# Think Tank > Political Philosophy & Government Policy >  Anarchism is more of a complaint than a solution.

## Madison320

The economic news has been pretty boring lately, so I figured I'd start an anarchist thread. Hopefully this won't get immediately moved over to the anarchist section. Anyway the reason I said anarchism is more of a complaint is because I think "no government" is basically an impossible condition. Maybe I'm wrong but the way I define government is this: In any geographic area there's always going to be a group that has the most force and that makes the rules. I call that government. The idea that you can have competing governments or protection agencies, in the same geographic area never pans out because force doesn't work that way. The natural tendency is for the strongest group to overpower the weaker groups and absorb them. The most powerful group makes the rules. I would call that government. So given that there's always going to be a most powerful group that makes the rules I think the best solution is to try to keep control over that group the best you can. It's not a perfect solution, but unless there a fundamental change in human nature and force I don't see what else can be done.

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## fisharmor

Wow, I get to respond first?
Great, I'll say the same thing I always do in these threads:  *Go study the documented historical examples where it actually happened before making absolute statements about it being impossible.*

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## Ronin Truth

Why is not wanting a ruler just a complaint?  Most of human history, no rulers.

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## Madison320

> Wow, I get to respond first?
> Great, I'll say the same thing I always do in these threads:  *Go study the documented historical examples where it actually happened before making absolute statements about it being impossible.*


What happened to those examples? Where are they now?

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## erowe1

I would use the word "ideal."

I agree that true statelessness is an unachievable goal this side of the return of Jesus Christ, just as a world without theft is. But that ideal still serves us as something to aim toward, and to use as a measure according to which the evils of the state can be identified and remedies to them offered.

Perhaps the world is doomed to keep moving away from that ideal. If so, then the ideal still allows us to see that the direction the world is moving is wrong, and to oppose that.

Or perhaps the world can move closer and closer to that ideal. It may not reach it, but it may approach it asymptotically. If so, then it is that ideal of statelessness that provides us with that asymptote towards which we want to keep moving. As the powers of the state gradually lessen (if they ever will), there will never come a point where we can say, "There. That's it. Stop shrinking the state. This amount of theft, kidnapping, and murder is just right. Any less will be too little." No. It will still be necessary to identify the evils of the state, however small they are in comparison to today, and continue to oppose them.

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## thoughtomator

> The economic news has been pretty boring lately,...


You must not be reading the same sources I am reading. Economic news pretty exciting lately, what with wars erupting in several energy-resource-rich areas all at once, an _official_ negative GDP quarter, Obamacare trashing the economy, and the Fed losing control.

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## fisharmor

> What happened to those examples? Where are they now?


Oh, good, we're fast-tracking the conversation.
They were all crushed by states using war crimes.
In one example it's estimated that as high as 86% of the population was executed or systematically starved.

So here are the counter arguments:
1) Are you seriously saying this justifies having a state?
2) Can you name a state which survived having 86% of its population killed off?  If not, doesn't that kind of negate your argument?
3) Does the fact that your state-sanctioned history classes completely ignore these cases sit well with you?

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## Pericles

> What happened to those examples? Where are they now?


You are not supposed to ask that question. And not asking certain questions is the difference between faith and science.

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## Ronin Truth

> What happened to those examples? Where are they now?


Here's one:




> For two thousand years the disparate groups that now reside in Zomia (a mountainous region the size of Europe that consists of portions of seven Asian countries) have fled the projects of the organized state societies that surround themslavery, conscription, taxes, corvée labor, epidemics, and warfare. This book, essentially an anarchist history, is the first-ever examination of the huge literature on state-making whose author evaluates why people would deliberately and reactively remain stateless. Among the strategies employed by the people of Zomia to remain stateless are physical dispersion in rugged terrain; agricultural practices that enhance mobility; pliable ethnic identities; devotion to prophetic, millenarian leaders; and maintenance of a largely oral culture that allows them to reinvent their histories and genealogies as they move between and around states.
> In accessible language, James Scott, recognized worldwide as an eminent authority in Southeast Asian, peasant, and agrarian studies, tells the story of the peoples of Zomia and their unlikely odyssey in search of self-determination. He redefines our views on Asian politics, history, demographics, and even our fundamental ideas about what constitutes civilization, and challenges us with a radically different approach to history that presents events from the perspective of stateless peoples and redefines state-making as a form of internal colonialism. This new perspective requires a radical reevaluation of the civilizational narratives of the lowland states. Scotts work on Zomia represents a new way to think of area studies that will be applicable to other runaway, fugitive, and marooned communities, be they Gypsies, Cossacks, tribes fleeing slave raiders, Marsh Arabs, or San-Bushmen.


 http://www.amazon.com/The-Art-Not-Be.../dp/0300169175

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## Madison320

> I would use the word "ideal."
> 
> I agree that true statelessness is an unachievable goal this side of the return of Jesus Christ, just as a world without theft is. But that ideal still serves us as something to aim toward, and to use as a measure according to which the evils of the state can be identified and remedies to them offered.
> 
> Perhaps the world is doomed to keep moving away from that ideal. If so, then the ideal still allows us to see that the direction the world is moving is wrong, and to oppose that.
> 
> Or perhaps the world can move closer and closer to that ideal. It may not reach it, but it may approach it asymptotically. If so, then it is that ideal of statelessness that provides with that asymptote towards which we want to keep moving. As the powers of the state gradually lessen (if they ever will), there will never come a point where we can say, "There. That's it. Stop shrinking the state. This amount of theft, kidnapping, and murder is just right. Any less will be too little." No. It will still be necessary to identify the evils of the state, however small they are in comparison to today, and continue to oppose them.


But the problem is that if you shrink the state too much, another more powerful group will emerge.

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## erowe1

> But the problem is that if you shrink the state too much, another more powerful group will emerge.


And if you don't shrink the state however much that is, then the state that doesn't shrink already is that more powerful group.

Having an ideal of statelessness that tells us that however little theft there is, even less would always be better, allows us to see what's wrong with both of those situations and to continue to aim toward improving them.

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## Madison320

> You must not be reading the same sources I am reading. Economic news pretty exciting lately, what with wars erupting in several energy-resource-rich areas all at once, an _official_ negative GDP quarter, Obamacare trashing the economy, and the Fed losing control.


I'm waiting for the really exciting stuff. Like an increase in QE or a big spike in oil prices.

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## Cap

> But the problem is that if you shrink the state too much, another more powerful group will emerge.


There was a reason why Jefferson said "*The tree of liberty* must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants".

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## Madison320

> And if you don't shrink the state however much that is, then the state that doesn't shrink already is that more powerful group.
> 
> Having an ideal of statelessness that tells us that however little theft there is, even less would always be better, allows us to see what's wrong with both of those situations and to continue to aim toward improving them.


I agree that as you shrink the size of the state, state on citizen crime goes down. But at some point citizen on citizen crime goes up. There's a lot of places in the world where the primary danger is from other citizens. Does it make a difference whether it's the government that kills you or your neighbor?

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## heavenlyboy34

> You are not supposed to ask that question. And not asking certain questions is the difference between faith and science.


  I thought the verboten question was to "why trust any mortal to govern when they have no history whatsoever of doing it justly (by its founders definition)?"   At least the anarchists can answer questions like this.

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## Ender

> I agree that as you shrink the size of the state, state on citizen crime goes down. But at some point citizen on citizen crime goes up. *There's a lot of places in the world where the primary danger is from other citizens.* Does it make a difference whether it's the government that kills you or your neighbor?


Where?

And if my neighbor comes after me I can take care of him- not so with gov.

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## fisharmor

> And if my neighbor comes after me I can take care of him- not so with gov.


And if the government is who made it impossible for you to defend yourself against your neighbor, then your neighbor is only the proximate cause of your death.

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## jllundqu

> I would use the word "ideal."
> 
> I agree that true statelessness is an unachievable goal this side of the return of Jesus Christ, just as a world without theft is. But that ideal still serves us as something to aim toward, and to use as a measure according to which the evils of the state can be identified and remedies to them offered.
> 
> Perhaps the world is doomed to keep moving away from that ideal. If so, then the ideal still allows us to see that the direction the world is moving is wrong, and to oppose that.
> 
> Or perhaps the world can move closer and closer to that ideal. It may not reach it, but it may approach it asymptotically. If so, then it is that ideal of statelessness that provides with that asymptote towards which we want to keep moving. As the powers of the state gradually lessen (if they ever will), there will never come a point where we can say, "There. That's it. Stop shrinking the state. This amount of theft, kidnapping, and murder is just right. Any less will be too little." No. It will still be necessary to identify the evils of the state, however small they are in comparison to today, and continue to oppose them.


This may be the best analysis I've read in a long time on opposition to government.

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## erowe1

> I agree that as you shrink the size of the state, state on citizen crime goes down. But at some point citizen on citizen crime goes up. There's a lot of places in the world where the primary danger is from other citizens. Does it make a difference whether it's the government that kills you or your neighbor?


No. Morally it doesn't make a difference. And that's possibly the most important point that pushes me to oppose the state entirely. There do not exist two separate laws of morality, one for my neighbor and another for the state. If it's wrong for my neighbor to do it, it's wrong for the state to do it.

I would even say that if my neighbor kills me, then at that moment, my neighbor is essentially becoming a state within the very narrow confines of a population of two people, them and me. And in order for me to say that what they do in killing me is immoral, I am obligated to say that the state as an institution is inherently immoral.

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## ZENemy

Most people who are against anarchy have *NO $#@!ING IDEA WHAT IT IS.*

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## fisharmor

> Most people who are against anarchy have *NO $#@!ING IDEA WHAT IT IS.*


And the remaining 10% would be out of work.

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## Pericles

> Most people who are against anarchy have *NO $#@!ING IDEA WHAT IT IS.*


Which came first - anarchy or the state? Explain what then happened.

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## ZENemy

> Which came first - anarchy or the state? Explain what then happened.


We have no idea for the "truth" has been propagated by the "winners" of war.

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## ZENemy

> But the problem is that if you shrink the state too much, another more powerful group will emerge.


But will that group have a pseudo "Moral Authority"? Probably not, the "faith" in government is noting but misplaced religious faith, people are doing what they are told because of their belief in authority. A non "Moral" group rising and coming to the same power as our current gov is very unlikely and if it did, without moral authority it would be much easier to rally opposition to our cause. 

Anarchist: "Lets go overthrow the government
Idiot: OMG muh roads and other things

Anarchist: "lets go overthrow that mafia that is taking power"
Idiot: lock and load

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## Madison320

> Where?
> 
> And if my neighbor comes after me I can take care of him- not so with gov.



Detroit? Somalia?

What if your neighbor teams up with a 100 other neighbors and they have military weapons?

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## ZENemy

> Detroit? Somalia?
> 
> What if your neighbor teams up with a 100 other neighbors and they have military weapons?


Then I guess Ill be dead, Ill take danger over being a slave any day.

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## heavenlyboy34

> Detroit? Somalia?
> 
> What if your neighbor teams up with a 100 other neighbors and they have military weapons?


What if your neighbor buys off 435 congressmen and they have authority to use the most powerful military weapons in the world against you?  (see what I did there?)

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## VBRonPaulFan

> What if your neighbor buys off 435 congressmen and they have authority to use the most powerful military weapons in the world against you?  (see what I did there?)


Well technically they'd only need to buy up (435 / 2) + 1 lol

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## heavenlyboy34

> Well technically they'd only need to buy up (435 / 2) + 1 lol


Depends on the action they want to take.  Some things they can just pass in committees and whatnot. :P  There aren't many things that require unanimous vote, but it would be handy to have everyone bought off.

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## kcchiefs6465

> Most people who are against anarchy have *NO $#@!ING IDEA WHAT IT IS.*


Muh roads.

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## erowe1

> What if your neighbor teams up with a 100 other neighbors and they have military weapons?


That's what the state is.

It's wrong.

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## kcchiefs6465

> Which came first - anarchy or the state? Explain what then happened.


So essentially your argument is that since there are murderers and thieves in the world, and since they can band together for immoral purposes, that we must elect a bigger, badder group of murdering thieves to protect us from our possible murders and theft of property?

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## erowe1

> Which came first - anarchy or the state? Explain what then happened.


Anarchy came first.

Then a group of people conquered another group of people and enslaved them, thus creating the first state.

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## kcchiefs6465

> Detroit? Somalia?
> 
> What if your neighbor teams up with a 100 other neighbors and they have military weapons?


One, Detroit is the manifestation of failed policies much like the ones you advocate (the degree of socialization being the varying destined to fail factor) and two, what do you know of Somalia?

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## kcchiefs6465

A Letter to Grover Cleveland

http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/35016

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## ZENemy

Edit

-Stupid pic failed

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## PaulConventionWV

> Why is not wanting a ruler just a complaint?  Most of human history, no rulers.


How did you reach that conclusion?  Let me guess, you're going way beyond recorded history.

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## fisharmor

> How did you reach that conclusion?  Let me guess, you're going way beyond recorded history.


Technically you're right.
Without the state there's no need to have official mouthpieces who whitewash despicable official actions and make them officially acceptable.

There's a reason why we know practically everything the Romans did, while we know very little about Germans, Celts, or Gauls of the time.

History is tied to the state.

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## jllundqu

Anarchy works for hunter gatherers.... the second a large group of people settle in any geographical location SOME form of government pops up ergo MUh ROADS!

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## heavenlyboy34

> Anarchy works for hunter gatherers.... the second a large group of people settle in any geographical location SOME form of government pops up ergo MUh ROADS!


LULZ

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## PaulConventionWV

> Technically you're right.
> Without the state there's no need to have official mouthpieces who whitewash despicable official actions and make them officially acceptable.
> 
> There's a reason why we know practically everything the Romans did, while we know very little about Germans, Celts, or Gauls of the time.
> 
> History is tied to the state.


So what am I right about?

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## kcchiefs6465

> So what am I right about?


Everything.

And more.

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## acptulsa

> Well technically they'd only need to buy up (435 / 2) + 1 lol


They can buy off 218 and a half?




> I thought the verboten question was to "why trust any mortal to govern when they have *no* history *whatsoever* of doing it justly (by its founders definition)?"   At least the anarchists can answer questions like this.


So can minarchists:  Calvin Coolidge.  No history whatever?  What other lies are you telling us?

A better question is, what makes a person incapable of giving credit where credit is richly deserved?  By trying to write Coolidge out of the history books, you are engaging in the exact same tactics used by the Public Indoctrination Cent--er, I mean Public Schools.  Are you sure you want to associate with those people?

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## fisharmor

> So what am I right about?


You're right about history being tied to rulers.
They need to be sure future generations remember them for all the roads and hippodromes and moon landings.... and that they also forget or gloss over the genocides.

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## heavenlyboy34

> So can minarchists:  Calvin Coolidge.  No history whatever?  What other lies are you telling us?
> 
> A better question is, what makes a person incapable of giving credit where credit is richly deserved?  By trying to write Coolidge out of the history books, you are engaging in the exact same tactics used by the Public Indoctrination Cent--er, I mean Public Schools.  Are you sure you want to associate with those people?


Silliness.  For all Silent Cal's virtues, he did not represent the actions of the _entire_ State apparatus at the time.  Congress and the rest of the gang was busy as always with their nefarious deeds back then. (The Coolige regime lasted from 1923-29.  You need only look at what the regime did in those years.  It ain't pretty-same with every regime.)

But if you really want to bring up Cal...




> While the federal government had already subsidized airmail in the hope            of speeding up the formation of the passenger travel industry, Coolidges            Air Commerce Act of 1926 put civil aviation as a whole under the direct            authority of the commerce department. The inefficient regulations determined            by unresponsive bureaucracies have caused lasting damage to the industry.






I don't think I wrote anyone out of any history books (certainly didn't intend to).  I just think history books should be history, not hagiography.

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## Ronin Truth

> Which came first - anarchy or the state? Explain what then happened.


 Anarchy came first, then the hunter/gatherers became farmers.

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## Ronin Truth

> How did you reach that conclusion? Let me guess, you're going way beyond recorded history.


  Good guess, species history.  Unless it all began in Sumer.

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## otherone

> Good guess, species history.  Unless it all began in *Sumer*.


Yes. Organized religion was required for the creation of the state.  Superstition kept the unwashed masses from murdering the oligarchy (and still does).

