Why we won't succeed by only changing peoples minds

in anarchy •  7 years ago  (edited)

We, the voluntarists, want to free ourselves from state control and be able to take charge of our lives. Many of my friends are fighting to change peoples minds and strengthen the liberty movement. But this alone will not work.

The reason can be seen in history. If an idea has not succeeded in the past few thousand years anywhere on earth, it is likely that humans are not made to live in that way. The greed of humans will always create a few that will go to great length to establish control. We can see this worldwide in cartels, governments, dictators and so on. They weave a web of lies trying to justify their existence and succeed in it.

We can fight the lies and over the history of humanity these tyrants did often fall, just so another one will take their place. Freedom is great, but is is unstable and needs to be defended continuously. And there is no reason to believe that we would be able to do so when everyone before us failed.

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But there is one thing in history that has consistently changed governance. This is technology and not philosophy. The type of oppressive system that was in place always corresponds to the available means of exerting control. Medieval governance was organised hierarchical as a loose group of local authorities as the means for communication were very restricted.
The industrial revolution has changed these systems for the big empires that were required to secure the hunger for resources from around the world. Improved technologies of communication (printing press, ... ) were responsible for the rise of large democracies.

If there is one hope to change the type of government it should come from technology and not philosophy. In the recent years we have seen two major breakthroughs. The internet allowing global peer to peer communication and the blockchain removing the need for trusted third parties. Both of these technologies are in their nature opposed to the interests of governance.

Many of us already enjoy freedom on the local level, a level that due to human common sense has been very hard to control by the state. When we are able to communicate with each other in person and freely establish relationships of trust, human coexistence works very well and does not requiring a central authority. But at the level where personal communication is no longer possible and trust is lacking central authorities have taken full control. But this it exactly where the internet and blockchain are targeting the justification of central power.

So if we see change to a more voluntarist and free society this will be technology driven. I think it is great to talk philosophy and prepare people for this future, but this will not initiate change; it will make the transition less violent. If we want change, we should use every opportunity to support blockchain and try to advance and protect it.

In my opinion anarchy is not possible given our human flaws without blockchain technology and once we have adopted blockchain in our everyday lives we will move much closer to anarchy automatically. The philosophy of most people will change on their own at that point. Blockchain is the great gift our our time and it is up to us to make it a success.

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I disagree with all of your premises.
But not necessarily your outcomes.

The only change comes from changing yourself.

The Wright Brothers created the first powered flight.
But, this would never have come about if not for the people desiring the goal in the first place. Men dreamed of flying.
So, the desire came first, then the technology.

It is the same thing with bitcoin and blockchain.
First came the desire, then came people that actually worked out the problems with a trust network.

People are indeed changing. The consciousness of people is shifting. And because of this, we will see much better associations of people.
1st came the internetz, and when everyone can talk to everyone else, secrets cannot be hidden for long.
2nd people are starting to see narcissists for what they are. Soon they will realize that a narcissist's promise will NEVER be fulfilled. This leads to excluding them from even being in office.
3rd people will actually start learning compassion. Throwing money at a homeless person does not help them. It actually takes a lot of work to get them to a place where they would clean up their own room/ tiny house. But once we start understanding this, most govern-cement policies just fall apart.

And thus the revolution will come.
And yes, it will look like technology steps in and fixes everything.
However, the philosophy, and people actually making themselves better is where it all starts.

I don't think we disagree that much, in a sense it seems to be a chicken and egg problem.
Technologies are invented when people start research in a certain area and this is based on a prior shift in philosophy. But then the advances in technology themselves lead to a further shift in the philosophy of the masses, again leading to more innovation.

I absolutely agree that philosophy is important and also that real change only comes from changing your own life. I am pointing out that technology plays a crucial role in this process and I believe that without new technologies there could not be any sustainable progress.

Communications and accounting are essential technology for free and voluntarist people, but they are not the only requisites. Various other fields are no less rampant, nor less targeted at the heart of tyranny.

As technologies concatenate they produce novel conditions, greater than the sum of their parts. Epiphany, paradigm shift, and evolution are all cusps upon which we tread presently, and the internet and blockchain will play a part, as will distributed power production, 3D printing, and more besides.

