If I may clarify the purpose of this thread’s posting it is this: I am condemning the Anarchist MOVEMENT! Not anarchism as a theory and a whole, although I believe social anarchism is unrealistic and will lead to chaos.
i’m 100% for it.
taxation and fraudulent money systems are some of the roots of monopoly government power.
Exactly! Death Wish of the Anarcho-Communists.
“Yea, way to go - an article from a pre-anarchist Rothbard! Pre-anarchist Rothbard refutes anarchist Rothbard - sigh.”
It doesn’t actually do that. And he sounds pretty non-archistic to me. [;)]
Thus, the libertarian will usually reply: “Well, I believe in a limited government, the government being limited to the defense of the person or property or the individual against invasion by force or fraud.” I have tried to show in my article, “The Real Aggressor” in the April 1954 Faith and Freedom that this leaves the conservative helpless before the argument “necessary for defense,” when it is used for gigantic measures of statism and bloodshed. There are other consequences equally or more grave. The statist can pursue the matter further: “If you grant that it is legitimate for people to band together and allow the State to coerce individuals to pay taxes for a certain service – “defense” – why is it not equally moral and legitimate for people to join in a similar way and allow the State the right to provide other services – such as post offices, “welfare,” steel, power, etc.? If a State supported by a majority can morally do one, why not morally do the others?” I confess that I see no answer to this question. If it is proper and legitimate to coerce an unwilling Henry Thoreau into paying taxes for his own “protection” to a coercive state monopoly, I see no reason why it should not be equally proper to force him to pay the State for any other services, whether they be groceries, charity, newspapers, or steel. We are left to conclude that the pure libertarian must advocate a society where an individual may voluntarily support none or any police or judicial agency that he deems to be efficient and worthy of his custom.
That’s not entirely true, as much as I am critical of Chomsky and Zinn (and don’t consider them anarchists). They tend to criticize socialism if it is not “democratic” – thus are opposed to such regimes.
Nope, this stuff is easy to look up.
Thomas DiLorenzo on Zinn:
A first priority of all totalitarians is to rewrite their country’s history in order to make their “leadership” appear to be indispensable to the nation’s very survival. Thus, perhaps the most widely-used American history text in today’s universities is A People’s History of the United States, by Howard Zinn. Published without a single source citation, Zinn informs today’s college students that Maoist China, where tens of millions of innocent civilians were murdered by their own government, was “the closest thing” in all of history “to a people’s government, independent of outside control.” Castro’s Cuba “holds no bloody record of suppression,” Zinn writes, in another fantastic lie. http://www.lewrockwell.com/dilorenzo/dilorenzo81.html
Chomsky is even easier to look up: http://www.paulbogdanor.com/200chomskylies.pdf
See, statements like this are simply false. I have an anarcho-collectivist friend who is essentially an agorist. The claim that social anarchists are by defacto closet statists is simply false, and you’re spreading ignorance.
If he supports private property as agorists do, then he’s not an anarcho-collectivist. All social anarchists oppose private property. How many times do we have to go through this?
You seem to accept a false dichotomy or a non-sequitor in which if we are anti-capitalist, we must be statist by default. Well, sorry to break it to you, but there are plenty of anti-capitalists who abhor the state. Stereotypes don’t do you well.
Show me a single anti-capitalist who consistently opposes state intervention of any kind and supports private property.
When you make such over the top claims, you put yourself in a position in which you are no better than Mr1001Nights and the infoshop types, and it generally has the effect of feeding the confusion and flamewars.
Saying that social anarchists oppose private property is now an “over the top” claim? Good god man, that’s the root of their whole philosophy. Have you read any of their literature? Or even that silly FAQ? Geez louise.
