Ask an Anarchist!

Ah yes, the Oral Contract.

Can you explain what was wrong with my argument? I understand you disagree with my conclusion, in fact I think my conclusion is kind of abhorrent, but I see thinking otherwise with my other views as being inconsistent. I think selling the serum at any monetary price to be legitimate, and I think prostitution should be legal so I don't see how I can say that particular case should be illegal. How Amaedus can deny that it IS exploitation though I do not know.
 
Can you explain what was wrong with my argument? I understand you disagree with my conclusion, in fact I think my conclusion is kind of abhorrent, but I see thinking otherwise with my other views as being inconsistent. I think selling the serum at any monetary price to be legitimate, and I think prostitution should be legal so I don't see how I can say that particular case should be illegal. How Amaedus can deny that it IS exploitation though I do not know.

Oh nothing.

Just wondering why you might give such a specific example :rolleyes:
 
Did you read exactly what I said. It would be easy to say, rather than say "Suck my dick or die of cancer" (Someone else's words) to say "Pay me 100,000 bucks or die of cancer, or you can pay with it through sexual services."

Read carefully my three questions above. I'd respect a No to the first 2 or a Yes to the third. But I picked Yes to the first 2 and no to the third. So I have to support its legality I suppose.

Don't change the hypothetical to which I was replying to - the one amadeus responded to. The hypothetical is sexual exploitation vs. death from cancer, a patently coercive arrangement. Your questions are irrelevant because we are not talking about a non-coercive contract - ones in which the question of legal prostitution might be relevant.

Please explain how you can possibly think a coersive contract ought to be legal. Explain how this sexually coercive contract is any different than other coercive contract, such as "Become my gardener or I will shoot you in the face"
 
Become my gardener or I'll rape you wouldn't be valid either, but saying "I'll hire you as my gardener if you have sex with me" would be legal, even if it was the only job available (Assuming prostitution was legal.)
 
So this is a personal preference based on subjective experience? Just out of curiosity, what kind of problems has state caused for you? Or have you possibly adopted some 19th-century anarchists´idea of a "state"?
This isn't really based on a personal thing. It's not like "omg the cops killed my dad fk the govt", I would actually consider myself pretty privileged with the income my family gets(like $190,000 altogether). It just makes the most sense to me. My concerns are mostly for the people seriously abused by capitalism, and the state is an inherent part of capitalism since it's primary purpose is to protect the interests of the ruling class. The corporations control everything. Economic opportunity is a myth. We've already seen what happens when you destroy capitalism but put in a place a new state, a new ruling class just takes over and a new form of capitalism takes hold. "Power corrupts", really.

edit: And Domination defending slavery and sexual exploitation is just hilarious.
 
Become my gardener or I'll rape you wouldn't be valid either, but saying "I'll hire you as my gardener if you have sex with me" would be legal, even if it was the only job available (Assuming prostitution was legal.)

Again, assuming you are mentally capable of comprehending me, we're not talking about voluntary prostitution. It is an irrelevant analogy. My example was comparing sexual coercion (problems with oral or die from cancer) with other forms of coercion. My question is essentially this: Is a contract based on sexual coercion valid? Is a contract based on other forms of coercion valid? If these contracts are not valid, then they are not legal contracts. That's all that needs to be answered to talk about the relevant hypothetical which amadeus answered, and which Left was outraged over.
 
Simple, if said coercion involves "If you don't do this, I'll do that to you" then that's illegal. "Sleep with me or I'll inject you with a serum that gives you cancer" would be illegal. But simply choosing not to STOP something (Sleep with me or I won't give you the serum that heals you from cancer) that would be legal. Evil, and morally abhorrent, but it should be legal.
 
Nobody, including you, is perfect
That, sir, is grossly incorrect. :smug:

I'm not sure I understood that.
Well, the motivations behind me working is not simply survival but the obtaining of status, luxury items, and the like. I'm not a victim of the need to eat.

