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Everyday Anarchy Part 1 May 23, 2008 Introduction It’s
hard to know whether a word can ever be rehabilitated – or whether the
attempt should even be made. Words
are weapons, and can be used like any tools, for good or ill. We are all
aware of the clichéd uses of such terms as “terrorists” versus
“freedom fighters,” etc. An atheist can be called an
“unbeliever”; a theist can be called “superstitious.” A man of
conviction can be called an “extremist”; a man of moderation
“cowardly.” A free spirit can be called a libertine or a hedonist; a
cautious introvert can be labeled a stodgy prude. Words
are also weapons of judgment – primarily moral judgment. We can say
that a man can be “freed” of sin if he accepts Jesus; we can also
say that he can be “freed” of irrationality if he does not. A
patriot will say that a soldier “serves” his country; others may
take him to task for his blind obedience. Acts considered
“murderous” in peacetime are hailed as “noble” in war, and so
on. Some
words can never be rehabilitated – and neither should they be. Nazi,
evil, incest, abuse, rape, murder – these are all words which describe
the blackest impulses of the human soul, and can never be turned to a
good end. Edmund may say in King Lear, “Evil, be thou my good!” but
we know that he is not speaking paradoxically; he is merely saying
“that which others call evil – my self-interest – is good for
me.” The
word “anarchy” may be almost beyond redemption – any attempt to
find goodness in it could well be utterly futile – or worse; the
philosophical equivalent of the clichéd scene in hospital dramas where
the surgeon blindly refuses to give up on a clearly dead patient. Perhaps
I’m engaged in just such a fool’s quest in this little book. Perhaps
the word “anarchy” has been so abused throughout its long history,
so thrown into the pit of incontestable human iniquity that it can never
be untangled from the evils that supposedly surround it. What
images spring to mind when you hear the word “anarchy”? Surely it
evokes mad riots of violence and lawlessness – a post-apocalyptic
Darwinian free-for-all where the strong and evil dominate the meek and
reasonable. Or perhaps you view it as a mad political agenda, a thin
ideological cover for murderous desires and cravings for assassinations,
where wild-eyed, mustachioed men with thick hair and thicker accents
roll cartoon bombs under the ornate carriages of slowly-waving monarchs.
Or perhaps you view “anarchy” as more of a philosophical specter;
the haunted and angry mutterings of over-caffeinated and
seemingly-eternal grad students; a nihilistic surrender to all that is
seductive and evil in human nature, a hurling off the cliff of
self-restraint, and a savage plunge into the mad magic of the moment,
without rules, without plans, without a future . . . . If
your teenage son were to come home to you one sunny afternoon and tell
you that he had become an anarchist, you would likely feel a strong urge
to check his bag for black hair dye, fresh nose rings, clumpy mascara
and dirty needles. His announcement would very likely cause a certain
trapdoor to open under your heart, where you may fear that it might fall
forever. The heavy syllables of words like “intervention,”
“medication,” “boot camp,” and “intensive therapy” would
probably accompany the thudding of your quickened pulse. All
this may well be true, of course – I may be thumping the chest of a
broken patient long since destined for the morgue, but certain . . .
insights, you could say, or perhaps correlations, continue to trouble me
immensely, and I cannot shake the fear that it is not anarchy that lies
on the table, clinging to life – but rather, the truth. I
will take a paragraph or two to try and communicate what troubles me so
much about the possible injustice of throwing the word “anarchy”
into the pit of evil – if I have not convinced you by the end of the
next page that something very unjust may be afoot, then I will have to
continue my task of resurrection with others, because I do not for a
moment imagine that I would ever convince you to call something good
that is in fact evil. And
neither would I want to. Now
the actual meaning of the word “anarchy” is (from the OED): 1.
Absence
of government; a state of lawlessness due to the absence or inefficiency
of the supreme power; political disorder. 2.
