The Utopian Ideal

I've come about a dissatisfaction with my community and not to offend anyone, but in general, my peers. I'm not so cynical as to detest the entire human race and care nothing for the common good of the people. I'm not Ayn Rand. But certainly, I feel that being a minority in beliefs, such as I am, it's hard to not feel like on a daily basis, that I am putting forth a facade. The notion that I too, believe in what is fed to me, that I too will aggressively assert the rationality and realistic principles of a standard governing society. On the contrary, I detest out society. Not the people within the community, as they all have immense potential to extract themselves of this materialistic, competitive, consumerist, environment of societal and religious dogma. However, there is such conflict over the way our people ought to be ruled. Yes, ruled. Consciously diving into a typical nonconformist, anti-society rant that I know so many people would mock and yet, I believe there is truth in the nonconformist ideal. I've heard a number of my peers proclaim that they do what they want and live the lives they want, but I assure you, this is anything but true. We, as people, we do not seek this lifestyle. Some will say that people by nature are mere sheep, following the herd or leader. This is true to some extent, but few individuals as unfortunate as that is, choose to stray past those societal barriers. If you want the truth, I could not care less about material possessions. Take my bass, take my cell phone, take my ipod. Just leave me with my dignity and self-respect. This is not typical, the whole "minimalist" lifestyle, but it is the last freedom we have. The journey to this realization is not for the emotionally weak but for the few that make it here, it is the most liberating experience. After you reach this point in your life, all you see when you look around at others is misery. Others won't be aware of their misery, but they will be drowning in it. You may or may not choose to save them. I don't advise it as people are nearly impossible to change in their ways, as many a people can be stubborn and close-minded. Not to say that all people are, and I'm sure this entire rant is coming off as arrogant and condescending, but I assure you that I do not mean for it to. People by nature are corruptible and susceptible to a path of self-destruction and greed. I believe this can be controlled to a great extent. An extent so great that I believe in the utopia. I identify myself as a Social Anarchist. Immediately upon hearing the word "anarchy" a good deal of people are put off and aren't willing to consider it anymore than what they've been taught. The ... I don't want to say idiots, but I will anyway.. idiots would assume that anarchy is synonymous with chaos and destruction, a "free for all" if you will. No, that's exactly what anarchism is trying to avoid. Anarchism is a term that is extremely hard to define. It can refer to many different ideas and concepts. I suppose in a vague sense, it would be a lack of government. It would be a society run by communities of people without a state or federal government controlling their lives. It would be freedom at it's purist but never without personal and moral responsibility. Responsibility is a major factor in anarchism. It would not be plausible if each individual was not taught how to interact in the society so as to make the society functional. An anarchist society would in fact incorporate democratic principles as well as socialism and the European definition of "libertarianism", (If you have ever read or heard Chomsky's linguistic theories relative to political theory terms, you will understand that for different cultures there are different meanings of different words.) as well as communism. Communism in it's most pure form (and I think this is where all the other societal structures who have attempted communism have failed by having an authoritative government asserting dominance over the public to any degree.) is essentially anarchism as anarchism is stateless communism. Anarchism is based on the idea of all individuals working together for the common good with no corporations of politicians making a benefit off of them, at their expense. For example, I volunteer at a radically-leftist community center and bookstore. We have monthly meetings and at each meeting, we take votes on what we want to do with any extra money we've made or what to do about changing the keys or what have you. We do have managers who essentially elect themselves depending on whether or not they're up for the position and most people are not because it is a great deal of work. Regardless, we do have "managers" and we do take votes and we do have assigned projects and positions, yet this is anarchism. Nothing is mandatory, there is no dress code, there are no rules, we just ask that you do not steal or offend. We do not threaten those that might steal with prosecution, we just explain why they should not, as we are a nonprofit organization and we contribute to the community and are trying to re-educate others and offer alternative materials, etc. Another example of anarchism in the community is the RRFM or the "Really Really Free Market" in carrboro that occurs on the first saturday of the month. This is based on the gift-economy concept. Anyone who has extra items, materials, products or services or means of entertainment are welcome to show up and provide them to the public, which receives the aforementioned and may also give back. It ensures that all people within the community have what they need and can give what they have an excess of. Of course this is all optional and made into an enjoyable experience so nobody feels trapped in the process. This gift-economy eliminates the need for a middle man and large corporations with absurdly greedy CEO's. It has been working among our anarchist community for years. Anarchism does work, as it is working, however at the moment just as individualist anarchists within their community and not as an entire society. Most people will claim that anarchism, or any other radical-leftist political ideal is denying human nature. They claim that human nature is to reflexively and instinctively steal, lie, murder, rape, covet, etc without laws to prevent them from doing so. Laws are simply restraints. Laws have their faults (need I remind us of the law banning same-sex marriage from most states, the law banning marijuana, or the fact that for so long there were laws banning females the right to vote, that we were legally bound to segregation and slavery, that we instilled the patriot's act in our society to reenact big brother, or that for a few periods in time, abortion was illegal, etc.) and therefore, just as someone could claim that anarchism, communism, socialism etc are idealist utopias, well so are democracy and capitalism if you want them to be pure. We have lobbyists who can buy elections, we have wars that are fought for oil and claimed for terror, we have countries that claim to be the land of the free that advocated for child labor in factories and still advocates for child labor in foreign countries of which we supply our corporations with their stocks. We have innocent men and women being sentenced to death or multiple years in prison, we have doctors put in jail for assisted suicide when we allow euthanasia in pets because we see only that as humane. We are corrupt and we call ourselves a democracy. I'll rant more about this at a later time.