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What's Wrong With Capitalism? Contrapoints

Discussion in 'General political debates' started by 1xAntifa, Dec 5, 2019.

  1. 1xAntifa

    1xAntifa Experienced Member Uploader Experienced member


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    Nov 22, 2019
    Victoria, Australia  Australia


    Makes some very cogent points. What are our plans for an anarchist society beyond the platitudes? How do we organise? what about healthcare that needs expensive diagnostic equipment and highly trained specialists? How can we counter nazi/fascist enclaves? what would be our policies on policing and self defence? economics? We need to be thinking about this kinda boring nuts and bolts stuff. Just what is it we have in mind? Please discuss.
     
    kyledewolf85 likes this.

  2. Anarchowithoutcapitalism

    Anarchowithoutcapitalism Active Member Forum Member


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  3. delirio punk

    delirio punk Active Member Forum Member


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    An anarchist society would modify social threads so profoundly that to denote it as a general plan would be impossible. For example, huge communities with no identity like cities now a days would have to be modified.

    If you like, look back at indigenous communities, in those roots you will understand what capitalism really is and what needs to be modified.

    Health care as you see it for example, is based on a sick society, that eats sick food and has sick habits, that is why we become sick and need health care. Of course am not against scientific investigation and medical discoveries, but the objective of such research would differ in an anarchist society and a capitalist society.

    I believe we also, as anarchist must embrace death when it comes, this also must be modified from present society vs. anarchist society. Apparently, you would assume that the longer you live means better health care, but that is not necessarily the truth. If you have no money, you have no health care, even if the technology exists to cure you. That is because in a capitalist society the medical research´s objective is to get the researcher a costly car, get the owner of the company a patent to increase capital and power over people, and ultimately offer a service to other wealthy people.

    I believe that an anarchist medical research should focus on medicine that can be acquired by all. For example, good quality food, medicinal plants, homemade preparations.


    I know that my ideas seem vague but I think they will generate discussion and maybe we can all answer together what capitalism really is and why it is contrary to anarchism, also, how we could organize after the fall of the system, and even meanwhile.
     
  4. delirio punk

    delirio punk Active Member Forum Member


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    Bakunin espoused the notion of a secret revolutionary organization that would “help the people towards self–determination, without the least interference from any sort of domination, even if it be temporary or transitional”
     
  5. kyledewolf85

    kyledewolf85 Member New Member


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    My wife struggles with chronic illness and she has undergone multiple surgeries and requires pharmaceuticals. So I am fairly skeptical of homegrown DIY medicine and embracing death. Nor do I see what that has to do with anarchism per se unless you assume that modern medicine would be impossible without capitalism and without the state.

    I believe that we could still have professionally trained doctors and nurses, hospitals and clinics, modern medicine, and modern science and technology under anarchism. With the elimination of the profit motive and the distribution of services according to need, it would not bankrupt people either. It boils down to economies of scale. It is obvious that a large group of people would have to pool their resources to make it possible. However, I believe that the very need for healthcare would drive people to organize and build it without external compulsion.

    The only idea we would have to sacrifice is that of an amateur society where people rotate in and out of jobs every two weeks. Jobs that require a lot more education and experience, such as brain surgery, are best not performed by amateurs. The fetishization of job rotation seen among some anarchists is fine for menial tasks and unskilled labor, but there is still going to be a need for high-stakes jobs where we want people who have dedicated their lives to the mastery of a particular set of skills.

    As far as medical regulation is concerned, medieval guilds policed their own members, and there was a process of initiation whereby a person went from being an apprentice to a journeyman to a master. In the absence of a state, there could still be medical associations to ensure high-quality care, and people could still protect themselves from quacks and snake-oil salesmen by going to doctors and pharmacists licensed by reputable associations.
     
    delirio punk likes this.
  6. Gaffen

    Gaffen Member Forum Member


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    Here's my hot take:

    Anarchy, by dint of its nature, can't be planned for. At least not at scale. All we can do is seek our own self-determination as thoroughly as possible, and attempt to help others who are similarly interested. This is why I love the radical potential of the covid mutual aid groups.

    I'm not sure anarchy exists to provide an alternative to these big systems so much as it exists in spite of them. In this sense, the strength of... Systemic anarchy? Would rely on the resilience of the networks we build; the ability to talk directly to eachother, and to relay that information to the parties that need it.

    A lot of this reminds me of something I saw shared on an IRC channel I'm a member of (I haven't read all of this massive thread either, but it seems pretty relevant to the discussion).

    Without a doubt, the organised resources that state or capitalist structures provide for us have value - but I feel like, whatever an 'anarchist solution' to that looks like, would be so fundamentally different to what we have now, and so reliant on responding to pressures that come from its' implementation, that it is almost impossible to imagine them now.

    I don't think I'm entirely convinced with this implementation, but if we were to take seriously the question 'how does anarchy scale?' I think this is at least an interesting attempt to answer that question.
     

9 members have read this thread this month

  1. delirio punk
  2. punkmar77
  3. Abdul-Hadi
  4. Red Menace
  5. CULTO DEL CARGO
  6. Gaffen
  7. kyledewolf85
  8. clink
  9. Anarchowithoutcapitalism
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