richardrob.bsky.social
205 posts
118 followers
73 following
Active Commenter
comment in response to
post
Just because your friends jumps off a bridge doesn't mean you have to jump if you walk across it. You can do some stuff someone else does without doing everything else they do.
comment in response to
post
Even a house is kinda peculiar. For most of human history, if you wanted to build a house you picked a nice spot where there wasn't one and built one there. If you found a house with no one living in it, welcome home.
comment in response to
post
Why couldn't we have safe drinking water and roofs while also living in the trees? Why does it have to be all or nothing?
comment in response to
post
And who was the mayor of that metropolis? How much power did they have?
comment in response to
post
People prefer safety and predictability. If you want to call that order, fine. That doesn't need to be imposed from the top down. All it takes is a societal consensus. Creating a structure that imposes it from the top down necessarily creates a structure that can take it away.
comment in response to
post
No, I bet they were the bullies then, too.
comment in response to
post
So might makes right? Are you sure it's redistribution of wealth that makes you such a big fan of the state?
comment in response to
post
The First Nations of North America managed to sustainably farm the entire continent using anarchist principles.
comment in response to
post
How did that work out for your poker player?
comment in response to
post
But this is small scale. It happened at a home poker game.
This is just a question of how you deal with the existence of assholes. I put it to you that the number of police officers it took to arrest Tovar would comfortably fit around a poker table.
comment in response to
post
But the governing body that takes on climate change doesn't need to have the power to deal with two neighbors arguing over a tree.
comment in response to
post
Most problems can be solved on that scale though. That's basically why we have different levels of government.
We really only need large-scale government to solve large-scale problems. We can't solve climate change without global cooperation, for example.
comment in response to
post
Your argument for centralized authority is a guy punching an agent of a centralized authority?
You realize if your friend punches you, you could just punch him back.
comment in response to
post
I'll grant people inevitably make governments. What's happening right now is warlords are subverting the governments we've created and using them for their own ends. Which isn't much different.
Maybe we can make the next government in a way that doesn't centralize so much power in one person?
comment in response to
post
When you play boardgames do you have a government-appointed referee enforcing the rules, or are you and friends able to work together to make sure everyone understands and follows the rules? Maybe you're even able to negotiate house rules to address problems with the official rules?
comment in response to
post
What I mean is how much surplus do you actually need to extract to have a just society? Is it okay if people manage to keep some of their own surplus, so long as everyone else's needs are met?
comment in response to
post
How good at it do we actually have be?
If violence is your primary tool to get people to contribute to the community, it's a very short walk from supporting the whole of society to merely supporting those who control the violence. Which is where we are now.
comment in response to
post
I've heard this statement over and over. What I've never heard is proof they have lied.
The IDF on the other hand lies every day.
comment in response to
post
Israel is stealing aid and using it as bait to draw Palestinians to their deaths.
comment in response to
post
Anarchism is simply the idea that we can organize ourselves without having power over each other. Anarchists are very good at redistributing surplus, and all without having it extracted from them with the threat of violence.
comment in response to
post
Trump is already ignoring the courts and arresting judges. He also has stooges on the Supreme Court who only defy him when he threatens their power. Otherwise they're happy to make things up to support his agenda. The courts can slow him down, but they won't stop him.
comment in response to
post
The powers granted by the insurrection act are contingent on there being an insurrection. Just because the law is legitimate doesn't mean its invocation is.
Where's the insurrection? Trump is the one breaking the law.
comment in response to
post
How do you propose to resist an authoritarian government if not by refusing unlawful orders and unconditional laws?
comment in response to
post
Deploy the National guard now to help the protestors and keep ICE out of your state. Trump can't deploy soldiers that aren't there.
comment in response to
post
"How mean were they?"
WTF is that?
comment in response to
post
Whether or not the IDF targets children shouldn't depend on anything Hamas has done. Hamas doesn't have any six-year-olds in its ranks.
comment in response to
post
Acting as if the Venn diagram of Jews, Israelis, Zionists, the IDF, and the Israeli government is just a circle is the kind of nationalistic thinking that enabled the Nazis to carry out the Holocaust.
comment in response to
post
Project harder. You're the one talking about "the Jews" and "the Palestinians" as if they are monolithic groups. They aren't. We're all just people. Each of us belongs to a bunch of different groups for a bunch of different reasons.
comment in response to
post
Yup. But only Israel is doing it right now. So they are the ones who need to stop.
comment in response to
post
What hospitals or schools have Hamas destroyed? When has Hamas blockaded Israel?
It doesn't matter how desperately you want to "both sides" this. It's just not true. Palestinians have simply never even had the power to do half of what Israel has done to them.
comment in response to
post
I've never done that. What I've said is genocide is bad. Ethnic cleansing is bad. Sniping six-year-old children is bad. Blowing up hospitals and lying to justify it is bad. It doesn't matter who is doing these things they are bad things to do, and anyone doing them should be stopped.
comment in response to
post
I say we start doxxing quizzlings and reporting them. Maybe we can get the Gestapo to send themselves to CECOT.
comment in response to
post
While getting along just fine with the Jews already living there? Do you think it might have to do with the new guys talking about "a land without a people for a people without a land." You don't think that would worry the people currently on that land?
comment in response to
post
Ukrainians won't settle for a deal that requires them to give up land. And they wouldn't demand any land from Russia. Their only demand through the whole way has been that Russia withdraw its army.
comment in response to
post
The people were always there, regardless of what they called themselves. And they were still living in those homes at the time.
comment in response to
post
Or they didn't like being told they had to leave their ancestral homes because some British assholes drew some lines on a map. And the neighboring countries were hoping to avoid a flood of refugees.
comment in response to
post
The concept of a homeland is inherently toxic. It only leads to bloodshed. The Nazis used defense of their homeland to justify the Holocaust.
Can you think of a single example in history where a group of people were treated as a single entity and it went well for them?
comment in response to
post
If we're apportioning land based on religion, and there were already Jews who owned land there, doesn't that mean that's the land that belongs to "the Jews"?
comment in response to
post
I'm just saying a shared religion isn't a sufficient basis for a land claim. How could that ever be workable?
comment in response to
post
"Much" was legal land purchases? Not all? And since when is legal synonymous with moral? If someone knocked on your door and said you need to find a new house and a new job because they paid a guy in Egypt you've never met, you would be fine with it?
comment in response to
post
No, OP is clearly referencing I, Beetle by Arthur C. Clark.
comment in response to
post
I'm so left-wing I believe borders are a crime against humanity. I think people should be able to go wherever they want, as long as they aren't dicks to the people already there. My problem isn't European Jews settling in the middle East. My problem is the ethnic cleansing that has gone with it.
comment in response to
post
Valid land claims are made by people, not religions. And you don't get to be part of one, just because you share a religion with people making a land claim.
comment in response to
post
I never said I wanted to give all the land only to Palestinians. I have absolutely no problem with Jews moving into Palestinian territory, as long as they do so without displacing the people who are already there.
comment in response to
post
I almost get the impression he thinks that would be a bad outcome.
comment in response to
post
Just because there are members of a group you belong to in a neighborhood, that doesn't mean you are allowed to kick out their neighbours to move into that neighborhood. What is wrong with you?
comment in response to
post
That's not anti-Semitism, it's just human decency.
comment in response to
post
They had a Palestine of their own. It was called Palestine and comprised all of the territory Israel now covers.
comment in response to
post
Every history book I've ever read goes Exodus->Holocaust->October 7, 2023. Are you saying there's something being left out?