Libro.fm for stuff not at the library

The only book of his I’d recommend is The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. It’s quite Anarcho Capitalist, and sexist in places but it’s an interesting revolution story regardless and has some interesting ideas in it

Individuals owning something you need many people to use, like a coffee shop, large tracks of land, or an apartment building.

Because fundamentally there’s nothing wrong with landlords as people. They live in an unfair system and they’re doing what’s best for them. That’s true of the vast majority of people. Change the system, create one where doing pro social things are rewarded, and landlords will become beneficial actors. Honestly, this is true for the vast majority of people. Very few people really need “the wall”

My co-op and WinCo sell olive oil, vinegar, honey, and more as refills in addition to cleaning stuff.

This might be a regional thing. For reference I grew up in Oklahoma and “quite a bunch” seems natural and familiar. In British English quite has the opposite meaning so I could see why it wouldn’t make sense in that context. I wouldn’t be surprised if it didn’t sound right to other Americans due to regional linguistic differences.

Folks for groups and friend for individuals is my go to. Comrade if you want to be spicy

I see what you mean. I’ll try to give an example.

I tend to be skeptical of folks when I know they’re incentivized monetarily, emotionally, or socially to believe a certain thing but I do my best not to discount them out of hand. I think most people have a tendency to write folks off completely when it’s more useful to accept uncertainty. To know that a piece of information might be right even if it challenges my worldview. Unfortunately uncertainty is kinda hard work.

For instance, the US has a lot of incentive to make alternative economic systems seem awful. Anytime a pro US media source like Radio Free Asia says something negative about China. I have to accept that:

1. They’ve lied in the past
2. They’re incentived to lie again
3. It’s still possible they’re telling the truth

I have to accept that balance.

This works well for situations that don’t effect me personally. On the other hand, if there’s a person who has a predatory reputation in my friend group, I don’t have the luxury of giving them the benefit of the doubt. They are a present danger to myself and the people around me.

I moved to a city in the US where I can get around without a car. 95% of my trips I take via bike or public transit. I haven’t actually lost much weight but I have gotten much leaner

I was looking for Aurora. I also think it’s right on the money. Gets into the weeds with micro ecosystems.

The idea that humans need the diverse micro ecology of earth in order to not become ill over the course of generations is pretty interesting.

Bowline is a great knot. Definitely my go to for making loops and linking small lengths of cord together. I’ve even used it on a blanket to create tie outs to insulate the bottom of my hammock.

For those trying to move away from plastic I recommend buying some hemp cord and learning to tie a taut line hitch. It can serve a similar purpose as a zip tie

Please comment with your favorite knots

This is proven incorrect. While many societies throughout history have been heirarchical, many were egalitarian and rejected heirarchy. Mutual Aid: A Factor in Evolution, Worshipping Power, and The Dawn of Everything all talk about various early societies many of which reject authoritarian structures. One still existing group of egalitarian societies in Africa is called the San, by all accounts they’ve been around for millenia. I’m not aware of a long lasting egalitarian industrial society but the idea that human beings are incapable of living free from some authority is simply untrue.

I’m definitely not advocating for a return to hunter gathering. Billions would die. But I do think they have things to teach us.

Humans have long memories when they want to. Some of the longest surviving cultures are very egalitarian. The San peoples of Africa for instance. Oral traditions have long told stories that impart moral lessons about how to treat the environment, animals, and other people. Anti-authotitarian traditions and education are quite effective. The idea that a person can own a hundred acres was, and could be again, as absurd as claiming a pig can fly not all that long ago.

Long lived anarchist societies [1] have traditions and structures that resist this sort of thing. Morality tales, traditions that shame those who aim to put themselves above others, and a tradition of armed self defense serve to prevent subversion from within. These things tend to be frustrated early. If your neighbor gets “picked off” or joins a cult of personality are you going to sit around and wait for it to happen to you or are you going to get your neighbors together and put a stop to it. You’re right that individuals cannot stand up to such a threat, that’s precisely why they’ll form a militia to stop it. Ideally such things can be resolved with words but violence is a perfectly rational response to such a threat.

