Bizud

You've got a lot of praise for reason and a lot of scorn for passion it seems. I don't think it makes sense to ignore one or the other. I think anarchism is pretty reasonable - dismantle systems of hierarchy and domination and authority to increase human freedom. And I'm passionate about freedom, or else I wouldn't feel this way. Political ideologies are about how we believe human society should be structured. You can't take emotion out of the equation. This is just antidemocratic sentiment. If everyone involved has a say in how a workplace or household is run, that's not authoritarian. It's authoritarian if some have a say and some don't. Morality does not exist in nature. Morality is a social construct - it "exists" only in the sense that humans agree to behave as if it exists. What constitutes moral behaviour varies across time and place and among human beings. At one point usury was considered immoral; now it's not. At one point execution of criminals was considered moral. Now it's not. At one point homosexuality was considered immoral, now it's not. Morality is entirely subjective and what will be considered moral in Canada is not always the same as what will be considered moral in Saudi Arabia. There simply is no such thing as an abstract morality that exists independent of human society. Of course, you don't even think society exists, even though humans are social animals and it's impossible to explain how humans live (i.e. in society) without examining society. Of course, I'm a sociology student so I'm biased.

I think you're confused and confusing. Morality doesn't come from "objective reality." It does come from human feelings. I don't think this is vague at all. How hard is it to understand not having to submit to authority? Abolish bosses! Workers take over the workplace! This is analogous to peasants seizing the land they worked and lived on even though it "belonged" to feudal lords. Anarchism is after all a revolutionary philosophy. What I said is that people should have the right to control their own work, but they do not all work in isolation. That means some people would be self-employed and others would work in a democratic workplace (that probably means a union). Anarchists say that democracy should replace hierarchy. Pretty. Simple. And I said that where hierarchy exists people are not free. Hierarchical relationships are immoral relationships that benefit the person higher in the hierarchy. All people are equals. POWER TO THE PEOPLE. This is confusing?? I am a moral subjectivist. Morals do not come from objective reality. The very notion of morality is a social construct. It's created by society and different societies have created different moral codes. Of course, any anarchist society is going to be based on anarchist ethics that you're quite capable of understanding if you want to. People are equals, democracy replaces hierarchy, people are self-managing, don't hurt others - that pretty much sums it up right there. That's what my positions on everything from workplace management to transgender rights to abortion rights to how I interact with my housemates to war are based on. And of course they're based on human feelings. Without emotion there is no morality, since "good" and "bad" are emotion-based concepts.

I don't see the contradiction. I'm talking about abolishing power over others, and empowering individuals by freeing them of rule by bosses, parents, landlords, etc. Only capitalists call socialism slavery. Just the same, socialists call capitalism slavery. As for your assertion that rights must come from "reality," all rights and moral principles come from ideology, not some objective reality. They're ideas about how society ought to be organized and they change over time. Property rights, for example, at one point included the right to own other people. Now they don't. At this point, people can own the work that others do. If I work in a factory, the factory owner owns the products of my labour and pays me a wage. That's why anarchists/socialists believe in workers controlling the workplace. I don't think that's a vague principle at all, it's democratization of life, it's the obliteration of power relationships, it's the quest for a society of equals where people are self-managing, without bosses or rulers, based on community and love and respect. Yes, socialists do believe that people have to share what little resources we have left on this planet, and that our institutions should encourage love and community, not selfishness and individualism. And I'm an anarchist, I think it's very important that individuals are not subordinated to the collective - but my property is not part of me. In addition, I agree with Noam Chomsky that rights systems are not axiomatic and without contradiction. I have the right to freedom of speech, but not the right to slander another, and not the right to yell fire in a theatre, etc. I have the right to my income but not the portion that is taxed. In an anarcho-socialist system I have the right to control my own work, but if I'm working with another person, neither of us can fully control our own work on our own - we have to use democratic structures (hierarchical structures are unacceptable). I don't think we can really discuss liberating youths from oppressive control unless we can establish why control is oppressive. But to get somewhat back on topic, If you're asking me, I don't think we should be sending anyone, young or old, to maximum security prisons unless we've determined that he or she cannot possibly be reintegrated into the community (and that means establishing reintegration into the community as a priority for the justice system - priority number one, in fact). And, even if someone is locked up reintegration can still be pursued to a limited extent. As for sex with minors, yeah I think a 12 year old should legally be allowed to consent to sex. There was a recent case where an adult man was acquitted of statutory rape of a ten year old girl, because the girl lied about her age to seduce the guy. She sure didn't look ten, I guess. The judge agreed. Here's the thread on another board where we discussed it, I'm "butt newtons." Like Michel Foucault, I do think we should abolish age of consent laws for sex and trust in an individual's ability to gauge for themselves whether they are ready for sex or not. Sexual assault and sexual coercion remain illegal, so what's the problem - unless people are afraid that a bunch of kids are going to run wild with their sexual freedom. Our culture does like to pretend that child sexuality and adolescent sexuality don't even exist, after all, but they do.

