Tsunami situation verified. Relax, nobody on our side wants a violent revolution. The only hills you will find are the global enlightened community.
You will initially get depressed as you see the injustice around you.
You can deny what you see and go back to browsing Facebook.
Or, you can embrace the movement. I've been traveling the rabbit hole and I assure you that the thing is manageable if you put your time into it.
Here are some guidelines:
- You already have local communities (hacker/creative spaces) that have members who are on top of the news and working to escape the system. Find them.
- Find the commonality between libertarianism, anarcho-capitalism and anarcho-socialism. None of these ideologies are sufficient, but the conversations and debates are converging.
- Learn history and social/economic sciences. The history of debt money, the collapse of rome, today's corporate power structures, etc.
- Understand how the dollar works and how it's controlled and enforced. Support alternative currencies.
- Support open hardware. The EFF is your friend. Learn more about encryption and understand the vulnerabilities online and offline.
> find the commonality between libertarianism, anarcho-capitalism, and anarcho-socialism.
There is no commonality. At it's core, anarchism wishes to abolish capitalism, and libertarians/ancaps wish to keep it. It's a fundamental disagreement that starts the conversation off. There's no reconciliation here.
Well, both camps agree that the State as we know it today is mostly a Bad Thing, so there is some common ground. That said, you're right to suggest that it's hard for anarcho-socialist types and an-cap types to cooperate. Strangely enough, however, I find that it's usually the anarcho-socialist types who want nothing to do with an-caps, even when our goals do overlap. I guess they don't care much for the "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" thinking, even in a limited scenario.
Personally, I think if we could accomplish a RADICAL reduction in the size, scope and power of the State, that that would be a great first step, and we could then start figuring out what to do about economic systems and the property debate. But that's just me...
Saying "their goals overlap" is a fundamental misunderstanding of the anarchist position. Ancaps are not "the enemy of my enemy," they are my (in my anarchist days...) enemy: capitalists.
If you radically reduce the state without protecting the poor, you end up doing more harm to the poor. That's why anarchists are, for example, anti-austerity, even though it could be construed as "making the state smaller." Anarchists are for _the liberation of the working class_, (and all people...) and happen to believe that the state is one of the largest obstacles in achieving that goal. But removing the state without protections is just going to do far more harm than good.
You can also see this in their histories: anarchism comes from the First International, and is primarily about a means dispute with Marxists. ancap/voluntaryism comes from Rothbard, (who incidentally said that ancaps aren't anarchists...) who is... just a bit different than Marx. To understate it.
Ancaps and anarchists have almost nothing in common.
... besides the common goal of achieving peace and liberty by abolishing the tyranny of government. So yes, they do have a lot in common.
Anarcho-socialists (what steveklabnik calls "anarchists") have a reactionary attitude towards "capitalism" and see capitalism as the source of government tyranny. You'll see them claiming the word "anarchism" for themselves, and rejecting any form of capitalism.
Yet you'll find that in denying the freedom of voluntary trade, this particular group fail to propose an alternative that doesn't just turn into another tyrannical state.
I say, find an anarchist who can understand the Bitcoin protocol, and you'll find yourself an anarcho-capitalist.
The problem with anarcho-capitalism is that they believe the free market will solve everything, and they don't believe in environmental limitations, and they have no proposed mechanism of protecting the liberties of the poor. (the poor can't buy freedom, damnit).
In practice, most people admit that there should be personal property (such as your home and your body), and that there should be limitations to property (there are more empty houses in san francisco than homeless people). It's just common sense. Between anarcho-socialists and anarcho-capitalists, there is a way to achieve a good balance.
Yet you'll find that in denying the freedom of voluntary trade, this particular group fail to propose an alternative that doesn't just turn into another tyrannical state.
Yeah, that's always been one of my issues with anarcho-socialists - in the obsessive quest to eliminate all hierarchy, it seems that they've created a system that could only be enforced through... a hierarchy. Unless you can get every human being in a group larger than about 2 to agree on something, that is. And I'm not betting any money on that happening.
In practice, most people admit that there should be personal property (such as your home and your body), and that there should be limitations to property (there are more empty houses in san francisco than homeless people). It's just common sense. Between anarcho-socialists and anarcho-capitalists, there is a way to achieve a good balance.
Part of the problem with that is this: When you start having those kinds of discussions, what you refer to as "common sense" often winds up being a form of Utilitarianism, or based on Utilitarian arguments. And while Utilitarianism isn't necessarily Bad in any inherent way, it's an ideology like any other, and taken to it's further-most logical extremes, also leads to Bad Things being supported. See: the whole swathes of novels written about the evils of medical utilitarianism[1] gone too far.
For this reason, among others, finding a common ground between (left) anarchism and anarcho-capitalism isn't necessarily as easy as it might seem.
Saying "their goals overlap" is a fundamental misunderstanding of the anarchist position
Right, but I didn't say that. Not as a universal statement, anyway. I'm saying that there are certain, specific situations / circumstances where they do overlap.
Ancaps and anarchists have almost nothing in common.
Agreed, but the word I'm focusing on is the "almost". Where there is something in common, we could all probably accomplish more by working together a bit. But, in my experience, an-caps are often open to collaboration with anarchist-socialists / left-anarchists / whatever-term-you-prefer, but those guys usually don't want anything to do with us. I guess I'd say it's that we don't see "traditional" anarchists as our enemy, but they see us as theirs. But what can ya do? shrug
Fair enough. Frankly, I probably just should have not even replied, as my hostility stems from being sick of having this conversation over and over and over. See your siblings implying that anarchists are against 'free trade', or that they don't understand bitcoin...
The rhetoric when you understand both sides of this is immensely tiring.
As I said above, I'm not really in the mood, but since I made a snipe-y comment at you, I guess I at least owe you this:
1. No anarchist wants to stop you from trading things with anyone. Capitalism != trade. The issue is ownership of the means of production, not movables.
2. I personally understand Bitcoin quite well, which is one of the reasons I don't like it. however, I've seen quite a few of my fellow anarchists support it thoroughly, to the point of saying "If you don't support Bitcoin, you're not an anarchist." I _will_ say that I'm warming up to it slightly as a certain tactic for certain situations.
As I'm already irritated, you'll have to forgive me if I don't say more than that. Maybe another time.
Bitcoin is still growing, and more people are understanding the mechanism behind it. Many altcoins are just Bitcoin ripoffs, but we'll see interesting developments going forward.
Those have just been on my mind recently. Reddit is actually a good source of reading material once you have an account, unfollow stupid subreddits and follow the right ones like politics, worldnews, restorethefourth, libertarian, anarcho_* etc.
You will initially get depressed as you see the injustice around you.
You can deny what you see and go back to browsing Facebook.
Or, you can embrace the movement. I've been traveling the rabbit hole and I assure you that the thing is manageable if you put your time into it.
Here are some guidelines:
- You already have local communities (hacker/creative spaces) that have members who are on top of the news and working to escape the system. Find them.
- Find the commonality between libertarianism, anarcho-capitalism and anarcho-socialism. None of these ideologies are sufficient, but the conversations and debates are converging.
- Learn history and social/economic sciences. The history of debt money, the collapse of rome, today's corporate power structures, etc.
- Understand how the dollar works and how it's controlled and enforced. Support alternative currencies.
- Support open hardware. The EFF is your friend. Learn more about encryption and understand the vulnerabilities online and offline.
I could go on, share links, etc.