I know I had a similar argument before. Not with the same people though.
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Bardock42 is a whimpering pussy now who lost his flare to debate vigorously and just spouts senseless and thinly veiled puns here and there. You nazi pr*ck. Get your balls back from whoever you sold them to, you fat f*ck. What happened to the manly, chubby German big mouth we once knew, who'd flatten ignorance with a solid argument? Now it's like Andy Dick meets John Candy. You hybrid beefcake. Suck my c*ck
He made a similar post. We did not argue about it at all though.
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Bardock42 is a whimpering pussy now who lost his flare to debate vigorously and just spouts senseless and thinly veiled puns here and there. You nazi pr*ck. Get your balls back from whoever you sold them to, you fat f*ck. What happened to the manly, chubby German big mouth we once knew, who'd flatten ignorance with a solid argument? Now it's like Andy Dick meets John Candy. You hybrid beefcake. Suck my c*ck
Bardock42 is a whimpering pussy now who lost his flare to debate vigorously and just spouts senseless and thinly veiled puns here and there. You nazi pr*ck. Get your balls back from whoever you sold them to, you fat f*ck. What happened to the manly, chubby German big mouth we once knew, who'd flatten ignorance with a solid argument? Now it's like Andy Dick meets John Candy. You hybrid beefcake. Suck my c*ck
The definition is the definition. I shall say no more on it.
I have met people like that. Lots of them. What I haven't met is a scholar or historian of anarchy that participates in the kind of rallies you see at G8 or G20.
I'm sure they are there though.
Are you one?...If so then are you pissed off that these people effectively hijack your supposedly legitimate agenda.
though, at least in my opinion, they probably have a different agenda than I, and I would say they are highly ineffective at what they do, unless creating a state where protesters are constantly abused by aggressive police tactics is their agenda.
__________________ He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.
my goal for the moment is making people think less "anarchy means chaos and petrol bombs" and more "there are some reasonable points made by anarchists". I think I've been moderately successful.
Anarchy has a long way to go. It was demonized quite effectively ~150 years ago, and the propaganda from such has essentially informed the mainstream public about what anarchy is.
It is an uphill battle, against ignorance, partisanship and my own patience. Being told what anarchy is by people who haven't read the Wiki page gets tiresome. There are few topics people with such ignorance would feel they have the authority to speak about, and they would routinely be laughed out of most threads regarding religious or other mainstream political views, however, it seems that with anarchy, it is those who are informed about what the ideology actually stands for who are ridiculed.
I'm not saying I feel you, or anyone else here, is ignorant in such a way. Just, ya, people need to read...
wow, what a loaded question. To an anarchist, all countries. We can quibble, but at the very least, democracy doesn't work the way it should on paper.
There are numerous examples of anarchist societies which would have, from all available date, been successful. The largest single reason for the lack of success would be that they were devastated by the militaries of authoritarian nations.
scholarly reviews of Somalia show that it was the Islamic Courts attempt to take power which started the recent spate of violence, I don't have the source on me, but basically, the introduction of rigid legal systems created violence within the nation. At least, it was responsible for the recent violence that has brought Somalia back into the news post-Blackhawk Down
However, I've never seen an anarchist defend Somalia. If you want, we can go over specifics about how anarchy could possibly work, but, the essence is that poor nations without infrastructure are probably going to suffer such issues regardless of leadership. Look at the state of African nations with corrupt governance. Even those who have "fledgling democracies".
Rand wasn't an anarchist
__________________ He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.
I'd say you're fighting the wrong uphill battle. It'd be far more effective to get the people who believe they are anarchists but with entirely the wrong notion of what it actually is to change their opinions. Rather than those who don't agree with anarchy in the 1st place or know what it is. You might even kill two birds with one stone by doing so.
Completely irrelevant point. Criticisms of one do not, by default, make the other more valid. This is effectively the same wrong argument that creationists use against evolution. Pointing out flaws in evolutionary theory doesn't make creationism true.
Published findings?
The recent violence between the ICU and the ARPCT doesn't cover the problems that have occurred in a country that has had no government from 1991-2006 when the power of the courts began.
I've never claimed an anarchist did or would defend Somalia. What is there to defend? It's simply an example of what happens to a country if you remove government.
my friend apparently is in the hospital getting rabies shots, and I'm going to go keep him company, so I can't put a full reply right now (it'll give me a chance to look through my articles as well). I just wanted to put this:
those people would say I'm not an anarchist (yes, revel in the irony of that)
__________________ He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.
I look forward to your full reply. It may be the only thing I learn this week other than that punching junkies in the face in front of the police is highly amusing.
I wouldn't say that I am a scholar or historian, I would however claim that my understanding and thoughts on anarchy are superior to many who go by the label. I'd argue though that the cover the use is not necessarily most important to them, violence and rebellion may be more essential. I don't actually know whether a significant amount of people protesting the G8 would label themselves anarchist.
