So You're Seeing a Lot of Anarchist Posts, But You're Not Anarchist, WTF is Going On?!

Hi, there!  Take a seat, relax for a while.  We're going to have a little chat about anarchism if you have the time.  I'm sure you're curious as to what is going on with these weirdos who dislike the government.  You may have never heard from an anarchist thinker and only have seen "anarchists" breaking and destroying things in petty riots on the news.  Well, I'm here to hopefully help shed some light on the topic for you.

Anarchists are actually very different from one another.  Some that even fall under the same anarchic umbrella disagree staunchly on various aspects of their philosophy.  However, in the end, all anarchists agree on one thing, that the State must be abolished.  Anarchists see the State for what it is, a group of humans given the "right" to rule over other human beings within certain geographic locations via force.  This has yielded thousands of years of disastrous bloodshed and mismanagement in our world.

I am an anarcho-capitalist and here's my perspective:

Anarchy = No Rulers
No Rulers = Free People
Free People = Free Association
Free Association = Free Trade
Free Trade = Capitalism

• The world is not a Utopia now, and it won't be in a free society, either.
  • Some people are provably bad.  There are sociopaths and psychopaths among us and they are often hard to distinguish from good people.
  • Since humanity is not perfect, it makes no sense to take a class of humans and give them power over other humans.
  • Psychopaths and sociopaths are drawn to power over other people.  By having a government you give them an on ramp to this power.
  • "People are bad, so we need a government made up of people."
    • This doesn't seem like an effective solution for obvious reasons.
• We do not need violence to solve complex social problems.
  • Initiating violence causes far more social problems than it solves.
• I own myself, I control myself, and I am responsible for my actions.
• Since I own myself, I own what my body justly acquires.
  • When I make a post on Steemit, I used my body to make content, which people liked and voted on.  I own the rewards for that post since I created it and people voluntarily supported it.  My claim of ownership of those rewards is not questioned, as the blockchain confirms my claim.  My rewards are my property.
• Property is essential in our lives.  
  • When I wear a shirt I bought, it is my property.  If someone tries to take my shirt, that is stealing, as they do not have a rightful claim to that shirt, having not purchased it.
    • Property is not theft.  Stealing someone else's property is theft.
• In order to acquire property legitimately, one can utilize their skills in a way that is valuable to someone else who will trade with them in order to borrow those skills.
  • Many of us get jobs to do this.
  • Entrepreneurs, or risk takers, take on greater risks than their workers, as they evaluate what people want and how to deliver it, thus where to invest.  Entrepreneurs often achieve this by utilizing people who voluntarily lend them their skills in return for some compensation that they value.
  • No matter what, all actions taken by people are done in order to profit in some way.
• Profits are how we determine value in our world.
  • Value is subjective.
    • A guitar may be worth nothing to someone who doesn't play, but could be worth thousands to someone who does.
  • Everything we do in life is for profits.
    • When I go to the beach, I go because I am better off for having gone.  I had fun and added some great memories.  This is all that profits are, value added in some way or fashion.
    • When I go to work, I profit.  I spend my time and effort and convert it to money, which I feel is more valuable than if I had used my time and effort in another fashion.
    • Since I have voluntarily done this, I subjectively believe the money I receive is more valuable than my time, so I have profited by receiving the money for my costs.
    • When I sell something, I do so with the intention to make a profit.  I do this as I have invested my time, efforts, and money to deliver you a product you wanted, and would only sell it, in order to get something else I value more than my product.
    • You profit as well when you voluntarily purchase this product since you view that good as more important than your money through the act of buying it.  Since you are better off with the product, you have profited.
    • I could also profit by donating the item to a charity instead, since I would feel good as a result and may value that feeling more than the item I donated.  I may also value the fact that I helped someone out.  Again, value is subjective.
• Money is a medium of exchange, which enables us to more easily trade our time and efforts.
  • Money enables transactions that are not confined to varying, prearranged goods on each end.
  • Money opens up the economy to become vastly more intricate as trades can be settled far quicker when the medium of exchange remains constant.
  • Money is not bad, it is what represents your time spent doing things that others find value in.
• Everything requires work from someone.
  • Even picking an apple from a tree requires some amount of time and effort in order to obtain.
  • By picking the apple, you are spending your time and effort for the apple.  This is work.
  • Nothing is free.
• Peace and commerce is the best "foreign policy"
  • War is destruction.  (Value destroyed)
  • Commerce is growth.  (Value added)
• War is not profitable.
  • War is only "profitable" to the State and the companies who sell it arms, munitions, and the like.
  • It is completely unsustainable to fund such multi-year, money-burning, life-destroying endeavors if people funded these things voluntarily.
  • At some point, people would see the value lost in funding war, and withdraw their financial consent.
  • Therefore, war exists as a function of the State.
• Consent in the key to our humanity.
  • We all value consent when it comes to sex.
  • I ask now, why not extend our notions of consent to everything we do?
  • Where is the line where you decide to reject another's consent?
  • If I do not consent to a war, do you support the threat of violence I am under to pay for it?
  • If I stopped paying for it would you endorse the violence done against me by the State?
• We can figure things out.
  • Just look at how much our voluntary associations have produced in the past 100 years.  We now have affordable little devices in our pockets capable of communicating with virtually anyone in an instant, and that's the least cool thing that they do.
    • 100 years ago I would be happy to not die of tuberculosis in my 30's.
  • I really shouldn't have to list all of the other accomplishments that we have achieved without government.
  • To think we couldn't figure things out like roads, schools, courts, etc. is quite literally insane, given what we are already capable of achieving through our voluntary actions today.
• Decentralized, emergent solutions are superior to planned, imposed solutions.
  • People are different everywhere you go.
  • People value things differently everywhere you go.
  • Planning and imposing solutions for complex social problems for everyone is not only asinine, it's impossible.
• Through the competition of different ideas, we improve our world.
  • If someone else can do something better and cheaper than me, great!  Now I can find another way to bring value to the world.
    • Maybe I can make my items better and cheaper, thus benefiting my consumers.
    • Maybe I can make something else better and cheaper, that my consumers would like.
    • Either way, by competing, we are finding ways to add value to the world around us through emergence.
• Some ideas are bad.
  • These ideas don't generally get financially supported by others.
  • Bad ideas are most generally funded through force.
  • Good ideas don't require force.
• In the end, it comes down to force versus voluntary human association.
  • I choose voluntarism every time.

