Reading Recommendations for a Fellow Anarchist

ComradeAppleton

My main question to communists is as follows: If I make something myself and want to keep it for myself, why should I be forced to share it with the community?
I know this is really basic stuff, which is why I am asking for any really basic readings. All I've heard from people so far is a strange argument which goes something along the lines of: "Oh you never made anything yourself really, everyone assisted you throughout your life, your mother gave birth to you, therefore you own everyone, etc..." This seems a bit ridiculous to me. The only other explanation I can think of is the "Jesus-argument" ("share everything because that's a nice thing to do") which is just as silly. Is there any better explanation?

I don't think that saying "you've never made something 'yourself'" is silly. Almost every single act of productive labor that we do is only possible because of the labor of countless other members of our society.

Say you want to make something all by yourself, maybe something simple, like a box for your garden. It really only requires two basic materials: boards and nails. However, you have to go through several processes just to get to the point where you have those two materials: felling the tree, milling the lumber, forging the nails, all of which are specialized tasks. Of course all of these tasks require tools: saws, mills, hammers, ovens, anvils, which have to be constructed. Their construction requires raw materials, some of which must be extracted from the earth using mines, which must be dug and supported. And, of course, all of these steps require knowledge which must not only be discovered, but also taught. Only under capitalism does the absurd notion that, after all of that, hammering a few of those boards together into a rectangle means that you "made it yourself."

And, what the hell, I also think that sharing is a nice thing to do. What kind of dick thinks that's silly?

Lol, course you can have your own box/ garden. One has to differentiate between personal and private (exploitative) property. I think this is what you're looking for:

http://infoshop.org/page/AnarchistFAQSectionI5#seci57

[quote=ComradeAppleton[...]
My main question to communists is as follows: If I make something myself and want to keep it for myself, why should I be forced to share it with the community?
[...][/quote]

Your premise is defective. Socialism, communism or anarchism are not about "forcing" you or anyone else to share their birdhouse with the community. Rather, it is about acknowledging that all productive property is the product of social labor and by rights belongs to society.

As Marx said:

We Communists have been reproached with the desire of abolishing the right of personally acquiring property as the fruit of a man’s own labour, which property is alleged to be the groundwork of all personal freedom, activity and independence.

Hard-won, self-acquired, self-earned property! Do you mean the property of petty artisan and of the small peasant, a form of property that preceded the bourgeois form? There is no need to abolish that; the development of industry has to a great extent already destroyed it, and is still destroying it daily.

Or do you mean the modern bourgeois private property?

But does wage-labour create any property for the labourer? Not a bit. It creates capital, i.e., that kind of property which exploits wage-labour, and which cannot increase except upon condition of begetting a new supply of wage-labour for fresh exploitation. Property, in its present form, is based on the antagonism of capital and wage labour. Let us examine both sides of this antagonism.

To be a capitalist, is to have not only a purely personal, but a social status in production. Capital is a collective product, and only by the united action of many members, nay, in the last resort, only by the united action of all members of society, can it be set in motion.

Capital is therefore not only personal; it is a social power.

You're right, if you bake a cake and you genuinely worked for and earned all the ingredients that went into making it, no one can justly eat that cake without impinging on your right to the cake. But if you made the cake with ingredients that you did not work for, you'd be no better than a capitalist, whose cake (capital) was made with the ingredients (labor) of others.
If you built an entire cake factory with your own sweat, and set it into motion with no one's labor but your own, that cake factory as well as all the cakes made in it, would rightly belong to you. But if you lived in a communist society, no one would buy your cakes, and they'd all go stale, and you'd be reduced to poverty, ha ha ha ha, fool!

ComradeAppleton

Book O'Dead

Your premise is defective. Socialism, communism or anarchism are not about "forcing" you or anyone else to share their birdhouse with the community. Rather, it is about acknowledging that all productive property is the product of social labor and by rights belongs to society.

Well I certainly don't acknowledge that all capital belongs to society. Capital should belong to whoever made it. Isn't that more fair? I mean as long as communism is voluntary I have no problem with it, but I wish someone explained to me how some complete stranger from another part of the country or globe can have any claim on something I made.

What I was getting at with my initial post is the fact that a couple people (who said they are Anarcho-Communists) told me I'm not legitimately allowed to own my own land and produce everything for myself (or trade with people). I mean in some abstract Marxian world capital could be "social power" or whatever, but in reality someone has to have control over it right? So why can't I have control over my own capital?

Anyway I don't want to ramble on too much, but this is all quite amazing to me because I consider myself an anarchist.

No one makes capital by themselves. Capital is a product of social labor, not in "some abstract Marxian world", but in the here and now. Capital is the accumulation of uncompensated labor.

You can't be much of an anarchist if you're so concerned about possessing wealth and excluding others from sharing it with you; a true anarchist is not a propertarian.

To paraphrase Marx, communism deprives no one from enjoying the fruits of their labor; it deprives them of the right to use it in order to exploit others.

Yes, yes they do imply each other. You really should read wojtek's link.

ComradeAppleton

More to the point, I know I'm no expert, but how is it possible to let everyone enjoy the full fruits of their labor without allowing them to keep 100% of what they earned as their own property? It seems a contradiction to say that you keep all you make, but you also have to make sure others get to take some of it.

The premise is that both mental and physical labour is socialised. Producing things in isolation is not a rational way to mass produce things for a society. Therefore "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need" is a totally rational way to produce and distribute goods between workplace collectives. This is not a mad scheme to hold things socially produced in common for eternity.

You could have personally acquired the raw materials through the distribution of goods, but the only reason you would produce your object in the manner your suggesting is if you had an artistic or hobby rational behind it.

I suspect the rational driving you line of arguement is your misunderstanding over how goods are acquired in the here and now, hence your previous post about capital belonging to the person. You see, presently labour produces, and capital acquires this and distributes it irrationally and unevenly. We want to abolish capital, and ensure an equalitarian manner of distribution. Therefore if you were a mechanic or plumber, you could have picked up your required item due to services rendered, or you would have to put in a claim for it if you worked in said workplace when goods are distributed.

I think the mainproblem here is that you've abstracted production from reality.

Most goods produced for personal use are mass produced consumable items (a pint of milk, a t-shirt, a mobile phone, a spoon etc), goods that you would 'make yourself' (eg a sculpture,a painting, a homemade cake, a necklace made of shells you found on the beach) are generally produced from raw materials/produts that were previously mass produced (clay, paper, flour etc).

No-one would make anyone share those goods once they had been distributed to individuals. Firstly there is no material need to do so since such goods can generally produced in relative abundance according to demand, secondly it would be irrational since no-one even wants to 'share' your amateur doodlings. In short if you want to bake your neighbours a cake thats all well and good, but no-ones going to be banging on your door demanding an equal slice and a chance to see your nude etchings of your partner. This would in any rational society constitute a form of sanctionable personal harrasment.

Now there are goods which are not in ''absolute abundance'', to which supply is limited.
For example; tickets to a critically acclaimed cultural event, a long distance plane flight, a whole side of tuna, a holiday log cabin.
In a capitalist society such goods are mostly priced, often making such goods the preserve of those who can afford them. Without a price mechanism such ''luxury'' goods would logically have to be booked/rationed in some fashion. Eg you can have x amount of tickets/plane flights per year. You can also wait for or pool things like holiday homes etc

In short the only goods a communist society would force you to ''share'' or at least place some limit on your personal consumption of are those small number of largely non-consumable 'luxury items'' which by their nature are in limited supply.

ComradeAppleton

You seem to be conflating anarchism with communism. Neither one implies the other by any means. I don't think I need to be a communist in order to be an anarchist. "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need" is not the right idea to base a community on in my opinion.

It's you who are confusing anarchism with individualistic selfishness and exclusion. Is that your definition of anarchism?

More to the point, I know I'm no expert, but how is it possible to let everyone enjoy the full fruits of their labor without allowing them to keep 100% of what they earned as their own property? It seems a contradiction to say that you keep all you make, but you also have to make sure others get to take some of it.

Communism does not propose that individuals keep 100% of what they produce; it never has. What communism proposes is that whereas all wealth is the product of social labor it must, by rights, belongs to all of society.

Judging by your words you seem to feel that sharing what you help to create somehow makes you poorer instead of making you and others richer.

Communism, anarchism--I use the terms indifferently--is about solidarity, cooperation and mutual aid.

If you're serious about wanting to learn, that is, if you're not just maliciously trolling to see if you can get a rise out of someone here, I recommend you study some of the fundamentals of Marxian economics and sociology.

You can start by reading K.Marx's Value Price and Profit and Wage Labor and Capital.

I suppose someone should mention that Kropotkin was an anarchist and a communist though in it's original meaning and not the distorted authoritarian 'communism' associated with the old Russian block that included Poland. (A system which most here would prefer to describe as 'state capitalism').

And yes do read the short introductory texts by Marx recomended here remembering that whatever else they disagreed about the anarchist Bakunin held such analysis in high regard.

ComradeAppleton

Hopefully none of you are advocating this sort of thing where some ruling body gets to decide what is fair and what is not and constant redistribution takes place.

No however expropriations would take place in the transition to communism, though any body that claims to have a governing monopoly on the expropriation process would not be communist, because communist expropriation is subjected to democratic mass action. In the case of your grandfather though, if there was an actual housing shortage then the people who occupied his home would have a right to occupy it because of genuine need, but that right does not emanate from any centralized communist regime. I think it's a good thing to ask, also, why do some people have capital at their disposal while others are nothing more than wage-laborers? It's not just individual initiative that begets personal wealth, it's also material, historical conditions. I think that communism will involve a lot of disputes over who deserves what at some points, and there will be struggles between the governing bodies of the communes and individual dissenters on a number of occasions. But society has to be first and foremost subjected to democratic processes, even if the majority becomes overbearing, in order to learn and become free.

ComradeAppleton

Personally I just don't understand why communist are such absolutists. I think we all agree that a great majority (if not all) of past and current property titles are illegitimate. But that does not mean the solution to this problem is collectivization and the elimination of the concept of property titles! In fact, I can think of nothing worse than living in a commune where my voice is just one of many in some democratic process (that is what I feel like right now). I honestly couldn't care less whether I get ordered about by one powerful capitalist, or by a mass of communists. Both are equally bad for my well being. I abhor all authority, period.

This is really why I posted here in the first place. I wanted to know what the arguments are for collectivization of property, and also how people who claim to be 'anarchists' can forbid me from doing anything at all (other than by mutual, contractual agreement). For me property is an essential element of self-expression and anarchy basically means 'minding my own business' in all affairs. So how can anarcho-communists have a right to mind their business, but also to mind my business!?

You're perfectly entitled to your opinion. But your defense of private property is fetishistic and reactionary. Your views may have been useful in the 19th and 20th Centuries, when it was still possible for many more people to acquire capital, but today it is no longer so. Private property is obsolete and must therefore be abolished in favor of a more healthy arrangement.

Placing your narrow individual rights above those of the community to dispose of productive property is what capitalists do every time they defend their criminal, outdated system. They view property in the means of production as personal possession, whereas the rest of us see it as social property.

Marx clearly demonstrated that the social nature of capital has made private property obsolete and anti-social. That's the direction in which social evolution is taking us.

[edit]: As to authority: If the capitalists refuse to voluntarily give up their ownership and control of their wealth and it becomes necessary to "pry it out of their dead, cold fingers", then so be it; they'll have no one else to blame but themselves.

ComradeAppleton

In fact, I can think of nothing worse than living in a commune where my voice is just one of many in some democratic process (that is what I feel like right now).

So you'd rather your voice carried more weight than other voices?

Why do all these individualists / propertarians look into the future and decide that it consists entirely of them trying to trade a box of frogs for a cake or something... bUT thE ComMIes WOnT leT thEM!!!!!!1!111!!

I agree with you that authority, even the authority of a worker's commune, is more often than not undesirable and illegitimate. Communism is not only the collectivization of private property, but also the decentralization of it. This allows for a truly more genuine democratic control over production which would be oriented around the local commune rather than the global corporation, thereby strengthening the power of individuals in collective decision-making and genuinely making things more equal. The point is is that capitalism, which is very much alive and well, needs to be abolished through collective takeover of private property, which is not in the hands of a minority of hard-working anarchists, but gigantic super-corporations.

ComradeAppleton

Melancholy of Resistance

So you'd rather your voice carried more weight than other voices?

I'd prefer to have veto power over any decision which concerns me. I don't want mob rule based on voting, I want anarchy.

In communism everyone's "veto power" will be expressed through their vote. Their maturity and intelligence will be measured by their willingness and ability to cooperate with an enlightened majority.

Again, let me emphasize: Communism is about creating a cooperative society in which solidarity and mutual aid are the rule, not the exception.

Someone who places their individual property rights above the well-being of their community is no anarchist.

Hm. Some questions:

a) What right do you have to pick a particular piece of land or resources and decide that you, and nobody else, have the right to them?

b) By doing so this puts you in a position of authority as property owner, dictating who can and cannot access "your" resources. In what way is this compatible with anarchism?

c) Without a state or some sort of collectively agreed body (perhaps, even, that dreaded "democracy" you seem so frightened of), how would you go about enforcing said property claims?

d) If the answer to the above is "at the barrel of a gun", how does that make you any better than those nefarious collectivists who are just itching to take away your property? "Only state communists use murder as a means of attaining their goals and force collectivism on bystanders" can just as easily be switched to "Only capitalists use murder as a means of attaining their goals and forcing their notions of property on bystanders" for all the difference it makes.

e) Out of interest, are you American? I ask since I find these arguments somewhat reminiscent of the mythology around the "Old West", with individuals (or small groups) going off into the wilderness to set up their own little farm with nobody to interfere with them. "Anarchy is about leaving people alone, not about meddling in their business," as you put it. (FWIW I doubt this was possible even at the time and even less so now, but that's a different debate.)

---

To be honest I find this line of reasoning tends to rest on a rather paranoid - and rather right wing, "no such thing as society, only individuals" and all that - set of assumptions, mostly centred on ideas of the individual vs. society and the (ridiculous) idea that people could easily just go off and sustain themselves in isolated peace were it not for the villainous communists sending in the Cheka to confiscate your apples or whatever.

For what it's worth, in some hypothetical anarchist society I doubt anyone would object if you wanted to just go off and do your own thing, so long as it didn't adversely impact on others by monopolising or damaging resources people needed (stopping anyone else from taking food from "your" property in a time of hunger, or polluting the water source people rely on or whatever). Doing so would be more than a little selfish anyway, of course.

However, for the life of me I can't understand why you'd want to. We're social animals and only really experience life in relation to others - not simply as a collection of "individuals", but as a society and community, on anything from a tiny local level right up to worldwide. Anything from the doctors who treat you to the teachers who educate you to the people who talk to and debate with you - all of it is the product of a near-infinite number of social interactions between people and groups on a micro and macro scale.

The idea of the world as a set of discrete individuals negotiating with one another through contracts based on property simply doesn't reflect this reality IMO. Ideas of collective ownership, co-operation, participation and mutual aid, people contributing what they're able to and getting the things they need to survive - communism in other words - are to a large extent based on recognising that we're all dependant on one another to a greater or lesser extent, and trying to use that mutual dependance to benefit everyone rather than simply those who hold power, whether that power is based in the state, capital, property or some combination of the three.

In general the whole individual vs society notion strikes me as entirely false.

"Anarchy is about leaving people alone, not about meddling in their business." so we shouldn't meddle in the business of those who oppress and exploit us and just allow them the freedom as an individual to do so?

A society based on anarchy/communism is not going to prevent people from keeping possessions or having a private space, or personal interests and so on. It will hold the means to make those possessions, and the ability to decide how spaces are fairly allocated and shared, in common and allow all of us equal (as possible) access to them. We might just get somewhere close to anarchy/communism by organising against capital and government at a local level where we work and where we live (or occupying new places) in a non-hierarchical way, with an eye to building international and solidarity and mutual aid between disparate working class communities and effective ways of managing the commons and means of production collectively to ensure we all have our individual needs better met and can contribute to the fullest of our abilities.

We as a class (and as working class individuals) have nothing to gain from private property. Everything around us, everything we need to survive or enjoy life is the product of nature, and countless generations of social (re)production, including that which we help to create. Private property is an abstract concept made real by oppression and violence and class divisions, it only exists because some work to survive and some use oppression and exploitation to capitalise on the labour of others. I think you might be be confused about the difference between capital, productive property (the means of production), our individual needs and abilities and the products of our labour (like there is a difference between a toothbrush, a forest and a factory- one you can own in commuism, two you can't). What are you worried that the nasty communists will steal from you? What do you really claim sole ownership to? The ingredients, materials, knowledge, food you ate to work, crop varieties you choose to grow or eat, tools you use etc etc came from the labour of others. The totality of the web of social relations can not be effectively organised by people saying "fuck off! I own this- if you want some or want to use it you gotta give me something in return! Tell you what use my machine to make five and I'll give you one of them" oh dear, looks like we have hierarchy and capitalism when selfish people try and own shit, not anarchy at all. The influence of capital and private property means the things people need are distributed and produced in a way which creates and is characterised by exploitation and alienation. Instead of this anarchy/communism offers people performing to the best of their ability to fit in with a productive society as best they can and help make sure it meets individual and collective needs. Anarchy must abolish private property because claiming you own a part of nature and human existence or the product of other's labour, beyond your social position and own thoughts and actions, is to sow a seed of oppression and exploitation.

Anarchist communists do not want to create a centralised oppressive system. We want people to be more free to choose where they live, who they live with and how they work together to meet their needs and be socially productive. Private property is a barrier to this so we must 'interfere' in those that seek to live by exploiting property and owning (as opposed to just sharing in) the labour of others and the commons.

I'm high and prone to talking shit and better posters than me have tried to explain so that might missed the mark.... but I think you don't understand (some key bits of) anarchism. I think you might just come to see things from an anarchist (communist) perspective (ignore the fact that the term 'communist' is used to refer to a form of totalitarian government, that is like people thinking anarchy means violent chaos) so please do read more on this site- it's great!

At this point, I'm not sure why people are even bothering any more.

