The War Against Wages

[TGP]

It only takes ONE guy to gather a force of bandits........ and pretty soon he'll be ruling, extracting taxes, and all the panalopy of a state at the point of a gun. But instead of the nice genteel democratic state, it will be a raw, medieval, brutal state.

he wouldn't do that if he saw how against his own desires that was.

How can you predict how all 6bn humans will react to a situation none of them have ever been put in ?

Can you trust that ALL 6bn will see the light ?

Why do you expect all 6bn to react in an identical way ?

Some will not act how you predict, even presented with evidence that convinces you. Some will, others will not. Some will react the way you predict, others will not.

Your society will be destroyed by those who do not.

This is my point - founding a state and ruling with an iron fist is a form of self harm. Dictatorships have been here forever, and everyone under them dies earlier than in freer societies, has poorers food, less fun - if we say the point of becoming dictator is to have more, then there is no point becoming a dictator.

But it only takes one. You only have to have one not accept that as a valid argument, and all is lost. He can gather what irrational people he can, and things will snowball from there. Realistically, there will be millions who do so.

From some peoples perspective.......... from many in fact....... to be a dictator would be the very height of what they wish to be. If your aim deep inside is domintion over others......and somethimes it is, even for rational people, to be a dictator may be a rational choice. For others, who rationally wish to cede their control to a strong leader it would be rational to follow him.

We call the leaders sociopaths, and the followers authoritarians, but they are humans none the less....... they exist...... and many will not voluntarily surrender their worldview to your offers of psychiatric help. They like how they are. You will not convince them otherwise. Their aims and goals and values are not yours.

I agree, that's exactly what would happen if we removed the state tomorrow morning.

It's exactly what would happen if we removed the state in any situation in which humans remained humans, and there were lots of us the state was removed from.

Humans have differing views. Somewhere amongst that spectrum..........as long as we remain recognisably human......... there will be some who chose this path.

But they don't beleive "mad things". They beleive perfectly sane things........... like they'd raqther be safe and almost entirely free......... than entirely unsafe and entierly free (for example).

Or that they'd rather live in a genteel democracy that taxes them (with their consent) at 40%......... than embark on an experiment they are 95% sure will end with them under a brutal state being taxed (without their consent) whatever the warlord demands in tribute that month, up to and including sexual favours with them, their wife or their children.

That's nice, but allowing the 40% means they will end up under the brutal dictatorship also, it always has. It's the same old, same old - 1% becomes 2, 3, 4, 5, 69%+ and then - collapse of the economy, realigning of society and retrenchment.

And yet........... whenever that happens (and I don't accept it's inevitability)........ what they come up with afterwards is never an anarchy. Despite your putative cycle, humans continue to prefer to chose a state all over again in preference to anarchy.

They will continue to do so as long as they remain human, because the "default human condition" cannot stably hold onto an anarchy...........and does not, in general, relish the instability, lack of safety and high likelihood of violence it brings.

I could posit a similar cycle for anarchy, with better historical precedent. Whenever it has been tried it has failed........often in the most gruesomly bloody way.

The difference between this era and earlier ones is psychology and psychiatry. in earlier times loons couldn't be helped.

And even if you could create a miracle cure tommorrow that made every insane man sane it wouldn't help you.......... because in your anarchist society you couldn't force people to take the cure.

Now we have methodologies for at least coping with and identifiying them. There is no reason to believe that these methods will not improve over time. The same is true of child rearing - the days of flaying your kids alive for looking at you funny are not all that far back, and that is the behaviour which creates dictators.

Perhaps. But again......... how will an anarchist society force a free individual to alter his mental state in a way he does not wish to ?

Who will make the decision that "this man must be adjusted by force" and "this man may continue to live as he is" ?

They will not all volunteer for "adjustment". I suspect very few will.

So who will stand at the head of the line as the cattle trucks arrive.......... sending some to the left......... and some to the right.......... and forcing against their will one of the groups to have their personalities and mental liberty fundamentally altered ?

What if such a man decides for Injin......... and sends Injin down the side that leads to the man in the white coat with the bucket of pills and the sharp looking knives ?

What of liberty.......... when there is no liberty to think other than the way the man at the head of the line deems acceptable ?

Yours,

TGP

[Editeds to Add}..........Or perhaps in your mental picture it is Injin that stands at the head of the line, gesturing to right and left........ so what have YOU become ?

Edited March 20, 2010 by TGP

[bogbrush]

Is this a longest post competition?

[TGP]

Is this a longest post competition?

Yes, you lost BTW.

[Injin]

TGP.

I don't think there is anything much more to be said.

Your only real disagreement is with the probability of actual occurence and likelihood of stability, not the effect or basic philosophy. I disagree ofc but there is no way of resolving that dispute, as it's about possible futures. I see the barrriers to a free society coming slowly down, but you (and fair enough, can't argue with empiricism) point to all the things in the past that have made it impossible.

I see better child rearing, the rise of psychology and psychiatry, the internet and so on as all being new elements that might combine to make what is rationally the best sort of society possible.

Unknowable.