
Are you an anarchist? The answer may surprise you (2000) - fallingfrog
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/david-graeber-are-you-an-anarchist-the-answer-may-surprise-you
======
TulliusCicero
> Anarchists are simply people who believe human beings are capable of
> behaving in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to. It is
> really a very simple notion.

This can sound reasonable when you think of it in terms of, " _most_ people
behaving in a reasonable fashion, _most_ of the time". But anarchists don't
want to eliminate hierarchical use of force for _most_ cases, but for _all_ of
them.

Any time I've heard anarchists try to explain how they would deal with the
subset of people who are just real shitty in various ways, the responses have
been either, a) in our utopia, you wouldn't have those problems, because
hierarchy causes all of them, or b) increasingly convoluted and implausible-
sounding ways to deal with crazy assholes without using force.

~~~
marricks
I find it hard to believe you've talked to any real anarchists, or at least
listened to them. People like Noam Chomsky deal with that question extremely
head on. Below is what I said on another comment...

> Absolutely no form of government or system (anarchist 1000% included) will
> solve the problem of people being selfish or bad, all that anarchists
> contend (that I have seen) is that when there isn't those built hierarchies
> bad/selfish people don't amass power so everyone else can actually handle
> them on equal terms.

> Considering how Epstein was able to morph the whole political landscape to
> defend himself for over a decade, uh, any alternative can seem pretty
> reasonable.

Like half the comments on this thread are variations of "well bad people
exist" and it's maddening because bad people exist in this system! And they're
extremely powerful! We 100% do not deal with them largely because of the
systems that are in place.

~~~
bufferoverflow
Hmmm, no, it's a false equivocation. What do you do with really bad / evil
people who got caught doing evil things (there's enough evidence to put them
in prison). I never heard a good answer from an anarchist.

You have to realize there are truly evil people out there. People who will
assault innocent people, who will torture, who will rape, who will murder, who
will do all of the above to a toddler. And will force the parents to watch. I
don't want to live in a society where such people are simply let go, or get
some bullshit therapy and let go.

~~~
marricks
I mean, do you like that those people get off now if they’re powerful? Or if a
cop decides to do that either nothing happens or they get let go with a
million dollar pension?

At least in a flat society you’d have an equal say to advocate for w/e you
thought is just.

Personally for me, and many others who lean left, prison or death doesn’t sit
right because it doesn’t address the root of the problem and it’s often used
to quash dissent. This is perhaps what you find unsatisfying but if you were
magically placed into an anarchist community you’d have more ability to
advocate for what you thought was fair.

~~~
bbarnett
Holy whataboutism!

With no laws, no police, no jails, no courts, and no justice system, _everyone
on of those incredibly evil people mention in the prior comment_ goes 100%
free to continue their reign of terror.

Yet, of course, that's exactly the same as some people who slip through the
cracks of a justice system that catches many such people a year. Prosecutes
them with attempts to be fair. Puts them in jail so they can't hurt others.

Yup. Because someone might slip through the cracks, well.. that's precisely
the same as what the prior poster said!

What a false equivalency.

~~~
marricks
I mean sure in a society where no one holds anyone accountable that would
happen. That’s not what anyone is actually advocating for.

~~~
bbarnett
You cannot just give people stern looks.

The end result is, you need to be able to use violence, against those willing
to use it against you. Note, that can be a last step, but without it?

Those who care not about stern looks, "talking tos", or cold shoulders will
literally take everything you have, and kill everyone.

So now you fall to mob rule, lynchings, and what? Power of the strong man?

As soon as you organize, to provide for a response to organized
thugs/criminals/rapists/murderers, you now have a government. That's how
governments came into creation ; shared defense.

And you need that 24x7. And the people doing it for the community need to be
paid. And you need a way to judge, and sentence, and on and on and on.

You cannot simply wave this away.

~~~
bena
Thank you. Government is the logical conclusion of anarchy. The minute you
have two people who want to do something together, you need rules.

~~~
natmaka
Why can't they establish their cooperation rules between them, using existing
static material (contract templates...) if they want to, without any third-
party (for example a government) being mandatory?

~~~
bena
First, who enforces the contract?

Second, it doesn't really matter. Two people working together is pretty much
politics. It's government. It leads there. Cooperation requires coordination.

~~~
natmaka
> who enforces the contract?

In any healthy small community everyone tries to, in order to keep a good
reputation. In case of misunderstanding any third party appreciated by both
parties may act as a judge/referee. The need for a government, especially
central, only arises when the group isn't anymore a community but a large set
of (on average) loosely related and interacting persons.

> Two people working together is pretty much politics. It's government. It
> leads there. Cooperation requires coordination

Coordination nor politics doesn't imply any government.

~~~
bufferoverflow
And thus you invented government. As soon as you have an independent third
party deciding who is right, that's your judicial branch. And then you will
need the police to enforce the decisions of that judge/referee.

And then when you start having insane judges who rule that raping a child is
perfectly fine, you will want to stop it, and thus you will invent your
standardized laws.

~~~
natmaka
> As soon as you have an independent third party deciding who is right, that's
> your judicial branch

There IMHO is major differences between "a single government, dedicated to
regulate" (which attracts people willing to control others, often letting the
most unscrupulous gain power) and "any chosen third party".

Where most people are most of the time reasonable they will oppose insanity,
if necessary forcefully.

~~~
bufferoverflow
People who are reasonable most of the time don't need that much laws to govern
them. It's the cases of conflict, violence, murder, property ownership,
property destruction, and other negative things that inevitably lead to the
invention of government, judges, police, prisons. Every country in the world
has them, and for multiple reasons.

------
oxymoran
“Anarchists are simply people who believe human beings are capable of behaving
in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to.”

My anarchist sympathies want this to be true but this is a demonstrably false
fairy tale. Just look at how we treat the planet and other living things in
the presence of lawful order. Why would you assume that we would act
righteously in the absence of law? It is painfully obvious that we would act
much worse under anarchy.

~~~
ClumsyPilot
> "> Just look at how we treat the planet and other living things in the
> presence of lawful order"

On the contrary, it' and indictment of the current law system, it has
utterally failed to protect the environment and other living things, where-as
anacistic organisations, charities and protest movement have done a lot for
the environment. In fact they are the only ones that have done anything at
all.

If a given CEO damages profits for the sake of environment, he can be removed
as he is not fullfilling his legal duty, maximising profits. So even if a
hypothetical environmentalist became the chielf of ExxonMobil, he wouldn't be
able to do much.

~~~
PragmaticPulp
> anacistic organisations, charities and protest movement have done a lot for
> the environment. In fact they are the only ones that have done anything at
> all.

This is not true at all. Protecting the environment isn’t just about actions
like planting trees and buying up the occasional extra property parcel to
dedicate as a land reserve. It requires government scale regulation to impose
negative consequences on people and companies producing negative
externalities.

You can argue that the government hasn’t done enough in this regard, but it’s
demonstrably not true to claim that 3rd parties have done more than the
government to regulate industry and build national park level land reserves.

This is the problem with most pro-anarchistic stances: They take too much of
the current system’s benefits for granted while also assuming that less
regulation would somehow produce a more regulated outcome.

I don’t understand the desire to put impossible theories of anarchy on a
pedestal instead of simply making incremental improvements to the current
systems.

~~~
sudosysgen
The anarchist argument is distribution of power.

Take the example of pollution. Say you're an employee of a fossil fuel
cooperative. Is it in your interest to continue polluting? Yes, because you
after all own some of the ressources of that company and control it. So what
is the anarchist solution? Well, it's in the interests of everyone to stop
pollution, right? So you'd need people to come together, decide that
population is a concern, at least a good percentage of people, and offer you
to be compensated for your investment in fossil fuels in exchange to stop
polluting and find another job or not work in industry at all anymore. You
might say that this is unrealistic, but for the government to do anything
about pollution we needed hundreds of millions of people to protest and a
majority of the people agreeing that pollution is a problem worth fixing. And
if that doesn't work either, you elect and randomly chose people to supervise
the elected with short term limits in order to have authority against
pollution.

This is the anarchist solution to the tragedy of the commons in this case.

As for making incremental change, there are hard limits. There are existing
power structures that will hamper you very strongly - the state, private
interests, the corporate media, and so on. If you do incremental change that
they don't like, they absolutely will use violence to prevent you.

~~~
dTal
So, the "anarchist solution" to the tragedy of the commons - the avoidance of
centralized power - entails a majority of the population banding together and
acting as some sort of agent, with the power to set rules and redistribute
wealth? I see.

~~~
komali2
No the anarchist solution is to remove the need for that pollution at all. Why
frack when wind power works? Sure you don't get as much power but when the
whole world isn't spending 1/5 of their day driving from home to office to
modify spreadsheets, you'll find some power savings.

~~~
stjohnswarts
So they'll be out spending 6-10 hours a day hunting for food in the hills?

------
bjt2n3904
I don't often read anything from anarchists. Whenever I do, it always comes
off as sophomoric. Pretentious sophistry.

When you boil down his questions, they're not serious questions about anarchy,
they're lame excuses for him to keep talking.

\- Do you wait for your turn on a crowded bus?

\- Are you a member of a sports team or small group without a leader?

\- Do you think politicians suck, and people are selfish?

\- Do you really believe the things you were told as a child?

Good grief. These talking points are so generic, any political ideology could
use these.

"Are you a communist? The answer may surprise you! Do you like eating toast
for breakfast? Many communists also like to eat toast!"

~~~
nebulous1
I have issues with this article and with anarchism, and I agree that some of
this is sophomoric (not sure about sophistry though).

However, this article isn't really for you (or me). There are surprisingly
many people who think that "anarchists" simply want to see the world burn and
are promoting a society where their children are as likely to be murdered
while out playing as not. This article is just saying that that's not the
case.

