NON SERVIAM, ISSUES 1-17
AN INTRODUCTION TO
In modern times, the philosophy of the
individual's assertion of himself against
gods, ideals and human oppressors has
been most eloquently expressed by Max
Stirner in his book "Der Einzige und Sein
Eigentum".1
Stirner, whose real name was Johann
Kaspar Schmidt [1806-56], lived in a time
dominated by German Idealism, with
Hegel as its prominent figure. It is against
this background of fixation of ideas that
Stirner makes his rebellion. Stirner takes
down these ideas from their fixed points in
the starry sky of Spirit, and declares all
ideas to be the ideas of an Ego,2 and the
realm of spirits and ideas to be the mind of
the thinker himself. His heaven-storming is
total. Even the idealist tool - dialectic, and
the supreme ghost of Idealism, [Absolute]
Spirit - are stripped of their status of
intrinsic existence, and are taken back into
the Ego himself. This is most clearly seen
in Stirner's main triad: Materialist - Idealist
- Egoist. And the triad stops at its last link.
Any further progress cannot negate
Egoism, for - progress has been taken back
into the individual, as his - property.
For Stirner, the solution to the
"alienation", or "self-alienation" of
Idealism, is in self-expression, or -
ownership. What cannot be one's own
cause, the cause that is not one's own, is
not worth pursuing. As Stirner says "Away
then, with every cause that is not altogether
my cause!"
This is the philosophical starting point
of this newsletter. Formally, it will bear the
name i,, a journal of Stirner studies and
personalist philosophy. Its focus is stirnerian
personalist philosophy, but its scope
includes any articles on topics relevant to
adherents of a personalist philosophy.
1English
title: "The Ego and Its Own".
2Einziger
- single individual.
/ NON SERVIAM
Articles on literature through the ages will
be very fine, stories will be welcomed if I
see them fit, and I even think I might fall
for an article on French cuisine made easy
... However: If in doubt whether the article
will be accepted, contact me by email first.
A waste of time is a waste of time.
I hope to be able to make each of the
issues of the newsletter thematic, that is we
have one main theme in each issue. The
main theme is not meant to be the sole
content, however, but more an inspiration
for writing.
i /Non Serviam has been distributed
through the Internet since 1993. Its focus is
on ownness –self-ownership– and is, due to the
interest of the editor, mainly centered
around a dialectical egoism inspired by Max
Stirner.
The late Sidney Parker has for a long
time edited magazines with a similar scope,
and when he told me he was going to stop
publishing, we agreed that I would take
over where he left off. Since then, the
Internet has become ubiquitous, and all
distribution is via the Internet: visit our
web page to subscribe or download
individual issues:
http://i-studies.com
Svein Olav Nyberg
(editor)
Postscript: This not just a preface to i but
also a postscript to its first incarnation, Non
Serviam. The old name came from RA
Wilson’s Illuminatus trilogy, to convey a
sense of metaphysical rebellion. A very
suitable name for an antithesis, but –as it
has occurred to me over the years–
somewhat unsuited to convey the positive
affirmation of the Stirnerian synthesis. So
as of 2010, the name change is official.
Index

#0: Welcome
Advertisement
Index

#1: Editor's Word

Svein Olav Nyberg: What is Selfishness?
John Beverley Robinson: "Egoism"
Svein Olav Nyberg: The Union of Egoists
Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism and
The Individualist Alternative (serial)

#2: Editor's Word

Svein Olav Nyberg: The Self
Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism and
The Individualist Alternative (serial: 2)

#3: Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism and

The Individualist Alternative (serial: 3)

#4: Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism and

The Individualist Alternative (serial: 4)

#5: Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism and

The Individualist Alternative (serial: 5)

#6: Editor's Word [Stirner, Rand and Nietzsche]

Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism and
The Individualist Alternative (serial: 6)

#7: S.E. Parker: "Archists, Anarchists and Egoists"

Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism and
The Individualist Alternative (serial: 7)

#8: Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism and

The Individualist Alternative (serial: 8)
#9: Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism and
The Individualist Alternative (serial: 9)

#10: Editor's Word [Subject versus Object]

Sidney Parker: The Egoism of Max Stirner
Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism and
The Individualist Alternative (serial: 10)

#11: Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism and

The Individualist Alternative (serial: 11)

#12: Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism and

The Individualist Alternative (last: 12)
S.E. Parker: On Revisiting "Saint Max"

#13: Editor's Word [Celebration Issue]

John C. Smith: Last and First Words
Frank Jordan: In Praise of Max
Paul Rowlandson: Stirner, Youth and Tradition

#14: Wm. Flygare: "To My Sweetheart"

Svein Olav Nyberg: The Choice of a New Generation

#15: Editor's Word

Dora Marsden: Thinking and Thought
S.E. Parker: Comment to Ken Knudson

#16: Editor's Word

John A. Marmysz: A Prolegomena
To Any Future Nihilistic Philosophy

#17: Editor's Word

Chris Sciabarra: Ayn Rand –
The Russian Radical

Whoever is a complete person does not need - to be an authority!

