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[ded_maxim]

"So you talk about mobs and the working classes as if they were the question. You've got that eternal idiotic idea that if anarchy came it would come from the poor. Why should it? the poor have been rebels, but they have never been anarchists; they have more interest than anyone else in there being some decent government. The poor man really has a stake in the country. The rich man hasn't; he can go away to New Guinea in a yacht. The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all. Aristocrats were always anarchists, as you can see from the barons' wars."

-- G.K. Chesterton, The Man Who Was Thursday

Comments

[ygam.livejournal.com]

Хорошая книжка! Там еще джеймсбондовское кресло со спуском в подвал.

[ded-maxim.livejournal.com]

Кресло замечательное, ага. Там еще анархисты угощали Сайма омарами под майонезом.

[meshko.livejournal.com]

О, вот на омарах я и бросил. Что, стоит дочитать?

[wsobchak.livejournal.com]

>the poor have been rebels, but they have never been anarchists;

say what? I guess Nesto Mahno was a Ukrainian oil baron.

>The poor man really has a stake in the country. The rich man hasn't; he can go away to New Guinea in a yacht.

everything West of the Appalachians has been settled as a result of the poor pulling up that stake and getting the hell away from government. The rich stayed in the Northeast and South. And why the fuck would anybody want to go to New Guinea?

>The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all. Aristocrats were always anarchists, as you can see from the barons' wars.

No, the rich have always wished to be governed (if they themselves couldn't govern) by people close to themselves in blood and tribal alliance. The poor have never even had that option on the horizon.

[ded-maxim.livejournal.com]

say what? I guess Nesto Mahno was a Ukrainian oil baron.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Territory_(Ukraine)#Development_and_characteristics
The Makhnovists said they supported "free worker-peasant soviets" and opposed the central government, which was elected by the soviets. Makhno called the Bolsheviks dictators and opposed the "Cheka [secret police]... and similar compulsory authoritative and disciplinary institutions" and called for "[f]reedom of speech, press, assembly, unions and the like". In practice, the Makhnovist government was similar to a republic over the area they controlled. According to anarchist historian Paul Avrich, the Makhnovists "'voluntary mobilization'... in reality meant outright conscription, as all able-bodied men were required to serve when called up" and summary execution was used in military discipline.

And why the fuck would anybody want to go to New Guinea?

Don't be so literal, man. It's not the exact place that matters, it's the mindset. Ever heard of the Six Flags Theory (http://www.byebyebigbrother.com/pt_six_flags_theory.php)? Also look up when the book was written.

[wsobchak.livejournal.com]

Mahno was as anarchist as it gets in reality, and he was poor as poor gets. This pretty much disproves Chesterton's thesis. The fact that in order to preserve his state he had to resort to some coercion has nothing to do with anything-any anarchist will find the same, unless of course his anarchy remains purely academic.

I'm aware that New Guinea is being used as a representation of any far-away place and that Chesterton is saying that wealth makes people cosmopolitan. Maybe so, maybe no-most countries' elites stay at home for the most part, no matter how shitty those countries are. Bottom line is, when given the chance, the poor of Europe got as far away from government and as close to anarchy as possible. Look at Daniel Boone and his time.

[(Anonymous)]

everything West of the Appalachians has been settled as a result of the poor pulling up that stake and getting the hell away from government. The rich stayed in the Northeast and South.

the poor that can have more land they can possibly use just by riding 100 miles to the west is not the poor Chesterton is talking about

the option of "getting the hell away from government" is only available when there's a large empty space to go to
colonization of Americas is an exception in human history, not a rule
in the last 1000 years people had that option only a few (and short) times

[wsobchak.livejournal.com]

the poor I'm talking about and the poor Chesterton's talking about really differ only in location. The fact that the anarchy option has only rarely been available to the poor has no bearing on their predisposition towards it, which is undeniable. Bottom line, governmental coercion is that much less fun when you're exclusively its subject.

not that I personally give too much of a shit about "the poor" as some monolithic entity

[(Anonymous)]

their predisposition towards it, which is undeniable

well doh, everyone's first choice is to live by yourself on 10000 acres of fertile land
but when that option is not available, ppl in general prefer to have a government to oversee their neighbors

if the poor have predisposition to anarchy, and the rich do too, why is it so rare? the only real examples come from frontier societies like Iceland, where 1, the resources are much more abundant and 2, most of the population are young males ie not a random sample by far

[wsobchak.livejournal.com]

how about to scrape out a living in wilderness, surrounded by Indians, with no access to modern medicine and at the mercy of the elements? Is that everyone's first choice, too?

anarchy is so rare because: 1) the rich aren't predisposed to it, and neither is most of the middle class, 2) it takes serious balls to live in an anarchical society, 3) as prosperity comes, it breeds governance through the inkspot theory 4) coercion breeds coercion-Mahno wound up being forced to use some of the same methods he hated just to keep his state from being eaten alive. For all that, there are at least two steady-state anarchic societies I can think of which have been in existence for thousands of years-the Bedu and the Pashtuns. Hopefully you won't argue that it's because of the incredible wealth of the Rub Al Khali and Helmand province.