a hand in or it just doesn't happen. You don't get national defense without someone collecting taxes and organizing it, because if people don't pay (free ride) then nobody will want to pay and it doesn't happen. National defense is the most obvious, but this is also a problem with public safety things like lighthouses.

    (Incidentally, they've fully explored the lighthouse thing on the Planet Money podcast. First they discovered that merchants in port towns used to build lighthouses without government intervention! Take that government! But then they found out that towns would only build lighthouses near their harbors, and there were still hundreds of dangerous reefs and whatnot that wouldn't have lighthouses without government intervention.)

    It's the same thing with justice, if you think about it. If someone can just "opt out" of the justice system, then they're free to commit crimes and get away with it. If some people can just decide the rules don't apply to them, then the rules are meaningless for everyone.

    Also, we discussed it earlier in this thread, but you can pretty much opt out of government and society. If you're making little enough money, the government won't bother you about taxes. If you go live in the middle of the wilderness where you're not benefiting from public infrastructure, nobody will bother you about anything! Unless you cause a fire or try to build a dam or do something that will effect other people, of course.

    I am sorry, but this is absolutely not true. You cannot opt out of society - You benefit from society in a million different ways even if you're a survivalist living off game in the mountains.

    I figure I could take a bear.
  • AManFromEarthAManFromEarth Let's get to twerk! The King in the SwampRegistered User regular
    poshniallo wrote: »
    Behemoth wrote: »
    You still do not seem to have answered the fundamental question of how society regulates itself without somebody having a monopoly on force.

    I mean, if in an anarchist society I really like my neighbor's house, and I kill him and move in, what happens? Presumably if I do this enough times other people collectively go 'this sucks' and come deal with me.

    The problem is that this isn't fundamentally different from what the state does! You're just talking about people determining what force is and is not legitimate on an ad hoc basis, rather than institutionalizing that decision by means of government.

    Well, I think that the notion is that the community together would essentially figure out "the rules." Then it would be the case that you would opt in to those rules in order to get certain benefits, such as the protections of those rules. So you give up the ability to bash other people over the head and in return no one can bash you over the head either.

    You may think that this looks a lot like our society does today. There's one difference though. You get a choice. You can choose not to participate. You can't do that in any country today. You can't just say, "nope, don't want the protection" in Kansas. The government doesn't allow that. This is the fundamental difference between a group that determines itself and one that doesn't.

    Again though, I'm not an expert here. And this isn't even a position that I agree with, so don't rake me over the coals here.

    Well, this seems to be mostly a result of the fact that protection is something that is very difficult to give and take away. Unless that protection is in the form of just handing the person a gun, anyway. It's the public good problem, which is one of the things that economists generally believe the government has to have a hand in or it just doesn't happen. You don't get national defense without someone collecting taxes and organizing it, because if people don't pay (free ride) then nobody will want to pay and it doesn't happen. National defense is the most obvious, but this is also a problem with public safety things like lighthouses.

    (Incidentally, they've fully explored the lighthouse thing on the Planet Money podcast. First they discovered that merchants in port towns used to build lighthouses without government intervention! Take that government! But then they found out that towns would only build lighthouses near their harbors, and there were still hundreds of dangerous reefs and whatnot that wouldn't have lighthouses without government intervention.)

    It's the same thing with justice, if you think about it. If someone can just "opt out" of the justice system, then they're free to commit crimes and get away with it. If some people can just decide the rules don't apply to them, then the rules are meaningless for everyone.

    Also, we discussed it earlier in this thread, but you can pretty much opt out of government and society. If you're making little enough money, the government won't bother you about taxes. If you go live in the middle of the wilderness where you're not benefiting from public infrastructure, nobody will bother you about anything! Unless you cause a fire or try to build a dam or do something that will effect other people, of course.

    I am sorry, but this is absolutely not true. You cannot opt out of society - You benefit from society in a million different ways even if you're a survivalist living off game in the mountains.

    Agreed. If you're off in the mountains, you're enjoying not being shot at by warlord tribes, clean air and water provided by environmental regulations, and when you fall down a canyon and break your legs the park rangers will be helping you out or burying your body when they come across it in a few weeks.

    I guess you could opt out by running deep deep into the Rockies or the desert or the Canadian wilderness or Mexico, but even then.

    There's really only one way you can opt out of society, but you have several choices on how to go about it.

    Lh96QHG.png
  • QuidQuid Definitely not a banana Registered User regular
    In the end, no one has the "advantage in force" over everyone, and people who might have the advantage in force are plenty willing to work with others for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that it's just in their self interest not to go around murdering everyone they can get their hands on. I mean, think about this. Is the only reason that you haven't murdered someone purely because you're afraid of the government?

    The reason I don't worry about going for a walk at night is because of government.

    The reason people get aid they desperately need and I wouldn't provide out of ignorance or indifference is because of government.

    Also A still has the advantage of force over the other two. They pay taxes (food) and A provides a service (protection). Note that they can not opt out either. If they do, he has no reason not to steal their food as he will starve.

  • BehemothBehemoth Compulsive Seashell Collector Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    poshniallo wrote: »
    Behemoth wrote: »
    You still do not seem to have answered the fundamental question of how society regulates itself without somebody having a monopoly on force.

    I mean, if in an anarchist society I really like my neighbor's house, and I kill him and move in, what happens? Presumably if I do this enough times other people collectively go 'this sucks' and come deal with me.

    The problem is that this isn't fundamentally different from what the state does! You're just talking about people determining what force is and is not legitimate on an ad hoc basis, rather than institutionalizing that decision by means of government.

    Well, I think that the notion is that the community together would essentially figure out "the rules." Then it would be the case that you would opt in to those rules in order to get certain benefits, such as the protections of those rules. So you give up the ability to bash other people over the head and in return no one can bash you over the head either.

    You may think that this looks a lot like our society does today. There's one difference though. You get a choice. You can choose not to participate. You can't do that in any country today. You can't just say, "nope, don't want the protection" in Kansas. The government doesn't allow that. This is the fundamental difference between a group that determines itself and one that doesn't.

    Again though, I'm not an expert here. And this isn't even a position that I agree with, so don't rake me over the coals here.

    Well, this seems to be mostly a result of the fact that protection is something that is very difficult to give and take away. Unless that protection is in the form of just handing the person a gun, anyway. It's the public good problem, which is one of the things that economists generally believe the government has to have a hand in or it just doesn't happen. You don't get national defense without someone collecting taxes and organizing it, because if people don't pay (free ride) then nobody will want to pay and it doesn't happen. National defense is the most obvious, but this is also a problem with public safety things like lighthouses.

    (Incidentally, they've fully explored the lighthouse thing on the Planet Money podcast. First they discovered that merchants in port towns used to build lighthouses without government intervention! Take that government! But then they found out that towns would only build lighthouses near their harbors, and there were still hundreds of dangerous reefs and whatnot that wouldn't have lighthouses without government intervention.)

    It's the same thing with justice, if you think about it. If someone can just "opt out" of the justice system, then they're free to commit crimes and get away with it. If some people can just decide the rules don't apply to them, then the rules are meaningless for everyone.

    Also, we discussed it earlier in this thread, but you can pretty much opt out of government and society. If you're making little enough money, the government won't bother you about taxes. If you go live in the middle of the wilderness where you're not benefiting from public infrastructure, nobody will bother you about anything! Unless you cause a fire or try to build a dam or do something that will effect other people, of course.

