I’m politically agnostic and have moved from a slightly conservative stance to a vastly more progressive stance (european). i still dont get the more niche things like tankies and anarchists at this point but I would like to, without spending 10 hours reading endless manifests (which do have merit, no doubt, but still).

Can someone explain to me why anarchy isnt the guy (or gal, or gang, or entity) with the bigger stick making the rules?

  • bartolomeo@suppo.fi
    0·
    1 year ago

    This is a great question and there are a lot of good answers from people much better read than me, but I’d like to throw in that anarchy is the fact of life. Nobody has authority over anyone else unless that authority is given to them by the person. Authority over someone requires consent from the person (I’m talking about between 2 adults, not like authority over your kids). Yes, pointing a gun at someone’s head is an excellent way to get their consent to have authority over them. So in any form of government, the power lies in those who give consent for the government to have authority and validity a.k.a. “the people”. Normally this consent is extracted unwillingly through either threats of violence or some kind of hypnosis. It would be cool though to live in a society where citizens willingly and well-informedly (is that a word? I don’t give you authority to tell me which are words and which aren’t) give authority to a government to manage society so people can focus on living well in a sustainable, equitable, and peaceful system.

    • merc@sh.itjust.works
      0·
      1 year ago

      You’re just redefining the word to make it meaningless.

      You could argue that everything is actually anarchy because there are no “god given” or evolutionary required hierarchies. You could argue that everything is authoritarian because as soon as two people come in contact there’s a hierarchy established and one person has power over the other. You could argue that everything is democratic or communist, because in any system that doesn’t result in everyone killing everyone else, people make agreements with each-other.

      The actual definition of anarchy is really based on how it appears and functions. If nobody is functioning as a leader and there’s no obvious hierarchy, it could be described as anarchy.