It was a revelation to me: to have flat structures, you not only need to make it possible to organize without hierarchy, but you also need a process to constantly weed out emerging hierarchies.
i’ve noticed this is a common source of disagreement i keep having with nonanarchists.
where someone thinks that i’m advocating purely for the organisational aspects of anarchism, but not also materially, socially, culturally, and politically. they’ll dismiss my criticisms of the current system or proposals for alternatives as ‘that would never work today’, and instead cite monolithic, mythological essentialisms like ‘human nature’ at me which is just their opportunity to mansplain capitalist logic to me and throw down some ‘might makes right’ moral argument. people who think tool libraries would never work because one time their underpaid coworkers kept stealing other persons’ food from the breakroom fridge or something and well that’s proof of the greed inherent to all human beings and no we will not interrogate what leads them to stealing food. material conditions? what’s that?
anarchism to me isn’t simply a worldview or a form of organisation: it’s a lifestance, a lifestyle, a way of being, a way of thinking and a way of acting — and i believe it works best when it is all of those things. social change is cultural change is political change. when i advocate for change, i’m advocating to change both the system and the people who recreate it.
‘but how will you prevent [insert consequence of hierarchical conditioning] from happening under anarchism?’
and no we will not interrogate what leads them to stealing food. material conditions? what’s that?
Some people are just assholes. They can be in the same general situation as you, but not respect boundaries, and in the absence of consequence they’ll be downright sociopathic.
Anyone generalizing from those assholes to absolutely everyone is not being serious. But that’s not an excuse to ignore those exceptions and insist absolutely everyone is reasonable.
Yeah my point was anybody can be made into an asshole, depending on circumstances. A rich AH would be crafted by their upbringing, conditioned to never think about other people’s needs.
i’ve noticed this is a common source of disagreement i keep having with nonanarchists.
where someone thinks that i’m advocating purely for the organisational aspects of anarchism, but not also materially, socially, culturally, and politically. they’ll dismiss my criticisms of the current system or proposals for alternatives as ‘that would never work today’, and instead cite monolithic, mythological essentialisms like ‘human nature’ at me which is just their opportunity to mansplain capitalist logic to me and throw down some ‘might makes right’ moral argument. people who think tool libraries would never work because one time their underpaid coworkers kept stealing other persons’ food from the breakroom fridge or something and well that’s proof of the greed inherent to all human beings and no we will not interrogate what leads them to stealing food. material conditions? what’s that?
anarchism to me isn’t simply a worldview or a form of organisation: it’s a lifestance, a lifestyle, a way of being, a way of thinking and a way of acting — and i believe it works best when it is all of those things. social change is cultural change is political change. when i advocate for change, i’m advocating to change both the system and the people who recreate it.
‘but how will you prevent [insert consequence of hierarchical conditioning] from happening under anarchism?’
Some people are just assholes. They can be in the same general situation as you, but not respect boundaries, and in the absence of consequence they’ll be downright sociopathic.
Anyone generalizing from those assholes to absolutely everyone is not being serious. But that’s not an excuse to ignore those exceptions and insist absolutely everyone is reasonable.
Sure but desperation creates assholes.
When I was broke I kept money out of a wallet I found. I wouldn’t do that now and I’ve returned and given away much more because I can.
Some assholes are rich.
Psychopathy is a thing and touches a sizeable part of the population. It is unwise to dismiss their existence.
Yeah my point was anybody can be made into an asshole, depending on circumstances. A rich AH would be crafted by their upbringing, conditioned to never think about other people’s needs.