What's your proposed alternative to incentivizing working?
 
Basically the idea is that unlike the Leninists, there is not going to be a vanguard who overthrows the existing state and imposing a new way of life on the people in a very anti-libertarian fashion, the people are expected to empower themselves through various forms of direct action. The most notable of these are stuff like strikes, occupations, walk-outs, protests, etc.

The groups that do these things are organized in a very directly democratic fashion, and the idea is that through doing this the people will learn to govern themselves and see the value of self-ownership. And, much like an anarcho-communist/-collectivist/mutualist/individualist society, membership in these is completely voluntary. A revolution is not going to be forced upon anyone. This way there is as little resentment as possible during the process(and I should stress that it is a process, while there might be single events that characterize it, and there might be a single revolt that over throws the state and capitalism, there is still much work to be done).

In order to gain supporters, there has to be people who spread information about this, usually to the more agitated communities first(you can see a lot of support for anarchism in latin american countries and of course spain). But the main method for doing this, I think, is through libertarian child rearing. It's where you raise children in an extremely libertarian fashion, and when this is done it almost always creates more libertarian individuals. The methods typically advocated by anarchists is to not punish(nor reward) your children and generally allowing them to develop on their own, only intervening so that they don't hurt themselves or someone else(they still need to learn to respect rights of others of course if they are to truly believe in freedom). They would also attend libertarian alternatives to schools which are self-managed by the teachers and students. There is no set curriculum, the student explores it's interests and the teacher is merely there to supplement those interests. For more info: http://anarchism.pageabode.com/afaq/secJ5.html#secj513

I've already explained this above.

Ah, okay, so you're talking about a commune type situation, founded by people who are for this ideology.

Yes but that was after a majority of the people supported the measures.

But only in a certain are of the country (i.e. the north). The south was majorly against it, and we had to use the national guard to enforce those laws. So, still, how will minorities be protected in a society that doesn't have overarching authority to back them up?

I need a source for this. I think we formed tribes because people wanted to survive, ditto for communities. As for clubs, groups, and political parties, yeah people like to be with people have similar interests and viewpoints, but that's not really racism.

That's the entire point. The ones who survived were the ones who formed tribes, and after a couple hundred thousand years of doing so, it's rather ingrained in us. So we still form "tribes", even if we don't realize it. We stick with the people who are similar to us (i.e. the tribe) and tend to dislike people who aren't apart of our "tribe". i.e. see how partisan politics can be.

Also, racism isn't the right word. It's something else entirely.

I don't find this very likely but direct action by the minority would do. Society is already moving in a socially progressive direction, and it isn't being pushed by the state.

First thing, they're a minority, which automatically means they don't have the votes to overturn something that the majority of people want. How are these people going to be protected?

Second thing, with most countries around the world, we are the state. We're the ones pushing for social progression, because we've been empowered with the ability to due so. And we've set up a system that can enforce and protect those social progressions we've made.

With your system though, although social progression can be made, they can just as easily be reversed. There's no authority in place to make sure laws passed in the past that protect certain things stay in place. One day a community could like a certain minority group, the next, they could be a the most hated thing in town. What would stop them from depriving that minority group of their rights? And you can't answer, "Oh that would never happen because everyone in this ideal community would be [blah blah blah]", people change overtime. And although people right now value the idea that everyone has certain unalienable rights, that might not be the popular position in the future. But with the system we have in place right now, we protect against that by making it so certain things can't be infringed upon, and we have the authority to back it up. Say for example right now, there seems to be a large fear of Muslims in this country, and even though that is present, and there are people out there who fear them so much they would deprive them of their rights (not being able to build a mosque, etc.), we have a system in place where we can make sure that they do get those rights, even if it is unpopular.

But with your system, there doesn't seem to be anything in place to protect Muslims. If your system was in place now, Muslims probably wouldn't have the right to build or worship at mosques, and they'd probably be deprived of other rights too. How will your system protect against this? Assuming this society you're building is going to last sometime into the future?
 
