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Abortion and Individualist Anarchism
Ever since I first began my journey towards anarchism, my views on multiple conflictingintuitions and considerations all pulling my values in differentdirections, while the prevailing winds of my evolving moral systemchanged which were foremost in my mind. Usually, with things like this,it is important to open a dialogue about it with others, in order togain new perspectives and refine one's understanding, but due to theunderstandably controversial nature of the topic, I've found itdifficult to ... -
Communities do exist, and they're evil
The classic vulgar individualist quote is that communities don't exist, only groups of individuals. This is false. Communities may not exist as specific located physical entities, but they do exist ontologically, as higher-order meta entities composed of the emergent behaviors, desires, and powers that arise out of the interaction of their component individuals, and perpetuated through time by inherent self-cohesion and self-preservation properties, like gliders in Conway's Game of LIfe. The beh... -
Justice and the Anarchic Encounter: Synthesizing Neo-Proudhonian Social Science and Egoism
"Another world is possible" every time equal uniques, free absolutes,meet on a terrain shaped by any number of histories but no structures of Shawn P. Wilbur,"The Anatomy of the Encounter" As has become somewhat of a theme, perhaps even a requirement, for thisrecent spate of better-quality postings beginning with "Vision of AnAnarchist Society," instead of sitting down to Write About Somethingbecause I want to Build A System and building a system requires instead of, in other words, treating myb... -
On being anti-social
I like being anti-social. Those who are pro-social tend not to be able to comprehend this, but I like my independence from the herd, and even my opposition to it. This is not something to be fixed. Any notion of anarchism that does not leave room for someone like me is oppressive. You can't do comrade conversion therapy on me to "fix" my dislike of you people. -
Anarchist Conflict Resolution and Community Defense
/Author's Note: before or after you read this essay, I highly recommendyou readWhat Is Individualist Anarchism, which overlaps with this one in a few waysbut in general elaborates more on values, property norms, and long termgoals, but less on institutions specifically. I view these essays asessentially two sides of the same coin, and the way I phrase my ideas inone or the other my make more sense to you./<hr/> Two of the most important general social problems that an anarchistsociety needs to s... -
What Is Anti-Work?
Wanting work reform is not anti-work. Not wanting to do anythingchallenging or productive is not anti-work. These are the two primarymisconceptions about what it means to be anti-work that I hope tocorrect. The latter comes from our overt enemies, and the former fromthose cultists of the status quo who wish to co-opt our terms and ourspaces and destroy the revolutionary character of our ideas, all the i. e., our covert enemies. In thisessay, instead of arguing head-on against these misconception... -
Freedom and Domination: Toward a Reunification of Values
As soon as the relationship between lord and subject is established,hearts become daily more filled with evil designs, until the manacledcriminals sullenly doing forced labour in the mud and the dust are fullof mutinous thoughts, the Sovereign trembles with anxious fear in hisancestral temple, and the people simmer with revolt in the midst oftheir poverty and distress; and to try to stop them revolting by meansof rules and regulations, or control them by means of penalties andpunishments, is lik... -
Autonomy: Our Flourishing and Power
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of itsvictims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live underrobber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron'scruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated;but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without endfor they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may bemore likely to go to Heaven yet at the same time likelier to make a Hellof earth. T... -
Anarchism: Process, Not Destination
That which dominates all my studies, its principle and aim, its summitand base... is that I affirm, resolutely and irrevocably, in all andeverywhere, Progress, and that I deny, no less resolutely, theAbsolute... Progress, once more, is the affirmation of universalmovement, consequently the negation every immutable form and formula, ofevery doctrine of eternity, permanence, [perfection], etc., applied toany being whatever; it is the negation of every permanent order, eventhat of the universe, and... -
Democracy Won't Save You
God, the State, Society, Humanity, etc., etc. have their own cause forthemselves. If I don't want to subjugate myself God's cause, I am a"sinner". If I don't want to submit to the State, Society, Humanity, Iam a "wicked man", a "criminal", a "delinquent". "Sacred"! This is themost monstrous and terrible phantom before which all have trembled up tonow. Here is the old, harsh tablet that the new human beings must Renzo Nevatore, Cry of Rebellion In leftist circles, democracy is often used as a syn... -
Property Provisos
One of the particularly interesting threads from'Anarchistic Relations' that I wanted to follow more was that a set of limitationson property were a natural outgrowth of property based on egoisticreciprocity. To recap:Essentially, if we take the idea that generally speaking people want tobe able to satisfy the maximum amount of desires, that conflict is badfor that, and that autonomy is pretty much a prerequisite for desiresatisfaction, it seems clear to me that the basis for property "rights"wo... -
Freeing the noosphere