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## acptulsa

> Silliness.  For all Silent Cal's virtues, he did not represent the actions of the _entire_ State apparatus at the time.  Congress and the rest of the gang was busy as always with their nefarious deeds back then.


Yes, I know, thank you.  That's why he invented the pocket veto--so he could shut Congress down without getting overridden.




> But if you really want to bring up Cal...


You're going to condemn the man and refuse to look at his many accomplishments because he tried to stimulate a modern technology and succeeded in putting the U.S. in the forefront of it?  Yes, I agree that this went against the principles he stuck to like glue in just about every other area of American life, and yes I agree that it has done the air travel industry more harm than good since he left office.  Even so, men were dying trying to deliver the U.S. Mail, and that was the reason he did what he did.  That's not the kind of bathwater that would cause me to throw out the baby, too...

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## PaulConventionWV

> Everything.
> 
> And more.


Great.  What do I win?

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## heavenlyboy34

> Yes, I know, thank you.  That's why he invented the pocket veto--so he could shut Congress down without getting overridden.
> 
> 
> *
> You're going to condemn the man and refuse to look at his many accomplishments because he tried to stimulate a modern technology and succeeded in putting the U.S. in the forefront of it?*  Yes, I agree that this went against the principles he stuck to like glue in just about every other area of American life, and yes I agree that it has done the air travel industry more harm than good since he left office.  Even so, men were dying trying to deliver the U.S. Mail, and that was the reason he did what he did.  That's not the kind of bathwater that would cause me to throw out the baby, too...


That's not what I was getting at.  Sorry I was unclear.  It's one of those days where I "dive-by" post due to other obligations.  I was striking at the regime generally.  Even the best of men simply don't have the time and knowledge to deal with it all.  You would really need to cut the State apparatus down to levels 200 years ago for a single guy to do it.  Even the most brilliant minds have limits to "multi-tasking" abilities.
ETA: How do you know Cal's true motivation WRT "stimulating" technology?  Politicians rarely mean what they say when they talk about such things.
Gtg for dinner, but look forward to chatting with you again later.  Nice talking with you, good sir.  ~hugs~

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## PaulConventionWV

> Anarchy came first, then the hunter/gatherers became farmers.


Let's assume you're right, since none of this is actually recorded and you can pretty much make up $#@! to support your theory.  

Given that, did it cross your mind that maybe anarchy is only possible under the conditions that supposedly allowed it back then?  It's one thing when humans are just starting out.  Do we really want to return to those conditions just to achieve a state of anarchy?  That would basically mean the end of civilization and probably a lot of mass death.

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## PaulConventionWV

> Good guess, species history.  Unless it all began in Sumer.


So, in other words, you can't support the idea of anarchy with recorded history, so you have to make a bunch of assumptions about history that was not recorded so that those pesky facts don't get in the way.

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## PaulConventionWV

> Yes. Organized religion was required for the creation of the state.  Superstition kept the unwashed masses from murdering the oligarchy (and still does).


I heavily disagree on that point.  Religion is not a tool of the state.  In fact, it is antithetical to the idea of the state since it has a conflicting authority figure that cannot be superseded.  Religion may very well calm people down, but it is not used as a sort of apparatus for that purpose.  It is kept under control so that the state maintains its authority, but religion is not used by the state.  Even if it was necessary for the creation of the state (which is plausible since the Catholic church was a very valuable vestige of the state in the middle ages), but the state, in and of itself, is secular in that it recognizes no authority above it and strives to be the sole authority to which people are held accountable.  It would not be wise for the state to tell people to actively worship a god that supersedes all its power, especially when that god is the Christian God that forbids the criminal (albeit internally justified) acts of the state.

Even in the middle ages, you may notice how the church, as an organization, was increasingly secular in that it cut links between God and the people and instead insisted that people communicate with God through the church, thereby establishing themselves as the sole authority on what God's law was.  People were required to pay tithing to the church and confess their sins to the church in order to be saved.  God was effectively left out of the equation because they would not let God "speak for Himself", as it were.  Thankfully, Martin Luther helped bring an end to all this so that the church could no longer rule arbitrarily under the masque of God's authority.

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## Christian Liberty

Saying that anarchists want to abolish all government is a strawman.  Anarchists want to abolish the State.

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## erowe1

> Yes. Organized religion was required for the creation of the state.  Superstition kept the unwashed masses from murdering the oligarchy (and still does).


Source?

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## klamath

Hunter gatherers weren't anarchists as much as people wish it to be true. The strongest hunter  or group of strongest hunters ruled.  But oh well people have to dream.

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## PaulConventionWV

> Hunter gatherers weren't anarchists as much as people wish it to be true. The strongest hunter  or group of strongest hunters ruled.  But oh well people have to dream.


+rep

I hate it when people can't support their theories with the known, so they have to jump into the realm of the unknown and make dubious claims that can neither be proven true nor false by relying on a version of history laden with personal slant because none of it can be observed and its very occurrence is based on conjecture.

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## heavenlyboy34

> +rep
> *
> I hate it when people can't support their theories with the known, so they have to jump into the realm of the unknown and make dubious claims that can neither be proven true nor false by relying on a version of history laden with personal slant because none of it can be observed and its very occurrence is based on conjecture.*


Yet minarchists and Constitutionalists do this all the time.  Neither minarchism nor Constitutionalism has a coherent legal theory to rest on, so it has only the "Unknown Ideal" (to borrow a Randian term).

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## acptulsa

> Neither minarchism nor Constitutionalism has a coherent legal theory to rest on...


Really?  From a self-described monarchist who says hoping for benign tyrants is our best hope?  You think the most 'coherent legal theory to rest on' is the Divine Right of Kings?

Really?

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## PaulConventionWV

> Yet minarchists and Constitutionalists do this all the time.  Neither minarchism nor Constitutionalism has a coherent legal theory to rest on, so it has only the "Unknown Ideal" (to borrow a Randian term).


That's not exactly the kind of unknown I was referring to.  

In your opinion, though, who does have a coherent legal theory?  What constitutes a legal theory?

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## heavenlyboy34

> Really?  From a self-described monarchist who says hoping for benign tyrants is our best hope?  You think the most 'coherent legal theory to rest on' is the Divine Right of Kings?
> 
> Really?


Yes, really.  I've challenged this very forum to come up with a coherent legal theory-crickets.  Constitutional legal theory comes down to the opinions of a bunch of dead guys, the Federalist Papers, and SCOTUS.  
(just so there's no confusion, this article goes into detail about what I mean when I talk about legal theory/theory of law: http://ivr-enc.info/index.php?title=...s_and_Purposes)

I've NEVER described myself as a monarchist.  I have argued-and maintain-that monarchy is superior to any republican or democratic system, assuming the goal is maximum liberty and peace/prosperity.  We have a few threads around here on this already if you want to rehash that.  The overwhelming evidence proves this to be true.

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## heavenlyboy34

> That's not exactly the kind of unknown I was referring to.  
> 
> In your opinion, though, who does have a coherent legal theory?  What constitutes a legal theory?


A number of theorists have developed and written lengthy treatises on legal theory, sound and unsound.  Here is an article that discusses legal theory in quite a bit of detail-http://ivr-enc.info/index.php?title=Legal_Theory:_Types_and_Purposes  There is a bibliography at the bottom for further reading.

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## PaulConventionWV

> A number of theorists have developed and written lengthy treatises on legal theory, sound and unsound.  Here is an article that discusses legal theory in quite a bit of detail-http://ivr-enc.info/index.php?title=Legal_Theory:_Types_and_Purposes  There is a bibliography at the bottom for further reading.


Thanks.  Is there a particular legal theory that you adhere to?

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## heavenlyboy34

> Thanks.  Is there a particular legal theory that you adhere to?


There's not a single unified theory covering every aspect of law that I approve of yet, but I admire Kinsella's work on libertarian legal theory, for one.  I've read some interesting legal theory by Natural Law philosophers (contemporaries like Rothbard as well as classical NL theorists) as well.

ETA: Here's a decent lecture on Rothbardian legal theory: 

  Note: I disagree with Murray on a few things, such as the personhood/lack thereof of a fetus.

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## otherone

> In fact, it is antithetical to the idea of the state since it has a conflicting authority figure that cannot be superseded.  Religion may very well calm people down, but it is not used as a sort of apparatus for that purpose.


I am hard-pressed to come up with any historical state (other than communists) that either didn't claim authority to rule from supernatural powers, or claimed to be divine itself.  Sumer, Egypt, Rome, every Christian and Muslim nation, all the way up to the US.  Historically, religion wasn't used to pacify, it was used to terrify. There was no need for the NSA in ancient Greece when the gods see EVERYTHING.  Having the blessing of supernatural boogiemen was/is vital to a small cadre of oligarchs who wish to remain in power.

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## Bastiat's The Law

Anarchists are a lot like liberals, in that they discount flawed human nature.

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## otherone

> Anarchists are a lot like liberals, in that they discount flawed human nature.

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## fisharmor

> Anarchists are a lot like liberals, in that they discount flawed human nature.


*This argument was already addressed in this thread*.

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## Ronin Truth

> Anarchists are a lot like liberals, in that they discount flawed human nature.


We don't discount flawed human nature, in fact human nature is precisely why we don't want or need rulers or governments.




> *Robert LeFevre's Libertarian Quotes*
> 
> *An anarchist is anyone who believes in less government than you do.
> 
> Government is a disease masquerading as its own cure. 
> 
> A limited government is a contradiction in terms. 
> 
> If men are good, you don't need government; if men are evil or ambivalent, you don't dare have one.
> ...

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## erowe1

> Anarchists are a lot like liberals, in that they discount flawed human nature.


Human nature is flawed. And there's nothing we can do to change the world in such a way that will remove all the harm that humans will do to each other.

But the great thing about free markets is that they do kind of a jiu jitsu move on our flaws, where our own self-serving natures motivate us to serve others because it's profitable. The state never does that. If it does anything, it can only result in net harm. And the less harm it does the better. There is no minimal point below which the state would be doing too little harm.

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## roho76

> I agree that as you shrink the size of the state, state on citizen crime goes down. But at some point citizen on citizen crime goes up. There's a lot of places in the world where the primary danger is from other citizens. Does it make a difference whether it's the government that kills you or your neighbor?


Yes it does. At least if my neighbor kills me I didn't have to pay for it right up until I died.

----------


## klamath

> We don't discount flawed human nature, in fact human nature is precisely why we don't want or need rulers or governments.


Human nature is way you will always have leaders unless you are the leader. Millions of years of leaders prove this. Some always want to be leaders some always want to be led, and some always rebel against leaders and thus become leaders or die. The only people that manage to become their own individual leaders are people that can escape societies reaches which is pretty near impossible on the world today.

----------


## Ronin Truth

> Human nature is way you will always have leaders unless you are the leader. Millions of years of leaders prove this. Some always want to be leaders some always want to be led, and some always rebel against leaders and thus become leaders or die. The only people that manage to become their own individual leaders are people that can escape societies reaches which is pretty near impossible on the world today.


I don't think that I'm going to let you morph "leaders" into "rulers" and "governments". Nice try though.

----------


## klamath

> I don't think that I'm going to let you morph "leaders" into "rulers" and "governments". Nice try though.


I get it, you just want to change the name of states, governments and leaders. Carry on, call it what you want.

----------


## erowe1

> I get it, you just want to change the name of states, governments and leaders. Carry on, call it what you want.


"Leader" is definitely a more broad term that may include state rulers, but also includes people whom others follow voluntarily.

----------


## klamath

> "Leader" is definitely a more broad term that may include state rulers, but also includes people whom others follow voluntarily.


Pretty well doesn't matter. The followers will enforce the leaders ideas or their interpretation of that leaders ideas. Paulfest is a prime example.

----------


## erowe1

> Pretty well doesn't matter. The followers will enforce the leaders ideas or their interpretation of that leaders ideas. Paulfest is a prime example.


Ethically it matters. If the leaders use violence against the followers to make them accept their ideas, that's wrong. But if the followers adopt them voluntarily, it's not.

This is why the governments of voluntary organizations like churches and the Boy Scouts do not qualify as states. But of course their leaders are still leaders.

----------


## klamath

> Ethically it matters. If the leaders use violence against the followers to make them accept their ideas, that's wrong. But if the followers adopt them voluntarily, it's not.
> 
> This is why the governments of voluntary organizations like churches and the Boy Scouts do not qualify as states. But of course their leaders are still leaders.


And pretty much all of those organization retain the power to enforce their rules or force people out, violently if necessary.

----------


## erowe1

> And pretty much all of those organization retain the power to enforce their rules or force people out, violently if necessary.


Right. But they don't use violence to keep people in, like the state does. That's the crucial difference.

----------


## Ronin Truth

> I get it, you just want to change the name of states, governments and leaders. Carry on, call it what you want.


Thanks, I pretty much always have and it's probably very likely that I will continue indefinitely. But I guess it is kinda nice to have your permission.

What's the difference between a libertarian and an anarchist? Answer: 20 years.

----------


## mczerone

I've read through the thread and have some different takes on the OPs concerns:




> Anyway the reason I said anarchism is more of a complaint is because I think "no government" is basically an impossible condition.


Anarchism/Voluntarism/Abolitionism does not claim "no government".

It claims that the ideal condition is where each individual is free to choose their government. That there's no geographic monopoly on this service.

Your assessment is equivalent to saying that those who don't favor a geographic monopoly on soft drinks want no soft drinks. In fact, we want a world with Coke, Pepsi, Faygo, 7-up, and Vernors, and for any new entrant to the market to be able to compete. Your counter-position is that there needs to be just one soft-drink, your preference, say Diet Vanilla Coke, that everyone must be forced to drink, but that's okay because it's the most tasty soft drink in existence.




> Maybe I'm wrong but the way I define government is this: In any geographic area there's always going to be a group that has the most force and that makes the rules. I call that government.


Let's grant your statement "there will exist a group that's large/popular enough to enforce their will."

You still haven't proven uniqueness. Why can't there be a multiplicity of groups vying for your allegiance, where there is a peace between them enough for neighbors to subscribe to different "government service providers"?

Also, what is a "geographic area"? Are the current US states well-defined "geographic areas"?

The position that you're attacking (voluntarism) is possible moreso today than ever before because human interaction is less and less dependant on geography. Claiming that future "power structures" will develop based on geography essentially boils down to supporting a one world government (of some form) - as the entire globe is currently the only "closed system" relative to geography and human action.




> The idea that you can have competing governments or protection agencies, in the same geographic area never pans out because force doesn't work that way. The natural tendency is for the strongest group to overpower the weaker groups and absorb them.


Your argument is equivalent to: there might be a war, therefore surrender.

Basically, you make a blanket assertion that has evidence (and counter-evidence) that a certain human tendency is unavoidable. Sociology doesn't work that way.




> The most powerful group makes the rules. I would call that government. So given that there's always going to be a most powerful group that makes the rules *I think the best solution is to try to keep control over that group the best you can.* It's not a perfect solution, but unless there a fundamental change in human nature and force I don't see what else can be done.


Any control you perceive is merely an illusion. The only way to "control" a government service agency is to make them Mortal, to subject them to a profit/loss test.

----------


## Madison320

> It claims that the ideal condition is where each individual is free to choose their government. That there's no geographic monopoly on this service.
> 
> Your assessment is equivalent to saying that those who don't favor a geographic monopoly on soft drinks want no soft drinks. In fact, we want a world with Coke, Pepsi, Faygo, 7-up, and Vernors, and for any new entrant to the market to be able to compete. Your counter-position is that there needs to be just one soft-drink, your preference, say Diet Vanilla Coke, that everyone must be forced to drink, but that's okay because it's the most tasty soft drink in existence.
> 
> 
> 
> Let's grant your statement "there will exist a group that's large/popular enough to enforce their will."
> 
> You still haven't proven uniqueness. Why can't there be a multiplicity of groups vying for your allegiance, where there is a peace between them enough for neighbors to subscribe to different "government service providers"?


Force doesn't work that way. You can't shop around for it. If I'm accused of murder I can't pick my government service provider. It picks me. Whatever group has the most force in a given area is going to force me to resolve the issue. The group that has the most force is not going to ALLOW me to pick the arbitrator in a dispute.

----------


## Pericles

> So essentially your argument is that since there are murderers and thieves in the world, and since they can band together for immoral purposes, that we must elect a bigger, badder group of murdering thieves to protect us from our possible murders and theft of property?