Those aren't really real anarchists.

says who? A Civver? I thought in this thread you were supposed to explain anarchy, not just make statements and turn opinions into facts.

I get my information from the major anarchist thinkers of the last two centuries.

such as?

And I'm not going to deny that a new anarchist society would have to defend itself. But there's no reason why they can't claim themselves a de jure state and even appoint a representative to the United Nations, but organize themselves in an anarchistic fashion.

The problem I described is not what anarchists can or can not do, in fact the very essence of Anarchy is that you can do what you want... the problem is how foreign nations would react, you are going around the issue avoiding to speak about it.
Besides your ideas are a host of contradictions. First you were talking about direct democracy, now you're shifting to Representation. An organization such as the UN is based on the Representative governements that rule Earth nowadays. Anarchy has no place in such organization nor does direct democracy. If you were a real anarchist as you claim you are, you could not accept someone to represent you in the UN. Anarchists would consider the UN the most useless organization in the world, as in fact it has proven many times to be, already since when it was called League of Nations.

Well it does work, there are many examples of successful worker's co-operatives today.

cooperatives are organizations, associations, not states. They do not enforce laws. Workers/employees are almost the antithesis of Anarchy. You have a too simplicistic view of what is a state, social employment and what is -really- anarchy. I am as much an anarchist as you are, if these are the premises. Being leftist and having certain ideas isn't enough to self appoint yourself as anarchist. You must LIVE as one... if you ever tried to do it you'd know what I'm talking about and you'd know about the issues that arise when Anarchy confronts itself with the foreign world that surrounds it. TBH your answers are typical of the teenagers that draw the anarchic sign on their school backpacks, or in their CFC avatar image. That won't make of anyone a real anarchist.

And the "shopkeeper"(probably shopkeepers) do not have to comply with the decision. Joining the confederation is entirely voluntary and if they want to operate on their own then power to them!

confederation of what? So you say the people in this "state" vote for a law, but then not everyone is bound to respect the vote/decision. So why voting?
 
1) There is no competition in social anarchism.

Do consumers get to vote with their $$$? If yes, then there's gonna be competition

2) You wouldn't be able to out compete mass confederations of syndicates.

As long as people are free to try, are they? Or will the anarchists just steal inventions for their collective?

3) You wouldn't want to subject yourself to that kind of authority when there are clearly better options easily available to you.

I already explained why I would - I'm working for an inventor and we're making big $$$... And you think I'd be better off working for you, or your collective. Aint yer decision, you sound more bossy than my boss.

Because you needed money.

Anarchists will give me money so I dont need it?
 
says who? A Civver? I thought in this thread you were supposed to explain anarchy, not just make statements and turn opinions into facts.
Lifestyle anarchists aren't "real" anarchists, or at least not as they present themselves. They're entitled bums with a smattering of anarchist theory trying to turn their shiftlessness (often a shiftlessness supported by a knowledge that they can retreat into the arms of a middle-class family should they tire of their self-inflicted lumpenproletarian status) into some vaguely socio-political act. It's bourgeoisie slumming, not activism.

"Real" anarchists, or socialists of any bent, work. They don't simply claim to reject capitalist society while living as a parasite upon it. They engage with it, and actively attempt to overturn it. A liberation which extends as far as your own skin is no true liberation.

Of course, I'm a Nazi-Muslim-Communist, so what do I know? ;)

cooperatives are organizations, associations, not states. They do not enforce laws. Workers/employees are almost the antithesis of Anarchy. You have a too simplicistic view of what is a state, social employment and what is -really- anarchy.
You should probably do some research into Anarcho-Syndicalist theory. They've dealt with this stuff in a great amount of detail over the last century or so.

