Brainpolice : Anarchism, Racism

Rejecting The Natural/Synthetic Dichotomy

Brainpolice — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 14:34:00 GMT

I reject the natural/synthetic dichotomy. The natural/synthetic dichotomy is manifested in two fundamental ways: (1) the assumption that humans and/or human constructs are separate from nature and (2) the assumption that certain human constructs are "natural" while others are not. The problem with this dichotomy is that humans and their constructs are a part and product of nature; it is impossible for humans to step outside of the context of nature. Unless one wishes to posit a supernatural, all that exists or occurs is natural by default. Something that is not natural would be something that simply does not exist or occur at all. Hence, it makes no sense to speak of existing things or phenomenon as if they are not natural, or to defend or support a given thing or phenomenon by appealing to it being natural.

Everything is natural, regaurdless of how common or rare it is, when it occurs or doesn't occur, wether its beneficial or detrimental, good or bad, and so on. That which is natural, which is simply to say something that occurs or exists, cannot be construed as being good or bad by mere virtue of being natural. Nature is morally neutral in this sense, because the mere existance of a thing or phenomenon in of itself does not signify value. In other words, nature does not have intrinsic value. Understood broadly, it simply is what it is. This is not to say that there is no purpose or merit to assigning value to certain phenomenon, but that its mere occurance is not what gives it value. For if that which is natural is inherently good or bad, then literally everything must be assumed to be inherently good or bad, and that is absurd.

It's also important to note that just because something is natural does not necessarily mean that it is universal, inevitable or permanent. Nature is not static, it is dynamic, which is to say that it is in a constant state of flux. That which is common in the present may very well be rendered obsolete and archiac in the future. It can be quite fallacious to appeal to phenomenon from the past as if it is representative of an inevitable future or to regaurd current phenomenon as if they represent a permanent state of affairs. What once was natural can be rendered non-existant over time, and what once was little more than a pipe dream can become "the natural order". Appealing to the past as "natural" is simply a weak argument. The present and future is no less "natural" and the "naturalness" of things is really irrelevant.

One way in which the natural/synthetic dichotomy is manifested is in the arguementation of primitivists, anti-civilizationists and radical environmentalists. The contemporary technology and extended division of labor produced by humans is demonized as "unnatural" while more primitive and "self-sufficient" ways of living are romantisized as "natural". Human civilization is characterized as being inherently antagonistic with nature, and nature is assumed to have intrinsic value. Radically egalitarian philosophy makes use of the dichotomy as well, with egalitarianism being construed as "natural" while heirarchy is considered to be "unnatural". Interestingly, primitive societies are often pointed to as examples of egalitarianism, even though a non-biased look at such societies likely reveals quite a bit of heirarchy.

The natural/synthetic dichotomy is also manifested in conservative philosophy. Rigid class heirarchy, religious authority, familial authority, racism, nationalism, have been charactered as "the natural order" (with strong use of naturalistic language used to defend them), as if they are inevitable laws of nature and intrinsic authorities, and deviations from them are construed as synthetic attempts to produce a "new man" in antagonism with nature. Conservative philosophy strongly appeals to tradition as being "natural", and deviations from tradition such as homosexuality, secularism and multiculturalism are construed as "unnatural". All of this could be said to stem from a pessemistic and archiac accessment of nature that lies at the heart of conservatism.

Social contract theory and traditional statist apologetics is riddled with the natural/synthetic dichotomy because it tends to construe centralized political organization as if it involves man exiting "the state of nature", while at the same time there is a very strong temptation to characterize the rise of centralizd political organization as a "natural" phenomenon in the sense that is inevitable. Statism is construed as "the natural order" that inevitably arises from social organization. And statist politics is riddled with debate over precisely what kind of centralized political organization is the most "natural" or what the "natural progression" will lead to. Traditionally, anarchy is either brushed off as "unnatural" or is conflated with a primitivist "natural state" before centralized political organization took place.

While these various types of social phenomenon and organization most certainly can be evaluated, wether or not they are "natural" is really irrelevant to such an evaluation, because they are all "natural" to the extent that they occur or exist at all. The natural/synthetic dichotomy is a misnomer that sidetracks from the real substantive debates that could take place.

