shadowsonawall @shadowsonawall@qoto.org

@RLetot @RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @graphite @passenger we actually agree here more than it probably seems. I do not like the current socioeconomic realities, at all. I also believe the suggested alternatives, thus far, to be too naive to be actionable/applicable as a solution. My point has been to attempt to bring that to light in hopes that more people will spend their time and effort imagining socioeconomic options that might work to meaningly effect the broken and sad reality that is the "current" world.

@RLetot @RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @graphite @passenger semantically accurate, true enough!
I don't know the history of every/really any small tribe based cultures in the Americas. I fully believe that many/most were approximately as effective as the bushmen at maintaining a very envious level of egalitarianism. I do know that the larger civilizations of the Americas were as violent and exploitative as one would, sadly, expect. Europe most certainly did not introduce war/slavery/abuse/etc. Europe was arguably better at it but that's really neither here nor there.

@RLetot @RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @graphite @passenger Ahh, my mistake. What would the difference be between Athen's mechanisms and the similarly undermined laws and mechanisms in the United States?

@RLetot @RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @graphite @passenger 'countless' is disingenuous but there are certainly a number of cultures where centralization was very limited/rare. The Juǀʼhoansi come to mind, probably the longest lived example of such. Generically "bushman" cultures could be argued to be the most successful in history and many/most would fall into the category of limited/rare centralization. The problem is scale. The "modern" world requires a large number of people to be working together to provide things like roads/water/sewage/etc. Once you have to coordinate beyond a tribe or two worth of people, the internal disagreements and politics spill over into external ones and our baser instincts haven't successfully been neutralized at those scales (hopefully yet).

You point to Athens as an example of a larger society which has done so. As you'll find with any larger society, they are an extremely poor example of anything resembling the above. The thirty tyrants come to mind or the fact that they were violent bullies to all of the cultures surrounding them. Honestly, Athens was a pretty disgusting culture relative to egalitarian standards.

@Radical_EgoCom @passenger @RD4Anarchy @CatDragon @graphite The best I can offer at this point is to hope that you never run into a situation calling this to question. Good luck with the anarchism.

@Radical_EgoCom @passenger @RD4Anarchy @CatDragon @graphite without hierarchy or centralization, how would you propose Ukrainians prevent Putin's army from taking their farms?

@passenger @RD4Anarchy @CatDragon @Radical_EgoCom @graphite I suppose more directly: how do you convince Putin to cede his power and allow his legacy (his perception of it, the only reality that matters in this instance) to be dismantled as the state ceases to exist? Without that answer, things like Ukraine will continue to happen indefinitely. So long as things like Ukraine continue to happen, people will want protection. So long as people want protection, others will be given power to protect them. And then we have power to abuse.

@passenger @RD4Anarchy @CatDragon @Radical_EgoCom @graphite I will admit, I do not understand how you can "not have power lying around for harmful people to grab" and resist the powerful people who are going to take the things you do have.

@RD4Anarchy @CatDragon @Radical_EgoCom @graphite @passenger If I had a good conclusion, I'd have been pushing that from the beginning. You seem to be passionate about this problem space. That's amazing, humanity could use as many smart passionate people thinking about these problems as possible. Your efforts are entirely wasted, however, if you don't take into consideration the darker side of humanity. We as a species don't have a history of war and brutality on accident. The uncomfortable, arguably evil, tendencies of our species need to be accounted for in any successful socioeconomic solution. In particular, the tendency for individuals to take what they want because they can. This shows up as corruption, war, famine, even interpersonal abuse.

@HeavenlyPossum
"Why would communism be incompatible with your selfishness?"
> Because I am a vile creature and am willing to let others suffer when doing so increases the likelihood that myself and those I care about, in an intimate personal sense, will not.

"Poverty is a social relationship, not material deprivation, and is in no sense universal or permanent."
> But acutely present and not something I've yet heard a way to actually deal with, given that I'm not particularly unique in the above.

@RD4Anarchy @passenger @graphite @happycoyote12 @Radical_EgoCom

@HeavenlyPossum @RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @graphite @passenger
@happycoyote12
No doubt I probably do perform communism in my daily life with total strangers but, and apologies Coyote (he has a reply asking for personal funding if you are interested), I won't be in what is a critical need from a stranger. I have to live with my own selfishness, distasteful as it may be, as I try to make decisions that will most benefit me and my own. Offensive as it may be personally, though a hell of a mic drop Coyote, "the poor will always be among us" is a reality we must all navigate.

@foolishowl @RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @passenger I truly do love the idea. I believe that is exactly what the early christians attempted to do. Without changing the playbook, I fear the strategy will face a similar fate.

@HeavenlyPossum @passenger @RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @graphite 'family' may have been the wrong word, apologies. Tribes, maybe? Think of the hardcore MAGA crowd in the united states. They are a tribe acting selfishly and for their own benefit, crushing any who stand in the way of that. They are also comfortable cutting anyone out of the tribe should that individual act against the dictated presets of the tribe. This is human, this is an actionable transition. I personally don't like where it's going but it is the kind of mechanism I was thinking of.

@MothWaves @7331 @Radical_EgoCom @RD4Anarchy @graphite @passenger I could not agree more: we can (should) do our best to improve the world. It's why I brought my thoughts to the discussion. If we are to improve society, we need to identify concrete actionable steps towards transitions which will transform society in the right direction. "Everybody stops doing what they're doing and accepts <xyz>" isn't, unfortunately.

@HeavenlyPossum @passenger @RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @graphite I totally agree: we are all both selfish and egalitarian. Egalitarian when it comes to "our family" (loosely defined), selfish when it comes to those outside it. The result of those pressures is well, history. And it's not particularly pretty :(

@Radical_EgoCom @RD4Anarchy @graphite @passenger I wish you, all of us, luck with that transition strategy.

@MothWaves @7331 @Radical_EgoCom @RD4Anarchy @graphite @passenger end of the day, might will always make right. Sadly

@Radical_EgoCom @RD4Anarchy @graphite @passenger Let's say that the issue is in transition, how would one transition to an ideal Communist society "immediately" and without some kind of transition?

@Radical_EgoCom @RD4Anarchy @graphite @passenger I believe the tension is about how prevalent evil/selfishness is in the human experience. I can respect that you believe it is small relative to the whole. I disagree. I'll leave you with one last thought: do you believe that this type of system is unique to today's imagination? If not, why did it fail in the past? How could we prevent it from failing in similar ways going forward?

@RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @graphite @passenger I'm not trying to act in bad faith. I'm trying to help you understand the limits of what you are advocating for. We don't have to continue the discussion but if you do think about it further understand that evil isn't always about the environment/system people are in. There are a ton of people who are naturally selfish, plenty who naturally believe they are superior to others. That's a reality of our tribal biology and it has played out throughout history under every yet conceived economic system to one end: people crushing other people for their own benefit.