![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | → | Archive 5 |
This is an archive of talk posted at Talk:Anarchism. I would be useful to read this before making changes to Anarchism, and understanding why the page looks as it does now. Sam 10:19 Jan 18, 2003 (UTC)
Note: More (old) talk can be found in Talk:Anarchy.
I do not understand why I am being censored and oppressed. The libertarian socialists are trying to change every point at which the anarchist page says "anarchist" to "libertarian socialist" apparently they are trying to get everybody to call themselves libertarian socialists.
This is not right.
They are deleting numerous changes I have made to the anarchist website. For instance, I have taken several of the points at which one group or another has said, "anarchism is really libertarian socialism" or "anarchism is really socialism" and I have merged them all together into, "Anarchists tend to agree with socialists".
This is not sufficient for the libertarian socialists who are totally opposed to an actual anarchist trying to create a quality explanation of anarchism. For instance, somebody stated that anarchists are opposed to all forms of authority. This is not true. An anarchist later on did state that anarchists do not oppose all forms of authority but isn't that a little confusing? Should visitors to wikipedia be forced to weed through all of these contradictory statements?
Anarchists are opposed to totalitarian authority. Any authority that is totalitarian they oppose. Furthermore, they view the US political system as totalitarian.
But somebody doesn't want me to note that. They want it to say, "anarchists are opposed to all authority" because thatll show the reader that anarchists are fundamentalist and extremists and everybody should hop over to libertarian socialism...
They are not addressing even one point at which my changes were incorrect. For instance, if you read about a political party would you want to know where it has a following. Anarchism doesn't have a big following in Kazhakastan but they do have a large following in Japan.
I added information such as this-but it gets deleted. Why? I suspect the deleters are not even reading my changes but deleting on some immoral principle. They have been calling me a noobie. They are the noobies. They apparently don't want to create an online dictionary where people that know about the subject can show up and point out obvious things like, "If anarchists feel that there is a notable difference between anarchists, anarcho-syndicalists, anarchosocial-communists, anarco-communists, anarcho-socialists, red anarchists, green anarchists, anarcho-feminists, and the like YOU BETTER BELIEVE they don't consider themselves to be libertarian socialists, regardless of what the libertarians think.
Somebody has actually said that Ive changed the text to align itself with libertarian socialism. I have hardly done so! The test originally is worded that way. In continuance of that is a result of the previous wording.
Anybody who says anarchism means, "no government whatsoever" doesn't no what anarchism is. Anarchism believes in self-governance.
I AM BEING CENSORED! NOAM CHOMSKY AGREES WITH ME! ILLEGITIMATE AUTHORITY IS TOTALITARIAN!!!!!!!!!! DO I HAVE TO GO LOOK THROUGH MY EMAIL AND GET HIS ADDRESS AND PHONE NUMBER FOR YOU? WHAT IS WRONG WITH MY ENTRY? IS THERE ANYTHING ACTUALLY WRONG WITH IT? YOU ARE ALL IN THIS HUFF OVER WHAT? WHAT IS SO WRONG WITH IT?
The document used to read, "Anarchists oppose all government." It now reads "Anarchists support self-government". If you don't agree with this you DONT UNDERSTAND ANARCHIST THEORY
love the boss totally or not or be governed by some other nut with an english d ,come on can you not sit down and try to agree we need a better system in place a system that will respect us all no matter what or who we are , that respects our right to argue or not and respects whether we and this is a hard one for you middle cllassers are educated or not because most of us are out of school by 18 i try only to represent (trade unionists)or empower people not lead them not be an authority for them to look to but to help them gain enough confidence to say no when they have to.Authority sucks and has always sucked ,when somebody tells you what to do its wrong wheteher they be a political hack (chuckle chuckle on this page same old dark place to fall into)a boss , an intelectual and worst of that thing they call " a leader".We all have to deal with these sorts of ego trips in life and its sad but one day we will change it all but it needs to be done from the ground up and it will be a slow process it will be a evolutionary process there will be no quick big revolutionary change the golden age will be in our distant future and we all must demonstrate our willingness to put down the markers that will change all around us however small that contribution is. tom o' rourke
I just moved my more detailed discussion of libertarian socialism & anarcho-capitalism to libertarian socialism and anarcho-capitalism. My proposal is as follows:
In response to your points,
1. There must be some common ground, or different groups wouldn't lay claim to the same word. And the common ground is the "abolition of civil governments". If you believe that to be incorrect, then find the correct common ground.
2. The discussion of anarchy isn't that in-depth, but it doesn't need to be. Everything that is said about the term in your version of the anarchism page is said on the anarchy page. But succinctly. If you feel more needs to be said, then go ahead, and expand the anarchy page.
Finally, my version of the beginning doesn't eliminate any information. It just eliminates verbiage. Please demonstrate what information my version leaves out.
p.s. Is libertarian socialism actually a term libertarian socialists use, or do they call themselves anarchists?
I'd just like to say that I think it was a bad idea to merge Anarchy into Anarchism. The separate Anarchy entry made it much clearer what the use of the word was. Also, by merging the two there is now content on the Anarchism page that doesn't really belong there. For example, talking about the use of the word "anarchy" by punk rockers, etc. is ancillary to the "anarchism" entry. In general I advocate more distinct entries, not fewer. If you have two related concepts, and one is wholly subordinate, then I advocate them being under one entry, which would imply subpages--e.g. ethnic nationalism belongs under nationalism (but people like Larry Sanger hate subpages, so that won't happen), or redirects (like "happy" to "happiness"). But most of the time concepts are related but neither is wholly subordinate. And Anarchy is not wholly subordinate to Anarchism. I think redirects should mainly be used for misspellings. --TheCunctator
I don't think the bit about punk rock is at all misplaced on the "anarchism" page; it's simply a philosophy or an ideology like the others. It seems that this is the extent of our disagreement. If I believed that anomy was in a different class of topics than anarcho-capitalism, than I'd think they should have seperate pages. If you agreed that anomy was just like a-c or l-s, then that would make this just like "happy" / "happiness". Am I right? --DanKeshet
Anarchy and anomy are not indistinguishable concepts. "happy" is the adjectival form of "happiness". Punk rock isn't simply a philosophy or an ideology like the others; rather, there's a pretty big difference between political ideologies and music. However, I want you to know that I can also buy to some degree the argument for merging them. I just think that people here have been getting a little too merge/delete happy recently and lean towards separate entries. In other words, the extent of my disagreement lies in the philosophical grounding of wikipedian ontology. --TheCunctator
I didn't mean to say anarchy and anomy are indistinguishable; only that seeing how a bunch of groups are laying claim to the word "anarchy", anomy has as much of a claim as any other. --dk
Libertarian socialists and anarcho-capitalists view each other's ideas with hostility. Proponents of each of these two theories tend to claim that theirs is the only true anarchism, while the other position is not anarchism at all, because it opposes a wrong notion of power ('archos'). On the other hand, libertarian socialists consider themselves as part of the collectivist movement, while anarcho-capitalists consider themselves as classical liberals - this shows that the opposition between collectivism and individualism in matters of political economy is indeed more essential than the question of the existence of government.
Many libertarian socialists argue that anarcho-capitalism should not be called anarchism at all, due to the much older use of the word to refer to libertarian socialism. Anarcho-capitalists argue they have just as much right to the word as libertarian socialists have, and that their anti-statist tradition is actually older and more coherent. Individualist anarchists could arguably claim they are the oldest anarchist tradition, but they care little for such macho "length contests" about the age of traditions, since they don't feel like they are part of a collective they must defend.