-Max Stirner, The False Principle of Our Education

 non serviam #1
Contents: Editor's Word
Svein Olav Nyberg: What is Selfishness?
John Beverley Robinson: "Egoism"
Svein Olav Nyberg: The Union of Egoists
Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism
and The Individualist Alternative (serial)
Editor's Word
_____________
This is the first "real" issue of non serviam,
and the present theme, as will also be the
theme of the next issue, #2, is as presented
in #0:
By asserting oneself - by insurrection -
one is an egoist, one who puts himself first.
What is Selfishness?
Svein Olav Nyberg
I asked about "what egoism means". I
should perhaps also have asked what
egoism does not mean. For there are a lot
of misconceptions about what egoism is.
Religious literature incessantly warns us not
to think about our own best interest, but
the interest of the heavenly, of Man, and of
just about everything else. But seldom is
there found any advise to follow exactly
this own interest. Why then these warnings
against self interest, on and on, again and
again? Surely not to counter any opposing
system of ideas. For there have been close
to none. What then is left to counter but -
the individual himself! But to counter the
individual is not a position that looks very
good, so it has to be disguised, disguised as
an attack on some "Deep Evil" lurking in
self interest - in egoism. So the common
view of egoism is far from formed by
For the next issue of non serviam, #2, I
would therefore appreciate articles about
"what egoism means" in general. Both
questions of the type "is hedonism the real
egoism", and articles pondering the status
of egoism in ethics are appreciated.
Psychological angles of attack are also
appreciated.
Dissenting from this theme, I have a long
and well-written article by Ken Knudson
which I intend to publish in full. Given the
length of it, it will be sent as a serial. It will
also be available on the ftp site in not too
long a time. I have, on the version here, left
the page numberings for easier access to
footnotes.
observation of actual egoists, but by
propaganda in its disfavour. I therefore
find it fruitful to list what I consider the
types most typically mistaken for egoists,
both by critics of egoism and by "egoists"
themselves:
THE PSYCHOPATH: The psychopath is
characterised by a tendency of always being
in the right and of manipulating others. He
typically takes little heed of the interests of
people he confronts. The reasoning
displayed by those who identify
psychopaths with egoists are usually of the
type "He does not care for others - thus he
must care only for himself ...", which sets
up a dichotomy without any basis in reality.
Identifying an individual pursuing his own
interests with a psychopath is a powerful
means of keeping individuals "in line".
THE EGO-BOOSTER: Somewhat related to
the psychopath, in that he tries to make
himself "big" in the eyes of others often at
the expense of some third person. But the
Ego-Booster cares a lot about the
judgement of others. In fact - he depends
on it. Getting approval from other people
dominates his way of life. His focus is not
on himself, but on something else - his self
image.
THE MATERIALIST: The glutton, the
carelessly promiscuous and the one who
spends all his time gathering possessions is
often seen as the egoist by people who
have seen through the traps above. A
friend of mine wrote in his thesis on Stirner
that these were "vulgar egoists". They sure
enough care for their own interests. But
they only care for part of their own interest,
giving in to some urge to be dominated by
them. They either care only for the taste in
their mouths right-here-right-now, or for
the sensations in other bodily parts. They
do not satisfy the whole chap, as Stirner
wrote.
THE IDEALIST: Not too typical, but still -
important. Can range from the proponent
of Fichte's Absolute or Transcendental
Ego, to the idealist missionary who has as
his sole goal in this life to spread his own
ideas. The former is not a proper egoist in
that the "I" he is talking about is not the
personal, individual "I" but - an
abstraction, the mere idea of an ego. The
latter is just the materialist mentality let
loose in the realm of ideas.
THE FORMAL EGOIST: The formal egoist
is perhaps the most elusively like to the
proper egoist. For the formal egoist knows
that an egoist looks to the satisfaction of
the whole chap. Actually the formal egoist
can know more about egoism than the
egoist himself. For the formal egoist really
wants to be an egoist - and he follows the
recipe he has found to the last little detail,
and sets out to find even new nuances.
There is only one thing missing, and that is
his realisation that there is no recipe.
Egoism is not a religious or ideological
system to be followed by duty, but simply
the being and awareness of oneself.
Now we have defined selfishness in the
negative. How now about the positive; to
what degree is egoism positively definable?
First of all: What does it mean to "value
oneself", and is this what selfishness
consists in?
This problematic is in particular
motivated by a comment from a subscriber,
Jon Newton, in a discussion on whether
egoism meant following some personal
"axioms of value". First of all, Jon
commented that though underneath all
"axioms" of evaluation there had to rest the
deeper Valuing Subject him[/her]self, that
would in no way imply that the Valuing
Subject - as a consequence of that alone -
had to have a higher value than even the
axiom.
Now, how is the above problematic
solved, if at all? First, I think that declaring
as an axiom that the Valuing Subject is of
higher value, or to keep it in some other
way as an "act of faith" would be a miss.
This would be again - to place the act of
evaluation as being mediated by the
"axiom" or the "object of faith".
The Valuing Subject is the subject, and
viewing something else - implicitly or
explicitly - as the subject, is an act of
alienation and untruth. This does, of
course, tie in with the question of the value
of truth, which I will address in an
upcoming essay. But let us assume that the
person in question sees this, and can value
or non-value it as he wants. No generality
is lost by this approach.
So the question is whether a person
would or should value himself higher than
anything or anyone else.
It might be tempting, like so many have
done, to say some sentence to the effect
that if X is a necessary ground for valuing,
then X must necessarily be valued - or even
be the highest of values. In the case at hand,
substituting "oneself, the (Valuing) Subject"
for X would thereby yield the claim that
one should value oneself the most.
But I do not think such an attempt via
"a priori" judgement would get us very
far if we were honest about it. For such
an attempt would at best give us that I
had a conditional value [derived,
instrumental] from my values, and only
for a certain limited period of time, given
by these values. As an example, I could
have valued the propagation of the
species above all, and readily sacrifice
myself when this goal did so require. All
this without the contradiction an "a
priori" argument like the above would
require.
Instead, I propose we ask "What does it
mean to value oneself the highest?" or
"What does it mean to be an egoist?".
Indeed, what does it mean to "value
myself" at all?
One answer might be that to "value
myself" means to value my existence.
But "existence"? Now what is really
that? An empty, eternal staring into
blankness is still "existence". But not what
I would call very interesting, less even
attractive. Something is missing. But what?
Now, to "value myself" would mean, I
suggest, to value that which makes life
valuable to me. That means that when I
enjoy a good book - when I do what I
value the book for - I do not sit there (ho-
hum) valuing my existence, accidentally
having a book in front of my eyes; rather it
means that through the act of valuing the
book, which is what I value, I do thereby
value myself.
It is almost circular. I "value myself"
when I value that which - I value. I value
myself when I allow my own judgements of
value qua (Valuing) Subject be what is in
the end valued.
In contrast, "not valuing myself" would
mean to negate my own value judgements
qua (Valuing) Subject. It would mean to let
a Fixed Idea get the better of me and leave
its judgement as the final one instead of
my own; it would mean to let the Fixed
Idea brand my values as "sinful", "un-
human" etc. and - bow to it.
That was the theory. Now what is the
practice? Lots of unresolved questions.
Good. That's one reason I created Non
Serviam. But this gives a very different
picture of the Egoist than what is normally
being promoted throughout society.
Society's "Egoist" is nothing more than just
another example of what I'd call a
"spooked man"; a man who instead of
plainly following his own interests - i.e. his
own values - follows a Fixed Idea that is
accidentally branded "My Own Interests".
Society's "Egoist" is a charicature who
does not pet cats since oh horror! - the cat
might benefit from it too, who does not
like other people other than as means to
gaining material advantage - "for of course
an Egoist can see no value in other people,
his gaze is all directed at one person" - and
who's got as his prime imperative "Do not
give to beggars!"
As a contrast, let us take some real
Egoist, as described by Stirner: He does
not enjoy people when they are safely
tucked away in category boxes, but gets
charmed by the smile of a little baby. He
pets cats for enjoyment, and loves to sit for
a friendly chat with his friends - possibly
over a glass of wine he has given to this
friend.
Think about it. If Egoism is not about
making life as enjoyable as possible, i.e.
about realising one's values without
interference from Fixed Ideas, what is it?
Society's charicature would soon find
himself in a logical mess if he thought
about this. Not only would he fade away in
a Scrooge-like asceticism, but he would
begin to wonder why this bugger tomorrow
who incidentally identified himself-now
with "himself-in-the-past" should ever get a
little benefit from himself-now. He couldn't
even get a glass of water for himself-one-
minute-in-the-future.
As for ever being able to "axiomatise" my
own value judgements. Is it possible?
Stirner certainly did not think so. "I create
myself each day anew" and "I am the
creative nothing" are sentences that express
this existentialist sentiment.
I lean towards the same judgement, and
do in particular not see present-day
reductionism as a solution to the problem.
First of all, I do not think reductionism is
universally valid, and secondly, even if it
were, our mere biology would probably be
of such a nature as to make our values
incapturable through fixed axioms at the
Egoism
by John Beverley Robinson
There is no word more generally
misinterpreted than the word egoism, in its
modern sense. In the first place, it is
supposed to mean devotion to self interest,
without regard to the interest of others. It
is thus opposed to altruism - devotion to
others and sacrifice of self. This
interpretation is due to the use of the word
thus antithetically by Herbert Spencer.
Again, it is identified with hedonism or
eudaimonism, or epicureanism,
philosophies that teach that the attainment
of pleasure or happiness or advantage,
whichever you may choose to phrase it, is
the rule of life.
Modern egoism, as propounded by Stirner
and Nietzsche, and expounded by Ibsen,
Shaw and others, is all these; but it is more.
It is the realization by the individual that he
level on which we normally live and
breathe.
The above paragraph is of course merely