That's the gist of my perspective.  I look forward to delving into more of the specifics in the future.  There is a lot to this, and it took me years to fully wrap my head around it.  I'm still learning, in fact, and will continue to until the day I die.  My perspective may in fact change in the future.  That's completely normal.  So long as the changes I make are backed by morally sound reason and evidence.  (I'll get into morals and ethics down the road)

I don't want to speak for other anarchists.  Anarcho-communists, syndicalists, mutualists, agorists, pacifists, trans-humanists, feminists, etc.  There are so many different branches of anarchism, and I just don't feel it is appropriate to give my slant on their perspectives here.  I certainly have thoughts on them that I will share in the future, but I'll leave all of that for separate posts.

Anyways, I know that this is all a lot for people to take in.  I just ask that you not dismiss anarchism as a silly, childish idea.  Give it some thought.  I am sure if you put your emotions aside and think about it long enough, you will arrive at the same conclusions that I have.

I value your consent, and I would never seek the initiation of violence against you to compel you to do things that you disagree with.  I believe that you have it in your heart to not wish violence upon me or your fellow humans.  I believe that you will see that we can voluntarily solve our world's problems together.

Here are some quotes that helped me become an anarchist.

Big thanks to @larkenrose, @dollarvigilante, @dragonanarchist, @ericdjuly, @falkvinge, @ftlian, and all of the other great anarchists on Steemit already helping to push these ideas.  Check them out for some real quality perspectives.

Follow me and let's help keep anarchism great here at Steemit!

@derekareith