A rational form of inquiry would conclude anarchy was the starting point of human affairs. Therefore our inquiry should explore why the natural state of man did not persist - particularly if one has the objective or returning to it.

All of the straw man statements of if you do not advocate anarchy then you must approve of some form of the state are tiresome and show an inability to advocate forcefully for your point of view.

----------


## Pericles

> +rep
> 
> I hate it when people can't support their theories with the known, so they have to jump into the realm of the unknown and make dubious claims that can neither be proven true nor false by relying on a version of history laden with personal slant because none of it can be observed and its very occurrence is based on conjecture.


It seems anarchistic societies sucked at written records.

----------


## Bastiat's The Law

> We don't discount flawed human nature, in fact human nature is precisely why we don't want or need rulers or governments.


There will always be rulers because humans are tribal beings and have the will to power.

----------


## fisharmor

> The only way to "control" a government service agency is to make them Mortal, to subject them to a profit/loss test.


And we should also point out that under the state, the profit/loss test is reversed.
A business entity which succeeds is given money and market share and more power.  A business entity which fails is given less money and market share and power, and with enough failure, that entity ceases to exist altogether.

A government entity which succeeds is given LESS money and power.  A government entity which fails is given MORE money and power.

The state is set up in a way that incentivizes failure.  So some of us aren't really surprised that it fails.




> Force doesn't work that way. You can't shop around for it. If I'm accused of murder I can't pick my government service provider. It picks me. Whatever group has the most force in a given area is going to force me to resolve the issue. The group that has the most force is not going to ALLOW me to pick the arbitrator in a dispute.


But just stop and listen to yourself.  

First, so you're accused of murder - so what?
The way even our half-baked system is supposed to work is that an accusation doesn't mean $#@! until evidence is gathered.  You're supposed to be able to shrug off all sorts of accusations until someone actually has a case against you.  But you've been so conditioned by the state that you appear to be on board with the idea of shoving people around based only on accusations.

More importantly, you let slip an important part of your worldview, one which anarchists don't share at all.
You fundamentally believe that people are animals who would be running around murdering each other if not for the state threatening to force them to deal with it if they do.

We know better.  People are overwhelmingly peaceful and resistant to violence.  
There is a demand for peace.  
There is therefore a market for peace.

If you don't fundamentally believe that markets work, then fine - but you probably don't belong here.
If you do, however, then you don't get to pick and choose.  You don't get to say healthcare has to be covered by the market, but justice can't be, and still claim that you're philosophically consistent.

----------


## muzzled dogg

Abolitionists complained about slavery without ever providing a solution to the cotton picking problem

----------


## acptulsa

> And we should also point out that under the state, the profit/loss test is reversed.
> A business entity which succeeds is given money and market share and more power.  A business entity which fails is given less money and market share and power, and with enough failure, that entity ceases to exist altogether.
> 
> A government entity which succeeds is given LESS money and power.  A government entity which fails is given MORE money and power.
> 
> The state is set up in a way that incentivizes failure.  So some of us aren't really surprised that it fails.


Probably the best argument I've seen for why the bailouts prove we don't have a free market and the big corporations, from Bank of America to General Motors, are not private at all but actual parts of the government.

----------


## Bastiat's The Law

> Human nature is way you will always have leaders unless you are the leader. Millions of years of leaders prove this. Some always want to be leaders some always want to be led, and some always rebel against leaders and thus become leaders or die. The only people that manage to become their own individual leaders are people that can escape societies reaches which is pretty near impossible on the world today.


Agreed.  I also like to see an anarchistic society field a fighting force strong enough to fend off organized outside forces.  No leaders and rulers right?  Let's see how that affects military tactics on the battlefield.  Could they even muster a fighting force?  I have my doubts, but for sake of argument say they could.  What happens when person A wants person B to perform a flanking maneuver on the enemy and that person(s) refuse?  Roman armies conquered numerous peoples because they lacked cohesion and discipline on the battlefield.  Do anarchists even bother to read history?

----------


## fisharmor

> Agreed.  I also like to see an anarchistic society field a fighting force strong enough to fend off organized outside forces.  No leaders and rulers right?  Let's see how that affects military tactics on the battlefield.  Could they even muster a fighting force?  I have my doubts, but for sake of argument say they could.  What happens when person A wants person B to perform a flanking maneuver on the enemy and that person(s) refuse?  Roman armies conquered numerous peoples because they lacked cohesion and discipline on the battlefield.  Do anarchists even bother to read history?


Um... Arminius, Boudicca, Caractacus, Vercingetorix....  _just working off of memory there._
Let me cut you off preemptively: Yes, I know they all lost in the long run.  Success wasn't your criterion: it was mustering a fighting force capable of fending off an organized invader.
Whether or not that society is capable of withstanding the war crimes committed against it is a matter quite apart from your question of fighting forces.

So to answer your question, yes.

----------


## PaulConventionWV

> I am hard-pressed to come up with any historical state (other than communists) that either didn't claim authority to rule from supernatural powers, or claimed to be divine itself.  Sumer, Egypt, Rome, every Christian and Muslim nation, all the way up to the US.  Historically, religion wasn't used to pacify, it was used to terrify. There was no need for the NSA in ancient Greece when the gods see EVERYTHING.  Having the blessing of supernatural boogiemen was/is vital to a small cadre of oligarchs who wish to remain in power.


Modern-day US is more like the communist countries than any of the others you mentioned, and I might add, more successful.  The concept of God, however, had nothing to do with their ability to attain power.  People have always been very religious, and it was up to the State to take advantage of that wherever possible because it would've otherwise hurt their cause.  Like I said before, the Catholic Church in the middle ages grew increasingly secular by separating the people from God and forcing them to rely on the church for salvation.  Modern day US is one of the most secular states in history, as well as one of the most successful at attaining power.  

Throughout history, religion may have been something that the State had to deal with and adapt to, but religiosity wasn't something it strived for among its people.  Even if the state may have taken power by using the religious establishment as a channel through which to gain the respect of the people, it was never the religious aspect that gave them control, it was the secular aspect that gave them control, and religion was simply hijacked in order to achieve a high degree of secularism under which they could establish their own full authority and power.

----------


## Madison320

> Agreed.  I also like to see an anarchistic society field a fighting force strong enough to fend off organized outside forces.  No leaders and rulers right?  Let's see how that affects military tactics on the battlefield.  Could they even muster a fighting force?  I have my doubts, but for sake of argument say they could.  What happens when person A wants person B to perform a flanking maneuver on the enemy and that person(s) refuse?  Roman armies conquered numerous peoples because they lacked cohesion and discipline on the battlefield.  Do anarchists even bother to read history?


And if they muster up a fighting force, guess what, that's a government. Whoever's in charge of that fighting force is going to make the rules.


I don't think anarchists realize how bad things could be without government. Yeah, government sucks but I can usually make it thru most days without getting thrown in jail. My guess is that without government the odds are I won't make it into work without getting robbed. That's one reason why governments are formed in the first place. But like I said in the initial post it's almost impossible to even have "no government" since the most powerful group IS the government. 


Here's how Ayn Rand felt about Anarchy:

"Anarchy, as a political concept, is a naive floating abstraction: . . . a society without an organized government would be at the mercy of the first criminal who came along and who would precipitate it into the chaos of gang warfare. But the possibility of human immorality is not the only objection to anarchy: even a society whose every member were fully rational and faultlessly moral, could not function in a state of anarchy; it is the need of objective laws and of an arbiter for honest disagreements among men that necessitates the establishment of a government.

If a society provided no organized protection against force, it would compel every citizen to go about armed, to turn his home into a fortress, to shoot any strangers approaching his dooror to join a protective gang of citizens who would fight other gangs, formed for the same purpose, and thus bring about the degeneration of that society into the chaos of gang-rule, i.e., rule by brute force, into perpetual tribal warfare of prehistorical savages.

The use of physical forceeven its retaliatory usecannot be left at the discretion of individual citizens. Peaceful coexistence is impossible if a man has to live under the constant threat of force to be unleashed against him by any of his neighbors at any moment. Whether his neighbors intentions are good or bad, whether their judgment is rational or irrational, whether they are motivated by a sense of justice or by ignorance or by prejudice or by malicethe use of force against one man cannot be left to the arbitrary decision of another."

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## Madison320

> Um... Arminius, Boudicca, Caractacus, Vercingetorix....


Weren't they in Jurassic Park?

----------


## PaulConventionWV

> We don't discount flawed human nature, in fact human nature is precisely why we don't want or need rulers or governments.


Perhaps flawed human nature is a deterrent from both extremes?  

It is impossible for the statement to go both ways, so asserting that the statement is just as true either way doesn't exactly help your cause.  In fact, the assertion that flawed human nature has a sort of ingrained prescription rests on an unidentified ideal condition under which flawed human nature could be accommodated... but maybe there just isn't one.  

In other words, flawed human nature doesn't support statism or anarchism.  It's flawed because neither the state nor anarchy can accommodate for flawed human nature and make it something good.

----------


## Ronin Truth

> Perhaps flawed human nature is a deterrent from both extremes? 
> 
> It is impossible for the statement to go both ways, so asserting that the statement is just as true either way doesn't exactly help your cause. In fact, the assertion that flawed human nature has a sort of ingrained prescription rests on an unidentified ideal condition under which flawed human nature could be accommodated... but maybe there just isn't one. 
> 
> In other words, flawed human nature doesn't support statism or anarchism. It's flawed because neither the state nor anarchy can accommodate for flawed human nature and make it something good.


 The state has to mobilize and organize flawed human nature, it is the nature of anarchy is to just walk away and ignore it all.




> *Chaos is found in greatest abundance wherever order is being sought. Chaos always defeats order because it is better organized.* ~ Terry Pratchett

----------


## otherone

> Throughout history, religion may have been something that the State had to deal with and adapt to, but religiosity wasn't something it strived for among its people.  Even if the state may have taken power by using the religious establishment as a channel through which to gain the respect of the people, it was never the religious aspect that gave them control, it was the secular aspect that gave them control, and religion was simply hijacked in order to achieve a high degree of secularism under which they could establish their own full authority and power.


This is an interesting idea.  Could you give an example of an ancient state that made no claims of divinity, supernatural legitimacy, or divine lineage?  When civilization emerged, complete with writing, agriculture, division of labor, etc., how did oligarchs justify their authority?

----------


## PaulConventionWV

> Thanks, I pretty much always have and it's probably very likely that I will continue indefinitely. But I guess it is kinda nice to have your permission.
> 
> What's the difference between a libertarian and an anarchist? Answer: 20 years.


You know, I find this whole debate rather amusing because the question is rarely ever defined.  If the question is, "Is anarchy ideal?", then I think everyone is an anarchist.  I don't think you could find a single person that doesn't think it would be great if we could all live peaceably without government.  If the question is, "Is anarchy possible?" then I believe anyone who's being honest with themselves knows that it's not possible to have a society without a state.  The question, "Do we need government?"  is completely moot because we can't get rid of it.  No sane person would argue that government is an ideal.  At best, it's a necessary evil.  Even the most hardcore statists operate under the assumption that more government is not necessarily a good thing, but it is necessary.  Whether or not this is true, anarchy is simply a willingness to outwardly express that you believe the absence of government is an ideal condition, but it makes no claims as to the viability of achieving that.

----------


## Ronin Truth

I'm having a very hard time picturing some invading force occupying the (used to be) USA.  300,000,000 privately owned firearms in guerrilla hands could make for a very expensive and bloody occupation.

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## erowe1

> No leaders and rulers right?  Let's see how that affects military tactics on the battlefield.


There's that word again.

Why do you say "no leaders"? And here you specifically distinguish it from rulers.

----------


## Ronin Truth

> You know, I find this whole debate rather amusing because the question is rarely ever defined. If the question is, "Is anarchy ideal?", then I think everyone is an anarchist. I don't think you could find a single person that doesn't think it would be great if we could all live peaceably without government. If the question is, "Is anarchy possible?" then I believe anyone who's being honest with themselves knows that it's not possible to have a society without a state. The question, "Do we need government?" is completely moot because we can't get rid of it. No sane person would argue that government is an ideal. At best, it's a necessary evil. Even the most hardcore statists operate under the assumption that more government is not necessarily a good thing, but it is necessary. Whether or not this is true, anarchy is simply a willingness to outwardly express that you believe the absence of government is an ideal condition, but it makes no claims as to the viability of achieving that.


 It's more of a comparative advantage debate than a quest for an ideal. The state is an archaic savage and barbaric institution that really just needs to be outgrown. before it kills us all. 6,000 years on the road to nowhere, it's WAAAAY past time to try out some civilized other alternatives.

----------


## otherone

> It [anarchy] claims that the ideal condition is where each individual is free to choose their government.


Perfect.  Why wouldn't anyone want an opt-out clause? Why would a minarchist want someone to remain who wanted out?

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## PaulConventionWV

> This is an interesting idea.  Could you give an example of an ancient state that made no claims of divinity, supernatural legitimacy, or divine lineage?  When civilization emerged, complete with writing, agriculture, division of labor, etc., how did oligarchs justify their authority?


I don't need an example.  If you understood what I was saying, a claim to divinity doesn't go against any of it.  If a ruler makes a claim to divinity, it doesn't mean he's using the adherence to a particular religion to control his people, it means he's hijacking religion in order to move away from it and establish himself as the sole authority, and not the deity he claims to worship.  The point is that the goal is always to undermine God's authority, whatever god that may be, and transfer it over to the secular ruler.  A secular ruler cannot rule absolutely if people adhere to and recognize an authority above them.  

The Catholic Church of the middle ages was a rather ingenious example of a state that masqueraded as being under the authority of God, and yet the people were never able to directly receive that authority except through the church.  Pretty tricky if you ask me.  

Another important point is that making claims to divinity is not the same as adhering to a religion supposedly authored by a deity that transcends humanity.  The state always sought to make itself the sole authority.  That can be done either by hijacking religious establishments like the Catholic Church and claiming that it was the sole means through which God's commands could be received (thus giving itself the power to arbitrarily make claims of authority and pass them off as God's commands), or by claiming oneself directly as a deity and thereby directly establishing oneself as an absolute authority.

----------


## PaulConventionWV

> It's more of a comparative advantage debate than a quest for an ideal.  The state is a savage and barbaric institution that really just needs to be outgrown. before it kills us all.  6,000 years on the road to nowhere, it's WAAAAY past time to try out some civilized other alternatives.


And I don't think anyone would argue that it would be better to have a state than it would to be able to live without it.  Everyone agrees that it would be better to live without the state if it were possible.  The point is that it's not possible.

----------


## fisharmor

> I don't think anarchists realize how bad things could be without government.


First, you missed the part where it was explained that no anarchist is calling for no government.

Second, This was already addressed in this thread.

----------


## otherone

> A secular ruler cannot rule absolutely if people adhere to and recognize an authority above them.


In order for a "secular" ruler to "hijack" divine authority, there has to be a religion to begin with. hence, my original statement:
_Organized religion was required for the creation of the state
_.
Please provide an example of an ancient state whose oligarchs did not "hijack" divine authority?

----------


## fisharmor

> Please provide an example of an ancient state whose oligarchs did not "hijack" divine authority?


I'd actually settle for a modern example.

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> In order for a "secular" ruler to "hijack" divine authority, there has to be a religion to begin with. hence, my original statement:
> _Organized religion was required for the creation of the state
> _.*
> Please provide an example of an ancient state whose oligarchs did not "hijack" divine authority*?


Well, religion has been natural to **** sapien sapien for thousands of years...it doesn't seem a good indictment of religion because rulers tend to be good at hijacking it.  They're also good at hijacking media and other institutions...

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> Abolitionists complained about slavery without ever providing a solution to the cotton picking problem

----------


## Ronin Truth

*"Religion and politics are both the very same thing. They are both only, very old and very effective, means to control large masses of people. It has always only been that way, and it always only will be."*

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> *"Religion and politics are both the very same thing. They are both only, very old and very effective, means to control large masses of people. It has always only been that way, and it always only will be."*


What is this out of context, unattributed quote supposed to prove?  How does the author account for the very effective control of the masses held by the atheist Soviets?

----------


## William Tell

> *Anarchism is more of a complaint than a solution*


It really is, I see anarchists bash voting and such things all the time. But never give solutions, it's all complaining and whining all the time. Don't get me wrong, I would shed no tears if the Gov disappeared tomorrow, but anarchists for the most part are not working towards that in any practicable way.