Definitions

Brainpolice — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 05:08:00 GMT

So I put together some relatively witty definitions of my terms. If you're not offended by at least one of these, then you are awesome!

Constitutionalism - The belief that a piece of paper drafted and signed by a tiny aristocracy of men is a legitimate perpetual contract that makes the government voluntary on the part of those within a society that did not sign the document and limits the powers of governmental agents for all of eternity.

Minarchism - The belief that there can be a government limited to the protection of rights without violating rights in and of itself; the belief that all goods and services should be provided by the free market yet somehow the principle magically doesn't apply to the defense and arbitration industry.

Democracy - The belief that the government is controled by the people simply because every few years they get to punch a hole in a piece of paper with the names of a few rich and powerful men on it.

Nationalism - The belief that imaginary lines on a map constitute real and meaningful property boundaries; the belief that territories have human traits or personalities of their own; the belief that immigration is the spawn of satan.

Objectivism - The belief that the initation of force is wrong yet somehow it is permissible to arbitrarily invade Iran and Venezuela because "we" have oil interests there; the belief that only romanticism is real art; the belief that you can eliminate taxation and still have a "government".

Political Libertarianism - The belief that the state is inefficient and immoral yet for some strange reason the state is the only viable means by which we can bring about liberty; the belief that democracy is tyrannical yet we must use it to our advantage.

Paleoconservatism - The belief that conservatism was hijacked by leftists and communists and that the "true conservatives" are those who support protectionism and white nationalism; the belief that you're more conservative than those creepy neocons yet somehow you support just about as powerful of a government as they do.

Christianity - The belief that the path to salvation lies with devotion of one's life to a Jewish zombie hippie who is his own father.

Satanism (Laveyan) - The belief in the writtings of a former carnie con artist who haphazardly threw together the ideas of Ayn Rand and Aleister Crowley, incoherant ramblings on the Enochian key and rhetoric to drawn in rebelious teenagers.

Zionism - The belief that because your people were nearly liquidated once, you have an inherent right to liquidate others and forcibly remove them from their own territory.

Religion - The belief that fairy tales from centuries or millenia ago passed down through shaky oral tradition and written down by fallable men are actually absolutely true and codes to live one's life by.

Collectivism - The strange belief that groups have a mind of their own yet their component parts don't.

Altruism - The belief that self-destructive servitude for the sake of others is the greatest virtue; the belief that everyone should mutually be slaves to eachother.

Epistemological Subjectivism - The belief that all truth claims can be reduced to mere personal opinion or preferance, yet somehow this view isn't a mere opinion in and of itself.

Epistemological Nihilism - The belief that there is no such thing as truth, yet somehow it is true that there is no such thing as truth.

Statism - The belief that it is not only moral but necessary for a particular group of individuals to do that which is openly aknowledged as being immoral and not necessary for everyone else to do; moral hypocrisy at the institutional level.

Primitivism - The strange belief that living in a cave or mud-brick hut or as a hermit in the woods is preferable to modern industrial society; the romantisization of long gone tribal and hunter-gatherer societies (in which life was nasty, brutish and short) as peaceful and prosperous utopias.

Welfarism - The belief that the poor can be helped by giving them back a tiny chunk of what was originally stolen from them and keeping them in a state of dependancy on the government; the bribery of the lower classes.

Inflationism - The belief that all problems can be solved by simply printing up more money, despite overwhelming evidence that the arbitrary creation of new money creates problems in and of itself.

Monetarism - The belief held by a bunch of Chicago School economists who think that they are free market proponents but really are quasi-Keynsians.

Anarcho-Syndicalism - The belief that corporations are evil yet somehow corporate dominated, government chartered and cartelized unions are the path towards a free and stateless society.

Hobbesianism - The belief that a highly pessemistic view of human nature that entails war of all against all justifies absolute control by the state, despite the fact that the state is made up of *gasp* human beings.

Radical Environmentalism - The belief that the planet itself has intrinsic value and that human beings are inherently evil parasites on the face of the planet; the modern religion of nature-worshop.

Globalism - The strange belief that large-scale conflict and war would end if only we put all political power in the hands of a singular oligarchal institution with control over everyone in the entire world.