"In conclusion, communists want a regime of collective rule, and individualists want no regime of any rules - just a contractual society"

Sorry but if there is no 'rules' how the heck can you create and enforce a never-ending stream of contracts to enforce your model of social organisation? What if others do not recognise the rule of your contracts- you gonna use violence to get your way? Maybe hire an army to do it for you (they can each be contracted to die for your individual rights- fantastic!) Or are you gonna sit down and talk it out and reach a collective agreement, like a good communist?

You need to be a part of some sort of collective social organisation or life is shit and short. If the rest of the world population just evaporated I think you'd soon realise you have never in your life been as individual as you think you are. If society did evaporate and leave you and a few other 'individualists' behind in your individualist erm... utopia?... what would you do?

"I declare as an autonomous individual, subject to no collective rule, that I own all of the seas and everythign in them- I'll give you a contract to let you fish it but you have to give me 95% of the catch"

to which another individual replies

"well I own all of the land- so go jump in the sea and stop tresspassing"

Individualism and private property being the basis for social organisation is complete and utter nonsense. The only reason you exist and survive in the first place is by the labour of others and by sharing the commons- capitalism is a shit way of sharing our labour and the commons- a society organised on contracts between selfish individuals would be shit as well. I have a contract with my boss, I have a contract with my bank, I have a contract with my landlord- hooray for contracts eh?

bin

ComradeAppleton

Well this really isn't that complicated - the enforcement will be the same as in the communist commonwealth. I could ask all the same questions about communism. What if others don't recognize your communist collective agreement - will you use violence to get your way? Maybe you will hire an army to to die for your collective rights - fantastic!

:confused: I don't understand. Earlier, when discussing the way said "communist commonwealth" (whatever that even means) would go about collectivisation, you said

You're not an anarchist at all, but just a simple state communist. Only state communists use murder as a means of attaining their goals and force collectivism on bystanders. Johann Most would be proud of a statement like the one you just made

Or is it somehow acceptable for you to use murder to attain your goals and forcibly exclude people from access to resources, but not acceptable for others to use murder to attain their goals and allow people access to those same resources?

I mean, if so then your objection isn't really to do with the methods being used so much as with the ends they're being used for. Which is fair enough in itself but does kind of invalidate your initial outrage at the idea of the use of force for political goals.

Also, what is the difference between the communism you describe and the state? It seems pretty much identical.After all the state purports to be a collective agreement. It looks like once I would join the communist commonwealth I'm screwed - I would not have any rights anymore. The majority could just keep deciding everything, just like it is doing now, and the minority would just have to take orders. This is exactly what we have right now. And this is exactly the individualist critique of communist. Individualists want to cooperate and have collective agreements too, but we always want to have veto power over all decisions and a right of secession (removing ourselves and our property from the community) if that becomes necessary. What's so bad about that?

FWIW this is the sort of argument I'm used to hearing from Trotskyists - basically that any sort of social organisation constitutes a state, therefore anarchists either want no organisation at all, or they're hypocrites and secretly want a state but call it something else.

It's been referenced before but I would recommend checking out An Anarchist FAQ, in particular the following:

What about people who do not want to join a syndicate?
What if I don't want to join a commune?
Doesn't any form of communal ownership involve restricting individual liberty?

(Note: it's a while since I read it and kind of in a rush so not had time to re-read, sorry if it's not entirely relevant.)

My own view, fwiw, is that I'd hope any anarcho-communist society would include the right to withdraw (though why you'd want to is beyond me) and to go and do your own thing as you saw fit, so long as this did not impinge on the rights of others. In a situation where people were starving, I'd see nothing either politically or morally wrong in taking food from your farm to feed people who needed it; similarly, if you used your property to harm others, for example by contaminating the water supply, I'd similarly see it as not only justifiable but in fact necessary to stop you doing so, property rights be damned.

But in a stable, balanced society, if someone wanted to live differently and withdraw I doubt anyone would object or compel you not to - unless doing so would directly harm others.

As an aside, as far as this:

The majority could just keep deciding everything, just like it is doing now, and the minority would just have to take orders.

The majority is the working class (in a broad sense), and while we do have some decision making power, to suggest the majority decide everything is quite clearly nonsense. I don't remember getting a vote in the editorial policy of the Daily Mail, for starters, despite the fact it has a quite clear impact on the world around me...

Question: if you did decide to "remove yourself and your property from the community" (assuming for the sake of argument that you could do so without harm to others within that community), do you think you would still be entitled to the benefits of being part of that community - healthcare, education, food, culture and the rest of it? Or do you think you could just provide these things yourself?

And if the former - if you're still reliant on the wider community for these things - don't you think you owe that community something in return?

Oh, wait. No such thing as society. Never mind. :P

Edit: I'm still curious. How can you call yourself an anarchist when you explicitly want to set yourself up as sole authority, implemented by force, over a particular area (i.e. your "property")?

Jonthom
I don't remember getting a vote in the editorial policy of the Daily Mail

ComradeAppleton
I hope you don't mean that you have the right to regulate the free press in any way... That goes against every precept of anarchism. Benjamin Tucker is famous for his position that violent attacks against the ruling elite are impractical and wrong unless freedom of the press is abridged, at which point violence is the only way to get the message out. The Daily Mail (as devious and stupid as it is) is a private newspaper and you shouldn't have any say in its editorial policy.

CA, Do you see what you missed here?

ComradeAppleton

Thanks jonthom for the links! I guess I'm going to have to find some very clear definition of the possession/property distinction. Very many writers use these terms interchangeably. I mean if I'm allowed to have my own land, my own business, and my own resources, it wouldn't matter if I called it possession or property as long as I could freely exchange it and people would recognize it as mine.

IMO the distinction is more about the nature of the "property" involved, the social relations that go along with it, the impact on others, potential for exploitation and the like. Put another way, communism doesn't mean everyone gets to take your toothbrush, but it does mean everyone should have access to a toothbrush. And if you start hogging all the toothbrushes then chances are someone's going to take them from you and give them out to the cavity-stricken masses. Like a Robin Hood of dentistry or somesuch.

Er, anyway.

jonthom

Or is it somehow acceptable for you to use murder to attain your goals and forcibly exclude people from access to resources, but not acceptable for others to use murder to attain their goals and allow people access to those same resources?

I think you would agree that there is a great deal of difference between using violence to stop someone from using something which you set up (a mine, a field, a house, or your own body) and trying to access that vary thing which someone else has made. The first is called defense, and the second is called invasion.

Depends. That makes sense if you use property rights as your starting point, obviously. But not everyone does.

I think you'd agree there's a difference between using violence against someone trying to burn down your home with your family inside, versus using violence to shoot starving children trying to pluck an apple from a tree in your orchard. The first is common sense, the second is frankly despicable. But if you're basing your idea of morality and appropriate behaviour on property rights then the two are presumably equal.

jonthom

I don't remember getting a vote in the editorial policy of the Daily Mail

I hope you don't mean that you have the right to regulate the free press in any way... That goes against every precept of anarchism. Benjamin Tucker is famous for his position that violent attacks against the ruling elite are impractical and wrong unless freedom of the press is abridged, at which point violence is the only way to get the message out. The Daily Mail (as devious and stupid as it is) is a private newspaper and you shouldn't have any say in its editorial policy.

My point was more that your claim - that the majority gets to decide everything - is quite demonstrably false. I used the Daily Mail as an example but could have used anything really.

Like the way the government of this country is invariably drawn from a tiny minority of the population.

Or the way we have no real say in the activities of the businesses that we rely on for food, culture, housing, transport, care and pretty much everything else.

Or the way we have no real input into how the banks operate despite their clear impact on everyone's lives.

Or the way most of us working for bosses have little to no say in the work we do, aside from occasional employee consultations or, at most, "self-managed" capitalism (i.e. co-ops) dictated by the market.

Or...well, you get the idea I'm sure. The majority don't get to decide everything. At most, we get a say in who makes decisions supposedly on our behalf.

As far as freedom of the press: to be honest the idea of a "free press" is a bit meaningless under capitalism, since while in theory anyone can print what they like (unless the government has decided we can't), in practice the press is limited to and dominated by a small number of business interests. If the dominance of the Murdoch empire somehow represents a free press then, well, it's not so free IMO...

As for your question, I don't think I'm entitled to anything from anyone. But I think if people are rational they will allow me to trade with them in order to obtain the goods I want.

But what if they don't practice trade? Or you don't have anything they want to trade with you?

Originally property (as I understand it) was an anarchist position, it was the cartelization of capital that anarchists opposed. Proudhon's famous "la propriete, c'est le vol" slogan was aimed at exactly that. He is also famous for stating that "property is liberty". If you look at Josiah Warren's writings, or William Godwin's, you will see that it was seen as perfectly legitimate for people to own property as an exclusive rights - that was the highest protection of their individual freedom. In fact Warren explicitly said all property should be private - no public property can exist because it will lead to endless strife and conflict over it.

The whole assault on any property began wholesale when Marxism became rampant.

Would you say Proudhon and Warren weren't anarchists?

I'm not familiar enough with the folks you mentioned to be able to say one way or the other whether or not they were anarchists. What I would say though is that your idea of property rights, enforced by contracts backed up by force, seems as close to at least one definition of a state as makes no odds. More generally, making yourself sole authority figure over a given area (your "property") seems more than a little incompatible with anarchism IMO. And certainly puts you at odds with many anarchists, though not - taking your post at face value, since again, I'm not familiar enough to judge - with all.

ComradeAppleton

stateless_crow

Sorry but if there is no 'rules' how the heck can you create and enforce a never-ending stream of contracts to enforce your model of social organisation? What if others do not recognise the rule of your contracts- you gonna use violence to get your way? Maybe hire an army to do it for you (they can each be contracted to die for your individual rights- fantastic!) Or are you gonna sit down and talk it out and reach a collective agreement, like a good communist?

Well this really isn't that complicated - the enforcement will be the same as in the communist commonwealth. I could ask all the same questions about communism. What if others don't recognize your communist collective agreement - will you use violence to get your way? Maybe you will hire an army to to die for your collective rights - fantastic!

Also, what is the difference between the communism you describe and the state? It seems pretty much identical. After all the state purports to be a collective agreement. It looks like once I would join the communist commonwealth I'm screwed - I would not have any rights anymore. The majority could just keep deciding everything, just like it is doing now, and the minority would just have to take orders. This is exactly what we have right now. And this is exactly the individualist critique of communist. Individualists want to cooperate and have collective agreements too, but we always want to have veto power over all decisions and a right of secession (removing ourselves and our property from the community) if that becomes necessary. What's so bad about that?

I don't know what you mean by commonwealth... a communist society would be organised at a local level, with everyone having an equal say and the right to act as they best see fit, but if they act in an anti-social manner those they harm are free to respond appropriately.

Communists cooperate to manage the community dynamics and the productive infrastructure they make use of. (note 'productive infrastructure' like factories, forests, grain stores, land etc, which no individual can claim to have created or have the right to own and exclude others from using. These are not the same as possessions- like a pair of jeans or a laptop- which are easily reproduced by working together to manage our collective labour and how we put it to use at the means of production- possessions are never ever produced solely by an individual but since they are easily socially produced we can share and allocate them in a way which can be said to involve ownership- it would be better for everyone to own their own underwear and share the cotton fields, irrigation system, farming machinery, cotton mill and sewing factory to make the underwear! If one individual claims they own the cotton fields we'd all either run out of pants or go and tell that individual to piss off- probably the latter. What we would not do is agree to exploit the labour of the commune to sell stuff to, or buy stuff from the selfish git who nicked the cotton field... we would not negotiate a contract because their property ownership claim is illegitimate and anti-social).

If some people do not respect the collective agreement about how we collectively manage the coommons (collective property) we would respect their equal right to have a say and we would convene meetings and try and resolve any differences of opinion collectively. If one person, or a minority of people started selfishly claiming ownership rights and were prepared to use violence to enforce them- yes, violence might occur, but whose fault is that? Those that want to share and cooperate or the ones who want to hoard (stuff which they hold no legitimate claim to) and exploit others by denying them a share or forcing them to enter into an exploitative contractual agreement?

In communism each community/ commune/ workplace would make decisions collectively- this is inescapable because we all share the same planet and the same system of social production. We would have decisions we needed to influence beyond our commune and so we would elect delegates with a strict mandate to attend meetings and work with other communes at a regional or global scale with a view to sharing our surpluses and helping each other meet our collective and individual needs- agreements would be worked out and voted on and amended to best suit everyone's needs. I might go on behalf of the commune to the coast, taking our surplus underpants and seeking a share of their surplus fish- maybe we'll have some sort of agreement in place about sharing our respective surpluses, or maybe it's just based on building informal mutual aid (why bother with a contract anyway- we all have the right to amend our social relation at any time as circumstances change- if the cotton crop fails or the fish swim away- we have nothing to gain from trying to enforce a contract or a business deal). This is not the same as a state or a commonwealth of states where power is organised hierarchically- in communism we are free to choose how we live, and we are free to have an equal say on how we link with others in managing social reproduction- we are free to try and be an anti-social individualist trying to nick property ownership- but the rest of society is free to respond in the appropriate fashion and put a stop to any anti-social behaviour and talk (or beat) some sense into those who seek to misappropriate the commons for their own selfish (or deluded) reasons. I'm not saying violence is necessary or desireable, but that trying to capture the commons for your own sole control is a selfish and violent act and will be responded to as such in a communist society.

Everything we do, everything we consume, everything we help to create happens within the context of a complicated web of social relations. There is no fair way of defining property rights, you can only do this through force and oppression. You can define communal living arrangements through talking, voting and just getting on with it.

I am not advocating dictatorial majority rule- I am advocating an inclusive, free and anarchistic system of social decision making, which at all time respects individual freedom (except the freedom to exploit and be an anti-social prick- I mean you're free to try, and we're free to respond accordingly)

For you to say that majority rule 'is what we have now' is utterly absurd. Private property is what we have now (or rather what the ruling class have now- we have alienation and exploitation as a result) and along with private property inevitably we have violent and oppressive hierarchies of power aiming to protect the interests of the property-owning classes, capture and misuse more social wealth and enforce our continued subservience to them (we, the working class, do not own property- we have possessions- we would have more and better possessions, or access to things we need if the properties classes did not oppress and exploit us and use property for their own selfish ends instead of allowing us the freedom to share and cooperate as equals)

In communism where we choose to live and work is up to us, what we do with our labour is up to us, what we do with the product of our collective labour is up to us- but we have to work together to make the decisions that affect social (re)production and resource allocation because we all inescapably rely on social production and commons resources and each others labour to survive and thrive. To have some individuals claiming they own land and factories and we must sell our labour to them or trade with them does not promote individual freedom- it promotes the freedom of the few to oppress and exploit the many- of course we are free not to tolerate this.

How would you remove property from the community- the property (which is actually a commons resource) would be the land and the buildings and the factories and the water supply and the natural materials etc. Do you mean you would take the clothes you wear and the basic everyday (commonly available) tools you use and stuff? That's not property, that's just stuff- take it with you and go live somewhere isolated where no commune already exists..can't see why you'd want to.... but you can't take anything from the commons and claim you own it because that is oppressive to all the rest of us who have a stake in the management of the commons. People would not be slaves to the commune- and maybe you would find one where everyone constantly tries to trap each other in contracts and capture more property for themselves- sounds stressful to me, doubt the other communes would share much with you guys tbh.

Also, my example of giving away pants and hoping to get some fish in return and talking about 'what might utopia look like' is a futile line of argument. Anarchist communists would rather organise for material improvements here and now- organising ourselves non-hierarchically against the propertied classes and their exploitation. How do individualists go about building a better world? Surely your ideology means you feel constantly isolated and like the whole world is against you- I'd encourage you to rethink your ideology 1. because it's nonsense and 2. because it sounds really sad and lonely

Sorry if I'm sounding a bit narked. I am a bit tbh but I do believe you are posting in good faith.

Given your FULL INDIVIDUALISM it seems a bit odd to use the word 'comrade' in your username. Surely you have no comrades, only people with whom you make contractual agreements.

Work hard, get ahead eh? You must be loving the benefit cuts (if you are real and not a joke account?).

ComradeAppleton

I also think you are being extremely naive when you speak of the commune as making "collective decisions". I assure you, there is no such thing as a collective decision. Each person makes a decision and then the majority overrides the individuals. You can't have freedom where majority rule is employed in the decision making process. Either the individual has the right to decide or the collective has the right; they cannot share it.

You mean the individuals in the majority override the individuals in the minority and those individuals, because they're in the majority, are domineering? Isn't it authoritarian to want to halt the entire democratic process because you want to assert your enlightened individualism? I think it is a good lesson in both community and patience to bear with a majority when you know they're in the wrong; if they're wrong in their thinking then protesting about individual rights is not going to persuade them, because they're obviously deluded or motivated by their own interests. It's important to understand that humanity has a lot of shortcomings, and we have a long tradition of authoritarianism and selfishness which we're drawing from, and we need to each work with this in order to ultimately reach a collective harmony. Anyways, anarchy is a living process which isn't subdued merely because a majority has overruled against someone. It's in the fight against oppression and injustice, so if you continue that fight then you're giving life to anarchy and overcoming the tyranny of others. Also collective decision-making consists in the practice of every individual member of the collective having input, even if in the inevitable disagreement over interests some individuals interests become subordinated to the majority. The point is is that the decision-making process is open to the entire community in an organization that maximizes egalitarianism.

OK, ComradeAppleton I'll keep going then. Last post for this eve. Will be back again tomorrow too but I'll give up debating along these lines after that I reckon.

Being a socially cooperative person, or merely a person who wants to extract maximum quality of life from their surroundings, surely the logical course of action is being socially productive, and meeting your own social and material needs by working alongside other people freely and pitching in with useful tasks which can only be performed collectively, is not necessarily and should never be, a contractual obligation or a task enforced from above or dictated by differentials of property rights and access- but plain common sense- and a much more exciting prospect than worrying about whether some people aren't quite as good at being productive than you and therefore shouldn't partake as freely in the social bounty. I put it to you that in a communist/anarchist society, freeloaders would have a hard time of it, they might be able to get away with it up to a point- but I doubt they'd be popular or well-loved in their community. Those social goods which are shared the most freely- such as friendship and love- would be in short supply to those who spent all their time on idle individual hobbies and didn't contribute to the commons The idle would be in short supply in communism- I'd love to get pitched in with all sorts- learn how to treat the sick, learn how to fix cars, learn how to build bikes... whatevs... even if I just learned a bit and helped out now and then but my main job stayed fairly similar to how it is now (but no boss)- I wouldn't sit there procrastinating or wasting my time on management nonsense so I'd be much more productive and still have way more free time.

