# Giraffe: tag, you're it. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [July 17, 2009, 7:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315 "2009-07-17T07:33:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/61 "2009-07-18T04:22:06Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Hmm, let us see. Been around for about a month- BUT with 200+ posts and already PITing established members? That is not the hallmark of a newb. :dubious: 😕 Pit is not an acronym. Why would you write it like that? It’s just “Pitting”. Yes, I’m being nitpicky, but that’s just so weird I can’t let it pass. ---
**Author:** ![SmashTheState](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@SmashTheState](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmashTheState)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/62 "2009-07-18T04:41:39Z")
> [@AuntiePam](#): > > Interesting. Would you give an example of an institution that exists to remove freedom – especially the last part, the conditioning? And explain how they do it. > > (Seriously. I’m just trying to understand what you’re saying.) The basis of anarchism is simple. The word “anarchy” comes from the Greek word “anarkos,” which means, literally, “without rulers.” It does not mean without rules, without laws, or without order. In fact the most common anarchist symbol, the A inside of the O, symbolizes an aphorism originated by Proudhon, “Anarchy is Order.” There are many extant anarchist societies which exist today. The Yanomani and the Hopi, for example, have had stable, peaceful, orderly, and anarchist societies for millenia, where they have tribal elders whose word is often followed because it’s good advice, but who have no formal ruling authority. Early US communities in the northeast were anarchic; people gathered in town hall meetings and voted by direct democracy with simple show of hands on which laws and rules they wished to live by. Yet despite the clear, historic success of anarchism, I am constantly confronted by people who deny that anarchism can possibly exist, and believe with all their hearts that the instant rule by authority is removed, people will be raping and murdering each other in the street – despite the fact that rape and murder in the street happens NOW, even _with_ tyrannical oppression! I am informed that, despite the fact that humanity was largely anarchic for 2 million years prior to the rise of agrarianism, human nature requires authority and rulership. People are being taught by those who rule us that without their rule we will descend into
 well, anarchy. It’s interesting to note that before the word “anarchy” was used to denote chaos and lawlessness, the word “democracy” used to be used for the same purpose. As in, someone might say, “You can’t have a community without police, there’d be sheer _democracy_!” So how are people being taught this? It’s a death of a thousand cuts. Almost everything to which you are exposed, from advertising and television to school and books and magazines teaches people that authority is good. Police send Officer Friendly or McGruff the Crime Dog to schools to teach children that the men with guns and truncheons, who enforce rules to which the children never agreed, are their friends. From national anthems to the pledge of allegiance, we are immersed in nationalist and authoritarian rhetoric, literally from the day we are born. We are told that the Earth’s resources belong to those with pieces of paper – given to them by like-minded individuals – giving them some kind of metaphysical “ownership” over it. We are told that it’s okay that some are wealthy beyond the dreams of Croesus at the same time that 27,000 children die every single day from easily preventable causes (like shitting themselves to death, which could be cured with a half-penny worth of glucose) because some human beings are born more valuable than others – and that, for some strange reason, those who are worthy seem more often to be born white and male. You are taught to obey the teacher, and those who disobey are punished for it – or worse yet, the entire class is punished for it, in order to bring peer pressure to bear on those who defy authority. You are taught to obey police, obey the government, obey your boss, obey God, obey obey obey. Those who do not obey are troublemakers and malcontents. In court, I am told I must remove my hat and stand out of respect for the State and a system of oppressive enforcement I find morally, philosophically, politically, and aesthetically abhorrent. I have been threatened with violence and imprisonment when I have politely refused. It is instructive to understand the basis of fascism. The traditional symbol of fascism and the origin of the term is the fasces, a Roman symbol of authority consisting of a bundle of unform-length sticks bound to the handle of an axe. It symbolizes strength through unformity and conformity, the vicious authority of the axehead empowered by branches sheared to a unified procrustean length and fettered cheek-by-jowl in bondage. This archetypal symbol of authority has been used for centuries, and is found almost everywhere – including US coinage and the Oval Office. When I use Amerika (or Kanada, or Mexiko, or Demokrats, or Republikans), I am attempting to illustrate the fact that the basis of all authority is essentially fascist, the philosophy that strength is created by the subservience and conformity of the small and weak to a single strong and dominant patriarch. I am claiming forthrightly and that these organizations are fascist in character and fascist in nature, in a very literal and concrete sense. You ask me where this institutionalization of fascism originates. Every popular movie from Lord of the Rings to Terminator is about the glory of kings and rulers, and how a strong white man will save us from evil and folly. Half the shows on telebision are about the nobility of white men with guns and truncheons protecting the property of the rich. Where a “liberal” alternative to these exist, it’s all about how we must politely request the bad people stop being bad, and if they won’t
