I have always struggled to properly articulate my position on freedom of speech, as a legal concept created by the state. Canada (wisely, in my opinion) has defined theoretical boundaries at which point your speech is understood to also be an act of violence, and treated accordingly in theory–rather than conceiving of speech and violence as infinitely separable per the USA’s First Amendment. Even with the limitations on what can be literally said, though, power continues to distort the ability of some participants to speak their minds, per this naive liberal ideal. Or, to borrow the Markteplace of Ideas–some of us are cash poor and can’t afford to set up a vendor.
Enter political anarchists: (emphasis added)
The Rhetoric of Free Expression
There appears to be a broad consensus in the US political spectrum in favor of the right to free speech. While opponents may quibble over the limits, such as what constitutes obscenity, pundits from left to right agree that free speech is essential to American democracy.
Appeals to this tradition of unrestricted expression confer legitimacy on groups with views outside the mainstream, and both fascists and radicals capitalize on this. Lawyers often defend anarchist activity by referencing the First Amendment’s provision preventing legislation restricting the press or peaceable assembly. We can find allies who will support us in free speech cases who would never support us out of a shared vision of taking direct action to create a world free of hierarchy. The rhetoric of free speech and First Amendment rights give us a common language with which to broaden our range of support and make our resistance more comprehensible to potential allies, with whom we may build deeper connections over time.
But at what cost? This discourse of rights seems to imply that the state is necessary to protect us against itself, as if it is a sort of Jekyll and Hyde split personality that simultaneously attacks us with laws and police and prosecutors while defending us with laws and attorneys and judges. If we accept this metaphor, it should not be surprising to find that the more we attempt to strengthen the arm that defends us, the stronger the arm that attacks us will become.
Once freedom is defined as an assortment of rights granted by the state, it is easy to lose sight of the actual freedom those rights are meant to protect and focus instead on the rights themselves—implicitly accepting the legitimacy of the state. Thus, when we build visibility and support by using the rhetoric of rights, we undercut the possibility that we will be able to stand up to the state itself. We also open the door for the state to impose others’ “rights” upon us.
The Civil Liberties Defense
In the US, many take it for granted that it is easier for the state to silence and isolate radicals in countries in which free speech is not legally protected. If this is true, who wouldn’t want to strengthen legal protections on free speech?
In fact, in nations in which free speech is not legally protected, radicals are not always more isolated—on the contrary, the average person is sometimes more sympathetic to those in conflict with the state, as it is more difficult for the state to legitimize itself as the defender of liberty. Laws do not tie the hands of the state nearly so much as public opposition can; given the choice between legal rights and popular support, we are much better off with the latter.
One dictionary defines civil liberty as “the state of being subject only to laws established for the good of the community.” This sounds ideal to those who believe that laws enforced by hierarchical power can serve the “good of the community”—but who defines “the community” and what is good for it, if not those in power? In practice, the discourse of civil liberties enables the state to marginalize its foes: if there is a legitimate channel for every kind of expression, then those who refuse to play by the rules are clearly illegitimate. Thus we may read this definition the other way around: under “civil liberty,” all laws are for the good of the community, and any who challenge them must be against it.
The entire function of state-granted rights as “to protect you from itself,” combined with the subjectivity of who gets to define those rights, perhaps best describes my ambivalence towards representative democracies as we see them today.
Read more here, although I’m only half-joking when I say you might be put on a watchlist–you know, for protection purposes–for doing so.
-Shiv
So what? Individuals will always need protection from those who are more powerful than they are, and that protection can only be effective if it comes from those who are more powerful than they are. If that “more powerful” entity is something other than “the state,” does that really improve things?
@invivoMark
What you are envisioning is further hierarchies. Anarchism is the radical abolition of hierarchy, the redistribution of power to absolute equality. The whole point is that there cease to be “more powerful” anythings.
Plus you argue as if the state provides me protection. Decidedly, it does not.
