Incessant Rambling

 

Why Anarchy Won't Work

Throughout my experience in the punk scene I have
 encountered many views about government, most of 
which deal with an ideology called "anarchy." Anarchy
 literally means "lack of government," but has gained 
many different add-on definitions as the punk movement
 and society as a whole adopted, criticized, and 
analyzed it. Aside from the large group of punkers who 
walk around with their machine-made anarchy patches 
(part of the everlasting punk-fashion show), there are 
members of the scene that actually care about what's 
going on. Anarchy is commonly held as an answer to the 
political problems in America. There are also two 
prevalent types of those who assume the “anarchist” 
position, one of which is not even worth discussing 
(this would be the stereotypical punk rocker, whose
 view of anarchy is limited to the chronic chanting 
of "RIOT!" and "BURN IT ALL!" This is not constructive
 at all, and therefore can’t work). The more 
intelligent view is displayed by members of society 
(not necessarily the punk scene, though often times it 
is) that contend that our world was derived from chaos
 and therefore maintains the ability to thrive on it. 
What this view essentially holds, however, is that people are good 
by nature and laws and restrictions drive us to evil. However, according 
to history, this is not so. There’s been no known civilization to have 
existed without some form of government, concluding 
that civilization cannot exist without the 
structure/order that law provides us. This can be 
supported by the Social Contract Theory (credited to 
John Locke) which states that man himself willingly 
capitulated himself to governmental rule in order for 
the protection that the government would yield. Even 
early man saw the danger in a lawless society. In 
addition, look at some of the basic trends in history:
 laws came about, wars occurred, homicide, genocide, 
sexism, etc., all became part of the human history 
books. If man were intrinsically good, laws would never have surfaced 
(as there would have been no need), wars would not have occurred, 
and all the various forms of dissension and hate would not be 
present. Since they are, this proves that man cannot 
be good by nature. This leaves us with our childhood
 choice between good and evil. With this in mind, it 
is both ignorant and arrogant to assume that we would 
all choose the same paths. Therefore, in order to 
uphold our “basic rights” and maintain the peace that 
would not ordinarily be existent on account of our 
individualism, law has been instituted (I am in no way
 criticizing individual thinking as I am a great 
admirer of it, I am only illustrating the potential 
threat it presents to an anarchic society). No matter 
how it is criticized, law in some form is necessary. 
What kinds of law and how they are enforced/instituted
 is a matter of opinion. Anarchy is the ideology of 
the idealist, and the world will never be an ideal 
place. As a scene we should be activists working for
 reform, not separation.