New Hampshire Underground

   I suppose that our evaluation of others is based, not so much on who they are as themselves, but rather on the face that they present to the world, and thus it is that often others are surprised when they learn that I am an anarchist. And I suppose that I can empathize with the initial confusion, for I myself only gradually came to accept the label of `anarchist' for many of the same reasons.

   Now, I can only imagine what gruesome scenario enters the mind of each person as he envisions just what, exactly, anarchy might mean for the world, but I know what it used to mean to me. The mental picture that I formed of the anarchist was of an angry young man throwing a homemade bomb. The society he hoped for could only be one of chaos and disorder, where organized bands of thugs plundered without abandon and citizens huddled in the darkness of their homes, shivering for fear and praying for some escape back to civility and civilization. And this melancholy picture, of course, is as offensive to me as it is to you, being as I am a peaceful person, more at home sipping tea in a coffeeshop than I am burning effigies, and more inclined to vacation at a tropical paradise than to the heart of Somalia.

   So, I permit the reader a degree of astonishment at the revelation that I am an anarchist. It was, in fact, only reluctantly that I adopted the anarchist label; I learned that many other anarchists have also eschewed the anarchist label, preferring a more obscure and therefore less-maligned designation. So why is it that I unabashedly claim to be an anarchist?

   An ancient Jewish scripture makes what I deem to be an accurate observation, that "one man rules over another to his hurt." At every time and at every place throughout history is found the same story:  man's states achieve the subjugation of the masses under the control of the rich and powerful. War is routine. Tyranny runs rampant. Minorities are oppressed. Men are conscripted and enslaved. The belongings of the poor are plundered to pay for greater and greater extravagancies by those who enjoy the reins of power. The masses starve while a few live in shameful luxury.  Justice is perverted, and people live under constant threat that their security will be undermined. We tolerate this depravity for one reason, and one reason only: We are convinced that, for as bad as the state may be, it is better than the chaos of anarchy. And it is for this reason that the state must do everything in its power to demonize anarchy, to equate it with chaos and disorder.

   But it seems to me that a great lie has been perpetrated on mankind. Every war that has ever been fought was created and nurtured by states. War, that great scourge of mankind, can only exist among states. When individuals disagree with each other, the argument may escalate to fisticuffs. Yet, when states squabble, the end result is too often war, with the millions of deaths and injuries, as well as the poverty and disease that war entails. And yet the state, the sole author of the scourge of war, is held on a pedestal. We sing songs to honor it, make oaths and pledges to it, place its banner in our own places of worship. We display our loyalty to it with countless banners and emblems, placed prominently so that all may see our pride. We are not averse to even permitting our children to be sacrificed in its interests.

   Meanwhile, we deride the anarchist as "reactionary", but we do not even comprehend what we mean by such a statement. For it is everywhere acknowledged that states do evil things. Some men say, as Thomas Braden famously did in the Saturday Evening Post so many years ago, that they are glad that the state is immoral. Others say, as did one religious man with whom I conversed recently, that he prefers not to know everything that the state does for the ease of his own conscience. And almost universally, when it comes time to vote people will say things like, "I voted for the lesser of two evils," or "I held my nose and voted." When polled, only very few claim to be "extremely satisfied" by their rulers, most claiming to be somewhere between "somewhat satisfied" and "somewhat dissatisfied" by those who hold office. So whatever else the situation might be, it cannot be claimed that people view the state as a paragon of virtue and morality. Yet, the second a person suggests that we might dispose of the state, he is subjected to ridicule, derision, even violence. So it seems to me that the true reactionary position is the one that is averse to considering what alternatives might be available.

   This situation is as puzzling as it is disturbing. It would seem that every man, seeing as he does that the state is, at best, an imperfect solution, would incline his ear to see what alternatives present themselves, hoping that the situation might improve. But this is not the case. Rather, he satisfies himself that anarchy is impracticable from the outset, then refuses to entertain any suggestions to the contrary, his reaction being to put forward any conceivable obstacle with a sort of desperate finality, as if the fact that there are obstacles to peace mandates that we continue on in our incredibly destructive course.

