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Comment by Al-Khwarizmi | Hacker News Reader

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.

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> it's not that "most politicians are selfish, egotistical swine", it's that many people are.

But you are saying this because you _agree_ with the politicians. You believe your preferred course of action is better than most peoples'. There are different viewpoints and pilosophies on what would work out best. There is disagreement on what course of action will get society through it and optimize future outcomes. It is egotistical, and poisoning the well, to call everyone else egotistical and selfish because they disagree with you and the politicians you support.

I think that people left to themselves _will_ disagree with one another, but will make decisions based on personal reasons, such as trying to get their business to survive, or to gain an advantage, or just because they don't particularly fear death, or any of thousands of other reasons. I may disagree with their decisions, but I'm careful about my own judgement of "what is rational" in someone else's circumstances, or even about my own knowledge of how they should optimally behave. There are too many politicians who believe they know how everyone else should do things. Certainty in knowledge is rarely real. The compromise is to let people decide for themselves.

>There are different viewpoints and pilosophies on what would work out best.

In this case, it mostly seems to be a difference between what Joe Blow says and what actual epidemiologists say. One of these is decidedly more valid than the other. I'm sure the experts disagree on some points, but these are details compared to the difference between the overall message they offer and what some self-centered goob or conspiracy theorist wants.

Even experts disagree. Countries have taken different actions precisely because of that. And even then, it can quickly devolve to "rule by experts" in every area of our life. I can listen to experts, I can learn from them, and I can make my own judgement call.

> difference between what Joe Blow says and what actual epidemiologists say

That's my point. It is a radical step to let Joe Blow, however silly or stupid I may think he is, to decide his own way of living. Maybe Joe Blow thinks I'm an idiot too for living the way I choose to do it.

The thing is, the countries which have chosen an unorthodox approach to handling this epidemic have by all indicators we can find, failed.

Just because there are alternative approaches, does not mean they have equal merit.

> I'm sure the experts disagree on some points

That is quite an understatement, given that many experts made complete 180 turns contradicting what they said earlier.

But let's assume that they all agree on some point. Epidemiologists are still epidemiologists, i.e., people that know about diseases. They can inform you about how viruses spread, or what measures work best.

But they don't decide policy. Society needs to balance much more than just this epidemic. No intervention has zero unintended consequences.

Something that is getting clearer as numbers show more and more that the lockdowns so loved by the experts cause far more damage in other aspects of life, like premature death of untreated cancer patients, suicides, starvation, and so on.

> The compromise is to let people decide for themselves.

That's not a compromise. That's like saying "Some people like blindly shooting into crowds. Some do it to gain an advantage, some do it because they don't fear death, some do it for fun. Most gun wounds aren't even lethal. Sure, some people are opposed and think nobody should blindly shoot into crowds. So let's just compromise and say that everyone does what they want".

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.

> 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.

You could say this about any thief in any economic system, including the economy of survival (stealing food, shelter, etc). This is not a thing anarchy could solve.

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

These aren't laws or government, and they would still exist in an anarchistic system.

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

Yes, and there are no countries where no orders were required because people self-regulated.

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.

> Capitalism is fundamentally built on competition, it pits all participants against one another.

Life is built on competition, life pits all participants against one another. Resources are not infinite.

Resources are not infinite but human imagination is. We already produce more food than needed, there is hunger in the world, but not because of shortage but for multiple other reasons.

Main point is that humans are intelligent and we can choose where and how we compete or if we don't want to compete at all.

Holocene extinction is mainly because humans collaborated in much better way than any other animal can. Life might be build on competition but we see how powerful collaboration is.

> there is hunger in the world, but not because of shortage but for multiple other reasons.

That there's always been hunger in the world, even when we didn't produce more food than needed tells you production of food is not the resource limiting the distribution of food, other resources are. Even with all the imagination and collaboration of every communal government in the world to a scale never seen before in history, hunger is still a huge problem, because food is not the only resource, everything is a resource: time, interest, emotions, infrastructure, goods, distribution, people, communities, everything, and they compete with one another for our time and attention.

Everything is in competition, even your ideas and mine right now, and that's a good thing, but the first step to try and better our situation is to accept the reality of the natural world and not fight against it.

Ask the hundreds of millions of murdered Chinese or a Russian how well alternatives to capitalism work out.

Maybe the problem isn't the economic model.

Stalin and Mao, and their successors, were totalitarian dictators. Trying to call the states they commanded socialist is as disingenuous as most other arguments in defense of capitalism. Its like saying the National Socalist German Workers Party was socialist or in the interest of workers. Instead it might just be that those of evil intent will co-opt the hallmarks and language in the peoples interests to undermine their efforts and seize power in their stead for their own tyrannical ends.

But yes, if you want to participate in a socialist revolution, make sure your movement isn't taken over by fascists.

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

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.

If a socialist state fulfills its mandate to provide what it can for the betterment of its peoples condition than it would see many fewer cases of addiction than traditional capitalist economies with little or no socialism as a safeguard against destitution. See the Nordics, as per usual.

Just because you implement anarchism, you haven't automatically abolished capitalism. Bars would still be privately owned, and the owners would have incentive to keep them open in order to earn money to buy food (and protection etc).

In theory you could institute socialism in an arachic society. But that seems ... ill advised for anything larger than a small community. I can at least imagine socialism working in an exceptionally well organised state, but how would that work in a large-scale arnachy?

Wait did you say money?

Money doesn't exist in the situation you describe. Who is issuing the money? At best trading for good is the best possible.

Money is just a concept. Whether that's governement issued legal tender, gold, cigarettes or coffee beans doesn't really matter. Silver coins were in use long before governments started stamping them.

bitcoin does though

But without anyone to engage in fiscal or monetary policy to protect the value of BTC, it'd be vulnerable to huge swings in value.

Well, despite what anarcho-capitalists may say, in an anarchist society you would find it very hard to maintain capitalism as is familair to us today. This is because the State, and by extension its threat of violence, enforces private property rights. In a truly anarchist system where no other protection force evolves to reinstitute the government's role in protecting private property, you would have a very hard time building large amounts of capital. You may be able to control some small amounts of relatively private property (in addition to some personal property), but you absolutely could not maintain the current breadth of our global supply chain without the credible threat of violence from a large organization bent on maintaining private property rights.[0]

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[0]: Merely the threat of violence from a large organization, but not one with a goal of maintaining private property rights, is insufficient to maintain capitalist supply chains, because such an organization would naturally try to increase its own power through force. It would look more like a warlord, cartel, or small-time dictatorship with all of the corruption that implies than a smoothly working system of trade.

