So many Ancaps...

Honestly I am considering saying fuck it and just leaving. To me just out of hand dismissing me because of idealogy is just really silly. If you ever want to gain converts and understanding between us you will have to be reasonable. We'll see what happens.

Value is subjective, that goes for the value of goods and services as well as moral judgements. Am I anti-democracy? Hell yes I am, because democracy is the State just like monarchy etc...

I fail to see how voting to control people isn't coercive, and isn't a State. Please explain that to me. I think I have been reasonable. I'm not flaming you guys, I'm not trolling you guys either. I have been honest about my positions, and I am thinking about this stuff. For example that post about how the enforcement of private property is coercive. I'm thinking about it, I haven't just dismissed it out of hand. If you want intelligent non belligerent posts you might consider giving me the same curtosy. I think you guys are anarchists, just like I am, I hate the no true scotsman fallacy. However we have some very different ideas on some issues, that doesn't mean we have to hate eachother. I don't hate Christians for what I consider their silly and often immoral beliefs either. I don't think you should hate me just because you disagree with me.

"and that they must forcibly create the preconditions of free-market "freedom" and could even justify violence against the left as self-defence by shouting about gulags etc."

If you don't force people to stay in your community then I'm not going to come and fight you guys, or pay other people to do it for me. On the contrary it seems like you guys would justify violence against me, and mine for employing people, even if we let them leave and if they wanted to join you, letting them go and do it. If someone were to keep people from leaving through force of arms, you won't have to shoot that guy, if I don't someone else in my society will. I am for voluntary association I am not for enslavement!

Do I want to get up in the mornings and go to work? Hell no, I'd rather live in a universe where scarcity isn't a thing, and I could satisfy all my wants and needs by lieing on beach with naked ladies. But scarcity is a very real thing, so that is never going to happen.

So please just give me some common curtosy for once. I think the fact that I haven't up and left or resorted to childish name calling is a sign of good faith. If I came in here and behaved toward ya'll like ya'll have behaved toward me, you probably would have deleted my account and blocked my IP already.

Ergo why I wrote, "...to a certain extent".

Someone promoting "free"-markets, a notion which entails that, at the very least hypothetically (although accepted by many of them), people should be "free" to "voluntarily" contract themselves into slavery, or "free" to have their children employed, or have the"liberty" to discriminate (as in an owner of an establishment refusing service to some group), is not a bad person, Webby? Our esteemed guest has not explained in detail what s/he means by "free"-markets (or maybe s/he has and I haven't read it), I'll give you that, but ask and we'll see.

No, but in my darkest days I never promoted an ideology which was ok with discrimination or slavery. If I had, people would have been in their right to call me a moral monster.

Ethos,

I used to believe in "free" markets, however I have since come to the conculsion that there is only the market. I used to think that perhaps we could abolish the State, then I came to the conculsion that the State is what people want, or at least enough of them want it to make it what we have.

I am not okay with slavery, the question of whether or not people can contract themselves into it is one of the questions that gets tossed around by AnCaps. I don't think it's possible because in such a case an individual is free to choose not to be a slave i.e. at anytime he can break the contract, one cannot enter into a contract which one cannot break at a later date. If one is enslaved because the risk involved is too great for them to break free, i.e. in attempting to do so they could be murdered. That is not a voluntary system.

As far as discrimination goes, I'm not okay with that either. I think it's silly, it's ridiculous, and absolutely retarded. However to my mind people are free to believe what ever silly thing they want. Are we going to focefully keep people from praying to Allah five times a day? Or going to church, or believeing in Thor, or Wotan? All of these beliefs are rather silly, and if we look at the monotheistic religions they are used today to justify murder, rape, enslavement of women etc... Does that mean that we have to kill every Muslim, Christian, and Jew in existence? To sort of preemptively keep their religion from causing problems? The only way to keep people from believing in silly shit, is to kill them. Are you prepared to be a serial killer, killing everyone who you disagree with?

To my mind rights don't even exist only claims do. Property is not some magic thing that you wank to in your spare time. It's a construct that we use to resolve disputes over scarce objects and resources. Without property the word "theft" has no meaning, and really without property enslavement has no meaning either, since inorder to be enslaved you have to own yourself. If you don't own yourself how can you be a slave? I mean if you don't own yourself, then really you can't make your own choices, something else has to make them for you... I don't know, I find it interesting to think about however.