    I am sorry, but this is absolutely not true. You cannot opt out of society - You benefit from society in a million different ways even if you're a survivalist living off game in the mountains.

    Well, yes, you're still benefiting from national defense (Hey! North Korea! It's totally okay if you attack that guy. Over there. But only him!) and conservation laws and whatnot. But you can totally opt out of taxes by being dirt poor and/or living in the wilderness.

    EDIT: I realize now that this isn't as relevant to the current discussion as it was earlier (when we were arguing with that other anarchist who equated taxes to being robbed at gunpoint) but OH WELL.

    Behemoth on
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  • poshnialloposhniallo Registered User regular
    Behemoth wrote: »
    poshniallo wrote: »
    Behemoth wrote: »
    You still do not seem to have answered the fundamental question of how society regulates itself without somebody having a monopoly on force.

    I mean, if in an anarchist society I really like my neighbor's house, and I kill him and move in, what happens? Presumably if I do this enough times other people collectively go 'this sucks' and come deal with me.

    The problem is that this isn't fundamentally different from what the state does! You're just talking about people determining what force is and is not legitimate on an ad hoc basis, rather than institutionalizing that decision by means of government.

    Well, I think that the notion is that the community together would essentially figure out "the rules." Then it would be the case that you would opt in to those rules in order to get certain benefits, such as the protections of those rules. So you give up the ability to bash other people over the head and in return no one can bash you over the head either.

    You may think that this looks a lot like our society does today. There's one difference though. You get a choice. You can choose not to participate. You can't do that in any country today. You can't just say, "nope, don't want the protection" in Kansas. The government doesn't allow that. This is the fundamental difference between a group that determines itself and one that doesn't.

    Again though, I'm not an expert here. And this isn't even a position that I agree with, so don't rake me over the coals here.

    Well, this seems to be mostly a result of the fact that protection is something that is very difficult to give and take away. Unless that protection is in the form of just handing the person a gun, anyway. It's the public good problem, which is one of the things that economists generally believe the government has to have a hand in or it just doesn't happen. You don't get national defense without someone collecting taxes and organizing it, because if people don't pay (free ride) then nobody will want to pay and it doesn't happen. National defense is the most obvious, but this is also a problem with public safety things like lighthouses.

    (Incidentally, they've fully explored the lighthouse thing on the Planet Money podcast. First they discovered that merchants in port towns used to build lighthouses without government intervention! Take that government! But then they found out that towns would only build lighthouses near their harbors, and there were still hundreds of dangerous reefs and whatnot that wouldn't have lighthouses without government intervention.)

    It's the same thing with justice, if you think about it. If someone can just "opt out" of the justice system, then they're free to commit crimes and get away with it. If some people can just decide the rules don't apply to them, then the rules are meaningless for everyone.

    Also, we discussed it earlier in this thread, but you can pretty much opt out of government and society. If you're making little enough money, the government won't bother you about taxes. If you go live in the middle of the wilderness where you're not benefiting from public infrastructure, nobody will bother you about anything! Unless you cause a fire or try to build a dam or do something that will effect other people, of course.

    I am sorry, but this is absolutely not true. You cannot opt out of society - You benefit from society in a million different ways even if you're a survivalist living off game in the mountains.

    Well, yes, you're still benefiting from national defense (Hey! North Korea! It's totally okay if you attack that guy. Over there. But only him!) and conservation laws and whatnot. But you can totally opt out of taxes by being dirt poor and/or living in the wilderness.

    Depends on your taxation system. Some governments tax people at a flat rate for being a resident of an area. Some don't. Some charge less if you are poor. Some don't.

    You're not opting out of taxation just because the government hasn't charged you anything this year. You still get the benefits of taxation, and the government still claims the right to tax you if it desires to.

    I figure I could take a bear.
  • IskraIskra Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    Iskra wrote: »
    You still do not seem to have answered the fundamental question of how society regulates itself without somebody having a monopoly on force.

    I mean, if in an anarchist society I really like my neighbor's house, and I kill him and move in, what happens? Presumably if I do this enough times other people collectively go 'this sucks' and come deal with me.

    The problem is that this isn't fundamentally different from what the state does! You're just talking about people determining what force is and is not legitimate on an ad hoc basis, rather than institutionalizing that decision by means of government.

    Well, I think that the notion is that the community together would essentially figure out "the rules." Then it would be the case that you would opt in to those rules in order to get certain benefits, such as the protections of those rules. So you give up the ability to bash other people over the head and in return no one can bash you over the head either.

    You may think that this looks a lot like our society does today. There's one difference though. You get a choice. You can choose not to participate. You can't do that in any country today. You can't just say, "nope, don't want the protection" in Kansas. The government doesn't allow that. This is the fundamental difference between a group that determines itself and one that doesn't.

    Again though, I'm not an expert here. And this isn't even a position that I agree with, so don't rake me over the coals here.

    Sure but see, who's going to opt in and who isn't?

    The community that wants to live peacefully? Most likely will choose to abide by the rules.

    The dude with his small well armed militia? He's probably not going to surrender the advantage that he has by nature of his superior force just because the community asks him really really nicely to not translate his military superiority into vast material wealth and comfort by shooting people in the head.

    End result is, the people who have the advantage in force will exploit that advantage at the expense of everyone else. And since "everyone else" is composed of those who felt the lacked sufficient force to eke out an advantage, they get steamrolled into slavery or mass graves for their precious land and resources.


    (I realize this isn't your personal position on the matter, so I'm not attacking you here. Just pointing out why this is incredibly unstable, and will end poorly every time.)

    I think that this isn't really as forceful an argument as everyone believes. So let us say that we have three people. A, B, and C. A has a gun, and B and C don't. A is also hungry, and has no food. B and C both have food. You think that the most likely scenario is that A simply goes and kills B and C or enslaves them and takes their food (thereby making B and C starve). It wouldn't occur to A to trade with B and C? Maybe offer them protection in exchange for food? Then A can't simply just kill B and C, or he doesn't get any food, and B and C have a good reason to accept A's offer, because it ends up that they might need protection. I think that it's plausible that this would happen at least once. Okay, now we have D. Now D is short sighted, and doesn't give a shit about killing people. He wants to just kill B and C and take their stuff. But A is protecting them, and since D doesn't want to die, he's frightened off.

    See, while you accuse the anarchist of thinking that everyone is full of sunshine and rainbows you seem to hold the idea firmly that every single person is a total fuckwad who wants nothing more than the murder his neighbor and steal his stuff. Now, honestly, I think that most people are just fine and dandy working with others for mutual benefit. I think that the people who just want to kill other people and take their stuff are rare, and usually driven to do so by some need, and the inability to fill that need any other way. I think that the number of those rare people who just want to kill, rape, and murder are probably smaller than the people who are willing to defend themselves and their neighbors. Most small communities are more than a little anarchic, and they seem to not have rampant problems with theft and murder. Most people are able to get along well with their fellows.

    In the end, no one has the "advantage in force" over everyone, and people who might have the advantage in force are plenty willing to work with others for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that it's just in their self interest not to go around murdering everyone they can get their hands on. I mean, think about this. Is the only reason that you haven't murdered someone purely because you're afraid of the government?

