How has your atheism affected your political beliefs?

B166ER
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How has your atheism affected your political beliefs?

I know that personally being a very pro science atheist is completely intertwined with my politics. I most closely identify with Anarcho-Syndicalism, which is at it's core an atheistic philosophy so it goes hand in hand.

But I have met gay republicans and religious anarchists, so I can't say that people are completely without weird contradictions.

But, back to the topic: How has being an atheist affected your politics.

I think it would be interesting to hear about people's opinions on atheism's effect on politics.

A great song by a great band who sum up my political views perfectly.

"This may shock you, but not everything in the bible is true." The only true statement ever to be uttered by Jean Chauvinism, sociopathic emotional terrorist.
"A Boss in Heaven is the best excuse for a boss on earth, therefore If God did exist, he would have to be abolished." Mikhail Bakunin
"The means in which you take,
dictate the ends in which you find yourself."
"Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government! Supreme leadership derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony!"
No Gods, No Masters!


Kapkao
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B166ER wrote:I know that

B166ER wrote:

I know that personally being a very pro science atheist is completely intertwined with my politics. I most closely identify with Anarcho-Syndicalism, which is at it's core an atheistic philosophy so it goes hand in hand.

But I have met gay republicans and religious anarchists, so I can't say that people are completely without weird contradictions.

But, back to the topic: How has being an atheist affected your politics.

I think it would be interesting to hear about people's opinions on atheism's effect on politics.

A great song by a great band who sum up my political views perfectly.

It has convinced me that God needs to stay the FUCK away from politics. During the 90s... Fob James was governor of my state, and tried to institute public prayer in state-run schools. My jaw dropped a little... but I can't say anything surprised me then with regards to a state government with the most fucked up history ever. (...that I learned quite a bit about in a upper-middle class school district, right along with syphilis testing on humans)

Atheism (along with Pantheism) has convinced me in the belief in a free market completely absent of public investment: corporations have the same effect on individual prosperity that God has on rational thought. They both make those two phenomena damn near impossible.

 

And now I feel completely out of thought-fuel... wow. I need to stop posting at RRS... but it's just. too damn. addicting. Fuck!

“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)


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a slow change

When I was very young, I was considered somewhere to the right of Ghengis Khan because I firmly believed that for-profit business should make a reasonable profit.

Now, I am considered somewhere to the left of Karl Marx because I also believe soaking your customers for the sake of mega-million bonuses is not good for the economy.

I don't think I have changed my views all that much.

How I vote changed in the 80s with Reagan's "moral majority" nonsense.  At that point, I firmly and completely left the republican party.  I was voting independent, trying to pick the person most qualified for the job.  Now I vote for the least religious and sadly, that is usually the democrat.  Sad, because it is a shame for one party to be puffing off their self righteousness more than the other.  Sad, because politics should not be about religion, but about the economy and foreign affairs and infrastructure and such like.

-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.

"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken

"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.


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Some.  I tend to lean more

Some.  I tend to lean more towards Democrats now just because they don't push the religious morality as hard as the Republicans.

Honestly though I am disenchanted with both parties, since they are almost identical outside of a handful of moral issues, and the minor parties in America are full of whack jobs.  But since politics is about compromise, lately I tend to make do with Democrats.

Everything makes more sense now that I've stopped believing.


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Personally I can't say that

Personally I can't say that being an atheist has changed my view or opinion  of politics. I thought politics were corrupted when i was a theist and i still think they're corrupted as an atheist. I may say that my thoughts about politics are even grimmer since i keep seeing tons of money and recources being given to the church(it's not enough that they are exempt from any and all taxes). The church has an annal income of over 5 billion $, and they are using fairy tales and damnation threats to gather even more.

So overall yes, my political view MAY have been changed by being an atheist, and it hasn't gotten any better.

"I don't believe in afterlife, although I am bringing a change of underwear."


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Sorry about any misconceptions...

