The most dangerous religion

[SpontaneousOrder]

Except one can be altruisic without self-sacrifice.

It wouldn't be selfless then. So no, they can't.

[xoggoth]

Nobody can seriously suggest there cannot be a form of government, if you do and you promote that view you should be getting treatment

Hmmm, superficially that sounds right, without governments to set and enforce laws one might think we would all be killing each other, invading each other countries etc. But what if by government you mean any sort of authority? Tribal chieftains, gang leaders, others exerting peer pressure, even fathers telling their children what to do are a form of government, one or more men setting the rules for others.

What if you took all that away and every adult, everywhere, made decisions for themselves and themselves only? All our conflicts, except the most local ones between individuals, would disappear. The nearest we would ever get to a war is a fight with the bloke next door. All we need do to ensure this is to sow the seeds of hatred towards all our fellow men so we all trust nobody. Perhaps fostering love towards our fellow men is the exact opposite of what we need to do to obtain a less strife-ridden world.

[SimonMac]

NSFW

[NickyBoy]

It's ultimately irrelevant.There have been plenty of peoples that operated without the equivalent of a modern organised state. They are all footnotes in the history of another peoples conquests, if they are remembered at all.

The reason statism is so universally prevalent is because it out-competes anarchism in the never ending global dominance competition. A people that embraces anarchism is a people that will be conquered once the residual strength their abandoned state brought them fades.

As such, I fully endorse the people of every country other than mine abandoning statism. British empire MK II anyone?

[SpontaneousOrder]

Hmmm, superficially that sounds right, without governments to set and enforce laws one might think we would all be killing each other, invading each other countries etc. But what if by government you mean any sort of authority? Tribal chieftains, gang leaders, others exerting peer pressure, even fathers telling their children what to do are a form of government, one or more men setting the rules for others.

Government, essentially, is a monopoly on the right to initiate force (violence - whether that violence needs to be dealt, or the threat of it alone will suffice). So you're right in including chieftains & gangs, or anyone else who controls other men by force rather than voluntary association.

What if you took all that away and every adult, everywhere, made decisions for themselves and themselves only? All our conflicts, except the most local ones between individuals, would disappear. The nearest we would ever get to a war is a fight with the bloke next door. All we need do to ensure this is to sow the seeds of hatred towards all our fellow men so we all trust nobody. Perhaps fostering love towards our fellow men is the exact opposite of what we need to do to obtain a less strife-ridden world.

I'd almost agree with that. Rational self-interest, and a lack of "fostering love towards our fellow men", insofar as making them do things for their own good (or forcing others to sacrifice themselves for the good of others), is all that is needed.

Self-interested men in such a world prosper by benefitting their fellow man - in trades of value for value.

Forcing men to sacrifice themselves for the sake of other men only lowers the prosperity of all men (think minimum wage hurting the most vulnerable the most, ditto for rent control, dumping food stocks in Africa ruins African farmers who are needed to feed their own countrymen while artificially inflating farmer profits back home, etc).

And given that our main concern is that mankind isn't perfect, and there are bad men in the world - then what sense does it make to create a monopoly on the initiation of force and place it in the hands of a select few of those very same fallible men? If the justification for government is the consent of the governed (assuming mob-rule is your thing) and democratic representation, then that implies that the large majority of men are good in nature. If that's the case then we don't really need a core of special men with superpowers to govern us, do we?

[SpontaneousOrder]

It's ultimately irrelevant.There have been plenty of peoples that operated without the equivalent of a modern organised state. They are all footnotes in the history of another peoples conquests, if they are remembered at all.

The reason statism is so universally prevalent is because it out-competes anarchism in the never ending global dominance competition. A people that embraces anarchism is a people that will be conquered once the residual strength their abandoned state brought them fades.

As such, I fully endorse the people of every country other than mine abandoning statism. British empire MK II anyone?

That's far less relevant in the modern world.
For starters it is more profitable to freely trade with a people than it is to conquer them and take their resources by force, especially when there is no existing tax regime to usurp. Given the enormous marginal utility of labour now, compared to pre-industrial times, it would make no sense to wage war with a free society.
Secondly, we live in a massively connected world now. It's not like the vikings can land at felixstowe and move from town to town raiding and pillaging without people in other parts of the anarchic society even being aware and coming to their aid.

The reality is that a free society would be massively more prosperous than we current are. Why on earth would anyone invade their best trading partner?
Would anyone really invade the mainland USA, where everyone has the right to bear arms? Or at least lets imagine that they all still do have such a right and exercise it?

All that we have to do is to send two mujahedeen to the furthest point east to raise a piece of cloth on which is written al Qaeda, in order to make generals race there to cause America to suffer human, economic and political losses without their achieving anything of note other than some benefits for their private corporations

-- Osama Bin Laden explaining how their goal is to bankrupt the western superpowers, just as they did to the soviets in the 80s.

Invading such a 'nation', where the populace are prosperous & armed, and have their freedom to defend (rather than exchanging one prince for another), would be unthinkable - unless total destruction (*edit* - of the land they are attacking) was the agenda.

Taking small isolated populations which have existed without government in the past, isn't really a valid point of reference.

[minestrone]

I think you have been reading and believing too much on the internet.

[SpontaneousOrder]

I think you have been reading and believing too much on the internet.

Too much what?
I think you've been watching and believing too much of the talking heads on the TV. See? I can make meaningless throw-away comments too.

Lets make it easy to talk about something real... tell me something that you would be prepared to hold a gun to another innocent man's head for, and pull the trigger if necessary, that the government does that a free market cannot do?

I don't want to comply with whatever government policy that it is which you want to force me to do... pick one... what is it that you would put a gun to my head and pull the trigger for?

[minestrone]

Too much what?
I think you've been watching and believing too much of the talking heads on the TV. See? I can make meaningless throw-away comments too.

Lets make it easy to talk about something real... tell me something that you would be prepared to hold a gun to another innocent man's head for, and pull the trigger if necessary, that the government does that a free market cannot do?

I don't want to comply with whatever government policy that it is which you want to force me to do... pick one... what is it that you would put a gun to my head and pull the trigger for?

Whatever.

[SpontaneousOrder]

Whatever.

QED. That's why Larken Rose not only likened statism to religion, but suggested that it is a religion - there is no reasoning to be found. Only faith.