1 killed, 4 wounded in shooting in Copenhagen's Christiania neighborhood, police in Denmark say

https://lemmy.world/post/3930150

TIL about the Christiana commune. Interesting!

I love that story! I tell it every time someone tries to sell me on anarchism.

Christiana was an old military complex that the government gave up on, so anarchist squatters moved in.

Soon they realized, that they needed some way to decide matters that concerned everyone. So they formed small councils, and in these councils they each chose some people to represent them in one big council. These people weren’t elected politicians, just people chosen to represent them. They then voted on issues, and no, that wasn’t a form of democracy. It’s still anarchism.

Then then realized, that the upkeep of common areas and infrastructure costs money, so they required that everyone paid their share. That obviously weren’t taxes. Just mandatory contributions.

When organized crime started to spread, they decided on some mandatory rules (you read right: these weren’t laws, just mandatory rules that you had to keep if you didn’t want to face punishment). Then they chose some strong men that should make sure the rules were followed. No, not police men. Just concerned strong men.

They worked together with Kopenhagen’s police. Basically, they’d call the cops and then drag the offenders outside of Christiania to the waiting cops.

Part of the rules were that it wasn’t allowed to consume hard drugs or to wear motor cycle gang attire.

So in the end, they had no politicians, no government, no taxes and no police force. Just things that where basically identical to these things. The only thing they really don’t have is a prison, because they outsourced that to Kopenhagen.

Anarchism directly leads to a form of government, no matter how you call it.

If you want an opposite example, how anarchism lead to an anarcho-capitalistic nightmare, where the community decended into a rule by organized crime, google the Kowloon Walled City. It’s equally interesting.

The people who generally want to destroy a system and rebuild anew are usually clueless or have an ulterior motive.

While we are nowhere near the best we could be, we are also nowhere near the worst we have been in the past. Today is the result of an endless amount of people putting their effort, and often their lives, into improving society. This fight never ends.

The people who generally want to destroy a system and rebuild anew are usually clueless or have an ulterior motive.

It's worth noting that "destroy and rebuild anew" is a point of contention among anarchists. Some of us favor a revolutionary approach, but some (myself included) favor an "evolutionary" approach instead. Same end goal, just achieved through steady incremental change, rather than a big upheaval.

In practice though, success likely wouldn't fall cleanly into either category. There'd be incremental change punctuated by occasional (smaller) upheavals. But I guess all social change happens like that, really.

So all revolutionaries are either clueless or deceptive but all reformists are philanthropists who dedicate their entire lives to the improvement of society? Fucking please

How incredibly naive and cynical, both at the same time

In terms of the current systems we have in the west, yes. In terms of older revolutions no. It wasn’t intended to be a universal statement.

And I said generally. Not absolutely as your ‘all’ implies. The anchor for what I consider a person with excellent ideas is MLK, to give you idea.

But you’re welcome to think of me as a moron if it helps you fulfil your outrage needs. Sleeping well at night is important.