Topic: Politics, statism, anarchism, racism; split from: Wall Observer thread - page 6. (Read 5403 times)

ITT: bunch of rich westerners who think that laws prevent them enjoying their lives to the max.

NITT: bunch of poor people who'd cut your throats with a broken bottle if it wasn't for the protection of governments.

It's easy to imagine, the problem is there is no historical data showing anything similar.  None.
And when one government collapses, another one takes the reins.  Not anarchists.

Oh, I'm sorry. I misread it.

Some people have no imagination.

Look at the mess you've managed to get urself into!  You've lost two thirds of your worth in 2014 alone!  And that's compared to the dollar, which we all know buys 1/10 of what it did last year because gubermint.  So you're basically worth nothing
Come to a real bank and let us help u!

Someone willing to make a shitload of money providing services which are so desirable I imagine.

Seriously, is that so hard to imagine?

This argument again.

After the collapse and then the following anarchy, who will be providing the electrical power to run your local wallet? who will provide/maintain the network infrasrtucture and routing, etc. to make BTC trades possible?


etc.

Hey guys, how about we keep the debate well-spoken, friendly and polite?

Right now I have to praise octaft for the way he presents his arguments, that's the way of someone who is actually listening to what other people have to say instead of just waiting for his turn to speak. Remember friends, DISCORD CAN BE FUN! Just keep it friendly, eh? In the end we all want to make the world a better place.


IMO this is about systems. We are critiquing the current system (centralized government) right now. Big government vs. small government has as much of a place in the debate as government vs. no government. Personally I'd be in favor in trying any form of shrinking and localizing of government, alas my bias here is that this just doesn't seem to work.  Just like some people seem to feel that no government doesn't seem to work. Regarding that idea:


addressing the bolded part: yes you are correct, that is my answer. So far we have had sudden collapses. I'll address the related question in a minute. First I want to point out something regarding this situation.

Today we are almost entirely reliant on government to provide many of our essential services. Education, health care, infrastructure, defense, dispute mediation, even food production in many cases - all of these are provided to a large degree by government and often by government only, with alternatives being forbidden. This puts us in a position of dependency. This is actually a decent argument for decentralizing these services. Even while assuming the general benevolence and competence of the government in providing the services (about which I have serious doubts but this is not the point right now) it seems clear that such a position of utter dependence is dangerous. Because what if the government fails? For several generations we are living with an expectation of our needs being met thanks to this big provider so why would we spend our time worrying about creating alternatives? We have no alternatives, because our culture claims we don't need them. So yes, a collapse of government in these conditions will almost always be a catastrophe.

So "how else is it going to happen"? The alternative to sudden collapse which catches us off-guard would be either a preparation for said collapse, or even the actual "controlled demolition" of government. This involves creating alternative infrastructure for delivering resources and services. Once functional and tested alternatives actually are in place, the fear of the aftermath, of the chaos following the collapse of established order, would diminish significantly I imagine. One reason why so many people are willing to accept government as a "necessary evil" is this lack of alternatives, which makes a future without government even more scary, because of the uncertainty. Better the devil you know...

I'm happy to say that we are actually proceeding quite nicely in terms of building the technological infrastructure for decentralized alternatives of government. Decentralized ways of sharing and storing information without censorship have been deployed throughout most of the world by now, so communication has largely been set free and we are working on doing the same with value-transfer - another, higher-level form of communication. Once that has proliferated I imagine we can finally start building tangible, open-source, crowd-funded things like homeless shelters, hospitals, schools etc.

One thing which is rather slow to change, but change it does nonetheless is the culture. Our collective operating system as I call it. We can debate the benefits of smaller government or anarchy forever, but as long as the culture which underlies these institutions remains unchanged, the institutions themselves won't change. So what sort of shift in culture is needed? That's a whole big discussion in itself but I'd say it begins with a deeper sense of awareness of the consequences of our collective actions and a deeper sense of personal responsibility for the world, our environment and the society that lives in it. Actually feeling compelled to clean up your street and save that forest in your backyard instead of complaining that the designated experts (government) doesn't do enough about it. That sort of thing.

Entering "JayJayWallsoftext" post-length territory...over and out.

Like I said, I never really asked, I just called you out for ducking the other guys question, to which you gave a presumably honest answer so I stopped focusing on it.

In spite of any of what either of us has been through, I'm not sure it would be worse than having to hold the fear of it happening every single day.

I will show you the evidence if you want.
This discussion is worth absolutely zero when we don't take each others word for what we say.

Thus far it's been nothing but solid win for the governments.  Anarchists: zero.

If anarchy actually works, why is it the standing winner of the Darwin Award?

You don't seem to really "get" statism, right? It's about a concious compromise around the establishment of rules, which is by definition no paradise.

Please, your fooling yourself. It does not matter if us unwashed masses oppose anything. The only thing that matters is money and re-election, as for re-electiing, there are enough stupid people that would vote for whoever, even when its clear the intentions are not what they say.

Yes I can, but not in English, we've been there before.

How does "I've never experienced living in a lawless state and am glad for that" equate to "I've never experienced human brutality?" Besides, with your examples of human brutality, I think almost all of us experienced that or the emotional equivalent at some point in our lives. Anyway, who's to say you're not making it up? Who's to say I'm not making it up if I do share my experiences?

I see no point to it, I was just pointing out that what he was asking you had nothing to do with your age.

Governments can make any law they desire. Whether they can uphold the law is a whole other issue (if too many oppose it they cannot).

Or not  Or our Reptilian Overlords will ban it if it becomes a threat.
Anyhow, largely irrelevant, since Elwar's already got what he wants.

Well cause and consequence. The market will make it advantageous for people to accept it and therefore they will.

Thanks. Enjoy your statist paradise.

Ic.  Well, enjoy your Bitcoin paradise then, glad you're content