It's obviously too hand-wavy to take us beyond that.

~~~
pbourke
> There are surprisingly many people who think that "anarchists" simply want
> to see the world burn and are promoting a society where their children are
> as likely to be murdered while out playing as not.

Indeed. Anarchists clearly do not want to see the world burn, they just
redefine "world" to be the few blocks that surround their home. And children
are clearly safe when one subscribes to the correct private security service.
If children are murdered, that’s obviously a violation of the contract with
the security service that must be settled through arbitration.

------
dingdingdang
This is such demagogue reasoning that it is hard to know where to begin.

A good indication of something being off is when it is trivial to rewrite the
points to support the exact opposite point. I.e.

"Are You A Conservative? The Answer May Surprise You!"

"If there’s a line to get on a crowded bus, do you wait your turn and refrain
from elbowing your way past others even in the absence of police?"

"If you answered “yes”, then you are used to acting like a conservative! A
most basic conservative principle is that there exists an enduring moral
order. Thus voluntary community is an important aspect of human life leading
to reasonable understandings with each other and to treat each other with
dignity and respect."

Etc. etc.

~~~
qntty
You assumption that being (the traditional kind of) conservative is the
opposite of being an anarchist would be strange to many anarchists. Noam
Chomsky has said that he considers himself a conservative in the traditional
sense. Also see the essay by the '60s anarchist Paul Goodman called "Notes of
a Neolithic Conservative".

~~~
luckylion
I believe the parent comment's point wasn't about conservatives specifically,
but rather that you can just change a word or two and insert any ideology
you'd like by saying that since $ideology has [insert some words here] and
therefore would also form a queue at the bus station.

~~~
qntty
You could say the same about ethical theories too. They all have a way of
explaining what they would do when confronted with a runaway trolley or some
silly thing like that. The fact that all political ideologies have a way of
explaining why they would get in a bus queue just shows that asking someone
about why they line up for a bus is a good way to find out about how they
think about the world politically. It's just using a simple example to
illustrate how anarchists make sense of the world. There are many people who
(understandably) think that they don't live their life in an "anarchist" way,
and this article is just showing people that there is probably a lot about
their life which is consistent with anarchism. There is probably also much
which is consistent with the principles of other ideologies, but anarchism is
one of the least understood, so a simple exercise like this can be
informative.

[That being said, as something of an anarchist, I don't share the Graeber's
conception of anarchism but that's another issue.]

------
drblast
I think in many ways it's impossible to have this discussion with a U.S.
audience.

The idea of force and violence being the solution to everything is deeply,
deeply ingrained in U,S, culture. Simply suggesting that reason and
cooperation can solve some of the problems we in the U.S. attempt to solve
with more violence is usually met with the "starship troopers" ideology that
violence is the actual source of legitimacy of all government.

And we do treat everything this way. We have a problem and declare war on it.
War on drugs, war on poverty, war on obesity. That might sound like a tongue-
in-cheek way to state a problem is serious, but consider that mindset an
entire culture must have to make "war" be the perpetually used shorthand for
the ultimate solution to every social problem.

And a large portion of the U.S. apparently has no concept of a social contract
and a sense of cooperative action or "doing my part."

It's like violence and force is the only tool we have in the U.S. so every
social ill is met with the further application of it, way beyond what is
reasonable.

And it seems to be a one way trip. You can never suggest that we have gone too
far. Apparently there can never be too many police, too much military
spending, or too many people in prison. They only right answer is more of
that, please.

We are teetering on the precipice of complete authoritarianism because of our
culture and it's scary.

~~~
warning26
> And it seems to be a one way trip. You can never suggest that we have gone
> too far. Apparently there can never be too many police, too much military
> spending, or too many people in prison. They only right answer is more of
> that, please.

Personally, I think it's not taken far enough. Leveraging force to eliminate
ignorance would, I believe, benefit society. If we allow those who would push
untruths for either personal gain or simply out of ignorance, what does
society have to lose by ridding itself of them?

~~~
ssalazar
In the US ignorance and overuse of force go hand-in-hand, so I don't think
this is going to work out too well.

~~~
warning26
Fair point, I can't imagine it would be possible to implement it in a way that
wouldn't immediately become corrupted.

------
csours
I don't understand anarchy. Take littering for an example. Would an anarchist
system (oxymoron alert) have fines for littering? How about signs and a
slogan? TV advertisements?

Another example: I regularly volunteer at conventions. Somewhere between 90
and 95% of people follow the rules without much prompting. 5-10% of people
don't... but I sincerely believe that without volunteers watching, that number
would go up sharply. Another reason people behave is the threat of their badge
being revoked.

> "For thousands of years people lived without governments. In many parts of
> the world people live outside of the control of governments today. They do
> not all kill each other."

Hahaha no. Just no. People may not have lived under the control of formal
governments, but there is always some sort of power structure. They may not
have killed each other with systematic warfare, but small raids and personal
violence killed a lot of people per capita.

\---

Having said all that, I do think that internalizing the rules of society does
far more than overt displays of power, like police or military parades; but I
also think that the police play an important role in decreasing public crime.
However, I also do not think that simply adding more police or increasing the
harshness of enforcement will decrease public crime further.

It's all Pareto Principle.

~~~
otherme123
Taking littering: how littered is your home? Your work place? What about a
Comercial Center? In an anarchy society, the littering is limited to your own
property. Yes, you can live like a pig, as long as you don't litter properties
of others. If you throw trash in other people property, you don't face a fine,
but you will be expelled from the property and face a trial.

In our current society, littering is a problem in public spaces: streets,
rivers, sea, etc. In other words: is a problem created by the government.

The main mistake of non-anarchist people is to believe that there are no rules
in anarchy, or that it equates chaos or extreme individualism. But there are:
the rules that people gives to themselves. An example: religions form anarchic
structures. You can join and leave a religion at will, but they have a tight
set of rules their members should follow. A power structure exists, but you
can accept or leave it.

You might argue that a religion has a government, and thus it isn't "anarchy"
according to the definition. But as I said, you can accept or reject the
rules, and live under other religion rules, create your own religion or
without religion at all. Anarchy equates to "stateless society based on
voluntary associations".

~~~
bhupy
The problem I’m having with this is that, while yes you don’t have to worry
about the tragedy of the commons in your own home or church or place of
work...it isn’t feasible to live your entire life outside the commons.
How/where would one receive goods & services? How would one travel from A to
B, and over whose infrastructure?

~~~
sudosysgen
Infrastructure would indeed be communally owned, and the tragedy of the
commons need not apply on communally owned property. An economist actually won
a Nobel Prize for demonstrating actually how that happens :

"Political scientist Elinor Ostrom, who was awarded 2009's Nobel Memorial
Prize in Economic Sciences for her work on the issue, and others revisited
Hardin's work in 1999.[45] They found the tragedy of the commons not as
prevalent or as difficult to solve as Hardin maintained, since locals have
often come up with solutions to the commons problem themselves.[46] For
example, it was found that a commons in the Swiss Alps has been run by a
collective of farmers there to their mutual and individual benefit since 1517,
in spite of the farmers also having access to their own farmland. In general,
it is in the interest of the users of a commons to keep them functioning and
so complex social schemes are often invented by the users for maintaining them
at optimum efficiency.[47][48]"

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons)

~~~
bhupy
Except infrastructure in most of the US is communally owned, and we had to
institute authority and fines for littering.

While it's true that there exists some societies that have been able to
overcome the tragedy of the commons (it's usually extremely small homogeneous
societies), I don't think we have any evidence to suggest that it can provably
be replicated to the rest of the world.

It's like suggesting that there exists some companies that are able to sustain
themselves by being 100% WFH/remote, and therefore all companies should be
able to sustainably do that.

~~~
sudosysgen
If authority turns out to be absolutely necessary, that's okay. It just has to
be limited and kept in check.

As for the tragedy of the commons being only transcended in small homogenous
groups, that's stretching the definition of small and you can still have norms
for larger groups without introducing tons of authority.

As for as some companies being able to WFH and others not, there are reasons
that can be anaylized and propagated.

~~~
bhupy
> As for the tragedy of the commons being only transcended in small homogenous
> groups, that's stretching the definition of small and you can still have
> norms for larger groups without introducing tons of authority.

I'm not sure what's more of a stretch: defining "farmers in the Swiss Alps" as
as "small" community, or suggesting that what works for farmers in the remote
Swiss Alps necessarily works for New York City or London or Amsterdam. What
happens when people leave their cars parked on the sidewalk? What happens when
people litter their dockless bike/scooter-share wherever they please, with no
repercussions? What happens when a bicyclist in Brooklyn gets run over by an
SUV? What happens if I decide that I like your house, and take it from you by
force with my big gun along with my big goon friends, or perhaps even kill you
for it? Hell, I live in Brooklyn where there are actual laws and policing
RIGHT NOW, and there's still trash littered on the ground, dog walkers
occasionally leaving their poop un-picked, and cars sometimes parked on the
sidewalk:
[https://www.google.com/maps/@40.681231,-73.974329,3a,75y,334...](https://www.google.com/maps/@40.681231,-73.974329,3a,75y,334.09h,76.6t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s1hWgzy3UAX9z3rlvcqfLrw!2e0!7i16384!8i8192)

The devil is in the details, and the circumstances that make something work in
the Swiss Alps are important, confounding variables. At best, the evidence
suggests that minimal order can work in rural agrarian communities, and we see
a lot of that play out in rural parts of the US and the EU already.

> If authority turns out to be absolutely necessary, that's okay. It just has
> to be limited and kept in check.

The vast majority of people agree with this. The contention is at what point
this actually turns out to be "absolutely necessary", that's where reasonable
people disagree. In an increasingly urbanized and globalized world, the point
at which that happens has long since passed. The argument that the GP
commenter made can probably rephrased as "anarchy doesn't scale".

------
Al-Khwarizmi
I have never believed in anarchism, as I don't believe that "human beings are
capable of behaving in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to".
But with COVID-19, I am seeing more proof than ever.

In my country (but I guess it's the same in most, except perhaps some Nordic
countries) bars, pubs and discos only reduce seating or close indoor spaces
when forced to by law, in spite of the evidence that they cause lots of
outbreaks. A large chunk of people only started wearing masks when forced to
by law, and take any chance the law allows to remove them. The government
recommended remote work whenever possible but many companies just ignored it
in spite of having many workers that could perfectly work remotely, and just
implement it when forced by law. And so on.

Tell me again that "human beings are capable of behaving in a reasonable
fashion without having to be forced to"... it's not that "most politicians are
selfish, egotistical swine", it's that many people are. I'd rather have a
politician mandate masks or restrict bar/pub capacity (not because politicians
are any better than the average person, but because they tend to have at least
a bare minimum of education, access to advisors, some positive incentives -the
next election- and no high stakes on the decision like, say, a bar owner) than
have mask deniers and careless people spread the virus around by gathering in
closed spaces without masks.