If you run a pub, either you're tougher than any challengers or you employ bouncers. Maybe you even have the local community on your side because they like how you run the pub.

The problem is if someone amasses enough capital to pay a gang of thugs to do his bidding. Then you can just take over properties, which earn you more money to pay more thugs. You can easily scale that to a global organisation. That's basically what drug cartels are. They run just fine, trade with other illegal organisations etc. It's just that the overhead of building infrastructure and providing security is enormous, so it only really works in extemely high margin industries like illegal drugs.

But according to anarchist theory, those thugs wouldn't do that because that would violate anarchy. This is the problem with most political theories. They assume near 100% compliance.

I think this argument loses a lot of nuance. The idea behind anarchism, I think, is that people will generally be good to each other and support each other when left to their own devices. In fact, if you think about it, the capacity for doing harm is only very large when you have highly centralised power structures. The fact that people aren't perfect and can do harm at all means, to anarchists, that we should not give the power to cause widespread harm to any individual or small group.

As for the COVID example, we are being told that the disease is spreading because of irresponsible people congregating in bars and salons etc. But if you look at the numbers, the main places that the disease is spreading is in workplaces like meat factories. People are not going to work in these places and spread the disease because of some "selfish, egotistical" inclinations. They are doing so because the society we live in has selfish people with a lot of power that are willing to get others infected for the sake of profit -- i.e. the business owners who are forcing people to work in unsafe conditions if they want to keep their jobs. I think this is further evidence that anarchism is a better approach.

> people will generally be good to each other and support each other when left to their own devices.

Yeah, and when doing so they create organizations with quid pro quo behavior and ultimately form new countries. Anarchy is therefore impossible. Not because we can't handle being left on our own but because we handle being left on our own by creating new organizations.

"the capacity for doing harm is only very large when you have highly centralised power structures"

I don't think this is true. Look at the Mongols. A few nomadic tribes got together and conquered most of Asia. They created a highly centralized power center by force but they didn't start out with one.

I'm not sure that's a good example because these tribes themselves were autocratic in governance before they conquered other nations.

I don't think it was "highly centralized" compared to say Imperial China as an example. It was a bunch of nomadic tribes banding together. And there's no reason to believe all autocracy could be abolished and forever prevented from forming under (or outside of) an anarchist regime.

Yeah, I thought this was funny too. I literally read the same sentence and thought to myself: "ok, I am definitely not an anarchist.

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

Some times, yes. And some times multiplied by however many people there are results in a lot of some times that people wouldn't be forced to in an anarchy.

It's not a "some times" statement, it posits that humans are capable of living reasonably without being forced. That people sometimes behave unreasonably is a different matter.

Not really. It is very relevant. You only need someone to behave unreasonable even once to destroy multiple peoples lives. There are enough psychopaths in the world to fuck up any kind of system that's not completely based on separation of powers.

I would posit that communism would probably also be pretty nice for most people, if it actually worked. So far it hasn't, and its pretty unrealistic that it ever will. That's also my stance on anarchy. Idealist, but unrealistic.

>Not really. It is very relevant. You only need someone to behave unreasonable even once to destroy multiple peoples lives

These things are true whether or not you believe humans are capable of living reasonably without being forced. Forcing people isn't stopping these psychopaths from destroying lives, and there's at least reason to believe it helps push them to action.

In an organized society a psychopath can kill a few in a murder spree. In an unorganized society the psychopath can gather and organize a lot of thugs to loot and burn millions of homes. Has happened many times in history. I know which one I prefer.

The gun argument actually works here, if you ban good guys from organizing then all organizations will be bad ones. And an organized group of people always wins against unorganized groups.

Calling the societies being discussed "unorganized" isn't a fair view of the topic, and the rest of your post rather depends on that point of view.

So how would your anarchist utopia deal with an army of thousands raiding your village?

> the rest of your post rather depends on that point of view.

The need to feel safe from raiders is fairly universal.

"Thousands of raiders" don't magically appear, you prevent them by preventing the conditions necessary for thousands of people to unite with the goal of hurting others.

How would you prevent that without a power structure?

How does a power structure prevent it? Raiders are a result of people unable to live off their of own labor, generally as a result of the exploitation of others.

> In an organized society a psychopath can kill a few in a murder spree. In an unorganized society the psychopath can gather and organize a lot of thugs to loot and burn millions of homes. Has happened many times in history. I know which one I prefer.

I think this should be re-examined through the view of the ~1 million Iraqis recently murdered by one such “organized society”.

I don’t think the (violence-based) organization has the set of benefits you think it does.

When the good guys practices anarchy then the bad guys are free to create huge violent organizations. Our modern societies aren't perfect but violence is lower today than ever before.

What examples of communism are you looking at that "haven't worked?" I really hope you aren't about to suggest the soviet union, that would be silly, considering it had a state, social classes, currency, and no general ownership of the means of production, and therefore wasn't communism.

Might surprise you to learn that communism is working this very day, on communes all across the world. Also, the basic tenants of it have manifested themselves in various civilizations throughout history.

If a system doesn't work in a larger society it's not a system that can replace our current one that somewhat works on that scale.

Falsely assumed premise: that this "scaled" society is necessary or ethical.

Wow, if Soviet Union wasn't communist, wonder why there is such a gigantic section about it here...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communism#Soviet_Union

Because they called themselves Communist? Calling yourself something doesn't make it true.

Yeah, I think I'm gonna go with the vast amount of documented sources on this one

>I really hope you aren't about to suggest the soviet union, that would be silly, considering it had a state, social classes, currency, and no general ownership of the means of production, and therefore wasn't communism.

Y'know, this is a fair point for a philosophical conversation.

It's a terrible point in a conversation about deciding how to actually organize society, however. You can't ultimately know what people's intentions are before the fact. How other people who claimed to have the same ideology behaved once they gained power is inherently relevant.

Let's turn this around for a second. Let's say someone comes to you and says "Hitler got fascism totally wrong". It's actually a really great ideology that Hitler violated by doing X, Y, and Z. Would you give this person power in the real world?

> d. Let's say someone comes to you and says "Hitler got fascism totally wrong". It's actually a really great ideology that Hitler violated by doing X, Y, and Z. Would you give this person power in the real world?

