Fortunately Maga represents a minority who have been fooled by a much smaller minority who contributed to the limited choices between corporate-sponsored candidates in a corrupt system. Conditions determine choices, changing the conditions changes the choices available and possible.

Isn't it possible that living under systems in which they have very little or no power and in which they are not engaged in many decisions about their own lives have conditioned them to respond in this way?

& Yet here we are with Trump as predicted by the Iron Law Of Oligarchy, and a political system which was increasingly favouring the oligarchs even before him and across much of Europe too. But its flaws are fundamental, it always was a system designed to protect the wealthy and pacify the poor.

You are making my case for me ;-)

I know - but it's a distraction from work and gives me a chance to share good links someone else might like ;-)

Our local anarchist social centre has been going on quite a while, there is an anarchist bookstore down the road that has been there for over 100 years, some of the oldest unions are anarchist, and the rights they fought for we still enjoy (although under seige).

What happens now at bedtime? It isn't handed down by a ruler upon society now is it? Most things aren't.

As far as my kids were concerned they loved bedtime stories, they also were very active - the combination of the two got them to sleep just fine.

One of my favourite recent examples is Buurtzorg - there are about 15,000 of them across multiple countries, without managers, and by all accounts doing a better job than people have done in this area of healthcare before.

anarwiki.org/wiki/Buurtzorg

I have kids and grandkids ;-) Toddlers are quite a handful - I love that age though. It's a great time to enjoy (and get frustrated by) the ways they experience the world and learn about it. It requires helping them a lot, but I always found that part fun.

Structure is good - If we took a corporation that performed an essential function, then replaced managers with co-ordinators who understood the workflow, and changed out the board for a group of workers who understood the processes that kept it running etc. - it would still be structured

Glad you're watching it. Words change meaning over time and so its good to be on the same page about how they are being used. I wish it weren't so but English sucks that way! (Although amazing for poetry!)

And what do you do if there is no vote allowed in the mid-terms or next time? Or it is overturned? Now is the time to be preparing for that. In that case voting harder won't make a difference, but prefiguration, solidarity, direct action, and decentralised opposition can be effective.

I'm not convinced it would take that much - 2-5% in one country perhaps, then another and so on. Even when there are just a few people or communities here and there they make a difference, and when it all comes tumbling down they know what to do, and can carry on and expand what they do.

Steps are being taken, support is growing, alternatives are being created (& existing ones supported). Maybe I'm lucky I live in a city where this is more visible and active, and that I'm not in America any more, but I have family there and they are fighting in their own ways too.

My fear is that by blaming people (accusing them of laziness or not caring enough) you are doing exactly what a dysfunctional system wants you to do - because it takes focus off of the system and the powerful behind it and puts it on the disenfranchised who could be your allies.

Oh, and I wasn't giving China as an example of anarchism - I was responding to someone else who gave China as an example of a successful long term state. Although there was this even earlier -
anarwiki.org/wiki/Peiliga...

Yet so much of modern technology is based on non-hierarchal decentralised processes (it runs the web for a start).

We did have one country (Chile) try to implement something similar using Cybernetics (Project Cybersyn), but those trying were killed off by America rather than be allowed to succeed.

It is a wonderful thing to have your faith in such processes. I commend you for your good intentions and your desire to see a better world. I wish I had your belief in such systems, but my knowledge of history and party politics just wont allow it, but I admire what you are trying to do.

What makes you think I'm not? This is where the anarchist concept of prefiguration comes in - building a better world in the here and now in spite of other systems - going underneath, around, and minimising the need for them - while increasing the power of people and communities.

I'd never downplay the role of participation - especially in communities. I do believe that oligarchy is inevitable under any representative capitalist system. But I wish people hadn't voted in Trump.

I think we must minimise harm for ourselves and others in whatever ways possible however we can

If everyone magically voted for the lets-stop-ruling-over-people-and-organise-around-assemblies-and-federation-and-ensure-everyones-needs-are-met party and their representatives weren't killed off first (as always happens), then maybe. I'd vote for you if you stand for that. Good luck!

And capitalism will continue to coerce and exploit those people, and people will still live with insecurity and poverty, and the potential of so many will be lost. Yet we live in a world with enough and more to spare, full of peaceful people who don't want wars, but have to satisfy politicians.

Of course they want to end it & maybe they will. But because they want an easier time of things to do their evil more quickly doesn't mean that in most areas the powerful and wealthy still get most of their way even when voting is easier.

I'm not suggesting that. Just saying that short term gains can be good things, but history shows they don't last, so a better system is needed.

I personally voted for my local Green MP who won, and I have a friend who is an anarchist city councillor. But I understand the limits of the system.

I honestly believe that if the most powerful in society felt voting could undermine their power significantly they would end voting tomorrow. For most of the history 'democracy' most could not vote & most governments were set up to manage and protect the power of the wealthy (and royalty etc).

Why does a boss need to tell anyone want to do. There are large non-boss organisations, including businesses. There is even a group in Spain which finds failing business and offers to save them if they agree to having no bosses, and they are doing successfully!

He was finally and fortunately for the people of Hungary in many ways. Yet Péter Magyar is also right wing and women and gay people and immigrants are likely to still suffer. & He is still part of a system that could bring an Orban-lite back to power next election.

Can people even vote correctly? They could pick the candidate who says the ideal things, may even be sincere, and find that the system and its structure gets in the way, the existing powers in other areas (capitalism) get in the way, or the politician becomes corrupted by the system.

We know what doesn't work. It just seems to be insanity to me to hope for something different with the systems which produced these problems, and expecting them to do something different. I agree people shouldn't just sit at home, but its what voting every 4 years teaches them to do.

I agree we do have a lot already in place - we don't have to reinvent everything. For example civil servants working in environmental regulation know far more about ensuring safe water etc. than I do, and would happily carry on doing that, especially if empowered to - without political interferance.