~~~
surfpel
While I’m also not an anarchist, I don’t believe these are good examples. In
fact, they could be an argument _for_ anarchism.

With a lack of stimulus or even just in this economic system, bars and
businesses in general are incentivized to stay open. They are being ‘coerced’
to stay open.

People started rejecting masks and shutdowns en masse after astroturfing and
media convinced them to.

There are countries where orders were followed voluntarily and good results
followed.

~~~
zanny
Capitalism is fundamentally built on competition, it pits all participants
against one another. It stratifies social bonds and breaks people apart
because any cooperation represents unrealized exploitation.

Its why people are so miserable en masse, hostile, and chomping at the bit for
targets to attack and hate. Its worse in America because theres almost no
socialism at all to raise the floor of society - the country is buried in
homeless and something like 1 in 5 persons is food insecure (probably higher
now in the pandemic). If you fail in "winning" at capitalism to some degree
you are supposed to feel fortunate shelters and soup kitchens exist.
_Sometimes_. Society has broadly rejected them as the socialism they are and
underfunds or destroys them where able.

Its also why drug addiction is totally out of control. Desperation and social
isolation by our culture creates whole populations of people to be exploited
by drug profiteers. Many other nations don't do this by catching people before
they get that despondent or miserable and by helping (rehabilitation) rather
than hurting (prosecution) those that get that bad.

The process is cyclic. The desperation feeds into the hate feeds into the
predation feeds into the exploitation feeds into the desperation. But breaking
out of it requires class consciousness that is opposed at every level - at the
bottom by the animosity and inability to trust and at the top by the profits
and power reaped through the harm done.

~~~
lr4444lr
You think socialist and communist counties don't have drug addiction problems?

~~~
tehjoker
They do if they are poorly run. The critique a socialist would make is that it
is mechanically impossible to run a capitalist society in a fashion that
reduces desperation to an appreciably low level. There are fewer theoretical
reasons a socialist society should have this problem though practically any
particular government and situation can get messed up.

------
INTPenis
A swedish rapper said in 1998; "Den enda sanna demokraten är anarkist",
translates to "the only true democrat is anarchist".

Not meaning the Democratic party in the US but rather a literal interpretation
of the two words. Democrat meaning rule of the people and anarchist meaning no
leaders.

I was raised to believe in anarchism, and I still do at heart. But if it were
ever to work we'd need strict and global regulations on centralized power that
would need to be upheld by a coalition which would itself become a centralized
power.

Because evolution itself is randomness unchecked. So a political ideology
alone can't control when someone will come along wanting to exploit systems to
break free and gain more power for themselves or their own people.

~~~
mijamo
Anarchism does not mean no leader. It means no authority. Hence why it is
fundamentally different than democracy because democracy implies an authority
somehow attributed to the people (directly or indirectly).

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

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

~~~
niek_pas
Perhaps, rather than speculating on his work, you could read some of it, and
refrain from commenting on it until you have done so.

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

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

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

~~~
luckylion
I'm not sure that is true. While I don't know (or rather, I don't know that I
know) anyone who's actually a villain of some sort, I know quite a few people
in SEO affiliate marketing. Their businesses generally don't add any value,
they buy links, use cheap copy writers that produce mediocre content often
full of factual errors, Google eats it up like it was the best thing ever
(because of the links they bought), people get directed to their sites from
search queries and buy at the shops the recommend. They essentially inject
themselves between Google and the shop, but they're not adding any value - if
anything, they're reducing value (by influencing buying decision with lies -
not just marketing "women will find you more attractive if you have this car",
actual lies as in "this product can do X" when it can't).

And they know it, and when you ask them about it, they'll happily say so. They
don't believe that they are providing a service, and they're not telling that
to themselves either. Why do they do it, then? Because they get money for it.
They are well aware that they aren't adding value, but they're doing it
because it pays.

I don't believe that e.g. a thief, thugs or fraudster go around thinking they
do nothing wrong or that they act decently. They know, they are fully aware
that they are a net-negative to society. What I find more interesting in that
regard is this: do they realize they are abnormal in that regard, or do they
believe that everybody acts like them?

~~~
JackFr
I think people rationalize. Stealing from faceless corporations who treat
customers poorly is OK. Stealing from people who are “too rich”. People who
“need to be taught a lesson.” People who create a narrative of their own
victimhood.

I would say about the SEO affiliate marketers, that they would tell you that
they’re no different than other marketers, they just operate in a specialized
space.

------
fallingfrog
It’s important to point out here that anarchists are not advocating for lack
of organization; people are social animals and must work together to live.
They are advocating for lack of power structures of domination and
subordination.

Imagine there are two kingdoms on some continent. One is managed by some kind
of democratic council, and resources are shared equitably; the other is ruled
by a tyrant. Which one is more likely to make war on its neighbors? The
tyrant, obviously- because the tyrant has something to gain by conquest (more
subjects, wealth, and power) and the democratic society does not (assuming
that the society stays democratic after the conquest, they now have to contend
with the voices of a lot of angry new citizens). The same applies to any
organization: an organization is aggressive and violent in direct proportion
to how hierarchical it is.

There is a tragic principle of natural selection that plays out, however, if
you imagine that continent and imagine a random arrangement of democracies and
kingdoms, over time the kingdoms will make war and expand and the democracies
will not. After a few hundred years, most of the citizens of the continent
will be living under tyrants. And tyranny has to justify itself to its
subjects, through religion or ideology; the subjects will be made to feel that
obedience is virtue and that the king is a father figure and so forth. But
popular freedom movements will constantly be popping up and have to be
suppressed.

I give you: the modern world.

------
runjake
They lost me in the first paragraph with:

    
    
        “Anarchists are simply people who believe human beings are capable of behaving in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to. It is really a very simple notion.”
    

Having dealt with the dark side of humanity, there are lots of people who will
not behave reasonably if left unchecked, due to one reason or another.

And there are a lot of these people. Some of them lifelong criminals, some of
them even your friendly neighbor that keeps his yard looking really nice.

So you need a system of checks. You need some sort of enforcement arm that
apprehend and deals violence to these people. You need some place, away from
society, to secure these people. And now, you’ve more or less reinvented the
current structure.

Whether we like it or not, violence is the foundation upon which society
ultimately sits. The threat of violence keeps everyone inline. If you resist
each step of the law, ultimately, you will be dealt violence.

You may choose to be a pacifist, and that is somewhat admirable, but you’ve
really chosen to outsource the violence required to survive to other parties.
Society provides us a useful curtain that covers the horror of nature’s rules.

~~~
marricks
I mean, flipping that on its head where does the "dark side of humanity" end
up? Looking at all the police brutality, the Epstein's, the Koch brothers, the
crappy politicians... I mean the crap really seems to float to the top of
society.

In a society without hierarchies, an anarchist society, you still have groups
and communication and working together, you just don't have people above you
telling you something is OK or how it should be.

Absolutely no form of government or system (anarchist 1000% included) will
solve the problem of people being selfish or bad, all that anarchists contend
(that I have seen) is that when there isn't those built hierarchies
bad/selfish people don't amass power so everyone else can actually handle them
on equal terms.

And considering how Epstein was able to morph the whole political landscape to
defend himself for over a decade, uh, any alternative can seem pretty
reasonable.

~~~
sdfin
I don't think it's realistic to believe that hierarchies wouldn't emerge one
way or another. The hierarchy can arise in the form of a mafia, or in a more
regulated way.

~~~
frereubu
This was a fantastic essay by a first-wave feminist about the "tyrrany of
structurelessness". The idea is basically that if you abolish formal
hierarchies, hieararhcies will be established but they'll be informal ones,
outside any system of checks and balances. It was dealing with a smaller scale
that an entire political system, but it stuck with me and I think it's
relevant here:
[https://www.jofreeman.com/joreen/tyranny.htm](https://www.jofreeman.com/joreen/tyranny.htm)

~~~
domnomnom
This same tyranny exists with money. The beauty of financial transactions as
work and recognition is that there's never any ambiguity as far as your work
being valued. In academia you have, on the other hand, things such as nebulous
awards and recognition of placement on a publication. These things have real
implications for career placement. That can be an analogous sort of tyranny, I
think.

------
elgfare
This was interesting, I learned something.

The problem with anarchy is that everyone must be a good anarchist for it to
work. Our current society is also dependent on most people being good
anarchists, but it's also more resilient against non-anarchists.

Also, removing state power structures will not remove all power structures.
There will still be people with lots of material or social capital providing
them with power.

My hunch is that in absence of laws and power structures most people will miss
a social contract and will miss people telling them what to do. Basically it's
less taxing on our minds.

~~~
sudosysgen
Anarchism would also remove private property, and for it to work people would
have to organize in ways to minimize social capital.

~~~
elgfare
How do you do that though? There would of course be no _enforcable_ private
property, but ownership would not disappear as a (albeit nebulous) concept.

~~~
sudosysgen
Anarchism would mandate worker ownership of production, in the principle that
ownership only ever derives from use. So factories and the like would be
cooperatively owned, which makes it very very difficult for one individual to
amass seriously outsized amounts of material resources. Combined with monetary
policy that increases the velocity of money, the issue is fixed.

As for personal property, under the principle that you've worked for and use
your personal property and that it doesn't result in a master/slave relation,
it would be intact.

~~~
elgfare
> Anarchism would mandate worker ownership of production

Legitimately curious: How do you mandate anything in an anarchy?

~~~
vidarh
Mandate in this case is used in the abstract: in the absence of any system to
recognise and enforce private property rights, and in the face of a society
that sees coercion and aggression as pretty much the only things that are
wholly and totally unacceptable, they cease to exist because they only exist
in the first case through the state or other means of threatening force to
enforce it.