   "What," he asks, "are we to do about murderers? Let them run the streets?" Now, this is a curious question, because states are themselves murderers, only they accomplish their killings by the millions rather than individually. And we not only let them run our streets, as it were, but we let them patrol them. So it is as if we hire the bank robber to keep the children from stealing from our raspberry bush; not only that, we give him the key to our safe. Then we console ourselves that our bank robber is not as bad as the one that the neighbors hired to safeguard their raspberry bush.

   This situation would be funny if it were not so sad. For it seems to me that men have been duped. "Listen," says the would be ruler, "Men are very evil, and they will try to hurt you, so you need me to protect you." But if men are so evil, then how can we trust men to rule over us? And how can we trust men to follow whatever rules are set up anyway?

   Last year, I did not steal, nor did I rape, nor did I plunder or kill or defraud. Nor would I have done those things even if they had been legal. I needed no law to inform me of right and wrong; nor, I trust, did you. On the other hand, how many men did things that they otherwise would not have done, merely because the state said that it was okay? Would hundreds of thousands of young men, merely on their own initiative, have armed themselves to the teeth and journeyed to Iraq to torture, kill, and terrorize? No, to accomplish that great evil they needed a state to tell them that it was alright to do what they would otherwise find repugnant.

   I am often told, once I have explained myself, that my position sounds Utopian. But I wonder if this is not merely the speaker projecting his own dilemma onto me. For I cannot help but feel that the state is able to maintain itself only as a result of Utopian thinking.

   The anarchist sees crime as inevitable; there are unfortunately a few deviants who do not care about harming others, or, worse yet, even enjoy harming others. So the anarchist accepts this reality. It is a fact of life. All he can do is try to minimize the risk to himself or to those he cares about. But the person with Utopian thinking, on the other hand, is unable to accept this reality. He continues to grasp at the illusion that crime might be eliminated if only a suitable agency can be formed. He is oblivious to the fact that any agency powerful enough to stand up to the strongest evil is also strong enough to become the strongest evil. It remains only for the criminals to seize control of this agency. He is also oblivious to the fact that by attempting to preemptively stop crime he creates the very societal conditions which allow it to flourish: fear, mistrust, division.

   And with what cost does he purchase this increased threat of crime and violence? The sacrifice of his own liberty.  For all of mankind's experience speaks to the fact that by far the single most common aggressor against the rights of mankind is, and always will be, states. In the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson expressed the concept that states exist for the purpose of securing our rights. Yet, what a misguided notion!  To see how misguided this notion is, one merely needs to read the so-called Bill of Rights to the Constitution. This document attempts to secure for all Americans the rights to freedom of speech, freedom of worship, freedom of the press, freedom to peaceably assemble, freedom to bear arms, security against having the military quartered in my home, security against unreasonable searches and seizures, and security against unfair judicial proceedings. But who is it that threatens these rights if it is not states? The argument is, therefore, circular:  I need a state to secure my rights, which rights are only threatened by states.

   Now, before I end this essay, I need to make one thing very clear, because I think there is a very  common misunderstanding of anarchists, and it is a misunderstanding rooted deeply in our very language.  In this essay, I have consistently used the word state. I have tried to avoid the word "government". In the minds of many people, these words are synonymous. And it is for this reason that it is difficult to conceive of a life without the state.

