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Comment by bjt2n3904 | Hacker News Reader

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!"

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The thesis of the article is that anarchism is not particularly violent or exotic, but a natural extension of very common moral beliefs and practices. One could argue this is interesting in its own right, given popular depictions of anarchism, but the article goes even further, articulating an anarchistic view of human nature. You can reasonably disagree with this view, as others here have, but to criticize these "talking points" as "generic" seems precisely to miss the point.

The let me tell you more tactic is intentional. Longer sales copy tends to sell more. That is, the length of the sales copy is positively correlated with the conversion rate.

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.

> 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.

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