GodlessGabriel wrote:
Personally I can't say that being an atheist has changed my view or opinion  of politics. I thought politics were corrupted when i was a theist and i still think they're corrupted as an atheist.

I'm sorry if I make myself understood fully, but I was talking about your personal political views, not your views on the current political systems. If that was the question, then I would agree with you and go one step further and say all the politicians deserve a class war on their asses. I don't agree with ANY person in a position of power over another since I view freedom and liberty as my only religion, but I still have political views. I was talking about those personal views and not just the "possibilities" presented (I would say spoon fed) to us by our friendly neighborhood corporate oligarchy.

"This may shock you, but not everything in the bible is true." The only true statement ever to be uttered by Jean Chauvinism, sociopathic emotional terrorist.
"A Boss in Heaven is the best excuse for a boss on earth, therefore If God did exist, he would have to be abolished." Mikhail Bakunin
"The means in which you take,
dictate the ends in which you find yourself."
"Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government! Supreme leadership derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony!"
No Gods, No Masters!


Brian37
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I don't buy into anarchy at

I don't buy into anarchy at all I don't care who is selling it. It is just as absurd and a utopia as those who live under absolute rule.

Government has to exist because disagreements exist. "No government" is bad because it becomes Kaos  and a free for all. Strict fascism with absolute rule is fine for those in power, but fucks all the others. Neither appeals to me.

What does appeal to me is what the founders set forth, as an idea, but has not always been perfect in practice and most recently, has been run roughshod by the absolute power of the uber rich. BUT, the concepts themselves are solid.

The idea that law is not absolute rule, by vote or by dictator, but by advise and consent and the the ability to dissent. The concept that government is not there to favor one class or one political party or one religion. It is basically the concept of competition WITH the safety net of anti-trust anti-monopoly laws that provide a sanctuary to all. The concept of neutrality on speech and religion issues and that law is based, not on common political or religious party but COMMON LAW balanced with oversight and the consent of the governed.

 

"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
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Since atheism is a lack of

Since atheism is a lack of belief in God, I don't think it can affect politics.

 

Though I am re-evaluating my politics, it has nothing to do with atheism, I did that even when I was Theist.

 

 


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The problem is it has never worked that way

Brian37 wrote:
It is just as absurd and a utopia

It's not utopian, it's about decentralized direct democracy where everyone has a voice which isn't affected by such things as monetary class. But you would know that because you know enough about it to dismiss it completely.

Brian37 wrote:
Government has to exist because disagreements exist. "No government" is bad because it becomes Kaos  and a free for all.

You obviously have never read anything about the history or practice of anarchism, have you. It's not about "Kaos" at all, but self organization without hierarchy. Wow, I didn't know thinking for myself and having control of my own life was "Kaos" but apparently it is.

Read about the beginning of labor unions or credit unions, both very much influenced by anarchism (credit unions were originally created by Proudhon, an anarchist, then watered down). Read about the Spanish Civil War and the C.N.T./F.A.I. Read practically ANYTHING by Noam Chomsky. Once you understand what it's about AND how it has worked in practice, you will realize it has nothing at all to do with chaos. But you probably won't read anything about it since you seem pretty set "knowing" about it without knowing about it. Kind of sounds like a theist talking about what atheism is.

Disagreements will always exist, it doesn't mean the best way to solve them is to live on our knees.

Brian37 wrote:
What does appeal to me is what the founders set forth, as an idea, but has not always been perfect in practice and most recently, has been run roughshod by the absolute power of the uber rich.

Brian, sorry to burst your bubble, but since day one of the American experiment, it was created for and has been used by the "uber rich". It was created to unify, at that point thirteen colonies, so they could have the collective might to commit genocide against the indigenous population of this country on a massive scale. How many poor laborers, natives, slaves, women, etc. etc. helped draft the constitution? At no time in our history has it been anything more then a tool for the super rich to keep control. The laws were designed to be used against anyone who didn't have the money to pay their way to freedom. You talk about laws like they are not absolute, tell that to everyone who has been killed by the U.S. government for doing just that. Sacco & Vincetti, Joe Hill, and too many others to count. Tell the I.W.W. union members who were shot and hung for the crime of unionizing here in Everett, WA, that the law against unionizing wasn't absolute. It's slightly different now (you only get beat up, not killed, and yes that still happens), but however changeable the laws are, those people are still dead. Killed by a legal system which you are supporting.

