Val

@Val@lemm.ee
3 Post – 34 Comments
Joined 1 years ago

I needed a small and quippy option for the meme, but I agree, in this context that would qualify as a "fix".

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What's annoying is that we probably would be a whole lot closer to actual communism and anarchism if the bolsheviks never took power and destroy all the communism that was happening during the Russian revolution.

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This is in the context of voting. Voting blue will achieve nothing other than delaying. The point of the meme is to encourage people to not just vote, but to actively engage in politics in order to make things better. Basically the same thing you said.

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Yeah. I made It in inkscape. Happy you like it.

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I probably should have put a check on the blue and remove the third option. That would have made it clearer.

Nothing wrong with snoozing. Just don't expect it to fix anything.

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That is a fair point. Although there is a point to be made that "the system" is democracy and overthrowing a government that doesn't represent the population is a part of the system. But I agree that most people probably don't think that way.

If you can think of any improvements feel free to make changes and upload your own version.

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I should post a follow-up saying "You don't have to listen to people that have no intention of listening to you".

Not my fault USA decided to use red for the conservatives, even though red as been the socialists' color since we began.

Left-Right (Left-Right) and Authoritarian-Libertarian (up-down).

Anarchism. But it is meant to signify any kind of leftist ideology. I just chose anarchism.

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One needs to listen to a neo-nazi to understand them, help them. The problem is that they won't listen to us because being angry is easier.

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Ideology. every cent a capitalist doesn't make because of me is a small victory.

Anarchists argue that capitalism is an oppressive hierarchy that should be dismantled. That the ruling class is using money as a tool to oppress the poor and restrict their freedom.

Anarchism is a leftist/socialist way of thought. It does not protect the rich. Any anarchist who protects the rich is an oxymoron. Like the "anarcho-capitalists".

For further reading: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/the-anarchist-faq-editorial-collective-an-anarchist-faq-full#text-amuse-label-secf1

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Really? a typo and a spelling mistake is your bar for bad content? That seems a bit harsh.

Also this video sums up my feelings about english spelling.

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If this is sarcasm, then this is a conflict of terms that I thought about including in the meme but decided against for a snappier message. Listening can be read as either "obeying" or "hearing out". This meme was made with the "hearing out" meaning in mind.

If its not and you use that meaning of listen then Yeah, Ain't that great.

That is why I use anarchist instead. It means all of that while also making it clear that authoritarianism is not ok.

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matrix.org is basically IRC 2.0. It's federated and has a lot of cool clients.

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"polictics" was a typo. the spelling part was for whatever mistake you found in the title. I should have probably been clearer about that, but I thought the distinction was obvious.

I may have responded a bit too harshly. For me a downvote means "This post is completely trash and should not exist", so to hear that a single typo is enough to invalidate it made me a bit defensive. You are absolutely correct to point it out but I think a downvote is a bit too harsh.

Also I know that's probably not what downvotes mean to you but considering how they affect rankings I see them this way because downvote=less score=less people see=should not be seen.

The third box is smaller to reflect that it isn't a "real" option. I only added it because I thought only the two wouldn't be fitting for this community (and also complaining without providing an alternative is not useful). It's more of an open question. eg "You need to do something else because voting will not stop fascism."

In the FAQ there are questions like J.2.9 "What do anarchist do instead of voting?" and J.7.4 "What would a social revolution involve?". These might help answer your questions.

In general there is no easy solution. For Americans to fix their system they need to fight for real democracy. I think trying to get rid of FPTP is a good start. However I do not put much faith in any election reform succeeding. My personal (european (although it shouldn't matter)) opinion is that americans should try do build communities outside of government control so when things go bad they have someone to rely on.

I made this meme to just point out something I thought a lot about when scrolling through lemmy and that's that voting isn't enough because the best you can do is delay the inevitable. You can vote, but that won't make a meaningful change.

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That is why for any such society to exist there must be a widespread cultural belief in opposing authority. All of the members of society need to call out those who try to consolidate power. The entire community must be opposed to any individual power grab. They must not be given the opportunity. That is the only way to sustain the system.

Sorry! I over-reacted. You are absolutely right. I am just used to the communist/syndicalist side and so when seeing someone talk about anarchism being against taxes the mind immediately jumps to the an-cap conclusion.

However I wonder how does individualist anarchism deal with wealth inequality? And the above mentioned economic freedoms limiting political freedom?

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So this was an undercurrent I wanted to address: are you suggesting that Americans not vote in the 2024 general election?

As the meme says voting blue means a 4 year snooze. I am not telling anyone whether they should vote or not. Just pointing out how I see the current election. The points you make are sensible and I think if I were in the USA I would vote because of the reasons you listed.

I'm copying some quotes from the FAQ that I think fit in this conversation.
But considering the state of the US I think that at the moment voting is a useful tactic to buy time for organizing, not a solution.

J.2.8: anarchists don’t just say “don’t vote”, we say “organise” as well.

J2.5 last paragraph: [...] anarchists urge abstentionism in order to encourage activity, not apathy. Not voting is not enough, and anarchists urge people to organise and resist as well.


And when it comes to the last paragraph I must admit I am short of ideas. All of the groups you listed have a chance of helping, organization doesn't need to start with a political group, once you have a group together you can start talking about anarchist organization and see how people react.

As an anarchist I believe that revolution starts with the people. Get enough people together with a common goal (or a shared dream if you want to be poetic) and you will have a revolution. This might seem pointless since you're so small, but every revolution needs to start somewhere. And I believe only a revolution can fix the USA right now.

There are also some anarchist orgs like http://iww.org. I wish I knew more.

They will seize control of everything and make illegal anything they don't control.

That's why it's important to create these groups now. Once the fascist are in power it's too late.

If you don't mind reading there is a lot of more specific questions and answers in this FAQ:
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/the-anarchist-faq-editorial-collective-an-anarchist-faq-full

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You could have a command that recommends commands and then you select them on a drop-down list.

Alternatively if the dataset is verified you wouldn't need to worry about it running dangerous commands, since it doesn't know any. Or you could have a list of verified commands that run automatically and any command not on that list requires confirmation.

But this is missing the point that most of the time I know exactly what command I want to run so adding a LLM Is quite useless. The reason so much of linux is still relying on commands is because for a lot of people (myself included) commands are quick and efficient.

More specifically, yes. It is collective anarchism, but in this context I think it is obvious enough that I don't need to clarify it further.

Also I think that any type of anarchism allows for collective anarchism, and by extension could be used to mean collective anarchism.

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personally I generally favour blunt and to the point lol

Me too!

I think having these conversations in the comments can be more helpful than posting an alternative, because the people your meme speaks to can read on and hopefully broaden their views!

This should be the goal of this community. To share memes that invite people to discuss them, so the comments can make them think. The meme acts as a gateway to deeper leftist thought in the comments.

I apologize you couldn't find the answer to your question from my comment, and thus thought I was dodging it. I tried to explain it in the way that I see it. In my eyes I answered your question clearly, but I will try to be even clearer on my second try.
(hopefully this doesn't come off as patronizing)

I would also like to know what were the pedantics that you identified in my comment. If it was the final statement then that was my attempt to bring humor into the argument and wasn't in any way meant seriously. Perhaps I should have used /j

To get to your question (and hopefully answer it more clearly). An anarchist society forms when anarchists come together to create a society. If someone with guns came to destroy that society the anarchists would defend themselves. If one of the anarchists turns their gun against their comrades the others would respond in kind. If they don't the person takes power and the system stops being anarchistic.

Or to put it even more simply: In an anarchist society everyone is policing and protecting everyone else.

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I most certainly do not mean men with guns taking whatever they want. That is authoritarian. The revolution is an ongoing process to redefine society as a non-hierarchical. I see it as non-violent: only defending against violence, never inciting it.

Between writing that comment I read through the anarchist FAQ on revolution.
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/the-anarchist-faq-editorial-collective-an-anarchist-faq-full#text-amuse-label-secj7
And I agree with it wholeheartedly.

We as a species are far enough for anarchism to work, people just have to stop believing in authority, and we have to help them.

I also do not think anarchism is a utopia. There is nothing about it that couldn't work. Non-hierarchical societies have existed, and their dissolution just means people aren't ready yet.

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I think it is best to clarify my terms. Anarchy to me is a structured society built entirely out of free associations. It isn't lawless. Anarchy has rules. A lawless society will naturally take the shape of the people in that society. If all the people are anarchists, they will create an anarchist society, if they are statists, they will create a state. Society is a collection of people living together there is no reason it has to be hierarchical. The people are the ones who make it like that.

What stops our current society from devolving into that if anarchic revolution were to occur?

An anarchist revolution is the complete transformation of society to use non-hierarchical power structures. If after the revolution the society falls back into hierarchy then that means the people were not willing to let go their addiction to authority.

The link is for an FAQ, technically not a book, since most books are shorter than 3077 pages. However it does contain every question one might have about anarchy and answers it pretty neatly.

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Actually an entire state made out of democratic worker unions sounds pretty good. Although I personally would prefer no state.

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there should be an instances button at the bottom of the page that shows it.

As an anarchist my position is: Guns are useless until they're pointed at you. No problem with people owning them, but they should only be used to fight against systematic oppression, and (only if there is no other alternative) self defense. Otherwise guns are completely useless.

That’s why I think there’s significant cultural/educational changes needed before such a society (or something similar) could be attained.

That is exactly what I am saying. That is the anarchist revolution. Changing society to be non-hierarchical. It isn't replacing one government with another. It is transforming people to organize in non-hierarchical ways. The revolution is long and takes time and has been going on since the first anarchists thought their theory. It isn't fought with swords and guns but with thoughts and ideas. That is the revolution

(or to put it in another way)

The revolution I'm talking about isn't a coup. It isn't using weapons to destroy the government. It is teaching people that there is nothing inherently hierarchical about human society and we can live without it. If any government falls because of anarchism it will be because non-hierarchical associations have replaced the government or the government tried to stop anarchists from organizing and the anarchists fought back.

I hope that by clearing up what I mean about revolution. The other questions also get solved.

tribalism seems baked into the human existence

That's right, it seems baked into human existence because that's how most humans are raised. I believe humans are capable of moving past that.

I think it works great on a local level in small communities, but we have a globalized world, for better or worse

I don't see how the ideas fall apart when scaled up. When applying the way you interact with others to interacting with other communities the same rules apply. instead of organizing society between individuals you organize society between collectives. Same basic structures apply.

All murders happen because of emotional (killing someone in anger), economical (Theft gone wrong) or psychological (Doesn't realize it's wrong) reasons. none of these is prevented by sticking the murderer in a box after the murder.

All of these are prevented by building strong social network to manage any harmful impulses before something happens, which is something any reasonable anarchist would agree with.

Also If you think the list is incomplete then feel free to give another example.

Oh yeah also political assassinations and wars. But your comment already addresses those.

I think a better wording is that anarchy is naive. And I'd rather be naive than accept that this is the best we can come up with, because that's depressing.