   It is a truism that interaction between men requires a sort of government. This is evident in all of man's social dealings. A family exists in some sort of governmental arrangement, inasmuch as there are roles and understood norms of conduct within each family. Often, government in this sense is merely informal. In larger groups of people, it is likely to be more explicit. But what distinguishes these forms of government from the state is that the state is not voluntary. The state is really a very specific type of government. It is an authoritarian model of government that enforces its rule over anyone that it considers to be within its jurisdiction, regardless of whether or not they have consented to its rule. In this respect, a state is exactly like the mafia. In fact, the state differs from the mafia in exactly one respect. The sole difference between the state and the mafia is that a majority of the people in any given area acknowledge the legitimacy of the state. If the majority of people acknowledged the mafia, it would be called "the government". That is the sole difference between the two organizations. And the reader would do well to reflect on that. Because it is a universally acknowledged principle that the minority are entitled to the same considerations as the majority. But how can this be if the majority reserve the right to impose, at the most fundamental level, a form of governance upon the minority that is opposed to his conscience?

   It is sad that all of mankind's "national governments" are states.  What an anarchist objects to is being forced to adhere to an organization to which he has not given his consent, from which he may not withdraw if it violates his conscience, and which provides its "services" in a coercive rather than a voluntary way. At the heart of the anarchist argument is a desire to uphold peace and morality, freedom and brotherhood. An anarchist acknowledges a simple truth: that any relationship that is not consensual can only result in further violence; but that a relationship among a group of people that recognizes the value of each individual, that acknowledges his ultimate ability to choose whether to continue that relationship, is based on the greatest bonds of fraternity. This, and not bomb-throwing, is the legacy of anarchism.

 :clap:

QuoteIt is an authoritarian model of government that ...

*ding*

;D

Quote from: Caleb on March 11, 2008, 12:39 AM NHFT
To see how misguided this notion is, one merely needs to read the so-called Bill of Rights to the Constitution. This document attempts to secure for all Americans the rights to...

This is even truer than you imply. The Constitution and the Bill of Rights were specifically aimed at the state, i.e. meant to protect us from the state. Ineffective of course, but they show what a threat the founding fathers considered a state to be, and yet they insisted that we need one.

This is the best worded explanation of my own views I've seen yet, Caleb. It fits perfectly with a cartoon I've been planning to introduce the Anarchy Boogey-man, a creature who looks really strange but turns out to not be very scary. I'd love to reprint it with that cartoon with your permission, credit given of course.

Very good Caleb. :clap:

Quote from: Jacobus on March 11, 2008, 08:00 AM NHFT
:clap:

QuoteIt is an authoritarian model of government that ...

*ding*

;D

Yeah, I tried to work that phrase in there. I think "amog" is going to start being our little "Where's Waldo?"  Hey everyone, see if you can find amog in this little essay I wrote.  :)

Quote from: dalebert on March 11, 2008, 09:29 AM NHFT

Quote from: Caleb on March 11, 2008, 12:39 AM NHFT
To see how misguided this notion is, one merely needs to read the so-called Bill of Rights to the Constitution. This document attempts to secure for all Americans the rights to...

This is even truer than you imply. The Constitution and the Bill of Rights were specifically aimed at the state, i.e. meant to protect us from the state. Ineffective of course, but they show what a threat the founding fathers considered a state to be, and yet they insisted that we need one.

This is the best worded explanation of my own views I've seen yet, Caleb. It fits perfectly with a cartoon I've been planning to introduce the Anarchy Boogey-man, a creature who looks really strange but turns out to not be very scary. I'd love to reprint it with that cartoon with your permission, credit given of course.

sure. anyone can use anything I write. I don't write for profit or anything.  :) The only thing is, I'm not real happy with it just yet. I have a tendency to capitalize words based on the "whenever I feel like it" method, which doesn't really lead to much consistency. also, I think there's some repetition that I'd like to clean up, and I'll probably flesh out a couple of the thoughts that are a little thin, but I can't promise when I'll get around to that. If you do use it as is, just maybe uncapitalize some of the words that I capitalized at a whim for me.

Quote from: Caleb on March 11, 2008, 09:35 PM NHFT
If you do use it as is, just maybe uncapitalize some of the words that I capitalized at a whim for me.

I'm thinking of doing the cartoon pretty soon; maybe this weekend. I could run an editing eye over the piece and then run it by you if you want. I'm willing to update it later, though most will see the first run of it, of course.