It would be more precise to say that worker control in anarchism is a
_consequence_ of dismantling the system that enforces property rights.

~~~
elgfare
Thanks. That feels like weird chain of causality. All the bad stuff only
disappears when the systems protecting us from them are removed.

~~~
vidarh
Nobody is suggesting removing the systems that are _actually protecting us_.
The argument is that a lot of the structures are _not_ protecting us, but
perpetuating oppression, and that if we invert the power pyramid, and power is
only delegated by consent to the extent it is exercised in a manner that
minimises oppression, then we're left with what people actually consent to be
subjected to.

------
hprotagonist
_He said, "If you and I can agree that we will both do our share of the work
of the world" \-- that's the work 'round the Joe Hill House -- "If you and I
agree that we will only take what we need and put back what we can; if you and
I can agree that we'll care for the afflicted: and mostly, if you and I can
agree that we won't hurt anybody" \-- all the things you can't get from the
boss and from the state -- "then we can begin to build between us that
voluntary combination and get the work of the world done without the boss and
without the state."

Well, I've said that t'so many young people, especially lately, who get this
idea that anarchy is some kind of nihilism: "Oh you can't tell me what to do".
No! Anarchy, you've got to tell _yourself_ what to do because you've got to
learn to become your own best government. And believe me, you can do it better
and cheaper than they can._

Utah Phillips, "I will not obey"
[https://www.youtube.Com/watch?v=h5Ro4rTvDcw](https://www.youtube.Com/watch?v=h5Ro4rTvDcw)

------
cortesoft
Here is my argument against anarchism as some alternative to what we have.

We ARE living in the end state of anarchism. We know how people will organize
when there is no existing coercive power structure; they will form themselves
into groups with rules and laws and enforcement. How do we know this? Because
it is what people have done, over and over and over, when in that situation.

If all of the government were to suddenly disappear, groups would start to
form, power would collect and disperse and reorganize, and certain people who
are very good at that game (or have the right allies) will rise to leadership.
The end result will be some sort of stable-ish arrangement of groups who
control different areas and... here we are.

~~~
the42thdoctor
As long a group does not try to conquer another and everyone is free to change
groups, there's no problems with it.

~~~
cortesoft
You are ‘free’ to change groups, but most groups have a process for joining,
and not everyone who wants to join is able. And you will have to move to that
group’s territory.

Also, I am not sure what you mean by ‘no problems with it’.... this is an
anarchy, there is no one to bring those problems to. Some people trying to
conquer others is just a part of being in an anarchy. Some people want to
conquer.

------
PaulAJ
One piece of counter-evidence is the repeated story of online communities.

In the early days of the Internet there was Usenet (OK, so it started
separate, never mind), a global community, or collection of communities, using
text-based message broadcast. It was a nice, self-policing community where
obnoxious behaviour was frowned upon, and frowning was generally enough. Every
September a new cohort of university students discovered this wonderful
resource, and sometimes took a while to learn the social norms, but peer
pressure generally worked.

Then in the 90s the Internet started to become popular. AOL started
distributing free CDs that let you access Usenet. Lots more people arrived on
Usenet, resulting in the "Eternal September" when the social norms broke down
and everything became chaos. Spam and flame wars drowned out serious
conversation. Some of the communities within Usenet were able to continue
because they were small enough to maintain their own internal cohesion, but
increasingly these became exceptions.

I stopped using Usenet for discussion some time around 2000. There simply
wasn't any point. Even the cohesive communities were abandoning it for private
email lists and web sites.

------
Sebb767
> Anarchists are simply people who believe human beings are capable of
> behaving in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to. [...] But
> it’s one that the rich and powerful have always found extremely dangerous.

So you're telling me they don't behave well on their own?

Also:

> Do you believe [...] that certain sorts of people (women, people of color,
> ordinary folk who are not rich or highly educated) are inferior specimens,
> destined to be ruled by their betters?

Doesn't really go well with:

> Do you believe that most politicians are selfish, egotistical swine who
> don’t really care about the public interest?

So, all are equally good, unless you're rich or a politician, in which case
you're a pig. What could possibly go wrong?

~~~
sudosysgen
Do you not see the fundamental difference between disliking people for what
they are and disliking people for what they chose to do and become?

~~~
Sebb767
No. This is not black and white. Case in point: Religion. Is it okay to
prosecute someone for that? They choose it after all. You might say he was
born into that, but same goes for rich children. I hope I don't need to argue
on why prosecuting for a religion is a bad thing.

To be fair here, I don't think it's wrong in all cases to judge someone for
his groups. If you say everyone in the KKK is bad, that's fine by me (and,
FTR: I agree). But the hypocrisy irks me alot.

------
TeaB
Zapatistas, Apoists, Chris Boehm's work which suggests many if not all
(current) pre-industrial societies (implying all societies from 250 000 - 15
000 years ago) maintain anarchist-like societies.

As such, civilisation (and farming) and therefore hierachical societies
account for 0.06% of human societal structures, measured by time.

Edit:

just for kicks: “The assumption that what currently exists must necessarily
exist is the acid that corrodes all visionary thinking.” ― Murray Bookchin

~~~
nabla9
Pre-insustrial cultures were homogenic societies.

You can have functioning anarchist societies with traditional values or with
same minded -istas and -ists. Not with people with different goals and values.
I don't think anarchism works in a modern heterogenic society.

Only with a organized government you can have Mormonistas, and Trumpistas
living in the same neighbourhood with a Lesbian couple. Anarchism can't
protect minorities against the will of the people. Government can.

------
blauditore
> If there’s a line to get on a crowded bus, do you wait your turn and refrain
> from elbowing your way past others even in the absence of police?

> If you answered “yes”, then you are used to acting like an anarchist!

First, many people actually try to force their way into crowded trains to get
a good spot earlier in my experience. It's not exactly forceful, but also not
friendly or waiting-in-line.

Just because I behave that way doesn't make me an anarchist, or "acting like
one". There's a long way from following some practices to believing everyone
would follow those if not forced to.

------
INGELRII
I'M NOT AN ANARCHIST.

Consider the difference between a faceless government and something with a
face.

Faceless means impartial, once removed, not having skin in the game. Faceless
means not having to take aside. Faceless allows more formality.

Face means somebody who knows you personally. Anarchism means a governing body
with a face. People close to you. Society 'freely organizing itself' means
politics and people gaining power with social influence. Instead of visible
hierarchies, it means invisible hierarchies build from personal relationships.

I want more participatory democracy, more deliberative democracy, not
anarchism. Modern liberal democracy with laws and principles and visible
hierarchies allows individuals to separate themselves from the village, the
mob and the social games involved.

\---

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Participatory_democracy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Participatory_democracy)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deliberative_democracy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deliberative_democracy)

~~~
feralimal
Well, how does a technocratic government suit you? Entirely faceless, run by a
bunch of 'scientists' that you can't even vote out, but who know what's best
for you.

That's where we are heading. And many on this site are building that future.

~~~
INGELRII
I'm against "entirely" anything.

There are no fixed solutions for organizing society. We don't know what it is
to be a human (only strict ideologies are certain what humanity wants and what
the goal is). Allowing changes and feedback is the key.

~~~
feralimal
> There are no fixed solutions for organizing society.

Quite. But who says it is for anyone to organise 'society'?

You're missing the point of anarchism, I think. The only person you need to
'organise' and take responsibility for, is yourself. Most people look to
government (not themselves) to take responsibility. And that is the problem.

------
bem94
Anyone who want's an good read which features anarchism, I'd recommend "The
Dispossessed" by Ursula Le Guin. It's an incredible story in it's own right,
and has a very complete description of how a completely anarchist society
might function.

------
georgewsinger
The strongest, most "steelmanned" defense of Anarchy (and it's not even close)
is Michael Huemer's _The Problem of Political Authority_ :
[https://www.amazon.com/Problem-Political-Authority-
Examinati...](https://www.amazon.com/Problem-Political-Authority-Examination-
Coerce/dp/1137281650/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=problem+of+political+authority&qid=1599317402&sr=8-1)

------
domnomnom
"If there’s a line to get on a crowded bus, do you wait your turn and refrain
from elbowing your way past others even in the absence of police?

If you answered “yes”, then you are used to acting like an anarchist!"

No. This fails at scale. People are prosocial in small groups and in person
but when this scales it goes away. This is a slight of hand the author is
making to silently embed a false premise into the argument.

~~~
mistermann
You've done the same (or it has been done to you). Can you spot it?

~~~
domnomnom
You’ve done the same as well!!! Can YOU spot it?

~~~
mistermann
No, I can't, but I would absolutely love for you to point it out for me so I
might improve my thinking.

Are you actually able to point out where I've gone wrong?

------
jkhdigital
> Everyone believes they are capable of behaving reasonably themselves. If
> they think laws and police are necessary, it is only because they don’t
> believe that other people are.

I believe this is missing an important distinction between two kinds of law:
common and statutory. If anarchists had laws, they would be common law, which
simply represents accreted experience and wisdom about dealing with human
conflicts that inevitably arise in any society.

I absolutely think common law is necessary, because it provides a long-term
consistency and stability to human relations. Instead of individuals coming to
ad hoc decisions about how to redress wrongs and grievances, they can rely on
precedent which ensures some measure of fairness.

~~~
vidarh
I completely disagree with this. Common law is still enforced. The issue is
not the source of the law, but how the organ that enforces it gets the power
to do so - whether it is imposed from above, or entered into by consent.

We already enter into agreements about which rules apply in situations not
covered by law all the time.

The more you relegate to consensual agreements, the closer to anarchy you
get,whether those agreements include 'refer to common law principles' or
'refer to this book of statutes'.

------
galaxyLogic
Anarchism is not the answer. Democracy and extreme transparency of governance
is.

Anarchism doesn't start with the right question which is: "How can we maximize
the total average good for all people". Anarchism starts with "How can people
live without rules imposed on them by others?"

The idea that eliminating all rules imposed by others would produce maximal
average good for people is suspect, and has no real justifications proposed
for it. It assumes that every person could have the consciousness of what is
in the best interests of everyone, and then would always choose to follow the
guidance of such information.