So If your not lying about being working-class, your a field slave who thinks he's a house slave who wants to be a master. Wonderful, so either you're a class traitor and a boss-lover or your lying about your privileged upbringing to make your abhorrent views somehow more acceptable. Don't know what's worse, that you'd scab out on your workmates if given the chance or that you'd lie about your comfortable living. Whatever, I really doubt a worker could hate his fellow workers as much as you do.

I think it's a testament to the internet that someone an openly be against democracy on it. Wow, it's beautiful - the quasi-fascist is asking for tolerance! I guess your with the boss on that front, sick of all those workers going to the polls wishing to raise taxes on the rich by a single percentile is just one percentile to much! I am so sorry the government makes you unable to pay your workers piecework and for a couple dollars a day! I guess if fascism came to whatever country you live in you'd be as happy as a kid in a candy store. Finally, the elites can take power away from the rabble, you'd start rejoicing in the streets. Securing "liberty" from the tyranny of humanity. Do you even have friends, and are they as disgusted as I am with your ultra-reactionary fascist views?

Oh, and I' m not surprised that the new right ultra-elitist nietzschean is also an atheist who thinks Christianity, which has historically been the religion of the weak, is "immoral" and "silly". I bet he's a redditor too.

Also, I am slightly shocked but completely unsurprised his elk have a hard-on for old skool italian fascism, do you have any links of them hurling abuse at all the workers fascists killed in the Po Valley for strikng? How does it feel to be apart of an ideology that has in it's ranks race realists, white supremacists, pedophiles and pedophile apologists, violent misogynists, antifeminists, elitists and people who want to destroy democracy to "save liberty"?

Really how tolerant does someone have to be to a person as offensive at this. He can be like Mother Theresa while reminding you of Franco. His elitism, selfishness, individualism and his reactionary right- wing extremism deserves to be called out for what is - soulless and disgusting. I think I am perfectly justified in thinking he's privileged, only people that privileged can be so cruel and glorify power that much.

How mature. Yet another child masquerading as an adult. Alot of that going around.

if some guy in anaechy tried to exploit people i wouldn't stop them, because if they are freed from outside without getting class concious they'd just do it again. I'd just support the workers if they expropriated it and propagandize them.

This is fucking bullshit.
Nanner, you know me well enough, our PM exchanges have been incredibly interesting and you know that I am here in good faith and that admire your knowledge and intellect. After having been so candid with you, you also know my personal reasons for cutting people some slack and trying not to judge - it's not just some intellectual execise, liberalism for the sake of liberalism but a practical way of getting through life and dealing with relationships. You also know that I am not a supporter of ancap - my first couple of posts on this thread are clear enough.
The problem here is that your posts have been simple abuse. Anyone can be abusive in their own way but it will ALWAYS detract from their argument. Since I've been on Libcom I've tried to refrain from being abusive. I have been abusive about peoples politics for decades and I dare say my own sarcastic style has had it's amusing moments but really only demonstrated that my theory was lacking substance. Now, I know better than that of you but that's the impression you give when you get in this mode. Seriously mate, you come across as though you swallowed the A-Z of political history and then lit a stick of dynamite up your arse. It's embarrasing.
Honestly, I get the picture of you jumping up and down on the spot shaking with fury at what you THINK Notrueliberal is like. You accuse him of priveledge. I presume by that you mean he hasn't known hardship? Well if that's his circumstances what is he suppossed to do? Throw himself on the streets so that he is at one with the proles? Get fucking real! I thought that a common desire here was for better conditions, better pay and better lifestyle? Listen, when I'm working full time I earn £6-800 per week before tax. Am I earning too much? Am I too comfortable? Am I now middle class? Do I need to take a pay cut before I'm allowed an opinion, or am I allowed in the club anyway as I've worked in a factory and lived on the streets in the past? Maybe I'm a 'class traitor' because I no longer sleep in a telephone box!
I am saying this in good faith. You need to take off the hair shirt, climb down the ladder from the moral high ground and just fucking live a little.
As for everyone else, do none of you take exception to this? Is anything acceptable as long as it is acted by someone that's on your side? Fucking hell, this thread has been like a gang of skinheads with a yapping fucking pitbull at the front!