----------


## Ronin Truth

> What is this out of context, unattributed quote supposed to prove? How does the author account for the very effective control of the masses held by the atheist Soviets?


The soviets theology was Communism, the gospel "Das Kapital" written by Saint Karl. Their politics was the same. It's simpler for simpler minds.  At the end folks just walked away.

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> *It really is, I see anarchists bash voting and such things all the time. But never give solutions, it's all complaining and whining all the time*. Don't get me wrong, I would shed no tears if the Gov disappeared tomorrow, but anarchists for the most part are not working towards that in any practicable way.


Then you haven't read a significant amount of anarchist literature.  They deal with solutions all the friggin' time.

----------


## Ronin Truth

> It really is, I see anarchists bash voting and such things all the time. But never give solutions, it's all complaining and whining all the time. Don't get me wrong, I would shed no tears if the Gov disappeared tomorrow, but anarchists for the most part are not working towards that in any practicable way.


  I have no solution for cancer or Alzheimer's, etc. either.  Should I stop bashing those too.

----------


## William Tell

> Then you haven't read a significant amount of anarchist literature.  They deal with solutions all the friggin' time.


I have read plenty of their BS, hardly any of the ones on the internet have any real short term solutions or projects. They seem to just eat popcorn and smoke weed, while watching police brutality videos

I sympathize with them, I really do. But lets get something done dang it!

----------


## William Tell

> I have no solution for cancer or Alzheimer's, etc. either.  Should I stop bashing those too.


Up to you, I think spending hours and hours saying: Curse you Cancer!!!!!!

Is a waste of time. Again, I don't like cancer, but whining does not make it go away.

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> The soviets theology was Communism, the gospel "Das Kapital" written by Saint Karl.  Their politics was the same.  It's simpler for simpler minds.


Communism isn't a theology.  Especially as the Soviets practiced it ("Scientific Socialism" aimed at Communism with various multi-year plans).  After the Revolution, prominent religious figures were martyred and Universal Atheism became official policy.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religio...e_Soviet_Union 

If you want to spin atheism as a religion, okay...but the atheists on RPFs are going to get cranky.  

It has been said that Statism is a religion.  There's a bit of truth to it, but really it only borrows the cult aspects of religion.

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> I have read plenty of their BS, hardly any of the ones on the internet have any real short term solutions or projects. They seem to just eat popcorn and smoke weed, while watching police brutality videos
> 
> I sympathize with them, I really do. But lets get something done dang it!


If that's all you know, then you haven't read "plenty".  You've read a few blogs and maybe watched a few youtube videos.  Rothbard's system building was/is something minarchists can only aspire to, and other anarchists and voluntaryists have covered every objection uttered by minarchists.  Minarchists just don't like to read except for very short and simple things like the Constitution and the Federalist.

----------


## William Tell

> Communism isn't a theology.


I think it is




> * ARE Americans practicing Communism?* *  Read the 10 Planks of The Communist Manifesto to discover the truth and learn how to know your enemy...   
> Karl Marx describes in his communist manifesto, the ten steps  necessary to destroy a free enterprise system and replace it with a  system of omnipotent government power, so as to effect a communist  socialist state. Those ten steps are known as the Ten Planks of The Communist Manifesto The following brief presents the original ten planks within the Communist Manifesto  written by Karl Marx in 1848, along with the American adopted  counterpart for each of the planks.  From comparison it's clear MOST  Americans have by myths, fraud and deception under the color of law by  their own politicians in both the Republican and Democratic and parties,  been transformed into Communists.   
> Another thing to remember, Karl Marx in creating the Communist  Manifesto designed these planks AS A TEST to determine whether a society  has become communist or not. If they are all in effect and in force,  then the people ARE practicing communists.  
>  Communism, by any other name is still communism, and is VERY VERY destructive to the individual and to the society!!   
> The 10 PLANKS stated in the Communist Manifesto and some of their American counterparts are...   
> 1. Abolition of private property and the application of all rents of land to public purposes.  
> Americans do these with actions such as the 14th Amendment of the  U.S. Constitution (1868), and various zoning, school & property  taxes. Also the Bureau of Land Management (Zoning laws are the first  step to government property ownership)  
> 2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.   
> Americans know this as misapplication of the 16th Amendment of  the U.S. Constitution, 1913, The Social Security Act of 1936.; Joint  House Resolution 192 of 1933; and various State "income" taxes. We call  it "paying your fair share".  
> ...

----------


## Ronin Truth

> And I don't think anyone would argue that it would be better to have a state than it would to be able to live without it. Everyone agrees that it would be better to live without the state if it were possible. The point is that it's not possible.


I'm shocked and amazed by your apparent total lack of creativity and imagination.  We just need enough people to stop doing it. DUH!  

It's awful, no one likes it and nothing can be done about it.  Gimme a break.

----------


## William Tell

> If that's all you know, then you haven't read "plenty".  You've read a few blogs and maybe watched a few youtube videos.  Rothbard's system building was/is something minarchists can only aspire to, and other anarchists and voluntaryists have covered every objection uttered by minarchists.  Minarchists just don't like to read except for very short and simple things like the Constitution and the Federalist.


Missing the point, so you may say anarchism works, GREAT! Now how are you trying to implement it?

----------


## Ronin Truth

> Communism isn't a theology. Especially as the Soviets practiced it ("Scientific Socialism" aimed at Communism with various multi-year plans). After the Revolution, prominent religious figures were martyred and Universal Atheism became official policy. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religio...e_Soviet_Union 
> 
> If you want to spin atheism as a religion, okay...but the atheists on RPFs are going to get cranky. 
> 
> It has been said that Statism is a religion. There's a bit of truth to it, but really it only borrows the cult aspects of religion.





> *The Theology of Communism*
> 
> Dr. Martin H. Scharlemann,
> Chaplain (Brigadier General), AFRes





> In 1964 the Chicago University Press published a volume of essays entitled, _What Can a Man Do?_ The chapters of this book were written by one of our most distinguished Jewish journalists, Milton Mayer. One of his essays goes under the title, Christ Under Communism,1 It concludes with the observation that there are, at this time, only two serious contenders for the hearts and minds of men, namely, the Church and Communism.
> 
> At the moment, as the author points out, the Marxist movement looks strong and victorious, while the Church appears to be in retreat. Yet the Church has known right along that this contest would be long and bruising. She has entered the arena, therefore, prepared to endure. Communism has only recently discovered that this struggle is not an easy one. In the meantime, both address themselves to mans capacity for basic loyalties. Both work with an interpretation of reality which proposes to deal with the ultimate issues in depth.
> 
> That is to say, both have a theology, as Nikolai Berdyaev was quick to point out when he went into exile from Russia almost fifty years ago.2
> 
> It is a paradox, of course, to describe Communism in terms of theology. After all, do not its prophets insist that religion is the opiate of the people? Yet Communism itself may be spoken of as a religion. It certainly insists on dealing with men at the same level. Hence the World Council of Churches, in its Evanston Assembly of 1954, took special note of the structural correspondence between Christianity and the Marxist system of thought.
> 3


   Continued at http://www.airpower.maxwell.af.mil/a...harlemann.html

----------


## otherone

> Well, religion has been natural to **** sapien sapien for thousands of years...it doesn't seem a good indictment of religion because rulers tend to be good at hijacking it.


It's not an indictment of religion; it's an indictment of statism, as demonstrated by the Soviets.
Statism claims it has _moral_ justification for violence.  Historically, morality is codified by religion.  Organized religion is a broad system that creates a universal set of ethical standards, in many cases under the "auspices" of the oligarchy.  This code generally permitted the priests, or local rulers, or judges to "morally" burn alive, stone, decapitate, or whatever, whomever violates the code.
The Age of Enlightenment ushered in a more-man-less-god-centered age, where the new morality became focused on "the common good"...collectivism.  So instead of saying, "Allah weeps when a man porks a man", we got statements like "The Motherland weeps when a man porks a man".

----------


## Cutlerzzz

> I'm having a very hard time picturing some invading force occupying the (used to be) USA.  300,000,000 privately owned firearms in guerrilla hands could make for a very expensive and bloody occupation.


Private militaries with fewer small arms, less labor, and more capital (ships, plans, tanks, ect...) would be much better.

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> [CENTER]   Continued at http://www.airpower.maxwell.af.mil/a...harlemann.html


That's an interesting piece, but the details don't support the analogy.  It plays quite fast and loose with what Christianity actually is and what Communism is.  If you want to compare communism to a "religion"/"transcendental philosophy of spirituality", the most reasonable comparable object I know of is Buddhism.

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> It's not an indictment of religion; it's an indictment of statism, as demonstrated by the Soviets.
> Statism claims it has _moral_ justification for violence.  Historically, morality is codified by religion.  Organized religion is a broad system that creates a universal set of ethical standards, in many cases under the "auspices" of the oligarchy.  This code generally permitted the priests, or local rulers, or judges to "morally" burn alive, stone, decapitate, or whatever, whomever violates the code.
> The Age of Enlightenment ushered in a more-man-less-god-centered age, where the new morality became focused on "the common good"...collectivism.  So instead of saying, "Allah weeps when a man porks a man", we got statements like "The Motherland weeps when a man porks a man".


I'll +rep to that.

----------


## Ronin Truth

> That's an interesting piece, but the details don't support the analogy. It plays quite fast and loose with what Christianity actually is and what Communism is. If you want to compare communism to a "religion"/"transcendental philosophy of spirituality", the most reasonable comparable object I know of is Buddhism.


 Actually the quote is more sociological than theological. More about human institutions than deities. I just like the quote and I don't remember who said it.

----------


## Ronin Truth

> Private militaries with fewer small arms, less labor, and more capital (ships, plans, tanks, ect...) would be much better.


Just gotta make do, with what we've got. Maybe raid some armories and/or other military installations.

----------


## kcchiefs6465

> Anarchists are a lot like liberals, in that they discount flawed human nature.


"Human nature" (this is in quotations because human nature is such an ambiguous term. _Whose_ 'human nature'?) is opposed to "limited government" (a contradiction of terms, there is right, and there is wrong. And if society wishes to attain a level of achievement "the Gods" would be proud of, they'd go with right) as well. What does it prove? Furthermore, if modern day "liberals" are discounting flawed human nature, conservatives are much more so. Why? because in this sphere of ideas, progressivism/collectivism/socialism is certainly the fad. Hell, even the conservatives want to emulate them. A society based on plunder, Bastiat rightly predicted, would fall prey to its own game. So now unless CSPAN gives me an 'R' or 'D' by their name, I cannot tell which is which. _There's_ human nature for you. Work is tiresome. People want free $#@!. Most are uneducated, and wouldn't pick up a book if you paid them to. What can you do? Rather, what should you do? Aim for half-assed ideals of general freedom, some robbery, but only inasmuch as the elected few of Washington promote? Or say on principle, theft is theft is theft is theft? To hell with their monopolies; unprincipled, thuggish schemes and scams. "General welfare"!? What does that even mean, legally? Surely no two will agree. Where are the courts to ensure Justice? Oh, they were appointed life tenures by the executive and legislative?.... on petty partisan politicks? Give me a break.




> Sixth. It is not improbable that many or most of the worst of governments --- although established by force, and by a few, in the first place --- come, in time, to be supported by a majority. But if they do, this majority is composed, in large part, of the most ignorant, superstitious, timid, dependent, servile, and corrupt portions of the people; of those who have been over-awed by the power, intelligence, wealth, and arrogance; of those who have been deceived by the frauds; and of those who have been corrupted by the inducements, of the few who really constitute the government. Such majorities, very likely, could be found in half, perhaps nine-tenths, of all the countries on the globe. What do they prove? Nothing but the tyranny and corruption of the very governments that have reduced so large portions of the people to their present ignorance, servility, degradation, and corruption; an ignorance, servility, degradation, and corruption that are best illustrated in the simple fact that they do sustain governments that have so oppressed, degraded, and corrupted them. They do nothing towards proving that the governments themselves are legitimate; or that they ought to be sustained, or even endured, by those who understand their true character. The mere fact, therefore, that a government chances to be sustained by a majority, of itself proves nothing that is necessary to be proved, in order to know whether such government should be sustained, or not.

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> "Human nature" (this is in quotations because human nature is such an ambiguous term. _Whose_ 'human nature'?) is opposed to "limited government" (a contradiction of terms, there is right, and there is wrong. And if society wishes to attain a level of achievement "the Gods" would be proud of, they'd go with right) as well. What does it prove? Furthermore, if modern day "liberals" are discounting flawed human nature, conservatives are much more so. Why? because in this sphere of ideas, progressivism/collectivism/socialism is certainly the fad. Hell, even the conservatives want to emulate them. A society based on plunder, Bastiat rightly predicted, would fall prey to its own game. So now unless CSPAN gives me an 'R' or 'D' by their name, I cannot tell which is which. _There's_ human nature for you. Work is tiresome. People want free $#@!. Most are uneducated, and wouldn't pick up a book if you paid them to. What can you do? Rather, what should you do? Aim for half-assed ideals of general freedom, some robbery, but only inasmuch as the elected few of Washington promote? Or say on principle, theft is theft is theft is theft? To hell with their monopolies; unprincipled, thuggish schemes and scams. *"General welfare"!? What does that even mean, legally? Surely no two will agree. Where are the courts to ensure Justice? Oh, they were appointed life tenures by the executive and legislative?.... on petty partisan politicks? Give me a break.*


Indeed!  This is one reason why Constitutionalists need a coherent legal theory, as we were discussing the other day.

+rep for you, comrade. ~hugs~

----------


## William Tell

> Indeed!  This is one reason why Constitutionalists need a coherent legal theory, as we were discussing the other day.
> 
> +rep for you, comrade. ~hugs~


Speaking for myself, I am a Constitutionalist because following the Constitution is the best immediate step for those in Government to take. Anarchy is not happening anytime soon, I am not standing in its way, others are. But anarchy is not a lasting thing, it is a theory discussed in smoking rooms and the farthest reaches of the internet. Ron Paul accomplished more for the cause of liberty running for President than all the anarchists in Porcfest could even dream of.

----------


## kcchiefs6465

> Speaking for myself, I am a Constitutionalist because following the Constitution is the best immediate step for those in Government to take. Anarchy is not happening anytime soon, I am not standing in its way, others are. But anarchy is not a lasting thing, it is a theory discussed in smoking rooms and the farthest reaches of the internet. Ron Paul accomplished more for the cause of liberty running for President than all the anarchists in Porcfest could even dream of.


And even then, "we" are still .05 of the population.

So, "human nature" wins, I suppose. 

Considering your recent delve into comedy in saying that George H.W. Bush would be recorded as a good president, though he may because history will be written by people sympathetic to him and this system, (but that wasn't your point), I'd also recommend that you recheck what Constitutionalism entails.

----------


## William Tell

> Considering your recent delve into comedy in saying that George H.W. Bush would be recorded as a good president, though he may because history will be written by people sympathetic to him and this system, (but that wasn't your point), I'd also recommend that you recheck what Constitutionalism entails.


I never said that, I never even saw that post. Link it if you like, but it was not me I assure you. GHWB is a piece of garbage.

----------


## kcchiefs6465

> I never said that, I never even saw that post. Link it if you like, but it was not me I assure you. GHWB is a piece of garbage.


I do apologize. I can edit the post if you wish, or link this to it.

I should have known.




> History will show the elder Bush to be a good President.

----------


## William Tell

> I do apologize. I can edit the post if you wish, or link this to it.
> 
> I should have known.


It's cool Figured it was him, just because he is the other William username here. I'm not even a William, but I think the Swiss Apple hunter was cool!

----------


## Cutlerzzz

> Just gotta make do, with what we've got. Maybe raid some armories and/or other military installations.


What I'm saying is that competing privately owned armies would be the best and most economical way for an Anarchist society to defend itself from government, with insurgency as a backup option incase private companies fail.

----------


## Cutlerzzz

I'm on my phone and can't see the entire thread, but I believe I saw some people asking why Ireland/Iceland came to an end after 100s of years.

How many libertarian, constitutionalist, or minarchist societies lasted that long?

----------


## danda

> Wow, I get to respond first?
> Great, I'll say the same thing I always do in these threads:  *Go study the documented historical examples where it actually happened before making absolute statements about it being impossible.*


I'd like to.   links?

