Submitted by GoddamnedVoodooMagic in Anarchism (edited )

They're diametrically opposed. One requiees collectivism and a hivemind to begin to operate even semi realistically, whereas the other puts the individual first, and shuns the sort of conformity and levelling communism advocates and produces. You can't reconcile a philosophy that requires populistic, majoritarian group think with individualism...AKA, the exact opposite. Even socialists recognize that.

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OdiousOutlaw wrote

They're diametrically opposed.

Has that ever stopped anyone before?

Nationalist Anarchism has, like, 3 whole adherents and Anarcho-syndicalists are all over reddit.

You can't reconcile a philosophy that requires populistic, majoritarian group think with individualism...AKA, the exact opposite.

"diALeCtICs"

Even socialists recognize that.

They're the ones doing it half the time.

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GoddamnedVoodooMagic OP wrote

Good thing I don't really acknowledge the validity of NatAns or AnSynds in any capacity. Nor does anyone else here.

And considering 90% of socialists, even anarchist ones, deride individualism and chalk it up to a plague of capitalism...

Not dialectics, just doesn't make any sense.

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OdiousOutlaw wrote

Good thing I don't really acknowledge the validity of NatAns or AnSynds in any capacity. Nor does anyone else here.

I wasn't implying that you did so much as pointing out that egocoms aren't the first group to try to combine contradictory ideas.

Not dialectics, just doesn't make any sense.

That part was a joke.

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Fool wrote

Basically, it's an attempt to undertake Egoist ideas while retaining the communist aesthetics. If you read the material there is no difference between it and other Egoist ideas beyond retaining communism as a sacred but inherently hollow idea.

Overall the term communism is too bereft of actual specifics to be truely opposed to egoism, it's only when adding a specified structure to communism that it becomes the conformist leviathan.

Historically there was a number of Workers Syndicates built upon Egoism, that called themselves AnComs, so the fusion is not something new.

Overall I think people hold too much weight into these concepts, creating sacred ideas to uphold or vilify.

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subrosa wrote

there was a number of Workers Syndicates built upon Egoism, that called themselves AnComs

There was?

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Fool wrote

Looking it up again, I could only find the Glasgow Anarchist Group.

I guess I assumed since there was one there would be others.

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subrosa wrote

Ego-communism was proposed by D.Z. Rowan, Dr. Bones, and maybe a few twitter followers; other than a handful of position-taking exercises ("by egoism I mean" and "by communism I mean") and slogans it didn't really go anywhere.

I'll agree that it's a dubious mash-up, and that in uniting them we'll probably only lose both. Communism requiring hivemind and conformity and majoritarian group think, not exactly a sympathetic assessment. But fair enough.

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GoddamnedVoodooMagic OP wrote

Seems to me egoist communism was a poor attempt to breathe life into the corpse of anarcho communism, but no one really liked the idea and realized its contradictions (hence most ego coms just reverting to ancom-ism or Marxism). Like Dr. Bones qearing a hamsic bandana. As well as strwtching definitions a lot. And yeah, I'm not sympathetic to communism at all, so my assessment won't be positive.

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subrosa wrote (edited )

They don't seem to propose any ego-communism, maybe they were spared the battles over -isms and combinations of them.

But fair. For Ourselves, I'll mention them next time I tell the my story of ego-communism.

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subrosa wrote

black badger

an anarchist longer than you've been alive

weird flex but ok

Was this yours? https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/various-authors-green-anarchy-20#toc67

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GoddamnedVoodooMagic OP wrote

Damn, the bit about how the zine is anti pot makes me think of some FSU dork lmao

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subrosa wrote

I don't have any reference point for "FSU dork". My best guess was they're a Minor Threat enjoyer.

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GoddamnedVoodooMagic OP wrote

Imagine a straight edge kid who joined a straight edge gang that beat up stoners at shows and policed scenes

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__0 wrote

The first time in my life i ever heard about what straight edge was, it was some guy i knew telling me about a mormon straight edge gangster that unprovoked killed somebody on the spot for smoking a cigarette in public in salt lake city.

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black_badger wrote

What you think of as a "flex" is intended as satire. Who cares what I say on my profile? Does it make you nervous?

Yes, that's a review of my defunct personal zine by one of the GA editors from way back in the 00s. It's a stupid review, overflowing with personal animus (in fact, the author of that review has stated on numerous occasions in the years since that he's like nothing better than to beat me up). The part of his review about my essay on pot was hilarious -- he took it personally, when it was about me. What a dope (and i do mean dope). He's a natalist living off his partner and is into even more drugs now. I'm not straight edge, by the way. My essay about pot was about how it makes me uncomfortable to be around people I care about being high; it was not a moral condemnation of drug use.

And what does any of this have to do with me posting a link to "The Right to Be Greedy"? Ad hominem much?

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subrosa wrote

No ad hominem, I'm not even debating anything. Teasing a bit, if anything. I remembered the Black Badger review in GA and made the connection, was curious enough to ask.

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moonlune wrote (edited )

It's easier to conceive if you define the two words in an other way

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Majrelende wrote (edited )

Somebody's going to berate me for misuse of terminology, but people can certainly agree to hold things in common, to support each other in endeavours and through hardships, without the collective dominating the individual.

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OdiousOutlaw wrote

Yeah. A union of egoists. Egoist theory has said nothing against cooperation, love, or friendship; in fact, one could argue that egoists advocates for all of those things in their purest form; untouched by obligation or moral consideration.

Egoist Communists seem to ignore that those aspects are a part of egoism and attach the label of communism to compensate for an incomplete understanding of what egoism would entail for individual relationships.

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GoddamnedVoodooMagic OP wrote (edited )

If anything, communism is heavily opposed to genuine love and cooperation and friendship, preferring the iron bonds of class, race, gender, etc. Since you have a duty, a responsibility, towards these things, in the eyes of socialists.

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GoddamnedVoodooMagic OP wrote

What you're describing is still individualism at its core. Individuals enriched by the company of other individuals. Friendship and love are markedly egoistic, and rightly so. Communist ideas of these things are just crystalized and arbitrary groupings of people who likely didn't wish to be crammed together. And telling them their strength is in the designated category; thus, the group is paramount.

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Tequila_Wolf wrote (edited )

I don't think they are necessarily opposed.

If we understand how the liberation of a person is bound up in the liberation of all, because structures of oppression apply broadly and help nobody, it doesn't seem too hard.

I don't know about other people, and I haven't read the Stirner, but All Things Are Nothing To Me - Stirner's Communism is a useful short read to relate to this, which will also place Stirner in relation to Marx as a major influence for Marx, how since Stirner, Marx had to include Stirner's critique into his method in a way that makes the fit make some sense. That link's the essay that turned into a book that also exists.

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IHateTories69420 wrote

egoism isn't opposed or unopposed to anything it's just a tool to look at the world, especially the relationship between ideas and your mind

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