A
theoretical social state in which there is no governing person or body
of persons, but each individual has absolute liberty (without
implication of disorder). Thus
we can see that the word “anarchy” represents two central meanings:
an absence of both government and social order, and an absence of
government with no implication of social disorder. Without
a government . . . . What
does that mean in practice? Well,
clearly there are two kinds of leaders in this world – those who lead
by incentive, and those who lead by force. Those who lead by incentive
will offer you a salary to come and work for them; those who lead by
force will throw you in jail if you do not pick up a gun and fight for
them. Those
who lead by incentive will try to get you to voluntarily send your
children to their schools by keeping their prices reasonable, their
classes stimulating, and demonstrating proven and objective success. Those
who lead by force will simply tell you that if you do not pay the
property taxes to fund their schools, you will be thrown in jail. Clearly,
this is the difference between voluntarism and violence. The
word “anarchy” does not mean “no rules.” It does not mean
“kill others for fun.” It does not mean “no organization.” It
simply means: “without a
political leader.” The
difference, of course, between politics and every other area of life is
that in politics, if you do not obey the government, you are thrown in
jail. If you try to defend yourself against the people who come to throw
you in jail, they will shoot you. So
– what does the word “anarchy” really mean? It
simply means a way of interacting with others without threatening them
with violence if they do not obey. It
simply means “without political
violence.” The
difference between this word and words like “murder” and “rape”
is that we do not mix murder and rape with the exact opposite actions in
our life, and consider the results normal, moral and healthy. We do not
strangle a man in the morning, then help a woman across the street in
the afternoon, and call ourselves “good.” The
true evils that we all accept – rape, assault, murder, theft – are
never considered a core and necessary part of the life of a good person.
An accused murderer does not get to walk free by pointing out that he
spent all but five seconds of his life not
killing someone. With
those acknowledged evils, one single transgression changes the moral
character of an entire life. You would never be able to think of a
friend who is convicted of rape in the same way again. However
– this is not the case with “anarchy” – it does not fit into that
category of “evil” at all. When
we think of a society without political violence – without governments
– these specters of chaos and brutality always arise for us,
immediately and, it would seem, irrevocably. However,
it only takes a moment of thought to realize that we
live the vast majority of our actual lives in complete and total anarchy
– and call such anarchy “morally good.” For
instance, take dating, marriage and family. In
any reasonably free society, these activities do not fall in the realm
of political coercion. No government agency chooses who you are to marry
and have children with, and punishes you with jail for disobeying their
rulings. Voluntarism, incentive, mutual advantage – dare we say
“advertising”? – all run the free market of love, sex and
marriage. What
about your career? Did a government official call you up at the end of
high school and inform you that you were to become a doctor, a lawyer, a
factory worker, a waiter, an actor, a programmer – or a philosopher?
Of course not. You were left free to choose the career that best matched
your interests, abilities and initiative. What
about your major financial decisions? Each month, does a government
agent come to your house and tell you exactly how much you should save,
how much you should spend, whether you can afford that new couch or old
painting? Did you have to apply to the government to buy a new car, a
new house, a plasma television or a toothbrush? No,
in all the areas mentioned above – love, marriage, family, career,
finances – we all make our major decisions in the complete absence of
direct political coercion. Thus
– if anarchy is such an all-consuming, universal evil, why is it the
default – and virtuous – freedom that we demand in order to achieve
just liberty in our daily lives? If
the government told you tomorrow that it was going to choose for you
where to live, how to earn your keep, and who to marry – would you
fall to your knees and thank the heavens that you have been saved from
such terrible anarchy – the anarchy
of making your own decisions in the absence of direct political
coercion? Of
course not – quite the opposite – you would be horrified, and would
oppose such an encroaching dictatorship with all your might. This
is what I mean when I say that we consider anarchy to be an irreducible
evil – and also an irreducible good. It is both feared and despised