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## Christian Liberty

> Speaking for myself, I am a Constitutionalist because following the Constitution is the best immediate step for those in Government to take. Anarchy is not happening anytime soon, I am not standing in its way, others are. But anarchy is not a lasting thing, it is a theory discussed in smoking rooms and the farthest reaches of the internet. Ron Paul accomplished more for the cause of liberty running for President than all the anarchists in Porcfest could even dream of.


Do you agree with the principles though?  Maybe taxation cant 100 percent eliminated, but do you agree that it's wrong  and that the closer to zero the better?  Or is there some degree of taxation that you want and accept?  Do you agree that the statist legal monopoly is immoral, even if unavoidable?  What  is your ultimate goal?

im not against all political efforts, as long as they move us closer to a stateless society, even if the guy in question is a minarchist o r constituionalist

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> I'm on my phone and can't see the entire thread, but I believe I saw some people asking why Ireland/Iceland came to an end after 100s of years.
> 
> How many libertarian, constitutionalist, or minarchist societies lasted that long?


+rep for an excellent point!

----------


## Christian Liberty

> You know, I find this whole debate rather amusing because the question is rarely ever defined.  If the question is, "Is anarchy ideal?", then I think everyone is an anarchist.  I don't think you could find a single person that doesn't think it would be great if we could all live peaceably without government.  If the question is, "Is anarchy possible?" then I believe anyone who's being honest with themselves knows that it's not possible to have a society without a state.  The question, "Do we need government?"  is completely moot because we can't get rid of it.  No sane person would argue that government is an ideal.  At best, it's a necessary evil.  Even the most hardcore statists operate under the assumption that more government is not necessarily a good thing, but it is necessary.  Whether or not this is true, anarchy is simply a willingness to outwardly express that you believe the absence of government is an ideal condition, but it makes no claims as to the viability of achieving that.


Really I think only minarchists feel this way.  Most want to use the state to control others



> It really is, I see anarchists bash voting and such things all the time. But never give solutions, it's all complaining and whining all the time. Don't get me wrong, I would shed no tears if the Gov disappeared tomorrow, but anarchists for the most part are not working towards that in any practicable way.


not all anarchists say voting is wrong.  Just because you prefer overseer soft over mr harsh doesn't mean supporting slavery.




> Abolitionists complained about slavery without ever providing a solution to the cotton picking problem


That.



> Agreed.  I also like to see an anarchistic society field a fighting force strong enough to fend off organized outside forces.  No leaders and rulers right?  Let's see how that affects military tactics on the battlefield.  Could they even muster a fighting force?  I have my doubts, but for sake of argument say they could.  What happens when person A wants person B to perform a flanking maneuver on the enemy and that person(s) refuse?  Roman armies conquered numerous peoples because they lacked cohesion and discipline on the battlefield.  Do anarchists even bother to read history?

----------


## William Tell

> Do you agree with the principles though


I would shed no tears if the Government totally went away.




> Maybe taxation cant 100 percent eliminated, but do you agree that it's wrong  and that the closer to zero the better?


I agree that taxation is negative, a curse if you will. God warned his people about it through the prophet Samuel. Zero is my favorite percentage of Taxation as well.






> Or is there some degree of taxation that you want and accept?


I don't want any taxation, but I think our elected officials following the Constitution would be a great thing. Perhaps things would become even better after that happens. Supply and demand, demand liberty!




> Do you agree that the statist legal monopoly is immoral, even if unavoidable?


Hmmmm.... Depends what you mean by that. I think the wronged have a right to justice, whether they are wronged by common criminals, this justice system or any other entity. I think murderers etc should not be tolerated, however, I have no problem with anyone escaping so called justice if they truly repent. So my views do not fit into a typical legal mindset. Restitution should be required, but some crimes can not be repaid with money. I do not know what is the best solution in such cases from a perspective of worldly justice. I support Justice and second chances. I guess I am to theological on it...




> What  is your ultimate goal?


I think the best thing would be a moral society where most of this is irrelevant.




> im not against all political efforts, as long as they move us closer to a stateless society, even if the guy in question is a minarchist o r constituionalist


Good, because the anarchists are not making progress outside of the internet right now.

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## William Tell

> not all anarchists say voting is wrong.  Just because you prefer overseer soft over mr harsh doesn't mean supporting slavery.


I know some of those guys, and get along with them just fine. I view voting as another arena to fight for liberty. The main one in my view at this point, beyond the minds of the people that is.

----------


## Christian Liberty

> I know some of those guys, and get along with them just fine. I view voting as another arena to fight for liberty. The main one in my view at this point, beyond the minds of the people that is.


I'll answer the rest when I'm not on a iPod that s hard to use.  But I guess I'm slightly different from you in that I see voting as the secondary method and educational efforts as primary.  I also think voting for Cruz/Le e types is a tactical error, the will stab us in th back,

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> Missing the point, so you may say anarchism works, GREAT! Now how are you trying to implement it?


I'm not trying to implement anything.  I just want people to leave each other the $#@! alone and engage others peacefully, rationally, and voluntarily.  This is, unfortunately, a major challenge for most people.   I have no dog in the minarchist/anarchist duel-I just prefer the latter if the choice is limited so narrowly.

----------


## William Tell

> I'll answer the rest when I'm not on a iPod that s hard to use.  But I guess I'm slightly different from you in that I see voting as the secondary method and educational efforts as primary.


I did say education is the main thing, uneducated people are a harder sell from a political perspective. And if the current system collapses, we need an informed public to stay away from the rising tyrants.




> I also think voting for Cruz/Le e types is a tactical error, the will stab us in th back,


I think Lee is fine, he's not perfect obviously, but I think you are wrong if you think we would be better off without him in the Senate. I don't trust Cruz for a number of reasons, but he is an odd one, I support people who are sort of his type. I think if he and Rand had been running for the same Senate seat they would have sounded about the same. So it's really a smell test thing. I live in Texas and did not vote for Cruz, I voted for other candidates in the Primaries and Runoffs. But overall I am glad Dewhurst lost.

----------


## William Tell

> I'm not trying to implement anything.  I just want people to leave each other the $#@! alone and engage others peacefully, rationally, and voluntarily.  This is, unfortunately, a major challenge for most people.   I have no dog in the minarchist/anarchist duel-I just prefer the latter if the choice is limited so narrowly.


Gotcha' but we are in serious dog dung right now, I wanna get as far out of it as possible right now. The short term is my issue, I wanna be left alone too.

----------


## Christian Liberty

> I did say education is the main thing, uneducated people are a harder sell from a political perspective. And if the current system collapses, we need an informed public to stay away from the rising tyrants.
> 
> 
> 
> I think Lee is fine, he's not perfect obviously, but I think you are wrong if you think we would be better off without him in the Senate. I don't trust Cruz for a number of reasons, but he is an odd one, I support people who are sort of his type. I think if he and Rand had been running for the same Senate seat they would have sounded about the same. So it's really a smell test thing. I live in Texas and did not vote for Cruz, I voted for other candidates in the Primaries and Runoffs. But overall I am glad Dewhurst lost.


I'm not saying better, but I don't tink people like him are different enoughg for it to mater.  Frankly, even Rand is probably closer in absolute terms to the status quo than to. He ideal.  Politics only really works if the candidates object to the status quo on principle, a nd mos t of today's so called liberty candidates just 
dont.

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> Gotcha' but we are in serious dog dung right now, I wanna get as far out of it as possible right now. The short term is my issue, I wanna be left alone too.


Fair enough.  As long as you can distinguish short term necessities and long term goals like that, you'll fare well and we'll get along quite well.  ~hugs~

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## Madison320

> I'm having a very hard time picturing some invading force occupying the (used to be) USA.  300,000,000 privately owned firearms in guerrilla hands could make for a very expensive and bloody occupation.


The invading force can just drop a few bombs.

----------


## Madison320

> What I'm saying is that competing privately owned armies would be the best and most economical way for an Anarchist society to defend itself from government, with insurgency as a backup option incase private companies fail.


Who's going to pay for the army? Are you going to have a vote? Who's going to hold the election? Who's going to certify the vote? Who's going to decide which army to hire? What happens if the army you hire starts raiding people's stuff? Don't you see that as soon as a you decide to do any of these things you have a GOVERNMENT?

You're making the mistake of applying free market principles to force. Force doesn't work that way. You can't shop for an army like you shop for a car. You can freely pick your car. You can't freely pick the army, the army picks you.

----------


## Pericles

> Who's going to pay for the army? Are you going to have a vote? Who's going to hold the election? Who's going to certify the vote? Who's going to decide which army to hire? What happens if the army you hire starts raiding people's stuff? Don't you see that as soon as a you decide to do any of these things you have a GOVERNMENT?
> 
> You're making the mistake of applying free market principles to force. Force doesn't work that way. You can't shop for an army like you shop for a car. You can freely pick your car. You can't freely pick the army, the army picks you.


If mercenaries are any good at what they do, they have already figured out that there is no point in working for peanuts in pay when they can have everything.

----------


## William Tell

> If mercenaries are any good at what they do, they have already figured out that there is not point in working for peanuts in pay when they can have everything.


Yep, anarchy is just the transition phase before military dictatorship is established, traditionally.

----------


## Madison320

> Yep, anarchy is just the transition phase before military dictatorship is established, traditionally.


That's why I think it's far more realistic to try to figure out a way to keep government in check, vs trying to establish an anarchy. The former is extremely difficult but the latter is impossible.

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## Ronin Truth

> The invading force can just drop a few bombs.


  I'm talking after that.  Occupation not decimation.

----------


## Madison320

> I'm talking after that.  Occupation not decimation.


Yeah, it would be difficult to occupy the US even without an army. But it would suck BADLY to be living here trying to fend off an invading army. I'd rather pay a little to have an army and not have to worry about my house getting bombed or raided.

----------


## Ronin Truth

> Yeah, it would be difficult to occupy the US even without an army. But it would suck BADLY to be living here trying to fend off an invading army. I'd rather pay a little to have an army and not have to worry about my house getting bombed or raided.


 Often the invading army just comes in and takes over the existing government infrastructure, functions and resources and VIOLA, bigger army.

----------


## erowe1

> Yep, anarchy is just the transition phase before military dictatorship is established, traditionally.


Source?

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## ProIndividual

> Anyway the reason I said anarchism is more of a complaint is because I think "no government" is basically an impossible condition.


Then how did we have law, roads, trade, charity, defense, etc. for at least 8,000 years before the state came into existence? Having "no govt" is equivalent to the following: "having no legalized criminal organization of murderers and extortionists who yet outlaw all competitors while extolling their own need and virtue", and alternatively "crime is illegal for everyone, not just everyone except the parasitical political priest caste".

The state is not society. It did not invent society or civilized behavior. Statelessness predates the state by thousands of years, it lasted longer on average (despite nonsense, ahistorical claims it was incapable of law or defense), and it didn't legalize crime for a minority group called "politicians" and their thug enforcers. The state is not only unethical...which is inarguable using any logic whatsoever...but it is also an unnecessary evil.

As Benjamin Tucker once said *"The State is said by some to be a necessary evil; it must be made unnecessary."*

How much time and money have you, or the state, spent on trying to make the state's necessity unnecessary? As technology, anthropological knowledge, and human intelligence has increased over the last 200,000 years of our anatomically modern existence, how much time and resources have been dedicated to this task? How is that the govt is claimed to be MORE necessary than ever, yet common sense would stipulate the changes over the last 200,000 years would make the markets MORE capable and govt LESS necessary to perform these tasks for society?

How is govt NOT antisocial? Antisocial behavior is generally understood to be behavior which violates the right of others repeatedly, is parasitic, and is directly and measurably harmful, defrauding, and endangers imminently. How is that not exactly what the state does?

And the word "govt" started off as a VERB, not a noun. "No govt" is statelessness if used as a noun (as you used it)...but as a verb (the original use) it is indeed impossible to have "no govt"...as you need to govern yourself in order not to violate the autonomy (or rights) of others (an act which is illegal in stateless societies). It matters how you use the word.

Anarchists aren't against you governing yourself, or you governing those incapable of consent (if you have kids, or a severely mentally disturbed or handicapped adult family member, etc.). We aren't even against you governing those who create victims (self defense, for example). We are against you coercively monopolizing governance, or cartelizing it, or turning certain markets into a monopsony, in order to threaten possible competitors in the markets of defense and nonviolent dispute resolution services (law) from better serving consumers with lower prices than the state provides, better quality service than the state gives, or with more accountability to the consumers that the state can't provide. We also are against you threatening consumers with the same rape cages and property seizure the state threatens competitors with to keep them away from consumers...in other words, we're against ALL taxes (extortion legalized), as that is forcing consumers to buy your product/services on the threat of violent reprisal (same as when you try to compete against the state). 

Which markets do you think cease to exist when they aren't coercively cartelized, monopolized, or turned into monopsony? Which of these markets do you think DO NOT run on consumer demand purely (in the absence of the state), but instead exist only because coercion can make them exist? Why is it you think people don't demand defense and nonviolent dispute resolution on the markets? If they don't demand them on the market, why would the state feel it politically necessary to provide them? Why do they use them ("law and order" and "heroes" and "defense") as memes to sell other things they do if they aren't market demanded by the people at large?

What other markets require legalized organized crime (cartel, monopoly, monopsony) to run, and do not simply require market demand to create incentive for market supply?

*The state is more of a complaint than a solution*. It says "we can't have things the way we want, because of that damn Free Will thing,  so we'll use coercion to get it, even if it sucks worse than the alternative - which we'll brainwash kids to believe is an untenable solution". Want wars you can't convince soldiers to fight of their own Free Will, and can't convince citizens are justified enough to fund? No problem...just form a state monopsony on "defense" (which usually is actually offensive, not defensive, more times than not). Don't have the ability to persuade people not to do things you deem objectionable (but are not victimizing non-consenting people capable of consent)? No problem...coercively cartelize the legal market, and eventually monopolize it therefore, and you can make them do as you say.

Just pretend the individuals cease to exist when the word "society" and "civilization" are used to describe masses of individuals....then you can claim someone or some group "harm society" without proving it by pointing out individuals who were actually victimized, and then you can also claim to do things for the "good of society" while trampling the rights of, and being a parasite on, individuals within that collective label. *Then you can use Orwellian doublespeak and doublethink, and the cognitive dissonance necessary to fuel them, to claim antisocial behavior like the state is necessary to protect and preserve society.* Nothing, of course, could be more absurd.

----------


## ProIndividual

> The invading force can just drop a few bombs.


Do nukes magically get un-invented in a stateless society? Because otherwise, they can't bomb us...in terms of game theory mathematics, we are unexploitable (meaning, in math, there is no way to harm us without committing suicide).

If private companies maintained the nukes, we still have them. They still can't invade because of high gun ownership, and they still can't bomb us either. In fact, we might actually spend money on what the consumers ACTUALLY want on the market; DEFENSE (not empire called "defense"). And before you bring up terrorism...the state exists and that threat is only larger because of their empire overseas...plus, they might be able to stop more of it if not concerned with surveilling all of us without probable cause. To do so on the market, without govt there to incentivize it through law and funding, would bankrupt private security companies. They would only pursue those who they could reap a profit (or please donors, if non-profit) from going after...hence, probable cause would be the norm, not the rule no one follows. It is only through the coercive socialized funding that the state can so skew incentives of the market to do such things against us (the market demand - the consumers).

----------


## ProIndividual

> Yeah, it would be difficult to occupy the US even without an army. But it would suck BADLY to be living here trying to fend off an invading army. I'd rather pay a little to have an army and not have to worry about my house getting bombed or raided.


We didn't have a standing army until the end of the 19th century/beginning of the 20th century. In the no-standing-army period, we never lost a war. It wasn't until the inefficient standing army (in terms of economics, it's highly inefficient) that we began to lose wars (and impose empire on a mass scale, worldwide). Stateless societies had "militia" systems, based not on geographic arbitrary nonsense, but on consumer preferences with no regard to geography (other than the logistical necessities of defense). Defense sureties (kind of like legal and defense insurance companies) insured their customers against invasion and crime...it cost them when they failed (they had to pay out claims). So, they would coordinate with competing companies in the market because it was in their mutual best interest (as keeping their consumers safe was the entire business model). States, on the other hand, took hundreds of years to cooperate in such a way (the state destroyed all market incentives for competing jurisdictions to work together toward a common goal of defense of the populace). Hence, you used to be able to escape justice by simply crossing arbitrary government borders (State lines) within the USA.

