The Tyranny of the Politically Correct

by Keith Preston

  Now we come to a statement by Preston:

  (Regarding the assertion that Anarchism is opposed to all forms of authority) I regard this as a revisionist definition of anarchism and one that is difficult to glean from the writings of the founding fathers of anarchism given a proper understanding of their ideas in relation to the context of their times.

  It is perhaps ironic that Preston claims this to be the revisionist definition. Anarchists have been in no position to revise this definition. The works of Anarchist authors are readily available on the internet or in a library for any interested party and Anarchists have been in no position to alter them or destroy them. Is it happenstance that throughout history we see Anarchists aligning themselves with other anti-authoritarian movements? Every, and I say this with the utmost conviction, every Anarchist revolution, action, or moment of success has been intertwined with an opposition to all hierarchy (it should be noted that it escapes the scope of this article to explain in depth what “anti-authority” has meant to Anarchists. Obviously a shoemaker is the authority on making shoes. Anarchists have not and do not oppose that notion of the word).

  Equus’ comment regarding the shoemaker indicates that even he recognizes a distinction between natural and legitimate forms of authority, and coercive and artificial ones. Certainly, anarchists have traditionally opposed “hierarchy” in the forms of hierarchical privilege traceable to the impositions of the state. It is more questionable as to whether anarchism is simply a synonym for egalitarianism taken to the level of outright social nihilism. Some observations of Proudhon should help to clarify this distinction:

  The February Revolution replaced the system of voting by “classes”: democratic Puritanism still was not satisfied. Some wanted the vote given to children and women. Others protested against the exclusion of financial defaulters, released jailbirds, and prisoners. One wonders that they did not demand the inclusion of horses and donkeys.

  Democracy is the idea of the state without limits.

  Money, money, always money - this is the crux of democracy.

  Democracy is more expensive than monarchy; it is incompatible with liberty.

  Democracy is nothing but the tyranny of majorities, the most execrable tyranny of all because it rests neither on the authority of a religion, nor on the nobility of a race, nor on the prerogatives of talent or property. Its foundation is numbers and its mask is in the name of the people.

  Democracy is an aristocracy of mediocrities.

  It would seem safe enough to conclude that the founding father of modern anarchism was indeed rather suspicious of the wild egalitarianism our friend Equus seems to be insisting on.

  The Spanish Revolution of 1936 saw Social and Political revolution intertwined, with the Anarchists firmly declaring that neither supersedes the other.

  Yes, of course, but a social revolution against what? It was a social revolution against those institutions of oppression and exploitation allied with the state, e.g. feudal land barons, capitalist plutocrats, the theocratic church, the military, the police, etc.

  The Paris commune and French revolution saw Anarchists with convictions outside of opposition to the state.

  When have I ever argued that Anarchists should not have convictions outside of opposition to the state? I, for example, am an atheist and have very strong anti-Christian views. Yet I do not feel the need to bring my atheist convictions into all of my political projects for a variety of reasons. In the modern countries we have separation of church and state. Elites do not take religion seriously. Intellectual culture is overwhelmingly secular. Popular religion is very ecumenical in nature. Even conservative or fundamentalist religion is quite liberal by historical standards or even contemporary world standards. The influence of organized religion continues to decline. The common people are the most religious, and are alienated by overt attacks on their sacred beliefs. This is hardly conducive to organizing them politically and economically. Overt hostility to religion tends to produce a conservative religious backlash. Hence, I do not incorporate the militant atheism of many of the classical anarchists into my own paradigm (even if I might agree with it personally) because I do not feel it is necessary and I regard such as strategically destructive in a modern society. There are plenty of other issues that I do fit into my paradigm that do indeed involve matters other than opposing the state. As I said in an earlier critique of the cultural Left:

  I am very much for the development of non-state charities, relief agencies, orphanages, youth hostels, squats, shelters for battered women, the homeless or the mentally ill, self-improvement programs for drug addicts and alcoholics, assistance services for the disabled or the elderly, wildlife and environmental preserves, means of food and drug testing independent of the state bureaucracy, home schools, neighborhood schools, private schools, tenants organizations, mutual banks, credit unions, consumers unions, anarcho-syndicalist labor unions and other worker organizations, cooperatives, communes, collectives, kibbutzim and other alternative models of organizing production. I am in favor of free clinics, alternative medicine, self-diagnostic services, midwifery, the abolition of medical licensure, the repeal of prescription laws and anything else that could potentially reduce the cost of health care for the average person and diminish dependency on the medical-industrial complex and the white coat priesthood. Indeed, I would argue that the eventual success of libertarianism depends to a large degree on the ability of libertarians to develop workable alternatives to both the corporation-dominated economy and the state-dominated welfare and social service system. To the degree that libertarians fail to do so will be the degree to which we continue to be regarded as plutocratic apologists without concern for the unfortunate or downtrodden on the right end or as just another species of Chomskyite anarcho-social democrats on the left end.

