HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: nancy@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Nancy Lebovitz)
Subject: Re: black herring on econ
Organization: UDel, School of Life & Health Sciences
Date: Wed, 30 Sep 1992 06:32:38 GMT

In article <1992Sep30.010355.14714@vela.acs.oakland.edu> wlee@argo.acs.oakland.edu writes:
>>In article <1992Sep26.183553.6567@vela.acs.oakland.edu> wlee@argo.acs.oakland.edu writes:
>>>
>
>In article <1992Sep29.141025.16821@genie.slhs.udel.edu>, nancy@genie.slhs.udel.edu (Nancy Lebovitz) writes:

[stuff deleted]

>>
>>I think your project is a very good idea, though my temperment seems to be
>>more verbal than technological. (Sometimes there's a little voice in the
>>back of my head saying, "What are you doing to help with the Singularity?",
>>though. (The Singularity is Vernor Vinge's term for a great technological
>>change that will make the future incomprehensible to us-as-we-are-now. One
>>of the distinguishing features is intelligence increase.) 
>
>Is this sci-fi?  Any relation to Joan Vinge?  Pleaze cite titles.
>My original post was inspired mostly by  "Towards a liberatory technology"
>by Murray Bookchin and (I'll admit it) the H.E.A.D. revolution as described
>in Bob Wilson's "Schrodinger's Cat" trilogy.

Vernor Vinge is Joan Vinge's ex-husband. He has written about the Singularity
in his collection _Threats and Other Promises_, and in the novels _Marooned
in Real Time_ and _A Fire Upon the Deep_. 

The Singularity isn't exactly science fiction. It's something that Vinge
believes will happen, and he considers it an obligatory and fascinating
challenge to come as close to writing about the indescribable as he can. 

>>                              Nancy Lebovitz
>>                              calligraphic button catalogue available 
>>                                 by email  (170K)
>>                              nancy@genie.slhs.udel.edu
>>
>>Onomatopia--a social/political system that just sounds good
>>
>>
>Walter Lee    wlee@argo.acs.oakland.edu, lee@plex-1.ann-arbor.mi.us
>
>Keep the Aspidistra Flying!

Are you an Orwell fan?



Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy
From: robwil@well.sf.ca.us (Robert Wilson)
Subject: Deep South Anti-Columbus Anarchist Gathering
Organization: Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 1992 06:40:40 GMT


DEEP SOUTH ANTI-COLUMBUS ANARCHIST GATHERING
	WHEN: OCTOBER 8-12 
	WHERE: NEW ORLEANS

Yes indeed friends, Columbus was definately a lost conquistador who screwed up
a pretty good scene.  That being the case, let's do something to correct the
image people have of Columbus and promote alternative to the Western Imperialism
that he brought over with him.  Let's all get together and promote anarchist
alternatives to the people of New Orleans.  This is a very poor city that is in
desperate need of radical solutions to a world gone wrong.  So come on down to
New Orleans and express your anger, joy, passion, rage, and everything else you
are feeling, thinking, believing, and not believing.  Living space will be 
provided, but bring all the supplies you would need to survive in campground-
like conditions.  Also, bring any ideas, posters, flyers, magazines, books,
tapes, musical instruments, silk-screening   equipment, or anything else that
you would like to share with a bunch of anarchists who drink alot of Bourbon,
but don't hang out on the tourist trap, consume/die Bourbon Street.  Following
are some ideas that we could put into action when you come:

		EDUCATION ABOUT COLUMBUS
		ANTI-COLUMBUS ACTIONS (to be planned here; many to do)
		WAR ON THE POOR ALTERNATIVES
		ANTI-WORK ACTIONS
		NETWORK TOGETHER FOR MUTUAL AID AFTER THE GATHERING
		HEAVY POSTERING AND INFO SPREADING SQUADS
		DAY OF WORKSHOPS (lectures, silk-screening, zines, flyering)
			We need more workshops by others, show us your stuff.
		FREE ALL-AGE HARDCORE AND MUSIC FESTIVAL!
		DON'T VOTE DEMO
		SWIM IN THE TOXIC MISSISSIPPI RIVER!

			Any ideas you have....

Send any ideas, info, posters, flyers, etc. to counter Columbus Day:
	Deep South Anarchist Federation
	P.O. Box 791191, New Orleans, LA 70179-1191

If you wish to participate, call our info-line to join us when you get in town:
	(504)364-5163

Any support anyone wishes to provide, at any level, is welcome!  Thanks.


Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy
From: galt%peruvian.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Greg Alt)
Subject: Re: The Anarchy Paradox
Date: 26 Sep 92 05:05:26 MDT
Followup-To: alt.society.anarchy 
Organization: University of Utah CS Dept
Distribution: world 

In article <1992Sep24.200356.10155@shearson.com> pmetzger@snark.shearson.com (Perry E. Metzger) writes:
>drw@euclid.mit.edu (Dale R. Worley) writes:
>>The problem with private security companies as a general
>>law-enforcement tool is that the people who would hire them and the
>>people upon which they would be enforcing the law are likely to be
>>decidedly different.
>
>You forget that the people "upon whom they would be enforcing the law"
>would also have security companies working for them, which would get
>very very angry about having their clients killed. Checks and
>balances.

It still sounds like a bunch of pigs hired by rich people to bash the
heads of poor people.  The only difference between private security
companies and governments is that with democratic governments poor   
people can vote the fascists out of power.  Poor people will not be
able to pay for security companies; they will be forced to try to defend
themselves against an army of thugs that doesn't even pretend to have
a Bill of Rights.

----
"Dwayne Dibly?!" - The Cat (I've seen 5th season.  Have you?)
----
Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy,alt.cascade
From: darice@yoyo.cc.monash.edu.au (Fred Rice)
Subject: Re: Which brand(s) of anarchy?
Organization: Monash University, Melb., Australia.
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1992 13:56:07 GMT

>>>>Based on the violent actions of the Anarchy movement in the past,
>>>>I reject it as selfish, moronic, and one of the greatest
>>>>obstacles to freedom.

Many anarchists are anti-violence.  Generalizing like this just
demonstrates your ignorance.

 Fred Rice
 darice@yoyo.cc.monash.edu.au   
(who is not an anarchist because he thinks it is far too impractical.)

==================================================================
=   A poor man said to a rich one:				 =
=     `All my money goes on food.'				 = 
=     `Now that's your trouble,' said the rich man. `I only 	 =
=   spend five per cent of _my_ money on food.'			 = 
=                                        			 =
=                -- Idries Shah, _The Magic Monastery_		 =
==================================================================
From: tumidity@netlink.cts.com (Joel Garry)
Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy
Subject: Re: freedom
Date: 29 Sep 92 21:24:29 GMT
Organization: NetLink Online Communications, San Diego CA

glenne@csd4.csd.uwm.edu (Neuromancer ) writes:
> Again I think we differ as to what "work" means.  I don't care what
> the other people are doing.  I am only concerned with my own actions.
> Thus the lifestyle I describe does work for me.  If you define work
> as meaning make my life easy, or last as long as I can make it last,
> or make others live the way I do, then it doesn't work.  But if you
> mean living the highest quality life that I can, then it does work.

What I was referring to by "it won't work" is, pressures from outside
the utopian system will collapse it, or it will collapse of it's own
instability.  If somebody takes your lifestyle and/or your life 
away, it is a tautology that it isn't working.  You have to care what
other people are doing when it affects what you are doing.  Jim
Jones in the jungles of Guiana had to care what American Congressman
were doing to try to shut his operation down.  I think the results
epitomize a society not working.  We'll never know if it was "good"
or "bad".  One can only assume it was "bad".

--                    
INTERNET:  tumidity@netlink.cts.com (Joel Garry)
UUCP:   ...!ryptyde!netlink!tumidity
NetLink Online Communications * Public Access in San Diego, CA (619) 453-1115
Xref: sparky alt.society.anarchy:212 alt.cascade:2178
From: glenne@csd4.csd.uwm.edu (Neuromancer )
Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy,alt.cascade
Subject: Re: Which brand(s) of anarchy?
Date: 29 Sep 1992 15:08:35 GMT
Organization: Computing Services Division, University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee
NNTP-Posting-Host: 129.89.7.4

Whoa... hold on a minute here...  your assertion depends
on whether or not we define violence in the same way...
And no... don't pull out your dictionary and say that I
have to adhere to the definition it offers (I'm an anarchist,
remember?  Dictionary definitions are nothing more than
suggestions to me... a starting point.)
 
I have talked with people who have told me they are pacifists.
So I say to them, oh that means you want to close down all the
prisons and let all the prisoners go?   And they say wait a
minute!  I don't believe in that.
 
The thing is, how do you think we get people into prison?  Do
they volunteer to be locked up?  Heck no.  It takes violence
and coercion to get them into prison...  Namely the threat of
being shot to death if they try to escape.
 