Brian37 wrote:
The concept that government is not there to favor one class

REALLY?!?! How has it been anything other then for the rich? It has always favored the rich land owning minority against the rest of us. Tell me how the founders meant for it to be any other way. I have read a lot of the writings of founding fathers, and most of them were convinced any system that gave power to the "stupid" masses was wrong. They designed this country to be controlled by the rich minority, which if you look at how the protections for minorities was framed, was only about the rich minority for the most part. The founders didn't care about the other minorities, just the one THEY were apart of.

 

"This may shock you, but not everything in the bible is true." The only true statement ever to be uttered by Jean Chauvinism, sociopathic emotional terrorist.
"A Boss in Heaven is the best excuse for a boss on earth, therefore If God did exist, he would have to be abolished." Mikhail Bakunin
"The means in which you take,
dictate the ends in which you find yourself."
"Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government! Supreme leadership derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony!"
No Gods, No Masters!


Brian37
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B166ER wrote:Brian37 wrote:

B166ER wrote:

Brian37 wrote:
It is just as absurd and a utopia

It's not utopian, it's about decentralized direct democracy where everyone has a voice which isn't affected by such things as monetary class. But you would know that because you know enough about it to dismiss it completely.

Brian37 wrote:
Government has to exist because disagreements exist. "No government" is bad because it becomes Kaos  and a free for all.

You obviously have never read anything about the history or practice of anarchism, have you. It's not about "Kaos" at all, but self organization without hierarchy. Wow, I didn't know thinking for myself and having control of my own life was "Kaos" but apparently it is.

Read about the beginning of labor unions or credit unions, both very much influenced by anarchism (credit unions were originally created by Proudhon, an anarchist, then watered down). Read about the Spanish Civil War and the C.N.T./F.A.I. Read practically ANYTHING by Noam Chomsky. Once you understand what it's about AND how it has worked in practice, you will realize it has nothing at all to do with chaos. But you probably won't read anything about it since you seem pretty set "knowing" about it without knowing about it. Kind of sounds like a theist talking about what atheism is.

Disagreements will always exist, it doesn't mean the best way to solve them is to live on our knees.

Brian37 wrote:
What does appeal to me is what the founders set forth, as an idea, but has not always been perfect in practice and most recently, has been run roughshod by the absolute power of the uber rich.

Brian, sorry to burst your bubble, but since day one of the American experiment, it was created for and has been used by the "uber rich". It was created to unify, at that point thirteen colonies, so they could have the collective might to commit genocide against the indigenous population of this country on a massive scale. How many poor laborers, natives, slaves, women, etc. etc. helped draft the constitution? At no time in our history has it been anything more then a tool for the super rich to keep control. The laws were designed to be used against anyone who didn't have the money to pay their way to freedom. You talk about laws like they are not absolute, tell that to everyone who has been killed by the U.S. government for doing just that. Sacco & Vincetti, Joe Hill, and too many others to count. Tell the I.W.W. union members who were shot and hung for the crime of unionizing here in Everett, WA, that the law against unionizing wasn't absolute. It's slightly different now (you only get beat up, not killed, and yes that still happens), but however changeable the laws are, those people are still dead. Killed by a legal system which you are supporting.

Brian37 wrote:
The concept that government is not there to favor one class

REALLY?!?! How has it been anything other then for the rich? It has always favored the rich land owning minority against the rest of us. Tell me how the founders meant for it to be any other way. I have read a lot of the writings of founding fathers, and most of them were convinced any system that gave power to the "stupid" masses was wrong. They designed this country to be controlled by the rich minority, which if you look at how the protections for minorities was framed, was only about the rich minority for the most part. The founders didn't care about the other minorities, just the one THEY were apart of.