No matter how much capitalists insist otherwise, greed is still not good. I mean, it's pretty much universally recognized as the opposite of good. As for "socialist-collectivist" policies encouraging immoral behaviour, you're gonna have to explain that one to me. Also, anarchist socialists generally believe that money made from profit, interest or rent is obtained by exploitation. That's because people ought to have control of their dwellings and control over their own work (since what one does is a central part of one's life, one should be self-managing in it). And consistent anarchists are out to abolish power relations in every sphere of life, including the workplace and the family. Since complete autonomy is often impossible in these areas because people work and live together, democratic structures are necessary. First of all, rights are a social construct; there's nothing natural about them. Second, if all rights are derived from property, two things follow. One, if you have no property, you have no rights. Two, equal rights do not exist. So it's pretty obvious why anarchists and socialists, as egalitarians, would reject your definition of rights.

From the Canadian charter of rights and freedoms. Non-propertarian right: 15. (1) Every individual is equal before and under the law and has the right to the equal protection and equal benefit of the law without discrimination and, in particular, without discrimination based on race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, sex, age or mental or physical disability. "The essence of all slavery consists in taking the product of another's labor by force. It is immaterial whether this force be founded upon ownership of the slave or ownership of the money that he must get to live" -Leo Tolstoy

I'm sure you didn't mean it that way, but using "man" instead of "people" is sexist, as is implying wives as property. Most anarchists are collectivists as well as individualists. There's no contradiciton there. Furthermore, I don't think we should try too hard to put systems of rights or ethics into axioms. I don't need my ethics to be axiomatic. But if you do, most anarchists would generally believe: 1) One should neither submit to nor exercise power over another. 2) People should have a say in decision-making in proportion to how much they are affected by the decision. In one sense, I agree about the product of one's work. Socialism, real socialism has always meant, first and foremost, that workers own and control their own work. In most modern workplaces that means democratic structures and unions. As a social anarchist I think the workplace (and also the school, and the family, and all other human institutions) should be democratized. Property rights are not absolute. If someone acquired, legally, all land on the earth's surface and wanted to charge exorbitant fees for its use, I don't think any of us would consider that legitimate. We would surely recognize that as tyrannical. Well, I think that hierarchies that give bosses power over workers are similarly tyrannical, degrading and dehumanizing. The workplace is a central feature of society and there's no reason it shouldn't be democratically organized. Same for families and schools. edit: To restate, anarchists favour a society where all relationships between individuals are between equals, and where all associations are voluntary. Libertarians, to me, seem more like confused conservatives. They're very concerned about the state infringing their "liberty," but are not concerned about the way other human institutions and arrangements - the workplace, the family, the school, for example - limit individual freedom. Libertarians have no problem with these institutions or the people who run them behaving in coercive ways because they're doing it on their own property. Anarchists question all coercion. The Libertarian As Conservative by Bob Black

It's pretty evident what they were doing there. They came to a peaceful protest, disguised as protesters looking to get violent, toting rocks etc. There's a term to describe that, agent provocateur. They were looking to give the police an excuse to bust up the protest, which is what their bosses wanted. This is what cops always do at these protests, which is why nobody in that video is too surprised. Anyone who's been to a protest like that knows that if someone is going to be hurt, statistically, it'll be a protester, not a cop, and it will be the cops hurting him.

Like Supercanuk said it is an attack on the right to protest. It's well known that police have these sorts of agents provocateurs at all large protest events, this is just the first time they've been caught so red-handed. The union leader guy knew exactly what was going on. They were hoping to incite protesters to the point where the armored cops could move in and bust some heads. The police know who they're really serving.