my opinions. I think that most arguments
count in their favour, and hence adopt
these opinions as "mine" at the present
time. I used to be of the opposite opinion,
i.e. that reductionism was the truth, but
after a discussion with a friend who found
reductionism to be untenable, we switched
opinions - both of us!
Anyhow, even given that for some period
of my life my values were of the character
that they could be axiomatised: Why should
they? Would they ever express anything
new in regards to my values? If they did,
would not that mean they - contradicted
them, and thus had become Fixed Ideas
and - false?
is an individual; that, as far as he is
concerned, he is the only individual.
For each one of us stands alone in the
midst of a universe. He is surrounded by
sights and sounds which he interprets as
exterior to himself, although all he knows
of them are the impressions on his retina
and ear drums and other organs of sense.
The universe for him is measured by these
sensations; they are, for him, the universe.
Some of them he interprets as denoting
other individuals, whom he conceives as
more or less like himself. But none of these
is himself. He stands apart. His
consciousness, and the desires and
gratifications that enter into it, is a thing
unique; no other can enter into it.
However near and dear to you may be your
wife, children, friends, they are not you;
they are outside of you. You are forever
alone. Your thoughts and emotions are
yours alone. There is no other who
experiences your thoughts or your feelings.
No doubt it gives you pleasure when others
think as you do, and Inform you of it
through language; or when others enjoy the
same things that you do. Moreover, quite
apart from their enjoying the same things
that you enjoy, it gives you pleasure to see
them enjoy themselves in any way. Such
gratification to the individual is the pleasure
of sympathy, one of the most acute
pleasures possible for most people.
According to your sympathy, you will take
pleasure in your own happiness or in the
happiness of other people; but it is always
your own happiness you seek. The most
profound egoist may be the most complete
altruist; but he knows that his altruism is, at
the bottom, nothing but self-indulgence.
But egoism is more than this. It is the
realization by the individual that he is
above all institutions and all formulas; that
they exist only so far as he chooses to make
them his own by accepting them.
When you see clearly that you are the
measure of the universe, that everything
that exists exists for you only so far as it is
reflected in your own consciousness, you
become a new man; you see everything by a
new light: you stand on a height and feel
the fresh air blowing on your face; and find
new strength and glory in it.
Whatever gods you worship, you realize
that they are your gods, the product of your
own mind, terrible or amiable, as you may
choose to depict them. You hold them in
your hand, and play with them, as a child
with its paper dolls; for you have learned
not to fear them, that they are but the
"imaginations of your heart."
All the ideals which men generally think are
realities, you have learned to see through;
you have learned that they are your ideals.
Whether you have originated them, which
is unlikely, or have accepted somebody
else's ideals, makes no difference. They are
your ideals just so far as you accept them.
The priest is reverend only so far as you
reverence him. If you cease to reverence
him, he is no longer reverend for you. You
have power to make and unmake priests as
easily as you can make and unmake gods.
You are the one of whom the poet tells,
who stands unmoved, though the universe
fall in fragments about you.
And all the other ideals by which men are
moved, to which men are enslaved, for
which men afflict themselves, have no
power over you; you are no longer afraid of
them, for you know them to be your own
ideals, made in your own mind, for your
own pleasure, to be changed or ignored,
just as you choose to change or ignore
them. They are your own little pets, to be
played with, not to be feared.
"The State" or "The Government" is
idealized by the many as a thing above
them, to be reverenced and feared. They
call it "My Country," and if you utter the
magic words, they will rush to kill their
friends, whom they would not injure by so
much as a pin scratch, if they were not
intoxicated and blinded by their ideal. Most
men are deprived of their reason under the
influence of their ideals. Moved by the ideal
of "religion" or "patriotism" or "morality,"
they fly at each others' throats - they, who
are otherwise often the gentlest of men!
But their ideals are for them like the "fixed
ideas" of lunatics. They become irrational
and irresponsible under the influence of
their ideals. They will not only destroy
others, but they will quite sink their own
interests, and rush madly to destroy
themselves as a sacrifice to the all-
devouring ideal. Curious, is it not, to one
who looks on with a philosophical mind?
But the egoist has no ideals, for the
knowledge that his ideals are only his
ideals, frees him from their domination. He
acts for his own interest, not for the
interest of ideals. He will neither hang a
man nor whip a child in the interest of
"morality," if it is disagreeable to him to do
so.
He has no reverence for "The State." He
knows that "The Government" is but a set
of men, mostly as big fools as he is himself,
many of them bigger. If the State does
things that benefit him, he will support it; if
it attacks him and encroaches on his liberty,
he will evade it by any means in his power,
if he is not strong enough to withstand it.
He is a man without a country.
"The Flag," that most men adore, as men
always adore symbols, worshipping the
symbol more than the principle it is
supposed to set forth, is for the egoist but a
rather inharmonious piece of patch-work;
and anybody may walk on it or spit on it if
they will, without exciting his emotion any
more than if it were a tarpaulin that they
walked upon or .spat upon. The principles
that it symbolizes, he will maintain as far as
it seems to his advantage to maintain them;
but if the principles require him to kill
people or be killed himself, you will have to
demonstrate to him just what benefit he
will gain by killing or being killed, before
you can persuade him to uphold them.
When the judge enters court in his toggery,
(judges and ministers and professors know
the value of toggery in impressing the
populace) the egoist is unterrified. He has
not even any respect for "The Law." If the
law happens to be to his advantage, he will
avail himself of it; if it invades his liberty he
will transgress it as far as he thinks it wise
to do so. But he has no regard for it as a
thing supernal. It is to him the clumsy
creation of them who still "sit in darkness."
Nor does he bow the knee to Morality -
Sacred Morality! Some of its precepts he
may accept, if he chooses to do so; but you
cannot scare him off by telling him it is not
"right." He usually prefers not to kill or
steal; but if he must kill or steal to save
himself, he will do it with a good heart, and
without any qualms of "conscience." And
"morality" will never persuade him to
injure others when it is of no advantage to
himself. He will not be found among a
band of "white caps," flogging and burning
poor devils, because their actions do not
conform to the dictates of "morality,"
though they have injured none by such
actions; nor will he have any hand in
persecuting helpless girls, and throwing
them out into the street, when he has
received no ill at their hands.
To his friends - to those who deserve the
truth from him, - he will tell the truth; but
you cannot force the truth from him
because he is "afraid to tell a lie." He has
no fear, not even of perjury, for he knows
that oaths are but devices to enslave the
mind by an appeal to supernatural fears.
And for all the other small, tenuous ideals,
with which we have fettered our minds and
to which we have shrunk our petty lives;
they are for the egoist as though they were
not.
"Filial love and respect" he will give to his
parents if they have earned it by deserving
it. If they have beaten him in infancy, and
scorned him in childhood, and domineered
over him in maturity, he may possibly love
them in spite of maltreatment; but if they
have alienated his affection, they will not
reawaken it by an appeal to "duty."
In brief, egoism in its modern
interpretation, is the antithesis, not of
altruism, but of idealism. The ordinary man
- the idealist - subordinates his interests to
the interests of his ideals, and usually
suffers for it. The egoist is fooled by no
ideals: he discards them or uses them, as
may suit his own interest. If he likes to be
The union of egoists
Svein Olav Nyberg
A common misconception about egoism,
and about the egoism of Stirner in
particular, is that it is a reclusive, anti-social
kind of behaviour. As far as Stirner is
concerned, such commentators must have
been asleep through that half of his book
which is devoted to describing exactly the
social interactions of an egoist, or more
precisely - what social interactions are like
when they are not mediated by ideals or
"natural bonds".
Egoism is not anti-sociality, like some
believe, but is better seen as a more mature
kind of sociality.
Stirner is a dialectical philosopher, and as
such his focus is on relations. As is with
relations, it often comprises three elements,
the two relata, and the relation itself, and
hence the famous triad is a common
occurrence in dialectical philosophy. So
also with Stirner. Stirner's main triadic
development is that of (1) The "natural" or
material bond of the ancients, (2) The bond
by ideas, our "equality before reason", into
(3) the willed or owned relation.
In his book, Stirner starts the description
of owned relations with relations to
material objects and ideas. A willed
relation to these are said to be that they
are your property ("eigentum").
The opposite of the willed relation is, as
indicated, the bond, the "ought" and the
altruistic, he will sacrifice himself for
others; but only because he likes to do so;
he demands no gratitude nor glory in
return.
"shall". These are simply relations that
are not mine to dispose of, but which are
given me from outside - outside also in
the sense of coming from "my essence",
something I must conform to and cannot
dispose of.
A particular case of such a bond is when
you are not to let go of an idea. In
Hegelian terms: When that thought is
seen as exempt from and sacred to "the
power of the negative". Such an idea is
called a fixed idea. It is, in Stirner's words
"An idea that has subjected the man to
itself" - an idea that you are not to
criticise. [Recall that Der Einzige is "the
power of the negative" to himself.]
Ideas are often expressed in the material
world, as we call it. One such idea is that
of "property". It should be noted that the
common use of this word is that of
conformation to an idea –a Fixed Idea–
about what you can ["morally"] lay your
hands on. By Stirner, however, property
in this sense, "sacred property" or as he
even calls it "state property", is not
exempt from criticism and from - his
laying hands on it. It is in the sense of
idea already his property in his thinking it
as such - in the intentional, willing act.
However, factual possession, laying
hands on it, depends also on "my might",
as Stirner expresses it.
Now, once the relation of "Eigentum" -
of "property" in the Stirnerian sense has
been understood - and not before, can
we proceed to the meeting of two
Einzige, two Subjects. There are several
ways in which two people can meet:
1. The Bond. This is a meeting of two
people according to how they "ought to"
behave towards one another. As such it is
not a meeting which is willed, but rather a
meeting according to the "ought".
Examples of such are when the father
and the son meet in the roles of father and
son. "Father" and "son" they will always
remain in a descriptive sense. But when
they meet according to such roles, they
meet by an "ought" and not by a "will".
Roles are ascribed when the relation is
seen as a static object.
2. The property. The relation can be a
one-sidedly willed one. In this, the one is
an Einzige whereas the Other has
become Eigentum (for the one who is
Einzige). Perhaps this is the state of
things where we can say "Hell is the
Other" (i.e. when that Other guy is
Einzige and I am reduced to a role as
Eigentum).
Moses Hess criticised "Der Verein der
Egoisten" ["The Union of Egoists"] along
the lines that in such a meeting, there
would have to be one who dominated
and one who submitted to domination.
That is, Hess imagined that "The Union
of Egoist" would be a relation of the kind
(2) described above.
Now, (2) might describe a Hobbesian
egoist. But can it describe la derniere
maillon de la chaine Hegelienne (as Stirner has
been called)? No, that is a bit too crude.
Stirner did himself reply to this criticism
by pointing to examples: Two friends
playing with their toys, two men going
together to the wine shop. These do of
course not comprise an exhaustive list of
unions, and our man Stirner does indeed
speak of unions consisting of thousands
of people, too, unions uniting to catch a
thief or to get better pay for one's own
labour.
More philosophically, Moses Hess
describes a one-sidedness, and thinks it is
a necessary one for an Stirner. What is
then more natural than to apply a little
dialectical reasoning to figure out what
Stirner really did mean. I propose it is
3. The union. The relation is
understood as a process. It is a process in
which the relation is continually renewed
by that both [/all] parts support it
through an act of will. The Union
requires that both/all parties are present
through conscious egoism - i.e. own-will.
If the one part silently finds him/her-self
to be suffering, but puts up and - keeps
the appearance, the union has
degenerated into something else.
Only after development has come to
the understanding of the union of egoists
does Stirner come to the ultimately
important relation - the relation of me to
myself. In the section entitled "My self-
enjoyment", Stirner sets up mere valuing
of life against enjoyment of life. In the
former view, I am an object to be
preserved. In the latter I see myself as the
subject of all my valuing relations.
In this sense, Stirner can rebuke the
question "what am I?" and replace it with
"who am I?", a question which has its
answer in this bodily person who asks the
question. This is the "nothingness" which
Stirner speaks of as I. "Not nothing in the
sense of emptiness, but a creative
nothing."
My relation to myself is thus a meeting
of myself as willer, a union with myself
and a consumption –appropriation– of
myself as my own.
 A Critique of Communism
and
The Individualist Alternative
Ken Knudson
A NOTE TO READERS
I address myself in these pages primarily to
those readers of "Anarchy" who call
themselves "communist-anarchists." It is
my purpose in this article to show that this
label is a contradiction in terms and that
anyone accepting it must do so by a lack of
clear understanding of what the words
"anarchist" and "communist" really mean.
It is my hope that in driving a wedge
between these two words, the communist
side will suffer at the expense of the
anarchist.
I make no claims to originality in these
pages. Most of what I have to say has been
said before and much better. The
economics is taken primarily from the
writings of Pierre-Joseph Proudhon,
William B. Greene, and Benjamin R.
Tucker. The philosophy from Max Stirner,
Tucker again, and, to a lesser extent, James
L. Walker.
I hope you won't be put off by my
clumsy prose. I'm a scientist by trade, not a
professional writer. I implore you,
therefore, not to mistake style for content.
If you want both the content and good
style may I suggest Tucker's "Instead of a
Book". Unfortunately, this volume has
been out of print since 1897, but the better
libraries –especially those in the United
States– should have it. If you can read
French, I recommend the economic
writings of Proudhon. "General Idea of the
Revolution in the Nineteenth Century" is
particularly good and has been translated
into English by the American individualist,
John Beverley Robinson. (Freedom Press,
1923). Also in English is Tucker's
translation of one of Proudhon's earliest
works, the well-known "What is
Property?". This book is not as good as the
"General Idea" book, but it has the
advantage of being currently available in
paperback in both languages. A word of
warning: unless you are thoroughly familiar
with Proudhon, I would not recommend
the popular Macmillan "Papermac" edition
of "Selected Writings of Pierre-Joseph
Proudhon"; they seem to have been
selected with irrelevance as their only
criterion. Like so many other great writers,
Proudhon suffers tremendously when
quoted out of context and this particular
edition gives, on average, less than a page
per selection. Better to read his worst book
completely than to be misled by
disconnected excerpts like these. Finally the
individualist philosophy, egoism, is best
found in Max Stirner's "The Ego and His
Own". This book suffers somewhat from a
very difficult style (which wasn't aided by
Stirner's wariness of the Prussian censor),
but if you can get through his obscure
references and biblical quotes, I think you
will find the task worth the effort.
H. L. Mencken once observed that just
because a rose smells better than a cabbage
doesn't mean to say it makes a better soup.
I feel the same way about individualist
anarchism. At first whiff, the altruist rose
may smell better than the individualist
cabbage, but the former sure makes a lousy
soup. In the following pages I hope to
show that the latter makes a better one.
Ken Knudson
Geneva, Switzerland
March, 1971
COMMUNISM:
FOR THE COMMON GOOD
Communism is a 9 letter word used by
inferior magicians with the wrong alchemical
formula for transforming earth into gold.
–Allen Ginsberg,
Wichita Vortex Sutra
By way of prelude to the individualist
critique of communism, I should like to
look briefly at the communist-anarchists'
critique of their Marxist brothers.
Anarchists and Marxists have traditionally
been at odds with one another: Bakunin
and Marx split the First International over
their differences a century ago; Emma
Goldman virtually made her living in the
1920's from writing books and magazine
articles about her "disillusionment in
Russia"; in May, 1937, the communists and
anarchists took time off from their war
against Franco to butcher each other in the
streets of Barcelona; and the May days of
'68 saw French anarchists directing more
abuse against the communist CGT than
against the Gaullist government.
What is the nature of these differences?
Perhaps the most concise answer to this
question came in 1906 from a veritable
expert on the subject: Joseph Stalin. He
wrote in "Anarchism or Socialism?" that
there were essentially three main
accusations which (communist) anarchists
leveled against Marxism:
1. that the Marxists aren't really
communists because they would
"preserve the two institutions
which constitute the foundation of
[the capitalist] system:
representative government and
wage labour"; [1]
2. that the Marxists "are not
revolutionaries", "repudiate violent
revolution", and "want to establish
Socialism only by means of ballot
papers"; [2]
3. that the Marxists "actually want to
establish not the dictatorship of the
proletariat, but their own
dictatorship over the proletariat."
[3]
Stalin goes on to quote Marx and Engels to
"prove" that "everything the anarchists say
on this subject is either the result of
stupidity, or despicable slander." [4] Today
the anarchists have the advantage of history
on their side to show just who was
slandering whom. I won't insult the reader's
intelligence by pointing out how all three
objections to Marxism were sustained by
Uncle Joe himself a few decades later.
But let us look at these three accusations
from another point of view. Aren't the
communist-anarchists simply saying in their
holier-than-thou attitude, "I'm more
communist than you, I'm more
revolutionary than you, I'm more
consistent than you?" What's wrong with
Marxism, they say, is NOT that it is for
communism, violent revolution and
dictatorship, but that it goes about attaining
its goals by half-measures, compromises,
and pussyfooting around. Individualist-
anarchists have a different criticism. We
reject communism per se, violent
revolution per se, and dictatorship per se.
My purpose here is to try to explain why.
 non serviam #2
Contents: Editor's Word
Svein Olav Nyberg: The Self
Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism
and The Individualist Alternative (serial: 2)
Editor's Word
_____________
A friend of mine was half a year ago
confronted with the claim that the Self
"really did not exist", and that this was
scientifically proven. At the time, I only
laughed, and considered the proponent of
the idea to be a little weird. I still consider
it weird, but having heard the claim over
again, I do not laugh.
The Self
Svein Olav Nyberg
As seen in the last issue, what "selfish"
means depends strongly upon what you
mean by "self". I will not here try to correct
all the wrong ideas of what the Self is, but
rather give an indication of what I think the
right view is. There are, as you well are
aware, many different conceptions of what
"self" means. A general line of division
between these conceptions I have found
very well illustrated in Wilber, Engler and
Brown's book on the psychology of
meditation [1]: To different stages of
cognitive development belongs different
self -structures and, not the least, -images.
The highest stage, called the Ultimate stage,
is described as "the reality, condition, or
suchness of all levels." If you draw the
stage diagram on a paper, the Ultimate Self
is in relation to the other "selves" as the
paper in relation to the elements of the
In the last issue, I went over the basic types
of [mistaken] selfishness, and promised to
follow up with a discussion of what was the
true Self/ego. In conjunction with the
above concern, this is the starting point for
my article The Self.
Ken Knudson's eminent article continues.
The chapter one makes up almost half the
article, so I have chosen to issue the rest of
the chapter as separate issues, so that
discussion may begin. I hope the somewhat
arbitrary sectioning of the article into the
different issues is forgiven.
The next chapter will be "REVOLUTION:
THE ROAD TO FREEDOM?".
diagram drawn on it. Improper selfishness,
then, might be viewed as the mistaking of
the image for the real thing.
So, there is a very important division
between the underlying Self, and the
various self-images. This division is found
more or less explicitly in a variety of
sources. Pirsig, in his famous best-seller,
denounces the ego, but embraces the Self
in his praise of arete as "duty towards Self."
[2] The philosopher Nietzsche writes that
"The Self is always listening and seeking: it
compares, subdues, conquers, destroys. It
rules and is also the Ego's ruler. Behind
your thoughts and feelings, my brother,
stands a mighty commander, an unknown
sage - he is called Self.", and also, a little
above this, "[the Self] does not say 'I' but
performs 'I'." [3].