  ·  7 years ago (edited)

Good analysis. People don't really learn philosophy or are interested in thinking deeper to evolve how to live better... so use technology to make that easier by making trustless orgs. Good plan :) Resteemed.

Transparency of what the leaders do is important. They want to place cameras everywhere to watch our every move but they hide like the wizard of Oz. It’s becoming very obvious to the people now. That’s why they don’t like blockchain. Yes, we need to protect and grow blockchain to dismantle the madness. Great post sir.

Nice post.

In my opinion anarchy is not possible given our human flaws without blockchain technology and once we have adopted blockchain in our everyday lives we will move much closer to anarchy automatically.

I have heard one anarchist who had an actual plan to achieve that goal, one unlikely to succeed but it is a real voluntarist plan; his idea was to encourage everyone to buy all of their Christmas gifts with crypto. Might be worth a try.

Technology at the end of the day is only a means to do what you want. Blockchain has and will allow more people to live free from State control although it doesn't remove the tendencies people have to dominate others.

Perhaps if blockchain becomes ubiquitous to the point everyone's lives is based on it uses authoritarianism and Statism would be difficult to scale like it has in the past with empires and nation states. I think what is likely is we'll see those who seek power over others in certain positions and certain people will gladly accept their servitude, while a significant amount will be live outside of this system in more decentralized organizations using blockchain as an essential means to live freely.

  ·  7 years ago (edited)

Humanity is changing very fast We are evolving into new species right now.
If we get smart and conscious enough we will no longer need control and protection from outside.
p.s.
"In the beginning was the word "The Alphabet and the numbers are our most valuable "thing" our open source code and our best weapon against the slavery. Use it to expand our universe and to be free.

Great write up! Its true you cat change minds , but you can change yourself and go live without the need of society. Many people who have stayed from couchsurfing for example have left a changed person after seeing how some of us are living. The only thing that will make a real revolution is when people who talk the talk,actually take the step and walk the walk..
If you want a change then fucking change everything your doing ;)
I read somewhere for example,that if all the people who considered their selves as an activist, actually did live like one, then there would proberbly be no need for activists in the first place!!

Absolutely live as free as possible. For me realising this has made a huge difference in my life.

Sometimes I feel like freedom comes with a price... When I quit my job, I traded freedom of money for freedom of time. Now I have A LOT of time and not a lot of money lol.

ooooh yeh! but when you find that balance of having a job, but living for free, then suddenly your rich! (er)

how is your lifestyle? I didnt see any posts on your blog :)

Came in for anarchy, comment for couchsurfing!

ill b doing a blog about couchsurfing, its definatly some form of "civilian anarchy" hahahhahaa

I left the corporate life in 2016 and moved out of my place, stayed with friends all over the world and used couchsurfing. Havent paid rent for over a year!

I mentioned CS a couple of times on my own website, but yeah I'll be keen to hear your take on CS! Makes me feel like writing about CS on here too. I havent posted anything on Steemit yet....

Sounds a pritty cool start on Stemmit writing about your rent free year!

Congratulations on breaking out of them invisible chains of modern day slavery :) It really makes me smile when i hear of somebody new doing it!
Ill be doing the couchsurfing one either later or tomorrow.. I want to read your first post then! let me know when its done :P Lets share choices that we dont know we have until other people like yourself try it out and it works well..

Awareness! We gotta spread that shit generously around, its like a magical cure for depression- to pack a bag, quit the job, and go hitchhike somewhere and a watch Life work in your favor more than just sat in groundhog day deep in the system.

Amen to that! (figure of speech, I'm not religious hahaha a disclaimer)

My first post will be the introduceyourself one, so I can talk about how I got to this point of my life. Then it'll make more sense to people when my next post about couchsurfing / my rent free year comes out...

Good Luck :) Ive learnt the html lingo thanks to steemit! im pritty much a techno-phob so its a delicate balance for me hahaha

Just published my first post! Took me forever, and I know some html!

up voted & re steemed because Anarchy!