The idea you need a state to have a militia system, and to then call up a trained and coordinated army based on the temporary consolidation of those competing companies, is unfounded. It's common nonsense they teach in school, and it is intuitive...but it lacks deductive logic and historical/anthropological evidence. The only thing more ridiculous is claiming you need a standing army for DEFENSE (not empire). Here's the best quote about standing armies:




> Elbridge Thomas Gerry (pronounced /ˈɡɛri/) (July 17, 1744 – November 23, 1814) was an American statesman and diplomat, and Vice President of the United States of America, serving under James Madison:
> 
> *"A standing army is like a standing member. It's an excellent assurance of domestic tranquility, but a dangerous temptation to foreign adventure."*


It assures domestic tranquility through threats of violence against the people...it essentially uses fear over good people with justified beefs against the state to keep things quiet and tranquil (mostly for the rulers - '$#@! those ghetto trash', usually). Militias don't do that, or at least do so to a lesser extent. Also, stateless "militias" are in need of consumers to fund them of their own free wills, and if they $#@! up too bad, they go bankrupt and can't do $#@!.

----------


## ProIndividual

> If mercenaries are any good at what they do, they have already figured out that there is no point in working for peanuts in pay when they can have everything.


And the only way they can refuse to labor honestly for money, and instead can take over everything through coercion, is the tacit consent of the victims (those who see the government as necessary, or even worse, as good). If everyone saw it as anarchists see it (the truth), then they'd say all states are self-legalized criminal organizations, and they would revolt against the mere attempt to form one. 

It must be socially accepted for slavery to exist in any form...because if it is deemed a crime to hold a slave, catch a slave, and buy or sell a slave, then slaves can just walk out of bondage (like they did in Brazil when they illegalized catching slaves and returning them to masters). The fact citizenship is a softer form of slavery (see your forced labor via taxation if you don't see the slavery you exist in) doesn't change this point. 40-100 million people with guns (the number of gun owners in the USA) vs the military (the half that attempts to murder us over nationalist bull$#@!) in a Civil War is a long, drawn-out, guaranteed win for the people, not the military. It takes the consent of the masses of citizen-slaves to erect and maintain the red, white, and blue rapist cock of statism in the USA, or anywhere else. Some complain while being ass-$#@!ed, and some wave a flag and cheer on their own rape, and the rape of others. Field slaves and house slaves...the psychology of slavery is unchanged.

And most states didn't form out of statelessness via a runaway conquering mercenary private defense company. They formed via economic mistakes that incrementally became cartels, and eventually monopolies and monopsony. For example, the Allthing in Iceland fell apart into blood feuds because it artificially capped the number of competing sureties available to the consumers (forming a cartel over the legal insurance market). This of course led to higher prices for defense, lower quality service, and less accountability to consumers. Eventually they monopolized fully, and the state was completely formed. Had they never gave tacit consent as victims, the state never forms there most likely...it likely stays an open and free competitive market for law and defense (which worked awesomely until cartelized). Most stateless societies did this same mistake...they thought cartel, monopoly, and monopsony might offer "respite from the ills of competition". It turns out there were no ills of competition, except free choice and a preponderance of choice that required the consumer to inform themselves. 

If you understand how coercive state socialism harms food markets, housing markets, etc., then simply apply the same effects and logic to every market, including law and defense. You'll find the state's horrid results completely predictable and unavoidable.

The state is a cancer...a dead hand on society. It cannot be more efficient than private markets, it cannot produce lower prices (including coerced subsidy), it cannot produce better quality service, and it cannot provide more accountability to consumers than the market can. It is logically impossible. The only way to claim any of that is untrue is to compare apples to oranges, or to have nothing to compare the state to (which is what they want, hence their threats of rape cages and property seizure against consumers to make them pay them against their will, and to make potential competition stay completely out of the markets they have taken over).

----------


## A Son of Liberty

> Anarchists are a lot like liberals, in that they discount flawed human nature.

----------


## Ronin Truth

> Let's assume you're right, since none of this is actually recorded and you can pretty much make up $#@! to support your theory. 
> 
> Given that, did it cross your mind that maybe anarchy is only possible under the conditions that supposedly allowed it back then? It's one thing when humans are just starting out. Do we really want to return to those conditions just to achieve a state of anarchy? That would basically mean the end of civilization and probably a lot of mass death.


*The Nature of Man and His Government (pdf)*

----------


## ProIndividual

> Anarchists are a lot like liberals, in that they discount flawed human nature.


Not only is it obtuse, it is not at all true:

"...There are some troubles from which mankind can never escape .... [The anarchists] have never claimed that liberty will bring perfection; they simply say that its results are vastly preferable to those that follow from authority .... As a choice of blessings, liberty is the greater; as a choice of evils, liberty is the smaller. Then liberty always says the Anarchist. No use of force except against the invader...." --- Benjamin R. Tucker

This argument by statists boils down to circular argumentation (and informal logical fallacy)..."people are bad, so we need govt, made up of people....who are bad, so we need govt"....ad nauseam.

If people are so bad, and their nature so bad, as to disqualify them from individually self-governing, then how can you trust some of them to govern others? Especially when we KNOW beyond a doubt that most of the people chosen to lead are in fact the WORST of us, not the best? 

These statists suffer from the fantasy that the people who will get elected are the best among us, and that they aren't disproportionately (to the general population) sociopathic monsters. They fail to realize that the coercive monopoly over legalized unjustified violence (the state) is easily abused, and therefore draws sociopaths like flies to $#@!. What better job for a sociopath than a politician, a cop, a soldier, a corporate crony capitalist scumbag, a surgeon with life and death in his hands with little personal repercussion, etc.? This is why sociopaths choose jobs disproportionately that are in law, govt, crony business, medicine, etc. The least harmful being the latter one, of course. How ironic that the least harmful one on the list is the job where life is literally right in their hands.

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> Not only is it obtuse, it is not at all true:
> 
> "...There are some troubles from which mankind can never escape .... [The anarchists] have never claimed that liberty will bring perfection; they simply say that its results are vastly preferable to those that follow from authority .... As a choice of blessings, liberty is the greater; as a choice of evils, liberty is the smaller. Then liberty always says the Anarchist. No use of force except against the invader...." --- Benjamin R. Tucker
> 
> This argument by statists boils down to circular argumentation (and informal logical fallacy)..."people are bad, so we need govt, made up of people....who are bad, so we need govt"....ad nauseam.
> *
> If people are so bad, and their nature so bad, as to disqualify them from individually self-governing, then how can you trust some of them to govern others? Especially when we KNOW beyond a doubt that most of the people chosen to lead are in fact the WORST of us, not the best? 
> 
> These statists suffer from the fantasy that the people who will get elected are the best among us, and that they aren't disproportionately (to the general population) sociopathic monsters. They fail to realize that the coercive monopoly over violence is easily abused, and therefore draws sociopaths like flies to $#@!. What better job for a sociopath than a politician, a cop, a soldier, a corporate crony capitalist scumbag, a surgeon with life and death in his hands with little personal repercussion, etc.? This is why sociopaths choose jobs disproportionately that are in law, govt, crony business, medicine, etc. The least harmful being the latter one, of course. How ironic that the least harmful one on the list is the job where life is literally right in their hands*.


Why the Worst Get On Top:
http://www.savageleft.com/poli/rts-ten.html
F.A. Hayek was right on this one.  Link^^ is excerpted from Road To Serfdom.

----------


## Ronin Truth

> Why the Worst Get On Top:
> http://www.savageleft.com/poli/rts-ten.html
> F.A. Hayek was right on this one. Link^^ is excerpted from Road To Serfdom.


The cream rises to the top.  But then again, so does the scum.

----------


## danda

Let's say I'm still on the fence with regards to pure anarchism, voluntaryism, etc.   Sounds good in theory, but i have yet to hear anyone explain how a pure anarchist society prevents the most ambitious brutes from raising an army and seizing power.

In other words, we could have an amazing document that defines our social contract in terms of non-aggression, restitution, freedom, golden rule, etc, etc.  Call it our "constitution".  Maybe it doesn't even contain "laws"... just some agreed upon root principles and dispute resolution suggestions.  The shorter and sweeter the better.

So let's take that as a starting point.  Somehow we have a society that has obtained their independence and come up with this agreement between themselves.

And for the most part is living in peace and harmony.  Perhaps even becoming productive, wealthy, and technologically advanced.

Still, if you think of some of the lowlifes, thugs, bullies, sociopaths you have met in life, I'm sure you can picture some people that would simply view such a situation as a power vacuum and a big opportunity.   They would engage in immoral activities ( involving force, coercion, fraud ) and begin stockpiling weapons and amassing a gang which eventually becomes an army.   Probably there are rivalv gangs and armies for a while.  Until eventually one wins out and declares themselves ruler.

So can anyone explain to me in simple concrete terms exactly how such a thing can be prevented?   What institutions (if any) are necessary and how are they funded and organized without taxation?   Maybe it is crowdsourced like kickstarter?    I can think of some ideas, but I just want to know what the real anarchists (who have supposedly thought about this stuff a lot) propose.

Given that this scenario (thug comes to power) seems to be the primary practical argument against an anarchistic paradise, I would hope that there are some well thought out "standard" answers.   Hoping someone can enlighten me, and any others reading this thread.

thanks.

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> Let's say I'm still on the fence with regards to pure anarchism, voluntaryism, etc.   *Sounds good in theory, but i have yet to hear anyone explain how a pure anarchist society prevents the most ambitious brutes from raising an army and seizing power.
> *
> In other words, we could have an amazing document that defines our social contract in terms of non-aggression, restitution, freedom, golden rule, etc, etc.  Call it our "constitution".  Maybe it doesn't even contain "laws"... just some agreed upon root principles and dispute resolution suggestions.  The shorter and sweeter the better.
> 
> So let's take that as a starting point.  Somehow we have a society that has obtained their independence and come up with this agreement between themselves.
> 
> And for the most part is living in peace and harmony.  Perhaps even becoming productive, wealthy, and technologically advanced.
> 
> Still, if you think of some of the lowlifes, thugs, bullies, sociopaths you have met in life, I'm sure you can picture some people that would simply view such a situation as a power vacuum and a big opportunity.   They would engage in immoral activities ( involving force, coercion, fraud ) and begin stockpiling weapons and amassing a gang which eventually becomes an army.   Probably there are rivalv gangs and armies for a while.  Until eventually one wins out and declares themselves ruler.
> ...


How much have you researched?  The body of anarchist literature on this is HUGE.

----------


## Ronin Truth

Come to think of it, don't most solutions just start out as complaints?

----------


## willwash

> Yes, really.  I've challenged this very forum to come up with a coherent legal theory-crickets.  Constitutional legal theory comes down to the opinions of a bunch of dead guys, the Federalist Papers, and SCOTUS.  
> (just so there's no confusion, this article goes into detail about what I mean when I talk about legal theory/theory of law: http://ivr-enc.info/index.php?title=...s_and_Purposes)
> 
> I've NEVER described myself as a monarchist.  I have argued-and maintain-that monarchy is superior to any republican or democratic system, assuming the goal is maximum liberty and peace/prosperity.  We have a few threads around here on this already if you want to rehash that.  The overwhelming evidence proves this to be true.


As long as I get to be the King, then yes.  If anyone else gets to be King, then no.  And that goes for everyone else here too.

Though to be honest, anarchy really amounts to a million little monarchies, each individual is King/Queen of their own domain.  That's kind of what America was built on, hence phrases like "My house, my castle", "In this house I'm the King", etc.

But I don't think that's where you were going with that.  I think you were implying that I should submit to the authority of a monarch who through divine right, genetic superiority, dumb luck, or brute force came to be my master.

----------


## willwash

> The state is a cancer...a dead hand on society. It cannot be more efficient than private markets, it cannot produce lower prices (including coerced subsidy), it cannot produce better quality service, and it cannot provide more accountability to consumers than the market can. It is logically impossible. The only way to claim any of that is untrue is to compare apples to oranges, or to have nothing to compare the state to (which is what they want, hence their threats of rape cages and property seizure against consumers to make them pay them against their will, and to make potential competition stay completely out of the markets they have taken over).


What you say is correct, but you still haven't answered the question of who stops a funded, organized, and armed group with the specific intent of seizing power over a geographic area and establishing themselves as rulers of a tyrannical state.  The only thing that can stop one such group is another such group.  This begs the question, where do the funding, organization, and arming for either group come from?

The fact that the free market is superior to the state in providing a higher standard of living and is better and more efficient at producing goods and services does not answer the question.  The overall, average standard of living will be higher in a stateless society, true...but the standard of living for a select group that could take over and become rulers is even higher.  Even in the most corrupt African dictatorships there is a tiny ruling class which enjoys fabulous wealth as a result of their status, and they could care less if more overall prosperity would come to their nations from the elimination of the state apparatus, because it would still be worse for _them_.  So in a stateless society there is an incentive for groups to try to take over by force.  That force must be met with equal or greater force--so please, where does that equal or greater force come from?

Here's the scenario: I'm not talking about some tribal band of nomads living out in the middle of $#@!ty mountainous terrain that no one wants with no natural resources.  I'm talking about real people living in real cities and communities.  Hitler and his Brownshirts are marching down the streets pillaging those who stand in their way and declaring themselves masters of the world.  Submit to their rule or die.  You and your crappy little AR-15 for home defense aren't going to stop him.  Your neighbor's crappy little semiautomatic pistol, while great against a lone robber or two, fares no better against an army of thugs.  Your precious "private security firm" is hopelessly outgunned and is dealing with its other ten million customers facing the same situation anyway.  The only possible thing I could think of is some kind of "minute man" militia of you and a bunch of other guys pooling up their home defense weapons into an organized army to meet the threat.  But then who commands this army?  Who makes the strategic and tactical decisions about when, where and how to engage the enemy?  Decisions have to be made about where to concentrate one's forces, and this inherently means most areas are left undefended at any given time.  Sometimes, retreat is necessary for force preservation, which may mean your house falls to the enemy.  Do you stay with your army, or do you hemorrhage it by staying to defend your home?  Where does this army get its resources?  Maybe without an immediate infusion of resources, defeat is certain.  So do you go around plundering to acquire the resources necessary to achieve victory?  If you do this, haven't you become the very thing you are fighting against?

No one in this thread has given a succinct and concise answer to the OP's question, and I remain unconvinced that anarchy could ever work for the reasons s/he espouses.  AnCaps keep falling back on "well, the state isn't as efficient as the free market at providing goods and services."  Great.  Means nothing to the discussion at hand.

----------


## Carson

The criminals in the government and business globally have been milking anarchy to the bone in regards to illegal immigration. They refuse to follow the laws we have and are always demanding new rules that they aren't going to follow. 

The rest of the planet would just like to return to the rule of law.

----------


## otherone

> What you say is correct, but you still haven't answered the question of who stops a funded, organized, and armed group with the specific intent of seizing power over a geographic area and establishing themselves as rulers of a tyrannical state. _ The only thing that can stop one such group is another such group. _ This begs the question, where do the funding, organization, and arming for either group come from?


You are using "begging the question" incorrectly.  As to your point, have you been following the progress of "the Worlds' Greatest Superpower" in the Mideast the last 12 years?  You understand that without a central government, there can be no surrender?  No peaceful occupation?  
I think a better question would be, "How can anarchy account for the Stockholm Syndrome?"

I believe the real threat to an anarchist society comes from within.  **** Sapiens are herd animals with a seemingly congenital proclivity to prostrate themselves before a Higher Power.  In a world comprised of wolves, sheep, and shepherds, the vast majority choose to be sheep without realizing that their shepherds are actually wolves.

----------


## Madison320

> No one in this thread has given a succinct and concise answer to the OP's question, and I remain unconvinced that anarchy could ever work for the reasons s/he espouses.  AnCaps keep falling back on "well, the state isn't as efficient as the free market at providing goods and services."  Great.  Means nothing to the discussion at hand.


One thing I've noticed is that sometimes anarchists recognize the difference between forceful actions and voluntary ones. Most of them believe in natural law, that intiating force should be a crime and voluntary action should not. But when it comes to the free market, anarchists don't want to differentiate between forceful action and voluntary ones. They think there's no difference, that you can shop for a government like you can shop for food. The free market only functions in the absence of force.

----------


## Madison320

> Come to think of it, don't most solutions just start out as complaints?