Sharing our labour and trying to get along as equals to manage the collective world we live in (as individuals interacting with the natural world and social context we inescapably share) is a natural human tendency and an utterly beneficial one to all.

The tendency for communism exists, but it is suppressed by the counter human tendency for trying to get a bit more than the next person- and use your wits and strength to make sure they get less than you- and cooperating with other such individually-minded people to build up networks of power, enforcement and violence to ensure you get the reward of these (in my view anti-social) efforts. The desire to strive as an individual to ensure you can enforce your right to claim individual ownership and have more stuff than your peers is the foundation of the oppression anarchists must oppose, these sorts of individualist ideas lead to those few who hold them banding together to aquire and protect property through violence and put others to work for their own profit- these social conditions that allegedly aim to reward individual effort, or recognise differential rights of ownership, allow a minority to dominate and through dominance shift the burden of work and become the freeloaders you worry about (but its property that caused freeloading not passive sneaky coasters within the commons), individualism- anti-social thinking can become oppression. The majority of the working class continue to fall for the falacy that it is often 'human nature' to be selfish in a social context and that this is the best way to organise the economy, with property and exchange and soforth, but still those that benefit from this current social reality (the ruling class) still have to rely on armies and police to suppress the natural tendency for the majority to rebel against the powerful, deferentially rewarded, propertied, minority. The truth is where we are free from authority and free from fear of authority we will act far pro-socially- I don't cook dinner for my mates and then try and enforce (or even think it would be more fair for) each of them to cook a meal of equivalent value and effort for me, I take whatever they want to freely give and are able to freely give, even if that's just gratitude and help with the dishes, or a lift to work on monday, if one of them brought a large dessert, and then ate all of it I'd think the group, or some individuals within the group, would do something appropriate, and proportionate to encourage them to share next time. I wish society was more like that, so I do not respect anyone's right to own (productive) property or claim a greater share of social wealth than anyone else. Nor do I respect or spend much time and effort on selfish people, except of course the ruling class, but I have to strive on their behalf because they own all the property and force me to sign a contract to get meager wages in exchange for securing their privileged and property rights.

Just think of those scrounging bastards making only ONE pair of shoes and then watching Jeremy Kyle while Comrade Appleton makes FIVE and then contractually trades them for a bag of dead mice or 20 B&H or whatever, and living it up on his or her STOLEN TAXES to boot.

Jeremy Kyle? 'The Real Housewives of New York City' is where it's at! ;)

wojtek

Jeremy Kyle? 'The Real Housewives of New York City' is where it's at! ;)

Oh is that what you watch while you sniff glue and drink cider paid for with Comrade Appletons RIGHTFUL CAPITAL?

ComradeAppleton

PartyBucket

Given your FULL INDIVIDUALISM it seems a bit odd to use the word 'comrade' in your username. Surely you have no comrades, only people with whom you make contractual agreements.

You must have individualism confused with antagonism towards other people. As an individualist I can assure you that I value few things in life above friendship and comraderie with fellow anarchists.

Unless they want to share your stuff, obviously.

Compasionate Conservatism, eh?
You still dont understand the distinction between Possessions and Property do you? (unless of course you are a joke account).

At least three people have explained it already.
Im not doing an Ad Hominem. Your political positions, to me, are Consevative ones.

ComradeAppleton

I won't allow theft by the government, by the corporation, by a commune, or by individual persons.

ComradeAppleton locks up the man or woman
Who steals the goose from off the common
But leaves the greater villain loose
Who steals the common from off the goose.
And geese will still a common lack
Till they go and steal it back.

Whatever he was doing it was no an ad-hominem attack - he challenged the views you have expressed, and he challenged them in a way consistent communist critiques of individualist proprietary ideas you espouse.

If you don't understand the way people use vocabulary on here (property etc), maybe you should read a book or two and try and figure it out before you come on here and make six poor posters try and reinvent the wheel with you. You're telling us you don't understand and that we are wrong in the same breath, don't you think that's curious?

I think PartyBucket is right. Your views can best be described as conservative, but a conservative with a small c. Probably a conservative of the David Korten variety. Someone who opposes capitalism, but believes in "local" markets. But fails to see that it is "local" markets that have given rise to capitalism.

ComradeAppleton

I don't see what I have in common with Conservatives.

'Individualism' and advocating property rights for a very obvious start.

ComradeAppleton

Conservatives are champions of all kinds of traditional authority,
I oppose both traditionalism and authority.

in particular, the authority conveyed in property rights

you asked for a reading list, you where advised to read the anarchist faq, now go and read it, or where you joking when you asked?

as for property, property is basically the means of production, and possessions are things you use for yourself. that is obviously simplistic, but i don't see why i should bother when you wont.

ComradeAppleton

I think you got it all backwards. It's definitely not authoritarian to assert one's individuality and independence, but it is authoritarian to deny individual choice.
For example: Let's say I'm living in a small neighborhood with twenty other adults and they all want to have a big orgy. I then stand up and say I'm not into that idea and I'd much rather go watch TV while they get together and have their orgy.

There have to be some contractual limits which cannot be broken. That's what individualists want - small local associations where everyone knows their rights and can live together in peace or, if they consider it necessary, withdraw from the agreement and enter into a different one.

Let's use a different example. Let's say you live in a commune in which everyone has entered into voluntary agreement to build a cake factory. So, everyone puts in an equal share of labor into building the factory, and all agreements have been met. Everyone is happy and everyone is enjoying their cake. But as the days go on, people start wanting a different type of cake. The cake factory, however, can only produce one type of cake. So a communal assembly is held to determine which type of cake should be produced in the collectively shared cake factory. Now, after fierce debate about which cake is best, the commune comes together in unison to decide that strawberry cake is just what they need. However, after a prolonged silence comrade Appleton objects that the best cake there is is blueberry cake. Should the commune adopt comrade Appleton's view that blueberry cake is the finest specimen of cake when everyone else believes in strawberry cake? But as you said, if you don't want strawberry cake then the only solution is to go look for another association where blueberry cake is produced, or just bear with the strawberry cake. What is this perfectly harmonious association of individuals that you have in your mind, comrade Appleton? To me it seems that contractual agreements have to be negotiated again and again in the continual flux of circumstances and will thus necessarily run into some sticky situations. The best method to deal with this is democracy in a nonvertical and equally accessible organization.

wojtek wrote:
Jeremy Kyle? 'The Real Housewives of New York City' is where it's at! ;)

Partybucket wrote:
Oh is that what you watch while you sniff glue and drink cider paid for with Comrade Appletons RIGHTFUL CAPITAL?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzaVd6zl2bA ;)

Appleton wrote:
We have the division of labor, for example, without which we could not have mass production of goods of any kind. So it would be useless for you to dabble in different tasks. You should rationally still get a profession and work professionally in order to ensure normal levels of productivity.

'rationally get a profession' 'work professionally' 'ensure normal levels of productivity' For someone who hates authority/ capitalism/ Stalinism you sure talk like a boss/ capitalist/ Stakhanovite!

Bertrand Russell wrote in In Praise of Idleness (1932):
Modern technique has made it possible for leisure, within limits, to be not the prerogative of small privileged classes, but a right evenly distributed throughout the community. The morality of work is the morality of slaves, and the modern world has no need of slavery...

I think I'm right in saying your desired society is one composed of small business owners trading goods together based on individual and contractual agreements. Given the following, which seems logical to me, how will it NOT be corrupted?

...As small companies compete, you naturally get market leaders. As these companies get larger they become more efficient at producing goods and services. They invest in mass production techniques in order to produce goods more cheaply than their competitors. They buy raw materials at cheaper prices because they buy in bulk. They expand specialization amongst their workforce. They also copyright and patent their work, preventing rivals from using it. This is known as economies of scale. The bigger you get, the easier it is to make money. Smaller companies cannot compete. This is called a barrier-to-entry. If you wanted to compete with Ford motor cars, for example, just one car plant would set you back around $500 million.

When two market leaders merge they achieve massive economies of scale. This forces others to merge in order to compete, leading to ever greater concentration. Monopolies often buy their rivals. Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp, the world's second largest media conglomerate (often referred to as the ‘Evil Empire’), has just bought out competitor Floorgraphics, a company that was actually suing the media giant for anti-competitive behaviour. That’s one way to win a court case! In the UK, throughout the second quarter of 2007, companies spent over £9.5 billion on mergers and acquisitions, and a further £51 billion on mergers abroad....

http://www.marxist.com/monopoly-capitalism.htm

ComradeAppleton

Which means that people outside the commune can't own the means of production - and how can they survive if they can't own their own means of production!? Must they starve? Clearly not. They should be allowed to own their personal means of production and engage in any peaceful commerce which they might need in order to acquire other goods which they can't produce themselves.
I don't think anyone would be opposed to that - correct?

When 'the commune' is global how can anyone be 'outside' it? We want all means of production, globally, to be held in common, not 'owned' by anyone, in a society that is linked and interdependent on a global level. Since we want to abolish the very idea of things having value as we understand it in capitalism, so we abolish the idea of any kind of 'commerce'.

ComradeAppleton

So my question remains the same: People outside the commune who made a choice not to join should be permitted to own their personal means of production so that they can survive and they should be permitted to engage in any trade they think is necessary to obtain additional goods which they can't personally produce. Is this problematic for the communists?

So you want to 'opt out' of society, but still rely on it for these 'additional goods' (which I imagine would translate as 'most things' - how much can one individual or small group produce)? What is it that you would or could produce as an individual that that society could not produce in abundance anyway, ergo how would you do this 'trading'?
Also what would be 'personal means of production'? How would you come to have them? Would you personally produce them?

Seems to me you're a right libertarian. Have you tried doing the political compass test @ http://www.politicalcompass.org/test

I scored Economic Left/Right: -7.88 and Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -7.38 but as an anarcho-communist (this is a pleonasm in my opinion) some questions were v/ hard to answer.

ComradeAppleton

Communism limits my personal freedom way too much.

In fact, the realm of freedom actually begins only where labour which is determined by necessity and mundane considerations ceases; thus in the very nature of things it lies beyond the sphere of actual material production. Just as the savage must wrestle with Nature to satisfy his wants, to maintain and reproduce life, so must civilised man, and he must do so in all social formations and under all possible modes of production. With his development this realm of physical necessity expands as a result of his wants; but, at the same time, the forces of production which satisfy these wants also increase. Freedom in this field can only consist in socialised man, the associated producers, rationally regulating their interchange with Nature, bringing it under their common control, instead of being ruled by it as by the blind forces of Nature; and achieving this with the least expenditure of energy and under conditions most favourable to, and worthy of, their human nature. But it nonetheless still remains a realm of necessity. Beyond it begins that development of human energy which is an end in itself, the true realm of freedom, which, however, can blossom forth only with this realm of necessity as its basis.
- K. Marx, Capital Vol 3

For us communists, moving beyond the realm of necessity is the real freedom (aka minimizing the amount of work to be done while maximizing free time though this separation of the two are itself a product of the current mode of production), one that can only be achieved by abolishing the current production relations and class society with it. Aka markets and private property which artificially impose "scarcity" and thus the necessity of exchange.

ComradeAppleton

I also consider it unfair because it does not allow labor to claim its proper reward - instead it socializes all profits and losses (by supposedly "eliminating" them, which does not happen in reality) which makes all people reap the same rewards for different work. This is grossly unfair. If I produce more than others I deserve to be rewarded more.

The point is exactly that "reward" is done away with. Actually wage labor is far from being a reward for anything, but eh.

"Each according to their abilities, each according to their needs" means exactly that there is NO measure of your contribution thus the notion of "same rewards" is a bit of a lifeless abstraction still firmly grounded in the capitalist notion of wage as reward, and which still implies a notion of material scarcity, something which capitalism itself has abolished - so there is not even a need for "reward". One might also talk of the current notion of labor, as a social category, as an alienated sphere of daily life but that might be a bit too hardcore now. By which we usually mean that exactly because this sphere is re-integrated into our life, the distinctions of work and play are blurred as they cease to be anything but a creative activity.

The point being that you apparently see the wage relation as something positive and not exploitative as we do.

Have a look here - http://ancaps.super-forum.net/forum
Door on your way out and all that since you've asked for reading recommendations and have neither read them or be willing to challenge the beliefs which you've brought with you.

Don't take it as an insult, some of my best friends are capitalists.

i think thats completely wrong and free trade is completely opposed to freedom of humans

Have you tried snuggling with the Parecon crowd? I hear they're all into remunerations and stuff.

ComradeAppleton

radicalgraffiti

i think thats completely wrong and free trade is completely opposed to freedom of humans

On what basis do you say that? How can voluntary free trade be "unfree"? That seems like some kind of paradox. Free trade is free by definition. You don't have to engage in it if you don't like it because it's free. Only people who want to trade establish trade relations. So how can it make you or anyone less free?

trade doesn't happen in a vacuum, it requires and produces certain social relationships, free trade requires that if someone owns something, regardless of how much they may need it or how much another needs it, it is there's, and they are not required to take in to account the needs of others in deciding to dispose of it, it produces a separation between people who need to cooperate and puts them at odds with each other, it imposes competition where there needs to be none.

Also the free in free trade means, trade is not restricted, not that the people engaging in the trade are free, you can have free trade in housing, land, food, water etc, but have people who are homeless hungry and thirsty, they don't have the choice not to engage in trade, unless you consider starving a choice, but the trade is not restricted at all. if someone owns a warehouse full of food during a faming they can keep it locked up or burn it to increase the price, because its their's and they don't need to care if people starve. as soon as you support a restriction on how much someone can own or what kind of things you no longer support free trade

if you're opposed to democracy then you support a minority making decisions for others, thats vary un anarchists of you ;)

Co-operating with people is kinda a necessary part of life.

so are dumb double posts.

Passing this along in case you haven't read it: http://libcom.org/library/tyranny-structurelessness-jo-freeman

ComradeAppleton

[...]
So communists can do their thing in the commune and individualists can do their thing outside the commune. I don't see any problem with that.

You've eluded any attempt at discussion of the class struggle. In fact, with your insistence on claiming for yourself an inalienable right to own property and to exclude others from sharing it you have demonstrated that all you really want is to preserve that which creates classes and class antagonism.

You are no anarchist; you're a just a selfish twit. You're a disciple of Ayn Rand.

Please could you address my post? Thank you.

http://libcom.org/forums/general/reading-recommendations-fellow-anarchist-12082012?page=2#comment-491385

ComradeAppleton

[...]
I guess you are one of those communists who think they have a monopoly on the word "anarchist" and if someone does not agree with your gospel commandment "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need" all you can do is hiss and start calling names.
News for you: it is perfectly possible to be an anarchist without being a communist. The two can go together, but don't have to.

You're goddamned right about that! I will not accept your spurious claim on the anarchist label because everything you've written here proves that you are nothing more than an obstinately ignorant propertarian whose objection to communism is motivated by your own narrow selfishness; your worship of sacrosanct property.

Your libcom handle "ComradeAppleton" is deceitful as you consider yourself too good to be anyone's comrade. The title of this post is deceitful as you begin by professing that we here are your "fellow anarchist"; Your claim of being anti-authoritarian is a false one because you insist on affirming your illusory property rights, your authority, over and above the needs and wishes of those around you; your individualism is nothing more than an expression of your bloated sense of self-importance because your personal stash is sacred and God help anyone who presumes to use it without first obtaining a "contract", presumably redacted by you and with all the necessary clauses that give you the upper hand.

You are no anarchist in the true sense of that esteemed label; you are a pro-capitalist, petty bourgeois-minded libertarian of the Ayn Rand ilk.

ComradeAppleton

Book O'Dead

You're goddamned right about that! I will not accept your spurious claim on the anarchist label because everything you've written here proves that you are nothing more than an obstinately ignorant propertarian whose objection to communism is motivated by your own narrow selfishness; your worship of sacrosanct property.

I guess you also consider Pierre-Joseph Proudhon to be a "petty bourgeois-minded libertarian of the Ayn Rand ilk"? And how about Max Stirner, or the socialist egoists like Benjamin Tucker? Or the individualists like Emile Armand?

They are all just Randians! Wow, who knew!

Don't hide behind those guys; I'm talking about you, propertarian.

ComradeAppleton

Calling me a "Compassionate Conservative" is not a challenge, it's name-calling.

Sure, calling people names really is an effective way to prove your point right?

No, of course not and your judgement would carry more weight if only you weren't so fond of using labels as slurs yourself.

"Can you please tell me what the difference is between you and a normal run-of-the-mill social democrat? I mean you talk just like one"

"This is a deeply immoral position. It is the statist position."

http://libcom.org/forums/north-america/ron-paul-24022012?page=3#comment-491275"

i don't see how proudhon was an anarchist? max stirner was not and knew it, i don't know enough about tucker or emile to comment, but really what do you hope to accomplish by quoting the people at us or mentioning their names? anarchism is not anyoneism, its not defined by great leaders or founding fartheres, its a continuous practices and constant developing theory, "proudhon said " is not an argument.

ComradeAppleton

Book O'Dead

Don't hide behind those guys; I'm talking about you, propertarian.

Maybe next you'll tell me that Bakunin was not an anarchist because he didn't believe your communist mantra. I wonder how far you are willing to go with this.
The fact of the matter is that having your own means of production does not contradict anarchism. That much is clear to me now, after I was directed to this: http://anarchism.pageabode.com/afaq/secA3.html

Your insistence in comparing yourself to those historical figures is a clear sign of egocentrism.

In defense of your perverse views of private property you presume to invoke Proudhoun, for example, while ignoring his most famous maxim: "Property is theft!"

How do you reconcile that with your childish awe of property?

As to Bakunin, I can only refer you to Marx's summation of his method:

"To address the workingman without a strictly scientific idea and a positive doctrine amounts to playing an empty and dishonest preaching game in which it is assumed, on the one hand, an inspired prophet and on the other nothing but asses listening to him with gaping mouths."

Which are you, propertarian, the prophet or the ass?