-Which one of these denotes everyone being in charge?-Adrian
The reason I put this distinction in:
" * Anarcho-socialists (Libertarian Socialists) believe that all forms of hierarchy must be eliminated. Anarcho-capitalists believe that all forms of coercive forms of hierarchy must be eliminated, thus employer / employee relationships may be preserved, as they are freely entered into contracts."
is that I reject the idea that anarcho-socialists find "non-coercive" hierarchy acceptible. While all anarcho-capitalists I know reject the church (in this specific sense I am refering to the Catholic church, because all of the older (and primary authors for this *modern* anarchism debate) European anarcho-socialist writers either railed against the Orthodox (the Russians) or the Roman (everybody else, but the Spanish really come to mind) church), they do not deny the ability of someone to join the church if they felt like it. (Presumably because they feel in matters of human purview, coersion is wrong - but still believe in subordinance to a divine creator). Anarcho-socialists are against the church for the same reasons they are against the government, hierarchal control. And this goes for almost all social organizations - syndicatilism (? - need more coffee) notwithstanding.
As to the statement earlier in the thread: "Well, yes, both agree that anarchy involves "abolition of civil governments"" is incorrect. To contrast (from directly above): "this shows that the opposition between collectivism and individualism in matters of political economy is indeed more essential than the question of the existence of government." is much closer to the truth. Anarchists are ALL for civil society. All anarchists believe in spontaneous order, as opposed to coercive imposed order. Particaption of an active civic is essential to have a functioning civil society. This society will create and impose sanction for transgressions of the order agreed upon. To illustrate, neither anarcho-socialists or anarcho-capitalists allow murder to go unpunished. This is "government" (granted not in its traditional sense, if you can't stand the term use something equivalent), no matter how you slice it. Whether these norms be based upon collectivism or individualism is the real issue.
Finally, (whoo hoo!) punk rock adopted symbology from the anarchist movement, but that was where it really ended.
(Apart from Crass (see their website) and the anarcho punk scene I would argue... I intend to cover anarcho punk in more depth than that little stub I've put up so far, but it's a start.... quercus robur )
Punk rock is about disorder. It (as a movement) was concerned with the destruction of 'norms' in society. They rejected such basic ideas as "doing well for yourself" or "be good at what you do". For example, musicianship (based on 'norms') was rejected as being to studied, and therefore false. It was more important to express oneselves, in any way (positive or negative, constructive or destructive, peaceful or violent) desired. The resulting deconstruction and destruction of those norms would presumably result in a better society, or at least a society in constant revolution (and end in and of itself). This concept of constant revolution has been seen in many other, non-anarchist traditions. as for what happened after the destruction of society and its norms, punk rock never concerned itself with. Anarchism, for the most part in literature, deals very little with the "destruction" part, and jumps right into how the new order will be. I feel the reference should be moved, and the references to its anarchist symbology and self-identification contrasted to how more 'doctrinaire' (yikes! THAT came out of my mouth!) types feel about it.
- Dobbs 14:40 Sep 5, 2002 (PDT) hope I did that tag correctly!
I must admit, I know punk more from what it's not (other than an appreciation of the music) than what it is. As you seem to have an interest, please lead. Where do you think the definition (and the differences) need to go from here? Dobbs 05:14 Sep 6, 2002 (UCT)
Unless anyone feels that a whole seperate entry would be best -- which I doubt -- I'd like to suggest an expansion of the Anarchist musicians section recently added. Anarchist music or even Anarchism in the arts might be a good way to go.
This could include a discussion of Anarchism as it relates to punk rock -- for example, some argue that punk rock has little to do with "real anarchism" -- that is, anarchist political, social and economic theory. Rather, most punk rock simply uses anarchist symbolism etc...
Also, an Anarchism in the arts title would show the cultural impact of anarchism more clearly, and not only in punk.
Thoughts? -- Tzartzam 11:45 Sep 7, 2002 (UTC)
Yep, I think that's a great idea. Although I have reservations about the title (due to my objections of punk rock only utilizing symbolism and thus bears little relation to the movement), I think the real idea is to allow the majority of people to find information contained within the 'pedia quickly. If this means pandering to popular misconceptions, then so be it. My vote for the scetion title would be "Anarchism in the arts", with subheadings for each type, and a redirect from punk rock and other such related concepts to this page. Does the 'pedia support bookmarking within a page? Then we could jump right to the subsection. What does everybody think?
Dobbs 15:12 Sep 7, 2002 (UTC)
I've made a link from Anarcho-punk to Anarchism in the arts, although there's nothing at the end of it yet... anybody fancy starting an article?
Perhaps the A few famouse Anarchists bit should go under Anarchist? -- Tzartzam 19:55 Sep 7, 2002 (UTC)
From the old /Todo page:
Tzartzam: please see the libertarian socialism page. There's already an "Anarchism (libertarian socialism) in History" section over there. In order to keep the confusion and duplication to a minimum, I think it would be best if we keep as much of the history/thinkers/etc. on the individual philosophies' pages. After all, it would be really weird to have a "Anarchism in Spanish Civil War" section right next to an "Anarchism in Ayn Rand" section. DanKeshet
Well, Ayn Rand certainly wasn't a libertarian socialist in history. She was a objectivist, much closer to a anarcho-capitalist in history. So moving everybody over there isn't a complete solution, either. Or an I understanding the issue correctly? Dobbs 18:40 Sep 18, 2002 (UTC)
Err, sorry, Lir, but all your edits seem totally daffy to me. You've basically destroyed all the distinctions between the various strains of anarchist thought and equated anarchism with libertarian socialism, which was NOT the intent of this article at all, and was a position we sort of reached after extensive debate over who gets to be called "anarchist". Would you like to defend your edits, or shall we just revert them? Graft 16:42 Oct 2, 2002 (UTC)
Lir seems eager and a newbie as well. I'm going over to his Talk page and try and describe searching before starting new articles, and reading the talk page to get an idea of what everyone before you has done and is trying to achieve. Most anarchists I tend to meet seem to have developed their understanding from more general work and bits and pieces of popular descriptions. Our more doctrinaire and rigorous work describing the distinctions is a bit enlightning and confusing when people are first exposed. Dobbs 17:21 Oct 2, 2002 (UTC)
I think the opening sentence is either simplistic or one-sided:
Is this a Marxist view? If so, it should be labeled as such. There are other views of anarchism, such as the idea that there should be no government at all.
Also, I don't understand the distinction between democracy and the the replacement of all forms of hierarchy ... by democratically-controlled organization. Surely anarchism and democracy are not synonymous. -- Ed Poor
Great distinction. Okay, let's put that in the article, preferably somewhere near the top. I figure the best way to bring some order to the chaos without some tyrant imposing order from above is for us to work collectively on listing the forms of anarchy advocated by the various adherents:
-- Ed Poor
Moved:
WHEREAS LIBERTARIAN SOCIALISM IS A POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY DEDICATED TO OPPOSING ALL FORMS OF AUTHORITY--ANARCHISM IS A POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY DEDICATED TO OPPOSING TOTALITARIAN AUTHORTITY IN FAVOR OF DEMOCRACY AND COLLECTIVE OWNERSHIP OF PROPERTY.
Hey, Lir, you don't have to shout. And we can surely find some way to include this info in the article. What do you think is the best place? -- Ed Poor
--
Ed simply because u disagree with the first sentence is not reason to delete all the changes made. It was found necessary to be very clear on the above point as libertarian socialists keep changing the page to reflect libertarian socialist ideas and they have their own page on which to argue for the abolition of all authority-that is NOT an anarchist viewpoint-anarchism is against rulers
---
Anarchism is synonymous with democracy. Anarchists are very strongly in favour of democracy. Anarchists wish you would understand that America is not a democracy. America is a republic and thus a totalitarian police state. Anarchism is democracy. They are literal synonoms. Anarchism advocates removal of rulers and owners in favor of democracy.
