That’s bad child anarchist reading of things, government is good because it’s literally just a formalized structure for a community to work together and resolve disputes
When an anarchist says “government is bad” they’re talking about institutionalized government. When its the community governing itself that is not what we are speaking of. Come on, dont claim child when you’re eating it at face value too.
I think you’re conflating/mixing the state and the government. The government serves a necessary function of organisation and administration. The state is the organised institutions of class rule.
I think what I mean to say at heart is most governments suck and we can do better as people. Because as other commentors and yourself in a way said, a government can be your community in a building together counting raised hands.
Because as other commentors and yourself in a way said, a government can be your community in a building together counting raised hands.
That’s not really what I’m saying. I’m not arguing for reducing society to loosely linked city-states or town halls counting raised hands for everything. That would be a massive regression. I like hospitals, public transport, social safety nets, infrastructure, large-scale planning, disaster response, and all the other things that require complex administration.
I believe taking issue with the notion of government in and of itself is slightly silly. A government is necessary in any complex modern society. The real issue is the state, and more specifically the class character of said state.
In most countries today, the state is a bourgeois state: its courts, police, bureaucracy, laws, military, and political institutions ultimately defend private property, capital accumulation, and the rule of a small owning class over the masses.
It is much more logical and reasonable to fight to replace bourgeois class rule with institutions serving the working masses, while keeping and in places expanding the necessary administrative capacity for modern society. Than it is to fight to destroy large scale planning and administration as a whole.
In communist terms, yeah. The distinction doesnt really matter to anarchists as long as its not the people just governing themselves we dont really like it.
the distinction does matter because the answer to “why don’t the people govern themselves” matters
“democratic” government under liberal bourgeois democracy doesn’t represent the people because the economic and political power afforded to the bourgeoisie by their ownership of Shit is mutually exclusive with actual democracy
That doesn’t mean “government” is the problem because that’s literally the word you use for the collective of “the people governing themselves” unless you’re on some fucked up Josiah Warren* every man a small proprietor governing themselves shit which just isn’t realistic and also isn’t anarchism because anarchism isn’t “no hierarchies!” it’s concerned with the abolition of unjust and arbitrary hierarchies i.e. “i have all the political power because i literally own the town” is a problem but “we discussed it and adopted a constitution by a vote empowering executive representatives” isn’t (literally the people governing themselves)
anyway im drunk good night
*prob not accurate look dawg i’ve read a lot but i don’t read yknow
That’s bad child anarchist reading of things, government is good because it’s literally just a formalized structure for a community to work together and resolve disputes
When an anarchist says “government is bad” they’re talking about institutionalized government. When its the community governing itself that is not what we are speaking of. Come on, dont claim child when you’re eating it at face value too.
I think you’re conflating/mixing the state and the government. The government serves a necessary function of organisation and administration. The state is the organised institutions of class rule.
I think what I mean to say at heart is most governments suck and we can do better as people. Because as other commentors and yourself in a way said, a government can be your community in a building together counting raised hands.
That’s not really what I’m saying. I’m not arguing for reducing society to loosely linked city-states or town halls counting raised hands for everything. That would be a massive regression. I like hospitals, public transport, social safety nets, infrastructure, large-scale planning, disaster response, and all the other things that require complex administration.
I believe taking issue with the notion of government in and of itself is slightly silly. A government is necessary in any complex modern society. The real issue is the state, and more specifically the class character of said state.
In most countries today, the state is a bourgeois state: its courts, police, bureaucracy, laws, military, and political institutions ultimately defend private property, capital accumulation, and the rule of a small owning class over the masses.
It is much more logical and reasonable to fight to replace bourgeois class rule with institutions serving the working masses, while keeping and in places expanding the necessary administrative capacity for modern society. Than it is to fight to destroy large scale planning and administration as a whole.
ok but what you’re thinking of is bourgeois government
In communist terms, yeah. The distinction doesnt really matter to anarchists as long as its not the people just governing themselves we dont really like it.
No, in like, terms
the distinction does matter because the answer to “why don’t the people govern themselves” matters
“democratic” government under liberal bourgeois democracy doesn’t represent the people because the economic and political power afforded to the bourgeoisie by their ownership of Shit is mutually exclusive with actual democracy
That doesn’t mean “government” is the problem because that’s literally the word you use for the collective of “the people governing themselves” unless you’re on some fucked up Josiah Warren* every man a small proprietor governing themselves shit which just isn’t realistic and also isn’t anarchism because anarchism isn’t “no hierarchies!” it’s concerned with the abolition of unjust and arbitrary hierarchies i.e. “i have all the political power because i literally own the town” is a problem but “we discussed it and adopted a constitution by a vote empowering executive representatives” isn’t (literally the people governing themselves)
anyway im drunk good night
*prob not accurate look dawg i’ve read a lot but i don’t read yknow