If you pick your candidate based on media trends and debate circuses, then you're lost

a reply to: higherconscience

So you want a society where you can open a restaurant and put addictive drugs into your food in order to increase business?

You want a society where there are no clean air standards?

You want a society where a company can sell a product that will kill you after 10 years of use?

You want a society which has no formal military?

You want a society where the only education system is privatized?

In such a society, lets say China decides to use the coast of California as a dumping ground for toxic waste. How do you stop that from happening?

If a fire breaks out in a neighborhood how do you put it out?

With no ability to regulate the currency, how do you have money that's worth anything? Do you rely on using something else like the Euro?

Lets say someone goes out and rapes another, how do you punish them when you have no formally defined laws?

I take it this means you're also not in favor of the Constitution since it's all about the establishment of a government.

originally posted by: Aazadan
a reply to: higherconscience

So you want a society where you can open a restaurant and put addictive drugs into your food in order to increase business?

You want a society where there are no clean air standards?

You want a society where a company can sell a product that will kill you after 10 years of use?

You want a society which has no formal military?

You want a society where the only education system is privatized?

In such a society, lets say China decides to use the coast of California as a dumping ground for toxic waste. How do you stop that from happening?

If a fire breaks out in a neighborhood how do you put it out?

With no ability to regulate the currency, how do you have money that's worth anything? Do you rely on using something else like the Euro?

Lets say someone goes out and rapes another, how do you punish them when you have no formally defined laws?

I take it this means you're also not in favor of the Constitution since it's all about the establishment of a government.

Sigh. No. You are assuming these things will happen.

As far as asking me how I would take care of very specific scenarios, I have a question for you:

How would YOU deal with something? If your neighbors house is on fire, do you assume someone ELSE will extinguish it or do you help? I don't sit back and watch my neighbors house burn nor do I sit back and watch someone get raped or murdered. This isn't rocket science. You assist where you can. Stop EXPECTING someone else to step in if you are unwilling to help your fellow man.

And you are correct about the constitution. It is designed to restrict freedoms and delegate power to a someone(s)other than the average person.

Here's an example of how backwards this whole thing is..

I don't have the authority or power to tax your income. So how do I have the authority or power to give that authority or power to someone else so that they can? Makes no sense. Even if 99% of the people thought it was ok to do, what about the 1% who don't? Their voices are rendered meaningless.

Look, you are not going to convince me that I need someone to make rules for me. I reject this with every atom in my body. I urge you to think about what you really want, and ask yourself if you want someone to dictate how you live your life.

Also, just so I get this out there, there are bad people. We all know that. Clearly the rules and laws don't make them NOT do bad things. If someone who usually isn't a bad person says that the only thing keeping them from doing bad is a law, then that means they really are just a bad person pretending to be good.

I don't need a law to tell me to treat others how I would want to be treated. This is just common sense and decency.

a reply to: higherconscience

Well, if my neighbors house were on fire I would try and help, but the aid I could render would largely be in helping to evacuate them. Without a functioning government there is also no water system for fire hoses, and even if there were I don't own a fire hose and neither do most other people. It only takes a few fire hoses to serve society provided they're mobile, but that requires a fire fighting department. Anarchy is all about the individual, but groups of people are far more effective than individuals, and groups of people are what the government is.

Also, just so I get this out there, there are bad people. We all know that. Clearly the rules and laws don't make them NOT do bad things. If someone who usually isn't a bad person says that the only thing keeping them from doing bad is a law, then that means they really are just a bad person pretending to be good.

I don't need a law to tell me to treat others how I would want to be treated. This is just common sense and decency.

Laws rarely prevent bad people from doing bad things, but laws give us a mechanism to remove those people from society. If there is no body of laws your options are to either kill someone (or them killing you in self defense) or let them continue doing what they're doing. Should the penalty for every bad action be a dead body?

Also, there are often situations in which both people believe themselves to be right but see the other person as wrong. In fact that sums up almost every conflict in human history. To take a simple example, with no court system how do you solve a child custody case?

On top of this, government answers to the people, but with no government corporations can act unrestricted and ultimately amass the same level of power as a government. In the end you still have a body controlling you, but you get no say in it.

originally posted by: Aazadan
a reply to: higherconscience

Well, if my neighbors house were on fire I would try and help, but the aid I could render would largely be in helping to evacuate them. Without a functioning government there is also no water system for fire hoses, and even if there were I don't own a fire hose and neither do most other people. It only takes a few fire hoses to serve society provided they're mobile, but that requires a fire fighting department. Anarchy is all about the individual, but groups of people are far more effective than individuals, and groups of people are what the government is.