Anarchists do not call themselves democrats for a reason. There is an idea of democracy which the democrats do not endorse. This involves democracy as in, "people voting for stuff that affects them". It is unfortunate that the democrats and republicans use propaganda to make people think that they have given us democracy. All anarchists support democracy-but what type of democracy? just democracy. Not republican democracy or democratic republicanism. Democracy is anarchism. Anarchism is no rulers. Democracy is the people voting. The rulers get one vote. The people can over rule them. That is anarchism
WHY ARE PEOPLE CHANGING MY DOCUMENT WHEN THEY DONT EVEN KNOW WHATS IN IT? WHAT IS THIS NPOV? Somebody is upset because the document says, "Anarchists loathe capitalism" just like it said that BEFORE I edited it...
The old version also considered anarcho-capitalism to be a form of anarchism. Thus the "government-sponsored" statement. Anarchists loathe the government and capitalism. Anarcho-capitalists loathe the government cuz it really doesn't want to let capitalist take over.
Anarcho-capitalism IS a form of anarchism, simply by the fact that anarcho-capitalists call themselves "anarchists". There is no authoritative body decreeing who is and who is not an anarchist, or what is and what is not an anarchist belief. The ideals that YOU believe to be anarchist may be something else, but if a substantial number of people use the term "anarchist" to mean something different, it MUST be reflected in this encyclopedia. This entry is not "what Lir believes anarchism means", but rather is an attempt to show what the term "anarchism" has meant in general, historically. Graft
You as an anarcho-capitalist are not an anarchist. OF **** COURSE YOU FIND DEMOCRACY TO BE MORALLY REPUGNANT!!!! Why do you think the revision says, "Anarcho-capitalists claim to be anarchists but anarchists say they are not really anarchists but actually "super-capitalists" " Anarchists loathe capitalists. You can say whatever you want, I don't care, we can have a whole website about anarcho-capitalism, but I guarantee you 51% of the population isn't going to decide to give "You Incorporated" control of their lives.
I am not interjecting my opinions. I am interjecting FACT. Anarchism is a movement against capitalism and the government. Every anarchist hates the US Government and the Corporations. That is the very basis of anarchism. That is not negotiable. Anarcho-capitalists just have anarcho in thier political agenda to confuse things. They are either fools or intending to dominate the world economy. People that wish to dominate the world are the enemy of anarchists.
Cor this is more fun than usenet ;-)
Lir, Can you stop, please?
In this article we've had to come to a compromise; "anarchism" has been used to mean various different things, and, despite what you may believe, there is no central authority that dictates them meaning of a word. And you are certainly not that authority.
"Libertarian Socialism," as I understand it, is what I call Anarchism; it's what Kropotkin and Bakunin called anarchim, and they're considered the "fathers of anarchism" by many.
-- Sam
Oh, and by the way, I think you may have confused "libertarian socialism" with "libertarianism". Libertarian socialism is anarchism as Kropotkin, Bakunin, Goldman, Malatesta et al advocated it. Anarchism, in the 19th/early 20th century, grew out of the broad socialist movement. The split between authoritarian communists (today generally known as just "Communists") and libertarian communists (or libertarian socialists; then known as anarchists) came when Bakunin was thrown out of the International by Marx.
Anarcho-capitalists started calling themselves anarchists because they opposed government. The term really only has that negative connotation for certain; what those who call themselves anarchists advocate varies, what they oppose is their common ground.
Anarchy literally means contrary to authority. So there. -- Sam
Sooooooo...Im still waiting for any disagreement with my revision... The anarcho-capitalist and the anarchist have established that they don't agree. This is reflected in the revision. The libretarian socialist and the anarchist have agreed that they have slight differences in defining their respective eras...this is also reflected in the revision...
If you have a problem with the revision-try editing it-but there is too much in there that nobody is disagreeing with for it to be tossed
Seems to be a problem with the server now. : \ Too many edited versions floating around or something... The latest version (which can't be seen due to the error) explains that libretarian-socialism and anarchism are very similar movements with different histories but similar goals. It goes into some depth on the anarchism vs. anarcho-capitalism debate.
Regarding the changes I just made. In my experience, I have heard libertarian communism, libertarian socialism, left-anarchism, and red anarchism used to describe the same thing. Which term is used depends mainly on the speaker and what they are comparing it to. (For examle, I've never heard red anarchism except as comparison to green nor left except as comparison to right.) If there are difference between these philosophies, then by all means, seperate the pages and explain the difference. I will be enlightened. Otherwise, don't repeat synonyms. Same goes for green anarchism, anarcho-primitivism, and primitivism.
I still feel much of this page refers to what we're calling "libertarian socialism" as "anarchism". Specifically, the anarchist law part. Anarcho-capitalists here: do you believe that there should be no hierarchy? Perhaps this is because relatively few people who we call libertarian socialists call themselves libertarian socialists, so they find this page and try to change it to the only thing they call anarchism. Maybe we should move "libertarian socialism" to " left-anarchism"? DanKeshet
PS. Thanks to everyone for watching out for this page. I hope that it comes out of this whole thing improved.
As an aside - I think that the best single experiment in applied anarchy (as opposed to usenet, which has an application - but not quite what we are getting at) - Wikipedia - is all in a lather when we, as organized and doctrinaire anarchists, are accosted by someone who has strong, but not quite so well-defined ideas. I was settling into a good description of anarcho-capitalism when, out of the blue, we had a "true believer" in one of our "factions". Best to take it slowly and see what it produces, before we draw lines and start hacking at the limbs..... Dobbs 08:33 Oct 3, 2002 (UTC)
The problem, as I explained elsewhere, is that what is by far the most common form of anarchism is in fact just called "anarchism" by the vast majority not only of its proponents but by the public and by scholars of the field. But the term is clearly an ambiguous one, because it is used just as correctly to describe other forms of anarchism. Language can be ambiguous, because there's always context to sort things out, but encyclopedia titles can't be. So we are unfortunately forced to write an article on the most common form of anarchism under a name other than "anarchism", which must be used to disambiguate the others. It's unfortunate, but that's the way it it. Perhaps "libertarian socialism" isn't the best place for that article, and I'm open to suggestions (perhaps a parenthesized one like "anarchism (traditional)" or something?). But in any case, we still need this one for disambiguating. -- LDC
I for one am happy with the current introduction. -- Sam 11:41 Oct 3, 2002 (UTC)
"Anarchists are opposed to totalitarian authority. Any authority that is totalitarian they oppose. Furthermore, they view the US political system as totalitarian."
Green anarchists are NOT always primitivists. This is implied both on this page and the green anarchism page. Many Greens are tecnhnologists, but anti- pollution technologists.
agreed not all GAs are primitivist- I consider myself a GA but found the writings on primitivism in the UK Green anarchist magazine pretty inpenetrable. I beleive the new 'reinvented' Green anarchist magazine (the version edited by steven Booth) no longer makes a fetish of 'primitivism' quercus robur
The Merriam-Webster online dictionary defines anarchism as:
How can we weave this definition into the article? -- Ed Poor
Why do we need to weave it into the article? Dictionaries and Encyclopedias have different uses. If people want to look a word up in the dictionary, nothing is stopping them. But if people want to read a more in-depth and nuanced treatment of complex issues, they will turn to an encyclopedia, not to dictionary definitions (however elegant). If you got this from an on-line dictionary I assume it is available to every reader of Wikipedia. 132.235.232.88
Silly statement:
Most Freemasons, Christians, Wicca, true believers of all sorts believe the same. Creation myth, golden age, all that stuff.
