Mythbusters comments

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

Sudden destruction of social structures have historically led to chaos, followed by totalitarian government. (Essentially what happened with the economic collapses preceding the French and Russian Revolutions - by the time the smoke cleared, the citizenry was willing to obey anyone who'd stop the shooting and the looting.)

The type of society Hogeye possets is only possible in small groups - anything over 50 unrelated folks tends to make people nervous enough to go into "Mad Max" mode if presented with crisis. Honor, whether personal or clan, has to be paramount to be able to do away with policing organizations - if honor is paramount, dishonor, which in small groups is known immediately, is punished by the family/clan via death or exile, problem solved. The minute you get to city-sized groups you lose connection, you lose immediacy, you largely lose honor as a driver of behavior - you also lose the acceptible viability of death as a response for dishonor & exile doesn't mean much in an urban setting.

[Hogeye]

Hogeye - you put an awful lot of faith in the essential fair-mindedness and respect for other people's property of human beings. Our policing system, while nowhere near perfect and infected with some of these same kinds of people, came into being to deal with folks whose ideas of "mine and thine" is to make "thine mine" as quickly as possible.

You must think I'm one of those old-timey anarcho-socialists who's against police. I'm not. Anarcho-capitalists don't make any optimistic assumptions about man's nature, and like you we believe police are necessary. But we don't want monopoly police. You statists somehow think that a monopoly police force is necessary, while we think such monopolies are expensive, inadequate, and prone to aggression.

In the smaller communities, like the Irish tuatha, where interdependence was a survival trait, these things tend not to happen, but we haven't lived in those small communities for a long time.

Imagine you live on the border of Springdale and Fayetteville, and could switch police departments on the first of the month, any month. Sp Fville decides not to enforce pot laws. People in your neighborhood then can decide what law they want. Now suppose Johnson PD offers you a sweet deal. Now, allow startups, and you have anarcho-capitalism.

When I was in Costa Rica, somehow I came up with the beach hotel model of anarcho-capitalism. Suppose you're in a remote area where the State is a non-factor, if it intervenes at all it can be bought off. There are various resorts, catering to various types of clientelle. Some are for wild and crazy surfers, some for families, some for bird-watchers, some for adventure hiking, rafting, zip-lining, some for swingers, some for single men, some for single women, some for sports-fishermen, etc. Each resort has "laws" appropriate for their clientelle. I would say parts of Costa Rica are quasi-anarchist.

Remember the Y2K thing? I knew someone who was convinced that Y2K was what was going to bring on the kind of society that Hogeye describes. Only through a situation like that, which would suddenly and completely tear down the system that exists now can such a radical change in our complete societal structure take place.

I'm counting on hyperinflation to break up the USEmpire. Wolf DeVoon, legendary anarcho-capitalist, thinks a major terrorist attack could cause a breakup. It's really not that radical in one sense; all our social institutions pretty much stay the same, but the burden of government is lifted. There will still be roads and police and schools, there just won't be monopolies. The places that do best will be the ones that can evolve into the stateless situation without too many transition problems. A place with an alternate currency already set up and friendly networks of neighbors will do better than places where people are alienated and totally dependent on State. The latter could turn into a Mad Max scene for a while.

Sudden destruction of social structures have historically led to chaos, followed by totalitarian government.

Right. Luckily, getting rid of the State will mainly affect only a few parasites living off society. Our society will be just fine. The necessity for State is a spook in your head. Listen to Tom Paine:

SOME writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by wickedness; the former promotes our happiness positively by uniting our affections, the latter negatively by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron, the last a punisher.

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

Paine is correct that governments are created "by wickedness" - but only in response to wickedness - If the wickedness had not impinged upon society first, causing "our wants" to be abridged or unmet, there would be no government.

[Hogeye]

Right. My point was that society is not government. Thus, any assumption about "the total destruction of society" when the USEmpire disbands is erroneous.

Note that Paine's definition of government is the non-statist definition - what I've been calling the Nockian definition. For Paine, government is simply legal/arbitration services. This type of government is compatable with anarchism.