My anarchism thread

[Challenger]

Never going to happen.

Far to many people with far to many vested intrests in keeping governments in power for this to happen even putting practical problems asside.

One little thing though. Lets say America attains a state of anarchy without all the problems that Merkuri, myself and others have pointed out. What would then stop any one of those innumberous nations with a chip on their shoulder wandering in and taking over?

Challenger

[khyron1144]

Hussar said:

But, Kyron, you can never remove power from relationships. It simply isn't possible. If you do something for me, then I have power and you don't.

Actually I would have the power, since you are then in my debt.

[VladTaltos]

I Believe means The theory or doctrine that all forms of government are oppressive and undesirable and should be abolished. which is stupid if you do that and get rid of all the laws you'll have people like Charles Manson running around killing people the world would be thrown in Mass confusion and crap like that

[Hussar]

Khyron, that's only so long as I wish to acknowledge the debt. If I choose not to reciprocate, then I have the power.

Think of it this way. When your mom made you clean your room, did she feel any debt towards you? Did she have to reward you? Or, did she nag and/or yell at you until you did what she wanted? She has the power and you don't.

Which is not to say that you have no power. It's more complicated than that. But, in this isolated instance, she has more power than you do. And, you can basically scale up from there. Whether it's your mom or your boss or the local bully, in a state of anarchy they all have no limits to their power.

See, most people have it backwards. They think that government is there to take power from the people and give it to the leaders. That's wrong. Government, with its bureaucracy, Constitution and laws, is there to limit the power that can be gained by an individual over the group.

Anarchy simply won't work. You have 50 000 years of primate politics on the Serengeti Planes to try to counteract. Good luck. Any group of people will always form a hierarchy. Gender, age, nationality, doesn't matter. Primate politics dictates that there has to be an Alpha. Sure, the leader can change, the power can shift, but, it will always form itself into a pyramid structure.

[khyron1144]

I'm bumping this until I think of something good to say.

[khyron1144]

I have recently joined the ranks of the employed.

This has led me to start some serious thinking about my anarchist leanings.

Sometimes it seems as if authority is not necesarily the ultimate evil, but other times it looks like managers are a less than useful part of the work force.

[more on this later]

[ElrosTarMinitarsus]

Employment is inherently govermental (taxes ect..) so by going to work, you endorse civilization, not anarchism..

[Galadon]

If you go looking for nothing but the bad things in life.

(Guess what you find)?

[ElrosTarMinitarsus]

Galadon said:

If you go looking for nothing but the bad things in life.

(Guess what you find)?

ME!!!! MMUUUAAAHHH!!!!! 

[ElrosTarMinitarsus]

Did you know that anarchy is a form of democracy? Its called DIRECT DEMOCRACY.

There are many varieties of democracy, some hypothetical and some realized.

In contemporary usage, democracy is often understood to be the same as liberal democracy. This contemporary understanding of democracy to a large degree differs from how the term was originally defined and used by the ancient Greeks in the Athenian democracy political regime.

Direct democracy comprises a form of democracy and theory of civics wherein all citizens can directly participate in the decision-making process. Some adherents want both legislative and executive powers to be handled by the people, but most extant systems only allow legislative decisions.

Direct democracy in its traditional form is rule by the people through referenda. The people are given the right to pass laws, veto laws and withdraw support from a representative (if the system has representatives) at any time.

Modern direct democracy is characterized by three pillars:

Initiative
Referendum including binding referenda
Recall
The second pillar can include the ability to hold a binding referendum on whether a given law should be scrapped. This effectively grants the populace a veto on government legislation. The third pillar gives the people the right to recall elected oficials by petition and referendum.

Switzerland provides the strongest example of modern direct democracy, as it exhibits the first two pillars at both the local and federal levels. In the past 120 years more than 240 initiatives have been put to referendum. The populace has been conservative, approving only about 10% of the initiatives put before them; in addition, they have often opted for a version of the initiative rewritten by government.

Another distinctive example comes from the United States, where, despite being a federal republic where no direct democracy exists at the federal level, over half the states (and many localities) provide for citizen-sponsored ballot initiatives (also called "ballot measures" or "ballot questions") and the vast majority of the states have either initiatives and/or referenda.


The word democracy originates from the Greek δημοκρατíα from δημος meaning "the people", plus κρατειν meaning "to rule", and the suffix íα; the term therefore means "rule by the people." The term is also sometimes used as a measurement of how much influence a people has over their government, as in how much democracy exists. Anarchism and communism (as in the final stage of social development according to Marxist theory) are social systems that employ a form of direct democracy, and have no state independent of the people themselves.

[khyron1144]

ElrosTarMinitarsus said:

Employment is inherently govermental (taxes ect..) so by going to work, you endorse civilization, not anarchism..

I got nothing against civilization. I just got an axe to grind regarding government and organized religion and similar power games. I think anarchy could be the ultimate expression of civilization.

And calling someone that gets taxes docked from his check a government supporter is a bit misleading. There's no choice in the matter and even revolutionaries need money now and then.

[ElrosTarMinitarsus]

Well then, welcome to democracy!!! Cant have it both ways!