Debate: Be an Anarchist, Not a Minarchist

[Hugh Akston]

I think you lack imagination of the effect of bad actors really running the show. This is a bit like that thing where there’s not real difference between US and DPRK because all government illegitimate. Yeah but ... take a look that’s not real. The thing where biggest bully warlords extort and rape and pillage all day - that’s actually a thing.

So you’re saying that some warlords are better to live under than others. That’s not a terribly controversial claim.

But just because the extortion and rape and pillaging conducted by the US is less severe than that done by the worst imaginable doesn’t render the former a legitimate government and the latter not.

[JasonL]

So...DPRK is a state. It runs its own show. That’s a thing.

Pretending the biggest bully with a gun isn’t a state doesn’t make them not a state. The question is under which conditions of power is the greatest liberty preserved. Shutting your eyes and saying nobody will have coercive power is like saying everyone will share the right way in commutopia.

Also fair warning I drunk.

[JasonL]

I think you lack imagination of the effect of bad actors really running the show. This is a bit like that thing where there’s not real difference between US and DPRK because all government illegitimate. Yeah but ... take a look that’s not real. The thing where biggest bully warlords extort and rape and pillage all day - that’s actually a thing.

So you’re saying that some warlords are better to live under than others. That’s not a terribly controversial claim.

But just because the extortion and rape and pillaging conducted by the US is less severe than that done by the worst imaginable doesn’t render the former a legitimate government and the latter not.

But - then legitimacy in your terms means nearly nothing material. It trivializes the distinction between the greatest monsters and the most highly functional self determined societies that have ever existed in the earth.

[Hugh Akston]

I think you lack imagination of the effect of bad actors really running the show. This is a bit like that thing where there’s not real difference between US and DPRK because all government illegitimate. Yeah but ... take a look that’s not real. The thing where biggest bully warlords extort and rape and pillage all day - that’s actually a thing.

So you’re saying that some warlords are better to live under than others. That’s not a terribly controversial claim.

But just because the extortion and rape and pillaging conducted by the US is less severe than that done by the worst imaginable doesn’t render the former a legitimate government and the latter not.

But - then legitimacy in your terms means nearly nothing material. It trivializes the distinction between the greatest monsters and the most highly functional self determined societies that have ever existed in the earth.

What is that distinction?

[JasonL]

In your terms- “merely” degree. Look if your model doesn’t treat differences in human experiences between DPRK and US as salient - it’s not very serious about addressing the human condition.

[Hugh Akston]

In your terms- “merely” degree. Look if your model doesn’t treat differences in human experiences between DPRK and US as salient - it’s not very serious about addressing the human condition.

Degree of severity is a significant thing. And I already acknowledged that some warlords are better than others. My model merely rejects the idea that any of them have a legitimate claim to authority.

[Shem]

Who starts shooting first when they want your shit?

I'm just going to make it clear so nobody can say they weren't warned; in Anarchotopia, I am going warlord. I am going warlord early, completely, and every day of my life thereafter. There is not enough fairy dust in the world to make me believe that the people who currently use their resources to govern my life are going to suddenly decide that I should be free of their control if we do away with the legal codes that circumscribe the extent to which they can use their possession of stuff I need to live to control my actions. The simple fact of scarcity means that absent the thin ring of law, you will either live the life of a Montana survivalist, or live under the rules of the people who supply the things you can't provide for yourself. You're offering a choice between slavery, pauperdom, and banditry. Since it's going to end in banditry anyway, might as well get ahead of the curve.

[nicole]

In your terms- “merely” degree. Look if your model doesn’t treat differences in human experiences between DPRK and US as salient - it’s not very serious about addressing the human condition.

Degree of severity is a significant thing. And I already acknowledged that some warlords are better than others. My model merely rejects the idea that any of them have a legitimate claim to authority.

This, plus noting (as you have been) that states and anarchy share basically all the same fundamental problems because they are literally the same.

[thoreau]

OK, states and anarchy have the same problems and are literally the same.

I'd like to see fewer people treated inhumanely because of minor crimes. How will anarchy be any better for that end if anarchy and statism have the same problems and are literally the same? Is it just a relabeling of the same problem?

I mean, donations, activism, voting, and so forth might not be terribly effective, but they're probably no worse than relabeling the same system.

[nicole]

OK, states and anarchy have the same problems and are literally the same.

I'd like to see fewer people treated inhumanely because of minor crimes. How will anarchy be any better for that end if anarchy and statism have the same problems and are literally the same? Is it just a relabeling of the same problem?

I mean, donations, activism, voting, and so forth might not be terribly effective, but they're probably no worse than relabeling the same system.

I think I’m suggesting that the rest of you are re-labeling actually-existing anarchy as states because you think that makes something better.

My own personal recommendation as far as what to do is not to have kids. Obviously.

[Eric the .5b]

The point isn't in getting rid of [coercive authority], but as recognizing it as illegitimate and responding on that basis.

So in other words, that long list of complaints you had about the status quo was complete bullshit,, since we're already in anarchy.

But whatever. Go listen to music your parents hate.

[Eric the .5b]

OK, states and anarchy have the same problems and are literally the same.

