You are quite correct. I had not meant to equate the two (I thought that I had clarified in the following statement where I noted them as two different movements, but I can see how it could be misconstrued) Anyway, my gripes with all 3 of these systems are many and not necessarily relevent to this thread. I just take issue with ‘true believers’ of any sort.
Lib- you’ve articulated your position very well in the years I have read your stuff here- don’t agree with you, but respect your attempts at answering tough questions. However, most of the debates involving proponents of political systems that basically advocate the overthrow of our existing system (rather than its modification) fall outside of the realm of rational discourse.
I’ve no problem with a small ‘l’ libertarian, socialist, anarchist, or even communist. There’s nothing wrong with trying to move the debate in a new direction. I do take issue with people who can not be content with the give and take that politics demands to keep society out of violent upheaval.
I’ve also noticed that people that want the overthrow of an existing hierarchy always assume that either
a) they will somehow be one of the new leaders, or else in this new world, no one will try to take control
b) they would actually be left standing, body and property intact, at the end of said revolution (anarchists are the worst for this)
both of these strike me as remarkably arrogant, and after a while, it gets old.
Do what? I couldn’t find that claim on the page, but if it’s there, it’s ludicrous. Libertarianism is not “government-limited capitalism”. In fact, a libertarian political system need not be capitalist at all; capitalism is an economic system. It is as much a mistake to equate libertarianism with anarchy as it is to equate liberalism with communism.
Knowing me all those years, you know that I have never advocated the otherthrow of our system. In fact, I am on record as explicitly opposing it, and have quoted Franz Kafka many times: “Every revolution evaporates, and leaves behind the slime of a new bureaucracy”. I only mention it in case someone takes away from your post that your complaints have anything to do with me.
That’s another thread; start it and link to it and I’ll try to participate.
Stonebow, you might consider me a small-a anarchist. I think socialist anarchism, or something like it, is an ideal that we should keep in mind and try to work toward; at the same time, I recognize that it’s gonna require some extreme changes to society and perhaps human nature in order to achieve it. Specifically, unless most people start harboring as deep a mistrust of authority as I do, t’ain’t gonna happen, and any semi-anarchist society will quickly devolve into a tyranny.
That doesn’t mean that the goal shouldn’t be worked toward: the more people learn to trust their own ethic and mistrust the ethic of leaders, the less chance we have for people to commit large-scale atrocities. But we work toward that goal not by organizing self-defeating “revolutions” or by growing dreadlocks and living in coops and subscribing to the Workers Weekly News, but by dribs and drabs. We educate kids. We work toward social justice. We hold our nose and vote for the least bad candidate, and occasionally get the treat of voting for a good candidate. We talk to people.
When I was younger and naiver, I thought a revolution was the way to go. But when I was sixteen, I realized that wasn’t going to work, and nothing I’ve seen since then has given me any reason to change my mind. Some folks wanna get their reward in heaven, or the worker’s paradise; I prefer to work here on earth.