The parasites count on the deterrent effect that comes from the threat of punishment to control people’s behavior, at least to some extent. Without a specific “or else” part, a “law” would just be a suggestion. “You’re not allowed to do that! But if you do, we’re not going to do anything to you anyway.” What would that deter? Nothing.
Tag: behavior
Collectivist Thinking Leads to Atrocities
Collectivist thinking isn’t just about being cliquish or rude to others; carried to its natural extreme, it allows individuals to imagine a conflict where none exists and to use that imaginary conflict as an excuse for the most barbaric of behaviors.
Relationships Are Personal, but Rejection Doesn’t Need to Be
When people fail to satisfy you, try to understand their behavior in terms that aren’t about you. Consider the possibility that they are simply acting on their own self-interests in the best way they know how. And even if they made a real mistake or committed a real vice, it probably wasn’t because they were out to get you.
“Lethal Force”
What would someone have to do for you to feel justified using force against them that might result in their death? I’m not asking what would they have to do for the use of lethal force to be justified by arbitrators or a government “court system”, but only inside your own head.
Protest Should Not Interfere with Movement
The moment a person intentionally stops traffic and it is not an emergency scenario, they are detaining/kidnapping you and confiscating your property, at least for the time being.
Anarchy and Islam
I’ve met Muslims of every school of anarchist thought from anarcho-socialists to national-anarchists. Prominent among them are Hakim Bay’s “ontological anarchism” and Yakoub Islam’s “post-colonial anarcho-pacifism” but this is my story.
What Children Reveal About Human Nature
When a child doesn’t follow through on a promise to “never do it again,” it’s because of Social Desirability Bias, not because they lack self-control. Kids say stuff that sounds good to avoid negative consequences. In other words, they’re acting just like adults, minus the subtlety.
Authority and Morality
The decisions people make and the directions that people go in may in the end not serve them or lead to the kind of results that they want, but that is for each person to discover on their own. Advice can be given, suggestions can be made, but ultimately each person must walk their own path themselves. To try to play games of authority is to attempt to ignore all of this.
The Many Benefits, for Kids, of Playing Video Games
Video games have been under attack by the fear-mongers ever since they first appeared, and the attacks have not diminished. If you Google around the Internet using harmful effects of video games as a search phrase, you will find all sorts of frightening claims. If you look into the actual research literature, you find very little if any evidence supporting the fear-mongers claims, and considerable evidence against those claims.
Anarchism as Constitutionalism
Trying to refute anarchism by pointing to undesirable instances of anarchy is about as bad an argument as trying to refute Bidinotto’s advocacy of government by pointing to the Soviet Union or Nazi Germany. Whether a state is horrendous or decent depends in large part on its constitutional structure; whether an anarchic society is horrendous or decent likewise depends on its constitutional structure.