How about self defense, I ask?  If you and your family were unable
to flee, you would let someone kill you and your family, right?
Again they say, NO WAY!  I'd kill the sucker before I would let
my family be killed.
 
To me the watered down kind of pacifism seems like an excuse to
avoid being sent to war.
 
If the pacifists I have talked to do not adhere to my standards of
non-violence, do you seriously expect me to believe that
many anarchists meet these standards of non-violence?   Give me
a massive break.  And, if economic violence is violence (and I
think it is),  then I don't even live up to my own standards.
--
Glenn                            glenne@csd4.csd.uwm.edu
Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy
From: anand@Cadence.COM (Anand Bemra)
Subject: Notes from chomsky on anarchism (long)
Organization: Cadence Design Systems, Inc.
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1992 05:10:25 GMT


Newsgroups: misc.activism.progressive
From: galt%peruvian.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Greg Alt)
Subject: Re: Which brand(s) of anarchy?
Date: 30 Sep 92 08:59:32 MDT
Followup-To: alt.society.anarchy
Reply-To: galt%peruvian.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu
Organization: University of Utah, CS Dept., Salt Lake City
Distribution: world,local

In article <1992Sep29.181321.1831@shearson.com>, pmetzger@snark.shearson.com (Perry E. Metzger) writes:
>insist, take mine!". The idea that people should give away their goods
>seems based on the false premise that the world has a fixed amount of
>wealth and that the only way to make the poor better off is to
>redistribute this wealth. This is not true. Every time someone builds
>something, produces something, fixes something, or otherwise works,
>the world becomes a richer place. The pool of things that we possess
>increases. Wealth is not fixed. The economy is not a zero sum game.

But who builds, fixes, and produces things?  I don't think Donald
Trump has actually ever built, fixed, or produced anything in his life.
The people that do this are not the people that get rich.  And if 
someone gets to possess lots of things without creating things, they
are a parasite.  If Donald Trump was removed from the earth, there 
would be the same amount of goods and wealth being produced, but all
of his possessions would be distributed among the rest of the people,
making everyone more wealthy.


Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy
From: pmetzger@snark.shearson.com (Perry E. Metzger)
Subject: Re: Call for REVOLUTION.
Organization: Lehman Brothers
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1992 02:03:45 GMT

miballar@leland.Stanford.EDU (Michael Ballard) writes:
>In article <1992Sep25.103319.571@extropia.wimsey.bc.ca> miron@extropia.wimsey.bc.ca (Miron Cuperman) writes:
>>
>>Are you a collectivist or an anarchist?  You must choose, because you
>>can't be both.  You can't say you want freedom and then put conditions
>>on it.  Freedom means that everyone minds their own business.
>
>I would like everyone to know that there is a perfectly legitimate
>strand of political thought and tradition associated with the term
>libertarian socialist.  These people believe that freedom is, among
>other things, more than just minding your own business.  For one thing,
>it would involve the recognition that the social division of labor in
>an advanced state of technological and industrial development combine
>to make us all dependent on each other for our existence.  

You are entitled to your opinions, but most modern voluntarists would
hold that there is a contradiction between wanting people to be free
and wanting to find new "anarchosyndicalist" methods for restraining
them. Contradictions in peoples idea systems are hardly new, however,
and far be it for me to try to interfere with yours. However, I think
you will find that the fastest growing branch of the anarchist meme
complex is the anarchocapitalist, or voluntarist, or whatever you
choose to call us, branch. I won't call your branch "illegitimate"
because there is no one to grant legitimacy, but you will find that
far more people use the term libertarian to mean our position than
yours now. Just as we lost "liberal" to the fabian socialists early in
the century, you have lost "libertarian" to us, and I suggest you stop
using it, as given current usage, "libertarian socialist" is an
oxymoron. Continuing to use it only confuses your audiance.

--
Perry Metzger		pmetzger@shearson.com
--
		  Just say "NO!" to death and taxes.
			 Extropian and Proud.
Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy
From: pmetzger@snark.shearson.com (Perry E. Metzger)
Subject: Re: freedom
Organization: Lehman Brothers
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1992 02:26:50 GMT

entpph@ritvax.isc.rit.edu writes:
>Material prosperity to our citizens?  A few weeks ago our local
>newspaper (Rochester, NY) reported the results of a nationwide
>study that showed Rochester (about 65th in population) was 13th
>in the proportion of children living in poverty--40 per cent.
>
>40 per cent of the children in this county are living in poverty!
>
>When the newspapers brought this to the attention of our county
>executive shrugged it off, and responded that it wasn't his
>responsibility to do anything about it--the heartless bastard.
>
>Material prosperity for whom?  At what cost?

