That “anarchist faq” is full of fallacies, and deliberate mistranslations/misrepresentations of authors like Proudhoun, Say, etc. that are twisted to meet the author’s agenda. Factories and capital did not fall from the sky to the “haves” while the “have nots” were stuck with nothing. Capital is created by labor, and specifically labor that is geared towards improving future capability to produce as opposed to producing for immediate consumption. What separates laissez faire from state capitalism is that state capitalism coercively controls the process of capitalism for the benefit of a few, while laissez faire serves the consumers, enterpreneurs, and workers as they make choices in the market.
The only people who are “rich” in laissez faire are those who work, save, and defer consumption (and of course who they give gifts or inherit their wealth to).
You are not coerced to work in laissez faire, or use capital that was created by another person’s labor in any way. You may choose to be self sufficient, or you may choose to starve or commit suicide. This is nothing more than the reality of scarcity that is not forced onto you by any human being.
Claiming a right to another man’s capital is claiming a right to another man’s labor, and is a display of a slave driver mentality.
Claiming to be against capitalism is simply to be against the process by which capitalism is formed. If you are truly anticapitalist, you are also anti technology and antiprogress. We came from the jungles because of competition, the division of labor, and deference of consumption driven by self interest; and all of the good things that have come with that (the diminishment of child abuse, abuse of women, etc.) are all because of capitalism.
Anarchism is “without rulers” Anarchocapitalism is just as much anarchism as Herbert Spencer’s Social Darwinist anarchism and Max Stirner’s egoist anarchism, if not more so as anarchocapitalism is more compassionate towards society’s least fortunate. Similarly, Rothbard and Friedman are even less capitalist than Lysander Spooner was on issues like intellectual property.
I changed the thread name to Jon’s suggestion, but some were offended and changed it back. I think we need to take a uniform position now and engage mr1001nights. There’s no point in having the mods war each other.
That assertion about anarcho-syndicalism is pure propaganda. It is capitalists who will shoot you or force you to starve unless you subordinate yourself to their illegitimate power. Anarchism is based on the reduction of hierarchy and the placing of the burden of proof on authority. “Free market” advocates have no such concern for hierarchy. In fact, their whole system is based on bosses. As for the notion that in your “free market society” there “would be plenty of land that they could homestead and live a life on their own” it ignores that land is finite, and in a system based on private ownership and 7 billion human beings, that means excluding many of such ownership. Those people then will have to become wage slaves–having to work for a boss under threat of poverty, starvation or social stigma. A society based on bosses, like the one you advocate is inimical to “workingman associations”. This is due to something that you guys ignore: class interests
If capitalists shoot you or use coercion to make you starve, they are criminals (unless this is in self defense). Otherwise, if you starve because you can’t/don’t want to work for food, it is not the same.
The system of free market is based off of no interference/voluntary interaction.
People choose to work for bosses because they benefit.
I downloaded the 2 as PDFs to take a look - the author isn’t into brevity. I’ve recently been interested in the “pwnership” of the words Libertarian, Anarchist, etc. I’m torn as to conceding words to people simply because, let’s face it, Words mean what the majority think they mean.
I invite mr1001nights to listen to these 4 mp3s (2 hours in all unless you speed them up) about the Industrial Revolution.
I’m a non-archist or anarcho-capitalist. As is practically everyone here? It’s essentially just a battle over the esoteric… [8-)] Of course the socialist clowns are delusional enough to think the state protects property and of course they wish to impose rulers on everyone (thus not being anarchy), how else would they get rid of peoples property? They’re that naive to believe that people will just give it up? Hahah…
Side story: I was out last night and was chatting to this girl, anyway it eventually came out - she called herself as a socialist. I smiled and asked if she was a voluntary or coercive socialist. She ignored it and said she was an anarchist. I asked if she ever thought people would give up their property? She was a bit puzzled and said, “No… I’m not too sure about that.” - Utopian devoid of reality. Thinks all humans are inherently good. As opposed to some good / evil.
Anyway, personally I choose not to bother with the esoteric battle over labels. Traditional socialists have tarnished the anarchy label it. Fine, can keep the label - it doesn’t change nor refute anything though. All the socialists are good at is the esoteric, liberals, libertarians, anarchy, they corrupt everything they touch. [:)] And now you’re trying to do it with anarcho-capitalism. [8-)]
Thanks for ignoring every single one of my posts and addressing NONE of them. You are clearly a tool.
