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Anarchism isn’t the absence of rules but the absence of authority. Some anarchist ideas even replace the centralized authority figure with rules that apply to everyone and of cause free association so you are not forced to follow them and can move on instead
So is Lemmy (the platform) a case of anarchism at work?
it’s an archipelagic confederation, so yes!
That’s a very good question. It’s as anarchist as modern social media gets.
The thing is the moderators. In an anarchist utopia, they would take turns, be recallable and have to justify their decisions.
The last point is true for some instances but not all (think of the vegan cat food debate on .world verses how .ml blocks voices critical of China and Russia).
The other two points – to my knowledge – barely happen. This isn’t a huge problem, as I said, it’s as anarchist as social media comes. But it contains the risk of a centralized power. Sure, you can always leave the instance (even easier than on mastodon where you lose your followers) but this resembles the Libertarian “freedom” to choose your oppressor. Internal equality is very important.
This isn’t to criticize Lemmy. It’s overall very good and as anarchist as realistically and practically possible. But to showcase the anarchist ideal of councils and to spotlight the minor flaws we should be aware of, even if there is no perfect solution.
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I didn’t intend to start the discussion here. You are on lemmy.world. maybe filter “local” and you will see.
Important for this discussion is that the moderators reacted to the criticism and acted upon it.
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Most grass roots societies are like that. It’s “self” ruling so to speak. At least from what I have gathered and read. It’s been awhile since I did deep dive on it.
No just free association. But having no alternatives to legitimate needs, like participating in our civilization’s free speech discourse through the internet, free association doesn’t help. So before the fediverse you were “forced” to associate with reddit/facebook/twitter or have little association at all.
I’m not sure how anarchism would work for a social media platform. Everyone is a mod? Everyone can post anything and can delete anything? 😀
I believe generally as a philosophy anarchism only makes sense as all authority should be challenged and needs to be justified or be abolished. The amount of authority justified and needed might be relative to the level of “enlightenment” of the participants.
It’s always good to learn something from comments under memes. You make me think about libertarianism that sounds like a different (right wing) take on anarchism.
I’m not sure what makes you think of (right wing) libertarians. I specified the absence of authority. Libertarians are fond of the idea of voluntary contracts – or let’s rather call it voluntary authority – which in effect is never voluntary. You can choose for whom to work but there is a ruling class you have to work for. All you can do is choose your oppressor.
Free association among equals on the other hand is a very common idea among (left/socialist) anarchists and I think very early on. You can choose and leave the community you belong to.
Without some kind of authority, how can those rules be enforced?
Decentralized authority
Publicly shun people. You’re a rule breaker? You’ve been shunned by society and people who associate with you will be known associates of the shunned.
And further to that we have voluntary prison. Essentially, if you’re guilty of something and want to have the benefits of this society, you need to agree to a loss of some privileges - in whatever form is necessary. If you won’t, well good luck surviving when nobody will trade with you or let you live near them.
If you won’t agree to that, you can leave, but the full details of your trial and conviction are public and your decision to leave will be broadcast, so our neighbours know to look out for you.
That means trials will need to be fair, and seen to be fair, or else it will be easy to ask for asylum. Prisoners need to be fairly treated, or they will try their luck in a nearby place.
But if someone chooses to leave and is just trying to run from the consequences of their actions, well they’ll have a hard time being accepted anywhere else.
Coercive relationships are adjudicated by the oppressors.
That’s why it’s important to keep the rules non coercive
Anarchism is communism but for intellectuals
Well, there is a whole anti intellectual movement within anarchism which stems at least in part from a critique of intellectuals as an elite. That said, there are elitist Marxist and even ML uni professors, but also anarchist ones. I wouldn’t draw the line there.
I reject your definition and substitute my own. But I won’t tell you!
You got me. I’m taking rhis seriously :D Anarchy isn’t against rules. Just against hierarchy’s or unequal distribution of power. Which makes boardgames pretty anarchic since everyone can enforce the rules.
playing board games is a form of self-governance and builds revolution
Anarchists do believe in board game rules. Just that they think that using house rules everyone agrees on is a great idea.
Just that they think that using house rules everyone agrees on is a great idea.
Kinda. The most important part is that if someone disagrees with the house rules, they can choose to disassociate from the house and go somewhere else. There’s no state to say “this open field that’s not utilized is mine, bitch!” and then taze you.
There’s the state neighbouring anarchists who can’t form a state and so probably anarchists exist protected within the borders of some state unless some state respects not a state
However a state cannot acknowledge existence of something that doesn’t exist and has no joint body of commonality. Hence genghis khan moment. A state conquers the ownerless land.
Thus emergents from this Darwinian history are states. Squashing individuality in name of security against genghis khans.
Anarchism remains a purely theoretical thought exercise or a relic of the far past tribes
U r assuming that anarchists would be peaceful n just roll over on their backs to show their tummies to Genghis Khan.
The goal of anarchism is freedom. The existence of a State means no freedom. Thus, anarchist militias unite to fight this threat. A stateless society doesn’t equate an unorganised society.
Good luck being efficient and quick without central command and centralised power. There’s a reason anarchism didn’t survive evolutionary process.
Our economic systems and governing method are direct outcome of evolution. If they will be unfit for the contemporary reality they will die as all things do in nature that we are part of. Strongest and most resilient emerge. So far it’s been liberal democracy but there’s nothing that says this is a permanent victor
Who said there would be no centralised command? It would just be opt out. If an individual/community wanted to opt out of this, there would be noone forcing them to not do so.
As for evolution of political systems due to natural selection, would you say the same about democracy? Stable democracy that we know about today has existed only for the past 300 years. Women got the right to vote this century. If u r living under a dictatorship, would you use the same argument of natural selection to not fight for a democracy?
Who? Well maybe because if there are 1000 of communities all with different ideas then good luck agreeing to any basic thing like who is going to lead that command.
I would like to see this 🤣
Just that they think that using house rules everyone agrees on is a great idea.
I can think of one or two times where house rules were appropriate, and a couple of dozen times where they broke the game. I think that you should only apply a house rule where 1) the game is already broken and 2) you’re reasonably sure that the house rule won’t break it further. It’s good for when an otherwise fun game is ruined by something that the game designers overlooked.
I want to be a board game rule lawyer one day
Reminded me of This
I actually believe one day we’ll need lawyers and courts for complex virtual reality worlds.
Anarchy is not against rules, it’s against rulers.
Most board games are based on consensus.
Tankies linking Engels’ “On Authority” in 3…
ITT: Frantic redefinition of what anarchism is. Here it is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchism
Since this comment means its my turn now, I’ll redefine it into “no rules except the ones I agree with, otherwise GFY” sprinkled with a heavy dose of personal charisma that often clouds objectivity and the complexity of the reality.
Look y’all we can have decentralised worker cooperative communes with everyone contributing and things distributed as needed for the betterment of everyone’s living conditions rather than the enriching of the few, but only if I get to actually be Hitler in Secret Hitler next time we play!
we had to stop playing Secret Hitler because nobody would play the fascists
