1. Mod of !anarchism@slrpnk.net posts a great Greta Thunberg quote, but then tries to use it to justify not voting in the upcoming US election
  2. Multiple people point out that’s very clearly not what she meant
  3. Removed by mod Removed by mod Removed by mod Removed by mod

Using your mod powers to decide who is allowed and not allowed to speak is not very anarchist of you, @mambabasa@slrpnk.net

  • LibertyLizard@slrpnk.net
    122·
    24 days ago

    This is almost the exact opposite of an anarchist understanding of power.

    The point of anarchist critiques of the state is that the structure and systems themselves corrupt and constrain people into acting in ways that are authoritarian and harmful.

    So, even if you put a good person, and yes, even an anarchist into an authoritarian system, it will inevitably result in an abuse of power and violence towards oppressed people.

    This is exactly why anarchists generally don’t put forth candidates or actively campaign or support political parties in the existing system. Because embedding a different, even better person into a corrupt system will only lead to further corruption.

    I actually think that, ironically, this is a perfect validation of anarchist theory. Lemmy is a platform that was built by and for authoritarians (initially capitalists as Reddit, then only slightly modified by authoritarian leftists on Lemmy). The structure of moderation with mods and admins able to unilaterally take action and the difficulty of organized resistance inevitably leads to abuses, which is what this community is about.

    I’m still waiting for the social media platform that has better infrastructure for distributed power among users rather than the chosen few.

    • PhilipTheBucket@ponder.catOP
      61·
      24 days ago

      I completely agree with you here. That is more or less what I was saying.

      I talked about it in another comment, about the US founding fathers. There are certain malfunctions that humans have when you put them in a position of power, and a good choice for your “ism” that you’re going to use when you’re developing traditions of interaction with each other is going to take that into account.

      Lemmy is a platform that was built by and for authoritarians (initially capitalists as Reddit, then only slightly modified by authoritarian leftists on Lemmy). The structure of moderation with mods and admins able to unilaterally take action and the difficulty of organized resistance inevitably leads to abuses, which is what this community is about.

      I’m still waiting for the social media platform that has better infrastructure for distributed power among users rather than the chosen few.

      I completely agree with all of this. I may write up a big longer essay with some of my thoughts about what could be done about it. The ability to have a little peaceful-protest community like this one is quite a nice step forward, but the software is still not a completely comfortable fit, overall.

    • lemonmelon@lemmy.world
      3·
      24 days ago

      This may be my favorite comment on lemmy. I applaud the introspection and appreciate the irony you’ve brought to light.