ComradeAppleton

I could viciously kick someone right now. Is that a reason for you to permanently bind my feet together?

I (along with the other chumrades) would bind your feet together, just to watch you fall over and thrash across the floor in anger, then slow down and eventually, despairingly, stop (sort of like how i see this thread going). Then we would all have a big red fascist stalinoid chortle.

I joke. :groucho:

In all seriousness, if this is a thread about reading, I would suggest Marx. I found Capital pretty helpful, though the first part of the second volume really solidified things for me. As others have already pointed out (Rai for instance) 'capital' has a very specific meaning (as a system of exploitation and the production of surplus value*). It seems to me ComradeA that you throw around too many disparate terms (property, possession, capital) as if they are the same thing. They arn't. You say you despise capitalism yet you support an individuals right to 'own' capital (or, rather, accumulate capital [for the inherent violent birth mark of this accumulation see Marx on original/'primitive' accumulation]).

It seems to me that ComradeA has fallen into an odd trapping that many (especially in america, hence 'anarcho-capitalism'** or whatever) have fallen victim too. Thinking anarchism as a 'theory' of the individual*** rather than a set of ideas that arise from social and political movements (in Spain, in Italy, in the historic splits in the IWMA etc, etc). A large part of anarchist theory and practice is historically (please don't confuse this with a weak attempt at appealing to tradition) rooted in socialist movements.

* Roughly defined, Marxists of course have been falling over one and other for over a century now to piss on the others faces and tell them how wrong they are ('individualism').

** Although I get the feeling people only call themselves anarcho-capitalist to make their shite politics look a bit cooler. OoooOOOoooOOOOoo, ANARKY!

*** this 'theory' is often accompanied with a duff etymology of 'anarchism' where, no leaders, miraculously becomes the supreme 'right' of the 'individual' above all else.

:rb:

Oh one last thing. I have only mentioned Marx, but I don't consider ol' Carl some sort of God figure. He has some very VERY astute things to say about the nature of capitalism, etc, etc, but he is not the be all and end all. The debates (and eventual split) he had with Bakunin are also hugely important.

ComradeAppleton

radicalgraffiti

i don't see how proudhon was an anarchsit? max stirner was not and knew it, i don't know engough about tucker or emile to comement, but really what do you hope to acouplish by quoting the people at us or metioning ther names? anarchism is anyoen ism, its not defined by gret leaders or founding farthers, its a contiuse pratices and constanly devoloping theory, proudhon said is not an argument.

Apart from the typos if I understood you correctly then I agree with you. Anarchism is not defined by any particular theory or any particular thinkers, and I was not saying that it is. I was simply responding to being labeled as not an anarchist. So, if anarchism is "anyone-ism" then I certainly am an anarchist.

ah sorry my speling is shit espechalis when i'm drunk, i ment to say anarchsim is not anyone ism, its not prodhon ism its not bakuninsm, or kropotkinism.

i'm not a marxist btw, i think marsim is stupid, it doesn't mean marx didn't have good thigs to say or that he didn't have a great anaisliy of capitalism, but, to call your self a marxist? thats just fucked up hero worship, its totalys unscientiffic people shoudl be ashamed to follow one person in that way.

i am how ever a communist and i do think that the idea of a non communist anarchism is ridiculous, like and anarchism that isn't democratic or equaliterian

While currently sober i support RG's right to apologise to terrible spelling with another terribly spelt post. I am a serious proponent of drunk posting on libcom. :twisted: . If the commune won't allow that then it is not my revolution.

ComradeAppleton

But hopefully you would agree that Bakunin was an anarchist despite not being a communist :) After all, the famous slogan of Bakunin was "from each according to his ability, to each according to his contribution (or work)".

Stop making stuff up. The quote is "From each according to his faculties; to each according to his needs."

'Liberty without socialism is privilege, injustice, socialism without liberty is slavery and brutality'. This was....was Stalin right?

ComradeAppleton

radicalgraffiti

i'm not a marxist btw, i think marsim is stupid, it doesn't mean marx didn't have good thigs to say or that he didn't have a great anaisliy of capitalism, but, to call your self a marxist? thats just fucked up hero worship, its totalys unscientiffic people shoudl be ashamed to follow one person in that way.

i am how ever a communist and i do think that the idea of a non communist anarchism is ridiculous, like and anarchism that isn't democratic or equaliterian

But hopefully you would agree that Bakunin was an anarchist despite not being a communist :)

bakunin was an anarchist, but now things have moved on, things have changed since bukunins time and ideas have been tested

Well, this is my understanding of it. It may be incomplete but it's what I can offer to you for discussion. The communist movement is the struggle against capitalist exploitation and the centralized control over property, which is already collectively operated by the workers but monopolized by capitalist elites and secured in that monopoly by governments. Communism is the expropriation and takeover of these productive enterprises and the concomitant association of these enterprises into voluntary federations. This also means the abolition of the state as a guarantor of bourgeois property and the deconstruction of state power into decentralized democratic organs of self-government. Mutual aid would be a revolutionary practice to cement the establishment of universal communism but it could not be enforced given the autonomy of each associative organization. However working class cooperation, solidarity and mutual giving would be essential to ensure the entire supplanting of the capitalist social structure, in order for everyone to be in control over the fruits of their labor. Building a collective society would lay the foundation for individual fulfillment and fruition, allowing everyone access to the means of creating their lives as they wish.

I found this thread too long to quote or react on specific lines and thoughts, so I try to put forward my thoughts came during the reading of this debate.

I've already already expressed my issue with morality and morality based politics, ComradeAppleton. It seems to me that as the debate went ahead, you insist on certain base line truths, beliefs that you do not reconsider in the light of history, present social issues, and the objections of "your fellow anarchists".
The interesting thing is that I don't see you even try to get some justification for your principles, you just simply assert them, and expect the others to accept them. Propery/possessing, individual rights, good honest small businesses so on. Most of the anarchists I know came from an angle of issues with society, with life in general, and there's a search for solution, there's a search for a critical approach that gives the key to understand the present society and the processes shaping our present because once you understand the flow of society you have the chance to change it in order to eliminate the issues you encountered in the first place.

I would like to bring you down from your philosophical anarchism, from the politics of principles in to our real world where well considered actions decide how the world goes ahead, not frozen principles.

Communists like me, consider the following:
1) Personal experience: Most of us are wage workers with no control over our productive labour. Our everyday life revolves around the strict necessity to keep our jobs, to subordinate our will to our bosses, and making a stretch from the pay check to live until the next is coming. We experience the lack of control, the lack of healthy living conditions, we experience profit induced competition between fellow workers. Apart from the strictly work related things, we experience racism, sexism, all sorts of divisive and oppressive forces, making us vulnerable, a victim.
2) Social experience: We see the world around us. We see our friends, our families, our neighbours, people who we generally identify with, suffer similar experiences, and we know that because we exchange these experiences. We see how the individual issues at work are not isolated but widely spread problems, we see the number of poor, miserable life around us. We see people who aren't even capable of being in control of their life because they are in such a misery, such biological condition when their energy is drained by the struggle for simply to be alive.
3) Historical experience: We see that this condition did not arise from a single policy, a bad decision, or from the action of an evil individual or small social group. These conditions are the product of hundred of years of exploitation and power concentration, these conditions reflect the entire organisation of the human race. We could see that our individual will in the face of the huge machinery of society means nothing. We see empires, modes of productions emerge from the activity of large masses, subordinated to the mechanisms of social reproduction.

From these experiences communists concluded a few things:
* Society isn't just simply a bunch of individuals, but an organic entity that forms the life of each individual member.
* Human activity makes up the tissue of society, it is the decisive aspect therefore how society is functioning.
* Human activity today is frozen in to property that is, the way how the productive forces can be concentrated in the hand of small minorities, individuals while the rest of the active human race are subordinated simply because of the lack of property. Property is the politics of exclusion, the politics of misery that is imposed by social control and violence. This has nothing to do of the possession of your underpants, but the idea that you have the [bold]right[/bold] to use whatever productive force is at your disposal to your individual liking. This right must be enforced, either by the state, rent-a-mobs, or by your own violence. Property therefore is the major obstacle of a cooperating, self-controlling, indeed, progressing human race, where each individual has given the chance to grow and flourish the best way we can ensure.
* No changes in society can be facilitated without acting on the social level. What that means, is that individual moral, principles, individual actions, like killing the boss, the prime minister or blowing up the factory does not help on the issues we encountered on the whole stack of layers of our experiences. It must be the re-organisation of society. It must be accepted and actively pursued by the class that lacks any control in this society.

Will be continued...

It is a shame that you ignored Soc's post and continued to repeat yourself ad nauseam. (S)he offered you a unique perspective to discuss things a different way and you continued to quote old dead guys as if anyone cares...

Ah, universal principles. If everyone receives the full product of their labor (leaving aside the question of how you want to measure it without basically keeping the present system around), what about the people who can't work? You could say "Well, the working population supplies them with what they need", but then not everyone receives the full product of their labor. Is this society you're imagining supposed to be a sort of free market society for the young and healthy?

non-aggression principle + charity = voluntary social security

<=>

non-aggression principle = voluntary social security - charity

boom headshot!

ComradeAppleton

People who can't work (such as children) can rely on others for sustenance. But they are certainly not entitled to confiscate the labor of others. I do not see anything wrong with people voluntarily giving their product away to others or participating in collective schemes of providing for those who cannot work or providing for everyone's retirement needs.

I could have sworn that Ron Paul made this exact argument. Forgive me, as I don’t remember the context.

ComradeAppleton

People who can't work (such as children) can rely on others for sustenance. But they are certainly not entitled to confiscate the labor of others. I do not see anything wrong with people voluntarily giving their product away to others or participating in collective schemes of providing for those who cannot work or providing for everyone's retirement needs.
The essence of anarchism is not that everyone consumes all that they produce in isolation, but that they must have the opportunity to do so if they wish.

Fuck any society where anybody is dependent on charity from the like of you for their survival.
Heres you:

Nowt to do with 'evil' more disgust at the idea that you think you can reserve the right to decide whether someone eats or not dependent on your mood, or that it would be a magnanimous gesture from you.
Patronising shite.

ComradeAppleton

Judging by most of the recent replies people are here are Marxists rather than anarchists. I can now sort of see why the 19th century individualists hated Marx so much.

I think people told you from the very start that Libertarian Communists accept large parts of Marxist theory, that doesnt make anyone 'Marxist' in the sense that I suspect you are using it.

Materialism > idealism, simple as that

I addressed soc's post. I clearly stated what I consider to be equitable and moral relations between people in society. I don't think I am in any way obligated to agree with everything other people say, so I am only writing my opinion on behalf of myself, not on behalf of "dead guys". If you don't care about what I am saying then don't read my posts, is that so difficult? Or maybe this is communism showing its true face - everyone has to be in everyone else's business all the time...

I have so far not had an answer to the key question - what makes it right for communists to confiscate the product of my labor? When capitalists do it, we all protest, but change the name of the system and it's suddenly allowed!? That is completely ridiculous. Either people have a right to the product of their labor and then capitalism is immoral and compulsory communism is just as immoral, or people don't have a right to their labor and capitalism is just as fair as any other system.

It is also funny the way you use the word "unique". There is nothing unique about communism, where everyone has the same rights to the same things and is ruled by dictates from the "majority" (which magically possesses divine powers of determining right and wrong courses of action).
Uniqueness is the essence of individualism. Each individual is unique and must be allowed to pursue whatever ends he wishes to pursue, regardless of majority opinion or "society's" needs and purposes.

It's disturbing that every time you respond to someone, you subtlety or radically change what they were saying, twisting the discussion back into the echo chamber that you inhabit. Anyway, I don't care about people "confiscating" my labor, I don't work that hard or care that much about my work normally. I do care about the alienation, fear, shame and stress that Capitalism and your weird small business utopia do and would inflict upon me. And that was the "unique" part of Soc's post. They took the discussion out of a theoretical and largely useless discussion about abstract "rights" (a bourgeoisie concept in and of itself) and just so stories about "the future" and talked about why we want things to change now, and how that shapes theany discussion of a better arrangement. A fundamental critique of things as they are and therefore radical, whereas your critique of "everyone wants whats mine!" is childish, boring and inanely typical. No one will ever want the shit from your garden, don't worry. What is stopping you from living off the grid and acting out your fantasy? It's better than baiting people on a forum, misrepresenting their views, pretending to read things they offer you and misunderstanding terminology, no?

Let me ask this question that bugs me quite a bit.

Communism is defined not by the end results, but rather the whole process of social transformation: Based on the argument I put forward in my previous post, the communist model of social transformation is that we form an organisation of those who have the same experience and came to the same conclusion as we did. There are quite a few different ideas how such an organisation would look like, that makes different strands, like council communists, anarcho-syndicalists, (social) insurrectionists, etc.. But at the core the idea is that communism eventually emerge as a active, militant organised movement that starts out as a resistance movement against those experiences I described previously, and turning in to project of reorganising the entire social aspect of life, the very core of the capitalist relationships. At the heart of oppression we found that it is the property as a social function that characterises all oppressive regimes throughout history. We found that in our present situation, property takes shape decisively as private property. Without citing now the entire history property, you should remember the distinctive feature of Feudum over private property: the single most important thing in the mediaeval production was the land. Feudum thus was a property that belonged to a family, not to a single man. In practice, it meant that no owner can sell his land because nobody had the right to deprive his heirs from the property. The nature of property reflects the nature of society.

You are concerned that communists come after your property. In reality, people have a very complicated and tightly integrated society, where different groups relying on a mutual access to each other's property, in diverse scopes. Even without taxation and government, you'll find that your property isn't controlled only by you. Going by the example of the feudal property system, you can see that family was and is seen as a property holder and within the family, the access to property is controlled by the inner working of the family. A free man in the medieval Europe couldn't gamble away his property, even if he really wanted to. But the benefit of his property was controlled by him, making him the head of the family. A single person responsible for the family fortune. However, feudum and private property had never belonged to the producers, they belonged to the respective ruling class, the minority that imposed control over the rest of the population. Property is nothing but a control of access and to have control, you have to prepare to impose your will over others. In feudal structure it was the tribal military hierarchy which was the guarantor of the feudal property rights, and for the private property it is the State. Incidentally, the rest of the social functions like justice was also under the same control as the access to the key elements of social reproduction. Land lords were not simply property holders, but as such they also had control over other people, the slaves of the property.

Communism comes as a movement of those who had no free access to their reproduction. This makes communism inherently anarchist: It creates a free access to the social production process. That's why I said, that nobody will go after your shoes and nobody go after your possessions at all. But you will not be granted by the right to exclude others from any resource either.

Finally, I would like address your recurring theme of being oppressed by the collectivity. First of all, what others already tried to explain to you, humans tend to be collective beings. It is an evolutionary fact, that cooperation makes the human race so successful as it is. Communication the exchange of ideas, and organised actions (hunting for instance) made our race widely spread around the planet and despite the great inequalities, we're growing in numbers, thus biologically successful. The individual will was, is and will be always subordinated to different forms of collective will. Your individualism however suggest that you would not surrender your right to private property, thus the possibility of imposing your individual will over others. All we have is your morals which never stopped anybody to anything. You see, Christians preach the ten commandments and still commit murder. We need more than your word that your will not accumulate property to turn it to capital over others. We need a social organisation that doesn't allow individuals to get more power over others only by gaining access to more resources at a single moment and starting an accumulation process (which definitely will follow, see the Historical Experiences section :) ).

So there's two logical objection to your individualist approach:

1) You need somebody who protects your rights. It can be either you, or the State. Given your opposition to the State it follows that you would like to be a dictator of your own, with no competition from the "collective". You sir, want to use property against the collective entity of the human race.

2) As a big weakness of your theory is that your moral stand will oppose the actions you have to take in order to achieve what your moral dictates. You can't call a collective movement of individualists because that movement must be more consistent and effective than a rant crowd of not-in-my-backyard types. The only way of getting that consistency is that you and your fellow anarchists form a proper collective with capable of collective actions and decisions, and ultimately, collective reproduction (you see, you want others to join, after all). Without this force, your ideas just stuck on the level of a child who hysterically throw himself on the floor and rant against reality.

The funny thing is, that I do not consider my self as an advocate of democracy, or majority rule at all. I had my fair share of argument with my comrades here, vicious fights even, but I believe that there are other collective processes to and that in a communist society decision making is overrated in the first place because we would not step on each other toes that often.

* Note that capital in our discourse doesn't mean just any tool. It means the process where a tool is operated by someone who is hired as a wage worker while the tool and therefore the product is entirely owned by somebody else. You use the word capital without this distinction which rather shows that you jumped on to the capitalist bandwagon, where even friends, culture, and basically everything in the world is capital: intellectual capital, social capital, cultural capital, and the most disgusting of all, I heard in many cases called the workers as the holder of their own body as capital - as if they were just like Henry Ford with a less efficient turn over, aren't they?.

ComradeRomney

Life is beautiful because of individuality not because of commonality. Living as an independent entity is impossible now and would be impossible under communism, so I am considering other solutions.

Bollocks, communism is all about realizing the individual, which is impossible with private ownership of the means of production. One quick question: what is the relationship between individuals and society? Seems like you argue that individuals emerge independently from society, or that society is simply the aggregate of individuals (i.e. society as arithmetic)

I suggest that you read Soc's posts very carefully as s/he is really going to the trouble to explain very carefully what libcommies mean with communism. Don't just skim like it seem you do with everything (how else would you not be able to engage) and then go back to your unfounded and ahistorical assumptions about life, the universe and everything.

Here try this

Make sure you eat the same berries he did.

ComradeAppleton

I am an anarchist, but an individualist at the same time. I assure you this is entirely possible.

Only you would know.

ComradeAppleton

…if you think abolishing the state and creating a commune is radical, then what could you say about my demands - abolish the state, the commune, the society. These are all pretty much words for the same thing anyway, a collective entity which has claims on my liberty and my labor. I reject any such claims.

