Is Aggressive Society Good?

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
81

I wrote this in another thread. And I STILL HAVEN’T FOUND THE DAMN DOCUMENTARY!!! haha!!

"The state emerged AFTER civilisation. There has to be civilisation before a state can develop.
Mankind evolved from hunter-gatherers to farmers which lead to specialisation which led to trade.
With trade came the neccesity of writing. All this occured without a state.

In archeological digs in Mesopotamia they found villages without a social hierarchy ( i saw this on tv so unfortunaly i can’t give you a link)
No building more important then the other, no palaces or no temples.

The explanation the archeologist came up with is that is was an egalitarian society without big differences in status or wealth.So the obscene aquisition of wealth and power was froned upon.

That might be true but that tells us something more. The state is not neccesery for civisation and civilisation predates the state.

Perhaps it’s because these guys are funded by the state that they are pissing around the pot (dutch version of the expression beating around the bush). Their great discovery was that the initial rise of civilisation occurred in anarchy. Because enormous wealth and power were considered bad, it was regulated as people regulate what they consider bad behaviour."

82

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:

[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:

Every civil need of society was created by the market first before the State came along and usurped it as a monopoly privilege.[/quote]

Is that a fact? Well then, point me to this historical era where the market was providing these civil goods first in the absence of a state - as you flatly contend here - and then show where, in the historical timeline, that darn state “usurps” it.

Can’t wait for your answer.[/quote]

The state isn’t exactly creative either.
Can you give me some examples of discoveries that the state made?
I mean goverment employees, not companies who were hired by the state.
Then make a list of discoveries made by anything which is privatly owned.

83

liftic you are flattly wrong. the state existed before the market ( with market we do talk about
a trade system with money right? )

before the state came about in mespotamia. people where farmers and they had a trading system, but it
was a gift system. The one person in an humanrelationship who gave the most and biggest gifts gained status
over the person who received them. (kinda like the birthdaygift system in among the hobbits in LOTR).
This men who where able to give the best gifts, where called big men. This system is the beginning of
the patron - client system that have lived on, and still thus in some way.

after the state cameabout money where born after some time. money also called capital, is called that because
alexander the great, had his head carved in on the coins. the system where actually created to make him
and the state more popular. ironic or what liftic, when you think about anarchocapitalists.

anarchist societys in the stoneage where very socialistic in nature. people lived in groups and the group
was a very importent consept for them. so pre-state cultures did not even have privat property. privat property is actually a quit new invention when you consider have long humans( homo sapiens ) have existed. maybe 5% of our existence have we had the concept of privat property.

on civilation topic. I do believe that if a culture should be defined as an civilation it must have
written language. I do believe that this came about at the same time the state did, but it doesnt exclude
an state-less civilation, because we do have the knowledge to create that know.

end of rant :stuck_out_tongue:

84

[quote]florelius wrote:
anarchist societys in the stoneage where very socialistic in nature.[/quote]

Really? You know this how exactly? Please provide documentation of this.

85

What does Social Democracy, Republicanism and Anarchism have in common?

They all end in Ochlocracy and the annihilation of the host civilization.

86

[quote]Grandgousier wrote:
What does Social Democracy, Republicanism and Anarchism have in common?

They all end in Ochlocracy and the annihilation of the host civilization.[/quote]

If civilization is born out of a peaceful and cooperative society and anarchism is the idea that people should be free to choose their own associations which ultimately must lead to peaceful, cooperative society then how does it end up in mob rule?

There has never before in the history of mankind been anything closer to mob rule than social democracy – the modern day state.

87

[quote]Dabba wrote:

[quote]florelius wrote:
anarchist societys in the stoneage where very socialistic in nature.[/quote]

Really? You know this how exactly? Please provide documentation of this.

[/quote]

I can provide documentation tomorow, but now I am going to sleep because there is
night here where I am.

but as I sad before, they had common property or squatting ( not squat as in training:P)
in the stone age. well the core of socialisme is the abolishment of privat property, and
common ownership over the means of production. why I guess you get confused is because people
lived in small groups and there was not state at this time, and I guess you think of socialisme
as “das folkstat” a big superstate that owns everything, and yes thats a form of socialisme, but
so is also a stateless societys consisting of small indipendent communitys with common ownership of the means of production, as in the stoneage.

88

[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
If civilization is born out of a peaceful and cooperative society…[/quote]
Whoa, let’s stop and reconsider this. Civilization and the ‘Civilizing State’(A Monarchical state and a powerful aristocracy, as opposed to the vulgarizing Democratic/Republican State) were both born out of coercion, in tandem. If you have any evidence of civilization emerging or even enhancing without a Civilizing State, I’d like to see it. And if you point to America, I remind you that Americans were most civilized when they first left Monarchy and have been getting progressively more apish ever since. When the American State decided to do away with the quasi-aristocracy of the founders by extending franchise to the masses, it signed Civilization’s death warrant.