Most people who have called themselves anarchists have been socialists. North American variants aside, anarchism has always been the anti-statist wing of the socialist movement.

Actually, some kids that young do drink and it's really sad. But I'd rather they have to do it in full view of the community than out in the woods, especially if they're drinking dangerously. A bar will cut you off at some point. How come you think the only way to learn something is to have an authority figure teach it to you? People teach themselves all kinds of things, and teaching someone else doesn't require being an authority figure. Yeah, that was my whole point. We know that people younger than 16 do learn to drive. Wait, so are you saying it was good of them to let you make the decision or bad of them? It sounds like your parents treated you with respect. Unfortunately, some parents don't respect their kids at all. Some are just petty tyrants, some are abusers, most just replicate a lot of what their parents did to them as children. When adults make children feel powerless, children become resentful and parents become alienated from their children. If I have kids, I'll let them play video games all day if they want to. It's better for them than learning to sit at a desk in an age-segregated environment and work on command and only eat and go to the bathroom when some strange adult says you can. Sorry, I'm pretty anti-school. There's nothing wrong with video games Again I must emphasize the simple fact of social constructions. Adulthood is a social construct. The average age during most of early human history was between 20 and 30 years. In some cultures a person can be an adult at 13. In others, it's 18. In the US, it's basically 21. There's nothing natural about that, those are laws. Law is quite obviously constructed, not natural. To say that things are the way they are because of human nature is a fundamentally conservative view that I just don't agree with - we know that things have not even always been the way they are. I am 100% opposed to any kind of test for voting ever. It has to be a universal right. This is a democracy. You get a say because you're a valued member of the community, period. We have been gradually extending the franchise for as long as it's been around. By now, even prisoners can vote (as it should be). Minors are pretty much the only ones who can't. I think that's appalling, and contributes to much of the anti-youth prejudice in our laws and culture. Cheers. Surely you can distinguish between that and what we're talking about here. You don't need legal authority to do that. I'd grab anyone out of the way of a car, not just my own kid.

Children don't have the legal right to protect themselves from harm either. They do on paper, but not in practice. There's a lot of harm a parent can do to a child before it crosses the legal line where the kid must be removed from the home. But, okay, nobody supports a 6 year old who wants to live on their own, but most 6 year olds are not going to do that unless they're running away from a bad situation. And what about a 16 year old that doesn't want their parents running their life anymore?

I agree. There's a lot of classism here. When we realize that homelessness is a social problem, not a private trouble, maybe things will change. The compassion of a society must be measured by the treatment of its most vulnerable members. In a country as fucking rich as Canada it's scandalous that there's any homelessness, poverty and hunger at all.