This is just pure ignorance that demonstrates your lack of a genuine and coherent understanding of contemporary society. Previous participants in this thread have already explained to you the functions of the state, and how it is distinct from society. But you continue to make this claim, as the one you made above, that the “state”, “society”, the “commune”, etc. are all referring to the same thing. It’s exactly the kind of critique offered by “anarcho”-primitivists. Similarly to the primitivists, you seem to believe, from what I’ve read from your posts, that the problems (oppression, exploitation, etc.) we face in society stems from organization in and of itself. It is totally absurd to believe that organization “naturally” oppresses people, and that all we’ve got to do in order to free people is to get rid all of it. I for one believe that it is not organization in and of itself that is root to all of our problems, but rather “hierarchical” and “undemocratic” organizational structures such as that of capitalism.

A few times in this thread, you have fully admitted that you reject society. You clearly express belief in a dichotomy between the individual and society, a dichotomy that abstracts the individual from society; puts the two in complete opposition to one another. First of all, society is real, and we, as individuals, are certainly not outside of it. But just because we belong to society doesn’t mean we are oppressed by it. Once again, what’s oppressive is not society in and of itself, but the ways in which it is organized. I often prefer to use in place of society, the word community. We do not have to scrap communities all together. It is not community that destroys individuality and diversity, an assertion you would make, but structures that puts the command over the community in the hands of a few. Replacing the current order with a so-called “free” territory of isolated, independent individuals is not going to restore individuality. But rather creating communities that allow individuals to retain their individuality and autonomy will do so, communities that will give individuals the ability to expand their faculties and/or capacities to live a good life. The question for us, at least for me, is how should such a community look like and how do we get there.

The answer will certainly not come from your small markets’ approach of isolated individuals who’ll compete (or cooperate somehow) between and amongst themselves. You never explain how such an order can assure us that it will never give rise to power and exploitation. You seem to believe that your fairy tale world will remain “small” and “local” forever. Apparently there’s no changing dynamics and processes inherent in the kind of world you describe. That’s also absurd, because as we have seen historically and explained to us by many socialist thinkers, it will inevitably lead to monopolization and exploitation, which is what we are experiencing today. You never explain how your market-based fantasy won’t end up with this fate.

Agent of the Fifth International

This is just pure ignorance that demonstrates your lack of a genuine and coherent understanding of contemporary society. [...]

Like i said, his views are reactionary inasmuch he wishes a return of some imaginary, idealized world made up of discrete, isolated individuals. He fails to acknowledge that all that he is is thanks to a complex series of social interactions that took place for over half a million years.

His proclaimed hatred of authority, as he understands it, is really an expression of an immature personality, resentful of the need to interact with others and wishful of a world wherein he alone can impose his own authority on people.

His views are those of incipient fascism: The uni-personal authority of the Nazi version of the Nietzchean Übermensch, which is what I've always thought to be at the root of Randian "libertarianism".

As you correctly pointed out, beyond his indignant protestations against the present, he offers no logical path to his malignant little fantasy world.

ComradeAppleton

But this is all armchair sociology - in the real world we are all separate people and no such thing as society actually physically exists.

I definitely think you're mistaken in this kind of solipsism and I would posit that bourgeois civilization encourages this type of thinking which is so deprived of collective sensibility and so incognizant of the fact that individuals belong to a densely interconnected web of life. What makes individuality so rich is that it happens within a plurality of individuals, that is, a society. In social interactions the boundaries between self and other merge; the societies in which we live still tend to try to preserve this boundary though, most powerfully exhibited, of course, in property relations, whose underlying social reality is suppressed... communism is the actualization of this reality and the means for each individual within society to participate freely in the creation of their existence. Communism is not the enforced sharing of every single material object, though it can become that, but that's where the inevitable social wrangling of democracy comes in. However, I would argue that there is perfect anarchy in a person seizing a loaf of bread from another who has two and will not part with either. How can a person said to not be impinging upon someone else's autonomy when they are depriving them of the means of life out of their own perceived sense of autonomy, of their 'right to own the product of their labor'? The anarchist is the one who expropriates the bread without politely and long-windedly going into a discussion of 'rights' and 'liberties'. However, there certainly can be cases where the product of one's labor is being taken unjustly.

I think that anarchism naturally merges with communism, even though communism can become prone to majority rule. But that is because individual interests will necessarily clash in the societies to which they are inherently bound up with. To become a social isolate is not very anarchistic, also, because anarchism is inherently social; that is, so long as their are rulers (whether they be dictators, tsars, parliaments or communes) in the world, there is no anarchism.

I'm gonna merge with you, comrade... you can't escape The Commune, comrade... But it's that emotional interdependence which binds us to others and overcomes the duality of self and other. No matter how strong-willed a person is they still share their existence with others and participate in others' lives. You can, of course, become a complete hermit and live away from everybody. But that reclusive lifestyle can hardly be called anarchy. Being personally free from the rule of others, while humanity still remains subjected, is a very inadequate form of anarchism. And indeed, if one can justifiably say that one's efforts could be useful in aiding the overthrow of governments, then to forgo this potential and turn one's back on society would be indirectly participating in the perpetuation of this government. So, anarchism is social, so long as there are governments that exist. Once every single person in the entire universe is an anarchist, however, I agree, you can go live on the top of Mount Uranus for all I care.

I also have another example of the potential problem of individualism. Let's say you were involved in the Paris Commune, and, as you probably know, were facing an immediate attack by the French bourgeoisie. But you and some other individualists don't want to fight. Let's leave aside the fact that the Paris Commune was doomed. But because of the gravity of the situation the Commune needed as many fighters and barricade-builders as possible... now, would you stay firm to your principles of self autonomy and resist the communards, and face ejection from the Commune? Or would you fight for the good of all?

First of all, individualist anarchism is nothing but misguided anarchism. Second, I doubt you take any time to read anarcho-communist literature. Your overly obsessed with "individualist" anarchism; constantly quoting or referencing bourgeois individualists we don't care about.

ComradeAppleton

[...]
This sounds as if you were on drugs. And if I can't escape the commune, then you admit it is tyrannical.
[,,,]
Are you trying to say that compulsory labor and drafting people into the army are good? What kind of perversion of anarchy is this? You cannot ever force anyone to do anything - that is tyranny and force, which are the opposite of anarchy. Only voluntary relations can ever be called anarchistic. This applies to expulsion as well - if you expel me from my house because I didn't join your army then you are clearly just another terrorist. At least your actions would meet the definition of that type of behavior. I don't think I have to remind you that drafting people into the army against their will is identical to slavery.

Also I have a feeling you remain willfully ignorant of what individualist anarchism is. I doubt you even take the time to read about it and read some individualist critiques of communism. You are a communist first and foremost, not an anarchist.

Compulsory military service and mandatory labor are designed for morons whose fetishistic individualism (such as yours) prevent them from assisting their communities in times of need.
Barring that, you will be given the choice (a free one, mind you) of either facing a firing squad or permanent hospitalization.

Appleton, you seem to view anarchism, communism and other political positions not as movements of people in history but as abstract philosophical concepts. Why?

Indeed ComradeA has a penchant for straw manning communism, and for semi-quoting anarchists (I joked a few pages ago with that quote, it wasn't Stalin, it were Bakunin. The socialism and liberty one).

Book O'Dead

Compulsory military service and mandatory labor are designed for morons whose fetishistic individualism (such as yours) prevent them from assisting their communities in times of need.
Barring that, you will be given the choice (a free one, mind you) of either facing a firing squad or permanent hospitalization.

With a temper like that I think I would prefer ComradeA's company under capitalism than yours in socialism. Jesus christ, you sound EXACTLY like a bolshevik 'socialism for everyone, apart from the people who disagree with us, then, mandatory labour'. Fuck that. This conversation is getting ridiculous, there is no point saying 'I would do X, I will do Y....when the revolution comes,' individuals relations to themselves and their 'communities' are always in process, revolutionary processes will produce different subjectivities. Hopefully most of us will be part of this process. There is not a pre-given 'community' there that ComradeA needs to serve, the community is produced through revolution, through education (the education of acting in common).

There will be some who won't, like bosses, but whatever, we remove power from their hands. If during this whole period ComradeA is still not affected by this process, fine, let s/he go to the woods or the hills or whatever. It is really not that offensive.

ComradeAppleton

...just a STATIST communist of the Johann Most variety - the ones who want to kill anyone who is not a communist.

I don't really know much about Johann Most. But from a quick research, I found the following links to texts written by himself. He is definitely not a "STATIST" communist.

http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/bright/most/pitproc.html

http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/bright/most/anarcom.html

Arbeiten

Indeed ComradeA has a penchant for straw manning communism, and for semi-quoting anarchists (I joked a few pages ago with that quote, it wasn't Stalin, it were Bakunin. The socialism and liberty one).

Book O'Dead

Compulsory military service and mandatory labor are designed for morons whose fetishistic individualism (such as yours) prevent them from assisting their communities in times of need.
Barring that, you will be given the choice (a free one, mind you) of either facing a firing squad or permanent hospitalization.

With a temper like that I think I would prefer ComradeA's company under capitalism than yours in socialism. Jesus christ, you sound EXACTLY like a bolshevik 'socialism for everyone, apart from the people who disagree with us, then, mandatory labour'. Fuck that. This conversation is getting ridiculous, there is no point saying 'I would do X, I will do Y....when the revolution comes,' individuals relations to themselves and their 'communities' are always in process, revolutionary processes will produce different subjectivities. Hopefully most of us will be part of this process. There is not a pre-given 'community' there that ComradeA needs to serve, the community is produced through revolution, through education (the education of acting in common).

There will be some who won't, like bosses, but whatever, we remove power from their hands. If during this whole period ComradeA is still not affected by this process, fine, let s/he go to the woods or the hills or whatever. It is really not that offensive.

Once you accept CA's premise (that anarchy=individualism) you're trapped in a false moral dilemma.

In times of war or crisis, when a community of individuals is called upon to come together and pull as one, anyone who refuses to help becomes part of the problem and can serve to undermine all of the work of the group. Such behavior cannot be tolerated if the community is to survive and triumph against adversity.

An army that is unable or unwilling to deal effectively with cowards and deserters is doomed.

In a time of peace or relative tranquility you may enjoy the luxury of CA's company more than mine (i salute you for that), but in a time of war and struggle you're best served by sticking with someone like me.

ComradeAppleton

Are you trying to say that compulsory labor and drafting people into the army are good? What kind of perversion of anarchy is this? You cannot ever force anyone to do anything - that is tyranny and force, which are the opposite of anarchy. Only voluntary relations can ever be called anarchistic. This applies to expulsion as well - if you expel me from my house because I didn't join your army then you are clearly just another terrorist. At least your actions would meet the definition of that type of behavior. I don't think I have to remind you that drafting people into the army against their will is identical to slavery.

Also I have a feeling you remain willfully ignorant of what individualist anarchism is. I doubt you even take the time to read about it and read some individualist critiques of communism. You are a communist first and foremost, not an anarchist.

I'm trying to illustrate that by refusing to participate in the defense of the community, you'd quite possibly be assisting in its demise, and the demise of every individual a part of it. In such a case the freedom of the individual is bound up with the freedom of the community and transcending egoistic boundaries is imperative for the preservation of all. It's the same thing when barricading the entrance to a squat when the building owners are trying to get in. In order for every individual to remain autonomous the entire community needs to join in unison and barricade the door. If that involves getting you out of your bed and forcibly putting your body onto the barricade, who cares if that makes me a communist rather than an anarchist?

That's like saying that if I see someone being beaten up in the street and I don't defend that person, I am inevitably "assisting" the people who are beating him up. This is ridiculous beyond words. I am responsible only for those people who I want to be responsible for, not for everyone in my community.

Spoken like someone with sociopathic tendencies or just your average Randroid.

ComradeAppleton

In the 19th century American anarchist movement he was widely referred to as the leader of the "'State Communist" faction because he wrote that all individuals who possess or attempt to get hold of their own means of production have to be killed.

I do not believe in violence, and so do not defend anyone who advocates using it towards some goal. But just because Johann Most or any anarchist for that matter does so does not mean he or she is a “state communist.” It’s as if you’re just throwing up political labels and associating it with whatever you think it is. The question of violence has always divided the anarchist movement, but most would say it’s only okay when it comes to self-defense. However, ones position on this matter doesn’t distinguish whether that person is a communist, anarchist, liberal, conservative, primitivist, moderate, or even a fascist.

ComradeAppleton

Historically Most and his people were opposed to "State Socialists" (those who wanted to establish socialism through political means like voting and lobbying government) and the "Socialist Anarchists" (individualists who did not want communism at all, but wanted a stateless society).

This quote is just insulting. It is firm proof that you came into this discussion (actually you started it) with a somewhat inaccurate, insufficient and confused knowledge of the broad anarchist movement you believe you are a part of. Politically, I consider myself a representative of socialist anarchism. Most people here at Libcom.org are representatives of socialist anarchism, even those you most disagree with and even find troubling. To make this clear; I’ll explain. The tradition of anarchism historically divided itself into two broad categories; socialist anarchism and individualist anarchism. There may be some overlap, but they have mostly been separated from each other. To make this clearer, socialist anarchism was and still is the largest current within the overall anarchist movement historically and internationally. Individualist anarchism has mostly been a literary phenomenon in the United States; basically a minority. Why? That’s because the “individualists” don’t have the right approach in tackling contemporary issues. Socialist anarchism, as a broad category, includes many tendencies; the most important ones are anarcho-collectivism, anarcho-syndicalism, and anarcho-communism. The last one, anarcho-communism (or communist anarchism), I would add emphasis on. For some reason, you don’t consider it a type of socialist anarchism. That’s because for you, socialist anarchists are “individualists” (a horrible assertion) who did not want communism (an assertion that is double worse than the previous one), but wanted a stateless society (this is an assertion that “communists” as you see them don’t want a stateless society, also wrong). For your information, the term “communism” is just a more radical synonym for the term “socialism”. There has been a lot of things associated with the term, but you shouldn't let such things confuse you.

I don’t know how you arrived at the assumption that socialist anarchists are “individualists”, and that they are distinctly different from communist anarchists. But the following quote sheds some light on your misstep:

ComradeAppleton

By definition, anyone who claims communism must be compulsory is a statist.

To you, communists are compulsive, which means there statists, socialist anarchists are not, which somehow means there “individualists”. Communist anarchists are not compulsive, as there is nothing to suggest in their literature or from you that they are. And there’s nothing here in this thread by previous participants, who identified themselves as communists, to suggest so also. You are going to have to elaborate here.

ComradeAppleton

Marx wanted to use violent and political means to nationalize (collectivize) everything so that eventually somehow a magic stateless utopia could emerge, while Kropotkin wanted to keep communism voluntary. Marx was the biggest influence on the State Socialist and State Communist movements, while Kropotkin and Proudhon were popular with the Socialist Anarchists (despite their hostile attitude toward communism, they deeply admired Kropotkin).

Marxism is another matter which I am not going to go into here. From my understanding of history, the socialist tradition itself divided into two separate categories much like anarchism: a libertarian strand (socialism from below) and an authoritarian strand (socialism from above). Identifying with the former is socialist anarchism, while Marxism is placed in the latter. Your right, Marx had the biggest influence on the latter. But you said something very contradictory, “…while Kropotkin and Proudhon were popular with the Socialist Anarchists (despite their hostile attitude toward communism, they deeply admired Kropotkin).” That explanation is totally confusing.

ComradeAppleton

I don't see much difference between what you described above and a state...Also your argument is ridiculous: "by refusing to participate in the defense of the community, you'd quite possibly be assisting in its demise"
That's like saying that if I see someone being beaten up in the street and I don't defend that person, I am inevitably "assisting" the people who are beating him up. This is ridiculous beyond words. I am responsible only for those people who I want to be responsible for, not for everyone in my community. I am also only responsible for my own actions, not for the actions of others. Furthermore, does that mean that pacifists can't be anarchists? Pacifists will not participate in any defense, and yet there can be no doubt that pacifists are by definition anarchists (because they never invade others). You seem to be getting yourself into a problematic position there...

Again, I encourage you to read Emile Armand's great summary of the individualist anarchist position:
http://www.panarchy.org/armand/individualist.html

You are right that it is hypocritical and wrong to compel a person to fight for freedom. However, isn't allowing violence to happen when it is quite possibly within your means to stop and minimize it not pacifism at all? And how can there be anarchy when even though you're enjoying personal freedom, others around you are being subjugated and oppressed? It's more than just an eyesore to see people being dominated and exploited, it's a duty to go and help them. I think you're completely right that that duty should never be dictated by an external authority... but one ought to be compelled by one's conscience. If you don't have a social conscience, you're not an anarchist. Anarchism is freedom among society, not apart from it.

Anyways, I hope we can still be friends comrade. I admire your principles and think you're a valuable asset to the cause of liberty, even if somewhat overzealous. I dare say though... The Commune will be watching you. I enjoyed that individualist bill of rights, though I find it somewhat abstract for my mind. Here's my recommendation for you: http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/michail-bakunin-revolutionary-catechism

ComradeAppleton

That's like saying that if I see someone being beaten up in the street and I don't defend that person, I am inevitably "assisting" the people who are beating him up. This is ridiculous beyond words. I am responsible only for those people who I want to be responsible for, not for everyone in my community.

Spoken like a true sociopath. Were you bullied as a child or something?

Oh god... I scare myself when I'm high. Please don't insult the individualist, he means well, he means well... he was just sticking a little firmly to his principles...

qbbmvrjsssdd why did you delte/edit your post. Even though you wrote it high, you made some really good points and you gave me quite the lulz as well (especially towards the end there).

ComradeAppleton

First of all I was simply repeating what was said of Most in the 19th century. Among the Socialist Anarchists he was called a State Communist. I can quote sources if you wish. Second, what else would you call someone who advocates violence against anyone who does not comply to his/her vision of society? That is exactly the definition of a state - a violent organization which forces people to conform. There is no other definition of the state that I know of.

Repeating what was said of Most throughout the 19th century is not going to do you justice. It seems to me he had accusations thrown at him, but it doesn’t mean that those accusations were correct or some historical laws to be repeated down generations. I have no idea in what situation Most was advocating violence; as I said, I hardly know the guy. But his means in this case, wouldn’t describe his ends. Your last sentence is just ridiculous. I think participants before have already explained to you as to what is a state. You seem to be equating the state with just organization (totally wrong). Hopefully you mean, at least, violent, hierarchical, organization.

