The IFG - Still don't think.....

From: Michael Lorrey (mike@datamann.com)
Date: Fri Feb 09 2001 - 10:12:30 MST

nrb wrote:
>
> Michael Lorrey wrote:
> > They are invariably anti-capital, and blame all of society's ills on
> > corporations. They refuse to see government as the problem, using the
> > same sort of excuses they use to apologize for the USSR: government is
> > just a tool that has been corrupted by corporations because it was
> > structured to protect the rich, etc. etc etc.
>
> I would be interested to know if your sampling from these groups is scientific or
> anecdotal, because this seems like a simplification. Of course, it's common for people
> from all political persuasions to lack the critical thinking skills necessary to make
> sound judgments about issues that push emotional buttons in them. But I would be no more
> willing to accept the position that ALL of anything this complex can be attributed to
> corporations than I would be to entirely blame government. Just because there are people
> in the greens who only see things in black and white doesn't weaken the argument that some
> corporations are responsible for some ills (this seems more reasonable and likely to me).
> I am confused by your statment that "they refuse to see government as the problem," since
> it is unlikely that government is THE problem any more than it is that corporations are
> THE problem. Certainly it's more likely a confluence of culprits, many of whom are not
> acting out of greed or evil, but are simply misinformed or ignorant (although there are
> glaring exceptions).

Here is a message I got from the list owner of the primary NE North
American anarchism activism co-ordination mail list. These people are
the ones primarily involved in much of the 'green' and anarchist
protesting going on around the US. This guy has booted me from the list
because I was debating some fine points which raised a ruckus among the
faithful:

<<<<Date: Tue, 6 Feb 2001 21:14:04 -0500 (EST)
Subject: Banned from the AAC e-mail list
From: Ian Mayes <ianmayes@dojo.tao.ca>
Reply-to: ianmayes@dojo.tao.ca
To:
Cc:

Comrades,

Hello there, my name is (I)An-ok and I am the list maintainer for the
AAC e-mail list.

You have been unsubscribed from the Atlantic Anarchist Circle (AAC)
e-mail discussion list because you are not anarchists. Anarchism is
fundamentally opposed to any and all forms of capitalism, and you have
publicly stated that you are not anti-capitalist. Therefore you have
been kicked and banned from the AAC list unless you ever become *both*
anti-government *and* anti-capitalism, i.e. an anarchist.

To learn more about anarchism I suggest that you read "An Anarchist FAQ"
located at: http://www.geocities.com/capitolhill/1931/

To learn about how "anarcho"-capitalism is not a form of anarchism,
please go to this section of "An Anarchist FAQ":
http://www.geocities.com/capitolhill/1931/secFcon.html

Thanks, and please leave the AAC list alone.
                                  In Solidarity,
                                    (I)An-ok 

-- 
For more on the inspirational revolutionary anarchist ideas, life and
times of comrade (I)An-ok aka "Ian Mayes" go visit:
http://www.twinoaks.org/members/(I)An-ok>>>>
> 
> As for the last sentence quoted above, I believe there is plenty of actual evidence that
> the US government (at least) has pretty much been bought and paid for by powerful (i.e.,
> rich) interests. This has been par for the course throughout the history of this country,
> and the recent presidential coup is only one more example of it. Why exactly does
> accepting this interpretation somehow conflict with your libertarian position? Why is a
> large, powerful collective that calls itself a corporation better than a large, powerful
> collective that calls itself a government? I mean, who's watching the watchers here?
A corporation has no legal power to use force to make you buy their
product, pay them extortion money, or die in their service. A
corporation cannot shoot you out of hand without any repercussions.
Governments can do all of these. What powers corporations do have that
do get abused are only granted to them by the monopoly on the market of
force that government has. End that monopoly and you end both government
AND corporate abuses. Follow the power. Where is it most concentrated?
In government.
 
> > If your statement is true, then why do the people in every other culture
> > invariably want the sort of society we have? They want 4 door cars, PCs,
> > internet access, good neighborhoods and schools, honest elections, and
> > all of the other features of the America that isn't marred by big city
> > welfare state problems.
> 
> I'm not saying my statement is true. I'm just asking that we allow for the possibility
> that not everyone values what we value, even though many do. There is a rich body of
> anthropological evidence that suggests that imposing our values on other cultures has
> been, in many (but not all) cases, a negative process. I believe they used to call this
> imperialism. ;-)
Ah, yes, and thanks to imperialism, 1/4 of the human race is no longer
burning its wives to death when their spouses die. I don't see that as a
negative process.
Thanks to imperialism, despotic insular states like Japan and China
opened up and modernized. Thanks to imperialism, four of the ten most
stable nations on earth exist entirely due to colonization.
Local opposition to 'imperialism' is typically a matter of one despot
and his henchmen getting pissed off that they aren't allowed to abuse
their serfs like they used to. 
> >
> > Then you should accept the previous one as well. Animals always want to
> > get the greatest benefit for the least investment possible, and will
> > engage in pecking order behaviors.
> 
> I can't accept your line of reasoning here, but would defend to the death your right to
> say it. Something we humans have going for us that appears to be lacking in most of the
> other animals (as far as we can tell) is this nifty little thing called culture, which
> provides us with such potentially elevating concepts as ethics, morality, altruism and
> cooperation (among so many others). Self preservation is still there underneath it all, of
> course, but we now have thousands of years worth of conceptual tools that help us to think
> about our actions and their consequences.
2000-3000 years is nothing to evolution, and 'culture' is a thin veneer
that typically dissapears entirely with sufficient stress.

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