What? No! Because hitler got fascism perfectly right, and fascism is a terribly unethical way to organize government.

I meant specifically I am all about anarcho communism, it's happening and working right now in communes all around the world, has worked in the past, and imo is better than massive nation states forced to point nukes at each other on a hair trigger to sustain themselves.

> Because hitler got fascism perfectly right

Huh, out of all the potential responses, this is actually the one I wasn't expecting. Mostly because fascism is notoriously poorly defined to the point where experts can't agree on what it actually means. To the point where the wikipedia page on its various definition is quite a lengthy read ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Definitions_of_fascism ).

While I agree with you on the downsides of the large, powerful nation states, My point was more about the rationality of outsiders to these ideologies. The reaction of "People labeling themselves this way enacted totalitarian governments during large parts of the 20th century, I probably shouldn't give any power to current people labeling themselves this way." are fairly rational.

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

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

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

That is an example of voluntary association. They chose to gain the benefits of the union, they need to pay the dues.

My point is that voluntary donations isn't enough to run much at all, even for organizations that the worker is in control of.

And a society needs roads. How would you ensure people pay for roads in an anarchist society? Would you have toll booths everywhere? That isn't economically feasible. Donations? As I said that isn't even enough to pay for a worker union, roads needs more than that.

Voluntary association, not voluntary donations. People need roads, when this problem is brought up they will be willing to pay for roads. If you are unwilling, you aren't part of the society anymore.

> People need roads, when this problem is brought up they will be willing to pay for roads. If you are unwilling, you aren't part of the society anymore.

Sounds like taxes to me.

I never said there wouldn't be taxes.

How does banishment from society work? What happens to people who refuse to leave and still use the roads?

Those are kinds of decisions that the society should make.

That's how taxes work though. If you want to be part of society (have a job, employ others, own real estate or a business), then you have to pay taxes on those. After all, the well-being of the economy is a public good maintained by the state. If you don't participate in any of those ways, then you don't need to pay taxes. If you try to participate in society but don't pay the tax for doing so, you get punished.

There is no option to leave society and not pay those taxes, while that option is present in anarchism. You are forced to be a part of the state or you face strict punishment.

So then that is not voluntarily association.

Because presumably, you would be kicking people off of roads, using force, if they refuse to pay the roads tax.

That's using force.

It's not a "road tax," if you don't choose to be a part of society, you can't be a part of the society. You are free to leave. The concept of "kicking people out" implies that they have some natural right to be part of that society.

> The concept of "kicking people out" implies that they have some natural right to be part of that society.

Thats still force, though.

You are just saying that the force is justified. But thats still force to physically prevent someone to have access to those roads.

It is force, in that you are physically, using a threat of violence against someone else, because you don't want them using your road.

I am not saying that this is morally wrong, or anything. I support the justified used of government force against others. But lets not pretend that this isn't force/violence.

> you can't be a part of the society.

It is not that they "can't". Instead, it is that other people will use violence/force against them, in order to prevent them from being a part of society. That is force. that is violence.

You can make the argument that the violence is justified. Which is fine. I absolutely believe that violence and government force can be justified. But justified force is still force!

> You are free to leave.

And if they refuse to leave? What are you going to doing about it? Answer: you will probably use force against them (although you may believe the violence is justified, justified violence is still violence!).

>You are just saying that the force is justified. But thats still force to physically prevent someone to have access to those roads.

These people aren't members of society. There's no real need to physically restrain them from the road because they don't have easy access to the road. We're not building roads to random strangers houses, and we can refuse their attempt to connect to our road.

>It is not that they "can't". Instead, it is that other people will use violence/force against them, in order to prevent them from being a part of society. That is force. that is violence.

>And if they refuse to leave? What are you going to doing about it? Answer: you will probably use force against them

There is no need to use force first. If you aren't part of the society, you have no home, and no access to food. They will either leave, join society, die, or use force to try and steal what they need. The only time force is necessary is in the fourth example, where they instigate the use of force.

> There's no real need to physically restrain them from the road because they don't have easy access to the road

And if they go there anyway?

What, are you going to setup a giant wall around society?

That's the point. You cant actually stop someone from being in society without using force.

> you aren't part of the society, you have no home, and no access to food

Sure they could have access to those things. There could be other people who choose to sell them a house or sell them food, in exchange for their labor, or other goods.

What are you going to do? Stop these other people from selling them food?

You'd have to use force to do that.

There would absolutely would be many people who would be perfectly fine selling them food or housing, in exchange for goods or labor. Or maybe even charity! That exists.

> They will either leave, join society

No, actually. The other possibility is that they refuse to leave, and other people continue to do business with them. Likely through engaging in trade with them for their labor.

You are not going to succeed with some sort of embargo against them, unless you plan on using force yourself.

> We're not building roads to random strangers houses

They don't need you to connect roads to their house. firstly, because roads are already connected, all over the world. And 2nd, they could just find someone who already has a house that is connected, and rent from them, by exchanging labor or goods that they have acquired.

Or maybe some people would perfectly be fine with letting them stay for free! Charity exists and is common in the world right now. I see no reason why it would stop.

What, are you going to send out "community" embargo squads, that follow people around, find where they live, and find who is hiding the secret tax evaders or something, so that you can enforce your embargo on both of them?

It would be exceeding impractical to enforce some sort of society wide embargo against people who refuse to pay taxes, because you are not only going to have to embargo the tax evaders, but you are also going to to have to embargo the people who refuse to follow your embargo. And then, what? You exile those people to? Who already have a house, and are already in the city, or connected to the roads, and are living in society, and the like?

Ridiculous.

You can't do that effectively, without using forces, lol

Or even beyond that, there could be a critical mass of people who refuse to leave society, and also interact with each other. IE, they still use your roads, but also trade with each other. And the trade between them is enough for them to sustain themselves (especially since they already get the benefit of the roads and stuff, but don't have to pay for it!)

>There would absolutely would be many people who would be perfectly fine selling them food or housing, in exchange for goods or labor. Or maybe even charity! That exists.

Really? You think that of a society that everyone together created the rules for, built for their own well being, and that they are voluntary a part of would be full of people willing to throw that all away to help someone who already spit in their face? I think you're wrong. This isn't helping the disadvantaged, this is helping those wishing to exploit you.