Animal Rights - The belief that non-human entities deserve human rights; the belief that chickens and bumble bees should be equal before the law; the attempt to liberate the unliberatable.

Marxism - The belief that some crazy rich German guy has predicted an inevitable egalitarian future and has mapped out the path towards the liberation of all poor and working people through the work of a benevolent dictatorship.

Racism - The strange belief that a particular roll of the genetic dice entitles and requires one to completely separate themselves from others with another particular roll of the genetic dice; the collectivism of bubble-headed bigots.

Secular Deities and the Problem of Humanism

Brainpolice — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 04:17:00 GMT

An atheist criticism of contemporary secularism

Most atheists and agnostics still have a religious mindset, only they have replaced the formal concept of a god with other concepts. In the absence of faith in an all-knowing and all-loving god outside of the universe, they have substituted faith in other artificial constructs that are considered to be inside of the universe. They rely on faith in an abstraction to be confident in the existance of order and morality. They act as if the non-existance of such abstractions, or at least the lack of them as a rationale, would lead to chaos and immorality. The abstraction worshiped may be the state, the nation, humanity, the planet or environment. These things are treated as if they were spirits or geists and are used as an appeal to authority.

To be sure, abstractions can be sensible and useful insofar as they are derived from reality by reason. But most secular people either do not derive their abstractions from reality or treat certain things that exist in reality as if they were deities. Collective concepts such as nations are treated holistically as if they were sentient entities in and of themselves and are used as an authority for justification of goals and actions. But strictly speaking a nation does not exist, at least in the manner it is being viewed by the nationalist, as an individual entity or actor. And for an example of the adoption of things in reality as deities, radical environmentalists tend to treat the planet itself as if it were a diety with intrinsic value. The planet most certainly does exist in reality, but it does not have intrinsic value and is not a sensible source of morality.

The vast majority of contemporary secularists still believe in things that do not exist, particularly collective constructs. They refer to specific groups of people, such as races and economic classes, as if they existed as singular concious actors. But realistically speaking, there is no race or economic class as a whole that one can point to as being responsible for anything. Nor can an individual reasonably claim to be acting on the behalf of such collective abstractions. "The white race" or "the proletariet class" cannot rationally be used as a reason justifying one’s actions. Racists merely use the abstraction of a race as a diety. Classists merely use the abstraction of a class as a diety. Statists merely use the abstraction of a state as a diety. In all cases, the functionality is the same as a diety. All deities in formal religions, of course, originated from the anthropromorphisization of elements that people interpreted from around them in the world. The contemporary atheist, while they may have abandoned the formal concept of a god, is merely repeating this process in reverse.

It is unfortunate but most atheists are statists, and usually of the "left" variety. I think this is partially due to the cliche way in which contemporary cultural politics is framed in public discourse. Since it is assumed that the "right" is for religious people, the secularist has more of a tendency to flock to the "left". Of course, I reject the notion that the "right" is necessarily any less statist then the "right", but that’s beside the point. The overall point is that while many atheists don’t worshop a god external to the universe, they nonetheless still worshop human beings or leaders or rulers. They treat certain human beings in positions of power as if they were a god anyways. But in my view atheists should reject the state and other such worldly "geists" for some of the exact same reasons that they reject the concept of a god. If you reject the concept of a god, you should have no more reason to treat humans as a god. Human beings should not be treated as gods. Noone deserves to be worshoped. Noone deserves to be a ruler. You have no more reason to consider rulers worthy of your respect then any non-existant deity. While the rulers might actually exist in reality, they nonetheless don’t necessarily deserve your respect any more then a deity.

