# Anarchy: What's the deal? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 26, 2009, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656 "2009-09-26T17:17:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2009, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/81 "2009-09-30T23:48:58Z")
> [@DanBlather](#): > > The burden would be on the person who wrote it. But whether it is true or not, the phrasing shows so much bias that it fails to serve as an effective cite for anyone who doesn’t already believe as you do. For example, I could say that “cowardly, mis-informed, and childish protesters who advocate overthrowing the governmental system, utterly alieniated the very working class people that they hope to liberate from tyranny”. Anyone reading that would reasonably infer that I don’t like anarchists and question any factual claims that follow. > > But like the protestors who cover their faces in shame, and the writer of the article, I don’t think you’ll grasp the idea that how you speak and act is as important as the ideas that you propose when you try and influence others. Oh, I grasp all kinds of things. Like, I grasp that that was a thinly veiled insult directed at me. I also grasp that you aren’t really refuting any of the content of the article. You’ve found a supposed bias, and because of that, you think you’ve found justification for ignoring anything else in the article. I grasp that. I also grasp the idea that any bias doesn’t necessarily mean that the facts presented are untrue. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2009, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/82 "2009-09-30T23:51:06Z")
> [@Muffin](#): > > Some people like to go to protests and rallies because they have an opinion that they wish to voice. Some people like to go to protests and rallies because they like to throw rocks at police and damage property. Some of the former would prefer if the latter would find another hobby. > > Too bad for the anarchists that their public persona is defined by violent anarchists. Too bad for the rest of us social activists that we have to suffer anarchist klingons turing up at our protests and rallies. Unfortunately for you, history is well on their side, not yours. You can hardly argue that they’re somehow unfaithful to the ideals of anarchy when violence was a fundamental part of more or less all the originators of it. ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/83 "2009-10-01T00:05:03Z")
I really don’t care why anarchists justify their being violent, or why they and the authorities knock heads. What I care about is that it gets in the way of accomplishing something useful. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/84 "2009-10-01T00:45:40Z")
> [@Muffin](#): > > I really don’t care why anarchists justify their being violent, or why they and the authorities knock heads. What I care about is that it gets in the way of accomplishing something useful. Like what, in an anarchistic context? Is there a nonviolent way to destroy the state and capitalism? (N.B.: Anarchists, unlike Libertarians, are anti-capitalist, small-c communists. “Property is theft!” is a tagline, not of Marx nor of Rand, but of the anarchist Proudhon.) ---
**Author:** ![Never\_Say\_Dice](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ee59a6/32.png) [@Never\_Say\_Dice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Never_Say_Dice)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/85 "2009-10-01T00:51:13Z")
Anarchy is feudalism without the aristocracy. Better. But it’s still feudalism, agrarian and something that works best a hundred years ago. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/86 "2009-10-01T01:30:11Z")
> [@Never\_Say\_Dice](#): > > Anarchy is feudalism without the aristocracy. Better. But it’s still feudalism, agrarian and something that works best a hundred years ago. Disagree completely. Anarchy was a likely choice _before_ agrarian economies settled in, and they are a likely choice in the pan-technological post-agrarian world we’re 7/10 of the way into these days, but it was absolutely totally NOT the structure of choice for the 10,000 years of agricultural society. THOSE years were the province of chiefs, dictators, murderously violent coercive hierarchical societies run by warlords. And scarcity. Lots of scarcity, and harsh scrambling in order to survive, and fighting over and hording the little that was there to be had. All of which was not a central characteristic of the prior hunter-gatherer societies and to an ever-increasing extent does not define the post-agrarian world either. ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/87 "2009-10-01T02:09:57Z")
We are in a post-agrarian world right now. Go dig about for figures on the growth of urban centres in the last century. [About half of all people live in cities.](http://www.ted.com/themes/the_power_of_cities.html)[A billion are squatters now now, with three billion anticipated to be squatters by 2050.](http://www.ted.com/speakers/robert_neuwirth.html) And no Care Bear societies in sight other than a handful of remnant tribes and a few experimental communities. ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/88 "2009-10-01T02:25:58Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > And scarcity. Lots of scarcity, and harsh scrambling in order to survive, and fighting over and hording the little that was there to be had. All of which was not a central characteristic of the prior hunter-gatherer societies . . . Whether or not people share within a family or tribe is immaterial, given the tremendous level of territorial violence often found between tribes. In any event, an urban world of billions of people will not and cannot sustainably revert to hunting and gathering. Nor will taking control of property away from individuals eliminate scarcity; it will do quite the opposite. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/89 "2009-10-01T03:20:17Z")