------
chmod600
Simple question:

Two families both like that big house in the prime location. Who gets it?

The one that slept there last night? The one that built it? The most obnoxious
family so that they can drive the others away?

Without laws, the result will probably be the latter, no?

------
feralimal
Yes, apparently he died last week. The person said to be behind the phrase we
are the 99% at the Occupy Wall Street movement. He was an interesting
character.

My question would be: do anarchists really work as professors at the London
School of Economics? And Yale? Aren't you a 'system man' at that point?

~~~
mathieuh
We all have to live in this system, it's unrealistic to think all anarchists
should be ideologically pure and live in the woods off the land like
Kaczynski.

I believe thinking and writing and getting these ideas into the mainstream can
be a form of praxis. As Zizek says, sometimes the most revolutionary thing to
do is nothing at all.

~~~
feralimal
Absolutely. The system is pervasive and we have to live within it.

But should you embrace it? While Yale and LSE are no doubt great institutions,
to my mind they are also up there as educators of those who go on to become
the system's top managers.

~~~
vidarh
LSE has a history as a hotbed of activism ever since it was the focal point of
UK student rebellions in the late 60s.

It's not nearly as Conservative as you might think.

~~~
feralimal
Hotbed is right. The institution literally force grows radicalism. And yet, it
is considered a top university.

The reason is that it helps to present what is in fact a false dichotomy. The
radical thought they support is that within the Overton window. Nothing that
would really shake up the ruling elite is expressed there. Like CNN and Fox
news.

------
stuartd
For me, Proudhon [0] said it best, 180 years ago (did a bit of tidying, e.g.
de-capitalization, paragraphing):

> To be governed is to be watched, inspected, spied upon, directed, law-
> driven, numbered, regulated, enrolled, indoctrinated, preached at,
> controlled, checked, estimated, valued, censured, commanded, by creatures
> who have neither the right nor the wisdom nor the virtue to do so.

> To be governed is to be at every operation, at every transaction noted,
> registered, counted, taxed, stamped, measured, numbered, assessed, licensed,
> authorized, admonished, prevented, forbidden, reformed, corrected, punished.

> It is, under pretext of public utility, and in the name of the general
> interest, to be placed under contribution, drilled, fleeced, exploited,
> monopolized, extorted from, squeezed, hoaxed, robbed; then, at the slightest
> resistance, the first word of complaint, to be repressed, fined, vilified,
> harassed, hunted down, abused, clubbed, disarmed, bound, choked, imprisoned,
> judged, condemned, shot, deported, sacrificed, sold, betrayed; and to crown
> all, mocked, ridiculed, derided, outraged, dishonored.

> That is government; that is its justice; that is its morality.

Edit: and I must include his canonical line, adapted for modern times:

> Whoever lays their hand on me to govern me is a usurper and tyrant, and I
> declare them my enemy.

[0] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre-
Joseph_Proudhon#Anarchi...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre-
Joseph_Proudhon#Anarchism)

------
throwaway39293
People are asking a lot of basic questions in the comments.

I recommend exploring
[https://anarchism.pageabode.com/afaq/index.html/](https://anarchism.pageabode.com/afaq/index.html/)

It's very quick to browse and find answers.

------
sudosysgen
I think an important thing that is lost here is that anarchists in practice do
not advocate for removing _all_ hierarchies. Just the most possible
practically, which is a heck of a lot less hierarchy than we have now, and to
crucially keep these hierarchies in check via rotations, direct democracy, and
so on, to prevent any one person to accumulate much of any power at all; in
essence making authority a painful chore.

------
PaulAJ
In "The Hacker Crackdown" there is a quote from Gail Thackeray:

Fifteen percent of the populace will never steal. Fifteen percent will steal
most anything not nailed down. The battle is for the hearts and minds of the
remaining seventy percent.

Never mind whether its 15%, there is a minority of people who will steal, or
perform other antisocial acts, if they think they can get away with it. If the
majority of people see this happen without consequences then they will behave
in the same way, partly because under those circumstances theft is a
reasonable choice, and partly because of herd instinct.

So yes, I believe that human society does need a system of laws backed by
enforcement. I don't need to believe that its everyone else who needs to be
controlled and I alone am moral, I just need to believe that there are some
people who need to be controlled.

------
elindbe2
"The first is that human beings are, under ordinary circumstances, about as
reasonable and decent as they are allowed to be"

I'd like to try and understand Graeber's argument but I get stuck here. If you
take one glance at history with all of its various wars, raids, riots,
revolutions, etc I can't see how one could sustain this claim. For example,
did Ghengis Khan act about as reasonable and decent as he was allowed to be?

This points to a larger problem I see with much if today's social commentary:
taking the existence of an advanced civilization for granted. If you believe
that today's society is inevitable and indestructible then you don't need to
put any effort into sustaining it and can simply change anything you wish
without worrying about the consequences to civilization.

------
username90
No, when you remove repercussions lots of people go out and loot stores. And
then thanks to the broken windows effect a majority of people will follow
suit. People are well behaved today not because we are born decent but because
we have grown up in a well functioning society with strict laws.

------
spicyramen
In reality Anarchism fails to address the fact that people behave different,
there are people that is good, respect each other, work hard, look for
themselves and their families...while there are others which just don't
(pedophiles, rappist, burglars, scammer, etc.). Like there are people that
prefer a 9-5 job vs serial entrepreneurs. In a world with such diversity of
thoughts is naive to think that humans can behave in reasonable fashion. In a
world where we all behave different a set of rules and structure is needed

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

[https://novaramedia.com/2020/09/04/the-opposite-of-a-
cynic-d...](https://novaramedia.com/2020/09/04/the-opposite-of-a-cynic-david-
graeber-1961-2020/)

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

[https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b054zdp6](https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b054zdp6)

------
yongjik
> If there’s a line to get on a crowded bus, do you wait your turn and refrain
> from elbowing your way past others even in the absence of police?

> If you answered “yes”, then you are used to acting like an anarchist!

No, if you answered "yes", then that means you live in a society that
maintains bus stops, and buses, and these buses are expected to come at
regular intervals and stop _right in front of_ the first person waiting in the
line, and (for example) not stop fifty meters from the stop sign (and in the
middle of the road), forcing everybody to run toward the bus before it takes
off again, because there are five other buses and eight illegally parked cars
between the bus and the stop sign.

In other words, being able to wait in line in an orderly fashion is not (only)
the result of human decency. It's a result of decades of social trial-and-
error, forcing people to (for example) not park at bus stops, and eventually
convincing enough people that there is a working social system.

I guess one can build a convincing case for anarchism (I particularly liked Le
Guin's take in _The Dispossessed_ ) but this example is a straight-up first
world problem.

------
ddingus
I have observed anarchists generally don't like being told what to do. That is
not a judgement. Just observed behavior leading to an obvious conclusion.

To be fair here, I don't like being told what to do.

When the machinery of society is running well, lives are reasonable, etc...
these people continue to advocate and agitate, but the masses will generally
go with what is easy, reasonable.

It's all pretty harmless.

Now consider the case when said machinery is not running well, is unjust, and
generally not reasonable.

Suddenly, that advocacy and agitation takes greater root. Screw being told
what to do, essentially.

Society sees greater unrest and in general the basic social contracts come
into question.

From whatever establishment happens to be in majority control point of view,
anarchists and others willing to subvert are bad, harmful elements that should
be avoided and or dealt with more formally.

Seems to me that is not harmful at all, may even be beneficial, a self
correcting mechanism of sorts.

Anarchists are simply a necessary artifact of human nature.

The T-cells of society.

The remedy is not to condemn anarchists, or consider their ideas irrelevant.

It is to run society better. Make the basic deal sexy, compelling enough that
people will accept being told what to do in return for a modest, reasonable,
dignified life.

Edit: From discussions with an anarchist friend:

When the common man, labor, the basic, necessary classes are abused,
overexploited, they are offended. It may be they are members of said class
too. So there is clear self interest.

Agency really matters. Potential does too. Overly totalitarian society tends
to labor to excess and snuff out being human.

Social democracy is largely comparable with anarchism. Rule by democracy, not
by purse, or bloodline, army, or god.

This exchange seems to support my observations above.

Nice weekend lark! This discussion here, along with a couple I will have with
others will prove interesting and informative.

If nothing else, I suspect many of us, if we are truly seeking info like this,
will understand one another better.

Never a bad thing.

------
miki123211
While I believe a vast majority of people will behave reasonably without law
enforcement, there's that small minority who wouldn't, and that's what the
government is protecting us against. That small minority can do a lot of harm,
think of an internet forum with 100 reasonable users and one troll, posting at
a rate of 1 post per minute, just for the fun of it. That troll can easily
ruin discussions for anyone else.

With that said, I agree with the anarchic notion of pushing power down,
though. Push most decisionmaking power as low as possible. The higher you are
in the hierarchy, the less power you should have. Make lots of small
communities that self-organize and are very easy to leave, that last part is
important. Accept the notion that some people are evil, no matter what you do.
Instead of fighting against the incentives, embrace them. Those thinking about
power grabs should know that, even if they succeed, it's trivial for
nonconsenting people to leave, so it's not worth the trouble.

Any given level of hierarchy should only deal with two things, conflict
resolution between lower level units that can't come to a voluntary agreement;
and possibly removing units that disproportionately affect others from the
hierarchy (not sure about that one). Internal decisions should be made
internally. A higher level should only coordinate when absolutely needed.

In other words, members of communities should be able to do whatever they
want, as long as they don't hurt other people. All voluntary agreements are
fine. Only when something can't be voluntarily resolved, or when a member
starts behaving violently, the community leadership step in to fix the
situation. When someone grabs too much power and does bad things with it,
either members leave, or other communities decide to stop associating with the
bad one, which might cause members to leave. Same for all other levels.