Some romantic boast like "Anarchists believe that anarchism is the natural state of humanity preceded all other forms of government" could be defended, but it is false to say there was a "movement" from prehistoric times. Ortolan88
So, while the recent additions on the literal meaning of the neologism "anarchism" are interesting, I'm not sure they really belong in here. Yeah, maybe "anarchos" means something totally opposite what "anarchism" means, but it's a neologism - it wasn't meant to have the original usage. It was made up by some dude (who knows) to represent an idea in the modern day. So, the discussion seems sort of out of place, like "those damn anarchists don't really understand what 'anarchos' is all about!" One could say this for any poorly-rendered neologism, of which there are no doubt hundreds. Distracting, especially in the first fucking paragraph. Graft 00:58 Oct 16, 2002 (UTC)
A Greek-English lexicon by Liddell and Scott gives one of the meanins of anarchos as "without a head or chief," attested in ancient texts like Herodotus, so any discussion based on the idea that it only refers to a things without beginnings or without laws altogether is entirely incorrect. Anarhikos seems poorly attested in general, and I think it would be best to have a reference on it before assuming it's some sort of standard term.
Words' meanings change over time. I would not doubt a native speaker on the modern meaning of the terms, but they could have had other meanings in ancient Greek that have since disappeared. It looks like that's what has happened here: Herodotus uses anarchos to describe a condition where the magistrates are missing. And I am not going to discount modern scholars on the basis of nationality, especially since nobody speaks ancient Greek as a native language nowadays.
That's fair, I was identifying anarchia and anarchos for purpose of simplicity. The word anarchism, after all, comes from both, since the second comes from the first. Anarchos, though, is still mentioned as applying to leaderless people, with the Iliad 2.703 (talking about the men formerly under Protesilaos) as the cited example. I can't read ancient Greek, only pick out individual words and compare them with the translation, but with a dictionary handy it should be enough. In any case, it isn't that important at the moment; the definition given is good enough.
And, btw, I don't think it's fair to call the Athenian Democracy an anarchy, even in the very vague sense of having no rulers. It isn't like the elected strategoi had no authority, and it isn't like the citizen males didn't form a ruling class.
Those theories are not the same, as this paragraph implies. What I've replaced it with needs expanding.
I've moved the "anarchism and terrorism" bit to anarchism and violence -- I think it merits its own section, if only to be able to reference it. But I am, of course, open to discussion. -- Sam
I haven't heard this term used -- is it used in the states? -- Sam
yes-it came out about the same time the green party arose and allied with green anarchism-then there were the red anarchists who said, "damn the man. fuck this trying to get elected crap. lets smash the state for real yo."
Could green anarchists and anarcho-syndicalists be put under libertarian socialists? Anarcho-syndicalists are very definately "left", after all.
In fact, I think it's fair to say the left and right developed seperately. I think we can integrate the left and right parts into two sections (left and right, basically!) which would follow the development of the various theories in relation to each other, and follow that with a discussion of the arguement between the right and left (as already exists). -- Sam
An anonymous user added the following to the anarcho-capitalism vs. libertarian socialism section:
I thought this was representing the views of quite a lot of anarchists, but was rather flippant, so I've rewritten it to read as the last point in that section does now. I think it makes sense, but others might want to look at it to see if it could be altered, or if it even needs to be there at all. -- Camembert
I've just made anarchist into a redirect to anarchism - I saw no point in having both, as I explained at Talk:Anarchist. The below is stuff from that page that wasn't entirely duplicated here. I don't know if any of it is of any use, I thought I'd put it here just in case. -- Camembert
Quotes:
with links) http://recollectionbooks.com/bleed/gallery/galleryindex.htm
To the anonymous user who just made massive edits to this page, wiping out the article that was here before - please try to understand that many different people call themselves anarchists, and, whether we like it or not, we have to represent that in the article. The above discussion makes this clear - anarcho-capitalists are people too (no, really ;). There is more to anarchism, as the word is understood now, than Kropotkin. Also, we're not really interested in long extracts from primary sources - these can be obtained elsewhere. We're engaged in writing an encyclopaedia, not a political manifesto. You might be more interested in the libertarian socialism (aka left-anarchsim) or Peter Kropotkin articles than this one, but please try not to stamp over everybody else's work without very good reason.
And to everybody's favourite editor, Lir ;) - yep, maybe some of what was written can be integrated into something, but I think it's more suitable for libertarian socialism than this page. As such, I've removed it from the article page, but am going to add it to User:Camembert/Sandbox, and anybody who wants to try to weave the stuff into any article is welcome to go there and have a go at doing so. -- Camembert
Does everyone understand this sentence as it stands, and in the current context (under "development of anarchism")? Does it make sense? I wrote it, but I just though it might need clarifying somehow, perhaps... -- Sam
This page has made much progress since I last checked it.
Most anarchists I know think that government is wrong and oppressive, not "disorderly", whatever the hell that means. The point we want to make is not that government is "disorderly", but rather that anarchism doesn't necessitate a lack of "order".
Whether it's true or not, most anarchists don't consider themselves to want to "take power". They (say they) want to obliterate or distribute power. I think this should be rephrased. DanKeshet
Although the vast majority of historical anarchists have been socialists, we can't say that they're the only "true" anarchists. The term originated during the French Revolution to describe a certain group, who were not necessarily anarchist.
True, Proudhon was the first to call himself an anarchist, and that can be mentioned. But today, anarchism means different things to different people. This must be represented here.
Please justify changes of this manner on this talk page. -- Sam 13:11 Nov 14, 2002 (UTC)
I removed the note that suggested wikipedia isn't an anarchy because of the "list of blocked IP addresses". Wikipedia, I'd say, is anarchistic in many ways. If wikipedia had a monopoly on the wiki software (which it doesn't), then we could say that blocking certain IPs is not anarchistic; however, because the software is free and open source, alternative wikipedias can be created, so there is no monopoly. The only place were the question of monopoly on resources comes in, then, is one external to the wikipedia: the restricted access to servers and other hardware that the current (non-anarchistic) economy gives us.
Also, Wikipedia is, in any case, an anarchy as per the definition in the paragraph preceding that one. -- Sam
Anarchy means "No rulers - not no rules". Banning vandals from Wikipedia is not non-anarchic. I vote it stays removed. That, and it has the sound of a spiteful comment by someone who has had their feelings hurt. Not exactly what we should be aiming for..... Dobbs 16:13 Nov 23, 2002 (UTC)
Can someone reword the bold bit above? It makes sense to me, but I think a rewording would clarify it a bit to those new to the subject. -- Sam
I'm thinking of restructuring this page:
What do you think? -- Sam
Two thoughts - 1) shouldn't diggers be included in the development of Anarchism 2) I always thought that Situatism was an insult, the correct word was Situationist, as in Situationist International - Karl
I just made a bunch o' relatively minor changes to the page. I expanded the linguistic roots of 'anarchy' a bit. What do you folks think of it now? Too much, too verbose?
I also made some minor corrections throughout the text. And just so people know, it was I who edited from 65.26.78.49 and 65.26.83.66 in the past. I just created myself an account, as I figure I'll be contributing around here as time goes on.
I'd have to say that the entry for 'anarchism' is one of Wikipedia's best! I'm sure it'll have some historical significance in the future, as it's the first anarchistically created {definition,history} of anarchism. *smile* And the entry just gets better over time, too! My only contention with the entry is how much 'anarcho-this vs. anarcho-that' there is. I realize that when writing an article about anarchism, there has to be some stereotyping. But I also feel that it can have a downside. For myself, as an anarchist, I draw wisdom from all the branches of anarchist thought, and I try to work with and get along with other anarchists, regardless of what syllables they choose to use to define themselves--as an anarchist, I see this as the most anarchistic way of behaving and of coming to my own conclusions. I suppose this perspective fits under "individualist anarchism" as discussed in the article...