All forms of democratic government are nothing more than the monkeys running the circus. And I can’t help but see an even more rapid coarsening of culture under anarchism, it’s difficult to judge anarchism though when there are so few examples.

[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
… and anarchism is the idea that people should be free to choose their own associations which ultimately must lead to peaceful, cooperative society then how does it end up in mob rule?[/quote]
Read National Geographic magazine if you want to see free association.

[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:
There has never before in the history of mankind been anything closer to mob rule than social democracy – the modern day state.[/quote]
Anarchism might fix that. But seriously, I would very much like to see anarchism tried out, if only for intellectual curiousity. Just not near me.

89

This is a very good book about the nature of the common man.

90

[quote]florelius wrote:
I can provide documentation tomorow, but now I am going to sleep because there is
night here where I am.

but as I sad before, they had common property or squatting ( not squat as in training:P)
in the stone age. well the core of socialisme is the abolishment of privat property, and
common ownership over the means of production. why I guess you get confused is because people
lived in small groups and there was not state at this time, and I guess you think of socialisme
as “das folkstat” a big superstate that owns everything, and yes thats a form of socialisme, but
so is also a stateless societys consisting of small indipendent communitys with common ownership of the means of production, as in the stoneage.
[/quote]

Whoa, whoa don’t assume that I have the standard view of socialism, bud. Look, I think any sort of modern human attempt to say that we had socialism in the stone age is kind of a joke because we really don’t know what society was like back then. And it is hardly socialism in the Marxian sense. Doesn’t Marxism require capitalism as a prerequisite before socialism or am I misunderstanding it? Unless you’re going for the broad definition. But in that case, if it was voluntary exchange between individuals and no geographical monopoly (state) existed, then I would also call it a free market :).

91

[quote]Dabba wrote:

[quote]florelius wrote:
I can provide documentation tomorow, but now I am going to sleep because there is
night here where I am.

but as I sad before, they had common property or squatting ( not squat as in training:P)
in the stone age. well the core of socialisme is the abolishment of privat property, and
common ownership over the means of production. why I guess you get confused is because people
lived in small groups and there was not state at this time, and I guess you think of socialisme
as “das folkstat” a big superstate that owns everything, and yes thats a form of socialisme, but
so is also a stateless societys consisting of small indipendent communitys with common ownership of the means of production, as in the stoneage.
[/quote]

Whoa, whoa don’t assume that I have the standard view of socialism, bud. Look, I think any sort of modern human attempt to say that we had socialism in the stone age is kind of a joke because we really don’t know what society was like back then. And it is hardly socialism in the Marxian sense. Doesn’t Marxism require capitalism as a prerequisite before socialism or am I misunderstanding it? Unless you’re going for the broad definition. But in that case, if it was voluntary exchange between individuals and no geographical monopoly (state) existed, then I would also call it a free market :).
[/quote]

yes its socialisme in a broad sence. a better word to describe this pre-state societys would be
that they where collectivistic.

free market would be a bad way to describe them, do you think that the womans in a tribe had to buy
the meat from the men who where hunting?

92

[quote]Grandgousier wrote:

Anarchism might fix that. But seriously, I would very much like to see anarchism tried out, if only for intellectual curiousity. Just not near me.[/quote]

X2

93

[quote]florelius wrote:

[quote]Dabba wrote:

[quote]florelius wrote:
I can provide documentation tomorow, but now I am going to sleep because there is
night here where I am.

but as I sad before, they had common property or squatting ( not squat as in training:P)
in the stone age. well the core of socialisme is the abolishment of privat property, and
common ownership over the means of production. why I guess you get confused is because people
lived in small groups and there was not state at this time, and I guess you think of socialisme
as “das folkstat” a big superstate that owns everything, and yes thats a form of socialisme, but
so is also a stateless societys consisting of small indipendent communitys with common ownership of the means of production, as in the stoneage.
[/quote]

Whoa, whoa don’t assume that I have the standard view of socialism, bud. Look, I think any sort of modern human attempt to say that we had socialism in the stone age is kind of a joke because we really don’t know what society was like back then. And it is hardly socialism in the Marxian sense. Doesn’t Marxism require capitalism as a prerequisite before socialism or am I misunderstanding it? Unless you’re going for the broad definition. But in that case, if it was voluntary exchange between individuals and no geographical monopoly (state) existed, then I would also call it a free market :).
[/quote]

yes its socialisme in a broad sence. a better word to describe this pre-state societys would be
that they where collectivistic.

free market would be a bad way to describe them, do you think that the womans in a tribe had to buy
the meat from the men who where hunting?
[/quote]

Of course. In a world of scarcity, there had to be some way of obtaining it and some way to economize. Either the group was forced to give up their belongings to everyone else by some entity, they voluntarily chose to exchange goods, or they used force and coercion to take goods from other people. When I say a free market, generally speaking I mean voluntary exchange between individuals. So, in that sense they may indeed have lived in a free market.