  The student protests of Paris, May 1968 brought on a whole new approach to left struggles that were outside of the state and labor movement (and I believe now define the new left).

  No doubt about it. Yet a core element of my arguments is that the New Left of 1968 is now the status quo.

  This will all be explained in more detail later, the point being that it is overwhelmingly easy to glean that Anarchists have always been opposed to forms of authority outside of the state until the right retro-actively tried to place themselves in-line with the leftist thinkers of the past.

  This ignores the fact that the American right is historically rooted in the left (e.g classical liberalism) and that many right-wing movements in the Anglosphere today reflect this classical liberal influence, e.g. libertarianism, paleoconservatism, populism, Anabaptist influenced forms of Christian evangelicalism, or agrarianism. Moreover, the ideas of the radical traditionalists that have influenced a number of Third Positionist tendencies overlap very well with those of classical anarchists. The radical traditionalist journal Tyr describes its principles as “resacralization of the world versus materialism, natural social hierarchy versus an artificial hierarchy based on wealth, the tribal community versus the nation-state, stewardship of the earth versus the maximization of resources, a harmonious relationship between men and women versus the war between the sexes, and handicraft and artisanship versus industrial mass-production.”

  This vision sounds almost Kropotkinite, does it not?

  Moreover, Preston has stated that he accepts:

  “natural inequality of persons at both the individual and collective levels, the inevitability and legitimacy of otherness”

  This places, at least, Preston himself in the position of the conservative thesis, the sociological side generally associated with the right, if not Third Positionism itself. If nothing else, it distances the entire notion of Third Positionism from Anarchism and the classical understanding of Libertarianism outside of the US. It is ideologically impossible to claim any lineage to Anarchist thought without the idea that social inequality is to some extent a social construct.

  Where have I ever denied that “social inequalit
y is to some extent a social construct”? Do the English and the Afghans have “equal” levels of social evolution concerning gender relations? Would not the relationship between the culture of the Dutch and that of the Saudis constitute an inevitable “otherness”? Equus next turns his attention to the question of the state itself.

  There is no doubt that old leftist ideas have gained popularity amongst western industrialized states. Public education and universal healthcare are just two examples of leftist ideas practiced by the state.

  No doubt about it. But is this a good thing? The traditional anarchist critique of state-controlled education is that it is a means of disseminating the state’s legitimating ideology and inculcating youngsters with pious reverence for the state. The historic purpose of the welfare state was the cooptation, pacification, and subjugation of peoples’ movements by making people dependent on the state and crowding out alternatives. Kevin Carson has written extensively of the progressive welfare state’s efforts to overrun popular institutions, and the welfare state idea has its roots in Prussian militarism. An anarchist who cannot grasp these principles is not worthy of the name.

  This does not, however, place leftism firmly in the statist sphere of political belief. The Left, like the Right, has statist and anti-statist strands of thought. However, it is also true that the Left has significant, even dominant, strands of extreme statist tendencies exhibited in such movements as Jacobinism, Marxism, and Leninism.

  National Socialism, a clearly right-wing ideology, has seen itself manifested in the state.

  Well, the true origins of National Socialism are something of an embarrassment to the Left.

  Most leftists, adhering to the conflict theorist understanding of social inequality, believe that the state is a tool that can be used to minimize or destroy social inequality,

  This simply means that “most leftists” are incompatible with Anarchism.

  Similarly, most of the right sees the state as a way to ensure that a system of stratification is as functional as possible,

  The pro-state Right is likewise incompatible with Anarchism. Thus it does not mean the anti-state Right should be shunned.

  The New Left is intensely critical of authoritarian statism (as Paris 1968 demonstrated), but does not leave behind old understandings of authority (class oppression, gender oppression, racism, etc.).

  This statement completely ignores what the New Left has subsequently evolved into, and the fact that the New Left has become part of the status quo.

  On the State, Anarchism, Goals, and Strategies

  A key objection Equus raises against my position involves the contention that left and right wing anti-statists, whatever their surface appearances, oppose the state for fundamentally different, even diametrically opposed, and therefore incompatible reasons.

  If nothing else, Third Positionism does not lay in the same historical bed as Anarchism, it’s not even in the same bedroom. While there may be right-wing thinkers that see the state as a mechanism to ensure the functionality of a society and others who see it as a roadblock, neither the left or right necessarily see it as a tool that must be used. Without the understanding that social stratification is to some extent socially constructed, Third Positionism and ATS are squarely on the right of the ongoing political discourse, accepting that social inequality is inevitable.

