h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

A slight change would give you "society is a state where you give up SOME freedom in order to have SOME safety".

It would be nice if everyone was nice and we could have a state of happy anarchy. But clearly, not everybody is nice and some people are out and out maniacs. The majority of us require some degree of protection from the excesses of the worst of us. It would be good to have a sensible balance though.

Thats the thing. People don't trust each other to behave in a civilised manner. Of course if someone were a lunatic then no Government or law could stop them attacking you. But then maybe lunatics themselves are simply products of modern society. I have read much anarchist and communist theory and they all agree that the inequality and injustice created by a ruling class (a government in a republic) are the major causes of stealing and violence.

What do I believe? I'm afraid I have to be an optimist so I don't think that there is any such thing as a bad person. Evil is simply a creation of society.

A great source of information is a free book I found on the Internet called 'Now and Then: The ABC of Communist Anarchy'. You can find this at [url removed by moderator]

You need to read the house rules - I'm afraid you're about to be further oppressed, by the moderators, for posting a link in a forum. Pop the link on your personal space instead, and tell us to look there.

Also: if Evil is simply a product of society, who made society? Would that not be people again?

Society really just happens. If there is a ruling class, power can be an incredibly corrupting force, probably more so than money and even people with the best intentions can become tyrannical forces. If there is no ruling class then power cannt corrupt people. Furthermore if money and profits are done away with the other great corrupting force will be abolished.

Anyway...aaaarrrrrggggghhhhhhh. I keep on forgetting where I am within this crazy h2g2-shaped universe. Is that a frog!? I was trying to write in GuideML at the beginning of this forum and I'm just so confused.

The link is on my user page... now.

Going back to the whole murder law thing: If the law was abolished would you then go about murdering people?

The truth is that Anarchism is largely faith. People haven't been truly free for several thousands of years so it would be difficult to completely accurately predict how humans will behave with absolute freedom. The people of Russia were living in anarchy for a few months while the revolution was happening and it was a period of great friendship between the workers but then the dictatorship occured and everything went a bit pear-shaped, to put it bluntly.

The fact is that some people blindly believe in God. Anarchists, however, much less blindly believe in people.

There you have it Pipe! Society just happens. It seems to be part of the nature of humans to form a clot. We stick together in large lumps and the lumps get bigger. We start with little families that grow into bigger families and the next thing you know we have tribes - on and on it goes, with the clot getting bigger and more complex and more in need of regulation. So what are you suggesting? We should fight our basic nature? Each individual should somehow, independently get the urge to fight their basic nature (because it's not something you could force people to do)?

Just suppose a bunch of what you might perceive to be "right thinking people" go off and live in the wilderness - they have no hierarchy, they're self-sufficient, they do their own thing, harm no-one and are answerable to no-one. How long before some more organised, hierarchical group came along to take them over, take all they've worked for and possibly kill them if they resist?

Bear in mind that there are currently more than 6 billion of us on the planet and that number's growing. You would like us all to live in a free, anarchist way - each individual responsible for their own actions, each individual finding a way of earning a living by ... what? hunting, gathering, cottage industries, bartering? And presumably, nobody is responsible for sorting out murderers and robbers. How's it going to work?

No such anarchy occured in Russia as there was always a leader. Anyway society needs law s to function as learning by your mistakes is fundamental and the consequences of breaking the law does this.

>I have read much anarchist and communist theory and they all agree that the inequality and injustice created by a ruling class (a government in a republic) are the major causes of stealing and violence.<

What's the alternative. It's human nature to be greedy. In a capitalist republic, the greed of one person is balanced against the greed of another. Everyone pretty much knows how to get ahead, and they understand that if they want to get ahead they have to play by the rules.

When the communists took over Russia, we saw what greed does when it isn't checked. The powerful concentrated power and wealth, and they oppressed and/or murdered the rest.

I suspect the same thing would happen in anarchy. When unbridled by law, the strong would simply take what they wanted. People would band together for protection. Stronger members would take over the groups. Power would be concentrated, and the weak would be oppressed.

To pinch a line from Jerry Pournelle and Larry Niven: The strong take what they will, and the weak endure what they must.

If you want to read more of my rambling on the subject, Asteroid Lil and I discussed this some in my space.

For a few brief days after the usurping of the Tsar, there was an anarchy. Then a provisional government was installed, which was subsequently overthrown because the people didn't like that either. Following this there was anarchy. The people started working together to begin production, without the help of any government but soon ran into problems, simply because they had not prepared well enough for the revolution. That is one of the principle reasons why the dictatorship was allowed to form.

With regards to greed being part of human nature: Anarchists would argue that greed is either completely created by capitalism and inequality, or at least vastly accentuated under these conditions. It wasn't the communists who revolted, as such. The people were simply fed up with the awful conditions they were suffering under the present regime and decided to have a revolution. At that point there were many different theories and parties explaining what they thought the country should do. There was even one group who simply denied that this was actually a revolution on the grounds that Russia was not under the conditions for which Karl Marx predicted the revolution. There were two factions who garnered the strongest support - the Communist Anarchists, who wanted to abolish government altogether, and the Bolsheviks, who follwed Marxist teachings and wanted to instate a dictatorship for the people or a 'Proletarian dictatorship'. The anarchists were a small party of limited means but they became very popular because the people really believed in their ideas. The Bolsheviks were a very large party who spread their propaganda all across the country. They even pretended to hold some anarchist ideals, having seen how popular they were, in order to get into power. Animal Farm by George Orwell is a very good account of the events. The animals rid themselves of the capitalist farmer and were very happy to begin with, while no one held power, then the pigs gradually took control and very soon the animals were being oppressed by capitalism again. The Bolsheviks believed themselves to be communist but what they actually instigated was merely state-controlled capitalism.

With regards the law and learning from mistakes: People who go to prison usually come out more bitter and twisted than they went in. In countries where rehabilitation is used for young offenders, rather than prison sentences, the percentage of re-offenders is cut by around 40%.

Salamander: I don't believe in mutualist anarchy (everyone working for themselves). I believe in communist anarchy, in which people work together to produce necessary items. Communist anarchists realise that products are socially produced. For example a mutualist may produce a computer from different components and claim that they own that, because they made it. However they would have been unlikely to also make the components and it would be very unlikely that the person also mined the raw materials. Communist Anarchhists believe that products are owned by society, not any one person.

Strongest people taking charge over weaker: I imagine that is how man became oppressed by a minority of ruling people in the first place. Obviously we can only hope that people have learned from the mistakes of their ancestors and that they believe in freedom so much that such an occurance would not be allowed to happen.