    I think that A uses his force to take B and C's stuff if he thinks he can do so without a credible risk of failure, yes. In small communities where everyone is interdependent on each other for survival, and everyone sees their neighbors as actual people (as per the monkeysphere concept), it might be possible to rely on decency to prevent outright murder for property. On a larger scale? Human history is full of bandits, pirates, and raiders of all colors and flavors.

    I mean hypothetical case here. New York City is run as an anarchist community, and somehow manages to support its current population density and infrastructure. As an anarchist city-state, there is no government, and most certainly no unified police force. One night, the power goes out. What is the more likely result here, mass looting and violence as people opportunistically steal more property for themselves and destroy the property of others they hold grudges against during the time when there is effectively zero chance of repercussions? Or everyone spontaneously organizes into community police task forces who patrol the streets and stave off theft through some highly armed concept of mutually assured destruction should one group start looting?

    Hell, even the best case second scenario is a ridiculously highly charged situation. If people I don't know, who I have had no contact with and therefore can make no character judgement about them, are massed with guns across the street from me, I'm going to be pretty damn nervous. I'd love for them to not be a band of murderous thieves, but I'm sure as hell going to be watching them to see if they make a hostile move. And they're going to be doing the same to me. After all, how would one tell the difference between a roving band of bandits looking for a target of opportunity vs the local peacekeepers? One guy on either side moves too quickly, or points his gun in the wrong spot, and oops, we've started a war. And of course the anarchist solution is to call in reinforcements so.....

    Going back to your example, A might protect B and C, sure. If he does so with their consent, hes now established a monopoly on the legitimate use of force, and has become their police and governing body. Welcome to statehood! In all likelihood though he does so by saying "I have a gun, give me as much of your food as you can without starving so that you can produce more food for me in the future", and now he's their feudal lord. Hurray freedom?

    The only way in which a plurality of force doesn't devlove into conquest, is in some sort of situation where all sides are equally matched, and you effectively have mutually assured destruction. I'm not sure living in a state of perpetual cold war with every other community is particularly desirable, nor is it anywhere near a stable arrangement that would last and foster prosperity.

    Iskra on
  • BehemothBehemoth Compulsive Seashell Collector Registered User regular
    poshniallo wrote: »
    Behemoth wrote: »
    poshniallo wrote: »
    Behemoth wrote: »
    You still do not seem to have answered the fundamental question of how society regulates itself without somebody having a monopoly on force.

    I mean, if in an anarchist society I really like my neighbor's house, and I kill him and move in, what happens? Presumably if I do this enough times other people collectively go 'this sucks' and come deal with me.

    The problem is that this isn't fundamentally different from what the state does! You're just talking about people determining what force is and is not legitimate on an ad hoc basis, rather than institutionalizing that decision by means of government.

    Well, I think that the notion is that the community together would essentially figure out "the rules." Then it would be the case that you would opt in to those rules in order to get certain benefits, such as the protections of those rules. So you give up the ability to bash other people over the head and in return no one can bash you over the head either.

    You may think that this looks a lot like our society does today. There's one difference though. You get a choice. You can choose not to participate. You can't do that in any country today. You can't just say, "nope, don't want the protection" in Kansas. The government doesn't allow that. This is the fundamental difference between a group that determines itself and one that doesn't.

    Again though, I'm not an expert here. And this isn't even a position that I agree with, so don't rake me over the coals here.

    Well, this seems to be mostly a result of the fact that protection is something that is very difficult to give and take away. Unless that protection is in the form of just handing the person a gun, anyway. It's the public good problem, which is one of the things that economists generally believe the government has to have a hand in or it just doesn't happen. You don't get national defense without someone collecting taxes and organizing it, because if people don't pay (free ride) then nobody will want to pay and it doesn't happen. National defense is the most obvious, but this is also a problem with public safety things like lighthouses.

    (Incidentally, they've fully explored the lighthouse thing on the Planet Money podcast. First they discovered that merchants in port towns used to build lighthouses without government intervention! Take that government! But then they found out that towns would only build lighthouses near their harbors, and there were still hundreds of dangerous reefs and whatnot that wouldn't have lighthouses without government intervention.)

    It's the same thing with justice, if you think about it. If someone can just "opt out" of the justice system, then they're free to commit crimes and get away with it. If some people can just decide the rules don't apply to them, then the rules are meaningless for everyone.

    Also, we discussed it earlier in this thread, but you can pretty much opt out of government and society. If you're making little enough money, the government won't bother you about taxes. If you go live in the middle of the wilderness where you're not benefiting from public infrastructure, nobody will bother you about anything! Unless you cause a fire or try to build a dam or do something that will effect other people, of course.

    I am sorry, but this is absolutely not true. You cannot opt out of society - You benefit from society in a million different ways even if you're a survivalist living off game in the mountains.

    Well, yes, you're still benefiting from national defense (Hey! North Korea! It's totally okay if you attack that guy. Over there. But only him!) and conservation laws and whatnot. But you can totally opt out of taxes by being dirt poor and/or living in the wilderness.

    Depends on your taxation system. Some governments tax people at a flat rate for being a resident of an area. Some don't. Some charge less if you are poor. Some don't.

    You're not opting out of taxation just because the government hasn't charged you anything this year. You still get the benefits of taxation, and the government still claims the right to tax you if it desires to.

    True!

    I concede the point. My use of the wording "opt out" was not appropriate. You can dodge taxes by being dirt poor in America because we have a somewhat progressive tax system. At least on a national level.

    iQbUbQsZXyt8I.png
  • LucidLucid Registered User regular
    What is the anarchist defense against marketing strategy and manipulation? While still woefully inadequate, at least now we have governmental organizations and regulation that monitor abuses in this area.

  • chocoboliciouschocobolicious Registered User regular
    _J_ wrote: »
    Lucid wrote: »
    _J_ wrote: »
    _J_ wrote: »
    Again though, I'm not an expert here. And this isn't even a position that I agree with, so don't rake me over the coals here.

    Can I point out that the majority of substantive arguments made in this thread, on behalf of anarchism, are made by persons who are not anarchists, and do not maintain anarchist beliefs?

    We've had a few anarchists pop in, say some crazy things, and then pop out. Yet we've maintained a discussion by means of, primarily, it seems, devil's advocate posts.

    That's weird, right?

    If you'll allow me to play devil's advocate, I'd argue that it isn't weird if the purpose of discussion is to examine different points of view rather than convince PA to form our own anarcho-collectivist compound off in the backwoods of Arkansas.

    I see these boards as a sort of informal debate club, so people playing DA doesn't strike me as odd as it possibly should.

    I didn't mean "weird" in a bad sense. It's just that, usually, we have genuine arguments on both sides.

    In this thread, however, we have crazy people, Devil's Advocates, and then everyone else.

    I like it, and it's a fun argument to watch play out...but I wish we had some true believers in anarchism who could actually articulate coherent arguments in defense of their beliefs.

    I think part of it is that the anarchy/libertarian posters in this thread still haven't gotten past the righteousness phase, in terms of argument. I mean, sometimes it's prudent and even necessary to step outside of what you deem to be the most believable ideology or system. It seems these posters are stuck on the being right part, it's almost personal that their beliefs are being challenged as such.