In [1] it is concluded that though all who
experience the Ultimate stage do essentially
the same, the experience and understanding
of it depends on the prior interpretation.
The Buddhist experience an egoless state,
while the theistic meditators experience
[being one with] their god. Who is having
this unifying experience? The same guy,
essentially, who has everyday experience.
Fichte [4] asks of his audience,
"Gentlemen, think of the wall," and
proceeds "Gentlemen, think of him who
thought the wall." In this way he gets an
infinite chain, as "whenever we try to
objectify ourselves, make ourselves into
objects of consciousness, there always
remains an I or ego which transcends
objectification and is itself the condition of
the unity of consciousness," as Copleston
describes.
Now, whether we shall side with the
meditators who claim to experience this I,
or with Fichte who says we cannot, is of
little importance here. What is important, is
that the I, this ground and condition
indeed exists, and that it is the ground of
the empirical ego or egos.
I want to take a closer look at this I - the
Self.
So far, the Self may be seen on as
something just lying in the background, a
kind of ultimate observer. But Fichte's
question can also be asked of action, "Who
is lifting your arm when you lift your arm?"
Like it was clear in the first case that it was
not the image of the Self –the ego– that
was aware, but the Self itself, it is equally
obvious that it is not the image of the Will
that lifts the arm - but the Will itself. To
understand this better, try to will the coke
bottle in front of you to lift. Won't do.
Now, "will" your arm up in the same way
that you willed the coke bottle. Won't do
either. Still, lifting the arm is easy. (See also
[3])
Proceeding like above, we can find a well
of parts of the underlying Self. But they are
all one. The Self that sees the stick is the
same Self that throws a rock at it. How else
would it hit? I have found it useful to single
out three of them, which I will call the
Experiencing Self, the Creative Self and the
Teleological Self.
Stirner [5] speaks of "the vanishing point of
the ego", and of the "creative nothing". He
has "built his case on nothing". This latter
is the one that reveals what he intends. For
surely, he has built his cause on - himself.
But in the way of Fichte, the Self is not a
thing, but the basis for speaking of things.
To be a thing is to be an object for some
subject and, as Fichte showed, the subject
cannot properly be an object. So, Stirner's
"creative nothing" is him Self.
In contrast to Fichte, however, Stirner
emphasizes the finite here-and-now
individual Self, not the abstract Ego:
"Fichte's ego too is the same essence
outside me, for every one is ego; and, if
only this ego has rights, then it is "the ego",
it is not I. But I am not an ego along with
other egos, but the sole ego: I am unique.
Hence my wants too are unique, and my
deeds; in short everthing about me is
unique."
So we see Stirner rejects the positivistic
idea of viewing himself from a 3rd person
vantage point. He is not "ego", the image
of himself. For one can have an image of
anyone. But ones own Self is experienced
from the 1st person point of view, and one
is oneself the only one who can experience
oneself from there. Again quoting Stirner:
"They say of God: 'Names name thee not.'
That holds good of me: No concept
expresses me; they are only names."
The history of philosophy can be simplified
as follows: We have gone from a focus on
experienced reality, to experienced self, and
from that on to that which contains both -
the Experiencing Self. Stirner, as a student
of Hegel, must have seen this, and, as he
states, this history is also my history. The
dialectic process is taken back into its
owner. I am not any longer viewing myself
as a moment in the dialectical self-
unfolding of the Absolute, but as he who
learns and thinks these thoughts, and - take
the advantage of them.
The philosophical process did not stop at
the Experiencing Self, with which an
empiricist would be content. A reaction
came, asking what elements of experience
were constituted by the subject himself.
The observer was no longer seen as a
passive observer, but as an active
participant contributing his own elements
into experience. Thus we can say that the
awareness of the creative role of the
intellect was properly emerging. We had
the Creative Self. This was idea was taken
very far by Stirners teachers - into German
idealism.
Stirner’s main thesis is that of the
individual as the ground not only of
observation and creation, but of evaluation.
This thesis is given a short presentation as
a 0th chapter in The Ego and His Own:
"All things are Nothing to Me." No outer
force is to determine ones cause, ones
evaluation. With a convincing rhetoric,
Stirner makes room for the case that he
himself is the evaluator, the one whose
cause is to be acted for.
Stirner’s main dialectical triad is then this,
that we go from mere experience to action
[thought], and as a solution to the strain
between these go to valuation and interest,
self-interest. This is a recurring theme in
his book, and the structure of the argument
is presented in the first chapter, very
appropriately named "A human Life".
The triad, as I have understood and
interpreted it, is this:
The Experiencing Self: This is, so to say,
the beacon that enlightens the empirical
world, which makes it possible qua
empirical world. With knowledge of oneself
only as experiencing, one is stuck with
things, and all ones activity is centered
around things, as Stirner says. One is a
Materialist. In history, both the personal
and the philosophical one, the Empirical
Self is seen as a passive observer on whom
the world is imprinted, all until we come to
the antithesis of this view:
The Creative Self: We discover our own
more active role in experience, our own
contribution of elements/form to our
experience, as shown by the [Kantian
inspired] experiments of the early Gestalt
psychologists. With this knowledge,
attention goes to thought itself, and, we
become intellectual and spiritual young
men. Our quest goes for that in which we
can pry Spirit, and we become - Idealists.
The Teleological Self: There is a
[dialectical] strain between the two views
and aspects of the Self above, a conflict
that can only, as Stirner says, be resolved
by a third party, which is the synthesis. We
begin to ask: Why do I focus on this, and
not on that, in experience? Why do I create
this and not that? For whom am I doing
my creation, my thinking? I find the answer
to the above questions in what I will call
the Teleological Self. The Teleological Self
is he [or rather - I] for whom all things
done by me are done, the commander who
is the measure of all activity. Any value, any
selection, and thereby any focus and any
creation, owes its existence to the
Teleological Self. In the Teleological Self
we find the grounding of our "why?".
The dilemma between Materialism and
Idealism is resolved in Selfishness. Not do
I go for the material for its sake, nor do I
let the cause of any ideal invade me and
make its cause mine. I take both, but as
tools and things to be disposed of at - my
pleasure. In this fashion the dialectics is
buried. For it is only alive in the world of
ideas, which I have taken back into myself.
This was an attempt to convey some
thoughts on the Self. If anyone feels
tempted to pick up this thread, expand on
A Critique of Communism
and
The Individualist Alternative
Ken Knudson
(serial: 2)
Before one can get into an intelligent
criticism of anything, one must begin by
defining one's terms. "Anarchism",
according to the Encyclopaedia Britannica
dictionary, is "the theory that all forms of
government are incompatible with
individual and social liberty and should be
abolished." It further says that it comes
from the Greek roots "an" (without) and
"archos" (leader).1 As for "communism", it
is "any social theory that calls for the
abolition of private property and control by
the community over economic affairs." To
elaborate on that definition, communists of
all varieties hold that all wealth should be
produced and distributed according to the
1 Historically, it was Proudhon who first
used the word to mean something other
than disorder and chaos: "Although a firm
friend of order, I am (in the full force of
the term) an anarchist." [5]
it or negate it, you are welcome. It will be a
pleasure.
REFERENCES
[1] Wilber, Engler, Brown:
"Transformations of Consciousness"
[2] Robert Pirsig: "Zen and the Art of
Motorcycle Maintenance"
[3] Friedrich Nietzsche: "Zarathustra", on
the Despisers of the Body.
[4] Copleston, Vol VII, p. 40
[5] Max Stirner: "The Ego & His Own"
formula "from each according to his2
ability, to each according to his needs" and
that the administrative mechanism to
control such production and distribution
should be democratically organised by the
workers themselves (i.e. "workers'
control"). They further insist that there
should be no private ownership of the
means of production and no trading of
goods except through the official channels
agreed upon by the majority. With rare
exceptions, communists of all varieties
propose to realise this ideal through violent
revolution and the expropriation of all
private property.
2Here Marx uses the masculine pronoun to
denote the generic "one". In deference to
easy flowing English grammar, I'll stick to
his precedent and hope that Women's Lib
people will forgive me when I, too, write
"his" instead of "one's".
That no one should accuse me of building
up straw men in order to knock them
down, allow me to quote Kropotkin3 to
show that communist-anarchism fits in well
with the above definition of communism:
"We have to put an end to the
iniquities, the vices, the crimes which
result from the idle existence of some
and the economic, intellectual, and
moral servitude of others.... We are
no longer obliged to grope in the dark
for the solution.... It is
Expropriation.... If all accumulated
treasure...does not immediately go
back to the collectivity - since ALL
have contributed to produce it; if the
insurgent people do not take
possession of all the goods and
provisions amassed in the great cities
and do not organise to put them
within the reach of all who need
them...the insurrection will not be a
revolution, and everything will have
to be begun over
again....Expropriation, - that then, is
the watchword which is imposed
upon the next revolution, under
penalty of failing in its historic
mission. The complete expropriation
of all who have the means of
exploiting human beings. The return
to common ownership by the nation
of all that can serve in the hands of
3 I have chosen Kropotkin as a "typical"
communist- anarchist here and elsewhere
in this article for a number of reasons.
First, he was a particularly prolific writer,
doing much of his original work in English.
Secondly, he is generally regarded as
"probably the greatest anarchist thinker and
writer" by many communist- anarchists,
including at least one editor of "Freedom".
[6] Finally, he was the founder of Freedom
Press, the publisher of the magazine you
are now reading.
any one for the exploitation of
others." [7]
Now let us take our definitions of
communism and anarchism and see where
they lead us. The first part of the definition
of communism calls for the abolition of
private property. "Abolition" is itself a
rather authoritarian concept - unless, of
course, you're talking about abolishing
something which is inherently authoritarian
and invasive itself (like slavery or
government, for example). So the question
boils down to "Is private property
authoritarian and invasive?" The
communists answer "yes"; the individualists
disagree. Who is right? Which is the more
"anarchistic" answer? The communists
argue that "private property has become a
hindrance to the evolution of mankind
towards happiness" [8], that "private
property offends against justice" [9] and
that it "has developed parasitically amidst
the free institutions of our earliest
ancestors." [10] The individualists, far from
denying these assertions, reaffirm them.
After all wasn't it Proudhon who first
declared property "theft"?4 But when the
communist says, "Be done, then, with this
vile institution; abolish private property
once and for all; expropriate and
collectivise all property for the common
good," the individualist must part company
with him. What's wrong with private
property today is that it rests primarily in
the hands of a legally privileged elite. The
resolution of this injustice is not to
perpetrate an even greater one, but rather
to devise a social and economic system
which will distribute property in such a
manner that everyone is guaranteed the
4 By property Proudhon means property as
it exists under government privilege, i.e.
property gained not through labour or the
exchange of the products of labour (which
he favours), but through the legal privileges
bestowed by government on idle capital.
product of his labour by natural economic
laws. I propose to demonstrate just such a