ComradeAppleton

I think you got mixed up when I used the words "social" and "socialist". They have a distinct meaning. The American individualist anarchists of the 19th century were socialist anarchists, but they were not what you would call "social" anarchists.

This further proves just how much of a confused individualist you are. The term “social anarchism” is just short for socialist anarchism, and has been for at least one and a half centuries. So the words “social” and “socialist” do not have distinct meanings. You can use one or the other, it doesn’t matter. I don’t know why you would introduce “social” anarchism, when we have been only using “socialist” anarchism, as I recall, throughout the whole discussion. Apparently you think there’s some pre-defined meaning behind “social” anarchism that sets it apart from socialism. But the following quote from you provides us with some more clues into your mistakes.

ComradeAppleton

They believed that the socialist critique of capitalism was correct, but they preferred an individualist solution to the problem. So they were socialist individualists, but they were not collectivists. Socialism does not imply collectivism, it only implies anti-capitalism.

Belief in the socialist critique of capitalism isn’t enough to make you a socialist. Your just reducing what the word “socialism” implies, which is what many people have been doing in recent history. It has been associated with “reformism”, “social democracy”, or “welfare state capitalism”, and in your case, a merely “anti-capitalism”. As I understand it, socialism has developed over the past two centuries to the point that it comes with clearly defined vision(s) that goes along with its analysis. To be a socialist, one has to be consistent in his approach; analysis and vision. After all, one’s vision is a reflection of what he/she understands of the current order and all of its faults. By now, socialism implies complete social transformation (socialization, collectivization, democratization, etc.), not just mere disagreement with capitalism or a “tweaked” capitalism as social democrats have done. Your next quote reveals why you would make such a reduction.

ComradeAppleton

As an example - Benjamin Tucker, a leading 19th century individualist anarchist, was a socialist. But he was not a collectivist (so he was not a "social anarchist").

I am aware that Benjamin Tucker referred to himself as a socialist, but that was at a time when socialism was barely developed. Your quote demonstrates how you perceive political movements as “abstract philosophical concepts”, not as historical movements of people. You do not take into consideration; history and time. You accept concepts as they were at one particular time, without reflecting on how much they have changed in usage. That’s why there is so much confusion in this debate. You’re approaching this debate as if we are in 1880, not the year 2012. By now, it is widely accepted amongst scholars who are interested in the topic that Benjamin Tucker is not a socialist. Your approach is, by nature, a fixed ahistorical dogma that I hope you will one day overcome. Until then, we can have a decent debate or discussion.

ComradeAppleton

Individualist anarchists included many great and well known personalities in Europe as well as the United States. They were well enough known, in fact, to often engage in lengthy debates with representatives of the State Socialist and Communist movements. Some members included P.J. Proudhon, Henry Seymour, and John Henry Mackay in Europe, as well as Benjamin Tucker, Voltairine de Cleyre, Josiah Warren, and Lysander Spooner in the United States. These well known people were not just a "literary phenomenon in the United States".

First of all, a movement that is comprised of only intellectuals (“personalities”) is what I mean by literary movement. Socialist anarchism is comprised of many intellectuals as well, but what set it apart as not a mere literary movement is the fact that it developed within the mass workers movement all over the world. Many of its principals have guided such movements, such as the IWW (“the Wobblies”). That is why socialist anarchism is also referred to as “class-struggle” anarchism, because it engages in the class struggle, something the majority of individualist anarchists have rejected historically. It is not enough that a few intellectuals here and there engage in some lengthy debate. But the individualists won’t go any further because they totally reject organization- and all kinds of organization.

I have no problem with what individualists espouse. Their desire to own their own plot of land in some “small” market setting is fine with me. But it is a desire that only wishes to rewind the clock backwards so we can see capitalism start all over again; it’s essentially a reactionary position. We, socialist anarchists, consider it to be an ahistorical fantasy. We understand, through our historical and social analysis, that in order to move forward with genuine change, we have to consider what it is we are dealing with at present and what dynamic is pushing society past, present, and future. The current infrastructure we are dealing with can’t allow us to have your “small” market vision.

ComradeAppleton

Furthermore, individualists do not care that according to you "current infrastructure we are dealing with can’t allow us to have your “small” market vision" because your opinion is inconsequential to the individualist as he/she does not recognize your right to determine what is or is not "allowed".

I guess your the guy who gets hit by a parked car by accident.

[quote=Comrade(sic)Appleton]If we have 50 people, none of whom call themselves a leader and are therefore all functionally equals, and 49 of those people compel one man to do something against his will, then a government has already been established and class has already been created. You then have a ruling class (numbering 49) and a subservient slave class of 1 man. Thus any compulsion of one person by another inherently creates a hierarchy, whereas any cooperation of one person with another eliminates hierarchy. Any such organization (from which a person is not allowed to secede at any given time) is a state. [/quote]

This is bourgeois individualist nonsense (and sexist), totally ahistorical regarding 'governments', 'classes' and 'states', and denies the eternal reality for all humans of society.

As Communists, we wish to control society, and bend it as far as is possible to all of our individual needs, not secede from it and abdicate our duty to our comrades.

You're in for a shock, mate, because by your definition a 'commune' is a 'state'...

Comrade(sic)Appleton

Society is ... just shorthand for a group of individuals.

Margaret Thatcher

There is no such thing as "society," only individuals...

Thanks for your clarity of expression, CA. Usually, the 'individualists' on here try to convolutedly justify their claims of 'individualism' and try reconcile their unexamined bourgeois programming with Communism, an impossible task.

I don't think that there's any point to me explaining any further, is there? You seem to be happy with your understanding of Communism, and there are plenty of other threads, besides this one, which address the issues of reductionism and structures, which include the issue of 'society'. Cheers.

Whereas "the individual" is not an abstraction at all :D

jura

Whereas "the individual" is not an abstraction at all :D

CA, as do all 'individualists', will just fall back on 'biological' existence as 'proof' that 'individuals' exist, whereas 'society', not being a biological structure, is thus 'prooved' not to exist.

Just like 'water', not being an 'atomic' concept but a higher level structure, doesn't exist for our reductionist individualist friends.

There are only atoms and individuals, such as hydrogen, oxygen and ComradeAppleton.

Be careful about gravity, it tends to impose itself rather involuntarily.

jura

Whereas "the individual" is not an abstraction at all :D

FWIW, even if we accept that the modern "subject" is a phenomenon of bourgeois jurisprudence and other institutions, that's not necessarily an argument against it's preservation in a communist society. This is the main point where I think the classical Anarchist tradition is superior to Marxism.

But I agree that naturalized, ahistorical conceptions that contrast an abstract "individual" to an abstract "society" are douchey.

Good call Angelus. I sometimes feel people throw the baby out with the bath water on that one, 'oh my god, I am not a auto-constitutive individual? WE ARE COMMUNIST-BORG'.

Arbeiten

I am not a auto-constitutive individual? WE ARE COMMUNIST-BORG'.

Or as well call them in German, "Gegenstandpunkt".

Angelus Novus

jura

Whereas "the individual" is not an abstraction at all :D

FWIW, even if we accept that the modern "subject" is a phenomenon of bourgeois jurisprudence and other institutions, that's not necessarily an argument against it's preservation in a communist society. This is the main point where I think the classical Anarchist tradition is superior to Marxism.

Then again I never heard about Marx stating anything to the contrary so I kind of wonder where that myth comes from - lemme guess, 2nd Int.? That's where all the bad stuff comes from anyway!

Angelus Novus

Arbeiten

I am not a auto-constitutive individual? WE ARE COMMUNIST-BORG'.

Or as well call them in German, "Gegenstandpunkt".

Actually laughed out loud on this one.

ComradeAppleton

those who do not work do not have a right to use the product made by others.

You're correct. We should kill the elderly, children, and disabled. No work, no food as they say.

Dear libcom,
I've known your for some years now. Like three or four years. That's like an eternity to me. So I feel like we're friends.

Best friends.

And when I see my friends doing something I think might end up hurting them, or going in the wrong direction I feel like I should tell them. I feel like I should say "hey pal, I don't think this the best thing for you to do." libcom, why are you debating with Comrade Appleton? Why would you put so much effort into arguing with someone who:

- continuously spins the content of your points into what he would've rather you said in order to not have to respond thoughtfully, or rethink anything

- often writes like he is in the nineteenth century

- wrote this:
ComradeAppleton

That's like saying that if I see someone being beaten up in the street and I don't defend that person, I am inevitably "assisting" the people who are beating him up. This is ridiculous beyond words. I am responsible only for those people who I want to be responsible for, not for everyone in my community. I am also only responsible for my own actions, not for the actions of others.

That's not a political position. That's a psychological problem. I was once on a thread where Comrade Appleton claimed that rape survivors who chose to use police intervention were "immoral".

Is this the type of person you wish to have an honest and principled debate with libcom? Comrade Appleton wants us to live in a callous, misanthropic world, where each of us would be profoundly isolated from the rest of our human family. Isn't that what we have already?

libcom, you're like my best friend. Please don't throw your life away debating a knock off brand Max Stirner.

ComradeAppleton

LBird,

First of all, critiquing the very existence of individuals is not an answer to a criticism of the concept of society. If the individual doesn't exist, society certainly can't exist either (just as the concept of water cannot exist without hydrogen and oxygen atoms).

Comrade, you really must try to read what we are saying - you can then still disagree with us, but don't pretend you are understanding and disagreeing with us when you make false claims about our position.

No-one argues that 'individuals don't exist' - of course, biologically, we all exist as individual beings.

ComradeAppleton

Second, it is somewhat useful to note that I exist as an individual - there is no other way for me to exist.

Yes, we all agree that you biologically exist separate from all of us, as do we from each other. I can't do a shit for you, not even under Communism.

The real issue is that we are discussing society (and its political dimensions), which exists at a different level to biology.

In the same way we can't discuss water at the atomic level of physics (hydrogen and oxygen separately as individual atoms) but must discuss it at the level of chemistry (hydrogen and oxygen in a certain relationship), so we can't merely discuss our biological existence when we want to understand our social existence. We exist at two levels, the biological and social.

If you continue to confuse the two levels, you can't understand politics, which is a social, not a biological, activity.

Society is about the relationships between us, not us as isolated physical beings.

And ideas, including your notions of 'individuality' as a political ideal, are produced within society and have a history.

Furthermore, we'd argue that political ideas have a class origin and basis, including your 'individualism'.

Political ideas can't be discussed at the level of biology. Existence is not the issue, but what and why we think the way we do.

laborbund

Dear libcom,
I've known your for some years now. Like three or four years. That's like an eternity to me. So I feel like we're friends.

Best friends.

And when I see my friends doing something I think might end up hurting them, or going in the wrong direction I feel like I should tell them. I feel like I should say "hey pal, I don't think this the best thing for you to do." libcom, why are you debating with Comrade Appleton? Why would you put so much effort into arguing with someone who:

- continuously spins the content of your points into what he would've rather you said in order to not have to respond thoughtfully, or rethink anything

- often writes like he is in the nineteenth century

- wrote this:
ComradeAppleton

That's like saying that if I see someone being beaten up in the street and I don't defend that person, I am inevitably "assisting" the people who are beating him up. This is ridiculous beyond words. I am responsible only for those people who I want to be responsible for, not for everyone in my community. I am also only responsible for my own actions, not for the actions of others.

That's not a political position. That's a psychological problem. I was once on a thread where Comrade Appleton claimed that rape survivors who chose to use police intervention were "immoral".

Is this the type of person you wish to have an honest and principled debate with libcom? Comrade Appleton wants us to live in a callous, misanthropic world, where each of us would be profoundly isolated from the rest of our human family. Isn't that what we have already?

libcom, you're like my best friend. Please don't throw your life away debating a knock off brand Max Stirner.

I think laborbund wins the thread.

ComradeAppleton,

Your response to LBird is quite repetitive, as is all of your other responses. You function like a propaganda machine. You continue to make all sorts of distortions and false claims about the views of many participants in this thread. Either your doing it on purpose, or you just don't understand our position and what we are trying to say. I think it's probably the ladder. You really lack understanding. And this lack of understanding has led to the development of your views being as contradictory as capitalism.

LBird

I can't do a shit for you, not even under Communism.

:p

laborbund

Can we go back to discussing, specifically, this odious position:

ComradeAppleton

Jason Cortez

yeah, those women who try to get rapists convicted are evil. etc...

I don't want to shock you too much, but using using slave-armies to fight your battles for you is evil. Just because the state has a monopoly on "justice" doesn't mean using it is good. You sleep with dogs, you wake up with fleas. You use the government, you work with the oppressor.

Yeah the cops are bad, but we live in the society we live in; we don't live in an anarchist society. How the fuck could you possibly feel justified heaping moral condemnation on rape survivors like this? No long treatise here, just wtf.

Never got an answer to this. Still WTF. I'm asking you Comrade Smeagol, what the fuck?

ComradeAppleton

Perhaps it is true that I do not fully understand your position, but have you ever thought that this is not my fault? Maybe you should explain yourself better. I just hear the same mantra over and over. I do not accept this mantra (that society exists). Do you have any proof that society exists? Such proof doesn't exist of course, just as proof that god exists does not exist... Imaginary beings don't exist.

Let's try again, then, to explain.

What, to you, constitutes 'proof' of existence?

It seems, once again, that for you 'proof' consists only of existence at the biological level. If so, then society doesn't exist. It is not a biological entity.

But then logically, if you reduce everything to their component parts, you can't admit the existence of 'water', only hydrogen and oxygen.

In reality, there are 'levels' to existence, beyond the atomic in physics or biological in humans.

Just as water has properties (eg. wetness) that don't exist at the separated atomic level, so society has properties (eg. politics) that don't exist at the separated individual level.

If you put the gases hydrogen and oxygen onto fire, an explosion results; but if you put them, as water, onto fire, the fire is extinguished.

If you are determined to only accept 'biology' as proof of existence, then you can't begin to understand, not only our arguments, but any political ideas or their origins, including your own.

'Individualism', as a political ideology, is not the same as 'individual' existence, as a biological being.

Hope this helps.

Comrade Appleton

All relations between people are completely contingent upon the will of the people involved, they can therefore sever and break relations at any given moment for any reason.

This is quite clearly untrue, given a moment's study of not only history, sociology or anthropology, but just the day-to-day life that we all experience.

ComradeAppleton

It's true for example that two people can often perform a task that one person can't perform.

This is as close as you've come to an understanding of the need to study relationships between people, rather than them as isolated individuals.

ComradeAppleton

I am only attempting to, in my own small way, to continue to job of Stirner, Proudhon, and Armand - the men who liberated the individual from the tyranny of other people's ideas.

Who's talking in abstractions now? The vast majority of 7 billion individuals on this planet are chained to an exploitative socio-economic system, which degrades, maims and kills millions every year, including young children and babies.

The only thing that you're doing, in your own small way, is ignoring reality in this real world, for an abstraction of 'individual liberty'.

Well, we've tried to explain. If you're happy with your liberal ideology, there's no more to be said.

ComradeAppleton

Only a truly a-theist, a-social, and a-historical person can really be free. Don't you know that in all other cases you are just an instrument of ideology?

Don't you realise that your first sentence here is an ideological statement?

Don't you realise that we are all 'instruments of ideology'?

The difference between liberals and Communists is that we examine ours, the better to understand it and its origins. Ironically, we are the ones who choose as individuals to employ an ideology of our own choice, unlike those who merely repeat the programming of our bourgeois society.

Whilst we have seen through the lies about 'free individuals' that we are all inundated with throughout our lives, you merely regurgitate the ideology of the rich.

As I've said before, you are free to ignore what has been said to you on this thread, but I must admit I don't understand your motivation in continuing to ask questions of Communists and then not trying to understand the answers.

You've not developed your answers in relation to what you've been told, whereas several of us have tried different tacks to explain things to you.

We know, you're an 'individual'. But you can't explain anything about our world from that stance. Perhaps it's become clear that you don't want to explain anything, but just repeat assertions.

I personally am only going to continue to discuss with you if you show some awareness of our replies, and develop your answers in opposition.

ComradeAppleton

You are clearly entering into a fallacy by saying that the fact of not having an ideology is an ideology in itself.

No, as usual you're ignoring what's being said. Either that, or you really don't understand.

We are not saying that there is a 'fact' of non-ideology.

We're saying that to claim to be non-ideological is itself an ideological claim.

You claim to be non-ideological, and we claim that you hold an ideological position.

Do try and keep up. There is no 'outside' of ideology. To claim that there is, is an ideological claim.

Society is people and the social relations between them, for someone not to be part of society the would need to be completely isolated and never interact with anyone else. You're claim that society doesn't exist just makes no sense, there are people and they interact with each other, this interaction influences all people involved with it, even if they only observer passively what others are doing.

Ideology is sets of ideas, beliefs etc, you clearly exhibit these and so have ideology, the idea the people can be free or independent of ideology is its self a part of modern liberal ideology.

You are completely enveloped by society and ideology. But that is not in itself a bad thing, the problem is the specific form of society and the kind of ideology.

ComradeAppleton

I think individualists are a much smaller minority and I am just as critical of the current paradigm as you are - so how exactly is that proof of either one of us being right or wrong?

Really? You think “individualists” are a much smaller minority? Have you seen how many votes Ron Paul had in the primaries? Do you know how many people have read Rand’s Atlas Shrugged?

ComradeAppleton

In case you haven't noticed, any 'programming' that goes on in society is exactly the opposite of what you claim. The world is filled with propaganda of solidarity, sharing, being nice to others, and all other useless neo-christian collectivist nonsense.

Where in the universe do you live? Avatar? You must be smoking something.

ComradeAppleton

I cannot believe any sane individual would want to live such an empty life devoid of all choice and action. What does it matter whether you are a tool of a slave-master or an ideologue? Both place the same demands on you. You are just a tool in their hands. In a war of ideologies no one can be victorious or satisfied until all others are dead. And then what? Even then it is ideology that wins, not you! You never existed, all you did was slave away for the idea, trying to embody it with all your being.

This is just full of crap. Nobody is saying we should become tools of ideology, as if that’s everything. Ideologies are born within the material realm, under specific conditions. And in most cases, they can have a class dimension, as someone else here on this thread mentioned before. They can encompass good ideas or bad ideas; ideas that everyone is not going to agree with. Whether or not you agree with our position, or whether or not we agree with yours, all we are trying to say (and certainly LBird) is that you have to be conscious of these ideas.