You must LIVE as one... if you ever tried to do it you'd know what I'm talking about and you'd know about the issues that arise when Anarchy confronts itself with the foreign world that surrounds it.
And how, prey tell, does one "live" as an anarchist? I really hope that you're not suggesting we all need to Freetown Christiania or GTFO, so to speak.
 
This is mind boggling. Having money doesn't put you above ethics? I don't know, this is the weirdest post I've ever seen. Inventing a medical treatment is not an excuse for sexual coercion of the terminally ill, I mean what can I even say? If you're willing to defend free market rape fantasy you're so unhinged I have no idea what to tell you.
I'm defending civver's right to property, no matter how repulsive I think his choices are.
 
Its been explained in this thread. Your right to property does not give the right to do violence unto others, like sexually coerce the dying.
 
Which shows exactly how empty your ideology actually is.

Well said.

It simply boggles the mind that another human being could prefer a world where you could effectively hold someone's life to ransom for sexual gratification to one where society helps the weak by paying taxes.

Incredible. And we're the ones demonised in America.
 
Is the grocery store holding us ransom by making us buy the food before we eat it? Is the landlord holding us ransom by having us pay rent to live in their building? Enlighten us as to what consensual transactions are ransom and which aren't.
 
Is the grocery store holding us ransom by making us buy the food before we eat it? Is the landlord holding us ransom by having us pay rent to live in their building? Enlighten us as to what consensual transactions are ransom and which aren't.

OK then amadeus, how about denying someone food unless they have sex with you? you going to try and pretend you can intellectualise that to be the same thing as selling food from a shop?

Look, you've backed yourself into a ridiculous corner and I'm sure you're looking for a way out of it, so why not just admit you wish you hadn't made the remarks you have in this thread?
 
Well, the motivations behind me working is not simply survival but the obtaining of status, luxury items, and the like. I'm not a victim of the need to eat.
Well I guess you could technically live off of food stamps since we have some degree of welfare, but it's hardly a life to look forward to and people don't take kindly to that sort of thing.

What's your proposed alternative to incentivizing working?
All that stuff you just mentioned.

But only in a certain are of the country (i.e. the north). The south was majorly against it, and we had to use the national guard to enforce those laws. So, still, how will minorities be protected in a society that doesn't have overarching authority to back them up?
Social pressure from other communities, economic pressure from other communities direct action by the minorities themselves.

That's the entire point. The ones who survived were the ones who formed tribes, and after a couple hundred thousand years of doing so, it's rather ingrained in us. So we still form "tribes", even if we don't realize it. We stick with the people who are similar to us (i.e. the tribe) and tend to dislike people who aren't apart of our "tribe". i.e. see how partisan politics can be.

Also, racism isn't the right word. It's something else entirely.
We didn't tend to dislike people who aren't apart of our tribe, I've never heard that.

The people who lived in tribes were just as intelligent as you and me. It's not like they were controlled by some sort of primal instinct that was making them hate other people. They were individuals and probably had just as many disagreements with people of their own tribe than in other tribes(except in the case of things like war, of course).

First thing, they're a minority, which automatically means they don't have the votes to overturn something that the majority of people want. How are these people going to be protected?
Voting is not the be all end all of an anarchist society. It's simply the way most people propose the people make decisions about the economy. Social issues are not intended to be dealt with votes.

But if it is abused as such, the methods I highlighted above could have some effect.

Second thing, with most countries around the world, we are the state. We're the ones pushing for social progression, because we've been empowered with the ability to due so. And we've set up a system that can enforce and protect those social progressions we've made.
'We are the state'? Are you talking about military interventionism?

With your system though, although social progression can be made, they can just as easily be reversed. There's no authority in place to make sure laws passed in the past that protect certain things stay in place. One day a community could like a certain minority group, the next, they could be a the most hated thing in town.
Why on earth would that happen?

people change overtime.
Yeah, in a socially progressive manner.

And although people right now value the idea that everyone has certain unalienable rights, that might not be the popular position in the future.
Why not?