Actually, I'm taking this one back

because it's unfair and inaccurate. Sorry.

I'm leaving this in though

becuase it is spot on.

There's a lot here but a couple of points I'd like to pick up on.

As pointed out earlier, a lot of the reaction you're getting is a legacy of previous "ancaps" who've posted here making largely identical points and which have often turned into complete train-wrecks. With that in mind the following threads might be of interest since they touch on a lot of the same topics:

http://libcom.org/forums/organise/founding-anarcho-communist-communal-enterprise-ideas-suggestions-16122012

http://libcom.org/forums/general/reading-recommendations-fellow-anarchist-12082012

Both threads are quite lengthy but they may be relevant. Note this isn't intended as a dismissive, only that it might help address some questions you may have - and also that it may shed some light on the response you're getting now.

edit: I'd also echo what Webby said re: Nanner (posted while I was writing). seriously, chill the fuck out.

A few specific points from your more recent posts:

That's quite a presumption and one I'm not sure is accurate.

For my part, I've been unemployed for a while but my last job involved my getting up at 4am in order to go to a supermarket and do other people's shopping for them. Funnily enough this wasn't really what I wanted to with my life; the only reason I did it was in order to have enough money to pay rent and bills, with (hopefully) enough left over for a pint or two at the end of the week.

In other words, I was having to do something I had no desire to do and which had little real social value, solely because otherwise I would be unable to feed and house myself. This may not be coercive in the sense of having a literal gun to my head, but it is coercive in a wider sense - and I don't see how an "ancap" society would make this better (if anything it would make it worse, in that I wouldn't have access to even the basic protections given by our current society - protections that were fought for and won by workers in struggle.)

Which gets back to the problem with this idea of "voluntary association". Yes, in theory an employer and an employee are entering into a voluntary contract; but when one side's choices are to voluntarily associate or starve, the "voluntary" bit becomes a little shallow.

As far as why communists would care about others engaging in capitalism, there's various reasons. For starters, as pointed out earlier, the idea of society being a series of discrete individuals or communities existing in a vacuum simply doesn't match with reality. Say there's some sort of natural disaster; the communist answer would be for people to band together and help one another by putting what resources we have at our disposal to the best use for the community as a whole. This however would run headlong into capitalists' desire for property rights; property rights that would almost certainly, as they are today, be enforced through violence.

Rather than through state police or army, an "ancap" society would (I assume?) have to replace these forces through private companies - in order to protect property rights. A situation where an individual large-scale property owner, with ambitions for more property and wealth, has a private militia at their disposal would be a clear danger to a communist society nearby.

More generally however the idea that employers and employees would simply be happy, independent individuals associating and dissociating at will simply doesn't seem at all feasible, in either a statist or "anarcho" capitalist society. And when a conflict between workers and capitalists inevitably took place, we wouldn't be very good anarchists to just stand by and watch...

And I fail to see how denying the basic necessities of life to those who can't afford them isn't coercive.

What I dislike more, if anything, is what could be described as the "'No True Scotsman Fallacy' fallacy" - i.e. that inherently any time we say something isn't truly anarchist then it must just be a fallacy by definition. "National Anarchists" are not anarchists, nor are "anarcho-capitalists"...just because sometimes people use it as a fallacy or to stifle debate doesn't mean we can't have a meaningful discussion about whether certain ideas should properly be seen as part of the anarchist tradition.

(I feel the same about Godwin's Law; yes, comparisons to the Nazis are often used for hyperbolic and flawed reasons, that doesn't mean such comparisons are inevitably wrong.)

I'm also not sure where you get the idea people "hate" you. We don't. We just disagree and are often quite assertive in doing so.

I'd also be interested if you could shed a bit more light on the examples you gave earlier in this thread about Cambodia and Acupoulco.

You mean you're a wage slave?

You don't know who Margaret Thatcher is?!?

Okay, webby's right. As much as I don't like right-wingers, I'm being wildly intolerant and super-angry at this guy for existing. I just sort have a file in my mind that sez "People I don't agree with" inside the cabinet "people I HATE HATE HATE". Just because this guy has some really terrible beliefs dooesn't mean he's personally awful. For all I know, he could be a volunteer at a homeless shelter or someone who constantly gives to charity. He might just be misguided.