 

BULLSHIT!

. IF it were solely about wealth then why go with a constitutional republic and not a monarchy? Why make freedom of speech a right. If class were the only thing that mattered their language would have reflected that in the constitution. If it was wealth based, they did a piss poor job, because long term, other classes have been able to appeal to that same constitution for protection.

Slaves were not rich, and the majority  were still slaves at the time of the ratification of the constitution, and many founders EVEN AT THAT TIME were against slavery. The "wealth" aspect of what you want to see, is merely a result of the founders being limited to what they could do at the time. I don't think you give them enough credit to thinking beyond class.

I think you are rebelling against them because right wing revisionists have sold you the Beck bullshit of "every man for themselves".

How the fuck can Jefferson fuck a slave an have a kid with them AND on top of that blaspheme Jesus. Not to mention he died in dept.

 

"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
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But lets play "what if"Lets

But lets play "what if"

Lets say I am wrong, what is your solution? Skip the semantics of history, what would you do?

If you could set up a society how would it work?

 

"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog


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Back in the days when I was

Back in the days when I was a believer I was a Republican, inherited it along with the religion from my parents. I was even somewhat of an activist in college. As my god belief disappeared so did my support for the Republicans especially when it was taken over by the moral stupidity groups. I became an independent early in the 90s and considered what each candidate brought to the game. After Bush won and Christians seemed to be flopping around everyplace I instituted a religious rule. The more a candidate spouted off about god the less likely they would get my support. I switched to the Democrats in 2008 in order to make a point against the Rethugs that had destroyed our country over 8 years.

If the Dems don't show some balls soon I'll be an Independent once again though it's very unlikely any Rethugs in Florida can help but trot out the God card to garner support.

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"I guess it's time to ask if you live under high voltage power transmission lines which have been shown to cause stimulation of the fantasy centers of the brain due to electromagnetic waves?" - Me

"God is omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent, - it says so right here on the label. If you have a mind capable of believing all three of these divine attributes simultaneously, I have a wonderful bargain for you. No checks please. Cash and in small bills." - Robert A Heinlein.


B166ER
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Hmmm...

Brian37 wrote:
If it was wealth based, they did a piss poor job, because long term, other classes have been able to appeal to that same constitution for protection.

Just for an example, the 14th amendment. It was designed to help newly freed slaves get an even shake. Yet out of all the 14th amendment cases, only three were for freed slave, the rest being corporations.

Look at the 1st amendment. Yes, freedom of speech is a guaranteed right on paper. But there are many people who have never voiced their unpopular opinions or peacefully protested things they are against because they are afraid of getting beaten up or even wrongfully arrested because they can't afford it. Therefore they HAVE no freedom of speech if they live in fear of the repercussions for using it.

Brian37 wrote:
The "wealth" aspect of what you want to see, is merely a result of the founders being limited to what they could do at the time. I don't think you give them enough credit to thinking beyond class.

I don't think you give enough thought to the "possibility" that they ratified it the way it was because it protected their class (the rich) more then anyone else.

Brian37 wrote:
I think you are rebelling against them because right wing revisionists have sold you the Beck bullshit of "every man for themselves".

No, it's because I have been poor all my life and have seen the true nature of this state. I have read the constitution so don't give me that "you are just ignorant of the truth because you are too stupid to read it for yourself". This country is one where it's better to be rich and guilty then poor and innocent. I rebel against ANY system which puts human beings who are just as fallible as anyone else in positions to boss and harass other humans.

I rebel because I saw my mother frantically jump through hoops because she got breast cancer and couldn't afford the treatment. I rebel because I have had the bus my niece (at the time about 3 or 4) and I were ridding stopped by four cop cars, had her taken from me, and both of us interrogated because she has Tahitian heritage and I am a red haired white guy.