Sure. If you want to create a mass action movement, you need to create a class consciousness, an “us” vs. “them” mentality. We are the exploited, they are the exploiters ripping us off. When it comes to taxes, everyone knows they’re being ripped off. Government spending makes up 40-60% of the GDP. Almost everyone thinks that’s too high. And it’s easy to tell who the taxpayer and the taxconsumer are. Taxpayers are everyday workers, entrepreneurs, and businessmen. Taxconsumers are public secter, welfare recipiants, and GM. In any public debate it immediately puts statists on the defensive. It’s very easy to explain to taxpayers how they are being ripped off and others are living off of their hard work and sweat. It’s not so easy to try explain libertarian legal theory or ABCT. It’s very easy to engage in ad hominems against opponents. Statists like to portray opponents of tax as “narrowly self-interested” and lacking a “social conscience” because it would lead to lower spending on social programs. To counter you just have to point out that they’re income comes from taxes (in almost all cases) and that rather than arguing for a lower income for haves and a larger income for have-nots, they are really arguing for a larger income for themselves and a lower income for everyone else. Also, every excuse given to raise taxes can be used as a justification to lower taxes. If one wants to help the poor, they should stop forcing them to pay social security, and eliminate the sales tax so the few dollars they have can go further. If one wants to help starving africans, eliminate trade barriers and domestic subsidization. It’s easy to argue against government programs from the veiwpoint of the taxpayers because they always seem to use the most inefficient and wasteful method of accomplishing the goals of the program.
Why do you need to assume ignorance on behalf of the capitalists? I’m sorry that I’m not too keen on siding with anti capitalist hacks, who’ve no clue of economics, it’s capitalism that allows these fools to entertain these ridiculous notions of equality and stateless communism. Fortunately their ideas will never be given a chance, they’re marginalized for all the correct reasons. Nonetheless, I don’t want to side with the people that want to destroy civilization in the name of fighting the “man” or any such nonsense.
There is a dichotomy, you’re either a capitalist or an anarchist. You either believe in a society exemplified by inequality and authoritarianism or you choose to use force in the name of equality, destroying civilization and bringing society down to their level.
You’re correct. Such conflict is a joke, it’s a shame the leftists waste the time of everybody with their vitrolic, unscholarly blog posts, and their self published books.
This may be true about some AnCaps, but the thing with all social anarchist, as I have seen, is that they are ignorant of workings of the real world.
What do you expect? They haven’t left their parents basement in years.
Lol! But Seriously does anybody met any social anarchist that weren’t college kids, hippies, or social misfits looking for a trend to follow?
Of course not, socialist anarchists don’t exist off the internet. They’re too busy over at the forums of the libertarian left complaining about us “right libertarians”.
What the hell is social anarchism? Free market is a social system by means of cooperation in the division of labor. It’s the reason you even have a social world at all (and do not where it doesn’t exist). And is not “authoritarian” either. Inequality (which is a fact of all systems) and authoritarianism are not the same thing. That’s why the idiots who think market monopolies exist are dead wrong. There’s no authoritarianism but the use of force to prevent competition/cooperation. Some of you just love being extremists just to get people’s goat. You’re not working from economics or fact (and surely not experience in the world), but fantasies.
If that was a sincere question, here is the answer: Social anarchism are anarchist schools of thought that base there ideal society on socialist economics. The main tenets are mutualism, communism, syndicalism, primitivism.
Hoppe has recognized that “anarcho-capitalism” is just consistent liberalism, or in other words - liberalism with its flaws removed (i.e. the state and democracy).
And this is why we true liberals (ancaps.) shouldn’t work with those people.
Amen! [;)]
As soon as possible…
Nick, I believe you need to refresh yourself with a dose of Harry Browne’s “How I Found Freedom in an Unfree World”. I think it’s out of print, but can be downloaded to a pdf or html file from their website. Google it.
I don’t have to worry my head about how you practice or believe your anarchism, nor do you need to concern yourself over how I function in my beliefs or practices. That doesn’t mean we can’t sharpen each other’s perspectives. That’s what we’re doing here on the forum.
But my anarchism doesn’t revolve around an “Anarchist Movement” or any other “movement”. I’m a sovereign state. I get robbed every day by the parasite statists, but I have that built into my cost of sovereignty. I didn’t even have to rush out and vote for Ron Paul in last year’s dog and pony show for the sheeple, called an “election”. Much as I like the man personally and philosophically, I didn’t get intimidated into “registering” with the white man so I could “vote” for him.
If I lived in Mexico or Costa Rica I’d have the same costs to pay, so I’ll stay right here with my family and friends. Slowly but surely some of them are seeing my example and beginning to look into the idea. But G-d deliver me from any “movement”.
The real sad thing is that before we came along, the social anarchist would fight with each other. Accussing one another of not being "real anarchist.
I’m beggining to use the term agorist.