While I’m not the biggest fan of Max Stirner and I think that he uses very odd language to get his point across, in his writting "The Ego and His Own" he pointed out the problem of secular people deifying either humanity as a whole as an abstraction or certain other human beings in general. Allow me to leave you off with a quote from "The Ego and His Own" that touches on this:

Atheists keep up their scoffing at the higher being, which was also honored under the name of the " highest " or être suprême, and trample in the dust one " proof of his existence " after another, without noticing that they themselves, out of need for a higher being, only annihilate the old to make room for a new. Is " Man " perchance not a higher essence than an individual man, and must not the truths, rights, and ideas which result from the concept of him be honored and—counted sacred, as revelations of this very concept ? For, even though we should abrogate again many a truth that seemed to be made manifest by this concept, yet this would only evince a misunderstanding on our part, without in the least degree harming the sacred concept itself or taking their sacredness from those truths that must " rightly " be looked upon as its revelations. Man reaches beyond every individual man, and yet—though he be " his essence "—is not in fact his essence (which rather would be as single* as he the individual himself), but a general and "higher," yes, for atheists "the highest essence."† And, as the divine revelations were not written down by God with his own hand, but made public through " the Lord’s instruments," so also the new highest essence does not write out its revelations itself, but lets them come to our knowledge through " true men." Only the new essence betrays, in fact, a more spiritual style of conception than the old God, because the latter was still represented in a sort of embodiedness or form, while the undimmed spirituality of the new is retained, and no special material body is fancied for it. And withal it does not lack corporeity, which even takes on a yet more seductive appearance because it looks more natural and mundane and consists in nothing less than in every bodily man,—yes, or outright in " humanity " or " all men." Thereby the spectralness of the spirit in a seemingbody has once again become really solid and popular.

Sacred, then, is the highest essence and everything in which this highest essence reveals or will reveal itself; but hallowed are they who recognize this highest essence together with its own, i. e. together with its revelations. The sacred hallows in turn its reverer, who by his worship becomes himself a saint, as likewise what he does is saintly, a saintly walk, saintly thoughts and actions, imaginations and aspirations, etc.

It is easily understood that the conflict over what is revered as the highest essence can be significant only so long as even the most embittered opponents concede to each other the main point,—that there is a highest essence to which worship or service is due. If one should smile compassionately at the whole struggle over a highest essence, as a Christian might at the war of words between a Shiite and a Sunnite or between a Brahman and a Buddhist, then the hypothesis of a highest essence would be null in his eyes, and the conflict on this basis an idle play. Whether then the one God or the three in one, whether the Lutheran God or the être suprême or not God at all, but "Man," may represent the highest essence, that makes no difference at all for him who denies the highest essence itself, for in his eyes those servants of a highest essence are one and all—pious people, the most raging atheist not less than the most faith-filled Christian.

In the foremost place of the sacred,* then, stands the highest essence and the faith in this essence, our "holy† faith."

-- Max Stirner, The Ego and His Own, Pages 48-50

PaleoConservaNationalistTarians

Brainpolice — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 20:50:00 GMT

There has been a lot of hooting and hollering lately in libertarian circles, particularly as it relates to the Ron Paul campaign. This seems to be representative of a broader conflict between "culturally left" and "culturally conservative" libertarians. It is becoming commonplace for critics and opponents of Ron Paul, as well as people who are simply neutral to him, to be labeled "CosmoBeltwayCentralistTarians". It is important to note that this is a cluster-concept or a package deal term. It lumps multiple distict ideas together into one: cosmopolitanism, association with the beltway and support for centralization. But it is disingenous to imply that all of these things inherently imply the other. It is even more disingenous to imply that libertarian critics and opponents of Ron Paul inherently must be on the pro-war bandwagon. Lumping pro-war, cosmopolitanism, centralization, association with and criticism and opposition to Ron Paul together into one package deal is simply unfair. Especially as it relates to anarchist and anti-voting critics who see the Ron Paul crowd as being the true "beltway libertarians".

What exactly is cosmopolitanism anyways? Philosophical cosmopolitans are moral universalists: they believe that all humans, and not merely compatriots or fellow-citizens, come under the same moral standards. The boundaries between nations, states, cultures or societies are therefore morally irrelevant. Based on this understanding of cosmopolitanism, how can any libertarian possibly object to it? Is libertarianism not based on the non-aggression principle, and does the non-aggression principle not apply consistantly to all human beings? If the non-aggression principle is only applied to certain nations or other such groups of human beings, then it no longer is being consistantly applied. Cosmopolitanism can be seen as a logical extension of individualism in that moral standards apply to individual human beings, not exclusively to group-identities.

