Letter to the Cabbages Pt. 1

[tyrannosaurus vex]

This is not intended for a discordian audience, since it would be preaching to the choir.  It's basically just high-minded posturing, but whatever.

***************************

Liberty is not inherent in any system of government.  In fact, the opposite is true.  Every type of government exists, by necessity, to limit liberty.  Your personal freedom is not something granted to you by your government: if that is what you believe, then you don't actually have it.  Freedom is something you take for yourself, it cannot be given to you. 

If a man is kicked out of a prison he is said to be free -- but if all he does with that "freedom" is to live in a room and go to work every day like he is "supposed to," then he is really no more free than he was in prison.  He has nicer clothes to wear, maybe, and his cell block is larger.  More choices at the comissary, more options in the mess hall.  But he is nevertheless as fearful of the Authorities as he was in prison; he is subject to punitive action by the administration whether inside or outside the prison walls.

In spite of these obvious truths, it has become popular among the masses to assume that because they are comfortable, they are "free."  There is a certain degree of truth to that (as is usually the case with lies), because they are "free" to choose from what is presented to them; they are "free" to associate with the approved groups; they are "free" to protest government policy, so long as they are in "free-speech zones" and they have a permit and they aren't physically located anywhere that might threaten what the government wants to do.

But that isn't really liberty.  Liberty is saying what you believe, even if it makes the Authorities uncomfortable.  Liberty is going where you want, and not telling anybody where or why.  Liberty means that you're free to cover your tracks if you want to, free to talk to and associate with whoever you want.  It isn't "Freedom within reasonable boundaries," because people are not reasonable and can be fooled into believing that even totalitarianism is reasonable.  Sometimes, totalitarianism IS reasonable, but just because a thing makes sense doesn't mean it is always RIGHT.

The government which claims to be "preserving" our rights and "protecting" our freedom is violating both while we idly sit by and accept entertainment and convenience in return.  How long until the resources that keep us mesmerized by television and fast food run out?  How far into imperialism and aggression will we allow our government to go to keep our stomachs and eyeballs pacified?

And what will we do when all else really does fail, and we are left with neither convenience nor liberty; our plates filled with stale bread and our living rooms filled with stormtroopers to keep us from complaining about it?

[Thurnez Isa]

yo
is this free use if the situation arrises?

[tyrannosaurus vex]

yeah

[Cramulus]

[tyrannosaurus vex]

I DEMAND A RETRACTION!

--vexati0n,
not as prolific as the monkey he's trained to state the obvious with a keyboard

[Iron Sulfide]

you ayn randroid (i'm just in love with that term, now)

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

Some interesting correlation with Lysander Spooner and Ben Tucker (maybe even the Prof from The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress)... have you examined the Socialist Anarchist/Realist Anarchist positions?

[East Coast Hustle]

HOW CAN THERE POSSIBLY BE ANY SUCH THING AS A "SOCIALIST ANARCHIST"?



srsly, that'd be like calling yourself a republican democrat.

[tyrannosaurus vex]

maybe it's a label like "Republicrat" that means you subscribe to an entire system of values that's corrupt and devoid of meaning.

Socialist-Anarchist: A political position that believes everyone should be free, but also admits that this impossibe due to humans' lack of self-control; and that the best possible reconciliation of these two facts is a police state where everyone wears tunics.

[hunter s.durden]

HOW CAN THERE POSSIBLY BE ANY SUCH THING AS A "SOCIALIST ANARCHIST"?



srsly, that'd be like calling yourself a republican democrat.

I think there are lots of people that naively think the two are somehow compatible.
I know a self-described socialist that felt the US government often overstepped its bounds.
Basically he wanted the government to baby everyone, but wanted to do drugs and not pay taxes. I'm not sure where he thinks the money from all the social programs was going to come from.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

I actually took a class at Maybe Logic which RAW presided over called "Non-Euclidian Politics: A View from Neither Left nor Right". There were several differnet concepts we looked at and many different systems do appear compatible with basic anarchism. For example, Socialist anarchism works in a manner similar to any number of voluntary communes, except there's no Federal Authority to control what the commune can and cannot do.