Why would the current concept of "charity" exist? It's current use is primarily for the rich to buy PR. If a member of the community is in need, the community will help them, they don't need people who's job it is to sweet talk others out of their money.

>What, are you going to send out "community" embargo squads, that follow people around, find where they live, and find who is hiding the secret tax evaders or something, so that you can enforce your embargo on both of them

We aren't discussing tax evasion, we are discussing people who openly refuse to be part if society. As they have openly done so, everyone in the community will know or will be told.

> would be full of people willing to throw that all away

People do things for their own benefit, and for the benefit of others, all the time.

For example, is everyone going to disown their friends and family, all for some nebulous concept of society? No, I don't think so. I think that many people's friends and family will be perfectly willing to continue to interact with someone who disagrees with the current state of society.

I certainly wouldn't disown any of my family members, for the mere fact of them engaging in some nebulous action of "rejecting society".

Family matters to a lot of people. You are not going to be able to convince all of a person's friends and family to disown them. Some people will still help out those friends and family

> This isn't helping the disadvantaged

I mean, you are straight up saying that you don't think these people should be able to have access to food. I think that there are many people who would say that they are disadvantaged.

You are not going to be able to convince everyone. Even if something like 10% of the population is willing to help out people who don't agree with your concept of society, that is more than enough to make sure that these people are still able to survive.

> this is helping those wishing to exploit you.

When it comes to friends and family, this just isn't a dealbreaker. Family members look out for other family members all the time, even when those family members are engaging in bad actions against them! This is very common! Family is very important to a lot of people.

As well as friends, to a less extent. I could not imagine any of my friends of family members disowning someone, because they don't agree with this definition of what society should be. Instead, people care more about their close relatives, and friends, than these high level concepts, a lot of the time.

> Why would the current concept of *charity" exist?

Because some people want it to? Even a small percentage of people disagreeing with you, is enough to make this work.

If your whole idea of society hinges on basically everyone in your society engaging in embargoes, that sounds pretty doomed to failure. Some people are going to disagree with you, and that is enough.

> If a member of the community is in need, the community will help them

Ok, but that argument works in my favor. There would absolutely be people who would consider these societal outcasts to be "people in need". And then this community of people, who disagree with you, would help them.

> we are discussing people who openly refuse to be part if society

But you have to target the people who disagree with you as well. Are you going to hunt down all the people who actually don't agree with you, and instead are perfectly fine with selling goods and services to them?

Or are you going to hunt down the friends and family members of these societal outcasts, for their action of helping out their freaking family member?

Not everyone is going to commit their life and soul to your cause. Many people would simply not care, and would instead be perfectly willing to trade housing and food for labor that these "reject society" people are offering.

Even more so, there is a monetary incentive to engage in trade with those individuals. People could make a bunch of money by trading goods and services with the societal rejects. Are you going to embargo these individuals as well?

That's a lot of people you'd have to embargo, if you are doing it against the people trading goods with them, for profit, as well as any of their friends and family who refuse to go along with your embargo.

> everyone in the community will know or will be told.

Finally, this statement is ridiculous. I live in a city, with a 500 thousand people in it. I could run into any of them, walking in the street, at any time.

Am I going to have to check someone's societal ID or something, before selling them something, or hiring them, or renting out a room in my apartment?

What does that even mean? Will you track me down, and embargo me as well, if I don't care about them rejecting society, and rent them a bedroom in my apartment anyway?

>For example, is everyone going to disown their friends and family, all for some nebulous concept of society

This isn't "some nebulous concept of society," this is the community that you have chosen to be a part of and are in control of. You say that you wouldn't abandon a family member, but what they are doing is akin to standing up and with a clear mind stating "I don't consider you family and want nothing to do with you." That is what "rejecting society" entails. You would not still blindly support that person.

>mean, you are straight up saying that you don't think these people should be able to have access to food.

These people chose not to have access to food. They are not "disadvantaged," they are facing the consequences they knew they would face for their actions. There's no need to immediately starve them, but they know they can't stay in the community if they won't be a member of it.

>Even if something like 10% of the population is willing to help out people who don't agree with your concept of society, that is more than enough to make sure that these people are still able to survive

It is not "my concept of society," it is something the society together builds. Yes, some people will disagree. They can build their own society and we can coexist.

Most of your arguments have put "me" as the ruler of this society and justify actions as them rebelling against me. This is not how the power structure goes. People may be willing to help those rebelling against "me," but they are less willing to aid someone rebelling against something they themselves chose to enact. Similarly, the punishment for someone harboring such an individual isn't my decision, it's something the community decides based on the circumstances.

> this is the community that you have chosen to be a part of and are in control of

Not everyone in the US lives in some 100 person small town "community". Instead, many people live in cities that have hundreds of thousands of people in it.

> That is what "rejecting society" entails. You would not still blindly support that person.

People absolutely still continue to support family members, all the time, even when they do "bad" things. It is extremely common. People care a lot about family. Yes, many people would absolutely still support them. I absolutely would continue to support them, as would many others.

And there is nothing that you could do to stop me from helping them, unless you are going to do something very impractical, like exile everyone who supports their friends and family as well.

> These people chose not to have access to food.

Doesn't matter. There would still be people who disagree with you, and would consider them to be disadvantaged, regardless of your opinion on the matter.

> they can't stay in the community if they won't be a member of it.

Of course they could still be in the community. They could still be in the community if they have friends and family who would be willing to support them. Which there definitely could be! People such as myself would absolutely continue to support my friends and family, even if they did this.

> Yes, some people will disagree. They can build their own society and we can coexist.

Or, they can continue to live in the same place as you do, and continue to support individuals who "reject" society.

> . Similarly, the punishment for someone harboring such an individual isn't my decision, it's something the community decides based on the circumstances.

Ok, and I am saying that people attempting to enforce punishment on every individual who harbors a friend or family member is going to be extremely impractical.

There are numerous motivations and reasons for someone to "harbor" others, and this "society" that you are talking about would require a near unanimous agreement on everything, which just isnt going to happen.

Instead, there would be a sizeable minority of people, who would continue to work with their friends and family. Why? Because thats what happens all of the time, in real life. People, all the time, continue to support their friends and family, even when they have done bad things.

>Not everyone in the US lives in some 100 person small town "community". Instead, many people live in cities that have hundreds of thousands of people in it.

Which can be broken down into numerous communities living together.

