Anarchism Bad

ANARCHISM REPRESENTS THE HERD MENTALITY, NOT FREEDOM

1. ANARCHISM CAUSES 'MORAL TYRANNY,' WORSE THAN POLITICAL
Paul Edwards, Editor In Chief, THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF PHILOSOPHY, 1967, p. 114-5.
The problem of reconciling social harmony with complete individual freedom is a recurrent one in
anarchist thought. It has been argued that an authoritarian society produces antisocial reactions, which
would vanish in freedom. It has also been suggested, by Godwin and Kropotkin particularly, that public
opinion will suffice to deter those who abuse their liberty. However, George Orwell has pointed out that
the reliance on public opinion as a force replacing overt coercion might lead to a moral tyranny which,
having no codified bounds, could in the end prove more oppressive than any system of laws.

2. ANARCHIST NOTIONS OF FREEDOM ARE WRONG

Friedrich Nietzsche, Philosopher, BEYOND GOOD AND EVIL, 1989, p. 88.
How much trouble the poets and orators of all peoples have taken--not excepting a few prose writers
today in whose ear there dwells an inexorable conscience--'for the sake of some foolishness,' as utilitarian
dolts say, feeling smart--'submitting abjectly to capricious laws,' as anarchists say, feeling 'free,' even
'free-spirited.' But the curious fact is that all there is or has been on earth of freedom, subtlety, boldness,
dance, and masterly sureness, whether in thought itself or in government, or in rhetoric and persuasion,
in the arts just as in ethics, has developed only owing to the 'tyranny of such capricious laws'.

3. ANARCHISM REFLECTS THE HERD MENTALITY

Lewis Call, Professor of History at Cal-Poly SLO, NIETZSCHE AS CRITIC AND CAPTIVE OF ENLIGHTENMENT,
1995, p. np.
A consideration of Nietzsche's views on anarchists will make clear the difficulties involved in placing him
within the tradition of anarchism. He writes in Twilight of the Idols: "when the anarchist, as the
mouthpiece of the declining strata of society, demands with a fine indignation what is 'right,' 'justice,' and
'equal rights,' he is merely under the pressure of his own uncultured state, which cannot comprehend the
real reason for his suffering--what he is poor in: life." Nietzsche goes on to associate the anarchist with
the Christian, and to decry both as "decadents." Clearly, these are some of the strongest criticisms
available to Nietzsche. That which was Christian, decadent and poor in life was inevitably what he
attacked most enthusiastically. Goyard-Fabre suggests that "the reactive passion of the anarchists makes
them, like the socialists, men of resentment." Anarchists sought revenge on society; this was precisely
what Nietzsche hated in the herd man. Bergmann suggests that Nietzsche saw direct evidence of this
anarchistic quest for revenge as he witnessed the particular kind of anarchism that was becoming
prevalent in Europe during the 1880s, a brand of anarchism that was heralded by Prince Kropotkin and
that became inarticulate in its love affair with dynamite. The anarchist, like the liberal, the socialist and
the nationalist, remains for Nietzsche an example of the political herd man, unable to transcend the
political tradition of the Enlightenment.
ANARCHISM INCORRECT VISION FOR FUTURE SOCIETY
1. RISE OF THE STATE NEED NOT VIOLATE ANYONE'S RIGHTS
Robert Nozick, Professor of Philosophy at Harvard University, ANARCHY, STATE AND UTOPIA, 1974, p. xi.
Since I begin with a strong formulation of individual rights, I treat seriously the anarchist claim that in the
course of maintaining its monopoly on the use of force and protecting everyone within a territory, the
state must violate individuals' rights and hence is intrinsically immoral. Against this claim, I argue that a
state would arise from anarchy (as represented by Locke's state of nature) even though no one intended
this or tried to bring this about, by a process which need not violate anyone's rights.

2. ANARCHY WOULD LEAD TO ENDLESS FEUDS, RETALIATION AND VIOLENCE

Robert Nozick, Professor of Philosophy at Harvard University, ANARCHY, STATE AND UTOPIA, 1974, p. 11.
In a state of nature, the understood natural law may not provide for every contingency in a proper fashion
and men who judge in their own case will always give themselves the benefit of the doubt and assume
that they are in the right. They will overestimate the amount of harm or damage they have suffered, and
passions will lead them to attempt to punish others more than proportionately and to enact excessive
compensation. Thus private and personal enforcement of one's rights (including those rights which are
violated when one is needlessly punished) leads to feuds, to an endless series of acts of retaliation and
enactions of compensation.

3. ANARCHIST ARGUMENT ABOUT STATE VIOLATING RIGHTS IS FLAWED

Robert Nozick, Professor of Philosophy at Harvard University, ANARCHY, STATE AND UTOPIA, 1974, p. 52.
Hence, so the argument continues, when the state threatens another with punishment if he does not
contribute to the protection of another, it violates (and its officials violate) his rights. In threatening him
with something that would be a violation of his rights if done by a private citizen, they violate moral
constraints. To get to something recognizable as a state we must show 1) how an ultraminimal state
arises out of the system of private protective associations; and 2) how the ultraminimal state is
transformed into the minimal state, how it gives rise to that "redistribution" for the general provision of
protective services that constitutes it as the minimal state. To show that the minimal state is morally
legitimate, to show that it is not immoral in itself, we must show also that these transitions in 1) and 2)
are each morally legitimate. In the rest of Part I of this work, we show how each of these transitions occur
and is morally permissible. We argue that the first transition, from a system of private-protective agencies
to an ultraminimal state, will occur by an invisible-hand process in a morally permissible way that violates
no one's rights.

4. WE ARE MORALLY OBLIGATED TO PRODUCE A MINIMAL STATE

Robert Nozick, Professor of Philosophy at Harvard University, ANARCHY, STATE AND UTOPIA, 1974, p. 52-
3.
Secondly, we argue that the transition from an ultraminimal state to a minimal state morally must occur.
It would be morally impermissible for persons to maintain the monopoly in the ultraminimal state without
providing protective services for all, even if this requires "redistribution". The operators of the
ultraminimal state are required to produce the minimal state.

5. MINIMAL STATE PROVIDES RIGHTS AS WELL AS INDIVIDUAL DIGNITY

Robert Nozick, Professor of Philosophy at Harvard University, ANARCHY, STATE AND UTOPIA, 1974, p.
333-4.
The minimal state treats us as inviolate individuals, who may not be used in certain ways by others as
means or tools or instruments or resources; it treats us as persons having individual rights with the dignity
this constitutes. Treating us with respect by respecting our rights, it allows us, individually or with whom
we choose, to choose our life and realize our ends and our conceptions of ourselves, insofar as we can,
aided by the voluntary cooperation of other individuals possessing the same dignity. How dare any state
or group of individuals do more. Or less.