dagblog - Comments for "#Occupy Organic Resilience-Cold Weather Tents & Group Survival Drills"

how do we better incorporate

jollyroger — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 02:38:31 +0000

In reply to I just wonder if maybe there

how do we better incorporate the horizontal into the current system.

I don't think that exactly captures the anarchist's spirit, but to offer an opinion unencumbered by any reading, let alone thought, on the matter, my hipshot is to highlight the experience of one's own consequentiality, which is so (tediously) provided to (as in anothr context) the "least" of us, by the consensus model. I'm willing to propose as a working hypothesis that a sense of one's own consequentiality is a necessary, if perhaps not sufficient, precondition of achieving the level of socialization such as to be reliably noninjurious to your neighbors.

One could do worse than ask how to extract that empowering energy without having to sit through the whole fuckin' general assembly, but still having each feel that their autonomy had been honored. (prolly ya gotta sit through the assembly or they'll know you are blowing smoke and not honoring their autonomy...)

I just wonder if maybe there

Elusive Trope — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 02:43:58 +0000

In reply to That picture is certainly a

I just wonder if maybe there is not some systemic/systematic way to evoke that unexpected virtue by expecting it.

There is something to that I believe. I just think that organizational structures, whether political or for-profit or otherwise, need to find a way to fluctuate between horizontal and vertical rather than choosing one or the other. Ideally, over time, the horizontal predominates although the vertical is able to impose itself when needed.

So maybe the way to look at the Occupy movement is not how it can show the way to switch the current system to a horizontal one, but how do we better incorporate the horizontal into the current system.

That picture is certainly a

jollyroger — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 01:56:23 +0000

In reply to Not that you have, but I have

That picture is certainly a "reductio" of the violence implicit in the fifty percent plus one imposing total dominance over the fifty percent minus one, which we intutively think perhaps insufficiently inclusive...Obviously anarchism requires a high level of civic virtue in the populace if it is to work--I just wonder if maybe there is not some systemic/systematic way to evoke that unexpected virtue by expecting it.

Not that you have, but I have

Elusive Trope — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 01:30:58 +0000

In reply to You will not be surprised to

Not that you have, but I have had the little rock 9 thrown at me when discussing the way forward on these issues - but I wonder where the desire for consensus based decision making models fall in this situation.

You will not be surprised to

jollyroger — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 00:26:35 +0000

In reply to The Amish I think are a good

You will not be surprised to learn I am one who has long been impatient with consensus based decision making models . I may have overlooked their strengths.

I thought that the way

jollyroger — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 00:21:22 +0000

In reply to I didn't understand a word of

I thought that the way resources to meet the challenge of the weather were marshalled, given the difficulties of the consensus based decision making process, was instructive--especially by comparison with the way things work in congress. My attempted deconstruction of the "horizontal mandate" was a tentative move in the direction of proposing that if people are able to experience agency (need4consensus adds value to the individual input) their game rises.

I didn't understand a word of

Oxy Mora — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 23:40:20 +0000

In reply to #Occupy Organic Resilience-Cold Weather Tents & Group Survival Drills

I didn't understand a word of it. But, good to see your script.

The Amish I think are a good

Elusive Trope — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 22:56:15 +0000

In reply to I wasn't proposing the end of

The Amish I think are a good example of this - but they aren't what I would call within the anarchist camp.

I suppose one would have to go into the nature of what drives antisocial behavior. And the horizontal mandate would most likely have a positive influence on some people. On the other hand, given the nature of antisocial behavior - i.e. it is antisocial - one can easily see the horizontal mandate making it worse in some individuals (in part because it is a mandate). Ultimately as a group gets larger and larger, the more diversity of opinion will develop. Eventually there will be those who are seen by others as undermining the mutual security, and the splinter groups will emerge, especially when there isn't a tight set of guidance and rules to begin with.

This is not to say that those participating in such events (or whatever one wants to call it) such as OWS won't experience a heightened sense of socialness - which can lead to cooperative, horizontal actions in terms of the greater good rather than the individual good.

The question is just how much of what happens within the tight confines of the OWS camp can be translated to the larger society.

Well, the (in retrospect)

jollyroger — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 20:58:52 +0000

In reply to Great question! It seems to

Well, the (in retrospect) intuitive solution to the looming question of the weather is impressive in its simplicity as well as the breadth of iimagination that understands the possibilities that open once (forgive me for the indulgence) bourgeois shibboleths are repudiated.

Moreover, through inclusion, the "problem" of the unhoused ( people who are on the streets tend to be on the same street-they have homes, they don't have houses) is solved far more organically then a shelter (eg, isolate) system.

update: I've been very uncomfortable with the ostensible "issue" of the "rarticipation" of street people which has been flogged by the guardians of the old order, every time they could trot out a concern troll to reference the rape of so and so (actually, the one case I heard of alleged a perp who lived,( ie had a home) in Bay Ridge. This because the communal energy harnessed by OWS has produced sufficient resources (shelter, food, security) that the safest place to exist has become Zucotti. As if that were something to regret abot Zucotti rather then deplore about society at large...

I wasn't proposing the end of

jollyroger — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 20:54:00 +0000

In reply to Actually it is not that

I wasn't proposing the end of predation, but the beginning of truly common defence and mutual security.