>People absolutely still continue to support family members, all the time, even when they do "bad" things

This isn't someone doing a "bad" thing, this is someone of full mind willfully saying they want nothing to do with the family. You think they'd still force their aid on them?

>And there is nothing that you could do to stop me from helping them, unless you are going to do something very impractical, like exile everyone who supports their friends and family as well.

You seem to still be under the impression that "I" am forcing my will. Decisions are made by the community, that these people are a part of. I'm not forcing people to sell out their friends, their friends are the ones rejecting their help. Your idea that people would still unquestionably offer help to people who have stated they do not want it and will not return it is just silly. If that happened in modern society, we would assume mental illness and barring that cut ties for at least some time.

All of your arguments resolve around someone committing some bad deed, and some faceless authority issues punishment on them. That is so far removed from what is happening, I don't know how to continue this conversation.

> Which can be broken down into numerous communities living together.

Lol, so now you are talking about ending the concept of cities? This is getting even more implausible.

> I'm not forcing people to sell out their friends, their friends are the ones rejecting their help

If no one is going to force people to sell out there friends then you need to understand that a lot of people would simply continue to provide support to them.

> Your idea that people would still unquestionably offer help

I am not saying everyone would. Instead, I am saying some people would. And some is enough. People absolutely can care a lot about their friends, family, and children, enough so as to provide unconditional support.

This happens all the time, in real life!

> that cut ties for at least some time.

Lots of people, right now, do not cut ties with family members, who do aweful things.

> willfully saying they want nothing to do with the family. You think they'd still force their aid on them?

I am telling you, that I would help any of my close friends or family, personally, for sure, as would many people I know, and you can't convince me otherwise to not help them.

This already happens, right now, in the real world!

I think that some people care a whole lot about their friends and family, and no argument that you make overrules this.

People, right now, provide massive amounts of unconditional support to many of their friends.

I absolutely would do that, for example, regardless of the arguments that are being made.

IE, I know many people that would never ever abandon their family, because they "rejected society", and that there is zero argument that people could make to convince them otherwise, because family matters to them.

>Lol, so now you are talking about ending the concept of cities? This is getting even more implausible.

No, I am not. I am discussing furthering what already happens, where cities break down into smaller sections.

>am telling you, that I would help any of my close friends or family, personally, for sure, as would many people I know, and you can't convince me otherwise to not help them

I am not trying to convince you, your friend said they don't want your help. If you continue trying to force it on them, you are an asshole.

>Lots of people, right now, do not cut ties with family members, who do aweful things.

Nobody has done an "awful thing". I'm done explaining this.

You keep making the same statements that don't even reference what I have said. I understand that friends and family are willing to stand by when their loved one does something bad. I also have friends and family. That is not analogous to what is being discussed. A closer example would be a family having an argument about where to celebrate Christmas, until finally someone breaks off and holds their own celebration.

> your friend said they don't want your help.

I am saying that if my friend "rejected society", but also asked for my help, then I would continue to give them the help that they asked for.

It would not be an asshole move if they have asked for my help, but also have "rejected society" at the same time. Because they asked for my help.

My support for my close friends and family is almost unconditional.

And I am talking about the individuals who both "reject society", and also want to live in that society, in a house or something, or they want to be able to eat, and these specific individuals are asking me for help, while also "rejecting society" at the same time.

I would provide them that housing or food that they asked from me, even if they "reject society".

> That is not analogous to what is being discussed. A closer example would be a family having an argument about where to celebrate Christmas, until finally someone breaks off and holds their own celebration.

Yes it is analogous. If my friends or family did what ever it is that you are saying that they are doing, I would still continue to give them unconditional support that they ask from me.

> until finally someone breaks off

And if they "break off" but still ask me for my help, then I would still give them my help.

edit never mind, I'm done.

"wishful thinking" alone isn't a good enough argument to consider the case settled. The American democratic system is "just wishful thinking," in reality powerful oligarchs control many of the day to day levers through lobbying and outright bribery, while other oligarchs slowly transform entire swaths of the population into willing sheep (rupert murdoch). But america still works, kinda, so it's not enough to say "it's just wishful thinking."

Ultimately the rulers of USA are decided by the people. You might have a lot of trickery and corruption behind the scenes, but every politician still needs to get votes from actual workers so they can't be too alienated. This isn't optimal, but it works well in theory and is fairly robust since if the system gets too corrupt people will vote in an unsanctioned candidate.

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

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

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

Wouldn't this be where anarcho communism comes into play? If there's no currency there's not really a need for taxation.

There is a world of difference between believing that you, yourself, are capable of behaving reasonably without instructions, and believing the same for every single other person.

How did you infer that from my comment?

If you don't believe humans are capable of living reasonably without being forced, you're only living reasonably as you're being forced or you view yourself as "special."

False. I can live reasonably and believe most others would too, but also believe a sizeable enough populace would not - harming the whole populace.

So you are special and other people need to be ruled.

How does it make me ”special”, if the majority is exactly the same as me? I think that’s the opposite of special.

You think there is a group of people inferior to you that need to be ruled.

I think you are confused about what the discussion here concerns.

No. You think that there are some people incapable of living reasonably without force, and that group does not include yourself. Presumably they are the people that are incapable of living reasonably with force.

>You think that there are some people incapable of living reasonably without force, and that group does not include yourself.

Yes I think so. Are you arguing there are no bad people in the entire human populace?

Regardless, it doesn't make me "special."

I think there are people who may be unable to act rationally in any situation, but I don't think force will solve their problems and I do think situations could arise where I end up as one of them. I think humans are largely a product of their environment, and most of the "bad" ones had experiences that made them act that way. They are still capable of acting rationally.

Superior to others is "special," even if you consider the majority to be superior.

> I think there are people who may be unable to act rationally in any situation

> They are still capable of acting rationally

Which one is it?

Why people act like the do is irrelevant to the system you are proposing. Or are you saying that abolishing all enforcement systems will cause everything bad in the universe to disappear?

Anyhow, I think we've milked this conversation for as long as it has capability to provide value, so perhaps we agree to disagree on this topic.

>Which one is it?

I believe through some accidents before or after birth lead to some people are completely unable to act reasonably. I don't think they are the people you consider "bad" but people with severe disabilities.

>Why people act like the do is irrelevant to the system you are proposing. Or are you saying that abolishing all enforcement systems will cause everything bad in the universe to disappear?

