Anarchists are not Leftists

[Downtown Hound]

9. There's a reason why neither has ever been in place for very long

They don't work. What happens in an anarchist society the minute there's a murder or a rape? You can't call the cops because there are no cops. So do go get justice for yourself? Let's hope you get the right guy. Say you don't get the right guy? What happens then? What do you do when somebody wants to build a house on that pristine beach you love so much? Do you kill them? Who settles disputes like these? So then you start creating committees, people who can delegate things like this. Guess what? You've just created a government.

The bottom line is, on a planet with more than six billion people with limited resources, there is going to have be some kind of authoritative body to prevent total chaos. Anybody who thinks otherwise is kidding themselves. What we can do as people, and as Democrats, is to make sure that people have a say in how that governing body acts, and see to it that it acts in the interest of the people as much a possible. Anarchism, like Libertarianism, is a pipe dream by people who haven't really thought things through. I should know. When I was younger and dumber and with a strong desire to be edgy and cool, I used to call myself one. I even participated in a black bloc march through San Francisco against the Iraq War.

Then I grew up, and realized that I was kidding myself.