What Exactly Is Anarchy?

What Is Anarchy?

What exactly is anarchy?  Is it lawlessness, Mad Max, a doomsday scenario and some bloke called Vivian with orange hair that kicks in walls and is just perpetually angry?  Fuck no, that is not what anarchy is about.  Let’s take a look at the definition of anarchy and what true anarchists are trying to achieve in today’s society.  Then maybe next time you hear someone on the news say that “anarchy is ruling” wherever a civil war is about to break out, you will be ready to mail or phone that television statement and tell them to know what the hell they’re talking about first.

Definition of Anarchism

Anarchy and anarchism is the doctrine or the theory that believes that any government is an oppressive government.  Therefore, any government is undesirable and should be taken down in its entirety.  Anarchists also reject any type of authority or coercive control.  Interestingly, a definition was added in recent year.  This definition says that anarchy or anarchism is terrorism and active resistance against the state.  How disgusting is that?  How dare people tar terrorists and anarchists with the same brush?  Anarchists believe in letting people rule themselves, terrorists believe in killing innocent people.  How is that the same thing?

In Laymen’s Terms

If you’re still not getting it, don’t worry.  Dictionaries have a funny way of throwing terms in our way that don’t really make any sense.  This is deliberate, so that we don’t get any ideas about trying to rule ourselves.  One of the best known anarchy statements is “there’s no government like no government” and that is what anarchy is all about.  Anarchists are peaceful.  They want to be left alone by idiots who think they can rule a country and its people.  They just want to govern themselves.  That doesn’t mean they will riot stores that don’t belong to them.  That doesn’t mean they will go into villages and pillage and rape.  Anarchists, actually, aren’t even violent at all. 

Does that marry up with the image you had of an anarchist?  Probably not right?  Ask yourself why.  Have you ever seen an anarchist?  If so, have you seen a real one, or have you seen what the media has been feeding you?  Don’t be afraid now, but an anarchist may just be living right next door to you.  They may have a job and they may be raising a family.  What will you be when you find out your neighbour is an anarchist?  Will you be one of those people who talks about them as if they are actually serial killers, along the lines of “gosh, he was always the quiet one” or “he seemed like such a family man, who would have every thought”?  Or will you be more intelligent and capable of thinking for yourself, beyond the media crap that is drip fed into us every day of our lives?  Perhaps you may even turn into an anarchist yourself, it seems it is contagious!