Some would have us believe that cosmopolitanism (and the opposition to nationalism and political borders that comes along with it) inherently implies support for global government, but this is not necessarily the case. It is true that some cosmopolitans may come to the conclusion that there needs to be a global government, but under logical examination their conclusion is actually inconsistant with cosmopolitanism because a global government will be run by an exclusive and small group of individuals who are not held to the same moral standards as everyone else. Even a global government would lack universal application of moral principles. No, the logical conclusion of cosmopolitanism is not global government, but the exact opposite: no government. To the philosophical anarchist, governments are illegitimate in part precisely because they represent an inconsistant application of morality. Along with reasons having to do with the problem of territorial monopoly, the anarchist may very well oppose political borders because they represent artificial divisions that allow moral inconsistancy.

On the question of centralization and decentralization, it is often implied that left-leaning libertarians and libertarian opponents of Ron Paul object to decentralization and favor federal dictation when it comes to certain issues. But this is also fallacious. Take the issue of abortion for example. Sometimes pro-choice libertarians are accused of supporting the idea that the federal government should essentially mandate abortion everywhere, and therefore favor centralization. But at least for this pro-choice libertarian's perspective, that's not exactly how it works. Once again, we are trying to consistantly apply principles. Many pro-choice libertarians would not support a federal ban or federal subsidization of abortion. But the point is that the same principle should apply to the states and localities. If it is true that the state has no legitimate authority to decide on the issue in either direction, then in principle no level of government may outlaw or subsidize abortion. Principles must apply consistantly.

It is of course true that a state's rights approach to the issue would be preferable to a federal approach, but a state's rights approach is still not entirely consistant. In short, from the fact that centralization at the federal level is potentially much worse then state's rights, it does not follow that states or localities may legitimately have carte blanch to do just about everything that the federal level is prohibited from doing. Decentralization, taken to its logical conclusion, leads to individual sovereignty. State's rights is actually a rather moderate form of decentralization. At least from an anarchist libertarian perspective, states of any sort don't have any rights. Individuals do. So the point is: go ahead and leave such issues to the states, but don't just stop there. Keep pushing for consistancy. Keep pushing for more and more decentralization. Don't just transfer governmental powers to the state or local levels and then suddenly fully support those powers.

Another disingenous set of claims is that "left-libertarians" and libertarian opponents of Ron Paul are erroneously defining libertarianism as a lifestyle, making it seem as if libertarianism requires one to personally support alternative lifestyles and "culturally left" causes. But strangley enough, I have yet to meet a left-libertarian that actually has made such a claim. On the one hand, this accusation is fallacious in that it equates support for the liberty of people to engage in such "culturally left" activities with active support for and participation in those activities. Someone may radically support someone's right to engage in all sorts of activities that they do not actually personally favor. On the other hand, this charge could easily be leveled at "culturally conservative" libertarians who appear to imply that cultural homogeniety, traditionalism and religiosity is a requirement for a functional free society. In the atempt to achieve such things, there is always a dangerous temptation to use political power. What many left-libertarians fear is not the freedom of people to hold and practise culturally conservative lifestyles, but the possibility that they will be enforced through political means. But this does not mean that culturally left libertarians are themselves going to support political means in order to deliberately attack things such as religion and racism.

Insofar as the culture question is concerned, no particular cultural views or practises are a requirement for a libertarian society. This is libertarianism in a narrow sense, as a political philosophy in which whatever is voluntary gets a green light. However, libertarianism as a broad philosophy may very well be seen as being compatible with certain cultural causes, and that some cultural sentiments and practises may be more conductive to a free society then others. It is important to emphasize the difference between cultural views or practises being a requirement and being compatible and/or conductive. No serious left-libertarian would claim that you have to be an anti-racist and secularlist in order to be a libertarian. However, they would quite likely see such views and causes as being compatible with libertarianism. They may very well approach libertarianism in a broad sense in which there are non-governmental forms of coercion or oppression that deserve opposition. Afterall, states are not the only institutions that violate the non-aggression principle. Why should private organizations that engage in fraud and coercive usury, along with religious institutions that instigate conflicts, be given a free pass?