system at the end of this article. If this can
be done, it will have been shown that
private property is not intrinsically invasive
after all, and that the communists in
expropriating it would be committing a
most UNanarchistic act. It is, therefore,
incumbent upon all communists who call
themselves anarchists to read carefully that
section and either find a flaw in its
reasoning or admit that they are not
anarchists after all.
The second part of the definition of
communism says that economic affairs
should be controlled by the community.
Individualists say they should be controlled
by the market place and that the only law
should be the natural law of supply and
demand. Which of these two propositions
is the more consistent with anarchism?
Herbert Spencer wrote in 1884, "The great
political superstition of the past was the
divine right of kings. The great political
superstition of the present is the divine
right of parliaments." [11] The communists
seem to have carried Spencer's observation
one step further: the great political
superstition of the future shall be the divine
right of workers' majorities. "Workers'
control" is their ideology; "Power to the
People" their battle cry. What communist-
anarchists apparently forget is that workers'
control means CONTROL. Marxists, let it
be said to their credit, at least are honest
about this point. They openly and
unashamedly demand the dictatorship of
the proletariat. Communist-anarchists seem
to be afraid of that phrase, perhaps
subconsciously realising the inherent
contradiction in their position. But
communism, by its very nature, IS
dictatorial. The communist-anarchists may
christen their governing bodies "workers'
councils" or "soviets", but they remain
GOVERNMENTS just the same.
Abraham Lincoln was supposed to have
asked, "If you call a tail a leg, how many
legs has a dog? Five? No! Calling a tail a leg
don't MAKE it a leg." The same is true
about governments and laws. Calling a law
a "social habit" [12] or an "unwritten
custom" [13] as Kropotkin does, doesn't
change its nature. To paraphrase
Shakespeare, that which we call a law by
any other name would smell as foul.
REFERENCES
[1] Joseph Stalin, "Anarchism or Socialism"
(Moscow; Foreign Languages Publishing
House, 1950), p. 85. Written in 1906 but
never finished.
[2] Ibid., pp. 90-1.
[3] Ibid., p.95.
[4] Ibid., p. 87.
[5] Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, "What is
Property: An Inquiry into the Principle of
Right and of Government," trans.
Benjamin R. Tucker (London: William
Reeves), p. 260. Originally published in
French in 1840.
[6] Bill Dwyer, "This World", "Freedom,"
March 27, 1971.
[7] Pierre Kropotkine, "Paroles d'un
Revolte" (Paris: Ernest Flammarion, 1885),
pp. 318-9.
[8] Paul Eltzbacher, "Anarchism:
Exponents of the Anarchist Philosophy,"
trans. Steven T. Byington, ed. James J.
Martin (London: Freedom Press, 1960), p.
108. "Der Anarchismus" was originally
published in Berlin in 1900.
[9] Ibid., p. 109.
[10] Ibid., p. 110.
[11] Herbert Spencer, "The Man Versus
The State," ed. Donald MacRae
(London: Penguin Books, 1969), p. 151.
Originally published in 1884.
[12] Prince Peter Kropotkin, "The
Conquest of Bread" (London: Chapman &
Hall, Ltd., 1906), p. 41.
[13] Eltzbacher, op. cit., p. 101.
 non serviam #3
A Critique of Communism
and
The Individualist Alternative
Ken Knudson
(serial: 3)
Let us take a closer look at the type of
society the communists would have us live
under and see if we can get at the essence
of these laws. Kropotkin says that "nine-
tenths of those called lazy...are people gone
astray." [14] He then suggests that given a
job which "answers" their "temperament"
and "capacities" (today we would hear
words like "relate", "alienation" and
"relevancy"), these people would be
productive workers for the community.
What about that other ten percent which
couldn't adjust? Kropotkin doesn't
elaborate, but he does say, "if not one, of
the thousands of groups of our federation,
will receive you, whatever be their motive;
if you are absolutely incapable of producing
anything useful, or if you refuse to do it,
then live like an isolated man....That is what
could be done in a communal society in
order to turn away sluggards if they
become too numerous." [15] This is a
pretty harsh sentence considering that ALL
the means of production have been
confiscated in the name of the revolution.
So we see that communism's law, put
bluntly, becomes "work or starve."1 This
1 Article 12 of the 1936 constitution of the
USSR reads: "In the USSR work is the duty
of every able-bodied citizen according to
the principle: `He who does not work,
neither shall he eat.' In the USSR the
principle of socialism is realised: `From
each according to his ability, to each
according to his work.'"
happens to be an individualist law too. But
there is a difference between the two: the
communist law is a man-made law, subject
to man's emotions, rationalisations, and
inconsistencies; the individualist law is
nature's law - the law of gastric juices, if
you will - a law which, like it or not, is
beyond repeal. Although both laws use the
same language, the difference in meaning is
the difference between a commandment
and a scientific observation. Individualist-
anarchists don't care when, where, or how
a man earns a living, as long as he is not
invasive about it. He may work 18 hours a
day and buy a mansion to live in the other
six hours if he so chooses. Or he may feel
like Thoreau did that "that man is richest
whose pleasures are the cheapest" [16] and
work but a few hours a week to ensure his
livelihood. I wonder what would happen to
Thoreau under communism? Kropotkin
would undoubtedly look upon him as "a
ghost of bourgeois society." [17] And what
would Thoreau say to Kropotkin's
proposed "contract"?: "We undertake to
give you the use of our houses, stores,
streets, means of transport, schools,
museums, etc., on condition that, from
twenty to forty-five or fifty years of age,
you consecrate four or five hours a day to
some work recognised [by whom?] as
necessary to existence....Twelve or fifteen
hundred hours of work a year...is all we ask
of you." [18] I don't think it would be
pulling the nose of reason to argue that
Thoreau would object to these terms.
But some communist-anarchists would
reject Kropotkin's idea of not giving to the
unproductive worker according to his
needs, even if he doesn't contribute
according to his abilities. They might
simply say that Kropotkin wasn't being a
good communist when he wrote those lines
(just as he wasn't being a good anarchist
when he supported the Allies during World
War I). But this idea, it seems to me would
be patently unjust to the poor workers who
would have to support such parasites. How
do these communists reconcile such an
injustice? As best I can gather from the
writings of the classical communist-
anarchists, they meet this problem in one
of two ways: (1) they ignore it, or (2) they
deny it. Malatesta takes the first approach.
When asked, "How will production and
distribution be organised?" he replies that
anarchists are not prophets and that they
have no blueprints for the future. Indeed,
he likens this important question to asking
when a man "should go to bed and on
what days he should cut his nails." [19]
Alexander Berkman takes the other
approach (a notion apparently borrowed
from the Marxists):2 he denies that
unproductive men will exist after the
revolution. "In an anarchist society it will
be the most useful and difficult toil that
one will seek rather than the lighter job."
[20] Berkman's view of labour makes the
protestant work ethic sound positively mild
by comparison. For example: "Can you
doubt that even the hardest toil would
become a pleasure...in an atmosphere of
brotherhood and respect for labour?" [21]
Yes, I can doubt it. Or again: "We can
visualise the time when labour will have
become a pleasant exercise, a joyous
2At least Berkman is consistent in this
matter. Marx, paradoxically, wanted to both
"abolish labour itself" ("The German
Ideology"), AND make it "life's prime
want" ("Critique of the Gotha
Programme").
application of physical effort to the needs
of the world." [22] And again, in apparent
anticipation of Goebbels' famous dictum
about the powers of repetition, "Work will
become a pleasure... laziness will be
unknown." [23] It is hard to argue with
such "reasoning". It would be like a debate
between Bertrand Russell and Billy Graham
about the existence of heaven. How can
you argue with faith? I won't even try. I'll
just ask the reader, next time he is at work,
to look around –at himself and at his
mates– and ask himself this question:
"After the revolution will we really prefer
this place to staying at home in bed or
going off to the seashore?" If there are
enough people who can answer "yes" to
this question perhaps communism will
work after all. But in the meantime, before
building the barricades and shooting people
for a cause of dubious certainty, I would
suggest pondering these two items from
the bourgeois and communist press
respectively:
"In Detroit's auto plants, weekend
absenteeism has reached such
proportions that a current bit of folk
wisdom advises car buyers to steer
clear of vehicles made on a Monday or
Friday. Inexperienced substitute
workers, so the caution goes, have a
way of building bugs into a car. But in
Italy lately the warning might well
include Tuesday, Wednesday, and
Thursday. At Fiat, the country's largest
maker, absenteeism has jumped this
year from the normal 4 or 5 percent to
12.5 percent, with as many as 18,000
workers failing to clock in for daily
shifts at the company's Turin works.
Alfa Romeo's rate has hit 15 percent as
hundreds of workers call in each day
with `malattia di comodo' - a
convenient illness.... Italian auto
workers seem to be doing no more
than taking advantage of a very good
deal. A new labour contract guarantees
 workers in state-controlled industries
180 days of sick leave a year, at full pay,
while workers in private firms (such as
Fiat) get the same number of days at 75
percent of full pay." [24]
When doctors, employed by the state,
made an inspection visit in Turin we are
told that they found "that only 20 percent
of the `indisposed' workers they had visited
were even mildly sick." For those who
think that this is just a bourgeois
aberration, let us see what revolutionary
Cuba, after 12 years of communism, has to
say about such "parasites". I translate from
the official organ of the Central Committee
of the Cuban Communist Party:
"Worker's discussion groups are being
set up in all work centres to discuss the
proposed law against laziness. These
groups have already proven to be a
valuable forum for the working class.
During these assemblies, which for the
moment are limited to pilot projects in
the Havana area, workers have made
original suggestions and posed timely
questions which lead one to believe
that massive discussion of this type
would make a notable contribution to
the solution of this serious problem.
An assembly of boiler repairmen in the
Luyano district was representative of
the general feeling of the workers.
They demanded that action be taken
against those parasitic students who
have stopped going to classes regularly
or who, although attending classes, do
just enough to get by. The workers
were equally adamant about co-workers
who, after a sickness or accident, refuse
to go back to their jobs but go on
receiving their salaries for months
without working. Questions were often
accompanied by concrete proposals.
For example, should criminals receive
the same salaries on coming back to
work from prison as when they left
their jobs? The workers thought not,
but they did think it all right that the
revolutionary state accord a pension to
the prisoner's family during his stay in
the re-education [sic] centre. At the
Papelera Cubana factory the workers
made a suggestion which proved their
contempt of these loafers; habitual
offenders should be punished in
geometric proportion to the number of
their crimes. They also proposed that
workers who quit their jobs or were
absent too often be condemned to a
minimum, not of 6 months, but of one
year's imprisonment and that the
worker who refuses three times work
proposed by the Ministry of Labour be
considered automatically as a criminal
and subject to punishment as such. The
workers also expressed doubts about
the scholastic `deserters', ages 15 and
16, who aren't yet considered physically
and mentally able to work but who
don't study either. They also cited the
case of the self employed man who
works only for his own selfish interests.
The dockworkers of Havana port, zone
1, also had their meeting. They
envisioned the possibility of making
this law retroactive for those who have
a bad work attitude, stating forcefully
that it wasn't a question of precedents,
because otherwise the law could only
be applied in those cases which
occurred after its enactment. The
harbour workers also proposed
imprisonment for the `sanctioned'
workers and that, in their opinion, the
punishment of these parasites shouldn't