I'm 24. Interesting attempt to discredit me based on age though. It really shouldn't matter how old the person writing this is. I think anyone should be allowed to drink and smoke, and drive if they can pass the test. And yes, I think everyone should get to vote, because otherwise some people will not be represented in the government. Our parliament is a disgrace, it does not represent Canadians. It needs more representatives from first nations, more women, more gays, more people from the working class and the poor and it needs a youth perspective as well. You really seem unable to differentiate between treating minors as full persons and saying they have to be treated the same as adults. What I'm talking about is the right to control one's own destiny, and to leave unpleasant or harmful situations. The right to walk out on one's parents, for example. Kids can already be emancipated from their parents and live on their own with government support - why do we only reserve this right for when all else has failed? It should be available to any minor that wants it. No parent should be allowed to use the "you live under my roof" excuse to coerce their kids. I also think spanking should be outlawed. A society that allows parents to control their children with violence shows considerable contempt for children. There is never any excuse for anyone to hit anybody, let alone a defenseless child. New Zealand is doing this, by the way, thanks to a private member's bill from a Green Party MP. Kids should be paid the same as adults, new workers should not be paid a lower "training wage" that is less than the minimum wage. That is just a way to allow businesses to be more profitable by hiring new employees (read: minors) that they can pay less. Parents should not be allowed to force their kids to take medications that they don't want to. They should definitely have no say if a minor wants or does not want an abortion. Kids should have the right to walk out on school at any age, or to attend the school of their choice. We all know that high school is there to keep kids off the streets and their parents' homes for 6 hours of the business day, and to train students to serve capitalism. You learn first and foremost to obey in high school. You learn to tolerate boring, routine work that someone else wants you to do. You learn to obey the timetable and the bells and do what the adults tell you to do. Also, I fully support unschooling, which is a homeschooling method that doesn't replicate the school environment at home. It's student-directed learning, and it's proving that kids don't need school to learn. I think most schools are totalitarian environments where kids are routinely subjected to degrading and harmful treatment. It's degrading to have to ask to go to the washroom. And to be subjected to degrading things is harmful to one's spirit. Finally, a comment on the socially constructed nature of our age divisions. Supporters of early public schools marvelled at how mandatory schooling until 18 was successfully delaying the onset of adulthood. People were staying "kids" longer. This was perceived as a good thing because it gave society more time to socialize people into the kind of adults we want to produce (obedient ones). Today, many people remain "kids" living in their parents homes and going to school well into their mid-twenties. No one would hire a 15-year old to be chief of medicine at a hospital, but nor should we subject minors to things that we would never allow ourselves as adults to be subjected to. I completely disagree. A 16 year old can buy alcohol in many european countries and all the evidence shows that they have less binge drinking and fewer alcohol related fatalities. This is because prohibition is a stupid idea that doesn't work, has never worked, for any substance, ever, and we should thoroughly reject the idea and legalize all drugs. Not to mention it relies on a police state. The state should not inhibit anyone's access to drugs! Uh, how about the same place that kids who live on their own get it now - from the government. I guess you have all forgotten what it's like to be a minor, treated like crap and viewed with a mixture of suspicion and disdain by society. There is this sense that "adults" are real people and kids are just developing people, not yet complete human beings. That's simply not true. Kids are full persons. http://www.communityarts.net/readingroom/a...nd_victimiz.php "One oppression that virtually every human encounters regardless of class, gender, race or ethnicity, is the oppression of children. It is our first experience of systematic invalidation, disempowerment and mistreatment. If we had not first been subjected to such treatment as young people and internalized it, we never would have tolerated the ensuing sexism, racism or classism heaped upon us. We would have had no doubts about our intelligence, self-worth, power, beauty, creativity, connection and honest pride as human beings. It is the primer coat of internalized oppression that makes us vulnerable to all the other layers of oppression we face later on." -Dan Kwong Youth liberation resources

You guys know that minors already drink and smoke, right? Prohibition didn't work for alcohol and doesn't work for pot and other drugs, why would we expect it to work for minors? And all these stories about minors hurting themselves with alcohol...you know adults do that all the time as well, right? I think we need to have a rational attitude towards drug use starting from the assumption that a person should have the right to control their own body and drug use. As for minors being stupid or spoiled, I think that's pretty blatant anti-youth prejudice. It's common to denegrate young people and youth culture. Sparg, believe it or not it's not childhood I think needs to be abolished, it's adulthood. food for thought

adult supremacist! See, this reminds me of the debates around earlier civil rights movements. White supremacists argued that black people couldn't take care of themselves and needed to be controlled by white people. Male supremacists argued that women needed to be controlled by men. Adult supremacists today argue that children need to be controlled by adults. Where does this attitude come from? It comes from being treated badly as a child, and from the way our culture generally takes a positive view of adulthood ("mature" is a compliment) and a negative view of youth ("childish" and "immature" are insults). All through our childhoods, in schools and at home, the idea that adults tell children what to do is drilled into our heads. By the time we become adults ourselves, we have internalized our own oppression and are ready to subject others to the same oppression. That's where attitudes like "children are stupid, end of story" come from. It's bigotry. You wouldn't get away with saying that about any other group in society.

Okay, so I'm talking full civil and political rights for minors. Start with the right to vote and run for office. Abolish adult control of children. Democratize schools, and families too. Parents will no longer be allowed to use violence or the threat of violence to control their children. Allow minors to live where they want, including on their own. Let them buy cigarettes and alcohol, let them drive if they can pass the tests, etc. What say? ;)

I wish you wouldn't accuse the French people of collective hate. Language is malleable anyway.