    I find it strange that some people treat their ideas / beliefs like baby kitties, tucked safely in a box under a warm blankie, lest someone disrupt them.

    I'd think persons would want to battle their ideas / beliefs against others.

    It's like pokemon. If you just keep your idea in your pokeball you're doing it wrong. If you don't let them out to battle, they never get a chance to grow or develop.

    So basically what you're saying is that some people are intellectually the equivalent of catching a team full of zigzagoon simply to walk around outside the grass and snag a few random but generally worthless items with pickup.

    I enjoy this comparison.

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  • Eat it You Nasty Pig.Eat it You Nasty Pig. tell homeland security 'we are the bomb'Registered User regular
    You still do not seem to have answered the fundamental question of how society regulates itself without somebody having a monopoly on force.

    I mean, if in an anarchist society I really like my neighbor's house, and I kill him and move in, what happens? Presumably if I do this enough times other people collectively go 'this sucks' and come deal with me.

    The problem is that this isn't fundamentally different from what the state does! You're just talking about people determining what force is and is not legitimate on an ad hoc basis, rather than institutionalizing that decision by means of government.

    Well, I think that the notion is that the community together would essentially figure out "the rules." Then it would be the case that you would opt in to those rules in order to get certain benefits, such as the protections of those rules. So you give up the ability to bash other people over the head and in return no one can bash you over the head either.

    You may think that this looks a lot like our society does today. There's one difference though. You get a choice. You can choose not to participate. You can't do that in any country today. You can't just say, "nope, don't want the protection" in Kansas. The government doesn't allow that. This is the fundamental difference between a group that determines itself and one that doesn't.

    So, anarchist society makes rules to govern itself, and everyone who agrees to be bound by those rules is also offered their protection.

    What happens to the people who don't agree? Let's say I've opted out of the rules. How does this anarchist society address me? Presumably if I were to just start stealing things or something I'd be sanctioned in some way, but by what authority? I didn't opt into any rules.

    NREqxl5.jpg
    it was the smallest on the list but
    Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
  • notdroidnotdroid Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    You still do not seem to have answered the fundamental question of how society regulates itself without somebody having a monopoly on force.

    I mean, if in an anarchist society I really like my neighbor's house, and I kill him and move in, what happens? Presumably if I do this enough times other people collectively go 'this sucks' and come deal with me.

    The problem is that this isn't fundamentally different from what the state does! You're just talking about people determining what force is and is not legitimate on an ad hoc basis, rather than institutionalizing that decision by means of government.

    Well, I think that the notion is that the community together would essentially figure out "the rules." Then it would be the case that you would opt in to those rules in order to get certain benefits, such as the protections of those rules. So you give up the ability to bash other people over the head and in return no one can bash you over the head either.

    You may think that this looks a lot like our society does today. There's one difference though. You get a choice. You can choose not to participate. You can't do that in any country today. You can't just say, "nope, don't want the protection" in Kansas. The government doesn't allow that. This is the fundamental difference between a group that determines itself and one that doesn't.

    So, anarchist society makes rules to govern itself, and everyone who agrees to be bound by those rules is also offered their protection.

    What happens to the people who don't agree? Let's say I've opted out of the rules. How does this anarchist society address me? Presumably if I were to just start stealing things or something I'd be sanctioned in some way, but by what authority? I didn't opt into any rules.

    That's essentially why the whole "monopoly of force is bad" argument doesn't make much sense as a justification for anarchism. When push comes to shove, the "final" way to stop a specific, unwanted behavior will always be violence. It is deplorable and should be a last resort, but it is nonetheless reality. I guess since anarchists reject the idea of a single entity ("the State") wielding the power to harm and/or punish others, that leaves them with 3 options (?):

    1) Not do anything to stop you and let you steal (or kill/rape/pillage/etc.) freely. Which is worse.
    2) Have multiple entities try to punish you --> Plurality of violence, because having 1 group harming someone is bad, but having multiple groups is OK? And as someone above me posted, it's fucking terrifying, and it's much, much worse. At best, that's mob justice.
    3) Rainbows and sunshine and bunnies and flowers! People don't steal or commit violent crimes if there's no government around, why would you invent things like this?

    notdroid on
  • OctoparrotOctoparrot Registered User regular
    An intro to why this argument seems disingenuous:
    rayofash wrote: »
    >This is how anarchy works. This is what you're suggesting we return to. When two groups disagree over resources, slaughter.

    Really? All disagreements devolve into slaughters? Wow, remind me never go to a buffet with you.
    The comparison isn't good because government services are not pizza.

    When the metaphor works for you, use it. When it doesn't, it's a bad metaphor.

    (Also I don't think fighting over resources would occur at a buffet)

  • V1mV1m Registered User regular
    Iskra wrote: »
    You still do not seem to have answered the fundamental question of how society regulates itself without somebody having a monopoly on force.

    I mean, if in an anarchist society I really like my neighbor's house, and I kill him and move in, what happens? Presumably if I do this enough times other people collectively go 'this sucks' and come deal with me.

    The problem is that this isn't fundamentally different from what the state does! You're just talking about people determining what force is and is not legitimate on an ad hoc basis, rather than institutionalizing that decision by means of government.

    Well, I think that the notion is that the community together would essentially figure out "the rules." Then it would be the case that you would opt in to those rules in order to get certain benefits, such as the protections of those rules. So you give up the ability to bash other people over the head and in return no one can bash you over the head either.

    You may think that this looks a lot like our society does today. There's one difference though. You get a choice. You can choose not to participate. You can't do that in any country today. You can't just say, "nope, don't want the protection" in Kansas. The government doesn't allow that. This is the fundamental difference between a group that determines itself and one that doesn't.

    Again though, I'm not an expert here. And this isn't even a position that I agree with, so don't rake me over the coals here.

    Sure but see, who's going to opt in and who isn't?

    The community that wants to live peacefully? Most likely will choose to abide by the rules.

    The dude with his small well armed militia? He's probably not going to surrender the advantage that he has by nature of his superior force just because the community asks him really really nicely to not translate his military superiority into vast material wealth and comfort by shooting people in the head.

    End result is, the people who have the advantage in force will exploit that advantage at the expense of everyone else. And since "everyone else" is composed of those who felt the lacked sufficient force to eke out an advantage, they get steamrolled into slavery or mass graves for their precious land and resources.


    (I realize this isn't your personal position on the matter, so I'm not attacking you here. Just pointing out why this is incredibly unstable, and will end poorly every time.)

    I think that this isn't really as forceful an argument as everyone believes. So let us say that we have three people. A, B, and C. A has a gun, and B and C don't. A is also hungry, and has no food. B and C both have food. You think that the most likely scenario is that A simply goes and kills B and C or enslaves them and takes their food (thereby making B and C starve). It wouldn't occur to A to trade with B and C? Maybe offer them protection in exchange for food? Then A can't simply just kill B and C, or he doesn't get any food, and B and C have a good reason to accept A's offer, because it ends up that they might need protection. I think that it's plausible that this would happen at least once. Okay, now we have D. Now D is short sighted, and doesn't give a shit about killing people. He wants to just kill B and C and take their stuff. But A is protecting them, and since D doesn't want to die, he's frightened off.