I think it is at least grammatically correct now, and I have standardized what words I capitalize throughout. I added a word here and there, but that's probably all I will have time to do for now. I am going to put it up on my site eventually, along with another project that I am working on.

Well, I was looking for a photo of Caleb to go with his article....this was the first I found  ;D

(http://www.nhunderground.com/wiki/show_image.php?id=2334&scalesize=0&nocount=y)

The other one I found...

(http://www.nhunderground.com/wiki/show_image.php?id=2499&scalesize=0&nocount=y)

Too much 'bomb throwing anarchist' image?

Quote from: Kat Kanning on March 12, 2008, 06:31 AM NHFT
Well, I was looking for a photo of Caleb to go with his article....this was the first I found  ;D

When I met Caleb, I'd never seen a pic of him and I remember being shocked that he wasn't much older. All I knew of him was his posts. Maybe it was his writing style or maybe it was just that he used an avatar of Gandalf for a pretty long time.

lol  :)

I think this one lends respectability:
(http://www.calebjohnson.org/self_photos/clown.jpg)

They warned me about flashbacks...  :o

I could find the mexican immigrant pic.  :D

I thought I was having a flashback and then realized it was just deja vu...

Caleb is the undergrounds version of Wavy Gravy  ;D >:D
(http://bunkstrutts.files.wordpress.com/2007/08/wavy-gravy.jpg)

Wow, Caleb, WOW!!!

That could well be the most powerful essay I have ever read.

It is like a laser beam to the core of the faulty paradigm that allows the AMOG to exist in the first place, delivering irreversible damage to it.  And you did it without going into extensive detail.  Bravo!

May I have permission to replicate and broadcast this essay to my target audience, without changes?

you are a "government" only if the US Empire says so .... otherwise you are a despotic regime ruling over people who need to be "freed" to enjoy democracy under the protective gaze of an ex-prez

what are you guys ... a bunch of insurgents? ;)

Quote from: srqrebel on March 12, 2008, 11:58 AM NHFT
This unintentionally infers that the State has legitimacy,

Legitimacy essentially just means "broadly accepted" so the state does have legitimacy. That doesn't mean they have any meaningful authority. Just because they're broadly accepted as having authority doesn't make them right. I was mis-using the word for a long time as well.

Quote from: dalebert on March 12, 2008, 12:38 PM NHFT

Quote from: srqrebel on March 12, 2008, 11:58 AM NHFT
This unintentionally infers that the State has legitimacy,

Legitimacy essentially just means "broadly accepted" so the state does have legitimacy. That doesn't mean they have any meaningful authority. Just because they're broadly accepted as having authority doesn't make them right. I was mis-using the word for a long time as well.

I looked up "legitimate" on Merriam-Webster, and found that when used as a transitive verb, as Caleb did, that definition is indeed correct, Dale.  Caleb appears to have used it correctly, after all.

I am consequently deleting that portion of my previous post. :)

Quote from: Russell Kanning on March 12, 2008, 12:08 PM NHFT
you are a "government" only if the US Empire says so .... otherwise you are a despotic regime ruling over people who need to be "freed" to enjoy democracy under the protective gaze of an ex-prez

I do understand what you are saying, Russell, and that is a pretty accurate portrayal of the current situation.

I just thought it is a good place to point this out:

True government does not rule over others at all.  "Governing" constitutes the function of keeping affairs running smoothly.

That is why I refer to that which is commonly referred to as "government" today, as the Authoritarian Model of Government.

The AMOG enslaves the individual, by criminally subjugating his will to the imaginary will of a fictitious entity, the "collective".

The Free Market/Voluntaryist Model of Government empowers the individual by leaving him free to decide and delegate his own, and only his own, affairs according to his own will.

Quote from: srqrebel on March 12, 2008, 11:58 AM NHFT
Wow, Caleb, WOW!!!

That could well be the most powerful essay I have ever read.

It is like a laser beam to the core of the faulty paradigm that allows the AMOG to exist in the first place, delivering irreversible damage to it.  And you did it without going into extensive detail.  Bravo!