I might as well be yelling at a cartoon caricature. I shouldn't be so angry at this guy. I still think it's morally wrong to believe in such a thing, and I don't support it at all. I'm going to quit being so angry and abusive and just argue in good faith. I apologize, notrueliberal, for assuming that you're just a secret capitalist who's just so right-wing out of rational self-interest. I'll stop being so angry and just engage in a rational argument.

The "non-aggression axiom" Is the biggest load I ever heard of, the very essence liberal theology. It's the idea that a person owning a gigantic latifundia would be the victim if his poorly paid quasi-serf workers took the land from him. It's the idea that a violent pornographer would be in the right if the government banned him from making any movie at all. It's the idea that it' s morally right to destroy society, but it's wrong to "limit someone's freedom" in order to stop it. It's the idea that all of society needs to be subjected to the will of individuals rather than the other way around.

Look at the Spanish Civil War. To say it started because of a political diagreement (Hobshawm) is completely wrong, it started because of a fascist coup plot backed by huge landowners, the bourgeoisie, the church, the army, and many elements of the state apparatus. They were sick of workers "causing trouble" and, one could say, "limiting" their "freedom" to exploit them ruthlessly. One could say that the terror that followed in Nationalist territory (and eventually all of spain) was simply the propertied classes pre-emptively defending their rights to use their property and their workers the way they wanted to. Under the moral sanction of the non-aggression axiom, the anarchists and socialists were the coercive ones and the propertied class was trying to defend their freedoms.

I don't think that's freedom. I don't think capitalists and landowners and whatever using their freedom to kill workers are freedom-loving individuals, even though their workers are apparently tyrants for taking their land (under the NAP they are!) The real "coercive" individuals in any situation like that would be the capitalists exploiting workers and telling them that, if they don't like it, they can go hungry until they find another one. According to the non-aggression axiom, a manager who's abusive towards his workers is morally right because that worker "consents" to being there. Poor women who are sexually harassed by bosses shouldn't complain because, according to the non-aggression axiom, they can "always leave".

The non-aggression axiom is a fundamentally inhumane moral system. It's a rejection of the interests of society in defense of might making right. It's not a rebuke of "coercion" but a defense of the powerful. I don't think any anarchist who's had to deal with poverty or bosses or whatever would give a shit about it. Rejecting democracy itself is the logical conclusion of such beliefs.

Nevermind

"The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread."

NTR, don't know if you're still around, but if you are I want to apologize for telling you to eff off earlier in the thread. It was unnecessary.

I wanted to comment on this because I think it gets to the bottom of our disagreement with you and is probably why people got their back up about you calling yourself an anarchist:

We did build those things. Capitalism is the organised and systematic theft of the labour of the working class. We want to expropriate the property and wealth of the capitalist class--the property and wealth that we created--and use it for the collective benefit of society.

You commented that you want to live in a post-scarcity world. We could easily do that if we eliminated unproductive work and applied technology and machinery toward eliminating dangerous work and reducing overall working hours. We could then allow people to gravitate towards the work they find most appealing with the proviso that undesirable work will have to be split between able bodies.

And then, bang, 20 hours of work a week, the continued relaxation of oppressive social morality, and it's all nude beaches from there on out.

I really think you should start by reading the Anarchist FAQ or The ABC of Anarchism or even something like Abolish Restaurants.

Wow, it's really disappointing to see how immature some of the people were in dealing with notrueliberal. At least at RevLeft he would have been sent to a gulag and debated there, you guys were just outright rude to him..

Well after some hours of consideration I decided to come back. And so here I am.

First of all as I understand it there are several points at which we disagree.

I see Man as a species of individuals. Homo Sapian Sapian, is not Linepithema humile. Humanity is made up of individuals. We are not ants. Society is not an ant hill.

"The non-aggression axiom is a fundamentally inhumane moral system. It's a rejection of the interests of society in defense of might making right. It's not a rebuke of "coercion" but a defense of the powerful. I don't think any anarchist who's had to deal with poverty or bosses or whatever would give a shit about it. Rejecting democracy itself is the logical conclusion of such beliefs."