Author's note: the historical references found herein are meant to be general and impressionistic. I am intentionally simplifying and linearizing this narrative to make a point about how the representation media for ideas effects the nature of the noosphere-economy, not to make any historical point. I have linked to relevant respectable sources for each historical thing so that you can go learn the real history in all its proper complexity if you are interested. The noosphere is the world create... -
Cops, Vigilantes, and Protection
There is a fine line between the defense of oneself and others, which isproper to anarchistic relations, and the exercise of authority which(when unleashed) is paradigmatic of police. This is not to say thatthere is a fine line between reciprocal anarchistic relations and the that is not the case at all, those twothings are poles apart. Instead, this is to say that the line where onesteps from non-hierarchical, anarchist relations with others ontorelations of authority and hierarchy which will e... -
Possession Versus Absentee Property
In this post, I'm just going to try to explain, as succinctly aspossible, the important differences between possession and absenteeproperty (generally just referred to as "property" by Proudhon,e. g. "property is theft"). I've covered this distinction several timesbefore, but I think I've boiled it down enough that creating aself-contained blog post for it is relevant. Someone's possessions are the material objects that they regularly orsemi-regularly use or occupy. Such things might include my ... -
Radical elitist egalitarianism
The most disheartening tendency common among readers is to tear out one sentence from a work, as a criterion of the writer’s ideas or personality. Friedrich Nietzsche, for instance, is decried as a hater of the weak because he believed in the Uebermensch. It does not occur to the shallow interpreters of that giant mind that this vision of the Uebermensch also called for a state of society which will not give birth to a race of weaklings and slaves. It is the same narrow attitude which sees in ... -
On schooling, public and at home
I find it very strange that so many so-called anarchists seem to have an intense bigotry against homeschooling, and a strong belief in the superiority and benefit of public schooling. It seems inherently self-contradictory for those who should be fundamentally opposed to centralization, state control, and bureaucracy to embrace public schooling. It seems even more contradictory for those who should reject the regimentation of anyone's lives, the production of people as if by a factory, the struc... -
The left has prigs too
I'm very tired, but I think it's finally time to talk about this. So excuse the awkward prose, and focus on the ideas. I've spent a lot of time in leftist circles, via social media (up until a year ago, when I quit cold turkey after a particularly unpleasant couple weeks) and in person. I've begun seeing a pattern in the thoughts and actions of leftists that sincerely and deeply disturbs me. It's not just in other leftists, either, but in myself as well, that I see this pattern of actions and th... -
Why I Identify As a Satanist
"Did [Satan] rebel against his maker? It was, as he himself informs us,because he saw no sufficient reason, for that extreme inequality of rank William Godwin, anarchist,1793 I think, given the rather obvious Satanist imagery that has permeated myblog, not to mention the references to it that are sprinkled throughoutmy posts, that it is finally time to explain why I am a Satanist. I givea brief explanation of why in my about page, but something like thisdeserves a much deeper examination than wo... -
The market is for Outsiders
I love the market. Yes, you heard me right. And more than that, I love it precisely because it is inhuman, alienated --- because it allows for functional anonymity, social and material decoupling, deterritorialization of relations of material interdependence, the destruction of all obligatory culture and values. The local supermarket doesn't care that I'm trans... All it cares about is whether I have money. It may be profitable for some surveillance capitalist corporations to know those things a... -
Power and Hierarchy
Identifying inequalities of power, instances of domination which createsthe space for hierarchies and other forms of authority andsubordination, is one of the cornerstones anarchist political and socialtheory. In order to fight back against something, after all, you have tobe able to identify it. I began this project from an unorthodox angle inmy account of theanarchic encounter, but I think a few words (at least) are necessary concerningthe nature of hierarchies, authority, domination, subordin... -
Independence and self-sufficiency are cancer
The ideology of self-sufficiency and independence, whether on an individual level or a community level (as localism) is a cancer, and it's annoying how much even anarchists buy into it."Oh no I'm depending on someone else who specializes in food growing for my food.""Oh no my community needs to import goods from other places""Oh no division of labor and specialization."The amount of people that seem to want to go back to everyone having to farm their own food for instance is so annoying, because... -
Why I Am No Longer An Anarcho-Capitalist
My primary problem with anarcho-capitalists, as I mentioned in anotheressay ('Two Principles of Anarchism') is that they are fundamentallyconfused about values. The value at the heart of all libertarianmovements is autonomy, often referred to as liberty: the desire to be afree individual, making one's own choices about one's life, labor, andassociations, according to one's own plans. This is why people areattracted to any form of libertarianism or individualist anarchism. Wewant to be free to li... -
Why I Am No Longer An Anarcho-Capitalist