be lifted until they could demonstrate a
change of attitude. The steadfastness of
the workers was clearly demonstrated
when they demanded that punishments
not be decided by the workers
themselves in order to avoid possible
leniency due to reasons of sympathy,
sentimentality, etc. The workers also
indicated that these parasites should
 not have the right to the social benefits
accorded to other workers. Some
workers considered imprisonment as a
measure much too kind. As you can
see, the workers have made many good
proposals, which leads us to believe
that with massive discussion, this new
law will be considerably enriched. This
is perhaps the path to social legislation
by the masses."3 [25]
These two extracts clearly demonstrate that
human nature remains pretty constant,
independent of the social system the
individual workman is subjected to. So it
seems to me that unless human nature can
somehow be miraculously transformed by
the revolution –and that WOULD be a
revolution– some form of compulsion
would be necessary in order to obtain
"from each according to his abilities."
3 The Associated Press has since reported
the passage of this law: "Cuba's
Communist regime announced yesterday a
tough new labour law that Premier Fidel
Castro said is aimed at 400,000 loafers,
bums and `parasites' who have upset the
country's new social order. The law, which
goes into effect April 1, provides for
penalties ranging from six months to two
years of forced labour in `rehabilitation
centres' for those convicted of vagrancy,
malingering or habitual absenteeism from
work or school. The law decrees that all
males between 17 and 60 have a `social
duty' to work on a daily systematic basis
unless they are attending an approved
school. Those who do not are considered
`parasites of the revolution' and subject to
prosecution by the courts or special
labourers' councils. The anti-loafing law -
seen as a tough new weapon to be used
mainly against dissatisfied young people -
was prompted by Mr. Castro's disclosure
last September that as many as 400,000
workers were creating serious economic
problems by shirking their duties." [26]
While on this point, I would like to ask my
communist-anarchist comrades just who is
supposed to determine another person's
abilities? We've seen from the above article
that in Cuba the Ministry of Labour makes
this decision. How would it differ in an
anarchist commune? If these anarchists are
at all consistent with their professed desire
for individual freedom, the only answer to
this question is that the individual himself
would be the sole judge of his abilities and,
hence, his profession. But this is ridiculous.
Who, I wonder, is going to decide of his
own free will that his real ability lies in
collecting other people's garbage? And
what about the man who thinks that he is
the greatest artist since Leonardo da Vinci
and decides to devote his life to painting
mediocre landscapes while the community
literally feeds his delusions with food from
the communal warehouse? Few people, I
dare say, would opt to do the necessary
"dirty work" if they could choose with
impunity ANY job, knowing that whatever
they did –good or bad, hard or easy– they
would still receive according to their
needs.4 The individualist's answer to this
perennial question of "who will do the dirty
work" is very simple: "I will if I'm paid well
enough." I suspect even Mr. Heath would
go down into the London sewers if he were
paid 5 million pounds per hour for doing it.
Somewhere between this sum and what a
sewer worker now gets is a just wage,
4 Anyone who has ever gone to an
anarchist summer camp knows what I
mean. Here we have "la creme de la
creme", so to speak, just dying to get on
with the revolution; yet who cleans out the
latrines? More often than not, no one. Or,
when it really gets bad, some poor sap will
sacrifice himself for the cause. You don't
have solidarity; you have martyrdom. And
no one feels good about it: you have
resentment on the part of the guy who
does it and guilt from those who don't.
which, given a truly free society, would be
readily determined by competition.
This brings us to the second half of the
communist ideal: the distribution of goods
according to need. The obvious question
again arises, "Who is to decide what
another man needs?" Anarchists once more
must leave that decision up to the
individual involved. To do otherwise would
be to invite tyranny, for who can better
determine a person's needs than the person
himself?5 But if the individual is to decide
for himself what he needs, what is to
prevent him from "needing" a yacht and
his own private airplane? If you think we've
got a consumer society now, what would it
be like if everything was free for the
needing? You may object that luxuries
aren't needs. But that is just begging the
question: what is a luxury, after all? To
millions of people in the world today food
is a luxury. To the English central heating is
a luxury, while to the Americans it's a
necessity. The Nazi concentration camps
painfully demonstrated just how little man
actually NEEDS. But is that the criterion
communists would use for determining
need? I should hope (and think) not. So it
seems to me that this posses a definite
dilemma for the communist-anarchist: what
do you do about unreasonable, irrational,
or extravagant "needs"? What about the
man who "needs" a new pair of shoes every
month? "Nonsense," you may say, "no one
needs new shoes that often." Well, how
often then? Once a year? Every five years
perhaps? And who will decide? Then what
about me? I live in Switzerland and I'm
5 I'm reminded here of the tale of the man
who decided his mule didn't NEED any
food. He set out to demonstrate his theory
and almost proved his point when,
unfortunately, the beast died. Authoritarian
communism runs a similar risk when it
attempts to determine the needs of others.
crazy about grape jam - but unfortunately
the Swiss aren't. I feel that a jam sandwich
isn't a jam sandwich unless it's made with
GRAPE jam. But tell that to the Swiss! If
Switzerland were a communist federation,
there wouldn't be a single communal
warehouse which would stock grape jam. If
I were to go up to the commissar-in-
charge-of-jams and ask him to put in a
requisition for a few cases, he would think
I was nuts. "Grapes are for wine," he'd tell
me with infallible logic, "and more people
drink wine than eat grape jam." "But I'm a
vegetarian," I plead, "and just think of all
the money (?) I'm saving the commune by
not eating any of that expensive meat."
After which he would lecture me on the
economics of jam making, tell me that a
grape is more valuable in its liquid form,
and chastise me for being a throwback to
bourgeois decadence.
And what about you, dear reader? Have
you no individual idiosyncrasies? Perhaps
you've got a thing about marshmallows.
What if the workers in the marshmallow
factories decide (under workers' control, of
course) that marshmallows are bad for your
health, too difficult to make, or just simply
a capitalist plot? Are you to be denied the
culinary delights that only marshmallows
can offer, simply because some distant
workers get it into their heads that a
marshmallowless world would be a better
world?
But, not only would distribution according
to need hurt the consumer, it would be
grossly unfair to the productive worker
who actually makes the goods or performs
the necessary services. Suppose, for
example, that hardworking farmer Brown
goes to the communal warehouse with a
load of freshly dug potatoes. While there
Brown decides he needs a new pair of
boots. Unfortunately there are only a few
pairs in stock since Jones the shoemaker
quit his job - preferring to spend his days
living off Brown's potatoes and writing
sonnets about the good life. So boots are
rationed. The boot commissar agrees that
Brown's boots are pretty shabby but, he
points out, Smith the astrologer is in even
greater need. Could Brown come back in a
month or so when BOTH soles have worn
through? Brown walks away in disgust,
resolved never again to sweat over his
potato patch.
Even today people are beginning to
complain about the injustices of the
(relatively mild) welfare state. Theodore
Roszak writes that in British schools there
has been a "strong trend away from the
sciences over the past four years" and that
people are showing "annoyed concern" and
"loudly observing that the country is not
spending its money to produce poets and
Egyptologists - and then demanding a
sharp cut in university grants and
stipends."[27] If people are upset NOW at
the number of poets and Egyptologists that
they are supporting, what would it be like if
EVERYONE could simply take up his
favourite hobby as his chosen profession? I
suspect it wouldn't be long before our
professional chess players and mountain
climbers found the warehouse stocks
dwindling to nothing. Social unrest would
surely increase in direct proportion to the
height of the trash piling up on the
doorsteps and the subsequent yearning for
the "good old days" would bring about the
inevitable counter-revolution. Such would
be the fate of the anarchist-communist
utopia.
 non serviam #4
A Critique of Communism
and
The Individualist Alternative
Ken Knudson
(serial: 4)
Peter Kropotkin opens his chapter on
"Consumption and Production" in "The
Conquest of Bread" with the following
words:
"If you open the works of any
economist you will find that he begins
with PRODUCTION, the analysis of
means employed nowadays for the
creation of wealth; division of labour,
manufacture, machinery, accumulation
of capital. From Adam Smith to Marx,
all have proceeded along these lines.
Only in the latter parts of their books
do they treat of CONSUMPTION,
that is to say, of the means necessary to
satisfy the needs of
individuals....Perhaps you will say this is
logical. Before satisfying needs you
must create the wherewithal to satisfy
them. But before producing anything,
must you not feel the need of it? Is it
not necessity that first drove man to
hunt, to raise cattle, to cultivate land, to
make implements, and later on to
invent machinery? Is it not the study of
needs that should govern
production?"[28] When I first came
upon these words, I must admit I was
rather surprised. "What have we here,"
I thought, "is the prince of anarchist-
communism actually going to come out
in favour of the consumer?" It didn't
take long to find out that he wasn't.
Most communists try very hard to
ignore the fact that the sole purpose of
production is consumption. But not
Kropotkin; he first recognises the fact -
and THEN he ignores it. It's only a
matter of three pages before he gets his
head back into the sand and talks of
"how to reorganise PRODUCTION so
as to really satisfy all needs." [My
emphasis]
Under communism it is not the consumer
that counts; it is the producer. The
consumer is looked upon with scorn - a
loathsome, if necessary, evil. The worker,
on the other hand, is depicted as all that is
good and heroic. It is not by accident that
the hammer and sickle find themselves as
the symbols of the Russian "workers'
paradise." Can you honestly imagine a
communist society raising the banner of
bread and butter and declaring the advent
of the "consumers' paradise"? If you can,
your imagination is much more vivid than
mine.
But that's exactly what individualist-
anarchists would do. Instead of the
communist's "workers' control" (i.e. a
producers' democracy), we advocate a
consumers' democracy. Both democracies
–like all democracies– would in fact be
dictatorships. The question for anarchists is
which dictatorship is the least oppressive?
The answer should be obvious. But,
judging from the ratio of communists to
individualists in the anarchist movement,
apparently it's not. So perhaps I'd better
explain.
The workers in some given industry decide
that item A should no longer be produced
and decide instead to manufacture item B.
Now consumer X, who never liked item A
anyway, couldn't care less; but poor Y feels
his life will never be the same without A.
What can Y do? He's just a lone consumer
and consumers have no rights in this
society. But maybe other Y's agree with
him. A survey is taken and it is shown that
only 3% of all consumers regret the passing
of A. But can't some compromise be
arrived at? How about letting just one tiny
factory make A's? Perhaps the workers
agree to this accommodation. Perhaps not.
In any case the workers' decision is final.
There is no appeal. The Y's are totally at
the mercy of the workers and if the
decision is adverse, they'll just have to
swallow hard and hope that next week item
C isn't taken away as well. So much for the
producers' dictatorship.
Let's now take a look at the consumers'
dictatorship. Consumers are finicky people
- they want the best possible product at the
lowest possible price. To achieve this end
they will use ruthless means. The fact that
producer X asks more for his product than
Y asks for his similar product is all that the
consumer needs to know. He will
mercilessly buy Y's over X's. The
extenuating circumstances matter little to
him. X may have ten children and a