Or maybe I've just been too impressed by the saying, "Fragmentation is artificial". -- Jizzbug 01:09 Dec 11, 2002 (UTC)
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | → | Archive 5 |
This is an archive of talk posted at Talk:Anarchism. I would be useful to read this before making changes to Anarchism, and understanding why the page looks as it does now. Sam 10:19 Jan 18, 2003 (UTC)
Note: More (old) talk can be found in Talk:Anarchy.
I do not understand why I am being censored and oppressed. The libertarian socialists are trying to change every point at which the anarchist page says "anarchist" to "libertarian socialist" apparently they are trying to get everybody to call themselves libertarian socialists.
This is not right.
They are deleting numerous changes I have made to the anarchist website. For instance, I have taken several of the points at which one group or another has said, "anarchism is really libertarian socialism" or "anarchism is really socialism" and I have merged them all together into, "Anarchists tend to agree with socialists".
This is not sufficient for the libertarian socialists who are totally opposed to an actual anarchist trying to create a quality explanation of anarchism. For instance, somebody stated that anarchists are opposed to all forms of authority. This is not true. An anarchist later on did state that anarchists do not oppose all forms of authority but isn't that a little confusing? Should visitors to wikipedia be forced to weed through all of these contradictory statements?
Anarchists are opposed to totalitarian authority. Any authority that is totalitarian they oppose. Furthermore, they view the US political system as totalitarian.
But somebody doesn't want me to note that. They want it to say, "anarchists are opposed to all authority" because thatll show the reader that anarchists are fundamentalist and extremists and everybody should hop over to libertarian socialism...
They are not addressing even one point at which my changes were incorrect. For instance, if you read about a political party would you want to know where it has a following. Anarchism doesn't have a big following in Kazhakastan but they do have a large following in Japan.
I added information such as this-but it gets deleted. Why? I suspect the deleters are not even reading my changes but deleting on some immoral principle. They have been calling me a noobie. They are the noobies. They apparently don't want to create an online dictionary where people that know about the subject can show up and point out obvious things like, "If anarchists feel that there is a notable difference between anarchists, anarcho-syndicalists, anarchosocial-communists, anarco-communists, anarcho-socialists, red anarchists, green anarchists, anarcho-feminists, and the like YOU BETTER BELIEVE they don't consider themselves to be libertarian socialists, regardless of what the libertarians think.
Somebody has actually said that Ive changed the text to align itself with libertarian socialism. I have hardly done so! The test originally is worded that way. In continuance of that is a result of the previous wording.
Anybody who says anarchism means, "no government whatsoever" doesn't no what anarchism is. Anarchism believes in self-governance.
I AM BEING CENSORED! NOAM CHOMSKY AGREES WITH ME! ILLEGITIMATE AUTHORITY IS TOTALITARIAN!!!!!!!!!! DO I HAVE TO GO LOOK THROUGH MY EMAIL AND GET HIS ADDRESS AND PHONE NUMBER FOR YOU? WHAT IS WRONG WITH MY ENTRY? IS THERE ANYTHING ACTUALLY WRONG WITH IT? YOU ARE ALL IN THIS HUFF OVER WHAT? WHAT IS SO WRONG WITH IT?
The document used to read, "Anarchists oppose all government." It now reads "Anarchists support self-government". If you don't agree with this you DONT UNDERSTAND ANARCHIST THEORY
love the boss totally or not or be governed by some other nut with an english d ,come on can you not sit down and try to agree we need a better system in place a system that will respect us all no matter what or who we are , that respects our right to argue or not and respects whether we and this is a hard one for you middle cllassers are educated or not because most of us are out of school by 18 i try only to represent (trade unionists)or empower people not lead them not be an authority for them to look to but to help them gain enough confidence to say no when they have to.Authority sucks and has always sucked ,when somebody tells you what to do its wrong wheteher they be a political hack (chuckle chuckle on this page same old dark place to fall into)a boss , an intelectual and worst of that thing they call " a leader".We all have to deal with these sorts of ego trips in life and its sad but one day we will change it all but it needs to be done from the ground up and it will be a slow process it will be a evolutionary process there will be no quick big revolutionary change the golden age will be in our distant future and we all must demonstrate our willingness to put down the markers that will change all around us however small that contribution is. tom o' rourke
I just moved my more detailed discussion of libertarian socialism & anarcho-capitalism to libertarian socialism and anarcho-capitalism. My proposal is as follows:
In response to your points,
1. There must be some common ground, or different groups wouldn't lay claim to the same word. And the common ground is the "abolition of civil governments". If you believe that to be incorrect, then find the correct common ground.
2. The discussion of anarchy isn't that in-depth, but it doesn't need to be. Everything that is said about the term in your version of the anarchism page is said on the anarchy page. But succinctly. If you feel more needs to be said, then go ahead, and expand the anarchy page.
Finally, my version of the beginning doesn't eliminate any information. It just eliminates verbiage. Please demonstrate what information my version leaves out.
p.s. Is libertarian socialism actually a term libertarian socialists use, or do they call themselves anarchists?
I'd just like to say that I think it was a bad idea to merge Anarchy into Anarchism. The separate Anarchy entry made it much clearer what the use of the word was. Also, by merging the two there is now content on the Anarchism page that doesn't really belong there. For example, talking about the use of the word "anarchy" by punk rockers, etc. is ancillary to the "anarchism" entry. In general I advocate more distinct entries, not fewer. If you have two related concepts, and one is wholly subordinate, then I advocate them being under one entry, which would imply subpages--e.g. ethnic nationalism belongs under nationalism (but people like Larry Sanger hate subpages, so that won't happen), or redirects (like "happy" to "happiness"). But most of the time concepts are related but neither is wholly subordinate. And Anarchy is not wholly subordinate to Anarchism. I think redirects should mainly be used for misspellings. --TheCunctator
I don't think the bit about punk rock is at all misplaced on the "anarchism" page; it's simply a philosophy or an ideology like the others. It seems that this is the extent of our disagreement. If I believed that anomy was in a different class of topics than anarcho-capitalism, than I'd think they should have seperate pages. If you agreed that anomy was just like a-c or l-s, then that would make this just like "happy" / "happiness". Am I right? --DanKeshet
Anarchy and anomy are not indistinguishable concepts. "happy" is the adjectival form of "happiness". Punk rock isn't simply a philosophy or an ideology like the others; rather, there's a pretty big difference between political ideologies and music. However, I want you to know that I can also buy to some degree the argument for merging them. I just think that people here have been getting a little too merge/delete happy recently and lean towards separate entries. In other words, the extent of my disagreement lies in the philosophical grounding of wikipedian ontology. --TheCunctator
I didn't mean to say anarchy and anomy are indistinguishable; only that seeing how a bunch of groups are laying claim to the word "anarchy", anomy has as much of a claim as any other. --dk
Libertarian socialists and anarcho-capitalists view each other's ideas with hostility. Proponents of each of these two theories tend to claim that theirs is the only true anarchism, while the other position is not anarchism at all, because it opposes a wrong notion of power ('archos'). On the other hand, libertarian socialists consider themselves as part of the collectivist movement, while anarcho-capitalists consider themselves as classical liberals - this shows that the opposition between collectivism and individualism in matters of political economy is indeed more essential than the question of the existence of government.
Many libertarian socialists argue that anarcho-capitalism should not be called anarchism at all, due to the much older use of the word to refer to libertarian socialism. Anarcho-capitalists argue they have just as much right to the word as libertarian socialists have, and that their anti-statist tradition is actually older and more coherent. Individualist anarchists could arguably claim they are the oldest anarchist tradition, but they care little for such macho "length contests" about the age of traditions, since they don't feel like they are part of a collective they must defend.
