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> Anarchists, in the "headless governance" meaning of the term. Distributed decision making without representatives. which is the same as libertarianism, since

• willnonya 4y ago
  That's not true at all.
  • iopq 4y ago
    Thanks for that argument, you've changed my mind and now I believe the opposite of what I believed
• jltsiren 4y ago
  Anarchists tend to oppose all kinds of power and authority. Governments, leaders, rich people, corporations, political parties, thought leaders, and so on are all inherently suspicious. From an anarchist point of view, the society should try to limit what those authorities can do with their power.
  • iopq 4y ago
    This sounds exactly like a libertarian to me. Don't make laws against Google, I will just avoid using Google myself. You can't use coercive power of the government to reduce the power of corporations, since now you are just creating an entity that is more powerful that has power over other entities. This is what happened in China where the corporations are just another branch of the government and have to do what the government tells them. I live in China and it's not a leftist paradise. It's a right wing shithole where rights of LGBT people are based on the whims of whoever is in power.
    • jltsiren 4y ago
      The difference is that libertarianism focuses on the form, while anarchism is more about the outcomes. Libertarians talk about states and governments and regulations, while anarchists oppose influence of any kind. Assume that there is, in a utopian libertarian society, a corporation that has grown big and successful by providing goods and services people buy voluntarily. Anarchists think that corporation is the problem. If you got rich by founding the corporation, you are also the problem. And if many people listen to me because I speak against the corporation, I am also the problem. Libertarianism is about giving individuals maximal freedom to do whatever they want, as long as it doesn't violate other people's liberties. Anarchism is about opposing excessive influence people have over other people, regardless of how they gained that influence.
      • iopq 4y ago
        If the corporation is still giving a good service then libertarians like it. If it acts as a monopolist, then libertarians would dislike it and look for alternatives in the free market. That's why libertarians want a free market, to be able to do that when there's natural monopolies. If you use the government to split up the big corporation, you're not an anarchist.
    • pksebben 4y ago
      which would be fine, if it weren't for the fact that FAANG companies have a massive lobbying spend. The issue is that some systems are invasive. If we don't make any collective decision to restrict some behaviors (like lobbying) all the (legal) freedom in the world is meaningless, because the options available have been reduced anyway. If we, say, allow intel to install hardware-based binary signature checking, it doesn't matter how legal it is to run X piece of software, cause where the hell are you gonna run it? The primary argument I hear against this thinking is "so the market will correct because you can just buy elsewhere". Free markets have been the norm for a while now, and it's not gotten better, it's gotten worse. Go out and buy a phone that 1) does all you want it to do and 2) lasts more than 4 years. Have fun with that. There's more than one way to exert control over other people's business, and governance isn't even the biggest offender. Yes, we should keep the government from overreach and it is indeed overreach. But we should also reinstate glass-steagall and drive over K street with a fleet of bulldozers.