An anarchist does not drive on the opposite side of the road just because what side to drive on has a rule. But they might treat a red light as a stop sign when there's little or no traffic.

Like models, rules are never universally right, but some are useful. Good rules are guidelines, that help keep us safe. Not policies to be policed, regardless of the likely outcome.

Following rules because they're rules is recorded in history as "just following orders". We know where that leads.

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A couple of days ago I posted about what being an anarchist means to me. Obviously given the way I defined it, I can't determine what it means for anyone else. A contradiction, yes. But one that holds space for flexible ways of understanding that can better respond to our constantly shifting situations.

One thing my freedoms-based definition didn't address though, was how I apply it to political economy. For example, do I believe that all legitimate anarchist politics is anticapitalist?

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So one thing I want to clarify is that although I see "anarcho-capitalism" as just fascism with better branding (Peter Thiel being an archetypal example of where it leads), I do accept that a person can be right-leaning economically, and still be an anarchist.

But there are limits, beyond which this becomes a contradiction in ways that are universalizing, and inflexible (again think of the neoreactionaries defending the freedom to deny others freedom).

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When people claim that property is an inalienable right - like freedoms of expression or association are - then "property is theft", as Proudhon famously put it. But as long as they accept that property is a social agreement, subject to negotiation and consensus, then "property is freedom" (a lesser known quote from Proudhon).

Having said that, being open to the idea of a place for markets in a free society does *not* make an anarchist right-leaning. It just makes them not a Stalinist.

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@cy
> So markets both cannot exist in a free society and a free society cannot persist with any sort of market in place

David Graeber covered this in Debt, better than I possibly could. If you haven't read that, I recommend you do. If you have, maybe time for a refresh?

But one argument against what you say here is that it's ahistorical. In his book Life Inc. Douglas Rushkoff pointed out that the importation of the tradition of the bazaar into Europe had a profoundly liberating effect.

@light
> I have a hunch that that's not the main freedom that @strypey was aiming for

Yeah, nah. See the clarification thread I just posted.

> more like the means by which we get the more valuable freedoms

It's more the other way around. The freedom to trade, and to make voluntary agreements about how to carry out transactions - whether via Gift Economy, bazaar money (see Life Inc.), credit vouchers, time banking etc - fall out of the more important freedoms, like that of association.

@cy

@cy
> What if those voluntary agreements include trading slaves?

Sorry to be grumpy. But again, you need to read in *context*. In this case, the context is right at the end of that same goddang sentence!

> fall out of the more important freedoms, like that of association

Please explain to me how slave trading is compatible with this?

If I hadn't had such a pleasant chat with you recently about P2P apps, I would be really struggling to assume good faith here.

Now get off my lawn : P

@light

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@cy
> I just think we've followed different lines of reasoning, so much that I'm arguing in bad faith.

... aaaaand you're still doing it. You're talking to me like I'm some Melon Husk fanboy. Rather than someone who's been involved in radical left politics since the 1990s;

https://disintermedia.net.nz/indymedia-stories-3-rob-and-me/

I'm sure it's not intentional, but this is pretty dang insulting, and you're not the only one who's done it in this thread. So it's really grinding my gears.

@light

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So let me be crystal clear. I stand up for all the rights and freedoms documented in the various UN statements on Human Rights, including the rights of indigenous peoples, the rights of the child, and so on. over the last 50 on universal rights. See my Core Principles here;

https://disintermedia.net.nz/about/

I do not support stockpiling weaponry, see the principle on nonviolence. I have been vegan for over 20 years and do not support lobster dinners. Although I do have a soft spot for lobste.rs.

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> voluntary agreements, where you're agreeing to pay rent to the landlord so that his police don't throw you out on the streets?

Are you fucking serious? Any agreement made under duress - especially that level of duress - is by definition not a voluntary one. Nor is it compatible with any of the aforementioned rights, which includes the right to adequate shelter. Again, this shit is insulting.

It's like asking a vegan whether that really means they support eating humans (no, I don't).