I don't think that the world is full of people who actively wish harm on others, and usually those people are trying to improve things for themselves. If we build a society based on making things good for everybody involved, these will be rare cases that society can address as they happen.

Put in simple terms, those people may currently be unwilling to act reasonably, but are completely capable in the right circumstances.

Here is the thing... a reasonable choice for an individual is not the same as a reasonable choice for a group.

A classic example is something like fishing. As an individual, it is entirely reasonable for me to catch as many fish as possible. I won’t put a dent into the fish population, and the more fish I catch, the better it is for me.

However, if everyone fishes as much as they want, the fisheries will be depleted. It is reasonable for an individual to fish as much as they want, but not for a society.

So why doesn’t everyone just fish less, because that is the reasonable thing for the society to do? Well, in an anarchy, I can only choose for myself. If I fish less, but everyone else still fishes as much as they want, then I will have less fish AND the fishery will still be depleted. I am worse off for no gain; it is clearly reasonable for me to fish as much as I can, since the fishery is going to be depleted no matter what.

Even if by a miracle everyone else agreed to voluntarily fish less, it would STILL be in my interest to ‘defect’ and fish as much as I want. My individual choice isn’t going to cause an issue if everyone else is already fishing less, so now I get more fish AND the fishery is fine.

Bottom line, no matter what everyone else does, my rational choice is to fish as much as I want. If everyone is rational, the fishery will be depleted.

This is known as a collective action problem, and is a type of prisoner’s dilemma.

You can’t get out of it through individual rationality. You have to approach the problem collectively.

There’s precedent for human beings cooperating on matters like this to, say, prevent overfishing.

What makes you think such coordination would be impossible in the absence of a hierarchy that boils down to “obey these rules or we’ll put a gun in your face”? Most humans are reasonable and cooperative.

No, I am not saying the threat of violence is the only way to coerce people. I am saying there will need to be coercion of some kind, and relying on individuals making the best choices for themselves does not solve all the problems.

I think that’s the point of the article. There are better, safer, kinder, and more efficient ways of coercing people (with kindness and strong social ties and obligations and contracts, for example) than using top-down laws.

If you believe that the threat of violence isn’t the only way to organize a society’s rules, you’re most of the way there.

Violence isn't necessary 99% of the time, but the fact that it's available that last 1% is why it isn't necessary the other 99%. Some people are absolutely willing to exploit kindness, spurn obligations, and break contracts, if they can.

The fact that there exists a system of consequences backed by violence is what makes people follow social rules. Maybe the community's punishment for vandalism is a fine, or some kind of public service; I'm only willing to pay that penalty because of the threat of state violence being used against me if I don't. I'm all for minimizing the use of violence to enforce social mores as much as possible, but if it's not available at all, we start running into problems enforcing the milder, non-violent social consequences which we strive to use 99% of the time.

If someone attacks someone else and is sent to rehabilitative counseling, how do we make sure they go? In order to enforce the humane response, a violent response needs to exist as a backup.

I’m fairly sure there will remain sufficient coercive threat of human violence to keep society existing and operating well even without a state.

Your example is wrong.

All situations should be evaluated and re-evaluated at every instance, at every moment in time to account for new information and not only once at the beginning thinking it'll be the same forever.

Fishing as an individual its fine until too many people start doing it, then it becomes even bad for the individual. It becomes harder to fish, the fish get smaller, the prices drop, etc. Some of those things might be even good for society but not for the individual. At that point you've got to re evaluate your position, and even change your occupation. This is what happens all the time. Individual choices lead the way, society only acts after enough individuals have been affected, not before.

> Individual choices lead the way, society only acts after enough individuals have been affected, not before.

So you are saying there is no way to act with foresight? We can’t get together and decide to curtail individual choice so that we avoid a tragedy of the commons?

I don’t think throwing our hands up in the air and just continuing to destroy commons after commons is a good strategy.

> So you are saying there is no way to act with foresight?

No, I didn't say any of that. All I said is what is bad for society is also bad for the individual.

While this may be true, you seem to be ignoring the prisoner's dilemma part of this... yes, society (and the individuals in it) will be better off if everyone cooperates, but as an individual, it is still always better to defect.

Imagine, for example, there are two companies that make widget foo. They are identical, except Company A charges less than Company B, but Company A pollutes a bunch.

As a society, we want everyone to buy from company B. We would all be better off.

However, that isn't my choice as a consumer. I either buy from B and pay more, and company A still pollutes (one person out of thousands doesn't change the amount of pollution).

Or, I get the cheaper thing from company A, and everything else stays the same.

Why wouldn't I shop at company A? My one purchase wont make or break the company, and it won't change the amount of pollution by any noticeable amount... but I will notice the cheaper price.

This is what a collective action problem is.

These examples all make company A and B as beings outside the community, and that wouldn't be the case. When groups exist outside of societies that are focused on gaining power over others, problems arise.

Ok, I will tell you again.

In my community, people wear masks and social distance without being forced or told to. They do it for the same reason they wait in line at the bus.

What's the reason?

Because we're keeping each other safe from coronavirus. But I guess you caught me: we've replaced law and police with a virus that enforces our behavior on pain of death, lol.

>In my country (but I guess it's the same in most, except perhaps some Nordic countries) bars, pubs and discos only reduce seating or close indoor spaces when forced to by law, in spite of the evidence that they cause lots of outbreaks.

>The government recommended remote work whenever possible but many companies just ignored it in spite of having many workers that could perfectly work remotely, and just implement it when forced by law.

I believe an anarchist response to this would be these examples are not so much cases of people (generally speaking) going against expert advice out of choice, more that it is a few individuals in positions of power (pub landlords, business owners) exerting their will (for personal gain) on many other people who are not in a position to push back. Employees who heed expert advice risk their job security and healthcare in doing so. By removing hierarchies and power we may well see better outcomes than we do at present. That is, the behavior you are seeing is the effect of a political system and it is not necessarily true that these same behaviors will exist by changing to a different political system. If Anarchism in practice would not entirely end the behavior, it removes the innate incentivization of the behavior

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

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

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

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

To me it seems that you seem to be imagining anarchy only within the context of the current state of reality with the sole difference of anarchy being set to ‘true’. I think a world in which anarchy were dominant would be structured quite differently and involve humans with fundamentally nonviolent dispositions. My belief is that this is possible.

Anarchy means that the law of the strongest rules. Not sure why you think that this is somehow aligned with non-violence.