------
x87678r
I still have no idea what Anarchists want. In an ideal anarchist society are
there laws? Who enforces? Do you pay taxes? Can you own property or you just
build a house wherever you want and defend it? Is there money and who
organizes it? Something like a big hydro dam, factories, ships - who
owns/builds these and why? Even googling now gives no straight answer.

~~~
boomboomsubban
There is no "straight answer" as there are a variety of viewpoints that could
he considered "anarchism" and their responses to these questions differ. This
is true of whatever viewpoint you follow too, your personal beliefs differ
from the accepted dogma at certain points.

In as small of a description as possible, anarchism generally favors a
democratic city state.

------
yodsanklai
To me, anarchism is simply an ideal view which is the opposite of
authoritarianism. We all sit somewhere in between these two extreme points of
view.

In that sense, one can lean toward anarchism, e.g. they value personal freedom
and question unnecessary authority, but don't necessarily believe in a more
extreme form of anarchy without government and so on.

~~~
peschu
anarchy is the opposite of hierarchy

I always wonder why nobody knows that. There are so much and long comments
discussing this shit, but the simplest thing and explanation nobody seems to
know or nobody wants to know.

------
yunderfall
This is a common rhetorical tactic used by people with unpopular ideas. They
imply that most people just "don't understand" and would be on their side if
they would simply become more informed.

The reality, in my experience, is that most people simply aren't interested in
thinking deeply about social organization on a regular basis; and, of the
people who are, most of them already understand your ideas and will disagree
with them if everyone involved has the maturity to actually debate the issue
in depth and say what they mean. No, I am not whatever label you want to apply
to me. I may agree with aspects of your philosophy, but I probably disagree
with others. But the vast majority of these groups don't want to hear it,
because like Orwell said, there is nothing more maddening than someone who
listens calmly, shows they clearly understand your point of view, and
disagrees.

------
ggggtez
> Even if you decentralize society and put as much power as possible in the
> hands of small communities, there will still be plenty of things that need
> to be coordinated, from running railroads to deciding on directions for
> medical research. But just because something is complicated does not mean
> there is no way to do it democratically.

Aha! So, in order to organize in an anarchic society, maybe we should form
some kind of _democracy_ where people get to vote on things.

Of course, even if most people are good natured, managing and optimizing
trillions of dollars of budget is difficult, so it would be good if we could
elect _representatives_ that could work in a small community of anarchists who
can devote their attention to understanding these issues, and voting on them.
We could perhaps call them "Congress".

WAIT A SECOND. I GET IT NOW. Anarachy IS big government!

------
curation
What is really being discussed when the word anarchy is produced in contexts
like this, is power. Those who see themselves as connected to power will of
course vote no. Those who do not see themselves connected to power know enough
to shut up about it.

------
ctrlp
The simplest expression of anarchist principles I've seen is that it is
opposed to coercion. All else follows. This is very appealing but at any scale
we find that people must be forced to be persuaded. If that sounds Orwellian,
you're not wrong. Orwell was anarchist adjacent and a keen critic of the left.
(Check out Homage to Catalonia.) Anarchy is a fig leaf for totalitarianism. It
is a short step from the University diversity council to the reeducation
camps. We need to be very careful that the political options we are advocating
in the spirit of freedom and equity are not poisoned bait preying on our best
instincts for fairness and care.

------
anm89
I consider myself an anarchist but strongly dislike this version or definition
of anarchism. Anarchism is by definition a nonsensical political philosophy.
How do you anarchistically implement and maintain anarchy. This obviously
doesn't work.

For me anarchism is a personal philosophy. I choose to consider myself the
only meaningful sovereign for myself. I acknowledge that states exist and that
I might have very real consequences if I piss them off, I just don't believe
they have any special moral authority and try to be the one at the end of the
day that sets the rules for my life too the extent that I can.

------
scythe
I wonder why anarchists rarely critique the dynamics of FOSS, particularly
those projects with no commercial backing. You have a bunch of people in a
naturally leaderless setting who, at least apparently, want to cooperate and
build something in an environment where violence is largely irrelevant, and
yet:

> _Are you a member of a club or sports team or any other voluntary
> organization where decisions are not imposed by one leader but made on the
> basis of general consent?_

Well, _yes_ , but what a pain! Everyone goes off in all different directions
and boring stuff often doesn't get done. Sometimes I find myself wishing we
had a dictator.

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

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

------
dragonwriter
“Anarchists are simply people who believe human beings are capable of behaving
in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to.”

No, pretty much everyone, even the staunchest opponents of anarchism, thinks
human beings are _capable_ of that. Anarchists are people who believe that
people are not merely capable of that, but alo have a universal enough
tendency to act in an irrationally altruistic manner without external
constraint that external constraint is not necessary to prevent widespread
harm inflicted by even a small minority of transgressors seizing opportunity
for unjustified gain at the expense of others. I get that this piece is
intended to be a less subtle form for anarchism of what the “world's smallest
political quiz” is for libertarianism; propaganda to convince people that
despite disagreeing with most substantive political positions taken by most
anarchists they've ever encounter they are nonetheless closet anarchists, but
come on.

------
cryptofistMonk
"How many hours would we really need to work in order to maintain a functional
society — that is, if we got rid of all the useless or destructive occupations
like telemarketers, lawyers, prison guards, financial analysts, public
relations experts, bureaucrats and politicians, and turn our best scientific
minds away from working on space weaponry or stock market systems to
mechanizing away dangerous or annoying tasks like coal mining or cleaning the
bathroom, and distribute the remaining work among everyone equally?"

Somewhat interesting thought, but it does not sound anarchist at all. Who's
going to do the turning of our scientific minds, decide which minds are the
scientific ones, or distribute the rest of the shitty jobs? When jobs are
being distributed, who is going to be paying or otherwise providing for the
workers? This sounds a lot more like some kind of totalitarian communist
state.

~~~
ctrlp
Read Michael Albert's Parecon for an anarchist answer to these questions. One
of many of which Lenin would be proud.

------
andi999
It depends on the social surroundings. "If there’s a line to get on a crowded
bus, do you wait your turn and refrain from elbowing your way past others even
in the absence of police?" Yes, of course, but mainly because it also works.
When I went to a certain east asian country 10 years ago, I had to stop
queuing like this otherwise everybody cut in in front of me.

I know a person who couldnt stop the normal queing and failed at getting a
meal at mcD (never made it to the counter).

So there are cultural tipping points.

------
kgran
I don't know much about this kind of stuff, but if the natural kind of
division of labour still exists in an anarchist society, some group would
eventually be elected to act as those who catch thieves, rapists, murderers,
con artists and the kind. Not every person nor group is suited for this
dangerous job as a specially elected, trained and paid group of people, so the
emergence of 'anarchist' police would be inevitable.

------
chmod600
"For thousands of years people lived without governments. In many parts of the
world people live outside of the control of governments today. They do not all
kill each other."

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noble_savage](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noble_savage)

~~~
username90
Tribal societies have hierarchies and laws, they are not anarchies.

~~~
galaxyLogic
And they attack kill and steal from other tribes

------
drummer
Highly recommend the book 'What anarchy isn't' by Larken Rose. Free download:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/yd18waixbva1jae/WhatAnarchyIsnt-
FR...](https://www.dropbox.com/s/yd18waixbva1jae/WhatAnarchyIsnt-
FREEBIE.pdf?dl=0)

------
Hoenoe
A nice addition to this article would be
[https://thecorrespondent.com/443/brace-yourself-for-the-
most...](https://thecorrespondent.com/443/brace-yourself-for-the-most-
dangerous-idea-yet-most-people-are-pretty-decent/58612083398-55f77a22)

------
mr_woozy
>Do you believe that human beings are fundamentally corrupt and evil, or that
certain sorts of people (women, people of color, ordinary folk who are not
rich or highly educated) are inferior specimens, destined to be ruled by their
betters?

Can´t I believe in the first one without adhering to the second?

------
kstenerud
In my younger years, I'd respond to anarchists espousing their theories by
taking their wallet out of their back pocket or purse, and seeing how long it
takes for them to threaten to call the police (it can take a surprisingly long
time in a bar setting).

Nowadays I just ignore them.

------
thomastjeffery
"Are you an X?" is a fallacious concept made popular by religion.

We are all capable of understanding a variety of viewpoints, and partially
agreeing with them.

The more abstract the viewpoint, the more parts are available to where with.

Anarchy is one of the most abstract ideas I'm aware of.

------
aimor
This is the second article by David Graeber (died recently) I've read today.
About 15 years separate the two, but the style is similar.

Can someone explain it to me: What is the joke? Or, what context am I missing?
Wikipedia isn't filling in the gaps here.

------
squibbles
Benevolent anarchism does not scale. The more pluralistic a population, the
more differences of opinion and disagreement on principles. The rule of law is
one way to cast multiple subjective experiences into a single objective
framework.

------
jmnicolas
Look at any real life anarchist experience (CHAZ being the latest example):
after a few days / weeks of chaos, the first thing they do is recreate the
services that a state provide.

------
noxer
>Do you believe that human beings are fundamentally corrupt and evil

Certainly not all but it only needs a few so I guess I'm not an anarchist I
accept reality even if I don't like it.

------
netman21
Ho did Prof. De Lapaz define Rational Anarchist? "I believe I do not need a
government, but I acknowledge that _you_ may feel the need to be governed."

------
robofanatic
Humans having been living without so called governments or police for millions
of years. The perfect anarchist world would have happened by now if it
actually worked.

~~~
sudosysgen
It did work. The main issue was agriculture, which made private property a
source a power, which allowed some people to accumulate more power than
others. As soon as we developped agriculture, it stopped being the natural
outcome.

------
nmeofthestate
"Do you have this one-dimensional and pessimistic view of morality, or this
other equally naive view of morality? Well then guess what!" etc

------
schwax
A question I'm asking myself is: "What would it take for anarchism to work?"

(See also: "What would it take for capitalism to work for everyone?")

