this post was submitted on 07 Nov 2023
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Well, yeah - when you're advocating for a very radical change in societal structure, with potential downsides ranging as far as actual genocide, I feel like it'd be irresponsible to not point out flaws perceived in the proposed structure (or - lack of structure - as the case may be). You'll forgive me for not just taking your word when you say "we've got it figure out bro".
The trouble with reading an argument in a book is that it's a one way conversation. It's easy to present an idea in a way that seems totally sensible, when you're the only voice speaking. I don't doubt that you've ready many anarchic books that make sense when you read them, but the fact that you and others are having trouble distilling those arguments in a comprehensive fashion here shows that the arguments made in those books were probably not as compelling as you perceived them to be when you read them, but were just presented well (likely with a bit of confirmation bias sprinkled in).
History and modern economics? Can you point to a modern nation that is heavily decentralized with a greater industrial base than it's centralized peers such as China and the US? As for decision making, I'll grant you that on small scales a lack of centralization works in your favor. Trying to get 100 people to decide on something is a lot easier than 100 million, but when dealing with a military or economic threat from a centralized power, 1 million separate decisions made by groups of 100 don't actually help.
True, though guerilla warfare certainly wouldn't be unique to anarchism. And while I agree the USA has failed in pretty much all of it's military goals since WW2, I'd point out that the targets of those military campaigns were completely decimated by the time they withdrew. Small comfort to your anarchic society that they weren't completely conquered when every village has been drone striked into rubble.
I'd also point out that the failings of the US military since WW2 has infinitely more to do with the fact that none of our wars have actually had meaningful objectives. During the cold war, each one had the dubious unofficial objective of "embarrass the SU", the wars in the middle east were fought for purely economic reasons (whatever might have been stated publicly), which is a goal they did actually succeed in.
I don't disagree with this at all - but the fact that the current systems aren't working well doesn't mean we should just ignore problems in proposed alternatives.And ultimately i don't see how implementing anarchism actually fixes any of the problems you describe, given that all the problems you describe are fundamentally rooted in the flaws of human nature.
Hell, Climate Change in particular is one that would be basically impossible to actually solve in an Anarchic society. Say I wanted to build a super-polluting factory in our anarchic society, I go out where there aren't any people currently living, use my own resources to build said factory, and start polluting. Whose to say I can't? Who would even know what I'm polluting? I don't disagree that our current society is fucked - but just because the current system is broken, doesn't mean we should toss it out for a half-baked one just because it's different.
I'm sceptical that you have read as much as you claim based on some of what you've said espesh re super polluting factory.
I can no longer continue hurting myself to reply. Read some academic crap, read rebuttals. You will find what you're looking for.