 why, we must request they stop again, in a very stern tone of voice! We are told that no matter how many people are hurt or killed, no matter how many must live their lives in misery as a result, we must never rock the boat or challenge the essential _authority_ of those responsible. The only choice we are allowed is to request that authority please stop being so mean. This is by no means a modern phenomenon either; Kropotkin in his autobiography discusses the same thing: “I read the Social Democratic newspapers, I saw their disgusting attitude towards anything that bore even the slightest revolutionary character, and I realized that there could be no reconciliation between a revolutionary party and a party trying to earn a reputation for ‘moderation’ in the eyes of the government and the bourgeoisie.” This very forum is a good example of society in microcosm. We are told that our behaviour is rigidly constrained for the good of all by a small cabal in positions of authority by right of the fact that they have a piece of paper which gives them “ownership” of the physical media on which this forum exists. But because they know that such rigid oppression produces friction, and that sufficient friction will make the machinery break, they provide a “BBQ Pit” where speech is regulated slightly less – though still constrained, and subject to censorship and banishment by sole decision of those with authority. Within this very narrow slice of partial freedom, we see a vicious wolfpack mentality where those who fall sufficiently outside the groupthink are savaged and mocked, not necessarily to deter those who are being mocked (because these outsiders are generally either strong enough after a lifetime of bucking authority not to be fazed by this sort of mockery or broken by same and no longer even aware of it) but to deter those whose beliefs fall outside the accepted norm, but who are not masochistic or broken enough to admit it in public. Did someone consciously put this self-regulating, self-enforcing institution together for the explicit purpose of manufacturing oppression? No, of course not. But the structure of oppression is implicit in its form, and complicit in its function. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/63 "2009-07-18T06:17:24Z")
> [@SmashTheState](#): > > This “newb’s” first modem was 110 baud, was the size of a toaster oven, and had an acoustic coupler for the bakelite telephone handset. I was bickering online with aspies and Randroids on Fido 15 years before SD existed. Believe it or not, the mutual admiration society around here didn’t invent the Internet. You’re new _here_, or so your profile sez. :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Carrot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f0a364/32.png) [@Captain\_Carrot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Carrot)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 6:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/64 "2009-07-18T06:47:29Z")
Smash, the problem is not with your politics. The problem is that you’re a dick. ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 8:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/65 "2009-07-18T08:19:33Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > You’re new _here_, or so your profile sez. :dubious: You know, if you don’t like him, fine. But your suggestion that he’s an old member returning as a sock is pretty fucking stupid. There’s no evidence for it, and he clearly has a style all his own. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 9:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/66 "2009-07-18T09:24:08Z")
**Smash** , a question: how do your political opinions differ from **Psychonaut’s** , as explained in [this](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=519493)thread? ---
**Author:** ![Cicero](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cicero/32/3594_2.png) [@Cicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cicero)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 9:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/67 "2009-07-18T09:49:45Z")
His political opinions seem pretty similar to **Haymarket Martyr.** ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 9:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/68 "2009-07-18T09:55:48Z")
Sorry, don’t remember him. Can I have a link? ---
**Author:** ![Cicero](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cicero/32/3594_2.png) [@Cicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cicero)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 10:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/69 "2009-07-18T10:03:23Z")
[Here](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=512984&highlight=haymarket) is one thread. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 10:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/70 "2009-07-18T10:16:02Z")
Huh. I don’t see \*\*STS \*\*as being opposed to killing cops. ---
**Author:** ![Cicero](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cicero/32/3594_2.png) [@Cicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cicero)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 10:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/71 "2009-07-18T10:21:37Z")
Oh- I didn’t mean identical. Just similar in some comments. ---
**Author:** ![SmashTheState](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@SmashTheState](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmashTheState)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 10:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/72 "2009-07-18T10:36:37Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > Huh. I don’t see \*\*STS \*\*as being opposed to killing cops. I have no objection to police, only to a professional police class who has more rights than I do. Greeks used “vigilantes” (which is where we get the term), ordinary citizens who took turns patrolling the streets and maintaining order. The early police force in New York City was entirely volunteer. ---
**Author:** ![Harborwolf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@Harborwolf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harborwolf)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 11:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/73 "2009-07-18T11:03:33Z")
> [@SmashTheState](#): > > Yet despite the clear, historic success of anarchism, I am constantly confronted by people who deny that anarchism can possibly exist, and believe with all their hearts that the instant rule by authority is removed, people will be raping and murdering each other in the street – despite the fact that rape and murder in the street happens NOW, even _with_ tyrannical oppression! I am informed that, despite the fact that humanity was largely anarchic for 2 million years prior to the rise of agrarianism, human nature requires authority and rulership. Right. The idea that without “tyranny” we would descend into raping and pillaging is totally ridiculous. Your idea that society would be perfectly fine if we dropped the tyranny and broke up into small groups of individualized societies is far more realistic.:dubious: I find your ideas fascinating and would subscribe to your newsletter if newsletters weren’t simply just another way for the fascists to oppress the independence of ones own thoughts. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 11:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/74 "2009-07-18T11:21:52Z")