While I’m with you on the critique of both the concept and execution of state-sponsored “protection”, the idea that after the revolution there will cease to be ” ‘more powerful’ anythings” is contradicted by my experience in this world.
As an example, my abuser was physically smaller than myself and not more muscular, so I had at very least an advantage of leverage, and very possibly one of overall strength. Yet my abuser was able to “win” every confrontation in the sense that she could be certain both before and after the fact that I would be hurt and she would not. Her willingness to use violence gave her power over me and would do the same with anyone who, like me, rejected use of violence.
For anarchy to work you need every identifiable community to value each and every single one of its members equally, and to share the same ideas on the limits of acceptable violence, acceptable speech, and more. Otherwise, in at least some of those communities, someone will propose themselves as arbiters of disagreements and members of the community become subject to the whim of the arbiter. If the arbiter’s role is formalized, with powers granted and limitations codified, then you have government once again, and we are without positive anarchy.
There are lots of aspects of the state I’d like to tear down. And there will certainly never be a government I fully trust. But I trust the local bully less.
Maybe this is all down to my own failure of imagination, but its easier for me to see a continuing refinement of law leading to ever more positive, helpful government than it is for me to see the absence of law leading to a just and safe live for queers, perverts, trannies, PoC, women, and other marginalized peoples.
Not that I think we’re close to a government with which I could be satisfied, just that I see the potential for bullies under anarchy to be worse, so I can at least see some marginal, barely perceptible return on efforts I make to work within the system, where I see that even if i were successful in an effort to create a positive anarchy, I don’t believe it would be possible for that positive anarchy to sustain itself and the rapid collapse (that I see as inevitable) of local communities into negative anarchy seems worse, in my imagination, even than the status quo.
@Crip Dyke
Right now, the local bully wears a badge and can ruin your life with something that lasts a hell of a lot longer than a bruise from a punch, and will arguably inflict comparable or worse tortures than the emotional/psychological abuse.
If my abuser, or yours, were a cop, perhaps that would illustrate my ambivalence. Yes, all societies have to deal with those willing to use violence to get their way. But our society also authorizes people to use violence to get their way, too, as long as they dot their i’s and cross their t’s and shine their badge. Who do you think they’re going to recruit?
The local bully and the government are one and the same.
This discourse of rights seems to imply that the state is necessary to protect us against itself, as if it is a sort of Jekyll and Hyde split personality …
Yup. The J & H metaphor is a century anachronistic, but the authors of the US Constitution would have grasped the concept without problem.
Remember: Dr. Henry Jekyll started out as a somewhat virtuous person attempting to become completely so. Anybody who wants to create a society without contradictions needs to start with a non-human species, or perhaps a universe without Gödel’s Theorem.
But that’s not possible in a society. “A large number of people” will be more powerful than “one person.” Unless you want to become a hermit, you have to live somewhere where there are more powerful things than yourself. (And if you do become a hermit, there are bears, I guess, so that’s not an out either.)
Not necessarily. I’m only saying that “not the state” isn’t inherently more protective than “the state.” That’s the point where anarchists lose me. Critique the state all you want, it’s pointless until you can create a superior not-state.
I think the ACLU got it right when they (belatedly) realized that first amendment rights and second amendment rights aren’t compatible with each other. As soon as someone starts talking with a rifle slung over his shoulder (pronoun chosen deliberately), it stops being speech and starts being intimidation.
Of course, the best thing would be to get rid of open-carry laws across the country. But failing that, we need restrictions on ‘militias’ who want to march around city streets waving around their masculinity props and terrifying the citizenry.
invivoMark@#6:
Critique the state all you want, it’s pointless until you can create a superior not-state.
That bogus reasoning can be turned around into “tell me how to create a superior state, such that anarchism would be pointless” – we can demand an impossibility on either side of the problem, but that doesn’t justify whichever side whichever one of us is arguing for.
Critique anarchism all you want, it’s pointless until you can create a state that does not obviate its members autonomy.
