from j-lu’s “Pleasure Saucer”:

A friend of my acquaintance, and fellow Mallet Assembly alumnus, one Mr Juan Cortez (not his real name), has offered to have “The Anarchy Debate” with me. You know the Anarchy debate: some kind soul rushes in to assure the misguided anarchist that this dangerous silliness could not possibly work, and there’s another argument about first principles. This happens all the time, and it can tiresome. However, Juan is an intelligent fellow, so this should be an eloquent debate (at the time of this writing, it is still ongoing), and I needed a typical example of this sort of debate on my site anyway, if only to have something to point in case it comes up again.
The structure of the debate is as follows: Juan writes me a post with his objections to anarchy, I respond to that, he responds to the response, and so on and so forth. The only editing that will be done it changing his details to obscure his identity (He evidently now works in a field where political radical opinions can be damaging to his career), and to enrich the content of the text with links and suchlike. Enjoy.

Freedom is impossible without government. The Rothbardian idea of private sector police, soldiers, and courts is downright silly. It would lead directly to endless civil war, and here’s why: If I am president of a private government system, and you’re one of my subscribers, what motivation do I have to obey any concept of moral behavior? ...

First of all, the idea of an actual traditional as-we know-it business is but one possible option in the world After the Revolution, and not necessarily the optimal one. Other options include mutual aid societies formed upon affinity, religious, ethnic, or vocational lines, or contracted businesses run as co-ops, or the highly motivated individual, and of course Post-Revolution World (which I will now call PRW) would probably have a combination of all these possibilities, plus some more that I can’t think of.
But let’s go with the idea of the traditional business: CortezCo. You offer your clients protection and security for themselves, their property, and their businesses. And let’s say that you are a genial sociopath, with no moral compass, no empathy, but enough foresight to plan for your long-term best interest, and enough charm to not send the casual acquaintance running for the hills.

neat conversation, nerds.

what sayeth you, boarding Public? is anarchy attainable? is the correct path through government regulation of corporate power, or through armed revolution?

what does chomsky say?

what does bookchin say?

What Would Kropotkin Do?

Was Emmma Goldman really an anarchist? Or just a radical malcontent ahead of her time?

http://pleasuresaucer.com/2009/10/great-anarchy-debate-redone-part-1.html

No restrictions other than those determined by the laws of our own individual nature sounds great and I would be all for it..except I don’t trust the average man or even the above average man to have the intelligence, moral compass, and respect for others to govern themselves…

Chomsky says the following…

If one were to seek a single leading idea within the anarchist tradition, it should, I believe, be that expressed by Bakunin when, in writing on the Paris Commune, he identified himself as follows:

  I am a fanatic lover of liberty, considering it as the unique condition under which intelligence, dignity and human happiness can develop and grow; not the purely formal liberty conceded, measured out and regulated by the State, an eternal lie which in reality represents nothing more than the privilege of some founded on the slavery of the rest; not the individualistic, egoistic, shabby, and fictitious liberty extolled by the School of J.-J. Rousseau and other schools of bourgeois liberalism, which considers the would-be rights of all men, represented by the State which limits the rights of each—-an idea that leads inevitably to the reduction of the rights of each to zero. No, I mean the only kind of liberty that is worthy of the name, liberty that consists in the full development of all the material, intellectual and moral powers that are latent in each person; liberty that recognizes no restrictions other than those determined by the laws of our own individual nature, which cannot properly be regarded as restrictions since these laws are not imposed by any outside legislator beside or above us, but are immanent and inherent, forming the very basis of our material, intellectual and moral being—-they do not limit us but are the real and immediate conditions of our freedom.[12]

Here’s some more of what Chomsky says..

My only problem with anarchy is that most people are too stupid o make decisions on there own..

Left to there own anarchistic devises we’d have a very messy world..It’s much better to be a anarchist in a semi orderly republic..than to be a an anarchist in an anarchistic world..

for instance on this forum I get to play the anarchistic lunatic..against your very reasonable linear internet geek world..have you noticed the more unreasonable you guys get the more reasonable I get..? It’s not that much fun to be a lunatic in an insane asylum..much better to be crazy in a sane world..or at least in a world where folks think they are sane..that would be the MX forum world..

True anarchy is getting less possible with the mass media..Anarchy requires folks who think for themselves..the mass media has homogenized our culture to where it’s almost impossible to be free from the overwhelming agreement system that is embedded in us, that has turned us into consumer robots ..or impish rebels.. ... even if we resist the media..Either way the powers that control the media ,control us either through compliance or through rebellion..

When you write sentences like “most people are too stupid o make decisions on there own,” it might be a good idea to realize that it’s “their own.”

When you write sentences like “most people are too stupid o make decisions on there own,” it might be a good idea to realize that it’s “their own.”

Which illustrates my point…

Ya know the founding fathers…knew you needed an educated elite to govern the farmers and squirrel hunters..That’s why they went with the senate and congress and president and supreme court and all those over educated blowhards..

Course in those days most folks couldn’t read or write..so they’d have a time wading through the new health care reform proposals..what is it 10,000 pages or something like that..and that’s not double spaced..

You are assuming the farmers and squirrel hunters needed governing. Don’t project your neuroses, Richey.

So is Richey a farmer or a squirrel hunter?

they didnt feel they ‘needed governing’, they felt they needed to not have as much power or access to the mechanisms of power and legislation as the wealthy. HUGE difference actually.

so, johnny, how do you feel is the best way to get from here (pre revolution, as you call it), to the PRW you speak of? armed insurgency? just wait for the facade to crumble? or, as chomsky speaks of at times, by working within the mechanisms of democracy in order to subvert the wealthy elite?

I was looking around and I noticed this future world article ..it was talking about http://www.fixmy street.com ..I started to see a vision of a new perhaps more self governing community Modality..It’s not traditional anarchy but it does give some power back to the people..technology might save our souls after all..

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/features/tomorrows-world-the-gizmos-about-to-change-the-way-we-live-1807363.html

Another pioneering democratic service is http://www.fixmy street.com. Here, members of the public can report problems in their area such as graffiti, fly-tipping and anti-social behaviour to their local council (a neighbour of mine recently complained that scaffolding on an adjacent house could be used by burglars to gain entry to her house). The latest development to the service is an iPhone application that lets users take a picture of the problem in question and send it in to be dealt with, specifying their location via the phone’s GPS.

Of course, the natural endpoint of any e-democratic “revolution” would be the introduction of e-voting systems across local and national politics. The major problem, though, is how susceptible these would be to hacking and corruption.

Part 2 is up:
http://pleasuresaucer.com/2009/11/great-anarchy-debate-redone-part-2.html

˙˚∆˚ (slo-pff) - 25 October 2009 01:51 PM

so, johnny, how do you feel is the best way to get from here (pre revolution, as you call it), to the PRW you speak of? armed insurgency? just wait for the facade to crumble? or, as chomsky speaks of at times, by working within the mechanisms of democracy in order to subvert the wealthy elite?

In answer to question, in general, I advocate Dual Power and Counter-Economics.