My primary problem with anarcho-capitalists, as I mentioned in anotheressay ('Two Principles of Anarchism') is that they are fundamentallyconfused about values. The value at the heart of all libertarianmovements is autonomy, often referred to as liberty: the desire to be afree individual, making one's own choices about one's life, labor, andassociations, according to one's own plans. This is why people areattracted to any form of libertarianism or individualist anarchism. Wewant to be free to li... -
An absolute beginner's cyberspace privacy guide for rising fascism
So you're worried about the rising tide of fascism in the United States, and you want to take some steps to make it harder to surveil you. Welcome! I'll take you through a few things you can do. Many of this will involve using alternatives to the technology you're presently used to using. This will be difficult, both because you'll have to get used to new interfaces and set new software up, and because many of these pieces of software, while very functional (I use them every day), are also devel... -
Two Principles of Anarchism
Up to now the victories of justice over injustice and of equality overinequality have been won by instinct and the simple force of things, butthe final triumph of our social nature will be due to our reason, or Pierre-Joseph Proudhon There are two principles, which, when generally followed, bring the bestaverage results in life for an individual who follows them, and alsoform the basis of a society which benefits all the members thereof. These principles are the principle of reciprocity, and the... -
Theft is Good, Actually; or, Stigmergic Socialism Vs. The Welfare State
stigmergy (noun) - (biology) A mechanism of spontaneous, indirectcoordination between agents or actions, where the trace left in theenvironment by an action stimulates the performance of a subsequentaction. - (systems theory) A mechanism of indirect coordination betweenagents or actions, in which the aftereffects of one action guide asubsequent action. In my previous essay, I mentioned how the enforcement of absolute laws,for example in the case of theft, can actually be harmful - not just tothe... -
What Is Individualist Anarchism?
"Infernal world! and thou, profoundest Hell, Receive thy newone who brings A mind not to be changed by place or time. The mind is its own place, and in itself Can make a Heaven of Hell, aHell of Heaven. What matter where, if I be still the same, And what Ishould be, all but less than he Whom thunder hath made greater? Here atleast We shall be free; th' Almighty hath not built Here for his envy,will not drive us hence: Here we may reign secure; and, in my choice, Toreign is worth ambition, though... -
Why the "Left" always loses
See also: What the fuck does praxis even mean? In my opinion, I think it's really kind of for three interlocking reasons. The first is that The Left has increasingly become the politics of /ressentiment, with very few exceptions. This is not inherent to many of the projects of the Left, but it's inescapable in Leftist culture as a whole. "Leftism" is a system of morality and values constructed by the weak, the oppressed, the disabled, and the marginalized, in order to define themselves as good i... -
Fuck the State... But Not Like That
A state? What is that? Well! ...*A state, is called the coldest of allcold monsters.* Coldly lieth it also; and this lie creepeth from itsmouth: "I, the state, am the people." ... Where there is still a people,there the state is not understood, but hated as the evil eye, and as sinagainst laws and customs. ... The state lieth in all languages of goodand evil; and whatever it saith it lieth; and*whatever it hath it hathThus Sake Zarathustra, Friedrich Nietzsche Murder, kidnapping, robbery, bigotr... -
Anarchistic Relations
In giving up the anarcho-capitalist framework for distinguishing betweenlegitimate and illegitimate interactions between people, I gave upclarity for greater correctness. This has left my philosophical system,in terms of what I support and do not support, in a state of generalflux. This was acceptable, in the sense that being correct is far more there are a millionwrong, but quite simple, narratives about the world which everyone but nevertheless establishing some clarityat some point is necessa... -
Eternal Social War: A Theory of Social Forces
[T]he things that we do together with others do not simply add up... specialization and association bring about the formation ofunity-collectivities, social beings with qualities, strengths andperhaps even ideas that arise from the combination and unification of Shawn P. Wilbur,/Constructing an Anarchism: Collective Force/ So, given the shortcomings and internal contradictions of a planning,top-down, revolutionary approach to anarchism, what is the alternative? What is this general social theory... -
A Hayekian Argument For Occupancy-and-Use
Occupancy-and-use is the term given by anarchist theory to a vaguecollection of property norms focused around the idea that theright to use a thing, to determine what happens to it, anddetermine the conditions of its transfer, etc, should be assigned tothose who actually do use (or occupy, a form of use that has to dowith spacial location) that thing. Of course, the range and extent ofthis bundle of rights, as well as what counts as actual occupancy oruse, is up for debate and compromise, but th... -
How to do a revolution
And tonight, when I dream it will beThat the junkies spent all the drug money onCommunity gardens and collective housingAnd the punk kids who moved in the ghettoHave started meeting their neighbors besides the angry onesWith the yardsThat their friends and their dogs have been puking and shitting onAnd the anarchists have startedFilling potholes, collecting garbageTo prove we don't need governments to do these thingsAnd I'll wake up, burning Time's Square as we sing"Throw your hands in the air '...
Tag: anarchism
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