Yes, but my point is that it would be a better use of time and energy to find a solution that is achievable. We need to figure out a way to control force, not try in vain to eliminate it.

----------


## Ronin Truth

> Yes, but my point is that it would be a better use of time and energy to find a solution that is achievable. We need to figure out a way to control force, not try in vain to eliminate it.


  Not everyone is a good problem solver, some folks are just really good complainers.  Elimination is a flavor of control.  I don't really care much for vain tries either.

*"Do, or do not, there is no try." -- Yoda

*

----------


## erowe1

> Yes, but my point is that it would be a better use of time and energy to find a solution that is achievable. We need to figure out a way to control force, not try in vain to eliminate it.


What do you mean by "solution"?

To me, "solution" implies something final, like reaching a perfect state that can't be improved. Anything short of that is just progress towards the solution.

Progress is good. But in order to make progress there has to be some sense of what the perfect is according to which progress can be measured.

----------


## danda

> How much have you researched?  The body of anarchist literature on this is HUGE.


Great!  Links?

----------


## danda

Well said willwash!  I agree that some type of militia might become necessary from time to time to serve as equal and opposite force.  I think the key is that it must be understood by all militia members that the militia is to be disbanded when the threat is gone.  no standing armies.

I think that this could work via a volunteer / crowdfunding model.   So individuals get together to form a militia, but membership is voluntary and funding is voluntary.  Thus, when funding and/or volunteers dry up, then the militia must necessarily end.  Also, the bigger and more obvious the threat, the easier it should be to find funding from peaceful honest folk.




> What you say is correct, but you still haven't answered the question of who stops a funded, organized, and armed group with the specific intent of seizing power over a geographic area and establishing themselves as rulers of a tyrannical state.  The only thing that can stop one such group is another such group.  This begs the question, where do the funding, organization, and arming for either group come from?
> 
> The fact that the free market is superior to the state in providing a higher standard of living and is better and more efficient at producing goods and services does not answer the question.  The overall, average standard of living will be higher in a stateless society, true...but the standard of living for a select group that could take over and become rulers is even higher.  Even in the most corrupt African dictatorships there is a tiny ruling class which enjoys fabulous wealth as a result of their status, and they could care less if more overall prosperity would come to their nations from the elimination of the state apparatus, because it would still be worse for _them_.  So in a stateless society there is an incentive for groups to try to take over by force.  That force must be met with equal or greater force--so please, where does that equal or greater force come from?
> 
> Here's the scenario: I'm not talking about some tribal band of nomads living out in the middle of $#@!ty mountainous terrain that no one wants with no natural resources.  I'm talking about real people living in real cities and communities.  Hitler and his Brownshirts are marching down the streets pillaging those who stand in their way and declaring themselves masters of the world.  Submit to their rule or die.  You and your crappy little AR-15 for home defense aren't going to stop him.  Your neighbor's crappy little semiautomatic pistol, while great against a lone robber or two, fares no better against an army of thugs.  Your precious "private security firm" is hopelessly outgunned and is dealing with its other ten million customers facing the same situation anyway.  The only possible thing I could think of is some kind of "minute man" militia of you and a bunch of other guys pooling up their home defense weapons into an organized army to meet the threat.  But then who commands this army?  Who makes the strategic and tactical decisions about when, where and how to engage the enemy?  Decisions have to be made about where to concentrate one's forces, and this inherently means most areas are left undefended at any given time.  Sometimes, retreat is necessary for force preservation, which may mean your house falls to the enemy.  Do you stay with your army, or do you hemorrhage it by staying to defend your home?  Where does this army get its resources?  Maybe without an immediate infusion of resources, defeat is certain.  So do you go around plundering to acquire the resources necessary to achieve victory?  If you do this, haven't you become the very thing you are fighting against?
> 
> No one in this thread has given a succinct and concise answer to the OP's question, and I remain unconvinced that anarchy could ever work for the reasons s/he espouses.  AnCaps keep falling back on "well, the state isn't as efficient as the free market at providing goods and services."  Great.  Means nothing to the discussion at hand.

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> As long as I get to be the King, then yes.  If anyone else gets to be King, then no.  And that goes for everyone else here too.
> 
> Though to be honest, anarchy really amounts to a million little monarchies, each individual is King/Queen of their own domain.  That's kind of what America was built on, hence phrases like "My house, my castle", "In this house I'm the King", etc.
> *
> But I don't think that's where you were going with that.  I think you were implying that I should submit to the authority of a monarch who through divine right, genetic superiority, dumb luck, or brute force came to be my master.*


Indeed!  Though the circumstances by which a monarch becomes one are usually arbitrary, they are no more so than minarchist power brokers-and the monarchists have ownership incentive not to destroy the territory.  Distinct from the various minarchists, who don't mind raping and destroying the territory they claim to govern because they don't have long term liability or ownership.  These people only care about the next election, not things of immediate, future, or transcendental importance.

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> Great!  Links?


Do your own homework.  You're the one who has to prove his claim.

----------


## Ronin Truth

> Great! Links?


Done right, this should keep you busy for a while.  

http://www.lewrockwell.com/

http://www.strike-the-root.com/

----------


## danda

> Do your own homework.  You're the one who has to prove his claim.


somebody woke up on the wrong side of bed?    which claim is that exactly?

----------


## danda

> Done right, this should keep you busy for a while.  
> 
> http://www.lewrockwell.com/
> 
> http://www.strike-the-root.com/



Thanks, but I'm not interested in keeping busy for a while, and I have read lewrockwell articles many times.  A pointer to either of those sites is like a pointer to a library, or to google.   gee, thanks.

or said more succinctly, the content of the two web pages you provided does not appear to directly address or answer the question posed by the OP, or as rephrased by willwash.

So please, somebody either rub a couple neurons together long enough to consider and answer the question yourself, or provide a link to an actual webpage ARTICLE that analyzes the topic at hand and discusses anarchist solutions.





> What you say is correct, but you still haven't answered the question of who stops a funded, organized, and armed group with the specific intent of seizing power over a geographic area and establishing themselves as rulers of a tyrannical state. The only thing that can stop one such group is another such group. This begs the question, where do the funding, organization, and arming for either group come from?

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> Thanks, but I'm not interested in keeping busy for a while, and I have read lewrockwell articles many times.  A pointer to either of those sites is like a pointer to a library, or to google.   gee, thanks.
> 
> or said more succinctly, the content of the two web pages you provided does not appear to directly address or answer the question posed by the OP, or as rephrased by willwash.
> 
> So please, somebody *either rub a couple neurons together long enough to consider and answer the question yourself, or provide a link to an actual webpage ARTICLE that analyzes the topic at hand and discusses anarchist solutions*.


Why only articles?  Can we suggest books as well?

----------


## danda

Sure, I'd like some good book recommendations.  Likely will even pick up a couple.

But for sake of discussion of the topic in this thread it would be best if someone familiar with the subject matter (ie an anarchist) can answer the question directly either from your own brain, by quoting or linking to an article, or by quoting or paraphrasing from a book.

Once that happens, this discussion might actually go somewhere useful...

oh, and pre-emptively -- a 2 hour video or podcast is not helpful either.  But a 5 or 10 minute to-the-point lecture or discussion could be.




> Why only articles?  Can we suggest books as well?

----------


## Christian Liberty

The problem is that there isn't 1 answer to your questions.  There are a bunch of potential answers.

----------


## heavenlyboy34

> Sure, I'd like some good book recommendations.  Likely will even pick up a couple.
> 
> But for sake of discussion of the topic in this thread it would be best if someone familiar with the subject matter (ie an anarchist) can answer the question directly either from your own brain, by quoting or linking to an article, or by quoting or paraphrasing from a book.
> 
> Once that happens, this discussion might actually go somewhere useful...
> 
> oh, and pre-emptively -- a 2 hour video or podcast is not helpful either.  But a 5 or 10 minute to-the-point lecture or discussion could be.


Okay.  I'll get out of the way while the anarchists have at it and maybe contribute a bit hither and thither.

----------


## PaulConventionWV

> In order for a "secular" ruler to "hijack" divine authority, there has to be a religion to begin with. hence, my original statement:
> _Organized religion was required for the creation of the state
> _.


Religion may have existed _before_ the state, but that does not mean it was a _prerequisite_ for it.  There's a big difference there. 

You can't say that religion was required for the creation of the state simply because it existed before the state did.  The state may have needed to cater to the religious, but it certainly did not need religion in order to exist.  The state, on the large, does not like religion.




> Please provide an example of an ancient state whose oligarchs did not "hijack" divine authority?


But my point is that they _did._  Are you reading what I'm typing?  They may have used it, but they don't need it.

----------


## PaulConventionWV

> Well, religion has been natural to **** sapien sapien for thousands of years...it doesn't seem a good indictment of religion because rulers tend to be good at hijacking it.  They're also good at hijacking media and other institutions...


I love how you use **** sapien sapien, considering it was only invented very recently to refer to the most recent generations.  It translates from latin as "wise man", so apparently, we're the "wise, wise man."  That doesn't smack of generational bias or anything.

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## PaulConventionWV

> *"Religion and politics are both the very same thing. They are both only, very old and very effective, means to control large masses of people. It has always only been that way, and it always only will be."*


They may share common characteristics, but religion and politics are very distinct in that one depends on adherence to a transcendent authority neither seen nor heard.  Politics, via the state, is the means of establishing oneself as an authority above all.  Therefore, the two are quite opposed to each other.  You can't be an absolute ruler by telling people to do what God tells them to do.  You can only be an absolute ruler by either making yourself the mouthpiece of God, or by dismissing God and establishing yourself as the highest authority.  Either way, you have the highest authority and you don't need religion to do it.  

The state does not need religion for control, nor does religion help the state to control.  The state merely uses it because many people refuse to be controlled without it.

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## Czolgosz

Violently defend your freedom or succumb to those who will violently take it.  

Humanity summed up in a sentence, it's that basic.

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## PaulConventionWV

> The soviets theology was Communism, the gospel "Das Kapital" written by Saint Karl. Their politics was the same. It's simpler for simpler minds.  At the end folks just walked away.


Now you're just taking completely humanist ideas and giving them theological slants, even though the two ideologies are completely opposed.

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## heavenlyboy34

> I love how you use **** sapien sapien, considering it was only invented very recently to refer to the most recent generations.  It translates from latin as "wise man", so apparently, we're the "wise, wise man."  That doesn't smack of generational bias or anything.


Non-sequitur, FYI.

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## PaulConventionWV

> If that's all you know, then you haven't read "plenty".  You've read a few blogs and maybe watched a few youtube videos.  Rothbard's system building was/is something minarchists can only aspire to, and other anarchists and voluntaryists have covered every objection uttered by minarchists.  Minarchists just don't like to read except for very short and simple things like the Constitution and the Federalist.


I can't imagine how someone could actually describe a process by which, if put in place, would achieve anarchy on a significant scale.  For one thing, we don't even have a clue how such a transition would occur, since we have never actually seen true anarchy in recorded history.  

What I think you're referring to is more sophistry than solutions.  I'm guessing their solutions, for the most part, are indistinguishable from those of many "minarhcists" in that they succeed in bucking the system, but they fail in establishing a long-term solution that prevents another state or an altered state from succeeding it.  

Really, though, I think anarchists and minarchists are basically the same thing.  They only differ in their willingness to outwardly express their belief in the ideal of statelessness.  There will never be a stateless society, and I don't see anyone providing any practical plans for how to get there and stay there.

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## PaulConventionWV

> I'm shocked and amazed by your apparent total lack of creativity and imagination.  We just need enough people to stop doing it. DUH!  
> 
> It's awful, no one likes it and nothing can be done about it.  Gimme a break.


Well, it's kinda true.  The few will always control the many when they have ambition and a monopoly on force.

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## PaulConventionWV

> What you say is correct, but you still haven't answered the question of who stops a funded, organized, and armed group with the specific intent of seizing power over a geographic area and establishing themselves as rulers of a tyrannical state.  The only thing that can stop one such group is another such group.  This begs the question, where do the funding, organization, and arming for either group come from?
> 
> The fact that the free market is superior to the state in providing a higher standard of living and is better and more efficient at producing goods and services does not answer the question.  The overall, average standard of living will be higher in a stateless society, true...but the standard of living for a select group that could take over and become rulers is even higher.  Even in the most corrupt African dictatorships there is a tiny ruling class which enjoys fabulous wealth as a result of their status, and they could care less if more overall prosperity would come to their nations from the elimination of the state apparatus, because it would still be worse for _them_.  So in a stateless society there is an incentive for groups to try to take over by force.  That force must be met with equal or greater force--so please, where does that equal or greater force come from?
> 
> Here's the scenario: I'm not talking about some tribal band of nomads living out in the middle of $#@!ty mountainous terrain that no one wants with no natural resources.  I'm talking about real people living in real cities and communities.  Hitler and his Brownshirts are marching down the streets pillaging those who stand in their way and declaring themselves masters of the world.  Submit to their rule or die.  You and your crappy little AR-15 for home defense aren't going to stop him.  Your neighbor's crappy little semiautomatic pistol, while great against a lone robber or two, fares no better against an army of thugs.  Your precious "private security firm" is hopelessly outgunned and is dealing with its other ten million customers facing the same situation anyway.  The only possible thing I could think of is some kind of "minute man" militia of you and a bunch of other guys pooling up their home defense weapons into an organized army to meet the threat.  But then who commands this army?  Who makes the strategic and tactical decisions about when, where and how to engage the enemy?  Decisions have to be made about where to concentrate one's forces, and this inherently means most areas are left undefended at any given time.  Sometimes, retreat is necessary for force preservation, which may mean your house falls to the enemy.  Do you stay with your army, or do you hemorrhage it by staying to defend your home?  Where does this army get its resources?  Maybe without an immediate infusion of resources, defeat is certain.  So do you go around plundering to acquire the resources necessary to achieve victory?  If you do this, haven't you become the very thing you are fighting against?
> 
> No one in this thread has given a succinct and concise answer to the OP's question, and I remain unconvinced that anarchy could ever work for the reasons s/he espouses.  AnCaps keep falling back on "well, the state isn't as efficient as the free market at providing goods and services."  Great.  Means nothing to the discussion at hand.


This is my whole argument in a nutshell.  Everyone loves anarchy, but nobody thinks it's possible.  It takes unity to repel a unified army.

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## PaulConventionWV

//

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## PaulConventionWV

> Non-sequitur, FYI.


What are you referring to?  I was just objecting to the term.

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## otherone

> But my point is that they _did._  Are you reading what I'm typing?  They may have used it, but they don't need it.


Without examples, on what do you base your assertion?

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## Ronin Truth

> Thanks, but I'm not interested in keeping busy for a while, and I have read lewrockwell articles many times. A pointer to either of those sites is like a pointer to a library, or to google. gee, thanks.
> 
> or said more succinctly, the content of the two web pages you provided does not appear to directly address or answer the question posed by the OP, or as rephrased by willwash.
> 
> So please, somebody either rub a couple neurons together long enough to consider and answer the question yourself, or provide a link to an actual webpage ARTICLE that analyzes the topic at hand and discusses anarchist solutions.


Sorry.  Now I agree with HB34, do your own research, if you really care, which I now doubt.  Whats the matter, ya got a broken keyboard and mouse?

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## Ronin Truth

> Well, it's kinda true. The few will always control the many when they have ambition and a monopoly on force.



It also seems that being a psychopath and/or a sociopath and/or a megalomaniac really helps out a lot too.  The sheeple seem to love and idolize their whacko shepherds up until the time that someone kills them. 

*The Politics of Obedience: The Discourse of Voluntary Servitude (pdf)*

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## Christian Liberty

> Sorry.  Now I agree with HB34, do your own research, if you really care, which I now doubt.  Whats the matter, ya got a broken keyboard and mouse?


This isn't fair.  Not everyone has a ton of time to spend on this kind of stuff.  Now, you might not have the time to find him an article, or not want to take the time, which is your prerogative.  But the reality is its really hard to actually take a ton of time on political issues for a lot of people.  That danda is spending that time here rather than with the MSM is a good sign, at least to me.

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## Ronin Truth

> This isn't fair. Not everyone has a ton of time to spend on this kind of stuff. Now, you might not have the time to find him an article, or not want to take the time, which is your prerogative. But the reality is its really hard to actually take a ton of time on political issues for a lot of people. That danda is spending that time here rather than with the MSM is a good sign, at least to me.