I disagree with it being inhumane, we can argue about that at some point in the future.
Society doesn't have any interests. There are people who have interests, and these people in acting form society. I don't see society as magic, driven by a "collective" will. Society forms because it is far more effiecient to combine efforts than it is to be a Robinson Crusoe. This is the division of labour, specialization. A shoe maker makes shoes because he is good at it. The shoe maker isn't a dairy farmer because maybe he hates cows or whatever.

"In defense of might making right" and democracy is different?

"It's not a rebuke of 'coercion' but a defense of the powerful" On contrary, everyone to my mind has negative rights, not just the powerful. Am I saying bad things never happen and that it's immpossible for rich men to hire thugs to go about subjugating people? No, I'm not that naive.

"Rejecting democracy itself is the logical conclusion of such beliefs." Yes it is. That is absolutely true. Is it morally right for people to vote for someone's murder? If 50%+1 votes came in that said "We should kill Nanner" would it be okay for a goon squad to go to your home, break down the door and shoot you? I don't think so. Majority rule, is still rule, it calls for the sacrifice of the few to the majority. Is it okay for people to vote and tell others how to live their lives? Currently in the United States there is the debate over gay marriage. Conservatives think that it is their business to tell people who they can and cannot have sex with. I say it's no one's business, other than the adults involved. Thus far however the majority has said NO! And I say this is unjust. I don't think the majority has any right to tell me what I can and can't do in my home, nor do I think they have the right to tell anyone else either. Similarly I don't think that the majority has the right to tell people what they can put in their bodies, and can't. In the United States it is illegal to sell and consume raw milk. I think this is ridiculous. It's also illegal to smoke weed in most states, and again I say this is ridiculous. Do I think smoking Meth is a good idea? No I don't, but it's also none of my business.

You say about the NAP "It's the idea that it's morally right to destroy society" without the individual there is no society. The NAP is there to protect the individual. Sure there are plenty of examples of it not working. There are plenty of examples of communism not working. Is that an argument?

"According to the non-aggression axiom, a manager who's abusive towards his workers is morally right because that worker "consents" to being there." No, at least I don't think that's okay, nor do I think that's what the NAP says. If a manager beats his employee, the employee would be within his rights to fight back, or if he is weak and unable too, he would be in his rights to get someone strong to do it.

"For all I know, he could be a volunteer at a homeless shelter or someone who constantly gives to charity." I don't volunteer at a homeless shelter. However I have volunteered on the local fire department. And while I refuse to give to charity (way too many scams) I do give food to the homeless and poor. I also give them money when I have it. I don't do this because I feel obligated too. When I was a kid my family was so poor, because my grandma had cancer and those drugs are expensive, that we had to grow our own food to have something to eat. I took care of my grandma from the age of 9 until she died when I was 18, I never knew when I came home whether she would greet me or if I would walk in on a corpse. I have expierenced hardship, and I have been poor. Now days I scrape by, but I'm working to improve my lot in life.

You guys say I'm not an anarchist because I am a capitalist, I could say the same thing about ya'll. That you aren't anarchists because you believe in democracy. After all what the US and Britian have today is democratic. Not direct democracy sure, but it works in the same way. Again majority rule is still rule.

"You commented that you want to live in a post-scarcity world. We could easily do that if we eliminated unproductive work and applied technology and machinery toward eliminating dangerous work and reducing overall working hours. We could then allow people to gravitate towards the work they find most appealing with the proviso that undesirable work will have to be split between able bodies."

Scarcity is not do to "unproductive work" scarcity exists because the universe is finite. Men have unlimited wants and desires, and there are finite resources to get this done. Furthermore who gets to decide what is "unproductive work"? In addition to my mind eliminating dangerous work when possible should be a goal. A business if it's run by someone who isn't a moron, doesn't want it's workers hurt, because then they can't work. Furthermore, the business owner should want his workers to be happy. Because if they are happy they'll be more productive. Is this always the case? Nope, there are alot of assholes, and stupid people out there. I don't think anyone can deny that.

I don't think I've ever met anyone who wants to work. I don't think I ever will, because lazing about doing nothing is always going to be more desirable than work.