No one is going to “take control of property (or anyone else) away from individuals”. We’re back to [fucking for virginity](http://www.synaptic.bc.ca/gallery/BombingForPeace.htm), I see. Look, how many times and how many ways can we way it? _ **ANARCHY AIN’T HAPPENING EXCEPT WITH THE FULL AND EAGER VOLUNTARY COOPERATION OF ITS PARTICIPANTS** _. It cannot be established by force. There can’t possibly be any “taking away” nor can there be “overthrowing of” or any of that bullshit desructive macho shit. Real anarchy is more of your barn-raising, baby-sitting coop, fishingtrip without leaders sort of thing, writ large and done with a bit more formal structure perhaps, but no dismantling of the existing system is necessary FIRST… instead, if when and AS anarchic method starts to be a more efficient, more appealing, less cumbersome way of getting things done, people will just gradually rely on it, and less on money and competitive striving and enforced authority as the best way of doing things, until one day it crosses someone’s mind that you just never SEE any of that hierarchy and authority stuff done for serious any more. About as violent as a sunrise. ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/90 "2009-10-01T03:37:23Z")
Seems that a lot of anarchists do not share your vision. But then that’s typical of folks who have visions of utopia. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 6:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/91 "2009-10-01T06:57:57Z")
The anarchist system is not utopian. At least, I don’t see a system that will require that much individual effort and collective work as utopian. ---
**Author:** ![ivan\_astikov](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/58f4c7/32.png) [@ivan\_astikov](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivan_astikov)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 10:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/92 "2009-10-01T10:02:50Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > The anarchist system is not utopian. At least, I don’t see a system that will require that much individual effort and collective work as utopian. You’d rather see the masses continue to mulch grass and produce wool for their owners? ---
**Author:** ![Latro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a87d85/32.png) [@Latro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Latro)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 10:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/93 "2009-10-01T10:13:18Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > Real anarchy is more of your barn-raising, baby-sitting coop, fishingtrip without leaders sort of thing, writ large and done with a bit more formal structure perhaps, but no dismantling of the existing system is necessary FIRST… instead, if when and AS anarchic method starts to be a more efficient, more appealing, less cumbersome way of getting things done, people will just gradually rely on it, and less on money and competitive striving and enforced authority as the best way of doing things, until one day it crosses someone’s mind that you just never SEE any of that hierarchy and authority stuff done for serious any more. > > About as violent as a sunrise. I still don’t get how society is to function, on a bigger than small-village scale. Who will make de DVD players, who will transport Kalamata olives from Greece to my hamlet? IOW how will the world _not_ revert to agrarian levels of the poorest sort? ---
**Author:** ![VarlosZ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d78d45/32.png) [@VarlosZ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VarlosZ)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 11:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/94 "2009-10-01T11:25:39Z")
> [@Latro](#): > > I still don’t get how society is to function, on a bigger than small-village scale. > Who will make de DVD players, who will transport Kalamata olives from Greece to my hamlet? More importantly, who is going to ‘help out’ by agreeing to spend 8 hours a day on the manufacturing line at a plant that produces penicillin? ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 11:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/95 "2009-10-01T11:48:33Z")
> [@ivan\_astikov](#): > > You’d rather see the masses continue to mulch grass and produce wool for their owners? I don’t get it - I certainly haven’t said anything about sheep, so this cryptic statement means what, exactly? ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 11:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/96 "2009-10-01T11:53:35Z")
> [@VarlosZ](#): > > More importantly, who is going to ‘help out’ by agreeing to spend 8 hours a day on the manufacturing line at a plant that produces penicillin? Probably the same sort of people who today go and dig wells in third-world countries. Or build houses for the homeless, or volunteer at shelters. Plus, why would anyone need to work at something as archaic as a manufacturing line? Are the fabbers broken? ---
**Author:** ![Latro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a87d85/32.png) [@Latro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Latro)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 12:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/97 "2009-10-01T12:01:47Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Are the fabbers broken? Yes, and there’s no-one with the knowledge or equipment to fix them. Let alone build new ones.. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/98 "2009-10-01T12:29:31Z")
> [@Latro](#): > > Yes, and there’s no-one with the knowledge or equipment to fix them. Let alone build new ones.. Well, then we’re fucked… ---
**Author:** ![Latro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a87d85/32.png) [@Latro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Latro)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 12:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/99 "2009-10-01T12:36:43Z")
btw, do you know someone who makes 7X92 cartridges? Ammo is running low. Don’t know how much longer we can chase away the bandits. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2009, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656/100 "2009-10-01T12:40:05Z")
> [@ivan\_astikov](#): > > You’d rather see the masses continue to mulch grass and produce wool for their owners? It’s unfortunate that you think being employed necessarily means being an enslaved sheep. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anarchy-whats-the-deal/511656.md?page=6)