  First of all, not all Third Positionists are necessarily anti-statists, and those who are will more likely be decentralists of some kind or merely interested in pan-secessionism as a tactic, rather than adhering specifically to branches of anarchism that are directly influenced by Third Positionist thinking (like national-anarchism). In terms of forming alliances with third position-influenced groups, I would say “take them as they come,” meaning evaluate specific groups and individuals on the basis of what they can or could likely contribute to a wider anarcho-pluralist movement employing pan-secessionism as a tactic. Equus regards left and right wing anti-statists as incompatible on the basis of perceived differences in their respective understandings of human nature, particularly their contending views on “inequality.” While the elitism/egalitarianism dichotomy is not as picture perfect as Equus would have us believe, even if we concede this point for the sake of argument, it still does not follow that left and right wing anti-statists have no common ground. Equus goes on to describe a laundry list of points of view that should be excluded from the anarchist movement.

  This does not exclude Market Anarchists or Individualist Anarchists from the Anarchist movement (although it most certainly does exclude “Anarcho-capitalists”). The market, like the state, is a tool, a forum, a method. It is a tool by which Anarchists seek freedom from hierarchy and those on the right use to legitimize it. The Anarchist would claim, “The market will liberate all individuals from hierarchy,” while only the rightist would claim, “Any hierarchy as a result of the market is legitimate, fair, or natural and must be accepted since it is a result of the market.” The left seeks to reform or destroy hierarchy; the right seeks to legitimize it. The tools they use depend on the individuals.

  These are just word games. Why should anarcho-capitalists be excluded from the anarchist movement? Surely, we would want to exclude state-capitalists. I agree there is no room for plutocratic “conservatives” or vulgar “libertarians” in our ranks. But there is no reason why those who want to set up economic arrangements involving a Lockean basis for property rights or voluntarily employing wage labor should be prohibited from doing so in a stateless system.

  The reason Third Positionism, the populist right in the USA, and other right-wing ideologies have recently become anti-state or at least garner harsh feelings toward the idea of government is easily understandable in a historical context. It is a relatively new phenomenon from my understanding that the right can be associated with anti-state sentiment at all. As the left gained support in the government via the labor movement, black power movement, feminist movement, etc. the government has adopted some ideas from the left while maintaining social stratification. Public education and healthcare are two examples of this.

  This amounts to an admission by Equus that the Left has indeed become part of the status quo in many, many areas of society.

  In this sense, the right is opposed to government because the government has adopted ideas that are diametrically opposed to its traditional beliefs.

  Yes, in some instances, but so what? Naturally, in an anti-state movement some people will oppose the state out of consistent hostility to the state, while others will oppose it only because they see it as antithetical to their own interests.

  Inasmuch as the right opposes the current trend of governments, the alliance between Anarchists and the “libertarian” right is faulty at least, and most likely hazardous. ATS’ Statement of Purpose legitimizes and says it accepts the following schools of thought:

  “anarcho-monarchism, anarcho-feudalism”

  Being that some of the first Anarchist thinkers, let’s just use Proudhon and Baukunin as examples, lived in societies that had feudal, monarchist states it becomes increasingly hard, and as any further thought will prove impossible, to reconcile the term “anarcho-monarchism.” If Anarchism as a philosophy was first articulated in the face of Monarchist/feudal systems, how then could it have progressed towards them? Without retroactive defining that is completely delineated from Anarchism, it is impossible to give anarcho-monarchism any credibility.

  Once again, a distinction must be made between state-monarchism or state-feudalism and anarcho-monarchism and anarcho-feudalism, just as a distinction has to be made between state-capitalism and anarcho-capitalism, state-communism and anarcho-communism, or state-syndicalism and anarcho-syndicalism. Clearly, an anarcho-communist commune such as Twin Oaks is the polar opposite of state-communist regimes such as North Korea, Cuba, or the former Soviet Union. Clearly, a syndicalist model workers’ cooperative federation such as Mondragon is the polar opposite of the state-corporatist “syndicalism” of Mussolini. Clea
rly, a purely private business firm employing voluntary wage labor is the polar opposite of state-capitalist entities such as General Motors. Likewise, an anarcho-monarchist community where the participants voluntarily appoint a monarch or a collection of monarchs to serve such functions as the organization of protection or settling disputes is the polar opposite of the absolute monarchies championed by Thomas Hobbes. Prototypes for anarcho-monarchist societies can be found throughout history and contemporary Liechtenstein comes close to being such an arrangement. Likewise, it is possible that, for instance, an anarchist seastead or colony might voluntarily anoint certain individuals to be dukes, barons, counts, knights, and so forth, thereby setting up a kind of anarcho-feudalism. Indeed, “anarcho-feudalism” might well be conceptually useful in those countries where feudal titles still carry some influence, and where common people maintain a sacralized vision of the process whereby those titles are issued. Further, it is possible that in an anarcho-pluralist pan-secessionist action that some regions or localities of a more conservative bent might be inclined towards anarcho-capitalism, anarcho-monarchism, or anarcho-feudalism, while those of a more liberal or progressive bent might be inclined towards anarcho-syndicalism, anarcho-communism, or mutualist anarchism. Others may think what they wish of such beliefs or actions, but the disapproval of others does not invalidate their legitimacy.