It seems like you guys are equating fuedalism to capitalism in some ways. Like the capitalist is the lord of a castle and the workers are the serfs. Well I share your disdain for fuedalism. What exists today is fuedal certainly as well. We have what I call crony capitalism, we have the rich businessmen using their money to pay off government officials, inorder to reduce competition. So that they can charge more for crappier goods. In other words they use the government to create monopolies. Only through coercive action can a monopoly exist. And that remains true if you are like me and don't define property as coercive.

I see property as extending from self ownership in my mind. If I own myself I must be able to own property in order to sustain myself. If I can't own property then my life is in someone elses' hands and I am their slave. If the majority gets to decide what I can and cannot have then I am a slave to that majority. It doesn't matter if there is one tyrant or one thousand. I have absolutely no desire to be anyone's slave.

If we don't have private property then theft doesn't exist. Property is what gives theft it's meaning. Without property would it be wrong for me to break into a house and take stuff. If so why?

Peace be with you!

The thing that I am trying to get accross here is that I don't see our positions as mutually exclusive. I see democracy as coercive, and immoral, but if ya'll want to live in one good for you. The question is are you guys capable of the same curtosy? If you are then even if we disagree on stuff, that doesn't mean we need to kill eachother.

I hope that makes sense, to you guys.

I keep planning to get involved in this thread but it moves too quick for me. Glad to see some appeals for calm! Just to pick up one area.

People don't just pop into existence out of thin air, find a pristine wilderness and make something of it for themselves. All production and reproduction is social. We rely on each other and social production from before we are even born until we die. It therefore makes sense to make sure we all have the opportunity to fine-tune our social activities as equals, and collaborate to ensure we each contribute to the best of our abilities and help each other meet our needs. You can't do that by saying 'this bit of the world is mine, all mine- maybe I'll let you make use of it if you make a profit for me'. It's just not sensible or logical. We need to cooperate to maximise our wellbeing and potential by using our individual skills to transform the common world we share. Private ownership of the means of production is being anti-social, to the detriment of all who share human social existence- because one individual does not know what is best for the rest of us- this has to be decided through social activity. Of course we exist as individuals but we have to share the means of production, the commons, because we can't meet our needs individually, only socially.

"And I fail to see how denying the basic necessities of life to those who can't afford them isn't coercive."

Is it coercive to sit on my ass and not do anything? Is it coercive to not lift a sack off of another guys shoulders? Is failing to help someone coercive?

A right is not an obligation.

A Wotsit,

You say that an individual cannot decide what is best for the rest of us. I am not proposing that an individual decides what is the best for you. I'm saying you decide what's best for you.

On the inverse are you saying that a collective, a group, made of people who might not even know me, can decide what's best for me?

As I said before society isn't magic, society exists because the division of labour is more effiecent then solitary production. Hermits exist and live by themselves, it is possible to do so. But men come together and form society because it is more efficient.

You say that all production is social. This is an observably false idea. As I said hermits exist. While it is true that traditional reproduction takes exactly two people (is that society, I don't know, maybe) however givin the level of technology today all one needs is a donor. In other words, you don't have to know the mother or father of your baby. Hell it's concievable that a virgin could have a kid.

Yeah but a society of at least 2 people fucked to create the hermit

LOL sure but does that refute my point that the Hermit lives and produces goods, his clothes, tools, food, house etc... By himself?

Who taught him how? Who nursed him when he was a baby? Who created his parents and fed then?

Voluntary association

Ancap: anarchism for the rich, fascism for the poor.

iexist,

My point isn't to say that man is a magic being that just pops into existence. Fully clothed and educated, without any need for support.

I'm not saying that at all, what I am simply saying is that it's obvious to even a casual observer that production is not purely societal.

Sure the majority of production occurs in society because, due to the division of labour it is more efficient for it to happen that way. Again society does not exist because of a magic collective will, it exists because of the division of labour, and of course evolution.

So is the goal of communism then to make everyone equally poor? Is that what you're saying, jonthom?

Personally I always thought the saying "communism where we're all equally poor" was just rhetoric without merit. Maybe I was wrong... Please correct me, if I'm misunderstanding your meaning...

no.

the goal of communism is, put simply, to ensure that we all have access to the things we need in life, and that work and resources will be distributed to that end.

this does mean some people becoming more "poor", yes; I doubt Donald Trump would get to keep his personal golf course and hotel in a communist society. it would also mean my homeless mates not risking freezing to death each winter so, you know, there's that.

fail troll is fail