    See, while you accuse the anarchist of thinking that everyone is full of sunshine and rainbows you seem to hold the idea firmly that every single person is a total fuckwad who wants nothing more than the murder his neighbor and steal his stuff. Now, honestly, I think that most people are just fine and dandy working with others for mutual benefit. I think that the people who just want to kill other people and take their stuff are rare, and usually driven to do so by some need, and the inability to fill that need any other way. I think that the number of those rare people who just want to kill, rape, and murder are probably smaller than the people who are willing to defend themselves and their neighbors. Most small communities are more than a little anarchic, and they seem to not have rampant problems with theft and murder. Most people are able to get along well with their fellows.

    In the end, no one has the "advantage in force" over everyone, and people who might have the advantage in force are plenty willing to work with others for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that it's just in their self interest not to go around murdering everyone they can get their hands on. I mean, think about this. Is the only reason that you haven't murdered someone purely because you're afraid of the government?

    Counerpoint: Somalia

  • mcdermottmcdermott Registered User regular
    I think that this isn't really as forceful an argument as everyone believes. So let us say that we have three people. A, B, and C. A has a gun, and B and C don't. A is also hungry, and has no food. B and C both have food. You think that the most likely scenario is that A simply goes and kills B and C or enslaves them and takes their food (thereby making B and C starve). It wouldn't occur to A to trade with B and C? Maybe offer them protection in exchange for food? Then A can't simply just kill B and C, or he doesn't get any food...

    Actually, for as long as A has the gun, this option is still open to him at any time. For instance, if somebody undercuts A in the protection game, or B and C feel more secure and decide they don't need protection anymore, A can still just kill them and take their food.

    In fact, it's entirely likely that A is offering "protection" in less than good faith, and that given an actual aggressor coming after B and C he'd steal what he could and bounce, leaving them to their devices. Really what you're describing is more likely to wind up as an old-school protection racket, where what B and C are really paying A for is protection from A. And not much else.

    ...and B and C have a good reason to accept A's offer, because it ends up that they might need protection. I think that it's plausible that this would happen at least once. Okay, now we have D. Now D is short sighted, and doesn't give a shit about killing people. He wants to just kill B and C and take their stuff. But A is protecting them, and since D doesn't want to die, he's frightened off.

    Maybe he is, maybe he isn't. On the other hand, you're still describing a world where I'm being extorted by one gunslinger to protect me from another. Freedom!

    See, while you accuse the anarchist of thinking that everyone is full of sunshine and rainbows you seem to hold the idea firmly that every single person is a total fuckwad who wants nothing more than the murder his neighbor and steal his stuff.

    Not every single person.

    But the ratio doesn't need to be all that high for things to go sideways.

  • mcdermottmcdermott Registered User regular
    Also, all this "mutual benefit" thing only works if resources are plentiful enough to provide for everybody. As soon as you have a shortage? Yeah, see Somalia. Because when food becomes a game of musical chairs, you can bet your ass the guy with the gun will be sitting when the music stops.

  • ThanatosThanatos Registered User regular
    mcdermott wrote: »
    I think that this isn't really as forceful an argument as everyone believes. So let us say that we have three people. A, B, and C. A has a gun, and B and C don't. A is also hungry, and has no food. B and C both have food. You think that the most likely scenario is that A simply goes and kills B and C or enslaves them and takes their food (thereby making B and C starve). It wouldn't occur to A to trade with B and C? Maybe offer them protection in exchange for food? Then A can't simply just kill B and C, or he doesn't get any food...

    Actually, for as long as A has the gun, this option is still open to him at any time. For instance, if somebody undercuts A in the protection game, or B and C feel more secure and decide they don't need protection anymore, A can still just kill them and take their food.

    In fact, it's entirely likely that A is offering "protection" in less than good faith, and that given an actual aggressor coming after B and C he'd steal what he could and bounce, leaving them to their devices. Really what you're describing is more likely to wind up as an old-school protection racket, where what B and C are really paying A for is protection from A. And not much else.
    Also keep in mind that a gun is an incredibly asymmetrical weapon. It is far more useful for killing someone and taking their stuff than it is for protecting someone from someone else with a gun.

    Unless D is dumb enough to let A know he's coming, he's almost certainly going to win that fight.

  • Kipling217Kipling217 Registered User regular
    mcdermott wrote: »
    Also, all this "mutual benefit" thing only works if resources are plentiful enough to provide for everybody. As soon as you have a shortage? Yeah, see Somalia. Because when food becomes a game of musical chairs, you can bet your ass the guy with the gun will be sitting when the music stops.

    Or to put it in Rayofash's terms: If there is only enough food to feed B and C. Either B or C is going to be out of luck, because A has got a gun and he will make damn sure he isn't starving.

    There is no scenario in which A is going to starve. There are several scenarios where B an C are shit out of luck because A screwed them over. Yes, there is a scenario where A, B and C work together peacefully, but it is the only one. Its not even the most likely scenario.


    Ray, this is your scenario.., that you made.., to prove your theory... and it doesn't even work in theory.

    I think its time you admit that your theory doesn't work.

    The sky was full of stars, every star an exploding ship. One of ours.
  • QuidQuid Definitely not a banana Registered User regular
    Kipling217 wrote: »
    mcdermott wrote: »
    Also, all this "mutual benefit" thing only works if resources are plentiful enough to provide for everybody. As soon as you have a shortage? Yeah, see Somalia. Because when food becomes a game of musical chairs, you can bet your ass the guy with the gun will be sitting when the music stops.

    Or to put it in Rayofash's terms: If there is only enough food to feed B and C. Either B or C is going to be out of luck, because A has got a gun and he will make damn sure he isn't starving.

    There is no scenario in which A is going to starve. There are several scenarios where B an C are shit out of luck because A screwed them over. Yes, there is a scenario where A, B and C work together peacefully, but it is the only one. Its not even the most likely scenario.


    Ray, this is your scenario.., that you made.., to prove your theory... and it doesn't even work in theory.

    I think its time you admit that your theory doesn't work.

    Loser came up with that theory, not ray.

    Ray has presumably given up on the idea as per his last post. At least until he comes back.

  • LoserForHireXLoserForHireX Philosopher King The AcademyRegistered User regular
    I'm going to try to respond to everyone at once, instead of piecemeal. It might make it harder, might make it easier.

    I'm sympathetic to the argument that any anarchic society is going to eventually develop into a state. The only people who I've known to intelligently hold anarchic beliefs don't seem to have an answer to that question. I tend to think that while anarchism is nice (I guess), it'll eventually become a state.

    The issue with it not immediately being a state though is that anarchists tend to have a very narrow concept of what a state is. I'm not sure they're entirely off base with it though. So something that you explicitly consent to isn't a state, because in theory you will be literally contractually bound, and your contract will have an opt out clause. So if you don't like the way things are going, you pull out.

    As for the whole "what happens to people who opt out?" That I'm not entirely sure of either. It's never made a lot of sense to me, but I can give a shot at perhaps a plausible answer. No one can actually survive on their own. At some point, you're either going to have to be far far geographically removed from other people, or you're going to have to join up with SOME group of people. Now, you may be able to pick a group that has the rules that you want to live by, unlike the state system of today, where you don't get to pick where you live (otherwise there would be far more citizens of the US).