ComradeAppleton

As for your rather silly thesis that 'non-ideology is ideology' all I can say is that it is laughable. No god is a god, non-red is red, intelligent is stupid, a dog is a cat, existence is non-existence, are all these statements true?

You just continue with your ignorance here, which is just completely shameful. And after repeating more ignorance, you write:

ComradeAppleton

So let's just define society as a group of people and not get into any determinist and absolutist analysis which I expect would be your next step.

You’re the perfect example of someone who is deterministic and absolutist. You only want to talk about the “individual”. You want other peoples to fall, and yourself to elevate supreme above all others. Your whole sun analogy demonstrates your determinism; pulling out the most ridiculous step forward in trying to prove that no one has a claim on the “individual”. First of all, no one here made a claim on any “individual”. You say you do not care about abstractions. You need to go back and check all of your posts. You talk within sheer abstractions. You even admit; for you the only truly liberated “individual” is one who is “a-theist”, “a-social”, and “a-historical”. You allow yourself to be drowned with the worst of ideology. You don’t consider (or look critically) at anything that presents itself as reality.

ComradeAppleton

But saying that communism is 'good' is simply a lie. It is not any better or worse than any other model of interaction.

For the individualist communism has one fatal flaw - it requires organization.

This proves once and for all that you do consider “organization” in and of itself as a bad thing, or as you say, a “fatal flaw”. As for what you wrote afterwards, I wouldn’t mind if you go your own way. I don’t know who would suggest otherwise. If you think communism is a bad way of organizing an economy, what makes you think a true “market” would be better? You’re an idealist; plain and simple. You have the whole concept of idealism totally confused; detached from its true meaning. Communists, including myself, are materialists. You seem to have been offended when we rightfully labeled you as an idealist, so now you’re just trying to turn it and all of our arguments around, so you can label us as “idealists”. Just pitiful. Spinning things like Bill O' Reilly on Fox News.

ComradeAppleton

radicalgraffiti

Society is people and the social relations between them

Excellent! So we finally admit the society is just a group of people!

Don't words and logic play any part in your thinking?

radicalgraffiti writes about 'people and relationships'; you read 'just people'.

Can't you understand that relationships can vary?

Two people facing each other is different to two people facing away from each other. The relationship is an independent variable, a separable consideration from seeing 'just' the two people.

Except in your strange, isolated, uncomprehending universe, ComradeJanus.

ComradeAppleton

Perhaps it is my fault - I am not the most eloquent of people.

It's not eloquence that you lack, mate, but the abilities to read, understand and reason!

Comrade Appleton just want everyone to participate in the awakening of the sociopaths by passing around that masterpiece of theoretical work known as 'Dexter'.

Again, where in the universe does he live?

It's truly amazing!

It's planet Debate Club, I guess.

Khawaga

Comrade Appleton just want everyone to participate in the awakening of the sociopaths by passing around that masterpiece of theoretical work known as 'Dexter'.

You, my friend, have warmed the cockles of my heart.

ComradeMellon

For the individualist communism has one fatal flaw - it requires organization.

[...]

The job of the individualist is to question and critique all customs, dogmas, and fixed ideas. With each criticism there is hope that some inner scepticism will be awakened within other people which might lead them to discard their silly abstractions. That is what happened to me, so it might also happen to others.

So through questioning and critique you hope to free people from their false consciousness and awaken them to the righteous truth of Comrade Appleton Thought?

Ok, you Stirno-Leninist, what next?

How do you propose that your individualist revolt against the abstraction of society will spread to the benighted sheeple masses? This project might be a bit tricky since you eschew all forms of organization..

Which is another reason why, and you'll probably hate this, the anarchist-communist critique of society and vision of the future is far more realistic than yours - in addition to being preferable. For all your protestations that we are spinning abstract fantasies, you are the one (as people have constantly tried to drill into your head) who has crafted a bizarre conception of the universe and how the world works.

You see, communists understand the overcoming of capital and the state as a real movement whose precepts are already in existence; one that is based on our common condition as workers impelled to destroy the very conditions that bind us to our exploiters. So, our understanding of how humankind might move past exploitation is informed by our critique.

Your bankrupt analysis of the human world leads to the complete incoherence of your project.

ComradeMellon

Do other people's actions have an effect on me? Sure. Does that mean I am now in some mystical union with them, from which I cannot escape? No.

I suggest you follow this line of thought to its logical conclusion. That is to say, fuck off and go live in an isolated, free-market utopian community somewhere. Escape may just be your best bet at realizing the core tenets of Comrade Appleton Thought.

Here is a friendly suggestion.

Language is a product of society. Hence the phrase "there is no such thing as society" - as a proposition is inconsistent with the very act of being able to form it. As a speech act, however, it does have a meaning - usually "I am a bourgeois idiot". See also the etymological origin of idiot.

ComradeSociopath. I am not reducing individualism to a crude stereotype, I am reducing your "theory" into one. If you want a "serious" answer, look at what Ocelot wrote. Your very use of language is evidence that society exists and that individuals can be so only in society.

For you to be even able of thinking about the individual it has to be an abstract category of knowledge. It is sorta the case with anything. So there goes your entire argument.

ComradeAppleton

So what is the problem with communist 'society' theory? The problem is that communists give society existence (as all socialists do). Society becomes, in their mind, an entity. But society is not an entity. It is only a group of people.

Suggestive reading for a Chumrade (as this is, after all, the thread title).

Emile Durkheim The Rules of Sociological Method - especially the section on 'social facts'.

Wiki on structure and agency

Also, Emergent properties

While I think it is wrong to say the sum is greater than the parts (some borg-communist shit right there)

It remains the case, it seems to me, that the interaction between individuals and 'the social' (rather than 'society' that implies civil society and nation [which can then be used as a springboard for lazy comparisons between 'socialists' and 'nationalists']) is a mutually determining one which is far more complex than 'do as we say' (nasty stalin bogeyman) or 'I can just unplug from this society shit willy nilly' (crude individualism).

Arbeiten

Also, Emergent properties

While I think it is wrong to say the sum is greater than the parts (some borg-communist shit right there)

Unfortunately, Arbeiten, the notion of 'emergent properties' does imply 'the sum is greater than the parts'.

ComradeAppleton

...the triumph of will is the solution...

This sounds uncomfortably too close to 'Triumph of the Will'.

Comrade Appleton has elevated solipsism to a doctrine. It's basically a rather shite version of 'cogito ergo sum'.

This is what happens when you reject history, economics, politics, sociology, anthropology, philosophy, humanities, etc.

You are perhaps one of the most dogmatic thinkers to have ever walked this planet. I mean, seriously! You read the texts of a few so-called "individualists", and quote them like a good Christian and his Bible. You opened yourself to only these guys (Stirner, Armand, etc.), and closed out everyone who has had some significant contribution to the broad scope of intellectual knowledge. You have trapped your mind in a bubble. The only thing that goes in is whatever makes you feel good; whatever reaffirms your predetermined righteousness. You have already made up your mind. You don't what to change it. You refuse to consider anything that may contradict your current thought. Anything that may do so, you dismiss instantly; because to do otherwise, you would have to change. You would have to change your whole outlook. You would have to think, most importantly. And you wouldn't want to do that. Why? Well, one can say your lazy. Like those damn "teabaggers".

But that's not the reason. The real reason is because your current outlook comes with some benefits. Your current outlook (or dogmatism), by placing itself on the basis of the supreme individual, tells you that all you have to do, is abolish everything and start over. Lets rewind the clock backwards and restart this system of oppressive exploitation. But this time, you plan to put yourself in front of the line, and grab the biggest share of whatever's there. And force under your rule a mass of wage laborers. And no one can object. It's your "property", right? It's your "work", right? No one has a "claim" on you, right? Plus, wage labor is voluntary! It seems to me, this outlook makes you feel good and right; it makes you feel as if you would not have done anything wrong in your so-called free society.

Well, let me tell you something! I can tell no one on this forum, including myself, would want to work for you Mr. Comrade Reagan Appleton!

And by the way, Emile Armand is total garbage! So stop quoting him. It's not going to get you far.

Appleton is to Anarchism what Dick Cheney is to Anarchism.

Oh, come now. You sound like that one Randian acquaintance of mine who thinks if he fixes his neighbor's fence and gets some eggs for it, it's wage labor.

Guess pointing out that we are not the borg won't help since this 'discussion' if you want to call it that (more like two sides throwing shit at each other) has been moving in circles for 8 pages now. In a free access economy no one will give two flying fucks if you bake a cake and don't want to share. It's all about social practice and not isolated incidents - it's exactly this separation of private and social that is part of the problem (like one of the main contradictions of capitalism, social production and private appropriation), but that does not mean that suddenly we'll go FULL 1984 on you because you erect a fence around your lot!

The issue of private initiative opens a can of worms but this is in my opinion just another expression of the same contradiction between social and private and the resulting alienation of wage labor and the fragmentation of society into atomized cells.. If people go, oh what the fuck do I care about others and just kick back (or as another example, the 'tragedy of the commons' or graffiti on a wall), that's exactly the result of this divide stemming from "mine = I care" and "not mine = I don't give a fuck". That does not however mean it's always been like that or ever will. The thing is, even 'private initiative' is always a collective process (as Khawaga and others pointed out, by means of far-reaching social interconnections that are both visible and invisible). But we've been there before (with the example of fences and production of screws).

Railyon, I think you're making the mistake of taking at face value your interlocutors assertions that what attracts him to his position is "rationality". In fact, if you read the sub-text, the "Neitzschean" aesthetic is clear - the repression/eroticism of the übermensch reveals itself in recurring turns of phrases and irrepressible expressions of misanthropic contempt. The surface or form presents itself as rational, but the underlying libidinal drive is clearly the fascistic aesthetic of the self-love of the superior man pleasuring himself through liguistic frottage against the inferior slave-minded hordes. It's not discourse, it's masturbation. If I was you, I stop giving him what he wants, get some kleenex and clean yourself off, and go in search of more productive dialogue.

Just saying...

proudhon wrote an entire book against property.

I don't see proudhon as an anarchist though, and i wouldn't consider him a comrade. he was was an incredible misogynist and racist, as well as being nationalistic and opposing communism.

you do know that libcom is short for libertarian communism right?

ComradeAppleton

Also, comparing property in the sense that I have been writing about to state property is just plain ignorance.

I'm quite positive the overwhelming majority of people here will say state property and private property are just two sides of the same coin.

The more I think about it the more I think there are two different 'languages' being spoken here. Which in my experience has nearly always been the case when I've talked to marketeers. And I mean that in the least judgmental way possible.

It's peculiar really. Maybe both camps are both so imprisoned in their own modes of thought that discussion becomes nearly impossible.

Railyon

I'm quite positive the overwhelming majority of people here will say state property and private property are just two sides of the same coin.

Surely the distinction is between productive property (whether state or private) and personal property?

Productive property is social property and will be under our democratic control, whereas personal property is for private usage (underpants, toothbrush, etc.).

The definition of what constitutes 'personal property' will also be a social decision, not a private one.

LBird

Surely the distinction is between productive property (whether state or private) and personal property?

Productive property is social property and will be under our democratic control, whereas personal property is for private usage (underpants, toothbrush, etc.).

The definition of what constitutes 'personal property' will also be a social decision, not a private one.

Yes, I think this distinction is where the cross is buried. Private property for the free marketeers seems to be anything you can have the right of possession of, a way of looking at it that is just all too common.

Cue my statement about different languages being spoken. There's witchcraft at work here.

LBird

Railyon

I'm quite positive the overwhelming majority of people here will say state property and private property are just two sides of the same coin.

Surely the distinction is between productive property (whether state or private) and personal property?

Productive property is social property and will be under our democratic control, whereas personal property is for private usage (underpants, toothbrush, etc.).

The definition of what constitutes 'personal property' will also be a social decision, not a private one.

i think most people here call personal property "possessions", and normally use "property" to mean exclusively the private ownership of the means of production, unless they explicitly say otherwise.

I've noticed market supporters like to conflate the two concepts, or can't understand the difference, and use defences of possessions to defend ownership of the means of production.

This thread made me do this:

(Click for bigger version.)

omen's cartoon

...running about a field...

'Field'? Surely this is also a higher level concept, much too 'abstract' for ComradeAppleton?

No, he clearly would say "All I see are twenty-three individuals running about on several million blades of grass...".

radicalgraffiti

i think most people here call personal property "possessions", and normally use "property" to mean exclusively the private ownership of the means of production, unless they explicitly say otherwise.

I've noticed market supporters like to conflate the two concepts, or can't understand the difference, and use defences of possessions to defend ownership of the means of production.

Yeah, I agree completely, mate.

Since 7 people I've never met upped my previous post, it somewhat inflated my ego, and I feel myself coming round to ComradeAppleton's point of view. So I upped my own previous post, to bring it to an even 8, then I did this:

(Click for bigger version.)

all threads should be settled by means of cartoon satire.

Agent of the Fifth International

our response to LBird is quite repetitive, as is all of your other responses.

ComradeAppleton

My sense is the exact opposite. All I keep getting is the same reply...

LBird

No, as usual you're ignoring what's being said. Either that, or you really don't understand.

ComradeAppleton

...Once again you repeat what you wrote previously...

laborbund

Appleton is to Anarchism what Dick Cheney is to Anarchism.

ComradeAppleton

On the contrary, you people are to anarchy what Stalin is to anarchy..

You have to appreciate how a good number of ComradeAppleton's replies are essentially, "No u".

Poor comrade; he just wanted to be part of the club of the top 1%.

Last one for today. Just a quick summary of the general trajectory of this thread for anyone not up to speed:

(Click for bigger/readable version.) (ETA: The typo is deliberate. Fuck!)

I thought it would save people having to read the rest of the thread.

I've read it.

Every fucking last word of it.

I've even tried unreading it!

I hate myself!

I'm off to drink myself to death with cheap cider...

There have been some fantastic posts in this thread by comrades (and here I mean actual comrades, not people with mislabeled usernames). Appleton may not have bothered reading anything anyone said but I've found much of it pretty inspiring. Its always good to hear views you hold articulated in ways you've never been able to quite express yourself. Hopefully that's of some consolation to those who bothered writing long posts, only to be repeatedly ignored by someone unwilling to engage with any opinions that contradict his/her own.

Maybe we should just face it.

We're dogmatic.

Our holy writ is a handful of unfinished manuscripts and drafts by a bearded old man who drank like a fish.

More cartoons plz

Reginald J. Trotsfield

There have been some fantastic posts in this thread by comrades (and here I mean actual comrades, not people with mislabeled usernames).

Yeah, I just want to add the comments in my above post weren't directed at other posters, who have done a grand job given the circumstances, just at the general madness of having to explain the same thing over and over to someone who wanted it explained to them in the first place, but who deliberately dismisses every explanation offered out of hand, and who invariably twists what others said into the exact opposite.

ocelot

More cartoons plz

OK, one quick one for now! Inspired by this disturbing post (which surprisingly no one commented on at the time) from earlier in the thread:

(Click to see.)

Admin: omen posted numerous cartoons in this thread. The images have since gone off-line, however they have all been gathered here: https://libcom.org/article/adventures-comrade-appleton-and-anarchy 

The BORG synth is hilarious :D

omen

ocelot

More cartoons plz

OK, one quick one for now! Inspired by this disturbing post (which surprisingly no one commented on at the time) from earlier in the thread:

(Click to see.)

this one has had me giggling like a loon for the last fifteen minutes :D

You killed us with that one, didn't you?

What about her reality?

ComradeAppleton, why don't you read what we write, rather than make up pretend dragons and pretend to slay them?

What's the point of using up your time in such an unproductive way?

For us, this thread has been of some use in clarifying and explaining our ideas, as other posters have testified, but for you, it's just a continuous, monotonous monologue.

Don't you have any friends you can share your views with? Online or in real life? Why bother with us?

It's becoming pathetic, and I'm starting to feel ashamed at toying with you.

At the start of Appleton's membership I questioned why he was in a forum called libcom if he hated communists/ism and suggested he try some libertarian/freemarket forums. I'm not sure what he's still doing here as he's not converting anybody to his cause and we'd be the worst crowd to try that anyway.

You lot better up this like crazy, 'cause it was a bastard to pull off with a hangover:

(Click for biggy.)

I'd so fucking love a wallpaper version of that.

Railyon

I'd so fucking love a wallpaper version of that.

1680x1050 png or if your have something that can read SVG (like Inkscape) make your own to any size with this.

ComradeAppleton

This is just laughable. A real anarchist doesn't consult his decisions with 'society' before he makes them.

No True Anarchist.

ComradeAppleton

Democracy is the biggest tyrant as yet invented by man. It says that because there is more people on one side of an issue, they have the right to dominate, enslave, and exploit the minority.

:roll:

Answer me a straight question, ComradeAppleton, and I'll give you a biscuit: How is it that in a communist society, everybody is going to take a vote to steal your cake and gang rape you while you watch TV (your examples), but in an individualist society, where anyone can do what they want, for some reason nobody wants to do any of those things to you? And given you live right now in a more-or-less* democratic country, why aren't they all clamouring at your door for cake-sex right now!?

* No sniggering at the back of the class, please!

ComradeAppleton

LBird

Productive property is social property and will be under our democratic control, whereas personal property is for private usage (underpants, toothbrush, etc.).

The definition of what constitutes 'personal property' will also be a social decision, not a private one.

This is just laughable. A real anarchist doesn't consult his decisions with 'society' before he makes them. There is no such thing as 'social' property. By the way, if you mean that 'society' will decide what is private and what is not - that is the system we have now called democracy. Democracy is the biggest tyrant as yet invented by man. It says that because there is more people on one side of an issue, they have the right to dominate, enslave, and exploit the minority. No real anarchist can support unbridled democracy. The anarchist makes all decisions himself and his reality is the individual act.

You are clearly not a proponent of anarchist, but of Marxism.

So according to you:

1. Democracy is more tyrannical than absolute monarchy or fascist dictatorship.

2. "Real" anarchists don't consider the effect their actions have on others, they just do whatever they fuck they feel like.

3. All anarchists are men.

ComradeAppleton

People are mostly decent and outside of war or Africa gang rape is not on anyone's to-do list.