In such a society, every individual would actually be responsible for themselves, but survival (as thousands of years of human history tend to indicate) works best in some sort of community. Individuals would be free to Voluntarily associate themselves with a community and as a community be free of any Overreaching government. As long as the members can also freely disassociate themselves then no tenant of anarchism is necessarily broken. I have more but now must go catch my ride.

Some examples of such theoretical Socialist Anarchy (I think it is also called Mutualism) can be found in The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress, where small line families, polygamies and other assorted civil arrangements existed within (and eventually without) State control.

Also featured in that book was "Rational Anarchism" (I said realist before.. in error). Basically the Prof's Rational Anarchism position was that he would obey the laws that didn't inconvenience him, or that fell within his normal activities of life. However, he felt no boundary of law. Any State law that did not fit within his actions was disregarded. He argued that it was not rational to assume that humans would ever voluntarily live without some basic government, Therefore, the only position a anarchist could take was in the area of personal action. Rather that argue for No State, he chose to argue for the freest possible State which he personally would disregard if it ever suited his purpose.

Also, there does exist theoretical Collectivist Anarchism, which resembles Social Anarchism but the small group owns everything (as opposed to the individuals owning everything and helping each other out because it's in their best interests). There's Communistic Anarchism and ararcho-communism which are somehow different than each other and different still than the ones above. A lot of it has to do with economics and philosophical models which seem somewhat similar. For example, Mutualism leaves each person to fend for themselves, but collaborating on shared services.... a community might pitch in to build/maintain or pay for road service. Or they might all pay the salary of a Night Watchman to patrol the area. Collectivist Anarchism though the Collective owns everything and passes out the goods based on direct work done by the individual. Communistic Anarchism, though is much more philosophical and thinks that the collective should give to each person based on the satisfaction of the needs of the individual. People think Anarchism = Total Chaos, but that seems as much of a generalization as saying that all Discordians must:

1. Use FNORD in a post.
II. Say Kallisti at the end
C. Use ordered lists witrh the Official Discordian Numbering System
* Make some numerology BS that would make Crowley roll over in his Grave (if her weren't actually still alive and leading the Illuminati)
4.2 Make sure that the Law of Fives gets obeyed somewhere along the line....

Ratatosk, Squirrel of Discord
Muncher of The ChaoAcorn
Chatterer of the Words of Eris
POEE of The Great Googlie Mooglie Cabal

[Triple Zero]

maybe it's a label like "Republicrat" that means you subscribe to an entire system of values that's corrupt and devoid of meaning.

Socialist-Anarchist: A political position that believes everyone should be free, but also admits that this impossibe due to humans' lack of self-control; and that the best possible reconciliation of these two facts is a police state where everyone wears tunics.

i'll try ..

Socialist-Anarchist: A political position that believes everyone should be free, no government, but if you don't wanna work you should still magicaklly get moneys/food/housing from the government community, no forms of centralized control, rules or anything but again by magickal quantum chance everybody gets free healthcare when sick, social help when necessary etc, BUT!! because there is no government, you do not need to pay half your wage in taxes in order to finance this -- except that you're not working either way cause that would be oppresion and the state anonymous-decentralized-magick-free-lunch-provider takes care of you always.

i see no practical problems with this, actually.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

maybe it's a label like "Republicrat" that means you subscribe to an entire system of values that's corrupt and devoid of meaning.

Socialist-Anarchist: A political position that believes everyone should be free, but also admits that this impossibe due to humans' lack of self-control; and that the best possible reconciliation of these two facts is a police state where everyone wears tunics.

i'll try ..

Socialist-Anarchist: A political position that believes everyone should be free, no government, but if you don't wanna work you should still magicaklly get moneys/food/housing from the government community, no forms of centralized control, rules or anything but again by magickal quantum chance everybody gets free healthcare when sick, social help when necessary etc, BUT!! because there is no government, you do not need to pay half your wage in taxes in order to finance this -- except that you're not working either way cause that would be oppresion and the state anonymous-decentralized-magick-free-lunch-provider takes care of you always.

i see no practical problems with this, actually.

Bwhahahaha!!! I think that's how most of the Hippie Communes worked in the 70's didn't they? (Except with lots of Drugs added to the mix...)

[Triple Zero]

they actually worked ???

also "free love? phah! you HAD to!!"

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]