It's not a "some times" statement, it posits that humans are capable of living reasonably without being forced. That people sometimes behave unreasonably is a different matter.
Not really. It is very relevant. You only need someone to behave unreasonable even once to destroy multiple peoples lives. There are enough psychopaths in the world to fuck up any kind of system that's not completely based on separation of powers.
I would posit that communism would probably also be pretty nice for most people, if it actually worked. So far it hasn't, and its pretty unrealistic that it ever will. That's also my stance on anarchy. Idealist, but unrealistic.
>Not really. It is very relevant. You only need someone to behave unreasonable even once to destroy multiple peoples lives
These things are true whether or not you believe humans are capable of living reasonably without being forced. Forcing people isn't stopping these psychopaths from destroying lives, and there's at least reason to believe it helps push them to action.
In an organized society a psychopath can kill a few in a murder spree. In an unorganized society the psychopath can gather and organize a lot of thugs to loot and burn millions of homes. Has happened many times in history. I know which one I prefer.
The gun argument actually works here, if you ban good guys from organizing then all organizations will be bad ones. And an organized group of people always wins against unorganized groups.
> In an organized society a psychopath can kill a few in a murder spree. In an unorganized society the psychopath can gather and organize a lot of thugs to loot and burn millions of homes. Has happened many times in history. I know which one I prefer.
I think this should be re-examined through the view of the ~1 million Iraqis recently murdered by one such “organized society”.
I don’t think the (violence-based) organization has the set of benefits you think it does.
When the good guys practices anarchy then the bad guys are free to create huge violent organizations. Our modern societies aren't perfect but violence is lower today than ever before.
"Thousands of raiders" don't magically appear, you prevent them by preventing the conditions necessary for thousands of people to unite with the goal of hurting others.
How does a power structure prevent it? Raiders are a result of people unable to live off their of own labor, generally as a result of the exploitation of others.
What examples of communism are you looking at that "haven't worked?" I really hope you aren't about to suggest the soviet union, that would be silly, considering it had a state, social classes, currency, and no general ownership of the means of production, and therefore wasn't communism.
Might surprise you to learn that communism is working this very day, on communes all across the world. Also, the basic tenants of it have manifested themselves in various civilizations throughout history.
>I really hope you aren't about to suggest the soviet union, that would be silly, considering it had a state, social classes, currency, and no general ownership of the means of production, and therefore wasn't communism.
Y'know, this is a fair point for a philosophical conversation.
It's a terrible point in a conversation about deciding how to actually organize society, however. You can't ultimately know what people's intentions are before the fact. How other people who claimed to have the same ideology behaved once they gained power is inherently relevant.
Let's turn this around for a second. Let's say someone comes to you and says "Hitler got fascism totally wrong". It's actually a really great ideology that Hitler violated by doing X, Y, and Z. Would you give this person power in the real world?
> d. Let's say someone comes to you and says "Hitler got fascism totally wrong". It's actually a really great ideology that Hitler violated by doing X, Y, and Z. Would you give this person power in the real world?
What? No! Because hitler got fascism perfectly right, and fascism is a terribly unethical way to organize government.
I meant specifically I am all about anarcho communism, it's happening and working right now in communes all around the world, has worked in the past, and imo is better than massive nation states forced to point nukes at each other on a hair trigger to sustain themselves.
Huh, out of all the potential responses, this is actually the one I wasn't expecting. Mostly because fascism is notoriously poorly defined to the point where experts can't agree on what it actually means. To the point where the wikipedia page on its various definition is quite a lengthy read ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Definitions_of_fascism ).
While I agree with you on the downsides of the large, powerful nation states, My point was more about the rationality of outsiders to these ideologies. The reaction of "People labeling themselves this way enacted totalitarian governments during large parts of the 20th century, I probably shouldn't give any power to current people labeling themselves this way." are fairly rational.