For a minute there I was worried you were going to be racist, or something...

So I stopped reading this thread after it was clear that Comrade Appleton was just an obnoxious troll. But I just came back to it and I have to say that it's turned out to be one of my favorite Libcom threads ever.

omen

Inspired by this disturbing post (which surprisingly no one commented on at the time) from earlier

Yes appleton has some especially fucked up sexual politics, and I have tried to drag him into it a couple of times, but nobody seems interested. But to summarize:

- appleton believes that if you are raped, and you then choose to respond with police intervention, that YOU are "immoral". Not the rapist, nor even the cops, but YOU.

- appleton often, bizarrely, uses hypothetical rape or gang rape in order to criticize democracy and/or communism

its really, really creepy.

Also, Omen clearly wins the thread.

And oh yeah, wikipedia says:

Comrade means "friend", "colleague", or "ally".

This would suggest a social relationship right?

wikipedia then goes on to say:

The term is frequently used by left-wing organizations around the globe.

What does the phrase "left-wing" mean? I don't get it. What are "organizations"? The word is surely just a meaningless abstraction right?

ComradeAppleton

omen

Answer me a straight question, ComradeAppleton, and I'll give you a biscuit: How is it that in a communist society, everybody is going to take a vote to steal your cake and gang rape you while you watch TV (your examples), but in an individualist society, where anyone can do what they want, for some reason nobody wants to do any of those things to you?

This is very simple really. People are mostly decent[...]

In that case why do you assume that they will vote to do indecent things!?

ComradeAppleton

[...] democracy is all about not letting people make their own decisions, but instead making them do what the majority wants them to do.

Oi, cheeky! That isn't what democracy is about at all! You're just making it all up as you go along!

Democracy is about allowing people to make their own decisions about matters that effect them as a group. For example, people might vote to use a lake as a reservoir and have the water treated and pumped into their homes -- a task that might require miles of piping, and hundreds of people to build. In Appletonland I take it you prefer to drink typhoid out of a well?

Democracy is not about individual decisions. If you want to sit naked in front of your TV all day long, eating Doritos out of your navel and drinking Vimto out of a Wellington boot, no one is going to vote to make you get off your fat arse and work an eighteen hour day down the shitmines. No one is going to take any of your stuff: cake, pants, house, ukulele, etc, unless you happen to own a large factory fitted out with industrial machinery. Do you?

I am talking here about a democratic communist society, and not what we have now, which is shit.

ComradeAppleton

That is the very definition of tyranny - taking away a person's will and replacing it with someone else's will.

That is because you defined it wrong! You might as well have defined democracy as a small, furry, insectivorous, mammal, then complained that democracy kept stealing all your cheese!

ComradeAppleton

What I fear from democracy is not rape,[...]

Well that was your own example, so you've only got yourself to blame for that one!

ComradeAppleton

[...] but material oppression [...]

For the umpteenth time in this thread: No one in a libertarian communist society wants to steal your stuff, unless you own a huge fuck'n factory! Do you own a huge fuck'n factory!?

ComradeAppleton

We are living in a world where [...]

You know very well when people are using the word "democracy" here they mean "libertarian communism" which is not the world we are living in. No one here supports the shit form of "democracy" that we have today.

ComradeAppleton

[...] theft is common and even supported by most people (through taxes)

No it isn't! You want to get a good accountant. Try tweeting Jimmy Carr.

Also, if you think people voting for modest taxes and cake theft is the worst form of tyranny, you want to crack open a history book. There was this one German bloke, and you wouldn't believe the stuff he got up to!

Anyway, here's your biscuit:

laborbund

Also, Omen clearly wins the thread.

I suspect ComradeAppleton has other ideas...

The following clip ("It's about money, Dick!") is from the 2004 film "The Assassination of Richard Nixon":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emrHIpzjANI&playnext=1&list=PL967FA3EFA10980D5&feature=results_video

(Now re-imagine Sean Penn as your "average Libcom participant" and Richard Nixon as "ComradeAppleton")

You guys are probably not going to believe it, but ComradeAppleton is 1 down click away from a landmark record of 100 downs for the entire thread. It's an achievement! At least he won something, right? Libcom should send him a medal or something, for most anti-intellectualism and un-sophistication expressed on a forum by any participant.

Answer to eternal question of "what do war and Africa have in common?"

omen

That is because you defined it wrong! You might as well have defined democracy as a small, furry, insectivorous, mammal, then complained that democracy kept stealing all your cheese!

Remember, he rejects "history" and "reality". So he has no clue as to what the concept means. He takes everything for granted.

ComradeAppleton

2. Real anarchists consider the effect their actions have on others, they are not sociopaths.

ComradeAppleton

That's like saying that if I see someone being beaten up in the street and I don't defend that person, I am inevitably "assisting" the people who are beating him up. This is ridiculous beyond words.

Say what?

ComradeAppleton,

You have yet to give us a proper example of a situation in which this "majoritarian" democracy (for example, a cake factory self-managed by worker's councils) is tyrannical or oppressive. Please demonstrate precisely how this "majority" will enslave the "minority" you speak of. Please do so without resorting to "orgies" or whatever ridiculous kind of crap you pull out of your head. I think we would all like to see a genuine example.

Also, I would note that your use of terms like "majority" and "minority" shows how little you understand the essence of what democracy is supposed to be about. That whole argument of "the tyranny of the majority" is consistently put forth by right-wing propagandists, particularly the pseudo-individualists and right-libertarians, whose sole purpose is to just dismiss all organizations (whether or not their "democratic"). But most of those proponents are incapable of expressing why they oppose democracy as we understand it, or why the theory of "the tyranny of the majority" is correct in the first place. Why? Because that theory was invented by bourgeois intellectuals at a time when society was class-divided (as it still is). It is grounded in a particular class bias. Is it no wonder why anyone whose a member of the ruling class, or have some privileges associated with the current economic order, would oppose democracy? They, the members of the ruling class, have always feared "the tyranny of the majority", and will continue to do so. Democracy always comes into conflict with capitalism, and for perfectly understandable reasons. The argument of "the tyranny of the majority" is a bit old-fashioned. But you never update your thinking, as we can all see. You repeat the same old mantra like those petty pseudo-individualists who repeat it generations after generations.

I think we can all see why they would continue to do so. Their narrow-minded, '2+2=4'- type logic makes them incapable of grasping complexities. Therefore, they (including yourself) resort to simplistic equations. The simplistic equation you put forth goes like this: democracy=majority rule; majority rule=good for majority, bad (or slavery, in your case) for minority.

Agent of the Fifth International

The argument of "the tyranny of the majority" is a bit old-fashioned.

Heh. A couple of years ago I was listening to a BBC radio discussion about the government austerity measures. The two guests were a union leader, and some numpty from a free market think tank. Said numpty gave the usual argument in favour of government enforced austerity, despite its unpopularity, as being necessary because of the previous Labour government's spendthrift ways, blowing taxpayers' money on crazy social projects like schools and healthcare and poor people, etc. The union bloke suggested that the bulk of the deficit was actually caused by bailing out the banks after they screwed up the economy, and that a tax on bankers' bonuses might help to pay some of it, and moreover, that such a policy would prove popular with voters.

This was too much for the numpty, who went off on a near hysterical rant, and repeatedly bandied about the phrase, and I shit you not, "the tyranny of the majority."

So numpty logic seems to be, minority takes from relatively poor majority for something they didn't do and without their approval = good; majority takes a relatively small amount of money from a very rich minority, to pay for something that was all their fault = worse than Hitler!

I suppose I found it somewhat refreshing to hear someone from the ruling class basically say "fuck democracy", after nearly a decade of War On Turrur propaganda along the lines of "freedom and democracy are better than Jebus."

Agent of the Fifth International

Their narrow-minded, '2+2=4'- type logic makes them incapable of grasping complexities.

No, you've got it all wrong! It's actually "2+2=5" because you forgot that the second 2 is defined as a 3. Honestly, it's simple mathematics...

Agent of the Fifth International

Their narrow-minded, '2+2=4'- type logic makes them incapable of grasping complexities.

Yeah, our Communist method allows us to see that '2+2' can also '= 11', for example.

Because we know there is always a theoretical structure behind what seems obvious, we can soon work out that, if base 3 is being used, then '2+2=11'.

Of course, given the unspoken assumption that base 10 is being used, then we can agree that '2+2=4'.

But we have the advantage over those who take appearances and unspoken ideas as the basis of their method, including in social analysis.

As ComradeAppleton makes clear to us, that is the conservative method.

ComradeAppleton

Of course once again you completely misconstrued my position.

Yeah, because you've never done that...

ComradeAppleton

But what I have been condemning is a larger conception of democracy.

I think you'll find this is a libertarian communist forum, populated by libertarian communists, who have a very different view of democracy to mainstream views and your own twisted version. What you've spent the last 283 posts doing is condemning libertarian communism by comparing it to everything unfavourable right up to and including fascism.

ComradeAppleton

Democracy can only work in areas which are owned in common and even then only with the prior consent of every person involved [...]

That's what we've been fuck'n saying to you all along! And then you turn round and accuse us of wanting to enslave you and steal your fuck'n cakes!

ComradeAppleton

Comparing me with rotten 'political economists' (as omen has done) who always side with the banksters and exploiters is complete rubbish.

Ooo you fibber! I didn't and and I didn't even mention you in my last post! Cuh! Individualists! Always make everything about themselves!

ComradeAppleton

I can't vote to take someone's property away from them

So, anyway, I fear we may be going in circles again:

Its cool that Appleton is in to Proudhon now. Maybe in a few years he'll discover Bakunin and Marx. By the time he is fifty perhaps he'll be into Rudolf Rocker or something.

ComradeAppleton,

I think it's the complete opposite. You misconstrued our position, and continued to attack us with claims grounded on false assumptions. I'm not going to address every detail in your last post. I disagree with most of what you wrote in your first paragraph. You really need to work on your understanding of contemporary capitalism.

ComradeAppleton

By the way, this is exactly what Proudhon meant when he said that 'property is theft'.

As to Proudhon, you seem to be getting somewhere here, and I applaud that. First, his argument, ‘property is theft’, isn’t so different from the one given by a fellow named Marx. I’m not sure if you’re acquainted with him. His (Proudhon’s) argument is consistently put forth by most socialists that have followed him in the succeeding generations. In fact, it’s an argument most of us here at Libcom has been putting forth; and certainly in this thread against you. So I have no idea why you keep telling us about Proudhon and his ‘property is theft’ argument as if we didn’t have such knowledge already. Secondly, Proudhon too would disagree with most of what wrote in the first paragraph. I’m not going to explain why. As I said before, I don’t what to go into every detail. I suggest you read some more Proudhon.

ComradeAppleton

But what I have been condemning is a larger conception of democracy. For example (because you wanted an example), workers of one factory have no right to vote on issues which would affect workers in another factory. I can't vote to close my competitor's business down. I can't vote to take someone's property away from them. Everyone has a right to own their own means of production and to distribute the product however they wish to do so. I cannot change this through voting. Democracy can only work in areas which are owned in common and even then only with the prior consent of every person involved (otherwise some people might be forced into a system which they do not want to live under).

I think our disagreement here lies in the field of macroeconomics. At the microeconomic level (e.g., an individual workplace), you are willing to support democracy; from what I can guess from your quote above. So, I guess you would be willing to support a kind of ‘market socialism’ or a ‘mutualism’ expressed in Proudhon’s terms. But your personal approach to politics wouldn’t suggest that. You express yourself in a purely pseudo-individualist language that throws people off. Why wouldn’t we be confused as to what you want? You can’t just go up to somebody, and expect them to be talking in your language.

As to what we (at least, I) want is full democracy at the macroeconomic level. That means coordination between the workplaces of different industries. One can write a book on this, but I want to keep this short. Libertarian socialists feel that ‘markets’ and ‘competition’ isn’t an adequate way of regulating the affairs between productive enterprises and of distributing goods and services. Perhaps, it could be a potential disaster.

Maybe someone else here can further elaborate on our preference for democracy at the macroeconomic level.

Just to add a little more humor, this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZfloLPtaPrc) takes us deeper into the mind of sir ComradeAppleton, a child who never grows up.

ComradeAppleton

I am also very worried about the importance you place on economics when looking at relations between people

From the tool that keeps harping on about having "MY OWN BUSINESS".

This is going nowhere again.

ComradeAppleton

In Nietzsche's view you would be the creature of spirit who forgot the earth... and did the Saint not tell Zarathustra that he has become a child again?

Thus Spoke Zarathustra is one of the worst things I've ever read, and I've read some shit in my time! It's the kind of thing endlessly pawed over by teary-eyed teenage Goths, as they alternately stifle their sobs in a pillow and wail about the bleakness of existence, while wanking into a sock. It's essentially a badly written Bible for nihilists. Honestly, the only positive memory I have of it, is that of eating a pistachio ice-cream while I read it in the car, whilst trapped on the Isle of Wight in the rain.

Reading it is a lot like having Nietzsche piss hot syphilis directly into your eye sockets. Much of Nietzsche's oeuvre was actually written by filling a shotgun with words and repeatedly firing it in the general direction of a printing press. True story! Reading a William S. Burroughs' cut-up novel is more rewarding. If Capital was War and Peace, then Thus Spoke Zarathustra would be an early rough draft of the Da Vinci Code. And so on...

That said, On the Genealogy of Morality, is not only the best thing (and most lucid) Nietzsche wrote, but easily holds up well alongside anything Marx wrote, as a piece of pure philosophy. It's fantastic, and essentially a crude class analysis of Judeo-Christian morality. I'm throwing a clue your way, Comrade Appleblossom, it's an historical analysis of the evolution of Judeo-Christian morality. That said, I don't agree with all of it, and it's not without it's flaws... but then again, what is?

Also, this:

(Click it for biggy.)

ComradeAppleton

Agent of the Fifth International

This is going nowhere again.

I agree. Which is why I have always thought that individualism was more a matter of temperament than of rationality. It is impossible to persuade someone who is tribal in his very spirit that he is what he is.
But, as is every my motto, to each his own.

Well, at least we can agree on two things... I gave you one pity-up for that, and two more for each of these:

ComradeAppleton again

Agent of the Fifth International

This is going nowhere again.

I agree. Which is why I have always thought that individualism was more a matter of temperament than of rationality. It is impossible to persuade someone who is tribal in his very spirit that he is what he is.
But, as is every my motto, to each his own.

ComradeAppleton once again

Agent of the Fifth International

This is going nowhere again.

I agree. Which is why I have always thought that individualism was more a matter of temperament than of rationality. It is impossible to persuade someone who is tribal in his very spirit that he is what he is.
But, as is every my motto, to each his own.

Did you post those in advance for the next two times we go around the mindfuck loop!?

ComradeAppleton

I agree. Which is why I have always thought that individualism was more a matter of temperament than of rationality. It is impossible to persuade someone who is tribal in his very spirit that he is what he is.
But, as is every my motto, to each his own.

Ayn Rand

But why should you care what people will say? All you have to do is please yourself.

omen

ComradeAppleton again

Agent of the Fifth International

This is going nowhere again.

I agree. Which is why I have always thought that individualism was more a matter of temperament than of rationality. It is impossible to persuade someone who is tribal in his very spirit that he is what he is.
But, as is every my motto, to each his own.

ComradeAppleton once again

Agent of the Fifth International

This is going nowhere again.

I agree. Which is why I have always thought that individualism was more a matter of temperament than of rationality. It is impossible to persuade someone who is tribal in his very spirit that he is what he is.
But, as is every my motto, to each his own.

Did you post those in advance for the next two times we go around the mindfuck loop!?

Ayn Rand

If it's worth doing, it's worth overdoing.

Like a loyal minion in his (or her) master’s interest.

ComradeAppleton

...I have always thought that individualism was more a matter of temperament than of rationality.

I think CA may be a metaphor for individualism. Rather than accepting that his position is indefensible in the face of reasonable arguments provided by THE COLLECTIVE, he turns the knife on himself and admits that his position is not based on rationality all that much. Making him the only person able to (dis)prove himself wrong (or is it right? Who gives a fuck? It can be both at the same time, we're not dealing with reason anymore), thereby asserting his individuality.

Agent of the Fifth International

Ayn Rand

But why should you care what people will say? All you have to do is please yourself.

I didn't do this, but it's definitely worth posting:

Although now I regret it, as it makes my artwork look amateurish. :cry:

ComradeAppleton

As for omen making fun of Nietzsche, I agree he isn't the easiest to read and interpret. But he is a poet, and since your mind must be a Marxist machine, there is little you can draw from him[...]

Heh! I'm generally not overly fond of reading Marx, but nice of you to out me as a Marxist!

And I guess I can't really appreciate Nietzsche's stunning poety, due to my insistence on reading less talented Marxist authors such as Shelley, Sylvia Plath, Henry Miller, Jack Kerouac, James Joyce, Samuel Beckett, and so on. And I guess I can't grapple his difficult to interpret prose style, due to my reading such Janet-and-John authors as James fucking Joyce, Samuel Beckett, William S. Burroughs (the cut-ups as well!), Thomas Pynchon, etc.

Really, you are a clueless tool, Comrade...

ComradeAppleton

When it comes to any historical analysis it certainly can be interesting, but it is also irrelevant to present times and actions.

I refer the learned gentlemen to this post.

ComradeAppleton

[...]but your very philosophy is dependent on the fact that we are all products of history and society and must remain thus.

What would you know about "our" philosophy? You started this thread because you said you didn't understand our philosophy, and you've completely misrepresented and misunderstood it at every turn. Including that very sentence of yours just quoted: libertarian communists generally reject decadence theories of capitalism, and prefer to organize and agitate now for its overthrow, rather than waiting for history to somehow sort it all out for us, like some Marxists would have it.

ComradeAppleton

For all your talk or organization and revolution there is not an iota of rebellion in you.

So, while us ultra-conservative communists would be quite happy to violently overthrow capitalism and the state, Comrade "Fuck the System!" Appleton wants to dream away the state in favour of a utopian, petit bourgeoisie form of capitalism, *cough*, I mean anarchism. I have to admit, you've got me there...

ETA: To celebrate the 300th post, I baked you an anarchy cake:

But you can't have any because I baked it and it's my property, damnit!