I think you do the very thing you accuse me of, taking the "Beck" definition of the constitution, about anarchism, by only seeing the definitions made by people without knowledge of its principles.

http://www.blackcrayon.com/library/britt1910.html

I think this is a good answer to your question of how the society I envision would be set up. This is the entry in the Encyclopedia Britannica from 1910, written by Peter Kropotkin, a biologist and anarchist. Read it, please, and you might see why I hold to it like you hold to the U.S. constitution.

EDIT: spelling

"This may shock you, but not everything in the bible is true." The only true statement ever to be uttered by Jean Chauvinism, sociopathic emotional terrorist.
"A Boss in Heaven is the best excuse for a boss on earth, therefore If God did exist, he would have to be abolished." Mikhail Bakunin
"The means in which you take,
dictate the ends in which you find yourself."
"Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government! Supreme leadership derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony!"
No Gods, No Masters!


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It might have made me more

It might have made me more aware of the use of religion in furthering political goals. Atheist or christian though, I don't get how people can't see our politicians are doing this for a living and money is the key goal, not the happiness of the people.

Long ago politicians did not go to school for it, they did not make a living out of it, they were regular people who had an interest in doing their part for the country. Seems like I read somewhere George Washington had to pay most of his own expenses, and he was the president.

Now we have a congress who can vote themselves raises and make their own vacation times. Not to mention gold plated toilet seats and things of this nature. It's a career now, and has been for some time. Who can take the most money from a corporation and slide in a vote on ____ bill for them.

Anyway, I notice religious inuendo's in politics all the time, though it is hard to say a lot since I have been an atheist for some time.

Bush said the dead soldiers were "going to a better place", yea sure whatever makes you sleep better I suppose.

Not exactly politics but a little of the world in general and an awesome band that is no more =/

Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
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Interestingly enough, it was

Interestingly enough, it was the other way around. My politics influenced my religious views. As a [Parecon] Anarchist, I began to realize that complex systems of doing things were largely unnecessary when a simpler solution lay at hand. Just as government became pointless, so did God and his supernatural laws (yes, ex-Theist here).

Thus, as I dropped government as an idea to keep people in line, I dropped the idea of a God necessary to fulfill your life. I don't think I'd be an Atheist if I hadn't first realized the uselessness of the government.

"The Chaplain had mastered, in a moment of divine intuition, the handy technique of protective rationalization and he was exhilarated by his discovery. It was miraculous. It was almost no trick at all, he saw, to turn vice into virtue and slander into truth, impotence into abstinence, arrogance into humility, plunder into philanthropy, thievery into honor, blasphemy into wisdom, brutality into patriotism, and sadism into justice. Anybody could do it; it required no brains at all. Just no Character."

"He...had gone down in flames...on the seventh day, while God was resting"

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D33PPURPLE wrote:As a

D33PPURPLE wrote:

As a [Parecon] Anarchist, I began to realize that complex systems of doing things were largely unnecessary when a simpler solution lay at hand. Just as government became pointless, so did God and his supernatural laws (yes, ex-Theist here).

I see your point. Why have cars made in a factory, when everyone can just make their own? Why have safety standards, when everyone can just enforce their own? Why have health care, when everyone can just build their own hospital? I wish I had a brain like yours, your kind of math must be much easier than all this stuff we learn in school.

But to answer the question in the original post, I consider myself not a card-carrying atheist, but a radical atheist. Radical atheism is not just rejection of explicitly instituted Gods and religions, but rejection of bullshit in general -particularly the atheistic bullshit, of which religious bullshit is a spin-off. This has very profound influence on my political views, because I am more than happy to rate different kinds of bullshit and adress the one with the highest priority rating, depending on the context.

In this forum, for example, the prevailing bullshit story is that religious misconceptions are more dangerous than secular ones. I find this to be an extremely dangerous misconception, so I talk about this type of bullshit in this forum a lot.

Logic is a systematic method of coming to the wrong conclusion with confidence.