– and considered necessary and virtuous. If
you were told that tomorrow you would wake up and there would be no
government, you would doubtless fear the specter of “anarchy.” If
you were told tomorrow that you would have to apply for a government
permit to have children, you would doubtless fear the specter of
“dictatorship,” and long for the days of “anarchy,” when you
could decide such things without the intervention of political coercion. Thus
we can see that we human beings are deeply, almost ferociously
ambivalent about “anarchy.” We desperately desire it in our personal
lives, and just as desperately fear it politically. Another
way of putting this is that we love the anarchy we live, and yet fear
the anarchy we imagine. One
more point, and then you can decide whether my patient is beyond hope or
not. It
has been pointed out that a totalitarian dictatorship is characterized
by the almost complete absence of rules. When Solzhenitsyn was arrested,
he had no idea what he was really being charged with, and when he was
given his 10-year sentence, there was no court of appeal, or any legal
proceedings whatsoever. He had displeased someone in power, and so it
was off to the gulags with him! When
we examine countries where government power is at its greatest, we see
situations of extreme instability, and a marked absence of objective
rules or standards. The tinpot dictatorships of third world countries
are regions arbitrarily and violently ruled by gangs of sociopathic
thugs. Closer
to home, for most of us, is the example of inner-city government-run
schools, ringed by metal detectors, and saturated with brutality,
violence, sexual harassment, and bullying. The surrounding neighborhoods
are also under the tight control of the state, which runs welfare
programs, public housing, the roads, the police, the buses, the
hospitals, the sewers, the water, the electricity and just about
everything else in sight. These sorts of neighborhoods have moved beyond
democratic socialism, and actually lie closer to dictatorial communism. Similarly,
when we think of these inner cities as a whole, we can also understand
that the majority of the endemic violence results from the drug trade,
which directly resulted from government bans on the manufacture and sale
of certain kinds of drugs. Treating drug addiction rather than arresting
addicts would, it is estimated, reduce criminal activity by up to 80%. Here,
again, where there is a concentration of political power, we see
violence, mayhem, shootings, stabbings, rapes and all the attendant
despair and nihilism – everything that “anarchism” is endlessly
accused of! What
about prisons, where political power is surely at its greatest? Prisons
seethe with rapes, murders, stabbings and assaults – not to mention
drug addiction. Sadistic guards beat on sadistic prisoners, to the point
where the only difference at times seems to be the costumes. Here we
have a “society” that seems like a parody of “anarchy” – a
nihilistic and ugly universe usually described by the word “anarchy”
which actually results from a maximization of political power, or the
exact opposite of “anarchy.” Now,
we certainly could argue that yes, it may be true that an excess
of political power breeds anarchy – but that a deficiency
of political power breeds anarchy as well! Perhaps “order” is a sort
of Aristotelian mean, which lies somewhere between the chaos of a
complete absence of political coercion, and the chaos of an excess of
political coercion. However,
we utterly reject that approach in the other areas mentioned above –
love, marriage, finances, career, etc. We understand that any
intrusion of political coercion into these realms would be a complete
disaster for our freedoms. We do not say, with regards to marriage,
“Well, we wouldn’t want the government choosing everyone’s
spouse – but neither do we want the government having no
involvement in choosing people spouses! The correct amount of
government coercion lies somewhere in the middle.” No,
we specifically and unequivocally reject the intrusion of political
coercion into such personal aspects of our lives. Thus
once more we must at least recognize the basic paradox that we
desperately need and desire the reality of anarchy in our personal lives – and yet desperately
hate and fear the idea of
anarchy in our political environment. We
love the anarchy we live. We fear the anarchy we imagine – the anarchy
we are taught to fear. Until
we can discuss the realities of our ambivalence towards this kind of
voluntarism, we shall remain fundamentally stuck as a species – like
any individual who wallpapers over his ambivalence, we shall spend our
lives in distracted and oscillating avoidance, to the detriment of our
own present, and our children’s future. This
is why I cannot just let this patient die. I still feel a heartbeat –
and a strong one too! Ambivalence
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