May I have permission to replicate and broadcast this essay to my target audience, without changes?

yes, menno, anyone can use it. I believe in intellectual property rights, but i don't write for profit, so there is no need to ask.  :)  I mainly write to clarify my own ideas, and also to direct other people to what i have to say, because sometimes it is easier for me to express myself in written than in verbal form.

Quote from: Caleb on March 12, 2008, 07:25 AM NHFT
(http://www.calebjohnson.org/self_photos/clown.jpg)

Caleb is just emulating his idol- the clown monster from Stephen King's It.

Quote from: Caleb on March 12, 2008, 08:07 PM NHFT
yes, menno, anyone can use it. I believe in intellectual property rights...

intellectual property?
from the clown? ;)

I wanted to include a digg counter for your article when I repost it today but has this not even been submitted to digg yet? I did a search and didn't see it!

Also, has this been posted to the New Hampshire Underground yet? I guess I'll submit it to digg but I'd rather digg it there than at Strike the Root. I like STR of course, but I have a greater persona interest in promoting NHU. :)

UPDATE: Never mind. I found it. Doh!

UPDATE2: I don't wanna wait for a response so I submitted this to Digg. Please digg using this link.

http://digg.com/political_opinion/Why_I_Am_an_Anarchist

This article is now reposted with a new cartoon- The Anarchy Boogey-man.

http://anarchyinyourhead.com/2008/03/21/the-anarchy-boogey-man/

Here is a valuable opportunity to spread the freedom paradigm far and wide.  We need to be digging the hell out of this!

Quote from: srqrebel on March 21, 2008, 01:14 PM NHFT
Here is a valuable opportunity to spread the freedom paradigm far and wide.  We need to be digging the hell out of this!

Believe me. I would, but I can only digg it once.
;D

Finnally read it, excellent article.  You Kept It Simple. 

A message from someone who goes by the handle "Silentchap" in response to Caleb's article. I haven't read it yet. It's kinda long. I might chime in later.

--------

Evening.

I read the essay you posted with the March 21st comic (neat comic, by the way) and couldn't resist writing a response to it.

Starting here...

You state that a Utopian thinker tries to do the same thing that you do as far as crime. The difference is that the Utopian wants to completely remove the deviant behaviour and you merely accommodate for it. Leaving aside the structures that the Utopian creates keep the monsters away, how exactly does an anarchist defend himself and those he cares about from deviant behaviour? And moreover, suppose that someone outside of that circle of known and loved people is the one that is targeted by the behaviour. Is it just too bad for that person? Assume that the person targeted is a fellow anarchist. Can you help that person now? Would you? How big can this circle of people whom you will care about, or for, be? A few hundred? A few thousand? There are cities that size.

How do those cities function? They organize themselves to be more efficient and they communicate with other cities, establishing borders and organizations to communicate. Cities become states which become nations and you're back at square one. Forty billion individuals are currently running around on this globe and their groups overlap. Families belong to workplaces and schools which have their own affiliations and subgroups. And, to contradict one of your statements, lots of these are not voluntary or informal. When last I checked, you didn't get to choose your family, your skin or hair colour, or your gender. These attributes are given to you. Yes, you can modify them if you choose, change them after the fact, but you are what you are at the start. But while you're making up your mind, people set up groups, create stereotypes, and get very emotional based on these uncontrolled attributes. In fact, there are even folks who will get mad if you try to
change them.

Also, if you think a familial unit is informal government, try telling a child to question his mother and see what the reaction is. There are clearly defined procedures and guidelines that people operate under within a family. They vary from family to family but tend to remain constant in that the parents run the show and the kids are supposed to follow the directions of their creators. Kind of like a dictatorship, huh? This isn't to prep us for the systems we're going to discover we're a part of as we get older. It's to keep kids from causing permanent injury to themselves and learn the basic tools that make human life easier and more enjoyable. I don't tell my niece to close the fridge because I want to exert my authority over her; I do it because I don't want her to waste the cold air and raise the electric bill.

