Anybody who sees Authority as a responsability is naturally averse to having it because they would feel the weight of it and would feel bad if, whilst holding Authority, they made a mistake and others got in some way hurt because of that.
Those who see Authority as power to advance something (be it their own personal upsides or some idea they believe in) with little or no feeling of responsability towards others (be it not all directly or they’ve suppressed it by convincing themselves their actions are somehow “for the greater good” hence any bad they do with the authority has that grand excuse to salve their conscience), have no such aversion to holding authority.
That posture towards authority of people of the second kind applies more broadly to all manner of things which serve to pressure, convince or manipulate others (Authority is generally power force something on others) so of course they also have no aversion to using other such tools, including using ideology to manipulate others, and sometimes that means passing themselves as somebody who holds a certain ideology, and that includes Anarchism.
So yeah, you’re going to find that certain people who parrot Anarchist talk aren’t in fact people whose Principles mean they’re naturally Anarchist but rather people being Performative Anarchists in order to fit-in and manipulate others driven by entirelly different Principles, and such people are absolutelly pro-Authority as long as they’re in control of it.
In summary, there are two types of people who seem Anarchist:
Those whose personal principles means they are averse to people controlling other people. There are naturally against any form of Authority.
Those who want to control other people and are in a specific situation where Theatre Of Anarchism can advance their objectives. These are against forms of Authority which hinder their objectives but are in favor of forms of Authority which advance their objectives.
IMHO, the best way to spot the second kind from the first is to look for the often repetition of common slogans and having a superficial level of ideology with no actual tracing back to personal principles since they learned the ideology at an intellectual level rather than being drived by their Principles - i.e. what feels Right and what feels Wrong - to finding that formal ideology as something that fits them.
By the way, this method to identify the real ones from the performers also works for all other ideologies and even things like Faith - start paying attention and you’ll spot all manner of teatrics around ideologies all across the entire political spectrum as well as in people professing some faith or other.
Just wanted to say this is a fantastic take. 100% agree.
Too many people want to argue in the sense they are a ‘greater’ authority than you, to try to force you into agreement with them. And generally lack any ability to genuinely reflect on themselves, their actions, or the flaws/contradictions often inherent in their ideology. So ultimately they just fall back on slogans as self-evident truths that must be preached and obeyed.
That’s very different than actually reading the source material of an ideology. How many Anarchists have read Bakunin? Anytime someone claims to be anarchist I love asking them that and looking at the total look of confusion on their face…
Anybody who sees Authority as a responsability is naturally averse to having it because they would feel the weight of it and would feel bad if, whilst holding Authority, they made a mistake and others got in some way hurt because of that.
Those who see Authority as power to advance something (be it their own personal upsides or some idea they believe in) with little or no feeling of responsability towards others (be it not all directly or they’ve suppressed it by convincing themselves their actions are somehow “for the greater good” hence any bad they do with the authority has that grand excuse to salve their conscience), have no such aversion to holding authority.
That posture towards authority of people of the second kind applies more broadly to all manner of things which serve to pressure, convince or manipulate others (Authority is generally power force something on others) so of course they also have no aversion to using other such tools, including using ideology to manipulate others, and sometimes that means passing themselves as somebody who holds a certain ideology, and that includes Anarchism.
So yeah, you’re going to find that certain people who parrot Anarchist talk aren’t in fact people whose Principles mean they’re naturally Anarchist but rather people being Performative Anarchists in order to fit-in and manipulate others driven by entirelly different Principles, and such people are absolutelly pro-Authority as long as they’re in control of it.
In summary, there are two types of people who seem Anarchist:
IMHO, the best way to spot the second kind from the first is to look for the often repetition of common slogans and having a superficial level of ideology with no actual tracing back to personal principles since they learned the ideology at an intellectual level rather than being drived by their Principles - i.e. what feels Right and what feels Wrong - to finding that formal ideology as something that fits them.
By the way, this method to identify the real ones from the performers also works for all other ideologies and even things like Faith - start paying attention and you’ll spot all manner of teatrics around ideologies all across the entire political spectrum as well as in people professing some faith or other.
Just wanted to say this is a fantastic take. 100% agree.
Too many people want to argue in the sense they are a ‘greater’ authority than you, to try to force you into agreement with them. And generally lack any ability to genuinely reflect on themselves, their actions, or the flaws/contradictions often inherent in their ideology. So ultimately they just fall back on slogans as self-evident truths that must be preached and obeyed.
That’s very different than actually reading the source material of an ideology. How many Anarchists have read Bakunin? Anytime someone claims to be anarchist I love asking them that and looking at the total look of confusion on their face…