    As for the Somalia people, do you really want to get into a match where we talk about the atrocities perpetrated by states with a monopoly on power against places with no state? Because I can guarantee you the anarchist wins that discussion. Of course, when you look at things like Nazi Germany, or Stalinist Russia you say that those are states gone bad. Or they aren't the good states. That states don't necessarily have to be like that, they can be better, yet at the same time, you think every anarchic group has to be Somalia. You can't have it both ways.

    McDermott, you keep attributing violent and deceitful motives to every single human being who has any capability of exerting force. You seem to have a very Hobbsian view of humanity, like we're all barely constrained monsters that will kill others at the drop of a hat. If I'm starving, I don't think that I would immediately resort to killing other people for food, and I don't think that it's the State that would prevent me from doing that. I also don't think that I'm somehow special or morally superior to your average person. I think that most people wont resort to theft and murder when things get a little scary.

    Also, we admit that there isn't really a scarcity of resources now, right? We do have enough food to feed people, don't we? So when does this problem of scarcity arise? From where do we get this scarcity of food that drives everyone who might be able to exert force to steal and murder?

    The gun thing, I just picked a gun. I don't care what the weapon is. A tank, a roll of pennies, hope and love, whatever.

    Why isn't the scenario of cooperation the least likely one? Seriously? I think that there are a lot of good arguments against anarchism, but I don't think that the best is "human beings can't work together because we're all selfish assholes." Do you honestly think that the only reason that people are able to cooperate is because of the State? Is that the only reason you are able to cooperate with people? If the State wasn't looking, you think that you would just start killing people and stealing things?

    "The only way to get rid of a temptation is to give into it." - Oscar Wilde
    "We believe in the people and their 'wisdom' as if there was some special secret entrance to knowledge that barred to anyone who had ever learned anything." - Friedrich Nietzsche
  • LolkenLolken Registered User, __BANNED USERS regular
    Goumindong wrote: »
    Yea, I will totally defend that stance with me life! But not my time. No no no; can't be bothered to defend that stance with my time.

    This is probably the most annoying thing possible.

    Look: I simply don't spend time on this forum in the first place. This was literally the first time I have visited in years. I pointed that out to begin with.

    And now I'm leaving, because, as you indicate, I don't have time for this. I'm a student with two jobs and one of the most work-heavy institutions around. I don't have time to be a regular member of some online "community." There's hardly enough time just to chill with my real-world friends around here.

    If I really wanted, I could respond to every single one of your points, all of you. But you outnumber me something like ten to one and it would take a number of hours out of my weekend. Plus it'd be indefinite, because Terra Hypothetica is an infinite land.

    Why do you conclude that just because I don't want to piss away my time like that on some online forum for a video-game comic means that I won't be happy to defend my point in any public context? So you know, this is not the summit of public spheres for debate/argument. My departure has more to do with my wanting to spend my life well. Now I honestly don't mean to judge people who spend all their time on forums like this, I used to do it (when I had time in high school). But I don't have the time. As such, I can't be a regular member (in which case I'd be happy to stay in this thread indefinitely), and instead can only be an anonymous stranger among anonymous strangers (all of whom apparently DO have the time).

    Anyway, you've all been pretty rude. You aren't even the only one who accused me of bad faith *just* because I'm not sticking around. If I was a regular member that'd make perfect sense, but I'm far from it. Just a guy who wanted to check on a place he visited years ago. Then from the outset I have been supposed to prove that anarchy can work-- except this is preposterous from the beginning, because anarchism is, for one thing, a project (and an ethic) that will always be ongoing even after its successes, and you can all choose to ignore even anarchist organizing's remarkable gains just because they weren't complete and total.

    As in Spain: We're talking thousands of factories and workshops that, having been taken over, were run directly and in a federated manner; though the CNT did have an electoral presence in the de jure government, that government did not have much more than a nominal existence due to the extremely active rank-and-file of the unions, which was controlling the streets at that time: the revolt against the army was made by the people of Barcelona, not by a few people who were part of an elected office-- and as such they were in control of the situation on the ground. No police, mostly armed groups of local militias patrolling the streets (What an anarchy looks like at war, I'd say. One at peace would, you can imagine, look different). The State in Barcelona at that time could only exist nominally: the army was being dissolved since it had just tried to impose fascism. There was the Civil Guard, which had been a police force loyal to the Republican government, but they were outnumbered by the armed and rebellious masses, who were rightly suspicious of them: Later, after many of the anarchist fighters had already gone off to the front, the Civil Guard was employed by the (by then) Stalinist government to attack CNT strongholds. Only then did the anarchist's revolution get rolled back: and look at the fucking conditions, a year of total war against a fascist enemy that had the support of Mussolini and Hitler, and fending off the internal designs of a Stalinist faction of Communists. It's stupid and insulting to any observer's intelligence to say that the anarchists failed here because they were anarchists and thus anarchy fails. These were extraordinary men and women doing the best they could with a shitty situation. The point is, while the revolution was ongoing and the rank-and-file militias in the streets had power, anarchists were perfectly capable of running industry and being a productive society. Worker-control of industry is absolutely possible, it's happened, and not only in this instance. So that's proven, I mean, I don't know what else you need. Isn't the point that we acknowledge the redundancy of the bosses, executives, the rentier class, all those parasites who earn wealth just through their idle ownership of property? That's the point as far as I'm concerned: We don't need those people!

    Whether or not the free Spanish lost the war is a moot point. They would have lost it if they remained a nonrevolutionary, republican State. There are plenty who argued, the "Amigos de Durruti" group for instance, that if the revolution had been accelerated, and encouraged in the places where the public had not defeated the initial coup (that is, northern Spain-- anyone familiar with the history of the time knows how potentially revolutionary the Asturias region could have been), then the war could have been won, not as a war, but as a revolution. It just happened that within the CNT of the time there were a lot of people who cautiously decided that "war first, revolution after" was a better idea, and this was a strategic mistake but little else, and certainly not indicative of any inherent nonviability of "anarchism".

    In any case, in my very short time here I've had all kinds of slander pile on me, and people have read into me beliefs that aren't even mine, all in the vaguest, emptiest terms, such as claiming anarchists want to destroy the economy period (as in, not just the notion, but the whole physical infrastructure!) or assuming because I talk about some indigenous people that I am therefore some kind of primitivist? And on top of that seeming to imply that hierarchy (a social, metapysical thing) is necessary even for the existence of technology itself (a physical thing)-- something members of the open-source community would laugh at I'm sure. But not only this, you respond to and corroborate each other's slanders as though they were points, even though they're wildly off from what I was saying, and so amongst yourselves you continue to construct me as some horseshit straw-man. Who is apparently some kind of Joker-esque chaos-worshipper. Thanks for that.

    So yeah, considering this is apparently how yall argue here, I guess I'm just not accustomed to it, and so I'm definitely not sticking around. But accusing me of bad faith on top of it all, just because I'm departing, is the icing on the cake. Seriously? When you all distort ideas like worker self-management into destroying all infrastructure (btw, depending on how that's construed, it can be incredibly fucking offensive to working people)... when that's the kind of distortion I encounter, what the hell am I to do? Maybe if I did already spend a lot of my time here regularly, I would bother to sort out all of your bullshit. But I don't, I have a busy life, and besides I can have much better, more serious, and more illuminating political discussions around here at the university, or over dinner with friends, than I can on this board. And no, before you apply another gratuitously personal ad-hom slander, I'm not just friends with other anarchists, though a number of them have warmed up to my understanding of things after discussion.