-Which one of these denotes everyone being in charge?-Adrian
The reason I put this distinction in:
" * Anarcho-socialists (Libertarian Socialists) believe that all forms of hierarchy must be eliminated. Anarcho-capitalists believe that all forms of coercive forms of hierarchy must be eliminated, thus employer / employee relationships may be preserved, as they are freely entered into contracts."
is that I reject the idea that anarcho-socialists find "non-coercive" hierarchy acceptible. While all anarcho-capitalists I know reject the church (in this specific sense I am refering to the Catholic church, because all of the older (and primary authors for this *modern* anarchism debate) European anarcho-socialist writers either railed against the Orthodox (the Russians) or the Roman (everybody else, but the Spanish really come to mind) church), they do not deny the ability of someone to join the church if they felt like it. (Presumably because they feel in matters of human purview, coersion is wrong - but still believe in subordinance to a divine creator). Anarcho-socialists are against the church for the same reasons they are against the government, hierarchal control. And this goes for almost all social organizations - syndicatilism (? - need more coffee) notwithstanding.
As to the statement earlier in the thread: "Well, yes, both agree that anarchy involves "abolition of civil governments"" is incorrect. To contrast (from directly above): "this shows that the opposition between collectivism and individualism in matters of political economy is indeed more essential than the question of the existence of government." is much closer to the truth. Anarchists are ALL for civil society. All anarchists believe in spontaneous order, as opposed to coercive imposed order. Particaption of an active civic is essential to have a functioning civil society. This society will create and impose sanction for transgressions of the order agreed upon. To illustrate, neither anarcho-socialists or anarcho-capitalists allow murder to go unpunished. This is "government" (granted not in its traditional sense, if you can't stand the term use something equivalent), no matter how you slice it. Whether these norms be based upon collectivism or individualism is the real issue.
Finally, (whoo hoo!) punk rock adopted symbology from the anarchist movement, but that was where it really ended.
(Apart from Crass (see their website) and the anarcho punk scene I would argue... I intend to cover anarcho punk in more depth than that little stub I've put up so far, but it's a start.... quercus robur )
Punk rock is about disorder. It (as a movement) was concerned with the destruction of 'norms' in society. They rejected such basic ideas as "doing well for yourself" or "be good at what you do". For example, musicianship (based on 'norms') was rejected as being to studied, and therefore false. It was more important to express oneselves, in any way (positive or negative, constructive or destructive, peaceful or violent) desired. The resulting deconstruction and destruction of those norms would presumably result in a better society, or at least a society in constant revolution (and end in and of itself). This concept of constant revolution has been seen in many other, non-anarchist traditions. as for what happened after the destruction of society and its norms, punk rock never concerned itself with. Anarchism, for the most part in literature, deals very little with the "destruction" part, and jumps right into how the new order will be. I feel the reference should be moved, and the references to its anarchist symbology and self-identification contrasted to how more 'doctrinaire' (yikes! THAT came out of my mouth!) types feel about it.
- Dobbs 14:40 Sep 5, 2002 (PDT) hope I did that tag correctly!
I must admit, I know punk more from what it's not (other than an appreciation of the music) than what it is. As you seem to have an interest, please lead. Where do you think the definition (and the differences) need to go from here? Dobbs 05:14 Sep 6, 2002 (UCT)
Unless anyone feels that a whole seperate entry would be best -- which I doubt -- I'd like to suggest an expansion of the Anarchist musicians section recently added. Anarchist music or even Anarchism in the arts might be a good way to go.
This could include a discussion of Anarchism as it relates to punk rock -- for example, some argue that punk rock has little to do with "real anarchism" -- that is, anarchist political, social and economic theory. Rather, most punk rock simply uses anarchist symbolism etc...
Also, an Anarchism in the arts title would show the cultural impact of anarchism more clearly, and not only in punk.
Thoughts? -- Tzartzam 11:45 Sep 7, 2002 (UTC)
Yep, I think that's a great idea. Although I have reservations about the title (due to my objections of punk rock only utilizing symbolism and thus bears little relation to the movement), I think the real idea is to allow the majority of people to find information contained within the 'pedia quickly. If this means pandering to popular misconceptions, then so be it. My vote for the scetion title would be "Anarchism in the arts", with subheadings for each type, and a redirect from punk rock and other such related concepts to this page. Does the 'pedia support bookmarking within a page? Then we could jump right to the subsection. What does everybody think?
Dobbs 15:12 Sep 7, 2002 (UTC)
I've made a link from Anarcho-punk to Anarchism in the arts, although there's nothing at the end of it yet... anybody fancy starting an article?
Perhaps the A few famouse Anarchists bit should go under Anarchist? -- Tzartzam 19:55 Sep 7, 2002 (UTC)
From the old /Todo page:
Tzartzam: please see the libertarian socialism page. There's already an "Anarchism (libertarian socialism) in History" section over there. In order to keep the confusion and duplication to a minimum, I think it would be best if we keep as much of the history/thinkers/etc. on the individual philosophies' pages. After all, it would be really weird to have a "Anarchism in Spanish Civil War" section right next to an "Anarchism in Ayn Rand" section. DanKeshet
Well, Ayn Rand certainly wasn't a libertarian socialist in history. She was a objectivist, much closer to a anarcho-capitalist in history. So moving everybody over there isn't a complete solution, either. Or an I understanding the issue correctly? Dobbs 18:40 Sep 18, 2002 (UTC)
Err, sorry, Lir, but all your edits seem totally daffy to me. You've basically destroyed all the distinctions between the various strains of anarchist thought and equated anarchism with libertarian socialism, which was NOT the intent of this article at all, and was a position we sort of reached after extensive debate over who gets to be called "anarchist". Would you like to defend your edits, or shall we just revert them? Graft 16:42 Oct 2, 2002 (UTC)
Lir seems eager and a newbie as well. I'm going over to his Talk page and try and describe searching before starting new articles, and reading the talk page to get an idea of what everyone before you has done and is trying to achieve. Most anarchists I tend to meet seem to have developed their understanding from more general work and bits and pieces of popular descriptions. Our more doctrinaire and rigorous work describing the distinctions is a bit enlightning and confusing when people are first exposed. Dobbs 17:21 Oct 2, 2002 (UTC)
I think the opening sentence is either simplistic or one-sided:
Is this a Marxist view? If so, it should be labeled as such. There are other views of anarchism, such as the idea that there should be no government at all.
Also, I don't understand the distinction between democracy and the the replacement of all forms of hierarchy ... by democratically-controlled organization. Surely anarchism and democracy are not synonymous. -- Ed Poor
Great distinction. Okay, let's put that in the article, preferably somewhere near the top. I figure the best way to bring some order to the chaos without some tyrant imposing order from above is for us to work collectively on listing the forms of anarchy advocated by the various adherents:
-- Ed Poor
Moved:
WHEREAS LIBERTARIAN SOCIALISM IS A POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY DEDICATED TO OPPOSING ALL FORMS OF AUTHORITY--ANARCHISM IS A POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY DEDICATED TO OPPOSING TOTALITARIAN AUTHORTITY IN FAVOR OF DEMOCRACY AND COLLECTIVE OWNERSHIP OF PROPERTY.
Hey, Lir, you don't have to shout. And we can surely find some way to include this info in the article. What do you think is the best place? -- Ed Poor
--
Ed simply because u disagree with the first sentence is not reason to delete all the changes made. It was found necessary to be very clear on the above point as libertarian socialists keep changing the page to reflect libertarian socialist ideas and they have their own page on which to argue for the abolition of all authority-that is NOT an anarchist viewpoint-anarchism is against rulers
---
Anarchism is synonymous with democracy. Anarchists are very strongly in favour of democracy. Anarchists wish you would understand that America is not a democracy. America is a republic and thus a totalitarian police state. Anarchism is democracy. They are literal synonoms. Anarchism advocates removal of rulers and owners in favor of democracy.
