Post by @bss03@infosec.pub

2026-10-28 21:17 UTC

I wouldn’t consider anarchy a “society which allows violence as a means to resolve disputes”. But, I can see how you might make that assumption. I agree that the “most natural” form of governance is actually warlord-ism, the best people at violence raid from the worst people at violence, and often amass some level of power just a little beyond what a isolated community can wield. At least recent history seems to have this happen a lot when existing governments fall. The the descriptions of anarchy I have seen, violence is only permissive in defense of the rights of self or others, in particular but not limited to bodily autonomy and is not used to resolve disputes. Still, I’m uneasy about the leveling mechanisms I’ve seen proposed to counter the hoarding behaviors that seems to be not uncommon among humans, particularly those steeped in Capitalism like myself. I also probably have trust issues.

Replies (2)

@rockerface@lemmy.cafe 2026-10-28 22:21

The hoarding behaviours likely can be greatly alleviated by providing every human with basic societal safety nets. If you know that you’ll have food, water, shelter and other basic amenities even if you lose your job (or get sick, or get old, or take a maternal/paternal leave etc), how likely are you to want to hoard money or other items just for the sake of it? Of course, the small percentage of people would still do that, which is how we have the billionaires.

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@paultimate14@lemmy.world 2026-10-29 13:00

violence is only permissive What does this mean? I understand you go on to list the circumstances where violence could be permitted, but who exactly is doing the permitting here and how does that work? Are we expecting everyone who feels that their rights have been violated to be responsible for their own justice? If we want to ban people from using violence to achieve their own goals, or for collectivizing violence…How do you does anyone actually stop them? There are options like economic and social consequences, but when I look at world history those things can only succeed in rare scenarios. in defense of the rights of self or others Who judges this in an anarchist society? This is a statement that is very easy for political philosophers to make but is incredibly difficult to translate to the real world. Even on the case of individual vs individual, physical violence. But what about the more abstract violence? Looking back at ancient history, that could be things like overhunting, overfishing, overlogging. Hoarding rain water. People living downstream of others dealing with human waste in the river they depend upon. In modern times, who do we stop people from mining and burning fossil fuels? i’m uneasy about the leveling mechanisms High marginal tax rates funding social programs has, historically, worked. Part of what is necessary for it to work though is the collective and organized threat of violence against the wealthy, for the crime of being too wealthy.

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