The premise of what you say seems to be that we live in a zero sum
world where if one man is rich, another must be poor. This is,
however, not the case. The truth is that when one man works hard and
betters himself, it does not come at the expense of others. When one
man becomes rich by making things other people want, he has done it
not by stealing, but by producing things that others freely and
voluntarily gave their money for.

To eliminate the poverty you speak of, we need to eliminate the
governmental barriers to people becoming full participants in the
market -- everything from laws that keep poor people from becoming
taxi cab drivers because they can't afford to pay 100,000 for a New
York City taxi cab medalion, to the laws that take tax money from
people, give it to farmers not to grow food so that the price of bread
rises, and then makes those same poor people pay again at the grocery
store for food who's price was raised artificially with their own
money.

Only when the government is kept from restraining the capacity of the
people to make their own lives better will the poor become better off.
Most people would, I think, rather not have gotten $5000 in government
help to send their kid to college if they could have kept the $80,000
in tax money extracted from them over the last decade used to fund the
program. Government is just a fancy way of taking $50 from you, and
then handing you back $25 dollars to make you feel better.

--
Perry Metzger		pmetzger@shearson.com
--
		  Just say "NO!" to death and taxes.
			 Extropian and Proud.
Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy
Subject: Re: The Anarchy Paradox
From: tumidity@netlink.cts.com (Joel Garry)
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 92 16:23:25 PDT
Organization: NetLink Online Communications, San Diego CA

danny@athena.mit.edu (Daniel A Lagattuta) writes:
> 	There will be checks and balance through the free market.  Consumer
> Reports and other consumer watch groups, the media, and word of mouth would t
> people which security companies are the most efficient and least corrupt.  Pe
> would stop subsribing to ones that were bad.  There is, of course, some room 
> corruption but with any problem with anarchy, one must compare it to the pres
> system, where I do not feel particularly safe.  A good reference source on 
> a decentralized system of law and order woulde by Bruce Benson's "The Enterpr
> of Law."  In it, he outlines the evolution of our law and order system and ta
> about how state run systems of law and order are inefficient relative to priv
> law and order.

Free market, word of mouth, media?  If they worked, why aren't we in a
an anarchic utopia now?  What's his face, the economist demonstrated
years ago that (oh yeah, Keynes) periodicity in a free market can be
come infinite (i.e., the depression, a contraction in economic growth,
can last forever, so the government must interfere to end it).  Free
markets favor the MOST corrupt.  Wanna buy a Rolex, cheap?  This comes
from scarcity, the most basic of economic concepts and the need for
governments.  It is the most difficult concept for anarchy to deal
with.  True, there is enough food in the world for no one to have to
starve, but how do you convince people who are afraid of starving to
not hoard?  It is a distribution problem, not a production problem.
I suppose a sufficiently advanced government could brainwash everyone
from birth to share, and to make itself go away.  Is that anarchy?
Personally, I have come to believe that the first thing we have to
do is convince people that a steady state, not a growth economy is
desireable.  I don't see how to do this anarchically.

--                    
INTERNET:  tumidity@netlink.cts.com (Joel Garry)
UUCP:   ...!ryptyde!netlink!tumidity
NetLink Online Communications * Public Access in San Diego, CA (619) 453-1115
Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy
From: matta@lclark.edu (Matt Alexander)
Subject: Re: Which brand(s) of anarchy?
Organization: Lewis & Clark College, Portland OR
Distribution: world,local
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1992 02:04:17 GMT

In article <1992Oct6.161329.22038@athena.mit.edu> danny@athena.mit.edu (Daniel A Lagattuta) writes:
>In article <1992Oct5.090707.29572@hellgate.utah.edu>, galt%peruvian.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Greg Alt) writes:
>|> In article <1992Oct3.212130.13228@shearson.com>, pmetzger@snark.shearson.com (Perry E. Metzger) writes:
>|> >Do you imagine that there is no value in designing things? That
>|> >understanding how to set up, finance and run a business is worthless?
>|> >You can find millions of people who can lift heavy objects. How many
>|> >people do you know who could do what Bill Gates has done?
>|> 
>|> Bill Gate bacame a billionaire by telling IBM he would get them an
>|> operating system for their new PCs.  He then went to some people
>|> who had written an operating system and bought it for $50,000.  For the
>|> next 10 years, he became a billionaire letting the operating system
>|> sell itself.  The only significant revision of the OS was MSDOS 5.0.
>|> So, a bunch of creative people create something, and a shrewd business
>|> man gets set for life.  A perfect example of how wonderful capitalism is.
>
>	If it is so easy to become a billionaire, why haven't you?
>
>	I know it is hard to do what Bill Gates has done and I admire him for it.