Anarchists do not call themselves democrats for a reason. There is an idea of democracy which the democrats do not endorse. This involves democracy as in, "people voting for stuff that affects them". It is unfortunate that the democrats and republicans use propaganda to make people think that they have given us democracy. All anarchists support democracy-but what type of democracy? just democracy. Not republican democracy or democratic republicanism. Democracy is anarchism. Anarchism is no rulers. Democracy is the people voting. The rulers get one vote. The people can over rule them. That is anarchism
WHY ARE PEOPLE CHANGING MY DOCUMENT WHEN THEY DONT EVEN KNOW WHATS IN IT? WHAT IS THIS NPOV? Somebody is upset because the document says, "Anarchists loathe capitalism" just like it said that BEFORE I edited it...
The old version also considered anarcho-capitalism to be a form of anarchism. Thus the "government-sponsored" statement. Anarchists loathe the government and capitalism. Anarcho-capitalists loathe the government cuz it really doesn't want to let capitalist take over.
Anarcho-capitalism IS a form of anarchism, simply by the fact that anarcho-capitalists call themselves "anarchists". There is no authoritative body decreeing who is and who is not an anarchist, or what is and what is not an anarchist belief. The ideals that YOU believe to be anarchist may be something else, but if a substantial number of people use the term "anarchist" to mean something different, it MUST be reflected in this encyclopedia. This entry is not "what Lir believes anarchism means", but rather is an attempt to show what the term "anarchism" has meant in general, historically. Graft
You as an anarcho-capitalist are not an anarchist. OF **** COURSE YOU FIND DEMOCRACY TO BE MORALLY REPUGNANT!!!! Why do you think the revision says, "Anarcho-capitalists claim to be anarchists but anarchists say they are not really anarchists but actually "super-capitalists" " Anarchists loathe capitalists. You can say whatever you want, I don't care, we can have a whole website about anarcho-capitalism, but I guarantee you 51% of the population isn't going to decide to give "You Incorporated" control of their lives.
I am not interjecting my opinions. I am interjecting FACT. Anarchism is a movement against capitalism and the government. Every anarchist hates the US Government and the Corporations. That is the very basis of anarchism. That is not negotiable. Anarcho-capitalists just have anarcho in thier political agenda to confuse things. They are either fools or intending to dominate the world economy. People that wish to dominate the world are the enemy of anarchists.
Cor this is more fun than usenet ;-)
Lir, Can you stop, please?
In this article we've had to come to a compromise; "anarchism" has been used to mean various different things, and, despite what you may believe, there is no central authority that dictates them meaning of a word. And you are certainly not that authority.
"Libertarian Socialism," as I understand it, is what I call Anarchism; it's what Kropotkin and Bakunin called anarchim, and they're considered the "fathers of anarchism" by many.
-- Sam
Oh, and by the way, I think you may have confused "libertarian socialism" with "libertarianism". Libertarian socialism is anarchism as Kropotkin, Bakunin, Goldman, Malatesta et al advocated it. Anarchism, in the 19th/early 20th century, grew out of the broad socialist movement. The split between authoritarian communists (today generally known as just "Communists") and libertarian communists (or libertarian socialists; then known as anarchists) came when Bakunin was thrown out of the International by Marx.
Anarcho-capitalists started calling themselves anarchists because they opposed government. The term really only has that negative connotation for certain; what those who call themselves anarchists advocate varies, what they oppose is their common ground.
Anarchy literally means contrary to authority. So there. -- Sam
Sooooooo...Im still waiting for any disagreement with my revision... The anarcho-capitalist and the anarchist have established that they don't agree. This is reflected in the revision. The libretarian socialist and the anarchist have agreed that they have slight differences in defining their respective eras...this is also reflected in the revision...
If you have a problem with the revision-try editing it-but there is too much in there that nobody is disagreeing with for it to be tossed
Seems to be a problem with the server now. : \ Too many edited versions floating around or something... The latest version (which can't be seen due to the error) explains that libretarian-socialism and anarchism are very similar movements with different histories but similar goals. It goes into some depth on the anarchism vs. anarcho-capitalism debate.
Regarding the changes I just made. In my experience, I have heard libertarian communism, libertarian socialism, left-anarchism, and red anarchism used to describe the same thing. Which term is used depends mainly on the speaker and what they are comparing it to. (For examle, I've never heard red anarchism except as comparison to green nor left except as comparison to right.) If there are difference between these philosophies, then by all means, seperate the pages and explain the difference. I will be enlightened. Otherwise, don't repeat synonyms. Same goes for green anarchism, anarcho-primitivism, and primitivism.
I still feel much of this page refers to what we're calling "libertarian socialism" as "anarchism". Specifically, the anarchist law part. Anarcho-capitalists here: do you believe that there should be no hierarchy? Perhaps this is because relatively few people who we call libertarian socialists call themselves libertarian socialists, so they find this page and try to change it to the only thing they call anarchism. Maybe we should move "libertarian socialism" to " left-anarchism"? DanKeshet
PS. Thanks to everyone for watching out for this page. I hope that it comes out of this whole thing improved.
As an aside - I think that the best single experiment in applied anarchy (as opposed to usenet, which has an application - but not quite what we are getting at) - Wikipedia - is all in a lather when we, as organized and doctrinaire anarchists, are accosted by someone who has strong, but not quite so well-defined ideas. I was settling into a good description of anarcho-capitalism when, out of the blue, we had a "true believer" in one of our "factions". Best to take it slowly and see what it produces, before we draw lines and start hacking at the limbs..... Dobbs 08:33 Oct 3, 2002 (UTC)
The problem, as I explained elsewhere, is that what is by far the most common form of anarchism is in fact just called "anarchism" by the vast majority not only of its proponents but by the public and by scholars of the field. But the term is clearly an ambiguous one, because it is used just as correctly to describe other forms of anarchism. Language can be ambiguous, because there's always context to sort things out, but encyclopedia titles can't be. So we are unfortunately forced to write an article on the most common form of anarchism under a name other than "anarchism", which must be used to disambiguate the others. It's unfortunate, but that's the way it it. Perhaps "libertarian socialism" isn't the best place for that article, and I'm open to suggestions (perhaps a parenthesized one like "anarchism (traditional)" or something?). But in any case, we still need this one for disambiguating. -- LDC
I for one am happy with the current introduction. -- Sam 11:41 Oct 3, 2002 (UTC)
"Anarchists are opposed to totalitarian authority. Any authority that is totalitarian they oppose. Furthermore, they view the US political system as totalitarian."
Green anarchists are NOT always primitivists. This is implied both on this page and the green anarchism page. Many Greens are tecnhnologists, but anti- pollution technologists.
agreed not all GAs are primitivist- I consider myself a GA but found the writings on primitivism in the UK Green anarchist magazine pretty inpenetrable. I beleive the new 'reinvented' Green anarchist magazine (the version edited by steven Booth) no longer makes a fetish of 'primitivism' quercus robur
The Merriam-Webster online dictionary defines anarchism as:
How can we weave this definition into the article? -- Ed Poor
Why do we need to weave it into the article? Dictionaries and Encyclopedias have different uses. If people want to look a word up in the dictionary, nothing is stopping them. But if people want to read a more in-depth and nuanced treatment of complex issues, they will turn to an encyclopedia, not to dictionary definitions (however elegant). If you got this from an on-line dictionary I assume it is available to every reader of Wikipedia. 132.235.232.88
Silly statement:
Most Freemasons, Christians, Wicca, true believers of all sorts believe the same. Creation myth, golden age, all that stuff.