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I just thought I might add another quip about politics

Every time I see Bi66er in an argument with someone about "anarcho-syndicalism", I become a little more convinced in his political beliefs.

Thank you, that is all... *bow out*

“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)


B166ER
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Zus... What?

D33PPURPLE wrote:
As a [Parecon] Anarchist, I began to realize that complex systems of doing things were largely unnecessary when a simpler solution lay at hand. Just as government became pointless, so did God and his supernatural laws (yes, ex-Theist here).

ZuS wrote:
I see your point. Why have cars made in a factory, when everyone can just make their own? Why have safety standards, when everyone can just enforce their own? Why have health care, when everyone can just build their own hospital? I wish I had a brain like yours, your kind of math must be much easier than all this stuff we learn in school.

WTF? Do you even understand what ParEcon (participatory economics) is all about? It's about removing hierarchy from the equation regarding production and consumption. Nowhere does it involve not building cars in factories or individuals building their own hospitals. I don't know where you got all that. All anarchism is about is taking non-hierarchical democratic control over all segments of our lives instead of just delegating our personal power to other people.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Participatory_economics

http://www.zcommunications.org/zparecon/parecon.htm

ZuS, on the secular bullshit thing, I agree completely with you. Religion is a big load of bullshit, and can be very dangerous too, but there have been MANY secular philosophies which have been just as dangerous. Thank you for doing what is necessary and questioning ALL bullshit, and not just the bullshit of the religious variety.

Here is a video explaining what anarchism REALLY is, not just some propaganda from it's opponents or the ravings of crazy chaos worshipers who bought into the official bullshit.

"This may shock you, but not everything in the bible is true." The only true statement ever to be uttered by Jean Chauvinism, sociopathic emotional terrorist.
"A Boss in Heaven is the best excuse for a boss on earth, therefore If God did exist, he would have to be abolished." Mikhail Bakunin
"The means in which you take,
dictate the ends in which you find yourself."
"Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government! Supreme leadership derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony!"
No Gods, No Masters!


ZuS
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B166ER wrote:D33PPURPLE

B166ER wrote:

D33PPURPLE wrote:
As a [Parecon] Anarchist, I began to realize that complex systems of doing things were largely unnecessary when a simpler solution lay at hand. Just as government became pointless, so did God and his supernatural laws (yes, ex-Theist here).

ZuS wrote:
I see your point. Why have cars made in a factory, when everyone can just make their own? Why have safety standards, when everyone can just enforce their own? Why have health care, when everyone can just build their own hospital? I wish I had a brain like yours, your kind of math must be much easier than all this stuff we learn in school.

WTF? Do you even understand what ParEcon (participatory economics) is all about? It's about removing hierarchy from the equation regarding production and consumption. Nowhere does it involve not building cars in factories or individuals building their own hospitals. I don't know where you got all that. All anarchism is about is taking non-hierarchical democratic control over all segments of our lives instead of just delegating our personal power to other people.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Participatory_economics

http://www.zcommunications.org/zparecon/parecon.htm

I am aware of what Participatory Economics is all about and I am following developments and contributions to the theory. What I really commented on is the claim that this should be a "less complex" model. In context of developing informations systems for a very specific flat company structure, I have spent months researching coordination and delegation of rersponsibility in flat (low- to non-hierarchical structures). I don't think it can in any way be said that this type of organisation is less complex than the hierarchical one.

A very simple exercise is imagining a given project or problem as a gap or a chasm that you need to cross (straight out of Brenda Derwin's sense-making theory). The most efficient way to cross it is of course the straight line from one side to the other. You can imagine a bridge accross the gap as a single straight line from one side to the other - that is the flattest possible structure. Now, the longer the bridge is, the more structural support it needs to maintain this straight line. An example of such structural support could be one vertical pole in the middle of the bridge with cable lines connecting the pole to the bridge, sort of like the Brooklin Bridge.