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Bardock42 is a whimpering pussy now who lost his flare to debate vigorously and just spouts senseless and thinly veiled puns here and there. You nazi pr*ck. Get your balls back from whoever you sold them to, you fat f*ck. What happened to the manly, chubby German big mouth we once knew, who'd flatten ignorance with a solid argument? Now it's like Andy Dick meets John Candy. You hybrid beefcake. Suck my c*ck
The best examples are places like Kronstadt or the Spanish Anarchists of the Spanish Civil war. Admittedly, neither had a long period to show sustainability. Anarchy in Spain was successful in some towns and rural centers, and Kronstadt had a worked constitution that dealt with the distribution of food and labour which, on paper, should have been manageable.
Better modern examples come from self-selected groups of people who live in communes in the rain forest or other tropical climates, though they may not profess to be "anarchist", however, their lack of formal institutional government, mixed with their eco-friendly attitudes, do show that some form of stateless sustainability is possible.
Many communities have attempted various projects, such as radical ideas in convict treatment, with varying success.
There are generally two camps of anarchy. You could classify it as left-right, liberal-conservative, syndicalist-individualist, etc. The Syndicalists are most often those who think they are revolutionaries fighting the corrupt power structure, and they are informed by the firey rhetoric of Marx and Che. These people literally believe that the overthrow of the current political establishment will lead to anarchist utopia. These are the people who dress in black face masks and riot as if that is some form of political statement.
They also are the most interested in defining a very strict and discriminative anarchy. More tiresome than being told "anarchy can't work, dumbass" is "you aren't a real anarchist" by people who are from the syndicalist section. I guess this is my longwinded way of saying, people in the general public are more receptive of calm, rational explanations of my position than are other anarchists. In the crowd you speak of, I would mention that I support the right of a man to earn the product of his labour, and they would call me a capitalist whore. That I don't kneel to and blow Mr. Chomsky also irks them. This gives them a priori reason to dismiss anything I say, whereas people who aren't so invested in identity politics can have a reasonable conversation.
And I guess, frankly, I don't want the anarchy people think about to be associated with the syndicalist ideas. I personally don't agree with them (though I'd give them their right to call themselves anarchists) or, especially, their tactics. I don't believe in the revolution they have committed their entire cognition to, and they don't want to hear that working with people is better than fighting the power.
My point wasn't that anarchy is better than democracy because democracy doesn't work, it was about how to define a failed state. Democracy as practiced in most of the western world does not bring the individual freedom that it promised, and thus, democratic states can be said to have failed.
I looked all over for it. I found it on Wiley Interscience last summer, and have subsequently deleted those articles, or misplaced the USB stick. I could find a couple of articles that talk about how modern theories about how a state maintains order are misinformed given how local networks compensate for the lack of centralized institutions, so if you are interested I'll link the abstract.
But alas, I can't back that up...
for sure, the argument was, however, that violence increased when someone tried to take control, not when there was no formal government (which is the opposite of modern theory, though makes intuitive sense)
indeed. A prime reason why revolutions are foolish.
__________________ He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.
Many of those cultures don't lack authority though. They have it in the form of elders and other similar social structures that are just micro-societies.
Shame...I would've liked to read them. You tried searching internet archive. A lot of pages that are taken down are stored in basic format meaning links on the pages don't work etc.
My point is that Somalia was far better when it did have a government. It actually had an education system. Granted it was a flawed and often brutal dictatorship that forced citizens to take up arms against its neighbours but in terms of individual wellbeing, it was better than it has been for the last 15 or so years.
Revolutions unto themselves are foolish although sometimes the end result of the revolution is not. I don't think the French or Americans would argue that Revolutions have been bad for their countries.
Granted, most modern "revolutions" have really just been military coups. (Although the two terms are interchangable depending on what side you're on)
I don't argue against any authority. There do need to be ways for people to resolve disputes. Fluid and inclusive leadership, I feel, is preferable to a central, formal system.
I can't believe its not still on the Wiley page... they have a large archive of much older stuff.
I'll look harder when I have a chance.
fair enough, and ya, those institutions didn't spring up through grass root organization either. I'd be insane to try and find a pro-anarchy position there, other than to say, local forms of rule did establish themselves, and they were better than the years that have followed.
I don't know...
The problem is, revolution gets thrown around so much, that it really is a matter of perspective.
For instance, the Orange Revolution, which was really a successful counter-coup staged by the Ukrainian citizens, or the American revolution, where a group of already largely autonomous territories gained political independence.
I use it more to describe coups, where the formal government is totally overthrown and a power vacuum of some sort forms. I also tend to think this is how most self described revolutionaries see the term, though they feel they would fill that vacuum.
I think the French Revolution actually exemplifies what I'm talking about. For all its liberal legacies, it saw the "Reign of Terror", followed by Imperial dictatorship, then a return to Monarchy before finally becoming the state it is today. When the established monarch fell, it was the most radical, and the most ruthless who were able to gain power, not the benevolent.
__________________ He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.
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Sep 24th, 2009 10:18 PM