That's the opposite of anarchy. An-arch-y means a situation without fixed power structures.

You can't prevent bad guys from forming their own power structure without some form of power structure.

> the law of the strongest rule

Not so different to today then, is it?

Are resources still scarce in an anarchist society? Then you will still have conflict. And changing fundamental biology is probably possible, but neither a quick thing nor an easy one.

"Humans will be biologically different once we live in a new society" gets filed under magic in my opinion. Communists tend to use that as an explanation as well, and it didn't happen, and not for lack of trying or lack of commitment, I believe.

I understand most anarchists favor very localized constructs in general, what's your take why we aren't seeing a lot of anarchist communities? Is it that there would still be "the state" in the world that surrounds them, collecting federal taxes and stopping them from governing themselves, giving themselves the kinds of laws they want etc?

How would your job and healthcare be protected under anarchism?

The issue with your premise is in defining "behaving in a reasonable fashion". This is incredibly subjective. It also speaks to the ignorance that privileged people have in regards to assuming everyone else must also have.

In many cases, "Just close shop for two weeks (or maybe a year? Who knows...), and also you have to wear a mask all the time now" is not a reasonable ask. People have mouths to feed and bills to pay. Telling them to just shut off their income is a non-starter. And no, a $1200 stimulus check doesn't cut it. Banks still want their money.

"Okay fine, but why isn't everyone just wearing a mask? It's simple! insert judgmental angry emoji here"

Well, a lot of places ran out of masks (and toilet paper for some reason...) early on (thank you sensationalism + news) making it impossible to get one. Someone tried refusing me access to a grocery store that I went to to buy a mask because, guess what, I didn't have a mask (after multiple repeated attempts to buy one in my area). Tell me how this is reasonable?

Since then, it's really been a crapshoot for what you think the rules are for wearing one in public. Where I am, if you are outside, you don't need one, and no one is expected to wear one, but you keep your distance physically. If you go inside, you wear a mask - unless you are sitting at a table, then you don't need one, sometimes...? Every news outlet/friend/family member you hear from on the matter has a different take on what is standard procedure now.

A lot of the "reasonable asks" of people surrounding COVID are not actually as reasonable as they sound in a one sentence, "You have to close shop and wear masks now!" mandate from a politician.

It's hard for me to believe that a "fuck it.." mentality wouldn't evolve around the issue.

"Leaders" told everyone to stay home. People, largely, listened for a while. When the money ran out (or never existed to begin with) and no support came to sustain the situation but the messaging remained "stay at home" thats when people got mad and stopped listening.

Since the same leaders also said wear a mask, it went from "health experts trying to save lives" to "politicians trying to leave me destitute and homeless".

The US failed, as it always does, to provide for the needs of its citizens. So as the citizens usually do, they stopped listening. And in practice absolutely nobody gives a real shit - the people don't care and capital is eating future generations by the trillion. Everyones happy in the most perverted definition of happy.

Eh I’m not sure politicians am have proved in recent times to be much better.

And to that point, if you don’t trust your fellow person, why would you trust them to vote, or hold office? Why would you want them to wield real power?

We need to fix this country. It starts with us. Vote. Run for office. Stop accepting mediocre government.

The system is stacked against fundamental change. Its why for going on 200 years there has always been a movement to "fix" society through government that never actually seems to get much of anywhere.

The only time, in the US at least, anything has led to long term appreciable change in society for the betterment of the working class was when capitalism was in legitimate fear for survival in the face of communist revolutions the world over aside the great depression. The FDR generation didn't go from effectively total labor exploitation unbounded to 40 hour work weeks, unions, paid vacation, and safety regulations because the collective bourgeois woke up one day thinking their time had come by happenstance. Concessions were made to preserve the power structures that gave immense power to few at the cost of the many.

The civil rights movement was comparable where the most popular speaker in the country was espousing socialism and class consciousness and had to be assassinated to stop his movement adjourning organized aggression by the Black Panthers who also were mass murdered. But all that blood only managed to move the dial a hairs breadth toward liberty.

We will all be good citizens voting for one of the two choices presented us by our rulers this November, many of us going into the polls knowing the structural organization of said process means our vote is totally meaningless - first past the post, winner take all races down a scorecard of positions 90% of which you know nothing about but the letters aside the names, names you probably only heard in TV or radio ads inundating you for two months prior. Its a mockery of actual democracy and largely always has been - there is a reason the US was founded to have an electorate of white, land owning men.

> Its why for going on 200 years there has always been a movement to "fix" society through government that never actually seems to get much of anywhere.

I'd say this is just a convincing argument that we can't leave it to government to fix society then.

With respect to your points about capitalism. Yea sure. I think that to create a society that better respects the rights of workers and ensures that people live good lives. You'll see countries that are considered even more capitalistic than the US like the Nordics have really good government that they vote for and participate in, and they have great protections for workers. But they also pay for those things with higher taxes. The issue in the US is just that we don't believe the government can effectively do those things (and for decent enough reasons) so we just sit in this vicious cycle. Nobody wants to fix things.

> there is a reason the US was founded to have an electorate of white, land owning men.

Well there's a few reasons, but part of why we have a republic instead of a direct democracy is because the founders were worried about mobs of uneducated voters causing the government to do really dumb things. At the time the only educated people were white, land-owning men. If you can't trust your fellow citizens right now to vote, then I'm not sure why you'd trust them with even more power. To me it seems day in and day out I'm more and more convinced Americans shouldn't even be allowed to vote on account of how many dumb decisions we make. We don't deserve a republic or democracy. Fat, lazy, entitlement mentality for far too many.

Does this not sound the slightest bit naive to you at this point? It'd take a sweeping article 5 convention or a civil war to "fix" this.

No, and I think that the mentality that it might be naive is exactly what the problem is. I have no interest in a civil war. I have things that I care about. If the alternatives to me were civil war to "fix" things, or maintain the status quo, I'll take the status quo all day.

But I believe there are alternatives. Other countries have managed to elect smart people. There's no reason we can't.

I'm not far from your thinking but as sad as people's behavior was during covid, I wouldn't use it as a general case, it's a weird and wide crisis.

Also human groups of various scales differ. Some 20 people companies self organized.. larger group may not be able to do so.

This brings the question of the influence of education (both technical and emotional). A group a wiser and well balanced emotionally would behave very differently under a pandemic than a group of medium skilled in both.