Some ideas to consider:

1\. @visakanv on assholes:

> Assholes make up about 1% of most groups, cause about 75% of the damage, and
> ruin everybody’s experience. [1]

2\. Dale Pendell on a long-term formulation of anarchism he calls "Horizon
Anarchism":

> I want to see the president, when it comes time to sign a bill, even if the
> bill may be necessary, to recognize—instead of being proud of every piece of
> legislation that’s passed—to recognize that it represents a failure of our
> collective social nature. And, instead of giving away all these pens with
> fanfare, he should light a stick of incense and say, “My fellow Americans,
> it is with deep regret that I must announce to you that, because we could
> not solve this problem on our own, we have had to enact another piece of
> legislation. Let us pray we can recover our senses and repeal it as soon as
> possible.” [2]

3\. Another question to ask is "Why are some people willing to cooperate, but
not others?"

Theories of developmental stages give us useful models to understand the
prerequisites. What cultural, psychological, and physical needs must be meet?

I've found a good starting point in this area in Reinventing Organizations by
Frederic Laloux [3], which draws heavily on Ken Wilber's integral theory and
other research on developmental stages that came before it [4].

[1]
[http://www.visakanv.com/blog/assholes/](http://www.visakanv.com/blog/assholes/)

[2] [https://psychedelicsalon.com/podcast-055-horizon-
anarchism/](https://psychedelicsalon.com/podcast-055-horizon-anarchism/)

[3]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcS04BI2sbk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcS04BI2sbk)

[4]
[https://reinventingorganizationswiki.com/Developmental_Persp...](https://reinventingorganizationswiki.com/Developmental_Perspective_on_Organizations)

~~~
Hoenoe
Thanks for all the nice resources and good question. I think a good place to
look is also at Elinor Ostrom 8 design principles to deal with the tragedy of
the common and David Sloan Wilson's multilevel selection theory [1]. They call
is polycentric governance but it has a lot of related ideas. [1]:
[https://evonomics.com/tragedy-of-the-commons-elinor-
ostrom](https://evonomics.com/tragedy-of-the-commons-elinor-ostrom)

[1]: [https://evonomics.com/tragedy-of-the-commons-elinor-
ostrom/?...](https://evonomics.com/tragedy-of-the-commons-elinor-
ostrom/?utm_source=newsletter_campaign=organic)

------
amadeuspagel
I wonder how a similar essay for other ideologies would look like. Do you buy
things? You're a capitalist. Do you keep some things the way they are? You're
a conservative. Do you clean your room? You're a fascist. But I doubt someone
would bother writing such essays, and if someone did, I doubt it would get
upvoted to the HN frontpage. What is it about this that appeals to people? An
ideology that feels edgy, but doesn't actually offend anyone?

~~~
andybak
I think it's an particularly interesting thing posted here at the moment
because of the protests and the frequent demonisation of anarchism in the
media.

But it's also interesting on hacker news because of the popularity of
libertarianism amongst some here. It must be obvious how close anarchism and
libertarianism are. In fact when I was first made aware of libertarianism many
years ago it was regarded as a branch of anarchist thought.

~~~
vidarh
Libertarianism started on the far left - Dejaque criticised Proudhon for being
a 'moderate anarchist, liberal, but not libertarian' and went on to publish
the first libertarian paper.

Parts of the Socialist League who counted William Morris, Friedrich Engels and
Eleanor Marx as members were libertarian.

Right wing libertarianism first became a thing ca 1950s and was explicitly a
project by Rothbard to bring together anti-authoritarian groups on both the
left and the right.

The primary distinction tends to be that right libertarians see property
rights as one of the things the state must protect, while left libertarians
tends to see property rights as fundamentally oppressive.

------
icedchocolate
“ Anarchists are simply people who believe human beings are capable of
behaving in a reasonable fashion without having to be forced to. “

Lol you lost me immediately. This is essentially pretending anti-vaccers and
other groups of people just don’t exist. Just because you’re in a bubble of
educated, reasonable people, doesn’t mean everyone is like that, sadly.

------
garyrob
At first I react the headline as asking whether I was an antichrist. Hopefully
not.

------
TehShrike
I don't think these presuppositions make for a consistent anarchist. I think
Rothbard's presuppositions in Ethics of Liberty hold up better: every person
has full rights to their own body, the right to property, and the right to
whatever they make with their body and their property.

------
scoot_718
I don't trust other people sufficiently to fall for this load of crap.

------
wcerfgba
Anarchism is not a single political or economic philosophy, it is a very broad
school of thought. I would not agree that the most basic principle of
anarchism is self-organization. For me the nucleus of anarchism is that all
authority should be questioned and that power structures of all kinds (not
just governmental/state) should be analysed and dismantled.

If this has piqued your interest, you may wish to look in to libertarian
socialism, which is a narrower strain of thought within the anarchist
tradition, which advocates citizens assemblies, worker co-ops, and fractal
councils, among other specific solutions to some of the issues raised in this
thread.

Also, a short introductory video on anarchism from Philosophy Tube:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCAUmh99hMI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCAUmh99hMI)

------
ozim
"The number of left-wing and anarchist terrorist attacks in 2019 (26) reached
the level of 2016 and 2017 after a decrease in 2018. All attacks took place in
Greece, Italy or Spain." \- [https://www.europol.europa.eu/activities-
services/main-repor...](https://www.europol.europa.eu/activities-
services/main-reports/european-union-terrorism-situation-and-trend-report-te-
sat-2020)

What is behaving in a reasonable fashion most of the time when there are
anarchist terrorist attacks?

------
ajarmst
I'm pretty used to this sort of inverted 'No True Scotsman' (you know, if you
believe <innocuous thing> then you're really a <follower of a definitely non-
innocuous set of complex and frequently inconsistent and contradictory
intersecting beliefs, norms and practices>) assertion about Christianity,
Agnosticism, Atheism, Capitalism, Socialism, Fascism, Feminism, Objectivism,
Belief in the Paranormal or UFOs, and whatever John McAffee is currently
raving about. I will, however, confess to some amusement at seeing any careful
parsing of the rules defining anarchism.

------
sktrdie
RIP David Graeber. He died just a few days ago

------
cryptica
I believe that a small subset of humans are fundamentally evil and that these
people are hungry for power and are therefore the most likely to get into
positions of power. If you keep any system running long enough, the scum will
eventually float to the top. When that happens, you have to stir the pot. We
need a reset.

Any political system which will shake things up is welcome. Communism?
anarchism, capital redistribution, wealth tax, universal basic income...

------
chewbacha
The early descriptions reminded me of libertarianism. did anyone else feel
that?

“Libertarians seek to maximize political freedom and autonomy, emphasizing
individualism, freedom of choice and voluntary association.”

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism)

~~~
Giorgi
Yes, libertarianism is quite close to anarchy or minarchy. It looks like such
sentiments are very strong in places where goverment has failed their people
for dozens of years, in comparison of Europe for example.

~~~
torb-xyz
With the exception of anarchism being anti-capitalist.

Any ‘anarchist’ that is pro-capitalism is generally not regarded as anarchist
by the wider anarchist movement.

Fun fact: befor the modern US meaning, libertarian used to mean anarchist-
communist as a way around french authorities banning the word anarchist in the
late 1800 if I remember correctly.

~~~
vidarh
The first use was Joseph Dejaque criticising Proudhon for not going far
enough. Specifically he criticised Proudhons views on women.

This first use was in the 1850's I believe. Left wing libertarianism predates
the right wing use of the term by about a century.

During that time it was very much a term that encompassed anarchists and some
other socialists such as libertarian Marxists.

------
aksss
Click-bait headlines now?

------
golergka
Is it just me, or does this text seems to pretend as if anarcho-communists are
the only kind of anarchists and anarcho-capitalist don't exist? It doesn't
seem to talk a lot about property rights, but some phrases about "the way
society is organized right now" and "useless professions" are not what all
anarchists believe.

~~~
DavidVoid
Many people, for good reason, believe that anarcho-capitalism is an oxymoron.
Wikipedia has a short section of some anarchist criticism of anarcho-
capitalism [1].

 _Anarchists such as Brian Morris argue that anarcho-capitalism does not in
fact get rid of the state. He says that anarcho-capitalists "simply replaced
the state with private security firms, and can hardly be described as
anarchists as the term is normally understood"._

 _Similarly, Bob Black argues that an anarcho-capitalist wants to "abolish the
state to his own satisfaction by calling it something else". He states that
they do not denounce what the state does, they just "object to who's doing
it"._

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarcho-
capitalism#Criticism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarcho-
capitalism#Criticism)

------
lucasnortj
Reading this article it’s almost as if Graeber never looked at the world
around him and saw how people behave when they see that law and order has
broken down e.g. the London riots of 2010 where everyone ran to loot the
nearest Foot Locker as soon as they realised no one would stop them.

~~~
sudosysgen
Actually, a very tiny minority on the order of a fraction of a percent of
people did so. The anarchist reply would be that in an anarchic society where
it is the common interest that production goes smoothly, the 99.9% would have
a vested interest in stopping the 0.02% that's looting and such riots would
not happen, whereas in our current system private ownership means that there
isn't much of a reason to go out of your way to protect some rich corporations
property.

------
stagehn
Compare the murder rate per capita in tribal societies today versus modern
society. It's orders of magnitude higher. Case closed.

------
LoSboccacc
what a bunch of bad examples.

I (used to, pre-covid) see daily plenty people cutting bus lanes, so these
exist, and what you going to do to protect society from them? even a stern
look is not the anarchist way.

most sport teams have a captain and a trainer and most volunteer forces are
under supervision of more experienced staff around here. sure they don't
strictly command the squad, but they're the one responsible for organizing
participant to minimize internal and external friction

that capitalism is unfair is so generic it's extremely disingenuous to make
that critique as a sign of anarchism

there's quite a logical jump from "two wrongs don’t make a right" to "abolish
the criminal justice system", which isn't about punishment to begin with in
most societies.

"Pretty much every achievement has been based on cooperation and mutual aid"
\- pretty much most of the contemporary technological jump came from wwii, and
the modern technological jump came from private holdings competing and one
upping one another.

"Do you believe that human beings are fundamentally corrupt and evil" uh,
there's psychopathology that need to be cured; how many people submitted to
rehab vs how many people were forced into?