Autonomous individuals need protection from the state; asking the state to protect us from itself is always contradictory.
Proponents of the state then argues that, in the absence of a state, one might need protection from an aggressive neighbor. The flaw in that argument is that, in the absence of a state, there is nothing to prevent an autonomous individual from getting help from other autonomous individuals, as necessary when and where they can. It also does not stand to reason that that help would be perpetual; we don’t need to form a government in order to preserve and maintain that network of relationships between autonomous individuals.
The statists’ red herring argument goes something like: “Suppose you have a neighbor who is willing to use violence and you’re not? How do you stop them from threatening you into compliance?” Well, the answer is, “I’d find 5 other neighbors who were willing to tell them ‘stop that or we’ll make you stop'” The argument is not that me and my 5 other neighbors are forming a government, it’s that we’re preventing the first neighbor, who threatened someone, from forming a government. After all, if we sit back and let them go around threatening people into compliance, we have just allowed them to declare themselves King.
Governments exist by monopolizing political violence; everything comes from that. Anarchists don’t have to monopolize political violence but they do need to prevent others from doing so. Governments, presently, hold that monopoly; they will never give it up because it’s what they are and it’s how they exist. Personally, I doubt they will ever go away (they’ll just get bigger and bigger and more violent until the world is either devastated or it’s a world imperium) Humans needed to get the idea that “if someone says they’re king 3 or 4 of you need to get together and knock their brain out with a rock” a lot earlier than we did.
Retaliatory violence is also self-defense, and autonomy will not be allowed at all if everyone declares that they will never resort to violence; that immediately creates the whole disgusting edifice of kings and police.
Marcus, that’s quite a lot of straw you’ve used there. I’d link you to an argument clinic on straw man arguments, but I think both of us would be surprised to find out who the author is.
This is only relevant if you hold autonomy to be the ultimate good, the more of it the better, no matter what. I strongly disagree that that was true, even before handguns were a thing.
But of course, I can’t really critique anarchism. I’ve never come across a coherent and complete definition of anarchism that more than three people can agree on, so I suppose it really is pointless to critique it. Unless you care to attempt such a definition?
invivoMark@#10:
What do you mean, strawman? I was re-casting your own argument; that’s hardly strawmanning (unless your original argument was a strawman) Genuinely confused.
This is only relevant if you hold autonomy to be the ultimate good
Requiring that a state not obviate its members autonomy is not an ultimate good; it’s more a question of whether the state is legitimate or not – does it derive its authority, or simply assume it? I never said it was good or not. (I think the idea of a state being legitimate is kind of a contradiction in terms, but, then, I would)
But of course, I can’t really critique anarchism. I’ve never come across a coherent and complete definition of anarchism that more than three people can agree on, so I suppose it really is pointless to critique it.
I was using your phrasing, to illustrate how vacuous your comment was, not requesting that you critique anarchism. I’m not trying to establish some definition of anarchism. I have my own, which you’re welcome to if you want it, but, as you say, people will doubtless disagree with it if only for the sake of argument.
@6 invivoMark
Critique religion all you want, it’s pointless unless you can create a superior not-religion.
One of the criticisms I receive from the religious when I start to corner the fallacies that necessitate faith is that I haven’t given them an alternative system to believe in. Atheism might logically imply how we should approach knowledge itself but it does not necessarily imply ethical principles. There’s no ground on which to find a “should” or an “ought” except in oneself, which opens itself to error where belief in a perfect divine does not.
I point out that religion, too, was created by a person (or series of persons), and thus religiously derived ethics are still subject to error.
Swap out “religion” and “the state” and the argument is the same. I remember the frustration of being meticulously walked through the justifications for the state and seeing how leaky the logic is. To some extent it hasn’t stopped. That doesn’t stop me from arguing for its reduction and/or abolishment.