Fair doesn't really enter into it, nor even matter. A ton of time is not required at all. A half a pound of effort could probably achieve wonders. Evidence of ANY effort could probably help out a lot too. 

It's really not a good idea to complain and rag on someone who is only trying to help you. 

Whatever!

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## fisharmor

> I can't imagine how someone could actually describe a process by which, if put in place, would achieve anarchy on a significant scale.  For one thing, we don't even have a clue how such a transition would occur, since we have never actually seen true anarchy in recorded history.


Guys, I mean, it's the second post in this thread.
I get tired of repeating the historical examples in every single thread and I'm officially refusing to do it now. 
They existed.  Go find them, and study them, and then come back with a researched reason why those systems weren't viable.




> What I think you're referring to is more sophistry than solutions.  I'm guessing their solutions, for the most part, are indistinguishable from those of many "minarhcists" in that they succeed in bucking the system, but they fail in establishing a long-term solution that prevents another state or an altered state from succeeding it.  
> 
> Really, though, I think anarchists and minarchists are basically the same thing.  They only differ in their willingness to outwardly express their belief in the ideal of statelessness.  There will never be a stateless society, and I don't see anyone providing any practical plans for how to get there and stay there.


It's dead simple.  People alter or abolish states all the time.
They get pissed off and take to the streets and tear everything down, and it is in fact THEY who have no idea what to follow up with.
The state comes rushing back in and starts the same old shenanigans all over again.

All that's needed is a plan for the first part, and an agreement that there is no plan for the second part except to stop the state from coming back in.

But the saddest part is the fact that it's only impossible for the exact same reason why people were right when they said Ron Paul would never be president.
Don't you remember how pissed off that made you?  Do you remember why that pissed you off so badly?
It was because the person you were talking to was always, always someone who agreed with 99% of what RP was saying, and just couldn't get over how different it all was... and figured that if they couldn't get over it, nobody else would either, and set up a self-fulfilling prophecy about his losing.
All the while ignoring the fact that if everyone who dismissed his candidacy out of hand had actually done something about it, it would have actually happened.  It wasn't the neocons or the liberals who stopped it.  It was the conservative naysayers.

I don't want to be negative.  I'm incredibly heartened by what I see in this thread.  There are people who loudly denounced statelessness in the past in this thread recognizing it as an ideal at the very least.  That's way more than we've ever had.

So when any of you finally do the homework, just do all of us a favor.  Remember how mad you got when people would tell you RP would never win... and realize we've been that mad on this topic for the same reason for years.

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## Ronin Truth

Still waiting (apparently in vain) for some acknowledging comment or refutation on my Zomia post. (Thread post #9) Oh well. <shrug>

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## danda

> Sorry.  Now I agree with HB34, do your own research, if you really care, which I now doubt.  Whats the matter, ya got a broken keyboard and mouse?


I never stated that I "really care".  I did not start this thread.  I did however find it kind of interesting, as it is a question mark in my mind about anarchism, and one which I think many sort of gloss over.  Indeed it is a key point.

Yes, I could do my own research.  If I were presently so motivated.  I am not.  Instead I am participating in this thread with supposedly a number of people who are already knowledgeable about these matters.

And so, I am simply restating the question of the OP, myself, and willwash: 




> What you say is correct, but you still haven't answered the question of who stops a funded, organized, and armed group with the specific intent of seizing power over a geographic area and establishing themselves as rulers of a tyrannical state. The only thing that can stop one such group is another such group. This begs the question, where do the funding, organization, and arming for either group come from?


The fact that people here keep telling me to "do my own research" and engage in character attacks tells me that no one here has a clear and succinct answer to this question.  Else someone would simply post it instead of the snarky comments I've been seeing that do nothing to further the intellectual discourse.

As someone who would like to believe in a 100% voluntaryist society, I find that worrisome.

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## Christian Liberty

@danda- Again, the problem is that there are many potential answers.  There is no blanket answer.

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## danda

I just read your Zomia post.  While it is interesting that a society (small/mobile) managed to sustain a state of anarchy, I do not feel that the post directly addressed the question posed in the OP.   Namely, how does the society deal with the situation when a group of individuals act immorally and begins to amass power?  What is the equal and opposite force?  How does it come into being?  How does it sustain itself?   and once created, what prevents it from becoming as bad as the first?




> Still waiting (apparently in vain) for some acknowledging comment or refutation on my Zomia post. (Thread post #9) Oh well. <shrug>

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## Ronin Truth

> I just read your Zomia post. While it is interesting that a society (small/mobile) managed to sustain a state of anarchy, I do not feel that the post directly addressed the question posed in the OP. Namely, how does the society deal with the situation when a group of individuals act immorally and begins to amass power? What is the equal and opposite force? How does it come into being? How does it sustain itself? and once created, what prevents it from becoming as bad as the first?


Thanks! 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zomia_(geography)

http://www.fss.ulaval.ca/cms/upload/..._editorial.pdf

A landmass the size of Europe, a population in the millions and for 2,000 years, strikes me as not really being insignificant for anarchy.

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## fisharmor

> Namely, how does the society deal with the situation when a group of individuals act immorally and begins to amass power?  What is the equal and opposite force?  How does it come into being?  How does it sustain itself?   and once created, what prevents it from becoming as bad as the first?


The last question is precisely the problem with minarchism.
What prevents any particular state from becoming as bad as any other state?  Nothing.  All the seeds are already planted within the most innocuous state.

I personally believe the answer to your question is this: people need to learn something about law.
Consider for a moment what law is - or at least, what you currently understand law to be.
Our best current understanding of law is that it is a set of mandates by the state, the breaking of which will cause the state to take revenge on you.
You may wish to argue that point, but that's what it is.  Nothing more.

Now remove the state from the law equation, and what do you get?  Under our current understanding, you get nothing.  I posit this is the source of everyone's fear of anarchy.  They don't understand law to be anything other than the state's edicts and revenge, so they can't comprehend how law can be provided without the state.

It was only after looking at historical examples of stateless legal systems (yes, I am belaboring that point for a reason) that it occurred to me that law actually is possible in the absence of the state.  But it is true law, not merely the edict/revenge arrangement we live under.

Real law does not govern our individual interactions with the state.
Real law governs our individual interactions with other individuals.

Modern libertarians have a shadow of this understanding built into their talking points.  Is DUI a crime or not?
Libertarians answer no, because without a victim there can't be a crime.  But they never go farther than that, to the point of recognizing just how upside-down our current system is.  They think if only we subscribe to doctrine X (usually constitutionalism) everything will be OK, without recognizing that the entire underpinning of constitutionalism is this $#@!ed up legal theory that law is an edict/revenge arrangement.

In statelessness, people would recognize that the edict/revenge system is at best worthless if justice is the goal.  Historically, stateless legal systems rely on restitution, not revenge.  Restitution paid to victims or their families.
Under such a system, the goal would be twofold:

a) to recognize when individual people are being actively $#@!ty to each other 
b) to take corrective action against those individuals

Under our current system, this isn't possible.  First, there's no attempt to make sure that individuals are actually being harmed.  There's no such thing as a victim in our current system, except as a prop used by prosecutors to coax a jury into tagging along on their edict/revenge thing.
Second, in the rare case that they're actually dealing with a crime, the action taken against a convict is never corrective and is in fact most cases harmful to both parties.  The convict goes into a rape cage and is turned into an animal, and the victim is given the bill for it.

This is all a very long way of saying that with those two goals properly defined and implemented, it becomes pretty easy to see if someone is actively harming someone else and needs correction.  If they aren't harming anyone, then there is nothing to prevent.  When they do start harming people, a legal system will kick in and perform its market function.

I'm going to stop there for now, but I think that answers your main question.

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## danda

Thank-you fisharmor for a thoughtful post.

I agree that restitution rather than punishment is a good principle/goal/foundation.

I also agree that a free society would not have "laws" per se.  ( Perhaps a good substitute would be a set of shared principles, that might hopefully fit on a single sheet of paper.  Indeed, that every member of society could memorize if they so choose. )

So long as everyone abides by these principles all is well and good.  The challenge is when some individuals decide not to, and form coercive groups.

In that event, if the group performing the "$#@!ty activity" is large/powerful, then logic suggests that an opposing force that is at least as large/powerful is necessary to perform your step b) corrective action against those individuals.

Personally, my initial conclusion is that the "shared principles" could address this possibility by recommending that individuals form voluntary militia as necessary to put a stop to any person or group that is evidently willfully violating said principles, and that said militia must be disbanded immediately thereafter.

Doubtless it could be wordsmithed better.

Also, when restitution is not possible or the individual refuses to perform restitution, ostracism and banishment should be utilized rather than imprisonment or death.

thoughts?

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## Pericles

From page 6 of this link:http://www.fss.ulaval.ca/cms/upload/..._editorial.pdf





> In relation to Zomia, most societies have been little addressed by historians, apart from a
> recent collection of studies rooted mainly in China.One reason lies in the difficulty of
> gaining physical access to the region, and dealing with a daunting multitude of vernacular
> languages and scripts. However, it is also the case that the location (on the margins of colo-
> nial and imperial domains), the peoples (mountain minorities without political unity), and
> the texts that they produced (dispersed and very unevenly preserved), all pertain to a subsi-
> diary universe that, some would argue, was and remains of little historical and intellectual
> consequence in global terms.


A relatively small population in a large geographic area that never achieved anything. I see why some here are attracted to that.

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## helmuth_hubener

> The idea that you can have competing governments or protection agencies, in the same geographic area never pans out because force doesn't work that way.


 Pans out all the time, actually.

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## Ronin Truth

> From page 6 of this link:http://www.fss.ulaval.ca/cms/upload/..._editorial.pdf
> 
> 
> 
> 
> A relatively small population in a large geographic area that never achieved anything. I see why some here are attracted to that.


A landmass the size of Europe, a population in the millions and for 2,000 years, strikes me as not really being insignificant for anarchy.

Next step, anarchy + achievement (send some ancaps over there).

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## ProIndividual

Two questions I noticed:

1) What keeps a stateless society safe from invasion and being conquered, and what does it replace the state's legal system with?

2) What claim is it statists need to defend, but are instead pushing anarchists to defend their positions?

Answers:

1) No matter how it will work, we can never give you a satisfying answer. Why? If you were pro-slavery in 1850, and I was anti-slavery, and you asked me how the crops would get picked and planted without the slaves, even if I answered perfectly correctly, you'd be unsatisfied. If I could see into the future somehow, predicting oil discovery, oil refinement, inventions of various machines and tools which make modern farm equipment possible, etc., etc. then I could answer the question perfectly and correctly...but you would have thought me to be insane with such an answer in a world where the market hasn't yet been incentivized to invent these things in the absence of slavery. So, why ask for the pragmatic answers from us? You can't predict the way the state will go in 50 years anymore than we anarchists can predict how markets with different, less-perverse, incentives in the absence of a state will produce solutions to the demands in that market. Even if we perfectly answered with any of the dozens of theoretical answers we've proposed over and over and over in various threads and conversations, you'd still think we were crazy. That is to say, asking the question is not only nearly impossible to answer, but irrelevant. The reason to end slavery wasn't its inefficient way of producing crops...it was because IT WAS $#@!ING EVIL. That's all the answer any moral person needs. The pragmatics after-the-fact are irrelevant...because if the market truly demands what the slavery (state) produces, it will get produced in the absent of the slavery (state) doing it via coercion. Market demand will be met by market supply...it's the incentive the market creates in every service or good.

2) The statists are making the affirmative claim that a state is necessary (or worse, benign/beneficent)...to ask anarchists to prove a negative (that the state is NOT necessary) is illogical. You never have to prove a negative in logic. The burden of logical proof is on the statist...he or she must prove their claim with evidence, or it is logically invalid. Since most or all of their "evidence" to back this claim is refuted by anthropological and historical evidence, such as thousands of years of relative peace, law, trade, roads, defense, etc. in the absence of a state, it is not the fault of anarchists that the claim cannot simply be _a priori_ assumed for the sake of argument. The problem with statists usually is that they are completely ignorant to these anthropological and historical facts, have no intention to research them, are defending their position from assumptions completely unfounded, and lack basic familiarity with logic as a tool in debate.

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## fisharmor

> I could answer the question perfectly and correctly...but you would have thought me to be insane with such an answer in a world where the market hasn't yet been incentivized to invent these things in the absence of slavery.


You don't have to go back to 1850.  If you told me 20 years ago I would be having a serious written conversation about anarchy with people around the world in which I would reply on a phone which is also capable of playing any episode of Voltron on demand, I wouldn't call you nuts, I'd just back away slowly.

And yet........ here we are.

Statists seem to go out of their way to ignore major market miracles that surround them.

Of course the statist rebuttal is probably that it's only lion Voltron, not vehicle Voltron, so the market doesn't work.

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## Pericles

> A landmass the size of Europe, a population in the millions and for 2,000 years, strikes me as not really being insignificant for anarchy.
> 
> Next step, anarchy + achievement (send some ancaps over there).


Or, it was one of the areas of the world generally left alone because there was not enough wealth there to make it worth taking.

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## Anti Federalist

> I agree that as you shrink the size of the state, state on citizen crime goes down. But at some point citizen on citizen crime goes up. There's a lot of places in the world where the primary danger is from other citizens. Does it make a difference whether it's the government that kills you or your neighbor?


Yes, because in no case is it OK for citizen to kill another (barring legitimate self defense).

The state can kill, and it is perfectly accepted as being OK, to bring someone into compliance.

----------


## osan

> Anyway the reason I said anarchism is more of a complaint is because I think "no government" is basically an impossible condition.


You are apparently in dire need of some learning as regards human history.  The vast and overwhelming proportion of humanity's presence on this world has been under anarchic conditions, if the various anthropological records are to be believed.  As far as we can tell, Empire has been in place for a mere 8K years, give or take.  Before Empire spread to every corner of the planet, which has been the case for only about the past 40 years, anarchic societies flourished.  Anthropologists busily documented the "primitive" societies during the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries and if you would bother to read about so-called "tribal" societies, you find that they were universally anarchies.  There were no bosses.




> Maybe I'm wrong


_Maybe?_




> the way I define government is this: In any geographic area there's *always* going to be a group that has the most force and that makes the rules.


History proves you dead wrong.  What you describe certainly has existed and is almost universal today, but that has not been the case for the great majority of humanity's tenure on this rock.




> I call that government.


Call it anything you please.  I would note that there is a fundamental difference between governMENT and governANCE.  There is no such thing as "government".  If you disagree, I challenge you to show us so-called "government" - something upon which one may place his hands... hang his hat, so to speak.  There is, of course, no such thing.  Governance, on the other hand, is readily demonstrable in the actions taken by some WRT to others, or even themselves.




> The idea that you can have competing governments or protection agencies, in the same geographic area never pans out because force doesn't work that way.


"Never" is a big assertion to make and demands more than the bare declaration.




> The _natural tendency_ is for the strongest group to overpower the weaker groups and absorb them.


Oy.




> The most powerful group makes the rules. I would call that government. So given that there's always going to be a most powerful group that makes the rules I think the best solution is to try to keep control over that group the best you can. It's not a perfect solution, but unless there a fundamental change in human nature and force I don't see what else can be done.


You throw terms such as "always", "never", and "human nature" around very casually while making very big assertions about them, yet you provide no proof of the veracity of your statements.  Ultra-FAIL.  Methinks you are going to have to do better that this.

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## heavenlyboy34

> Or, it was one of the areas of the world generally left alone because there was not enough wealth there to make it worth taking.


Humans are wealth.  In particular as slaves/citizens.

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## Carson

> You are apparently in dire need of some learning as regards human history. The vast and overwhelming proportion of humanity's presence on this world has been under anarchic conditions, if the various anthropological records are to be believed. As far as we can tell, Empire has been in place for a mere 8K years, give or take. Before Empire spread to every corner of the planet, which has been the case for only about the past 40 years, anarchic societies flourished. Anthropologists busily documented the "primitive" societies during the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries and if you would bother to read about so-called "tribal" societies, you find that they were universally anarchies. There were no bosses.
> 
> Snip...


Good point... but then again Nature seems to have a way for organisms to adopt certain rules they live by. Perhaps that is part of evolutionary drive.

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## A Son of Liberty

> Humans are wealth.  In particular as slaves/citizens.

----------

