Anarchy

'Anarchism addresses this problem by allowing everyone to make their own rules.' But other people won't abide by your rules, so if they do something against your rules, and you imprison them or discipline them in some way, then you are not respecting their right to not be ruled over. But if you don't discipline them, you don't have rules. 'You claim a system of anarchy is an oxymoron, but here you say "freedom to be ruled" as if that's not?' I thought you were for freedom. It seems like you are, but only what you class as freedom. So what if I want to be ruled over? Someone might. Who are you to dismiss their lifestyle choice and then tell them they can't live it? Obviously you are not for freedom. for freedom. 'Everyone can and should create their own rules. Rulers are the problem.' What? Everyone should create rules? I thought anarchy was about liberation and freedom from oppression. How can that be when you are advocating rules? If there are no rulers, how can a decision be made on anything? With millions of voices in the crowd no decisions can be made and no rules can be made,as everyone wants different things. ' There are laws to govern how fast you can drive your car and how much you have to pay your employees. Wouldn't any sensible person think that's a bit too much?' Um, no I actually like crossing the street knowing that I can without being hit at 150mph. The reason there are speeding laws is so that people don't die because of high speed lunatics. And your point about minimum wage is pathetic. I thought you hated oppression? Before the implementation of minimum wage (at least in Britain) factories were basically sweatshops with bosses earning huge slices of the revenue while employees starved to death because they were so poor. This regulation helps protect workers from exploitation. I don't think it is too much for people to demand a certain level of pay, as otherwise the workers at the bottom of society would be starving. 'Acts of theft, rape and murder wouldn't be issues if the intended victims could defend themselves.' No, they wouldn't, but my point is they can't. That's why they are called victims. Many people in society would be helpless to a rape or robbery, such as the old of age, children, and people with disabilities. They can't protect themselves, and I for one are proud to live in a nation (UK, if you haven't guessed already) where we have a police force to protect the vulnerable. 'It wouldn't be so difficult to provide security for ourselves without a government.' Please explain to me how this would work. Security means force, and force means weapons. Weapons give power, and there you have a government, namely the people who have the weapons. I call them the government because they have power over the unarmed people. For security you also need some kind of prison and rules. Who is going to enforce those rules if not the government? ' People would still organize themselves into groups that would be just as effective as what we have now. The only difference would be that the groups wouldn"t have leaders. Everyone would be equal.' Groups need leaders. Leaders need groups. A group needs a leader to reward hard work, to punish treachery and misconduct, and to make decisions when the vote is split. Again, you sound more and more like you are not advocating anarchy, but rather Marxist communism. Please explain how your views are different. 'People are instinctively afraid of change. That's why it takes so long to get anything major accomplished' Well if you think it takes a long time now, imagine if everybody had a say in EVERY decision that needed to be made! It is simply not feasible. Please tell me a system where everybody has a say in every decision (if they didn't there would be leaders making decisions, and you are against that), and it is still effective in getting stuff done. I'm all ears. 'If you disagree, tell me what the government does for society that society couldn't do for itself.' The government is part of society, but whatever. I'm guessing you mean society minus government. Well, they can establish rules. You would say 'Well, society can do that'. Yes, and that's government! The only way rules can be made is if a limited number of people make them. Otherwise nobody would decide on the same rules. So the only alternative to this is having a select number of people make the rules. Well, this is government.