So if you were emperor of the world, would you throw the political class and supporters in Sweden in prison for their unreasonable response to Covid as compared to the rest of the world?

Or would you throw the rest of world's leader's and supporters in prison as the opposite of that argument?

Are you personally willing to do this? If you ask a man with a gun to do it for you are you ever worried he will turn the gun on you?

Measuring our capacity for anarchist living in a cutthroat capitalist society is sort of like comparing an apple with a black hole.

You can come up with some vague emotional colors where they can seem similar, I mean they both exist, can be represented on paper starting with base geometrical shapes, but further analysis of their composition and parts reveals a lot of differences.

It’s not a given that bars and salons are a normal feature of a non-tiered trade society where finding efficiency has generally meant extreme division of labor (at the cost of labor market resiliency IMO).

Would we have loans and leases on bars and salons if society isn’t being reminded by media and their neighbors trading fiat currency “is the way”?

Would we have the same economic dread foisted upon us?

Why not brew communally, or otherwise, like in a maker space and share knowledge of the processes and experiences we enjoy individually rather than fetishize dead relatives more limited view of sound fiscal policies, and social pecking order?

Why do I need to care that somehow through some Machiavellian mind game there’s a monetary flow back to some investor across the world in me?

Dead people lacking an eother ignorant of, or severely lacking strong evidence, for things like economic success is coupled to skill (when obviously we can also see social governance prop up failed elites).

A PhD in physics means putting forth an idea that the world works a way it would given the absence of human existence.

Please explain then how PhDs in economics should be given the same esteem since they rely on a heavily indoctrinated by media, human society abiding social norms of police states that have only existed for a couple hundred years?

Where’s the free market when we’ve been willing to send in men with guns to protect the way since the beginning of the nation (Whiskey Rebellion?)

Can we do better without the coercion? We don’t know cause it’s always been there.

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

True but also not true.

Anarchism isn’t devoid of understanding of reality.

Anarchisms goal as a broad social meme is to not allow an official body that coerces the public towards further erecting of tent pole power structures within society. Like we have a Constitution and abdicate legislative work to a mythical free market, where an Amazon size entity can manipulate the labor and retail markets on a whim.

It seeks to establish a tent pole hierarchy based, at least the sources I agree with offer it something like this, and then within that it’s local communal rules. No influencers from DC enforcing proper life in collusion with their moneyed brethren on this coast, regardless of how the masses would spend their time.

But yes at the top it’s a tent pole like any other.

Trying to set aside physics itself isn’t the goal of anarchism. Don’t be ridiculous.

Pre-Columbus America’s are often mythologized as all hippie, but they were probably the purest anarchist society we can study.

Those who lived by the water fished and maintained the coast. Those inland made tools for doing that.

And we’re talking communities that could rival them contemporary Europe.

How complex we all think it is to change when really it’s just doing away with European notion of proper social hierarchy always leading back to a council of especially wise men whose wisdom was point guns first.

It’s an emotional attitude like capitalism. Neither are laws of physics. Just a personal attitude that one will not be a social control freak nor kowtow to them.

We have none of the old problems of logistical distribution. Why do we their old tenets and rules?

but ideologies, including anarchism, aren't roads to nirvana, they're far-flung points in a multidimensional mental space that map wholly inadequately to an even higher dimensional social space. they also systematically tend to lose nuance to fervor and identity.

for instance, while i agree that institutions (concentrations of power) can be dangerous, they've also done some amazingly good (and bad) things because of the power they coalesce. anarchism would say dismantle (large) institutions, and capitalism (or whatever) would say build 'em bigger and bolder! but the practical says do both in a chaotic, highly dynamic system of competing and cooperating interests, reaching a dynamic balance that's hard to rationalize beforehand.

yes, let's talk about these ideas and put forth observations and arguments, but in no case should be go all in on any one of them, including capitalism (which is also impractical in a pure, ideological form).

Why don't all anarchists live as free people in the woods?

Is it perhaps because they enjoy food, shelters and medicine that anarchism cannot create?

In Boston the majority of everyone I saw wore a mask before it was mandatory. The shame was (and still is) very strong for those who don’t wear one. I see junkies (drug addicts) who don’t give a fuck but I assume that’s because they have given up on life. All normal people are wearing masks that I can see.

And for a counter observation I saw lines out of nail/hair salons and bars in Atlanta the day Kemp dropped shelter in place at the beginning of May. I'd say I see 1 in 8 people wearing a mask anywhere that doesn't explicitly require it, and then people mostly wearing them improperly otherwise.

I live in a place where mask rules are not enforced. There is a growing split between places people gather without masks and places people gather with masks. Unless completely unavoidable I only go to places where everyone is wearing a mask. I think there is a similar filtering mechanism happening with everyone that prefers being around mask wearers, and those that prefer not wearing masks.

Seeing one place where people are not wearing masks is not a reasonable sample, and doesn’t show a complex story that is happening.

In the south, at some chains, even grocery store employees weren't allowed to wear them until the day after Trump said a mask or even a scarf would be ok:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i96408t-Xb4

I think that was March 31st or so. Up until then, the owners were worried it would drive customers away to let employees wear them.

So tell us, how many months of mask wearing would be "reasonable"? We're up to about six in my locale. Would twelve be reasonable? Eighteen? Until the virus is gone? That would require, most likely, eternal mask wearing, even with a vaccine. Why don't you lecture us about "reasonable" behavior some more.

The same amount is reasonable as the requirement to wear clothes.

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

They are being forced to - by the threat of being voted out of office.

Then you have an endless circle of force, which doesn’t really explain why governments can work but other systems couldn’t work. Because of course other systems would also contain circles of force.

Who said they they aren’t forced to. Specific individuals clearly can act reasonably on their own. It’s groups where you need control and systems of government influence those in power. Democracy’s clearly force winning some elections, but even dictatorship means relying on the military, police, and taxation etc.

Who says systems of anarchy wouldn’t also force certain people to do certain things?

Parent addresses this explicitly:

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

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

If a population does not tend to follow expert advice and a politician is incentivized by an upcoming election, it seems more of a negative incentive for them to act according to rationality

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

As you think their reasons for doing things are irrelevant.

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

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

They were wrong.

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

'No! I don't remember that nobody is better than anyone else' ? um P-:

That is definitely the debate that the Democratic side of the aisle seems to be making as well with the same amount of clarity and nuance.

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