    Anyway like I said I don't have time to come here crafting the responses that my opinions deserve, especially if I'm going to be treated like a hostile in some empty one-liner contest from the beginning. There's no reason for me to prove anarchy, it keeps proving itself when workers take over their workplaces anywhere. If anything, you all need to prove the necessity of States, since that's the positive claim; anarchism (notice: an-archism) is just a negative claim (rulers are not necessary) and thus doesn't inherently need any more explanation than "there are no gods."

    So, peace out. I'm off to get things done this weekend. If I have the time later I may eventually return, but I'll only post again if there's something substantial and not mean-spirited enough to respond to, which I doubt will be the case. This has been ridiculously mean-spirited from the beginning and there is no conceivable reason it should be. But I don't expect it to change. So as I said, I might post again but since I'm not going to be a regular here, I'm not going to somehow respond in detail to every criticism that gets leveled. There is no time in my life for it.

    Enjoy yourselves,

    - one anarchist

    tl; dr: "I'm an anarchist silly goose"

  • chrisnlchrisnl Registered User regular
    The point is not that whoever is making the argument will start killing people and stealing things, it is that absent the threat of punishment from a government that there ARE a small portion of people that will do this. It doesn't take many of these people to ruin things for a whole lot of others.

    steam_sig.png
  • mcdermottmcdermott Registered User regular
    McDermott, you keep attributing violent and deceitful motives to every single human being who has any capability of exerting f orce.

    Actually, I specifically said that not all people would act in violent or deceitful manners. Read mah posts, broski.

    Doesn't take many to fuck things up.

  • LoserForHireXLoserForHireX Philosopher King The AcademyRegistered User regular
    edited April 2012
    chrisnl wrote: »
    The point is not that whoever is making the argument will start killing people and stealing things, it is that absent the threat of punishment from a government that there ARE a small portion of people that will do this. It doesn't take many of these people to ruin things for a whole lot of others.

    Three things.

    How many of these people are there? Like, percentage wise of the whole earth's population. 50? 60? 10? I know you certainly can't be exact, but a good estimate that we can work with will do.

    Absent the threat from government isn't absent threat. People can and will still defend themselves. In fact, I'm even betting people will defend each other. There is strength in numbers after all.

    If you allow for the bad guys to band together into groups as well, well then you have people who can actually cooperate, and why are they stealing and murdering? They can and do cooperate with people to maximize resources. So what's their motivation? Love of murder? Do you really think that there are a lot of people out there that just love killing?

    LoserForHireX on
    "The only way to get rid of a temptation is to give into it." - Oscar Wilde
    "We believe in the people and their 'wisdom' as if there was some special secret entrance to knowledge that barred to anyone who had ever learned anything." - Friedrich Nietzsche
  • CasualCasual Wiggle Wiggle Wiggle Flap Flap Flap Registered User regular
    chrisnl wrote: »
    The point is not that whoever is making the argument will start killing people and stealing things, it is that absent the threat of punishment from a government that there ARE a small portion of people that will do this. It doesn't take many of these people to ruin things for a whole lot of others.

    Three things.

    How many of these people are there? Like, percentage wise of the whole earth's population. 50? 60? 10? I know you certainly can't be exact, but a good estimate that we can work with will do.

    Absent the threat from government isn't absent threat. People can and will still defend themselves. In fact, I'm even betting people will defend each other. There is strength in numbers after all.

    If you allow for the bad guys to band together into groups as well, well then you have people who can actually cooperate, and why are they stealing and murdering? They can and do cooperate with people to maximize resources. So what's their motivation? Love of murder? Do you really think that there are a lot of people out there that just love killing?

    Enough. There are enough people like that to fuck your entire system. Fuck, it would only take one self proclaimed warlord to force other people to adopt the same system or face life under his rule. I mean honestly, do you really find it that hard to believe that there are power hungry amoral people? Do you watch/read the news?

    The problem with anarchists is that they think everyone thinks like them (which is especially moronic as there are anarchists who want the governments to fall explicitly so they can live in a feudal warlord system). That no one might take advantage of a power vacuum to get themselves some slaves and harem girls. You're delusional.

  • override367override367 ALL minions Registered User regular
    Octoparrot wrote: »
    An intro to why this argument seems disingenuous:
    rayofash wrote: »
    >This is how anarchy works. This is what you're suggesting we return to. When two groups disagree over resources, slaughter.

    Really? All disagreements devolve into slaughters? Wow, remind me never go to a buffet with you.
    The comparison isn't good because government services are not pizza.

    When the metaphor works for you, use it. When it doesn't, it's a bad metaphor.

    (Also I don't think fighting over resources would occur at a buffet)

    That argument was silly, buffet? Where people can eat as much as they want?

    So we just need to eliminate scarcity, no big deal

  • LoserForHireXLoserForHireX Philosopher King The AcademyRegistered User regular
    edited April 2012
    Casual wrote: »
    chrisnl wrote: »
    The point is not that whoever is making the argument will start killing people and stealing things, it is that absent the threat of punishment from a government that there ARE a small portion of people that will do this. It doesn't take many of these people to ruin things for a whole lot of others.

    Three things.

    How many of these people are there? Like, percentage wise of the whole earth's population. 50? 60? 10? I know you certainly can't be exact, but a good estimate that we can work with will do.

    Absent the threat from government isn't absent threat. People can and will still defend themselves. In fact, I'm even betting people will defend each other. There is strength in numbers after all.

    If you allow for the bad guys to band together into groups as well, well then you have people who can actually cooperate, and why are they stealing and murdering? They can and do cooperate with people to maximize resources. So what's their motivation? Love of murder? Do you really think that there are a lot of people out there that just love killing?

    Enough. There are enough people like that to fuck your entire system. Fuck, it would only take one self proclaimed warlord to force other people to adopt the same system or face life under his rule. I mean honestly, do you really find it that hard to believe that there are power hungry amoral people? Do you watch/read the news?

    The problem with anarchists is that they think everyone thinks like them (which is especially moronic as there are anarchists who want the governments to fall explicitly so they can live in a feudal warlord system). That no one might take advantage of a power vacuum to get themselves some slaves and harem girls. You're delusional.

    Okay, so you're going to take the "bad guys can cooperate but good guys can't" angle. So we've got one bad guy and thirty normal people (that's about a 30% ratio of bad guys in the general populace). What you're saying is that one bad guy will be able to force all 30 of those normal people to live under his oppressive and authoritarian rule with little to no resistance? All by himself? Of course not, so he cooperates with other bad guys, so that they all work together to oppress everyone. So why are they working together to oppress everyone? Do they have some drive to oppress? Do they just want to kill and enslave people? Do they just get off on it? And there are enough people like that such that the whole population can't resist them? Why don't the bad guys work with the normal people and reap the benefits while not exposing themselves to the risks of having to live like warlords?

    I find it hard to believe that the power hungry amoral people are stupid enough not to maximize benefit while minimizing risk.

    LoserForHireX on
    "The only way to get rid of a temptation is to give into it." - Oscar Wilde
    "We believe in the people and their 'wisdom' as if there was some special secret entrance to knowledge that barred to anyone who had ever learned anything." - Friedrich Nietzsche
  • CptHamiltonCptHamilton Registered User regular
    chrisnl wrote: »
    The point is not that whoever is making the argument will start killing people and stealing things, it is that absent the threat of punishment from a government that there ARE a small portion of people that will do this. It doesn't take many of these people to ruin things for a whole lot of others.