Regarding the majority vs. minority point, keep in mind that while there are lots of smart people around, there are also people who are stupid. The stupid can and do create laws and guidelines that are unspeakably moronic on a daily basis based on fear, ignorance, or even sheer viciousness. And these laws are made by a minority, not the majority. It's rare if ever that a government will listen to the entire populous when passing a law and there is certainly not a large number of people involved in drafting it or proposing it for use.

You state that it's sad that people have to exist within these systems without consent and have no choice but to accept the systems as they are. Guess what? You can change which system you support, even if its anarchistic. The choice of government is voluntary because you can choose where you want to be and which system of governing you will support and live by. You're allowed to move throughout the planet, picking and choosing which system you want to live under by taking yourself there. And if you can't find one you like, you can make your own up as long as it doesn't fly in the face of another system. Ah, I hear you exclaim, but I want to live here and I don't want to support this system. Then the onus is on you to change the system, not the other way round. Granted, with a corrupt and densely bureaucratic system, that's a pain in the ass but that's the way things are. The system was established and is supported by people who outnumber, outbuy, or
outshout those who would put another system in place. Shift the balance and you get your own system to live in.

On the notion that governments consider those within its jurisdictions as under its control, in order for any system to function, you have to set parameters for it. Since most folks exist in a physical world, the easiest way to set borders is with physical ones. Most of the time we don't know which system we're being controlled by because disclosure is a pain and usually doesn't matter because most systems tend to operate under the guidelines. While you may not consent to the rule of the place you visit, you are the one who chose to visit and therefore, since you are the visitor, you have to abide by the rules of the place you visit because the permanent residents have consented to those rules. Now if you are native to the area and don't like how things work, you can work to change the way things work provided, of course, that you have access to the system. Here, we do. In some countries, it's a little harder. Oh, and there is one more difference between
mafia and government. You can't elect someone to the mafia. They tend to be a little more vicious and exclusive in their selection process. The retirement package tends to differ too.

Finally, most relationships that we have with other entities are not consensual, Caleb. When you drive, you don't ask other drivers if you can join traffic. You wait for a gap and you join in. When you turn on your computer and access the Internet, you don't have to consent to anything. You just join in. Want to visit a church, get a tattoo, paint your house? No need to obtain permission, you just do it. Yet all of those interactions involve other people, relationships with others. Other drivers will watch you as you approach, websites will note your presence, the preacher will see you in the back row, the tattoo artist will take money from you and ask what pattern you want, and passers-by will notice that you really like aquamarine. These relationships are non-consensual but they are there.

You're angry that the system you currently reside in is violent and those who lead it abuse their power. I don't blame you because I am too. Can it be changed? Not without people like us agreeing on what to replace it with and acting on those ideas. We can isolate ourselves and those we care about but all that will do is present a target for the system. The system deals with its enemies with violence and unlike us, the system has greater numbers, greater funding, and isn't afraid to shoot first as it has demonstrated. Removing ourselves from the system won't change it or those within it.

The principle of an anarchist isn't to love thy fellow person, but to function without an authoritarian system. Individuals interacting with individuals. Period. The problem with that is that when people meet people with shared interests, they start acting on economics of scale, creating efficiencies to help each other. With those efficiencies comes trust, trust that those who run the systems we create will not exploit the people who take part in those systems. Sometimes the trust will be kept, other times it will be betrayed. And the authorized versus the disenfranchised fight begins again. So we either have to stop ourselves from working in groups or we have to learn that trust can be abused and that when it is, you pick up the pieces, fix what is broken, and move on. We try to improve our systems, make things better instead of just letting them continue to break in the same way. We move towards Utopia.

And yes, that last was a small tweak of the nose. Forgive me, but I couldn't resist.

Cheers.

i suppose my answers would probably be different than most "anarchists", coming as they do from the christian perspective, but I will try to respond later.