> [@SmashTheState](#): > > The Yanomani and the Hopi, for example, have had stable, peaceful, orderly, and anarchist societies for millenia, where they have tribal elders whose word is often followed because it’s good advice, but who have no formal ruling authority. [Peaceful, eh?](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ya%CC%A7nomam%C3%B6) > [@](#): > > Historically more than a third of the Ya̧nomamö males, on average, died from warfare.[3] Chagnon claimed that Men who participated in killings had more wives and children than those who did not[1]. However, many criticized Chagnon’s data as it is impossible to confirm. Some Ya̧nomamö men, however, reflected on the futility of their feuds and made it known that they would have nothing to do with the raiding.[1] These findings, originally reported by Chagnon, have been empirically replicated several times.[4] > > The accounts of missionaries to the area have recounted constant infighting in the tribes for women or prestige, and evidence of continuous warfare for the enslavement of neighboring tribes such as the Macu before the arrival of European settlers and government. > > Violence among the Ya̧nomamö is often domestic, with women commonly beaten by their husbands in disputes. The violence is seen as an act of love by the women, however. Women will shave their head after a beating to show off their bumps. They will even put a red dusting on the bump showing it off even further. I actually met Napolean Chagnon in college. Not only are you a troll, you are an ill-informed troll. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![ashman165](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8e8cbc/32.png) [@ashman165](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ashman165)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/75 "2009-07-18T12:21:48Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > [Peaceful, eh?](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ya%CC%A7nomam%C3%B6) > I actually met Napolean Chagnon in college. > > Not only are you a troll, you are an ill-informed troll. > > Regards, > Shodan Well, I was his gay lover. Beat that. ---
**Author:** ![SmashTheState](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@SmashTheState](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmashTheState)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/76 "2009-07-18T12:44:59Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > [Peaceful, eh?](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ya%CC%A7nomam%C3%B6) > I actually met Napolean Chagnon in college. > > Not only are you a troll, you are an ill-informed troll. Before you make snide comments about others being ill-informed, perhaps you should make certain that it’s not _you_ in need of better education. What we call the Yanomani are actually several tribes of very different people. It is the highland people, the Siapa Yanomani, to whom I refer. I quote from Napoleon Chagnon: _“The most startling difference is the degree to which violence and warfare – and the consequences of these – distinguish highland and lowland groups from each other. Warfare is much more highly developed and chronic in the lowlands.”_ And from Patrick Tierney’s Darkness in El Dorado: _“Chagnon was initially astonished at how peaceful the Siapa Yanomani were compared with lowland groups. [
] The Siapa mountain villages differ so much from ‘the Fierce People’ that they appear to belong to a separate tribe altogether.”_ Perhaps you’d care to reconsider your position? ---
**Author:** ![aldiboronti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@aldiboronti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aldiboronti)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 12:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/77 "2009-07-18T12:53:32Z")
> [@SmashTheState](#): > > Greeks used “vigilantes” (which is where we get the term) No, we didn’t. Originally a member of a US vigilance committee the word’s earliest known appearance is this one: > [@](#): > > 1856 C. NORDHOFF Man-of-War Life xv. 255 The second day after the expiration of their liberty, notice was given the vigilantes, ashore, that five dollars reward would be paid for every man of the crew rendered on board. It comes directly from the word _vigilant_ which comes ultimately from the Latin vigilant-, vigilans, pres. pple. of _vigilare_ to keep awake, Info from the OED. As you can see the term has no connection to the Greek whatsoever. Unless, of course, you have authoritative cites to back your assertion up? ---
**Author:** ![SmashTheState](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@SmashTheState](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmashTheState)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 1:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/78 "2009-07-18T13:08:26Z")
> [@aldiboronti](#): > > Info from the OED. As you can see the term has no connection to the Greek whatsoever. Unless, of course, you have authoritative cites to back your assertion up? You are correct on the etymology of the term – it comes from Latin, not Greek – however, this is beside the point I was making, that the Greeks had no professional police class whatsoever. _One of the most remarkable features of Athenian democracy is the extent to which legal services themselves (dispute resolution and enforcement) were the province of civil society rather than of the state. Laws were passe by the state (or at any rate through the state, via popular referendum), and applied by governmental courts (manned by juries). But there were no police, and no public prosecutors. All suits were treated as civil suits, prosecuted by the victim; offenses against the community as a whole were prosecuted by self-selected individuals on behalf of the larger society, rather like class-action suits today. (No distinction between crimes and torts was recognised.) And even before coming to court, litigants were asked to seek private arbitration, thus exhausting all avenues within civil society before turning to the state (rather the opposite of today’s practice)._ – **Roderick T. Long** , Associate Professor of Philosophy at Auburn University _“Most of the major tasks of policing – investigation, apprehension, prosecution, and even in some cases enforcement of court decisions – fell to the citizens themselves. For private initiative and self-help were the rule. 