You see the problem though, right? There is no point in describing what economic system these people lived in. They didn’t clearly live in any economic system. Beyond that, it doesn’t even really matter how they lived. What may work for groups of 500 people tens of thousands of years ago may not work for societies nowadays. It’s laughable that you’re even trying to justify socialism by saying that cavemen lived in a socialist society. In any event, I believe Lifty’s point was that voluntary exchange predates the state, and that no state decree created money. Money became useful as a medium of exchange due to the inefficiency of the more basic “I trade one apple for your orange” system.

94

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:

[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:

Every civil need of society was created by the market first before the State came along and usurped it as a monopoly privilege.[/quote]

Is that a fact? Well then, point me to this historical era where the market was providing these civil goods first in the absence of a state - as you flatly contend here - and then show where, in the historical timeline, that darn state “usurps” it.

Can’t wait for your answer.[/quote]

Lifticus, see above - still waiting on your answer. Looking forward to it.

95

I don’t need to show you anything. It’s logic and you do not get it.

Civilization created the state and not the other way around.

96

[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:

I don’t need to show you anything. It’s logic and you do not get it.

Civilization created the state and not the other way around.[/quote]

That’s not what you said - you said “voluntarism” provided all sorts of civic goods through the “private” sector. Here’s your list, Einstein:

[i]Feeding the poor

Educating the poor

Healing the poor

private courts

private security

and many other private charities for that matter

Every civil need of society was created by the market first before the State came along and usurped it as a monopoly privilege. [/i]

So, show me where these civic goods - ‘private courts’ is an excellent place to start - where first provided by “the market” - you know, through the exchange mechanism of private property governed by prices and supply and demand - but then was usurped by “the state”.

I do appreciate your clumsy attempt to introduce a red herring, though, and I probably would too if I were you - but just provide evidence of the claims you made and it’ll be a hootennany, because, after all, you do have evidence of your claim, right?

97

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:

So, show me where these civic goods - ‘private courts’ [/quote]

You ever heard of tribalism?

I cannot show you where in history this happened. Google it! I am sure you will find a ton of competing scholars whom all disagree on the subject.

Logically, tribal societies understood the necessity for justice. There was no State that came in and told them how they should uphold it. Not only this there were many separate clans within ethnic societies that exercised their own rights to justice and some of them even differently – I think Macedonia and Mesopotamia were at least two in history that did.

Besides this, when I said “private” I wasn’t implying they were for profit (I am not sure if that is where our disconnect lies) I was merely using this in contrast with state ownership. For profit courts couldn’t have happened until much later after a trade based economy was developed and the notion of profit was learned.

Naturally, the State tate cannot develop without civilization first. Civilization requires only that people are free to associate how they wish – justice has to be a part of this process or it will never get started.

98

[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:

So, show me where these civic goods - ‘private courts’ [/quote]

You ever heard of tribalism?

I cannot show you where in history this happened. Google it! I am sure you will find a ton of competing scholars whom all disagree on the subject.

Logically, tribal societies understood the necessity for justice. There was no State that came in and told them how they should uphold it. Not only this there were many separate clans within ethnic societies that exercised their own rights to justice and some of them even differently – I think Macedonia and Mesopotamia were at least two in history that did.

Besides this, when I said “private” I wasn’t implying they were for profit (I am not sure if that is where our disconnect lies) I was merely using this in contrast with state ownership. For profit courts couldn’t have happened until much later after a trade based economy was developed and the notion of profit was learned.

Naturally, the State tate cannot develop without civilization first. Civilization requires only that people are free to associate how they wish – justice has to be a part of this process or it will never get started.[/quote]

Gee! I thought justice was one of those things you could not see or feel and it was therefore of no importance whatsoever to you. (See “What kind of libertarian are you?” By L. Maximus)
One of us is mortally confused.

99

Justice is in reference to property.

100

[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:

You ever heard of tribalism?[/quote]

Yes, and their civic goods were not provided by “private” entities contracted for in a market system. So, still waiting on your evidence.

Of course you can’t - it’s just another one of your horseshit claims that finds you dithering like an idiot to defend after you hit “submit”.

You are only proving that there is yet one more subject you are are guilty of ignorance. These primitive tribes “exercised their own rights” through their own state, not through a private market. “States”, as it were, are both large and small - it is what a state is, not how big it is, that determines whether it has the character of a “state” or not.

These societies very much had a “state” and the kind that you least liked - the rule of law was tethered to divinity and religious power, not any sort of principle based on protection of property interests.

I think it is in your best interest to simply stop making up completely bogus and absurd facts and attempting to pass them off as legitimate.

You said it was provided by a market, not merely private. Ever more dissembling, aye? Your distinction on “profit” is irrelevant - there were no “private” courts, profit or not.

This is just your typical hot gas and another red herring - you didn’t say civilization came first…you said developed civic goods came from the market first.

At this point, how about you just say “hey, I just made all that up because it fits with my anarchist narrative - I had no idea anyone would challenge me on the veracity of it. I made it up - busted!”…?