Anarchy is ‘no rulers’ not ‘no rules’. If someone is going to do something harmful for the community, you don’t just let them. You are actively incentivised to stop them, because it’s your obligation as a member of the community.
Contrast that to today’s system, where if someone wants to release factory run-offs into the local water source you can’t stop them and they’ll bribelobby some politician to let them do it, while arresting you for protesting it
Right. That sounds like it could be fine. But it seems like it would (d)evolve back into rules when people get tired of re-arguing the same conflicts repeatedly. People would have arguments, write down or remember the results, look back at them when the same kind of problem comes up, and now you’ve reinvented common law.
Or be very susceptible to tyranny of the majority. “We all decided you can only have the shit-water, so you can leave or fight us all.”
The way it was phrased in the meme (which, admittedly, is only a meme) makes it sound like you’re not allowed to stop other people.
Anarchy is ’no rulers’ not ’no rules’. If someone is going to do something harmful for the community, you don’t just let them. You are actively incentivised to stop them, because it’s your obligation as a member of the community.
Which reduces matters to force vs. force; and for that matter, is much more directly an individual making decisions for other individuals than most modern states.
No rulers cannot also mean no enforcement beyond individual action, because that effectively means no rules.
Direct action isn’t “force vs. force” in a vacuum it is people-led defence of a community’s survival against those who would prioritise their own interests over the collective well-being. By framing enforcement as “individual action,” you ignore the reality of mutual aid and horizontal organisation, wherein the community itself sets the standards for tolerated behaviour.
Removing the state doesn’t leave a vacuum for might makes right it replaces top-down systemic coercion with horizontal accountability; Where a community’s refusal to cooperate with a bad actor is a far more sophisticated, and less violent, regulator than a politician who can be bought to look the other way and use the state apparatus to inflict physical violence on those who oppose.
Direct action isn’t “force vs. force” in a vacuum it is people-led defence of a community’s survival against those who would prioritise their own interests over the collective well-being.
I can literally quote conservatives saying the exact same shit. The point in this is not to equate anarchism with conservatism, but pointing out that the justification of people-led defence of a community’s survival against those who would prioritize their own interests over the collective well-being is nearly universal as a justification for ideologies, including my own, and thus does not serve as much of a justification for anarchism in particular.
By framing enforcement as “individual action,” you ignore the reality of mutual aid and horizontal organisation,
My response was made directly in the context of you asserting that the individual who sees the shitter is incentivized to stop them.
wherein the community itself sets the standards for tolerated behaviour.
… so…
… wherein a group of people make decisions for the lives of individuals.
Removing the state doesn’t leave a vacuum for might makes right it replaces top-down systemic coercion with horizontal accountability; Where a community’s refusal to cooperate with a bad actor is a far more sophisticated, and less violent, regulator than a politician who can be bought to look the other way and use the state apparatus to inflict physical violence on those who oppose.
How is a community’s refusal to cooperate with a bad actor more sophisticated? Wouldn’t that mandate the community enforcing the refusal on all individuals within the community?
Good, do that.
Anarchy is ‘no rulers’ not ‘no rules’. If someone is going to do something harmful for the community, you don’t just let them. You are actively incentivised to stop them, because it’s your obligation as a member of the community.
Contrast that to today’s system, where if someone wants to release factory run-offs into the local water source you can’t stop them and they’ll
bribelobby some politician to let them do it, while arresting you for protesting itRight. That sounds like it could be fine. But it seems like it would (d)evolve back into rules when people get tired of re-arguing the same conflicts repeatedly. People would have arguments, write down or remember the results, look back at them when the same kind of problem comes up, and now you’ve reinvented common law.
Or be very susceptible to tyranny of the majority. “We all decided you can only have the shit-water, so you can leave or fight us all.”
The way it was phrased in the meme (which, admittedly, is only a meme) makes it sound like you’re not allowed to stop other people.
Which reduces matters to force vs. force; and for that matter, is much more directly an individual making decisions for other individuals than most modern states.
No rulers cannot also mean no enforcement beyond individual action, because that effectively means no rules.
Direct action isn’t “force vs. force” in a vacuum it is people-led defence of a community’s survival against those who would prioritise their own interests over the collective well-being. By framing enforcement as “individual action,” you ignore the reality of mutual aid and horizontal organisation, wherein the community itself sets the standards for tolerated behaviour.
Removing the state doesn’t leave a vacuum for might makes right it replaces top-down systemic coercion with horizontal accountability; Where a community’s refusal to cooperate with a bad actor is a far more sophisticated, and less violent, regulator than a politician who can be bought to look the other way and use the state apparatus to inflict physical violence on those who oppose.
I can literally quote conservatives saying the exact same shit. The point in this is not to equate anarchism with conservatism, but pointing out that the justification of people-led defence of a community’s survival against those who would prioritize their own interests over the collective well-being is nearly universal as a justification for ideologies, including my own, and thus does not serve as much of a justification for anarchism in particular.
My response was made directly in the context of you asserting that the individual who sees the shitter is incentivized to stop them.
… so…
… wherein a group of people make decisions for the lives of individuals.
How is a community’s refusal to cooperate with a bad actor more sophisticated? Wouldn’t that mandate the community enforcing the refusal on all individuals within the community?