Centralized power is actually pretty bad at holding ground and subjugating populations. They have to build whole expensive structures of social control to ensure soldiers will fight. As soon as that structure is less convincing than a losing fight they run. The people being subjugated need no such structure. They have every reason to fight to protect themselves, their family, their community, and way of life.

Nothing I’ve described goes against your definition. A group of people deciding not to feed, house, or allow someone to stay in their midst is not a heirarchy. It’s also not government. Just as a group is free to associate it is also free to disassociate.

1. They have long existed and some still persist. The Dawn of Everything by David Graeber and David Wengrow talk about several.

It is true libertarianism in the older socialist sense. It assumes most people will act in their own self interest. It assumes that most people are at their core social. It asserts that the structures of capitalist control: isolation, bigotry, corporate media and more have convinced people to act in destructive ways that neverless enable their survival. Capitalism also enables unempathetic narcissistic people to gain unjustified control over all of our lives.

Power vacuums demand to be filled. Anarchism leaves no openings. When early states began encroaching into stateless societies they had an easy time with patriarchal and other heirarchical societies. Bureaucracies and tyrants were easily subsumed by dethroning a leader and implanting a friendly local. Anarchist societies were another story. They were not habituated to authority, they fought tooth and nail to maintain their anarchy. I don’t have access to my books right now but in a couple days I’ll drop an excerpt from Worshiping Power that goes into detail on a couple of examples.

I think “more developed” is not great here. It’s assuming because it’s the most common currently and supplanted more anarchist methods that it is better. States and capitalism have benefits that anarchy does not. You can not engage in an anarchist invasion. You can not extract value from a country using colonialism in an anarchist society. This enables capitalist and state control to expand and eventually control the land that anarchist, chieftain led, and other pre state communities once controlled [1]. Capitalism and the state conquered and coerced until it held an almost universal control [2] but that doesn’t mean it’s better to live under.

One of the agreements I have in mind is trading what a farm’s workers need: insurance in case of bad harvest, tools, infrastructure, education, labor, etc for what a city or town needs: food [3]. The “punishment” for breaking such an agreement is not violence. The result is the end of the agreement. That is not coercive control because the other can go to someone else for the same need.

It probably wouldn’t be efficient at large scales [4]. That’s why you make small decisions among those the decision effects. A group might elect a recallable representative for their watershed council and the meeting notes would be distributed to everyone who wanted to read them. However, most decisions about a workplace or neighborhood could probably work by assembly [5]. It is a kind representative democracy but the purpose of anarchy is not ideological purity. The point is creating a society that eliminates as much oppression as possible and enables the most freedom possible.

Bartering, as large scale economic system, is a myth. Gift economies, slavery, stateless communism, and more were far more common. Barter between communities existed but it was the minority of economic activity. The economy I suggest has more in common with Anarcho Communism. To borrow a phrase, “from each according to their ability, to each according to their need.”

1. The exceptions are legion but they don’t exactly control a lot of land. The San are an example.
2. Worshipping Power does a good job examining the transition if you’re interested in reading more.
3. Each of those line items could be spread across a miriad of organizations and communities.
4. The current system is only efficient at funneling money to the top so I’m not that worried.
5. These are just possibilities but I think it’s a workable structure that I would describe as non-heirarchical.

Anarchy is liberal in the sense that it pursues individual’s freedom not only from oppression but also to act in ways that enrich themselves. It does not require total chaos as it’s detractors have tried to characterize it since the term was coined.

Anarchy is social in the sense it accepts human beings are almost always better off in groups and that society’s goals should be for the betterment of all.

It is democratic in the sense that people come together to make decisions; although, consensus is perhaps a better descriptor. Democracy has an association with first past the post voting and decisions that bind those represented.

It is not a liberal social democracy as that tends to be used to describe a capitalist society with strong social programs, a beauracracy, and police state. They also tend to be supported by colonialism abroad or petrochemical extraction but I suppose that’s not necessarily a requirement. I would agree that such a society is not anarchist.

Structure is not heirarchy. A collective farm is a structure just as much as a factory farm. An agreement where a farm exchanges food for labor, infrastructure, medicine, education, and tools from a city does not preclude anarchy. Either side breaking that agreement when the other begins acting in bad faith is not oppression or a police state.