But with the system we have in place right now, we protect against that by making it so certain things can't be infringed upon, and we have the authority to back it up.
Well if the majority of the people become bigots all of a sudden it kind of follows that the government officials they elect will espouse those views(both as a matter of probability, and as a means to get elected) and then in fact they use their authority to make it harder for minorities to gain rights, as has happened so many times in the past.

Say for example right now, there seems to be a large fear of Muslims in this country, and even though that is present, and there are people out there who fear them so much they would deprive them of their rights (not being able to build a mosque, etc.), we have a system in place where we can make sure that they do get those rights, even if it is unpopular.
Well for one, the majority of the country don't seem to be racist against Muslims. That's why the judges for these sorts of things rule in favor of equal rights.

Take the supreme court case against anti-sodomy laws a few years ago. 3 judges ruled against it. Where was the state protecting minority rights in the case of those three judges? Or, as a better example, the 1986 decision which ruled in favor of anti-sodomy legislation. It has nothing to do with what the constitution says(we've only had secular schools for instance since the 60's, despite the very first sentence of the bill of rights contradicting that policy), it has to do with how the majority feels. And the system we have in place only makes it harder for minorities to gain the rights they deserve.

onedreamer said:
says who? A Civver? I thought in this thread you were supposed to explain anarchy, not just make statements and turn opinions into facts.
I take it you don't know much about anarchist theory.

Proudhon, Bakunin, Kropotkin, Goldman, Berkman, Malatesta, Chomsky, etc.. None of them advocate anything these "anarchists" you've met seem to be doing.

The problem I described is not what anarchists can or can not do, in fact the very essence of Anarchy is that you can do what you want... the problem is how foreign nations would react, you are going around the issue avoiding to speak about it.
Besides your ideas are a host of contradictions. First you were talking about direct democracy, now you're shifting to Representation. An organization such as the UN is based on the Representative governements that rule Earth nowadays. Anarchy has no place in such organization nor does direct democracy. If you were a real anarchist as you claim you are, you could not accept someone to represent you in the UN. Anarchists would consider the UN the most useless organization in the world, as in fact it has proven many times to be, already since when it was called League of Nations.
No you simply haven't been paying attention. Direct democracy of close to 7 billion people is impractical. I've said more than once that for assemblies of larger groups different communities would appoint delegates. They don't get to espouse their own views, they're just there to relate the will of a certain syndicate or commune or whatever. They're just a voluntary servant of the people. The same could be done for something like the UN to gain legitimacy and avoid attacks from aggressive authoritarians, you've not provided one good reason why not.

TBH your answers are typical of the teenagers that draw the anarchic sign on their school backpacks, or in their CFC avatar image. That won't make of anyone a real anarchist.
TBH you don't understand anarchism and you seem obsessed with attacking me no matter what I say.

confederation of what? So you say the people in this "state" vote for a law, but then not everyone is bound to respect the vote/decision. So why voting?
They're not really supposed to vote for laws. They vote to make economic decisions between syndicates. If one syndicate didn't want to associate itself with others then they wouldn't be forced to, but the pros would probably outweigh the cons.

Berzerker said:
Do consumers get to vote with their $$$? If yes, then there's gonna be competition
Uhm, no... Take FritoLay for example, they own several different snackfoods, and people use their money to "vote" on which is best. That doesn't mean they are competing against themselves.

As long as people are free to try, are they? Or will the anarchists just steal inventions for their collective?
You can try whatever you want, it's just a bad idea.

This notion of some guy inventing something awesome and then automatically being a millionaire is really laughable though.

I already explained why I would - I'm working for an inventor and we're making big $$$... And you think I'd be better off working for you, or your collective. Aint yer decision, you sound more bossy than my boss.
How is he going to get enough money to hire you and the many other employees required to create such a profitable business?

Anarchists will give me money so I dont need it?
No, please try to stay focused on the point. You still have to work, just not under authoritarian conditions.
 
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