That is a very effective analogy to introduction of hierarchy to the solution of the problem for the purpose of coordination and responsibility delegation (literally - responsibility chain). You can choose the height of the pole to modify the height of the hieararchy, introduce more poles to be able to have lower hierarchy, indeed you could have no height on the bridge at all, if you had a pole planted in short enough intervals to support the entire length of the bridge. But this is means introduction of complexity. Disregarding the problems of aligning many poles to forma bridge, or the increased chance of one or more smaller poles failing, I went straight for the problem bridges seam to handle automatically: coordination (of load) and responsibility delegation (of load between individual poles). Two individual adjecent poles distribute the weight between each other perfectly and so does the entire bridge. Human individuals and teams don't have physics on their side when trying to cover a project - this seams to be increased complexity, not decreased. Why? Because the higher the pole, the easier it is to allocate responsibility and coordinate the effort.

So why did I bother to research this at all? Technically because perfect hierarchies have 1) a single fault point 2) enormous waste of resources involved in maintaining the hierarchy 3) I had an actual company in need of a solution; conceptually because perfect hierarchies tend to do weird things without anyone in the hierarchy having the capacity to redirect the process, like kill millions of Jews for example.

I have no proof for this claim, but my experience and study lead me to believe that perfect hierarchies are the simplest problem solvers, most expensive to maintain and most likely to turn fundamentally anti-human, in the sense that they acquire their own structurally enforced goals that only by accident and never by purpose avoid hurting humans. When they do hurt humans, they often do so on extremely large scales and since the problem is systemic, they never stop unless forced.

B166ER wrote:

ZuS, on the secular bullshit thing, I agree completely with you. Religion is a big load of bullshit, and can be very dangerous too, but there have been MANY secular philosophies which have been just as dangerous. Thank you for doing what is necessary and questioning ALL bullshit, and not just the bullshit of the religious variety.

Here is a video explaining what anarchism REALLY is, not just some propaganda from it's opponents or the ravings of crazy chaos worshipers who bought into the official bullshit.

Tnx for the video. I respect Chomsky and his reasoning a great deal.

By the way, religious bullshit is really just a special niche of atheistic bullshit. We have to have made it, unless you consent to the idea that God did.

Logic is a systematic method of coming to the wrong conclusion with confidence.


B166ER
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Wasn't saying complexity wasn't necessary

Sorry ZuS, I thought you were disparaging the ParEcon part and not the complexity/simplicity stuff. I totally agree that complexity can't be done away with if we wish to live in civilization, and that complexity in social systems isn't the problem, it's how those systems are organized.

ZuS wrote:
By the way, religious bullshit is really just a special niche of atheistic bullshit. We have to have made it, unless you consent to the idea that God did.

Well said. It IS all atheistic bullshit, whether it carries that name or not.

"This may shock you, but not everything in the bible is true." The only true statement ever to be uttered by Jean Chauvinism, sociopathic emotional terrorist.
"A Boss in Heaven is the best excuse for a boss on earth, therefore If God did exist, he would have to be abolished." Mikhail Bakunin
"The means in which you take,
dictate the ends in which you find yourself."
"Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government! Supreme leadership derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony!"
No Gods, No Masters!


ShadowOfMan
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 Atheism began my adult

 Atheism began my adult mind.  It was the first moment that I took a step back and thought about something beyond video games.  In the face of massive public opinion, it was also the thing that prompted other questions about life and about history.  It's also when I became an anarchist (although really just a nihilist because it was a very unthoughtful rejection).  Later, as more complex questions of economics came to mind, I adopted a "holier than thou" stance, attempting to out Christian the Christians.  And by that I mean, I heavily subscribe to socialism in social matters because it is the most moral and benevolent system possible.  It allows for collective power and places it in the hands of the people directly.  It makes our elected representatives our servants as they were intended.  But I also believe in capitalism as far as production of goods.  

 

I describe myself as an Anarcho-socialist, because I believe in direct democracy.  Direct action.  The collective force of moral people.  I believe in the freedom of the individual and I believe in the idea of the super organism.

A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce