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The abolition of law or at least the minimization of it
June 8, 2012 - 11:39pm
Washington's quote on government can easily be applied to law in my book though I see nothing handy about it.
In ancient times localized mores would take care of alot of issues that the law does now and the law was more secondary. anyone else for minimization of law or outright abolition?
Yes, I imagine that way of doing things without having laws get in the way would work out quite well for a wealthy slavekeeper...... I mean, um ... no, I disagree.
Slavery historically is either enforced by a top down religious based law or a more bottom up base intersubjective consesus(classical ireland for example) We've gotten over the hangups that create the latter, the former is still very much a potential reality through the continuing existence of law and state and its continued non voluntary mediation of labour.
I don't think so, Mike.
I can see how well we have gotten over the hangups of religion, and of course slavery is all to do with religion - it's written right on the dollar bills. And "bottom-up intersubjective consensus"... isn't that a fancy way of saying they're simple folk who need to be told what to do, and so eager to please that they just oppress themselves? Some fellow wrote this book that says you can even eat them - but he was joking.
Problem is I think all of us think we would do fine without laws; it's other people who are the problem. It's one thing to hear that proposal from someone looking to undo oppression, but coming from someone who was one of the richest men in his country it is quite another. Yes, I know they didn't want to have to worry about the law applying to them.
Though I disagree with the idea in either case
White supremacists cheer the repeal of hate speech law sections:
http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2012/06/08/bill-c-304-hate-speech-tories_n_...
Oh.... and this guy:
https://twitter.com/ToewsVic/status/210549199228506112
Religion was a motivating factor at a denovo stage, at this point its time to move on to other parts of the problem that make people problamatic, laws are an obvious cadidate, they are not of any kind of human scale and they super impose themselves on issues that are best handled directly or within a specific context. Negative liberty was a good step for the time in taking on the problem of human domination, unfortunately we swung towards positive prescriptions in the 20th century and this at worse this gave rise to stalinism and nazism respectively, the path I see is going back to negative liberty and taking it to its logical conclusions which lie somewhere in an anarchic framework.
And obviously those groups are going to have an issue with hate laws, that in no way makes the hate law a good idea, what you don't understand is that laws have a life of their own and will move themselves onto propaganda that you might agree with, what about black youth who chant kill all pigs, law is opurtunistic enough that it will move onto that enforcement. The only thing the logic of law is interested in is its preservation and expansion like the cancer that it is. if you have a problem with the kkk take them on directly or through clever proganda, don't rely on the law.
This is one thing that the right are correct on sadly. The left has become bogged down in identity politics and what they percieve to be offending propaganda agains some abstract 'opressed' group. As a result of this instead of extending the logic of the 1st amendment to other territories leftists have created this unessary continued mediation of law instead of getting it off our backs.
What about that? I think the 60s is calling you , and wants their stale, racist slogans back
Nah, I think I like the law better.
http://articles.cnn.com/2011-08-03/justice/us.civil.rights.seale_1_charl...
I don't think your options ever did much to prevent anyone from being lynched or shot, without the backing of the law.
Though I have to ask why you refer to something you offer as a positive option as "clever propaganda".
And Mike, this is Canada. We have no first amendment.
On the other hand, you will probably be pleased to know that they actually scraped together the cash to make "Atlas Shrugged Part II", which will include interviews with the great woman herself.... just in time for the U.S. elections.
How in hell do you construe racism in my anti-cop example??? I'm illustrating how people in poor prole communities who have been historically fucked over by cops answer back in propaganda. NWAs fuck the police for eg, in the us thankfully they would not have to put up with hate speech laws, but where people stoopid enough to put them in have, I have no doubt certain people in established positions of power would go after that kind of propaganda and would probably be succesfull. PS I don't like cops very much.
And.....what does the existence of the clan have to do with the arguement for laws? THINK man. Shootings and lynchings still go on btw and sometimes it can even be black on white, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAfjCjgjyA0&feature=results_main&playnext... which tend to be more under reported by the media. The end to these kind of things will come about through changes in conciousness not any kind of reactionary law.
And lulz to you pinning anyone who has a more negative anarchic liberty bent with being a randian, C'MON MAN! Yes I we don't have a voltarian kind of free speech law, sadly the US remains on of the few if not the only one that does 200 plus years later.
Whatever your meaning (and yes, I know it was just a brief snippet of a sentence), I just find it kind of an odd (and cliche'd) association.
Lots of people of all kinds have expressed anger and even death threats against the cops. But the fact is, some of the clearest analysis and organized action regarding what is fucked up in our society has come from non-white people, particularly African and Native people.
And when one looks at who actually perpetrates most of the violence and anger against whom, I think the image of non-whites calling for the oppressors' blood is more in the imagination than in reality (though sure, you can find some examples if you really want to).
Contrary to the idea of killing all pigs, I think the majority of responses have have been quite controlled and measured, when one considers the great violence that has been done to some of these people:
"Concerning nonviolence: It is criminal to teach a man not to defend himself, when he is the constant victim of brutal attacks. It is legal and lawful to own a shotgun or a rifle. We believe in obeying the law." - Malcolm X
And I don't want to make assumptions, but I find it odd that you keep using the word propaganda, which is rhetoric used to control and manipulate. It is a wholly negative word, in my opinion. I don't consider honest grievances to be propagandist at all.
Well this has gone a bit off topic anyway, the point is the relaxing of laws is a good idea to the point where mores and direct confrontation and dealings can take over, I'm not particularly interested in 'oppression' anyway as it is an identity category from the post 68 period that needs to be jettisoned, power and systems domination is what I focus on, in particularly how they stifle the individual.
And propaganda has been done even by anarchists not in power btw, though it was a poor choice of word on my part.
I think I see part of what you are driving at; I just don't think having a strong system of legal protections stops people dealing directly with one another in a positive way if they choose to (and I think we have a fair bit of direct confrontation - good and bad - right now).
Thing is that with direct confrontation you can't always predict which side is going to prevail, and in any case, I'd rather not see anything depend on shows of force - and plenty of times that is what it comes down to.
Well I doubt shows of force will happen very often, the thing about laws is that they are super imposing structures that quite often make things worse in the long run particularly when things go reactionary, most people are too lazy or non motivated to be forcefull anyway, and again you still have mores. And there are a lot of dealings that humans cannot do right now because laws have encroached on areas once defined by mores, if you're into porn for example laws are one of the biggest hinderences there is to that particular form of free expression, as well as recreational use of the human body in general. You can manuever around mores much more easier.
What about deregulation, foreign takeovers and making it easier for banks and corporations to rip-off the public and pollute the environment? That's been happening at an increased pace for the last 30 years. They call it freedom when they themselves are free to do as they please.
And slavery just morphed into a system of debt croppers after the US civil war. Today it is debt peonage similarly. They found that keeping slaves was too expensive and inefficient. It's a class war, and the only way to understand today's politics is to realize this. It's not the same one spoken of by socialists 100 years ago. They don't wage war on proles by employing us as per Capital volume one. Today they wage financial war on the working class. Meanwhile the factory owners are nowhere to be seen much less picketed. It's the same as before but different, much, much different. We need to arm ourselves with the truth before attempting to fight the good fight today.
Oh this is so delicious.
While it's thrilling that you aren't particularly interested in oppression (nice scare quotes), hey, guess what? Folks who are oppressed on a daily basis are rather interested. They're interested in, um, NOT being oppressed anymore. Like by the cops, or by employers, or the health care system or the education system, or the criminal justice system.
Imagine that.
And identity category (talk about a phrase needing scare quotes!) is a nice way to say Racism, Sexism, Classism, Homophobia, since I'm sure that's what you meant.
...ROFL...
You almost had me at that last part about power and systems domination until that nice piece of libertarianism at the end.
Now, if you were talking about stuff like this.....
Systemic oppression
Oppressed Brown Girls Doing Things
Components of an anti-oppressive framework
.... that would be different. But you aren't.
Check this video out, Mike, by another Mike: http://vimeo.com/28656760
Mike, I don't even know where to start, except to say that you clearly have little understanding of the babble policy, but enough understanding of the language of progressives to manipulate it. These are not semantic arguments -- they're real for far more people than not.
This not me posting an opinion. This is me being a moderator, upholding babble policy. Please better consider what you post.
Fidel the answer in a lot of those instances is the elination of particular laws, you should read Kevin Carson some time but basically he defines takes up Benjamin Tuckers 4 monopolies of land, tarriffs, money and patents and throws in a 5th in terms of transportation. You fase those laws out and you basically have the end of corporations.
Maysie oppression tends to be based on peoples conception of someone suffering from the category of identity as opposed to being suffering and being dominated in a more concrete matter, not all brown or black people agree with being swept under that ruberic(those attracted to conservative ideas for eg) A muslim Tarek Fateh has a different idea of Muslims in the west then the contemporary leftist 'conceptions' of muslims and what they are going through, in terms of women for eg you have those that are more conservative and do not see society as problamatically male and going after them, these dynamics are a lot more messy then what can be swept under the manichean ruberic of oppressor oppressed. I prefer to look at things as systems within spheres of power and domination, its not the particular group with the current historical upperhand that I care about, its the systems that need attention, unless you're a hunter gatherer, all humans have done these things to each other going back to the Sumerians, who hasn't been oppressed.
Jake do I look like I believe in Bourgeois law? Here's an even more radical analysis. http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/peter-gelderloos-the-justice-trap...
A somewhat loosely related discussion transpired in the Irish Slaves thread.
I don't know how its even possible to advance very far into the study of power and systems without recognizing an obvious characteristic embedded within the subject of oppression in its entirety; whether we're talking about the generalized, lighter side of things with being constantly misled or impoverished by the fallacies of political representation, or oppression imposed via the far heavier hand routinely wielding police truncheons and the carceral system down upon selected communities. There are certainly reasons as to why people in general are alternately categorized by the system between contrived threat assessments or usefulness, but I can't say that I detect a very effective strategy at all in suggesting to groups or communities that it's of little interest to you where they fell out historically within the oppressive order of things. I'd argue, as others have, that a melting pot argument where it concerns oppression will only get you so far because it would be ridiculous to begin with, especially today, even when examined superficially. And certainly, the libertarian approach can't be expected to pull that one off with joie de vivre.
Yet all, even rich, racialized folks know that they could end up on the wrong side of a cop's boot. Or gun. Anytime, anywhere.
All, even rich, women, understand the realities of male violence, strangers or others, as a real threat or presence in our lives. Anyime, anywhere. When we step outside our homes, and especially within them.
When I talk of oppression I don't mean sincere folks wringing their hands and earnestly talking. I mean real life.
If you don't know what I mean, then that's precisely the point.
And whether something is "of interest" to you, changes nothing of police brutality, racism, poverty and other suffering that stems from personal and systemic oppression. It's actually not about you.
Bringing this thread back to the highly theoretical place where it began...
Laws have generally been written for and served the interests of the ruling classes. Duh.
I've mentioned restorative justice models before, and they're worth considering.
But, and you can call me a sentimental fool, I've grown rather attached to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. If only their application were possible.
Yeah, I see that... sort of.
I think that domination of the law is more a function of power and wrong-headedness (on the part of many), rather than whether law is a good or a bad thing.
At this point, take away the law and they just win bigger. With the law, at least there is a chance (and I would argue a trend over the past - oh - 3,700 years) that those with less power, and a bit more sense of common good might have more influence.
So I don't see it as much of a choice at all. There always will be a law; the question is whose, how will it be determined, and how will it be enforced.
If you listened to Love, Hate and Stromboganda on CBC, civil rights in America was a cold war issue. Soviet propagandists were exploiting the fact that African-Americans were second class citizens. A few changes were made but still not enough to improve on economic democracy for all. The changes were superficial, like allowing blacks to ride the front of the bus. The colour of the street still fades to white as one ascends the floors of business towers and skyscrapers in America.
And US law currently incarcerates African-Americans at six times the rate for Pic Botha's South Africa. And since 9/11 and socialism for Wall St bankers, other countries see the US as a lawless and deeply corrupt nation.
Michael Hudson has a good essay about debt and democracy and how the creditor/banking class began supporting democracies since the Renaissance. They supported democracy and allowing the common class representation in governments not because they'd become liberal minded or overly generous. It was because royal debts died with kings and queens and princes. The bankers wanted something more secure than that setup. Oligarchies were followed by aristocracies followed by democracies and repeating in cyclically for the last 300 years. It seems the link is broken today with bankers pushing for more oligarchy and austerity to collect debts which can not be repaid except through privatizations and pawning off the family jewels and silverware. The people tend to support 'tyrants' described in Aristotle's 'Politics' for promising to wipe the debt slate clean and repossess the commons stolen by oligarchs over long periods of corruption and two-tiered justice.
Mike. Perhaps you didn't bother to read my moderating post. You continue to talk, in an informative way, about issues that you clearly don't understand, to people who have a great deal more knowledge and experience than you do.
You've got a couple of choices here. You can listen to those who know better and consider their opinions, you can continue on as you are, or you can go elsewhere.
Your choice.
I cringe when I see justice and the law intechanged as though the two were mutually exclusive terms (or I should leave it at interchangable). There's no such things as criminal justice, only criminal law. There's no such thing as systems of justice, only legal systems. A while back I was reminded that the concept of justice was the conception of relationships, whether those relationships were based upon the dialogue of rights, the dialogue of obligations, or the dialogue of owner and property (slavery). Justice is the place from which we view our relationships with.... well, everything. There’s no universal template for how those relationships (the principles of just relations) should function.
I'm trying to remember the movie, where Marlon Brando says, "law and justice aren't kissing cousins, they're not even on speaking terms".
Absolutely. The law really is just a tool. In that, I don't see it as good or bad.
On the other hand, it's a pretty important tool, especially when it involves people who may not have the same idea of what is just, or right, or fair. If we all agreed on that, of course we wouldn't need any laws at all.
Some people see the law as being just one part of justice, balanced by mercy. Neither can really stand by itself - in most cases, both are a necessary part of the whole.
(edit)
Googled it: A Dry White Season.
Thanks. And for what it's worth, pretty much agree with the rest of your post.
Not at all. I was pointed to a video by a British Marxist who agrees with you, but suggests concrete measures.
The biggest beef he has, quite rightly, is with the BS of "common" law and the lack of full sovereignty of the jury over all court proceedings (not just convictions).
Rebbacca Where have I instigated any thread or topic against the non debatable issues of human rights feminism racism ect? I'm making an argument about what to do with laws which in no way infringe on those issues, I have my own positions on those topics but whenever I post here I try to be compatibalistic as I still harbour leftist sympathies albeit from a negative liberty bent which has waned in the face of too much marxist influence.
Maysie I didn't want this to be about oppression but if you want my definition I tend to be more for the older definition of oppression having to do with a collective grouping of people who are being forced into an arrangement that they do not want, think of the Kurds or the San or Pygmie in relation to the Bantu historically, that is the more concrete definition, minorities in the west who are being afflicted negatively by a dominant culture but still want to buy in and reform it in their own ways can't really be said to be opressed, certainly when you look at say blacks in the US or even worse parts of the world like continental europe, there is discrimination, but oppression is to strong a word especially considering that most racialized minorities don't use that word to describe their experiences, there are also no separation movements save for some native americans which makes sense in that context for obvious reasons. Police brutality racism and poverty effect everyone to some degree but oppression is not the proper word to use.
As for the charter, to me its just an early 80s document without any imagination or cutting edge ideas, I understand its not revolutionary like the USA's but it had more then 100s to make substantial improvements on some 18th century models, it doesn't, there's no law minimization on human behavior, the freedoms of expression are not as good, there's no succession clauses something that the US constitution use to have there's no later enlightenment libertarian ideas, jives to much with the french idea of collective sovereignty or individual I could go on, overall an unimpressive document, I'll have another.
Smith the rise of law is concurent with the rise of religion property and slavery, before this you had things under human scale where mores and guidlines prevaled, Where not going back to those orgiastic communes tommorow but begining the elemination of law on basic issues of human relations would be a good start. It is not a tool, if it was we could theoretically dispence with it, people in areas of creative expression or economic self determination would not have to deal with its many mediating facets, its a fantasy structure, just like the origical states tied to the primordial religions, it expresses the failure of humans to settle accounts directly.
Jake how is phasing out an overreaching mediating structure not a concrete measure, the american amendment on the state not making a law on human creative expression was a concrete measure, there's more to go.
lolololol. No siree Bob, I did NOT ask for that. Thanks for my first morning giggle.
And the giggle's over. As is my participation in this thread.
Ignorance is bliss, Mike. Enjoy it.
Our consitutions (whether personal or societal) are present in our customs (mores); whether written, like the Canadian constitution, or not, as recorded in ceremonies (protocols), the language and mythology. An unwritten constitution represents law just as validly as a written constitution. Really, the institution of law is a much more complex mechanism than simply suggesting "doing away with it" would imply. It simply isn't possible. Without a personal constitution where could conscience possibly reside? I think that law is more constituent in personal governance than you realize. Are you confusing the content of law as the functioning of law? Law is simply an institution that tries to play catch-up to our evolving princples of justice and maturing constitutions.