While there may certainly be some legitimate criticisms of libertarian deviations towards the "left", deviations towards the "right" deserve close scrutiny. If there are "CosmoBeltwayCentralistTarians", there are also "PaleoConservaNationalistTarians". There is of course nothing inherently wrong with a libertarian holding "culturally conservative" views, but some of these people hardly can be described as consistantly keeping them personal and not supporting political means towards their ends. A "PaleoConservaNationalistTarian" may harbor any combination of the following traits: nationalism, populism, opposition to immigration, support for protectionism, constitutionalism, pro-family, sympathies for monarchy, anti-abortion, anti-secularism and racism. To the "PaleoConservaNationalistTarian", the white anglo-saxon is America's persecuted majority. Behold the white proleteriet's burden! Multiculturalism and secularism are viewed exclusively as being a political system that is enforced onto the persecuted majority of white Christians. Opposition to government mandated religion is equated to persecution of Christians. Accordingly, we must close and secure "the borders", deport the evil Mexicans who are "stealing our jobs", buy American products only, fight toothe and nail for conservative judges, try to get abortion illegalized at the state (or federal) level and support theocracy on the "local level".

While many of these libertarians quite likely have wonderful track records on questions of war and foreign policy, it seems that they have a tendency to reconcentrate such militartistic means into domestic police powers. Since they are nationalistic, they may very well see a "proper role" for the military and paramilitary forces on our own domestic soil: to stop people from entering the territory and to monitor those who do enter the territory for drugs, disease, criminal records, citezenship and visas. According to these people, if an individual does not have the explicit permission of the government, they may not own property, have a job or possess any negative rights whatsoever within the territory. Without such permission, the government has free reign to kidnap you and forcibly exile you from the territory. Additionally, allegedly there is nothing wrong with the government using the tax-payer's money to fund gigantic border fences and maintain a massive immigration beureacracy to keep track of who is who and where they are. Oh, and you can kiss the free market in language goodbye, since the government must mandate uniformity in language all across the country. "National sovereignty" is a high priority, higher then individual sovereignty apparently.

Some of these same people who would gladly do away with the federal department of education simultaneously have no problem with local school boards dictating the curriculum to be taught children. Indeed, all things that the federal government is not supposed to do, "the community", or what in reality is more local state bodies acting in the name of "the community", may legitimately decide. Collectivism (which always is imposed by what amounts to an oligarchy in reality) at the federal level is bad, but apparently collectivism at the more homely level has free reign. This approach may be more libertarian then having the federal government do such things, but it certainly is not consistantly libertarian. There are many double-standards that may be supported in a more local way. Forced integration bad, forced segregation good. Government-enforced secularism bad, government-enforced religiosity good. Clearly, the "PaleoConservaNationalistTarians" are not innocent when it comes to the use of political means towards their ends, particularly if the means are not federal.

Then there is their support for constitutionalism and the "rule of law". The problem here is that the "rule of law" is a myth and libertarian theory has long since debunked the common conception of the social contract. Of course, there's also the problem that enforcing the law for the sake of it being the law is not consistant with any libertarian conception of law. Libertarianism involves an independant theory of justice that whatever the law happens to be must be held up to. There is also a post-ponement arguement often made, which essentially states that because the current system and certain set of laws exist, it should be enforced for the time being until certain things are done away with first. Only when certain things are gone, such as the welfare state, can we move on to persueing other goals, so claims the "PaleoConservaNationalistTarian". Strategically, this only keeps the system in place. Such an attitude in itself post-pones change. Such gradualism is perpetuity in practise. Libertarianism is "radical" in that it always keeps pushing for the ultimate goal, it does not post-pone one section of its own goals by putting them to the side until other goals are first met, or it does not obtain (partially or fully) a goal and then stop there and be content with the status quo when there are other goals to be met or the goal is not fully met yet.

The problem with "PaleoConservaNationalistTarians" is that in the attempt to preserve traditions and create homogeniety they sometimes end up supporting political means. PaleoConservaNationalistTarians hold onto a historical view that is conservative in that they glorify the past. Tradition is to be preserved at all costs, while deviations are to be opposed toothe and nail. PaleoConservaNationalistTarians wish to "restore the Republic". But clocks cannot be turned back. In the attempt to turn clocks back, however, a lot of damage can potentially be done.