@11 Marcus,
If your comment @9 was a response to me, then it was full of straw men. You bring up and then counter several arguments I never made. If it wasn’t intended to respond to my post at all, then I apologize for the accusation.
I remember trying to pin you down previously on what you thought defined a “legitimate” state, to no avail. But I’m not trying to argue that any state, real or theoretical, is “legitimate” (that would be pointless since you and I will never agree on a definition of “legitimate”). But you said that critiques of anarchism are pointless until I create a society that both has infinite individual autonomy and a government. If I’m not critiquing anarchism on how much individual autonomy it has, then that’s a red herring. Whether or not a “legitimate” state exists never even enters the conversation.
@12 Siobhan,
I can envision a society without religion. And while I don’t think it’s inherently better than any society in which religion exists, I can at least wrap my head around the advantages to such a society. You and I both know that nothing has to replace religion.
But society will continue to exist whether or not a government does. I don’t see your statement as equivalent at all. Maybe that’s just because no one has ever explained to me how an anarchic society can succeed, or pointed to an example.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchism_in_Spain
Thanks, I’ll read it when I get a chance.
I promise I’m arguing in good faith, and not just trying to stir you guys up. I appreciate your patience in responding to my comments.
I do get it, invivoMark. Finishing In Defense of Anarchism left me terribly unsatisfied. And anarchist history/philosophy has been subject to heavy censorship from most western democracies, so it’s not surprising that most folks haven’t encountered its history. But it does exist!
Rseponding to Marcus
No. I reject the standards that you impose on this discussion. I choose to choose the approach which, roughly, works best for the best number of people. Currently, the only “real” plans that I’ve heard from anarchists are ridiculous or fantasies. I’ve spent quite a bit of time arguing about the details with several people. Example “real” plans include: technocracies (which is really just another form of government), anarcho-libertarian approaches which involve voluntary pay-in police forces, and state-less fantasies where everyone gets along because we’ll live in a post-scarcity world. So, given these concrete choices from the anarchists, vs something like the current system, I’ll take the current system every time, (roughly) because it’s demonstrably better for more people.
Of course, I know that Marcus has this absolutely ridiculous position that science and empiricism are inadequate to make these sorts of empirical judgments, and I don’t have anything more to really say to that, except it’s extremely sily.
As for other systems, I cannot evaluate a system if I do not know the details of that system. I need to have details on a system before I can evaluate it. So, Marcus, if you have a better system, an alternative to the general class of representative democracies, I’m all for hearing you out, and then evaluating it compared to the current system – and also of course compared to small reasonable tweaks that can be made to the current system.
The system is dynamically unstable. Very soon, some assholes will band together as roving bandits, which will be able to militarily defeat everyone else as they are not properly organized nor equipped, nor would they have sufficient warning and opportunity to organize and equip. It’s just another example of the standard freerider problem – a potential target of a roving bandit can freeride on his neighbors military preparations without himself participating, which means that very few people will be militarily prepared to respond to roving bandits. So, the roving bands win. However, soon these roving bandits will realize that if they set themselves up as feudal lords with regular taxation, they will be able to make even more personal profit (money, slaves, etc.), compared to being roving bandits – People under roving bandits tend to produce very little because they lose everything on a regular basis. Whereas, with regular taxation, the serfs have a much greater incentive to produce. (Other factors are important too.)
And that is the very rough history of human civilization – at least in Europe – ending right around circa 1600 feudal Europe, e.g. the kings of feudal Europe are simply exploiters of the people who realized that becoming a king with regular taxes, as opposed to being roving bandits, leads to greater profits.
> DICTATORSHIP, DEMOCRACY, AND DEVELOPMENT
> MANCUR OLSON
> University of Maryland
http://www.svt.ntnu.no/iss/Indra.de.Soysa/POL3503H05/olson.pdfPS: A fun part of the above paper is that by taking this same sort of pessimistic analysis, where the leaders of a representative democrat society are also just out for themselves, one can “mathematically” show that representative democracy is still better than monarchy.