This was brought up as a concern in the recent Norwegian election. Apparently Canadian observers were shocked to discover that they seem to have an entirely trust-based system. It's never been a problem for them. What I want to know is when has it been a problem for us? Again, until the new law change comes into effect, you do not need any ID to vote in a federal election. Poor people are far less likely to have a passport or a driver's license because they're less likely to drive or leave the country. But also, simply announcing "new security rules for voting" is enough to discourage many from even showing up. Education serves a public good. We, collectively, want an educated population. It also serves an equalizing function, particularly if students are not saddled with the brunt of the cost. How do I know that the ADQ would see tuition fees spike? They promised to end the practice of tuition freezes, and it's what governments all over the rest of the country did. For example, the BC Liberals. More to the point, we could have free education in Canada, in any Canadian province. No reason why we couldn't. After fifteen years of the federal government not paying their share, the public system is in a crisis NOW. So, NOW, people are willing to look at private delivery options because the viability of the public system is in question, NOW. Do you understand that this was not the case fifteen years ago? That fifteen years ago you couldn't talk about private health care in this country without being called far right wing? That two-tier health care is only being talked about because the public system has been mismanaged? That the public health care system could work perfectly with shorter wait times? That is what I am talking about. And if private health care expands in this country, public health care will contract, as there are only so many doctors to go around.

Okay, I can see waiting for 12 hours in an emergency room, or longer. But that's not "per patient." 6 hours per patient would be ridiculous. The wait times are so long because the rooms are full of people, and boy, are they ever full of people. Used to be you didn't need identification to vote in Canada. A new law is changing that, federally. It will make it harder for the poor and especially homeless to vote, and it will mean more people just won't bother. Here is an example. In the United States, there is a debate over the future of the social security system. Some say that it is not sustainable. Beginning in the Reagan years, the government started underfunding the system. Now, they point to it and say "see, public services do not work, the private sector can do the job better." It is the same story with health care in Canada. Nobody except the far-right wanted two-tier health care even ten years ago. Even Stockwell Day had to assure everybody that wasn't his agenda. Ten years of underfunding later, the health care system is in crisis and people are, rightly, demanding better, so advocates for an increased role for private health care step up with their solution. It has happened in other countries too. There is an established pattern. First, the public system is underfunded, then it is used as an argument for why the private sector could do better. Are you still in school? If the ADQ has their way, tuition fees will skyrocket. Not just increase. They will more than triple, I will bet money on it. Will a good education still be cheaper in Quebec than in, say, the United States? Of course, but the question is, where should the money for a good education system come from? I don't think it should come from students. The other questions are, will a tuition increase mean way more student debt and will it mean some people will not end up going to post-secondary education? Yes to both.

The ADQ are one of the farthest-right parties in Canada. Mario Dumont's cheap populism aside, he's a doctrinaire conservative, right up there with Harper and Sarkozy. Hey, let's allow more private money in the health care system - those with money should be able to buy anything, right? Hey, let's quit being so accomodating to immigrants - they should assimilate, right? Hey, let's make it easier to fire employees and harder to unionize - we're all businesspeople aren't we? Hey, let's raise tuition fees - who cares about inequality anyway, right? Let's "get tough on crime" with longer sentences and harsher prisons - who cares if it doesn't actually reduce crime, right? Right guys? Quebec is a more socially liberal place so the ADQ keeps a lid on its social conservatives, but they do exist in the party. You know, like the Reform party had its share of crazy bigots. The party always distanced itself from them, but the fact is it attracted those types for a reason. The ADQ appeals to reactionary sentiment in Quebec. And yes, they're right now benefitting from extreme disarray on the left and in the PQ to present themselves as the alternative to the Liberals. Other nutjob ideas of theirs include a directly elected head of government (presidentialism or semi-presidentialism) and abolishing school boards. Incidently, the left lost the election, badly. The PQ is demoralized and possibly a spent force, while the Liberals have rallied even more tightly around Charest and the minority situation will force the Liberals to lean even further to the right to secure the ADQ's support.

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/ne...t_id=1002690071

When you consider how much more civilized we have got in just the last two hundred years...we've abolished slavery, women can vote, the poor can vote, we have universal health care, women have control over their own bodies, same-sex couples can marry...I don't know why you guys have such a pessimistic view of human nature. A hundred years ago a trade union was a criminal organization, to stand up and demand worker rights, a criminal act.

I didn't like the anti-tax angle they approached the problem from (and I'm an anarchist), but I'm not surprised that Americans would have such hostility towards their own federal government. People who use the term "fascist" are always accused of hyperbole but I think it's accurate.

Liberals span the centre-left to the centre-right. Conservatives span the centre-right to the far right.