Some romantic boast like "Anarchists believe that anarchism is the natural state of humanity preceded all other forms of government" could be defended, but it is false to say there was a "movement" from prehistoric times. Ortolan88
So, while the recent additions on the literal meaning of the neologism "anarchism" are interesting, I'm not sure they really belong in here. Yeah, maybe "anarchos" means something totally opposite what "anarchism" means, but it's a neologism - it wasn't meant to have the original usage. It was made up by some dude (who knows) to represent an idea in the modern day. So, the discussion seems sort of out of place, like "those damn anarchists don't really understand what 'anarchos' is all about!" One could say this for any poorly-rendered neologism, of which there are no doubt hundreds. Distracting, especially in the first fucking paragraph. Graft 00:58 Oct 16, 2002 (UTC)
A Greek-English lexicon by Liddell and Scott gives one of the meanins of anarchos as "without a head or chief," attested in ancient texts like Herodotus, so any discussion based on the idea that it only refers to a things without beginnings or without laws altogether is entirely incorrect. Anarhikos seems poorly attested in general, and I think it would be best to have a reference on it before assuming it's some sort of standard term.
Words' meanings change over time. I would not doubt a native speaker on the modern meaning of the terms, but they could have had other meanings in ancient Greek that have since disappeared. It looks like that's what has happened here: Herodotus uses anarchos to describe a condition where the magistrates are missing. And I am not going to discount modern scholars on the basis of nationality, especially since nobody speaks ancient Greek as a native language nowadays.
That's fair, I was identifying anarchia and anarchos for purpose of simplicity. The word anarchism, after all, comes from both, since the second comes from the first. Anarchos, though, is still mentioned as applying to leaderless people, with the Iliad 2.703 (talking about the men formerly under Protesilaos) as the cited example. I can't read ancient Greek, only pick out individual words and compare them with the translation, but with a dictionary handy it should be enough. In any case, it isn't that important at the moment; the definition given is good enough.
And, btw, I don't think it's fair to call the Athenian Democracy an anarchy, even in the very vague sense of having no rulers. It isn't like the elected strategoi had no authority, and it isn't like the citizen males didn't form a ruling class.
Those theories are not the same, as this paragraph implies. What I've replaced it with needs expanding.
I've moved the "anarchism and terrorism" bit to anarchism and violence -- I think it merits its own section, if only to be able to reference it. But I am, of course, open to discussion. -- Sam
I haven't heard this term used -- is it used in the states? -- Sam
yes-it came out about the same time the green party arose and allied with green anarchism-then there were the red anarchists who said, "damn the man. fuck this trying to get elected crap. lets smash the state for real yo."
Could green anarchists and anarcho-syndicalists be put under libertarian socialists? Anarcho-syndicalists are very definately "left", after all.
In fact, I think it's fair to say the left and right developed seperately. I think we can integrate the left and right parts into two sections (left and right, basically!) which would follow the development of the various theories in relation to each other, and follow that with a discussion of the arguement between the right and left (as already exists). -- Sam
An anonymous user added the following to the anarcho-capitalism vs. libertarian socialism section:
I thought this was representing the views of quite a lot of anarchists, but was rather flippant, so I've rewritten it to read as the last point in that section does now. I think it makes sense, but others might want to look at it to see if it could be altered, or if it even needs to be there at all. -- Camembert
I've just made anarchist into a redirect to anarchism - I saw no point in having both, as I explained at Talk:Anarchist. The below is stuff from that page that wasn't entirely duplicated here. I don't know if any of it is of any use, I thought I'd put it here just in case. -- Camembert
Quotes:
with links) http://recollectionbooks.com/bleed/gallery/galleryindex.htm
To the anonymous user who just made massive edits to this page, wiping out the article that was here before - please try to understand that many different people call themselves anarchists, and, whether we like it or not, we have to represent that in the article. The above discussion makes this clear - anarcho-capitalists are people too (no, really ;). There is more to anarchism, as the word is understood now, than Kropotkin. Also, we're not really interested in long extracts from primary sources - these can be obtained elsewhere. We're engaged in writing an encyclopaedia, not a political manifesto. You might be more interested in the libertarian socialism (aka left-anarchsim) or Peter Kropotkin articles than this one, but please try not to stamp over everybody else's work without very good reason.
And to everybody's favourite editor, Lir ;) - yep, maybe some of what was written can be integrated into something, but I think it's more suitable for libertarian socialism than this page. As such, I've removed it from the article page, but am going to add it to User:Camembert/Sandbox, and anybody who wants to try to weave the stuff into any article is welcome to go there and have a go at doing so. -- Camembert
Does everyone understand this sentence as it stands, and in the current context (under "development of anarchism")? Does it make sense? I wrote it, but I just though it might need clarifying somehow, perhaps... -- Sam
This page has made much progress since I last checked it.
Most anarchists I know think that government is wrong and oppressive, not "disorderly", whatever the hell that means. The point we want to make is not that government is "disorderly", but rather that anarchism doesn't necessitate a lack of "order".
Whether it's true or not, most anarchists don't consider themselves to want to "take power". They (say they) want to obliterate or distribute power. I think this should be rephrased. DanKeshet
Although the vast majority of historical anarchists have been socialists, we can't say that they're the only "true" anarchists. The term originated during the French Revolution to describe a certain group, who were not necessarily anarchist.
True, Proudhon was the first to call himself an anarchist, and that can be mentioned. But today, anarchism means different things to different people. This must be represented here.
Please justify changes of this manner on this talk page. -- Sam 13:11 Nov 14, 2002 (UTC)
I removed the note that suggested wikipedia isn't an anarchy because of the "list of blocked IP addresses". Wikipedia, I'd say, is anarchistic in many ways. If wikipedia had a monopoly on the wiki software (which it doesn't), then we could say that blocking certain IPs is not anarchistic; however, because the software is free and open source, alternative wikipedias can be created, so there is no monopoly. The only place were the question of monopoly on resources comes in, then, is one external to the wikipedia: the restricted access to servers and other hardware that the current (non-anarchistic) economy gives us.
Also, Wikipedia is, in any case, an anarchy as per the definition in the paragraph preceding that one. -- Sam
Anarchy means "No rulers - not no rules". Banning vandals from Wikipedia is not non-anarchic. I vote it stays removed. That, and it has the sound of a spiteful comment by someone who has had their feelings hurt. Not exactly what we should be aiming for..... Dobbs 16:13 Nov 23, 2002 (UTC)
Can someone reword the bold bit above? It makes sense to me, but I think a rewording would clarify it a bit to those new to the subject. -- Sam
I'm thinking of restructuring this page:
What do you think? -- Sam
Two thoughts - 1) shouldn't diggers be included in the development of Anarchism 2) I always thought that Situatism was an insult, the correct word was Situationist, as in Situationist International - Karl
I just made a bunch o' relatively minor changes to the page. I expanded the linguistic roots of 'anarchy' a bit. What do you folks think of it now? Too much, too verbose?
I also made some minor corrections throughout the text. And just so people know, it was I who edited from 65.26.78.49 and 65.26.83.66 in the past. I just created myself an account, as I figure I'll be contributing around here as time goes on.
I'd have to say that the entry for 'anarchism' is one of Wikipedia's best! I'm sure it'll have some historical significance in the future, as it's the first anarchistically created {definition,history} of anarchism. *smile* And the entry just gets better over time, too! My only contention with the entry is how much 'anarcho-this vs. anarcho-that' there is. I realize that when writing an article about anarchism, there has to be some stereotyping. But I also feel that it can have a downside. For myself, as an anarchist, I draw wisdom from all the branches of anarchist thought, and I try to work with and get along with other anarchists, regardless of what syllables they choose to use to define themselves--as an anarchist, I see this as the most anarchistic way of behaving and of coming to my own conclusions. I suppose this perspective fits under "individualist anarchism" as discussed in the article...
Or maybe I've just been too impressed by the saying, "Fragmentation is artificial". -- Jizzbug 01:09 Dec 11, 2002 (UTC)