 Here punitive enforcement is not the result of coercion by a central authority but of autonomous self-regulation on the part of the community. 
 For many of the functions that the modern state now entrusts to bureaucracy, police, or judiciary were embedded in a variety of social institutions 
”_ – **Hunter, Virginia J.** 1994. Policing Athens: Social Control in the Attic Lawsuits, 420-320 B.C. Princeton University Press, Princeton. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/79 "2009-07-18T13:43:11Z")
> [@SmashTheState](#): > > Before you make snide comments about others being ill-informed, perhaps you should make certain that it’s not _you_ in need of better education. What we call the Yanomani are actually several tribes of very different people. It is the highland people, the Siapa Yanomani, to whom I refer. I quote from Napoleon Chagnon: > > _“The most startling difference is the degree to which violence and warfare – and the consequences of these – distinguish highland and lowland groups from each other. Warfare is much more highly developed and chronic in the lowlands.”_ > > And from Patrick Tierney’s Darkness in El Dorado: > > _“Chagnon was initially astonished at how peaceful the Siapa Yanomani were compared with lowland groups. [
] The Siapa mountain villages differ so much from ‘the Fierce People’ that they appear to belong to a separate tribe altogether.”_ > > Perhaps you’d care to reconsider your position? No, I am just fine. > [@](#): > > I trekked for seventeen days into the Siapa Highlands with a Brazilian malaria-control worker, Marinho De Souza
 > > In articles and in interviews, Chagnon had said that the Siapa Yanomami were healthy, well fed, and peaceful. Here, in the tribe’s unspoiled heartland, steel goods were scarce, and the homicide rate among men was much lower than it was in the lowlands along the Orinoco. > > What De Souza and I discovered, however, was a fearful, broken society
 > > At Narimobowei-teri, the first village that Chagnon’s helicopter had damaged, men with drawn arrows greeted us, fearing that we were enemy raiders. [Cite.](http://www.wwnorton.com/trade/external/tierney/newyorker.htm) The Dorita-teri village is located in the highlands ([cite](http://www.nytimes.com/books/first/t/tierney-dorado.html)). > [@](#): > > Despite their previous acquaintance, the Dorita-teri were not enthusiastic about seeing Chagnon and Brewer again. The village headman, Harokoiwa, greeted them with an ax. 
 > > Later they shot arrows into a palm effigy of the film’s anthropologist—Napoleon Chagnon. > > ``` > Now, on Chagnon's return, the headman began swinging his ax tantalizingly close to the anthropologist's head. Harokoiwa yelled that he did not want outsiders to poison any more rivers, a reference to Brewer's huge open-pit gold mines on Indian lands. > > Suddenly, one of the chief's sons, wielding another ax, rushed Chagnon. > > ``` Ah yes, the carefree, idyllic life of the anarchist - hunting, fishing, attacking people with axes. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![SmashTheState](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@SmashTheState](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmashTheState)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315/80 "2009-07-18T13:56:45Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > Ah yes, the carefree, idyllic life of the anarchist - hunting, fishing, attacking people with axes. So what? You’ll find violence everywhere on Earth, with or without freedom, with or without tyranny. No one has ever claimed that anarchism is Utopian. Human beings will remain human beings. The important part which you seem to be deliberately trying to obfuscate is that the Yanomani live in a brutal environment where starvation is a constant threat – and yet the anarchist Siapa Yanomani of the highlands are so much more peaceful than the lowlanders that the anthropologists who study them can hardly believe they’re the same tribe. And what’s even more astonishing is that the highland people have even worse conditions with less food than those in the lowlands. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/giraffe-tag-youre-it/503315.md?page=5)