On Anarchism, Bitcoin and the Impending Revolution

This article exactly captures my excitement about the future. Worth reading the whole thing. Some juicy parts:

The reason that government is everywhere is that government wins. It's a Darwin thing. The reason that government wins is that a bigger ship is more seaworthy, and a big enough ship needs a thousand builders, and a thousand builders need an organizer to deal out paychecks, and sooner or later the organizer's paychecks become more important than the ship. The ship is still made, of course, and it crosses the world conquering savages for loot. But in the end, the organizer is a king, and we all swear the pledge of allegiance. The original reason for building the ship? Shit, no one remembers. Anyways, here we go. (Ever watch Cube?)

And:

Bitcoin doesn't need to be legal to operate. And it's encroaching on the sort of grand scale project space that first gave governments their legitimacy. I think this is significant.

Noam Chomsky on Anarchism

Noam Chomsky on Anarchism:

It's based on the assumption that any... structure of authority and domination has to justify itself. None of them are self justifying. Whether they're in individual relations or international affairs or the workplace or where ever. They have a burden of proof to bear, and if they can't bear that burden, ...they're illegitimate and should be dismantled and replaced with alternative structures which are free and participatory.

A case for not voting

Here's some of the best news I've heard in a while, on voter turnout in Canada:

In addition to falling overall voter participation, another significant trend is the extremely low rate of participation amongst youth voters. Approximately twenty-five percent of eligible voters aged 18 – 24 voted in the 2000 federal election. Moreover, studies have indicated that many youth who don’t vote remain uninvolved in the political system, and do not voting when they get older.

Why is this good news? Well it has got alot of people worried. Low voter turnout can undermine the legitimacy of government. If everyone ignored government, it would go away.

"What a quack." you might be saying. "Convincing everybody not to vote -- that's not very realistic."

And yes, you'd be absolutely right. But you know what else isn't very realistic? Affecting the outcome of an election by voting. So that's how I'm choosing to exercise my vote this election - by not voting. You may think it's a waste of a vote; but its no more of a waste than yours.

Heck, even George Carlin Doesn't vote

And, back to the good news, not voting sends a very powerful message. It's gets people talking about electoral reform.

Some experts place much of the low voter turnout blame on Canada’s electoral system. Canada has a single member plurality system, commonly called First Past the Post (FPTP). In a FPTP system, a single individual represents a specific district. Instead of obtaining a majority of votes, the winner only needs to receive more votes than any other candidate.

Electoral reform. Isn't this what Canada really needs? The green party has support of somewhere between 5 and 10% of the Canadian public, yet they aren't even allowed into the debate. (Note: this is not an endorsement of the Green Party)



So that's how i'm casting my vote. For true, representational democracy.

Anarchist themes in hip hop

Lets play a game. I'll give you a name, and you tell me the first words that come to your mind. Ready? Lets go:

Tupac Shakur


So? What did you think of?

'Rapper' or 'hip-hop artist' was likely the first thing.

If you're not a fan, then likely things like 'gangster', 'thug', 'criminal' come to mind.

If you are a fan then maybe you thought of 'poet', 'genius', 'martyr', etc.

Did you think of 'Anarchist'?

To me, his lyrics are filled with allusions to the coercive nature of the state. A good example is the last verse of "Me Against the World". His best verse, in my opinion.

Listen to the whole thing, or jump directly to the verse in question.

With all this extra stressing
The question I wonder is after death
After my last breath
When will I finally get to rest from this oppression?
They punish the people that asks questions
And those that possess
Steal from the ones without possessions
The message I stress
To make you stop 'n study your lessons
Don't settle for less
Even the genius asks questions
Be grateful for blessings
Don't ever change, keep your essence
The power is in the people and politics we address
Always do your best
Don't let the pressure make you panic
And when you get stranded
And things don't go the way you planed it
Dreaming of riches
In a position of making a difference
Politicians are hypocrites
They don't wanna listen
If I'm insane it's the fame
Made a brother change
It wasn't nothin' like the game
It's just me against the world