I'd like to see fewer people treated inhumanely because of minor crimes. How will anarchy be any better for that end if anarchy and statism have the same problems and are literally the same? Is it just a relabeling of the same problem?

I mean, donations, activism, voting, and so forth might not be terribly effective, but they're probably no worse than relabeling the same system.

I think I’m suggesting that the rest of you are re-labeling actually-existing anarchy as states because you think that makes something better.

My own personal recommendation as far as what to do is not to have kids. Obviously.

Edgy.

[nicole]

Yeah, this is definitely not a matter of just going along with things because you’re used to them.

[JasonL]

Totally lost me with the everything is anarchy gotcha. That’s suggesting to me that you are carrying a notion of legitimacy that has no logical coherence and are insisting it’s the only thing that matters.

[thoreau]

Yeah, this is definitely not a matter of just going along with things because you’re used to them.

But not going along with statism would mean accepting anarchy, which gives you a gangster regime that is just like statism...

Is there a red pill that will let me escape this Matrix?

[nicole]

Yeah, this is definitely not a matter of just going along with things because you’re used to them.

But not going along with statism would mean accepting anarchy, which gives you a gangster regime that is just like statism...

Is there a red pill that will let me escape this Matrix?

No. That’s the point. There are only gangster regimes in real life.

KMW mentioned agorism, which I said in my original reply that I have long favored. Just do your thing. Live outside the state to the extent possible. Don’t obey laws you think are dumb if you think you can get away with it. Do what you think is actually right regardless of whether it’s legal or otherwise.

[thoreau]

If you think that I hold up loyalty to the state and its rules as over-riding the prerogative to live as one wants, you need to go read this thread. But the question of how individuals should weight and decide on courses of action is very different from the question of whether it makes sense to abolish something that will immediately be reconstituted.

[nicole]

Totally lost me with the everything is anarchy gotcha. That’s suggesting to me that you are carrying a notion of legitimacy that has no logical coherence and are insisting it’s the only thing that matters.

Well, Hugh has said a couple times it’s not the only thing that matters. But “legitimacy” is typically how people contrast state with nonstate violence. If no theory of political authority actually holds up (e.g., per Huemer), there is no state legitimacy and there’s no moral difference between a state and anyone else.

Which, as I have noted, is widely recognized throughout this thread. I don’t even know that anyone has made reference to justifications for political authority, in all this discussion of “the guys with the most guns are the state.” If you have that insight already, I don’t see what makes you think a state is...anything other than some guys with a bunch of guns.

[JasonL]

But private violence is also just violence and the game is to seek arrangements that mitigate violence from all sides. If any private act, say of violence or theft, can be unjust - the remedy is going to involve violence or threat thereof. If it can’t be than any rule set can exist then it’s just private violence all the time. Oh no we can justifiably put murderers in prisons just means murderers do whatever they want.

[Warren]

Oh no we can justifiably put murderers in prisons just means murderers do whatever they want.

I think I know what you mean, but I don't think you said what you wanted to say here.

[JasonL]

Should be oh no we can’t justifiably imprison murderers.

[Jadagul]

While I disagree with basically every position Nicole is taking in this thread, I think there's something specific that's causing confusion (as opposed to disagreement).

If I read "Debate: be an anarchist, not a minarchist", I read that as a claim that some political system would have better consequences/be more just than some other system. So a lot of people are reading the pro-anarchy as putting forward a concrete political program and trying to figure out what it is.

And I think Hugh and Nicole are rejecting that framework entirely, and arguing that any concrete political program is unjust. And that means that everyone else is confused.

[Kolohe]

If you think that I hold up loyalty to the state and its rules as over-riding the prerogative to live as one wants, you need to go read this thread. But the question of how individuals should weight and decide on courses of action is very different from the question of whether it makes sense to abolish something that will immediately be reconstituted.

That thread was a interesting historical artifact. I might be the only Team System / Clinton voter. (There might be one or two others; there's also definitely some Team System / Trump voters - and Anti Team System / Clinton voters)

[thoreau]

Although I've argued that the local Legitimate Sicilian Businessmen are a de facto government, if you want an interesting argument for a distinction between mobsters and less-undesirable governments, read Systems of Survival by Jane Jacobs. She argues that good/less-bad governments operate by a different system of ethics than well-run businesses, and a healthy society keeps those lines quite clear. Mafias and mafia-like states blur those lines between business and government, with the crime family trying to simultaneously exert coercive power and run a profitable business.

I can't do justice to the whole argument in one paragraph, but it's a fascinating read. She's obviously talking about idealized governments, and freely admits that some of her ideas are influenced by Plato, but I think she brings a useful dimension to the analysis.

That said, the critique of government as force is also an important dimension of analysis. I think it's dangerous to completely neglect it, just as it's dangerous to neglect other angles on something multifaceted like, say, systems of power in human societies.

[Eric the .5b]

And I think Hugh and Nicole are rejecting that framework entirely, and arguing that any concrete political program is unjust. And that means that everyone else is confused.

If they and/or painboy had started with "lulz, we live in anarchy, nothing means anything", we could have saved some time.