    Three things.

    How many of these people are there? Like, percentage wise of the whole earth's population. 50? 60? 10? I know you certainly can't be exact, but a good estimate that we can work with will do.
    Roughly 1% of adults have Antisocial Personality Disorder. Lacking any authority to stop them, at least that 1% will do whatever they feel like doing in order to get what they want. This does not, in any fashion, address the significantly larger percentage of people who either willingly follow a charasmatic but violent leader or people who don't have social disorders but honestly believe that they know better and are willing to use violence to force people to agree with them.
    Absent the threat from government isn't absent threat. People can and will still defend themselves. In fact, I'm even betting people will defend each other. There is strength in numbers after all.

    Defending one another may well be the problem in many cases. A group of people banding together to "protect their community" quickly and easily becomes a lynch mob or a witch hunt.
    If you allow for the bad guys to band together into groups as well, well then you have people who can actually cooperate, and why are they stealing and murdering? They can and do cooperate with people to maximize resources. So what's their motivation? Love of murder? Do you really think that there are a lot of people out there that just love killing?

    Up to a point it's easier to take than to organize creation. A group of a hundred raiders might be able to cooperate well enough to rape and pillage with everyone basically in it for themselves but working together to the extent required. It's significantly more difficult to organize a group of a hundred people into a functional community with complicated dependencies. Also: it takes a lot less knowledge and sustained effort to steal than it does to farm.

    PSN,Steam,Live | CptHamiltonian
  • OctoparrotOctoparrot Registered User regular
    Octoparrot wrote: »
    An intro to why this argument seems disingenuous:
    rayofash wrote: »
    >This is how anarchy works. This is what you're suggesting we return to. When two groups disagree over resources, slaughter.

    Really? All disagreements devolve into slaughters? Wow, remind me never go to a buffet with you.
    The comparison isn't good because government services are not pizza.

    When the metaphor works for you, use it. When it doesn't, it's a bad metaphor.

    (Also I don't think fighting over resources would occur at a buffet)

    That argument was silly, buffet? Where people can eat as much as they want?

    So we just need to eliminate scarcity, no big deal

    Since we're all playing Devil's Advocate, now.

    "Looks like someone hasn't been to a Shoney's after Sunday service lets out..."

  • PaladinPaladin Registered User regular
    Casual wrote: »
    chrisnl wrote: »
    The point is not that whoever is making the argument will start killing people and stealing things, it is that absent the threat of punishment from a government that there ARE a small portion of people that will do this. It doesn't take many of these people to ruin things for a whole lot of others.

    Three things.

    How many of these people are there? Like, percentage wise of the whole earth's population. 50? 60? 10? I know you certainly can't be exact, but a good estimate that we can work with will do.

    Absent the threat from government isn't absent threat. People can and will still defend themselves. In fact, I'm even betting people will defend each other. There is strength in numbers after all.

    If you allow for the bad guys to band together into groups as well, well then you have people who can actually cooperate, and why are they stealing and murdering? They can and do cooperate with people to maximize resources. So what's their motivation? Love of murder? Do you really think that there are a lot of people out there that just love killing?

    Enough. There are enough people like that to fuck your entire system. Fuck, it would only take one self proclaimed warlord to force other people to adopt the same system or face life under his rule. I mean honestly, do you really find it that hard to believe that there are power hungry amoral people? Do you watch/read the news?

    The problem with anarchists is that they think everyone thinks like them (which is especially moronic as there are anarchists who want the governments to fall explicitly so they can live in a feudal warlord system). That no one might take advantage of a power vacuum to get themselves some slaves and harem girls. You're delusional.

    Okay, so you're going to take the "bad guys can cooperate but good guys can't" angle. So we've got one bad guy and thirty normal people (that's about a 30% ratio of bad guys in the general populace). What you're saying is that one bad guy will be able to force all 30 of those normal people to live under his oppressive and authoritarian rule with little to no resistance? All by himself? Of course not, so he cooperates with other bad guys, so that they all work together to oppress everyone. So why are they working together to oppress everyone? Do they have some drive to oppress? Do they just want to kill and enslave people? Do they just get off on it? And there are enough people like that such that the whole population can't resist them? Why don't the bad guys work with the normal people and reap the benefits while not exposing themselves to the risks of having to live like warlords?

    I find it hard to believe that the power hungry amoral people are stupid enough not to maximize benefit while minimizing risk.

    I don't get how that's different from government

    Marty: The future, it's where you're going?
    Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
  • LoserForHireXLoserForHireX Philosopher King The AcademyRegistered User regular
    Paladin wrote: »
    Casual wrote: »
    chrisnl wrote: »
    The point is not that whoever is making the argument will start killing people and stealing things, it is that absent the threat of punishment from a government that there ARE a small portion of people that will do this. It doesn't take many of these people to ruin things for a whole lot of others.

    Three things.

    How many of these people are there? Like, percentage wise of the whole earth's population. 50? 60? 10? I know you certainly can't be exact, but a good estimate that we can work with will do.

    Absent the threat from government isn't absent threat. People can and will still defend themselves. In fact, I'm even betting people will defend each other. There is strength in numbers after all.

    If you allow for the bad guys to band together into groups as well, well then you have people who can actually cooperate, and why are they stealing and murdering? They can and do cooperate with people to maximize resources. So what's their motivation? Love of murder? Do you really think that there are a lot of people out there that just love killing?

    Enough. There are enough people like that to fuck your entire system. Fuck, it would only take one self proclaimed warlord to force other people to adopt the same system or face life under his rule. I mean honestly, do you really find it that hard to believe that there are power hungry amoral people? Do you watch/read the news?

    The problem with anarchists is that they think everyone thinks like them (which is especially moronic as there are anarchists who want the governments to fall explicitly so they can live in a feudal warlord system). That no one might take advantage of a power vacuum to get themselves some slaves and harem girls. You're delusional.

    Okay, so you're going to take the "bad guys can cooperate but good guys can't" angle. So we've got one bad guy and thirty normal people (that's about a 30% ratio of bad guys in the general populace). What you're saying is that one bad guy will be able to force all 30 of those normal people to live under his oppressive and authoritarian rule with little to no resistance? All by himself? Of course not, so he cooperates with other bad guys, so that they all work together to oppress everyone. So why are they working together to oppress everyone? Do they have some drive to oppress? Do they just want to kill and enslave people? Do they just get off on it? And there are enough people like that such that the whole population can't resist them? Why don't the bad guys work with the normal people and reap the benefits while not exposing themselves to the risks of having to live like warlords?

    I find it hard to believe that the power hungry amoral people are stupid enough not to maximize benefit while minimizing risk.

    I don't get how that's different from government

    In theory the difference is that one can leave the community at any time, and that the organization which evolved has the explicit consent of its members. Which no government on the planet does today. Since the anarchists I know all are obsessed with consent, this is what makes one organization just, and another not.

    "The only way to get rid of a temptation is to give into it." - Oscar Wilde
    "We believe in the people and their 'wisdom' as if there was some special secret entrance to knowledge that barred to anyone who had ever learned anything." - Friedrich Nietzsche
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