First, don't mock the video because it's filmed in a basement. I actually am thinking about a competition between me, Davis, and any other contenders who film in the worst location possible, while lighting up tobacco products, and smoking them the least professionally.
Second, I wanted to thank Alex for finally making the point that "anarchy" and "communism" are mutually exclusive events. When I started hearing the fringe term "anarcho-communism" I was like, "Are you kidding? Anarchists hate communists! They're the polar opposite of each other!"
Third, additional thanks for explaining these terms (anarcho-capitalism, anarcho-communist, etc.) for those of us unfamiliar with them. Now I know why everybody keeps calling me an "anarcho-capitalist" and "fringe right."
On a related note, from our Spanish Agent in the Field:
About anarchocommunism, it was strong during the Spanish Civil War
(1936-39), particularly in the region of Barcelona. The Communists,
Socialists, Anarchists, and Catalanist Nationalists (and their multiple
weird combinations) were united in the Frente Popular. Check http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andreu_Nin_i_Pérez, he belonged to all these groups. His allies killed him anyway.
I used to live near the mansion where the Russian Communists had had
their embassy in Barcelona during that war. It was in the basement of
that mansion where many anarchocummunists were tortured to death by
Stalin's thugs. A common practice was to place a starving rat inside a
cage on the belly of the prisoner. The cage had no floor, so the rat ate
its way out.
Actually, you're both wrong, depending on how you define anarchism. Communism isn't what most people think; the authoritarian socialism we saw during the Cold War was envisioned by Lenin as an intermediary stage between bourgeoisie capitalism and eventual communism. There were signs in the Soviet Union that said "we are building communism". The eventual goal was a society that had no government, where people had achieved a state of 'species-being' in which there were essentially no social conflicts and what we call work became a creative activity. No one has ever pretended to have gotten there, but if the typical conception of anarchism is as a society with no government (but where people get along anyway), then there is no direct incompatibility.
ReplyDeleteNot that either of those philosophies are anything but pure childish fantasy anyway; they're just different ways of expressing the typical hatred of all authority.
Anarcho-Communists are leftists who want to (violently) force their ideology on everyone else. How they plan to do that without a state is beyond me -- the concept itself makes no sense.
ReplyDeleteAnarcho-Capitalists are happy leaving you alone if you leave them alone. The free market can take care of roads, defense, and law. With a state you cannot have a free market.
That's the essential difference.
I beg to differ - Anarchy is not the opposite of Communism. Anarchy is perceived as an absence of laws, but Anarchy is really a police state with so many laws that everyone is breaking the laws. So there is appearance of out of control crime, but is really an over abundance of laws that no one can follow them.
ReplyDeleteInteresting viewpoints. I view anarchy as for example when the government itself ignores the Constitution, and judges do what they want likewise without paying attention to the basic legislated laws.
ReplyDeleteThey, of course, view themselves as above the law and only those who resist their anarchy count as anarchists.
Anonymous age 70
The eventual goal was a society that had no government. Anarcho-Capitalists are happy leaving you alone. So there is appearance of out of control crime, but is really an over abundance of laws that no one can follow them.
ReplyDelete