Also, just so I get this out there, there are bad people. We all know that. Clearly the rules and laws don't make them NOT do bad things. If someone who usually isn't a bad person says that the only thing keeping them from doing bad is a law, then that means they really are just a bad person pretending to be good.

I don't need a law to tell me to treat others how I would want to be treated. This is just common sense and decency.

Laws rarely prevent bad people from doing bad things, but laws give us a mechanism to remove those people from society. If there is no body of laws your options are to either kill someone (or them killing you in self defense) or let them continue doing what they're doing. Should the penalty for every bad action be a dead body?

Also, there are often situations in which both people believe themselves to be right but see the other person as wrong. In fact that sums up almost every conflict in human history. To take a simple example, with no court system how do you solve a child custody case?

On top of this, government answers to the people, but with no government corporations can act unrestricted and ultimately amass the same level of power as a government. In the end you still have a body controlling you, but you get no say in it.

Most firefighters are volunteers around here. So maybe picking your neighbor's house on fire wasn't helping my case. But you say without government they wouldn't have a water supply... I don't think that's true. In rural areas, they often use lakes/ponds as their supply. There is also no reason an urban area couldn't have a source of water for fighting fires. It doesn't take a government to set that up.

You say anarchy is all about the individual... that is an ignorant statement not based on facts. I don't believe in government, and I'm not all about myself.. as a matter of fact, I'd say I'm more about helping other people than people who believe government should take care of everything.

You say the government answers to the people. This is classic Stockholm Syndrome, and believe me I'm not singling you out, damn near everyone has it or has had it. Including me. Because we are brainwashed since birth to think we need government.

As for corporations acting unrestricted and amassing "the same level of power as a government" (you just admitted government has too much power, by the way) I don't have all the answers there either. As it stands, corporations have gained so much power BECAUSE of government, which has stolen power from every other individual. The two go hand in hand in today's world.


Again, I don't have all the answers and I don't claim to. But I do know that history repeats itself. Societies rise and fall. People are enslaved and 'freed'. Etc. etc. Throughout time, cyclical. Always the same stuff over and over and over... and the average person is always at the bottom, with the short end of the stick, taking orders... after all these millennia, what is the one common factor?

GOVERNMENT.

Government is always there. If it's so great, then why is it always so #ty?

The answer to that somewhat rhetorical question is NOT: But the government is made of people, and people are rotten.

Yes, people ARE rotten sometimes... but that's only part of it. The problem is thinking that we NEED rulers over us.


If 10 people are on a deserted island, will they all die if they don't establish a form of government to take care of themselves?

Anyways, sorry for rambling. I just no longer buy into the need of government. I've been cured of Stockholm Syndrome and it's extremely frustrating trying to talk sense into anyone who hasn't been yet. No offense to you.

a reply to: higherconscience

You may have a lake, river, or well for a water source but in order to get that water to where it needs to be you need an infrastructure of water pipelines. Those don't just randomly appear, they either come from a government office that builds and maintains them using tax money, or it comes from a private sector corporation that owns the water distribution rights and charges people for access.

My point on the difference between corporate and government power is not an admission of governments having too much power, because in a democracy or a republic the populace is able to vote on issues. The government is a reflection of the desires of society, and the people can change government policy. A corporation that answers to no one is much more similar to that of a dictatorship.

When it comes to this

Again, I don't have all the answers and I don't claim to. But I do know that history repeats itself. Societies rise and fall. People are enslaved and 'freed'. Etc. etc. Throughout time, cyclical. Always the same stuff over and over and over... and the average person is always at the bottom, with the short end of the stick, taking orders... after all these millennia, what is the one common factor?

There is always going to be someone at the bottom, even in anarchy you're going to have a group of people who are less capable and less affluent that will be on the bottom. One common factor in all of the very successful societies throughout history however is that when people have been able to petition their government, the government has been less tyrannical and the people have been more prosperous. Who would you expect to be at the bottom by the way? The government is the people, if the government is at the bottom of the totem pole then by definition the people are also at the bottom.

Who would you suggest should be on the bottom? Humans have an innate desire to create hierarchical power structures which inherently put the below average people on the bottom. One of the functions of a sane government is to make sure those who are on the bottom still get the benefits of society and have their basic needs met.

If 10 people are on a deserted island, will they all die if they don't establish a form of government to take care of themselves?

They won't die right away, but inevitably you're going to have someone in that group who decides the best way to survive is to take from someone else. Maybe one person rapes another, or one person steals another persons food, or someone kills another person in order to get more land. As soon as the remaining people get together, say that's wrong, and do something about the problem you have the beginnings of a government as you're setting down laws and a procedure for enforcing them.