Hmmm, how do you know that coercion is always bad? For instance, using violence to stop me from pressing the button that will destroy the world. Or, using violence to get someone to do something that saves other people. Wait, what about coercing a rich guy to give to the poor?
Ugh, this probably isn’t a good argument. I guess I am too persistant in trying to criticize arachno-capitalism.
You have it backwards buddy, it is coercion that maintains capitalist property (as opposed to the non-exploitative property I favor). Your whole system is based on coercion and would quickly lead to a state. The very origin of the state lies in disparities of wealth
I think we’re all just waiting to see more of your Marxist screed which you’ve gussied up in the disguise of anarchism. We want to see how much longer you can hold out on providing any evidence whatsoever for your oft-refuted gimblebabble. And it’s not that you’ve even shown the slightest bit of competence in both formulating and explicating your position–not in the least; you’ve simply become a squeaky toy for some to play with until they get bored.
So is yours. Or can anyone come and take whatever they will from your society, regardless of their contributions? No? Then you have a form of property rights, just as “coercive” as any other, “buddy”.
Wait, you have it backwards. Coercion doesn’t maintain a person’s property rights, it invalidates it. The system of the free market is based on voluntary interaction, not coercion. The origin of the state lies in some people coercing others and turning the masses into sheepie.
always? use of force is acceptible as a response to initiation of force. The button: You’ve demonstrated that you will initiate force.
Saves other people from what? How do you know that what the someone you’re forcing wasn’t going to save them in some other way? How do you know they aren’t in the middle of saving someone else? Who are you to define their values for them as to whom to save, and what methods to use, etc? The rich guy giving to the poor? Could be his favorite charity is wildlife in alaska or that he doesn’t consider people in the US poor and instead donates to african causes… Could be the money you’re taking from him to give to the poor was going to be part of a water purification investment that would decrease the cost of water to 3rd world nations by a factor of 10.
You are morally wrong for forcing your values on him, and you are ignoring Hazlitt’s one lesson as well - “What good things are you precluding by your intervention?”
Capitalists and their state (or private thugs like Blackwater, the Pinkertons etc) will shoot workers if they try to exert worker’s control of the workplace and the economy, or gain unconditional access to food and shelter. Capitalist control of the means of production entails coercion, because it results in many people having to work for a boss under threat of starvation. As my video shows, working to gain one’s sustenance in nature is not the same as having to work for a boss.
Market system is based on greed, bosses and hierarchy
the “benefit” in the sense that otherwise they face starvation, poverty or social stigma i.e. in the sense that someone getting hit with a hammer would benefit if someone instead offers to hit him with a stick. It’s a coercive set of choices
Do not have a source for it off the top of my head, but I am sure you can find one with a bit of searching. It is night time in the western hemisphere, just go outside and look up and tell me what you see.
“But we can’t get there yet!” Well, it used to be that Europeans could not get to America. And that you could not build houses on a swamp. But here I am, sitting in a house built in a swamp in America. How? Because people labored to build capital, sail across the sea, walk across the country, drain the swamp, and build a house.
ad hominem, strawman, and poisoning the well.
and also
you are just an apolagist for the union boss who is robbing my pockets
The change in property relations leading to “proletarization”of the work force, described as the shift toward dependence on wages for support,played a very important role in the modern consolidation of the nation-state structure. The close link between property and the state has been noted by many outstanding thinkers. For example John Locke, who in 1690 wrote that “[t]he great and chief end…of men’s uniting into commonwealths, and putting themselves under government, is the preservation of their property”[85] or Adam Smith who described how “…as the necessity of civil government gradually grows up with the acquisition of valuable property, so the principal causes which naturally introduce subordination gradually grow up with the growth of that valuable property… Wherever there is great property there is great inequality. For one very rich man there must be at least five hundred poor, and the affluence of the few supposes the indigence of the many. The affluence of the rich excites the indignation of the poor, who are often both driven by want, and prompted by envy, to invade his possessions…The appropriation of herds and flocks which introduced an inequality of fortune was that which first gave rise to regular government. Till there be property there can be no government, the very end of which is to secure wealth, and to defend the rich from the poor”.This tight link between property and state was also noted by John Jay (who repeatedly said that “Those who own the country ought to govern it,”)and by US Founding Father James Madison, who said that government “…ought to be so constituted as to protect the minority of the opulent against the majority.”