"certain sorts of people are inferior specimens, destined to be ruled by their
betters? " of curse I wouldn't call them "inferior" and "ruling", but some
people require continuous assistance or guidance. this question has been
loaded with negative term to cause a certain predefined answer to seem the
only right answer. ask yourself is someone with dementia would need a tutor to
manage their finances instead and help them trough surviving in decent
condition, and suddenly the answer is not as much black and white.

hope this is because it's a very short essay to a large introductory text,
because otherwise is severely lacking both in arguments and the logic by which
what's there has been built.

~~~
ctrlp
The standard reply is that social pathologies are caused by a pathological
system. In that way it's not much different than Marxist apologetics.
Unfalsifiable utopianism, and frankly, naive about human nature. There's just
so much hand waving when it comes to concrete proposals. Blueprints? like
what? Stalin himself would have been a fan a Parecon. I'll miss David. Debt
was a really interesting book. But, if this is anarchism, our most visible
anarchist activists today didn't get the message. We all practice Communism at
the level of a family. And we all practice anarchism in a somewhat free
society. But not all social systems scale. I do wonder why my favorite
anarchists like Graeber and Chomsky and Zinn found their homes in academic
institutions where most of their peers are fully capable of governing
themselves. Call me cynical, but scratch a cynic and you'll find a
disillusioned idealist, they say. It seems to me that if you scratch a social
anarchist and you'll find a crypto totalitarian.

------
Ensorceled
The major problem with anarchist and libertarian philosophies is being
demonstrated in the US right now ... at least 30% of the population is
willingly supporting a man with despotic intentions, seemingly to it's bitter
conclusion. The secondary problem is there are always sociopaths willing to
use that 30% for their own ends.

------
seventytwo
If what this article says is true, then anarchism will fail for the same
reason libertarianism fails. They’re both exercises in ideal realities.
They’re experiments with frictionless ramps, and ideal pulleys, and objects
falling in a vacuum.

Both in physics and in society, the world is more complicated than “government
is unnecessary” or “don’t tread on me”.

------
fallingfrog
The fundamental nature of politics is that it’s about relationships of power-
how power is exercised, who has power, who doesn’t, and what the relationship
is between people or groups of people. Whenever one person or group of people
is above another in some kind of power hierarchy, the same kind of dynamic
develops, no matter whether it’s in a corporate office or medieval Europe or
anywhere else- its always the same. The people on the bottom will always
display resentment and resistance towards those who have power over them,
because nobody likes having explicit or implicit violence threatened on them
and being exploited or told what to do. The person or people on top will
always display contempt and fear towards those underneath, contempt because in
order to justify being on top one has to believe that they are superior or
more deserving in some way, and fear because on some level they know that they
are outnumbered by a lot of very angry people. They know that the sword of
Damocles hangs over their heads. The discourse of the political right wing is
therefore always going to be dominated by both contempt and fear, for exactly
those reasons. The contempt manifests in talking about a “culture of
victimhood” and “welfare queens” and “black on black violence” and
“snowflakes” and the fear manifests in calls for law and order, more
aggressive policing, border walls and increased military funding. But the
source of the discord is the power hierarchy itself, whether it be racial or
class or gender or whatever, and until that is abolished the same poisonous
political dynamic will persist. It cannot be papered over by advocating for
everybody to “just get along” or “give peace a chance”; that’s just one more
way to tell the people at the bottom that they need to stop complaining and
accept their situation. Even if the discord calms down for a while, it will
inevitably bubble back to the surface again as resentment and anger build up,
and fear and contempt to meet it. Only equality can resolve the conflict.

------
yosito
People mean different things when they say they're anarchist. This article
describes a mix of libertarianism, humanism and egalitarianism that is quite
admirable. But many anarchists are willing to use violence against anything or
anyone they perceive as powerful or oppressive, and it's pretty easy to frame
pretty much anyone you disagree with in those terms. There's a reason that
anarchism is associated with violent stereotypes. I personally prefer to
identify with values like egalitarianism and humanitarianism without a label
like anarchism that is often associated with violence that I disagree with and
don't want to be even remotely associated with.

------
wrnr
What a mealy-mouth, I'm an anarchist because I oppose the state's monopoly on
violence with violence.

------
blhack
Is there a name for this type of thing where you label yourself as something
that everybody already understands, but then try to bait and switch the
definition on them?

Anarchists: we don’t believe in anarchy! We believe in the human spirit and
peace and harmony!

Satanist: we don’t believe in evil, we believe in love and treating each other
with respect and kindness!

I see this pop up all the time in politics and it’s always kindof funny to me.

(I won’t go into specifics of places this is happening in politics right now
for obvious reasons)

~~~
thomastjeffery
Well, satanism has always been about the irony, so I wouldn't call it a bait
and switch. It's meant to be an obvious satire, showing off the obvious flaws
present in judeo-christianity.

People often take satanism literally so they don't have to confront their own
problematic belief system.

I imagine many anarchist movements follow a similar pattern.

~~~
blhack
Yes that’s exactly what I mean! Just curious if there is a name for this sort
of thing. Irony, I guess?

“We say _satanism_ , but really what we mean is the opposite of satanism ;-)”

------
browserface
Anyone who has ever lived in a share house (or next to one) knows that without
laws civilization will descend into absolute chaos and endless tit for tat
revenge warfare.

Try parenting with anarchist principles.

At some point you run into limits. The point is, what imposes those limits?
Physics, gravity, society or yourself?

Ideally the limits you put on yourself should mean you never encounter
(negatively or destructively) any of the other systems of limits. But, not all
people are capable of always limiting or controlling themselves, and
no...that's not the fault of their being "arbitrary restrictions" or
"ludicrous laws" and it's not a "reaction against meaningless oppressive
authority", it's just people are not perfect and not always good at acting in
a way that doesn't put them up against the other sources of limits.

Even if someone has perfect self-control. Who says they have perfect knowledge
of the limits, which if they were to cross them would bring about their
destruction or detriment, in any given situation?

You should be the source of truth and guide for your life, but I don't think
you can expect to know everything and avoid all risks if you only pay
attention to what you think is OK and ignore signals from elsewhere. I think
you need to balance it with acknowledging that other people and society has
some fucking clue about that stuff as well. It's not perfect either, but you
shouldn't _not factor_ it into your decisions.

If anarchists were so clever at charting their own courses, how come they end
up getting arrested for stupid shit? I suppose they're "not true anarchists".

~~~
vidarh
Anarchism does not suggest no rules, but voluntary association. A flat share
is a perfect example in that if ypu don't like the rules you find other people
to share with - the rules are not imposed from above, but the result of
negotiation and entered into voluntarily.

I'm not an anarchist though I share some of the views, but so much of the
criticism of anarchism comes from misrepresenting anarchism as rejecting all
organisation and rules.

Different forms of anarchism favor different levels of organisation, but part
of the reason why there are so many variations is exactly that they all
believe in the existence of systems of organization and enforcement of rules.

~~~
browserface
I get that you see it that way. I think that might be shifting the goalposts
of anarchism in the face of criticism, and I suspect the appeal to "zero
rules" can be brought back later in less critical contexts.

But I appreciate the expanded perspective you've given me. So...voluntary
association, but still having rules and organizing. OK, sounds alright.

How is that different to the current global system? I mean it like, I was born
in country A, then traveled to country B and C, and discovered actually I
didn't like the culture and rules in country A, so I came to live in countries
B and C. I can go where I like to choose the system of governance that suits
me. None of these countries are anarchist....If anarchism speaks more to the
relationship between an individual and a system, and less to the system
itself, is it really a system of organization that could replace a
social/political system, isn't it more just like a "guiding philosophy" for
some individuals? Or a way of describing a set of things that some people
might do, even if they are not "anarchists".

It might be me, but anarchy seems to be having an identity crisis.

~~~
vidarh
All of this was there from the earliest conceptions of anarchism.

The difference is one of degree. Moving to another country requires means to
do so, and immigration procedures imposed on you by others that means
inherently you have rules imposed on you wherever you go.

It also involves the state you move from imposing rules on you that you have
never been free to consent to, and a central aspect of anarchism is to e.g
reject that the state has a justifiable claim to regulate property in the
first place, and so that unlike a flat share where you share a space that is
actively used by others, the state attempts to monopolise commons with threats
of force.

~~~
browserface
The degree seems to me to scale up. The sharehouse, the state. It's all the
same thing. A sharehouse can be plenty coercive too. Parent - child ?
Coercive. Personal relationships, they can be coercive too sadly. But
"coercion" on the other side is just "the power of bad", it's psychology.
Criticism and threats of penalties really do make people behave better. But
it's complicated. Read "The Power of Bad".

And don't give me that complaints about immigration and means. An anarchist
should be one for personal responsibility, choice, freedom and negotiation,
should be able to bend reality to their will rather than complaining in the
streets that it change, right? I guess I also wonder, what the hell do you
replace the state with? I mean, states didn't just "magically appear" out of
nowhere. They're born out of history of blood and death and suffering and
overcoming endless civilizational challenges (Read "Why the West Still Rules
For Now"), and I think there's a chance they're our current best solutions to
the problem of organizing for stability.

If anarchism was a powerful personal philosophy, a couple rules and
regulations would be not barrier. All is negotiation and anarchists are
apparently adept at such. I don't get it. Sorry.

Why submit to the sharehouse bitch, but rail and wail against the state? I
don't get it. It's the same dynamic. I think if you put the state on a
pedestal over you, it's like a type of daddy complex where you are giving away
your power. It's all just life. There's no getting around that's it's gonna be
hard. Anarchists seem like they want to adapt and thrive, but then they're
also complaining. I think their ideology has been misused and they're having
an identity crisis.

I appreciate your responses and attitude and I'm not trying to be offensive to
you. I'm tapping out of this discussion because I think it's a waste of time
to discuss in this age, but I do appreciate your style. Best of luck to you
both!

------
koheripbal
It's great to have people with diverse opinions - we are richer for that.

... but some people like Graeber, make the transition from spreading a mesage
form of activism to violent and destructive activism.

Not only does that alienate people, it's also findamentally wrong in a
democracy.

If you cannot convince people to vote differently with your words, then using
violence and intimidation makes you a cancerous part of the system.

~~~
scandox
> Graeber

> violent and destructive activism

When? Where? What? This is something I never heard of.