Yeah, but the question is did he do anything of value?
Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy
From: thant@void.esd.sgi.com (Thant Tessman)
Subject: Re: black herring on econ
Organization: Silicon Graphics, Inc.  Mountain View, CA
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 92 16:08:59 GMT


"And when he was demanded of the Pharisees, when the kingdom of God
should come, he answered them and said, The kingdom of God cometh not
with observation:  Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, 
behold, the kingdom of God is within you." - Luke 17:20-21


Talk about mixed messages, eh?  Makes one think there's more than
one author at work here.  One of them is offering eternal life
in exchange for your soul.  The other says you already have it.
Interesting...

thant
Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy
From: drw@euclid.mit.edu (Dale R. Worley)
Subject: Safe streets
Organization: MIT Dept. of Tetrapilotomy, Cambridge, MA, USA
Date: Wed, 30 Sep 1992 15:47:15 GMT

Personally, I'd measure the "civilization" of a country by whether one
can walk down the streets safely at night.  That's also the hardest
case for "private" legal or police arrangements to work.  I know of
places where private security companies provide safe streets (or
corridors), but they're either company sites or private communities,
and the mechanism for maintaning that safety was to exclude outsiders.
It seems to be very hard to have safe streets that are also public.

Amusingly, the only place I've lived that had *really* safe streets
was the town I grew up in.  The police there had a policy of inviting
troublemakers to leave town.  So it was really a similar situation --
people who might make the streets unsafe were systematically excluded
from the streets.

Of course, this only worked because it was a rural town, so once
someone moved to another town, it was difficult for him to get back.
In an urban area, all you have to do is move to the next town over,
and you can wander back any night you choose.  Only in some private
communities are there checkpoints on incoming roads.

Dale

Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy
From: danny@athena.mit.edu (Daniel A Lagattuta)
Subject: Re: black herring on econ
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1992 14:50:10 GMT

In article <qe8ro8c@zola.esd.sgi.com>, thant@void.esd.sgi.com (Thant Tessman) writes:
|> 
|> In article <1a7s7qINNsic@uwm.edu>, glenne@csd4.csd.uwm.edu writes:
|> 
|> [...]
|> 
|> > I don't plan on doing anything big to change the world either.
|> > Rather than give all my possessions away to whoever asks for
|> > them, I give to those who I think appreciate it most, and do
|> > not expect it out of me, [...]
|> 
|> What gives you the right to decide who gets *your* posessions?
|> Remember: property is theft.
|> 

	"Taxes are theft'" is a more appropriate phrase for an anarchist.  

					Daniel A. LaGattuta
Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy
From: mlinksva@nyx.cs.du.edu (Michael Linksvayer)
Subject: Re: Anarchy as a newsgroup?
X-Disclaimer: Nyx is a public access Unix system run by the University
	of Denver for the Denver community.  The University has neither
	control over nor responsibility for the opinions of users.
Organization: Nyx, Public Access Unix at U. of Denver Math/CS dept.
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 92 11:29:46 GMT

In article <1992Sep19.192951.16670@nntp.hut.fi> jkp@cs.HUT.FI (Jyrki Kuoppala) writes:
>Funny, there seems to be a difference of computer viruses and memes
>here.  For computers, isolation and careful control of software
>exchange to the outside world is often the recommended way for
>conttrol.  For memes, many countries keep trying isolation but it
>doesn't seem very effective (hmm, or how about China?) and seems to be
>out of fashion (though having a new rise in some countries, like USA).

I think the analogy works, but you've left out half of it -
virus protection. Even if you seldom exchange data with the
outside world, unless you have up to date virus protection
software there is a chance that a new virus will get into your
system unbeknownst to you. Inflexible ideologies are like virus
protection programs that never get updated, so isolation cannot
work for an indefinite amount of time unless isolation is total,
and even then new memes will appear independently of outside
influence (current computers don't evolve without outside
influence, so this isn't a probelm for them unlike human
societies).