mother-in-law to feed. The consumer still
buys from Y. Such is the nature of the
consumers' dictatorship over the producer.
Now there is a fundamental difference
between these two dictatorships. In the one
the worker says to the consumer, "I will
produce what I want and if you don't like it
you can lump it." In the other the
consumer says to the worker, "You will
produce what I want and if you don't I will
take my business elsewhere." It doesn't take
the sensitive antennae of an anarchist to
see which of these two statements is the
more authoritarian. The first leaves no
room for argument; there are no
exceptions, no loopholes for the dissident
consumer to crawl through. The second,
on the other hand, leaves a loophole so big
that it is limited only by the worker's
imagination and abilities. If a producer is
not doing as well as his competitor, there's
a reason for it. He may not be suited for
that particular work, in which case he will
change jobs. He may be charging too much
for his goods or services, in which case he
will have to lower his costs, profits, and/or
overhead to meet the competition. But one
thing should be made clear: each worker is
also a consumer and what the individual
looses in his role as producer by having to
cut his costs down to the competitive
market level, he makes up in his role as
consumer by being able to buy at the
lowest possible prices.1
*****
Let us turn our attention now to the
various philosophies used by communists
to justify their social system. The
exponents of any social change invariably
claim that people will be "happier" under
their system than they now are under the
status quo. The big metaphysical question
then becomes, "What is happiness?" Up
1 The usual objection raised to a
"consumers' democracy" is that capitalists
have used similar catch phrases in order to
justify capitalism and keep the workers in a
subjugated position. Individualists sustain
this objection but point out that capitalists
are being inconsistent by not practicing
what they preach. If they did, they would
no longer be in a position of privilege,
living off the labour of others. This point is
made clear in the section on capitalism later
in this article.
until recently the communists –materialists
par excellence– used to say it was material
well-being. The main gripe they had against
capitalism was that the workers were
NECESSARILY in a state of increasing
poverty. Bakunin, echoing Marx, said that
"the situation of the proletariat...by virtue
of inevitable economic law, must and will
become worse every year." [29] But since
World War II this pillar of communist
thought has become increasingly shaky -
particularly in the United States where
"hard hats" are now pulling in salaries
upwards of four quid an hour. This fact has
created such acute embarrassment among
the faithful that many communists are now
seeking a new definition of happiness
which has nothing to do with material
comfort.
Very often what they do in discarding the
Marxist happiness albatross is to saddle
themselves with a Freudian one.2 The new
definition of happiness our neo-Freudian
communists arrive at is usually derived
from what Otto Fenichel called the
"Nirvana principle." The essence of this
theory is that both life-enhancing
behaviour (e.g. sexual intercourse, eating)
and life-inhibiting behaviour (e.g. war,
suicide) are alternative ways of escaping
from tension. Thus Freud's life instinct and
death instinct find their common ground in
Nirvana where happiness means a secure
and carefree existence. This sounds to me
very much like the Christian conception of
heaven. But with communism, unlike
heaven, you don't have to give up your life
to get in - just your humanity.
2 Wilhelm Reich and R. D. Laing are
among the latest gurus of the libertarian
left. And it's not uncommon in anarchist
circles to hear a few sympathetic words
about Herbert Marcuse's "Eros and
Civilisation," despite the author's
totalitarian tendencies.
Homer Lane used to have a little anecdote
which illustrates the point I'm trying to
make about the communist idea of
happiness:
"A dog and a rabbit are running down
a field. Both apparently are doing the
same thing, running and using their
capacity to the full. Really there is a
great difference between them. Their
motives are different. One is happy,
the other unhappy. The dog is happy
because he is trying to do something
with the hope of achieving it. The
rabbit is unhappy because he is afraid.
A few minutes later the position is
reversed; the rabbit has reached his
burrow and is inside panting, whilst the
dog is sitting outside panting. The
rabbit is now happy because it is safe,
and therefore no longer afraid. The dog
is unhappy because his hope has not
been realised. Here we have the two
kinds of happiness of which each one
of us is capable - happiness based on
the escape from danger, and happiness
based on the fulfillment of a hope,
which is the only true happiness." [30]
I leave it to the reader as an exercise in
triviality to decide which of these two types
of happiness is emphasised by
communism. While on the subject of
analogies, I'd like to indulge in one of my
own. Generally speaking there are two
kinds of cats: the "lap cat" and the
"mouser." The former leads a peaceful
existence, leaving granny's lap only long
enough to make a discreet trip to its
sandbox and to lap up a saucer of milk.
The latter lives by catching mice in the
farmer's barn and never goes near the
inside of the farm house. The former is
normally fat and lazy; the latter skinny and
alert. Despite the lap cat's easier life, the
mouser wouldn't exchange places with him
if he could, while the lap cat COULDN'T
exchange places if he would. Here we have
two cats –perhaps even from the same
litter– with two completely different
attitudes toward life. The one expects a
clean sandbox and food twice a day - and
he is rarely disappointed. The other has to
work for a living, but generally finds the
reward worth while. "Now what has this
got to do with the subject at hand?" I hear
you cry. Just this: the communists would
make "lap cats" of us all. "But what's so
bad about that?" you may ask. To which I
would have to reply (passing over the
stinky problem of WHO will change the
sandbox), "Have you ever tried to
`domesticate' a mouser?"
Communism, in its quest for a tranquil,
tensionless world, inevitably harks back to
the Middle Ages. Scratch a communist and
chances are pretty good you'll find a
mediaevalist underneath. Paul Goodman,
for example, derives his ideal "community
of scholars" from Bologna and Paris
models based in the eleventh and twelfth
centuries. [31] Erich Fromm writes
longingly of "the sense of security which
was characteristic of man in the Middle
Ages....In having a distinct, unchangeable,
and unquestionable place in the social
world from the moment of birth, man was
rooted in a structuralised whole, and thus
life had a meaning which left no place, and
no need, for doubt. A person was identical
with his role in society; he was a peasant,
an artisan, a knight, and not AN
INDIVIDUAL who HAPPENED to have
this or that occupation. The social order
was conceived as a natural order, and being
a definite part of it gave man a feeling of
security and of belonging. There was
comparatively little competition. One was
born into a certain economic position
which guaranteed a livelihood determined
by tradition. [32] Kropotkin goes even
further than Fromm. I'd like to examine his
position in some detail because I think it is
very instructive of how the communist
mentality works. In perhaps his best-
known book, "Mutual Aid," Kropotkin
devotes two of its eight chapters to
glorifying the Middle Ages, which he boldly
claim were one of "the two greatest periods
of [mankind's] history." [33] (The other one
being ancient Greece. He doesn't say how
he reconciles this with the fact that Greece
was based firmly on a foundation of
slavery). "No period of history could better
illustrate the constructive powers of the
popular masses than the tenth and eleventh
centuries...but, unhappily, this is a period
about which historical information is
especially scarce." [34] I wonder why?
Could it be that everyone was having such
a good time that no one found time to
record it? Kropotkin writes of the
mediaeval cities as "centres of liberty and
enlightenment." [35] The mediaeval guilds,
he says, answered "a deeply inrooted want
of human nature," [36] calling them
"organisations for maintaining justice." [37]
Let's see what Kropotkin means here by
"justice":
"If a brother's house is burned, or he
has lost his ship, or has suffered on a
pilgrim's voyage, all the brethren
MUST come to his aid. If a brother
falls dangerously ill, two brethren
MUST keep watch by his bed till he is
out of danger, and if he dies, the
brethren must bury him –a great affair
in those times of pestilences
[Kropotkin must have been dozing to
admit this in his Utopia]– and follow
him to the church and the grave. After
his death they MUST provide for his
children....If a brother was involved in
a quarrel with a stranger to the guild,
they agreed to support him for bad and
for good; that is, whether he was
unjustly accused of aggression, OR
REALLY WAS THE AGGRESSOR,
they HAD to support him....They went
to court to support by oath the
truthfulness of his statements, and if he
was found guilty they did not let him
 go to full ruin and become a slave
through not paying the due
compensation; they all paid it....Such
were the leading ideas of those
brotherhoods which gradually covered
the whole of mediaeval life." [38] (My
emphasis)
And such is Kropotkin's conception of
"justice," which could better be described
as a warped sense of solidarity. He goes on
to say, "It is evident that an institution so
well suited to serve the need of union,
without depriving the individual of his
initiative, could but spread, grow, and
fortify." [39] "We see not only merchants,
craftsmen, hunters, and peasants united in
guilds; we also see guilds of priests,
painters, teachers of primary schools and
universities, guilds for performing the
passion play, for building a church, for
developing the `mystery' of a given school
of art or craft, or for a special recreation -
even guilds among beggars, executioners,
and lost women, all organised on the same
double principle of self-jurisdiction and
mutual support." [40] It was such "unity of
thought" which Kropotkin thinks "can but
excite our admiration." [41]
-----
REFERENCES
[14] Kropotkin, op. cit., p. 209.
[15] Ibid., p. 206.
[16] Henry David Thoreau, "Journal,"
March 11, 1856.
[17] Kropotkin, op. cit., p. 206.
[18] Ibid., p. 205.
[19] Errico Malatesta, "Anarchy" (London:
Freedom Press, 1949), p. 33. Originally
published in 1907.
[20] Alexander Berkman, "A.B.C. of
Anarchism" (London: Freedom Press,
1964), p. 27. This is the abbreviated version
of the Vanguard Press "ABC of
Communist Anarchism" which appeared in
1929.
[21] Ibid., p. 28.
[22] Ibid., p. 29.
[23] Ibid., p. 25.
[24] "Italy: An Illness of Convenience,"
"Newsweek," January 4, 1971, p. 44.
[25] "Un Forum Legislatif de la Classe
Ouvriere?", "Granma" (French edition),
January 31, 1971, p. 3.
[26] "Cuba Announces Labor Penalties For
Loafers," "The International Herald
Tribune," March 19, 1971, p. 4.
[27] Theodore Roszak, "The Making of a
Counter Culture" (Garden City, New York:
Anchor Books, 1969), p. 29.
[28] Kropotkin, op. cit., pp. 236-7.
[29] Mikhail Bakunin, "The Political
Philosophy of Bakunin: Scientific
Anarchism," ed. G. P. Maximoff (New
York: The Free Press, 1953), p. 285.
[30] Homer Lane, "Talks to Parents and
Teachers" (London: George Allen &
Unwin, Ltd., 1928), p. 121.
[31] Paul Goodman, "Compulsory Mis-
education" and "The Community of
Scholars" (New York: Vintage Books,
1962, 1964), p. 174.
[32] Erich Fromm, "Fear of Freedom"
(London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, Ltd.,
1960), p. 34. First published in the United
States in 1942 under the title "Escape from
Freedom."
[33] Petr Kropotkin, "Mutual Aid: A Factor
of Evolution" (Boston: Extending
Horizons Books, 1955), p. 297. This book
first appeared in London in 1902.
[34] Ibid., p. 166.
[35] Ibid., p. 169.
[36] Ibid., p. 176.
[37] Ibid., p. 176.
[38] Ibid., pp. 172-3.
[39] Ibid., p. 176.
[40] Ibid., p. 174.
[41] Ibid., p. 177.
 non serviam #5
A Critique of Communism
and
The Individualist Alternative
Ken Knudson
(serial: 5)
But where did the common labourer fit
into all this? Kropotkin makes the
remarkable generalisation that "at no time
has labour enjoyed such conditions of
prosperity and such respect." [42] As proof
he cites the "glorious donations" [43] the
workers gave to the cathedrals. These, he
says, "bear testimony of their relative well-
being." [44] (Just as the Taj Mahal bears
testimony of the relative well-being of the
people of India, no doubt). "Many
aspirations of our modern radicals were
already realised in the Middle Ages [and]
much of what is described now as Utopian
was accepted then as a matter of fact." [45]
As for the material achievements of the
Middle Ages, Kropotkin can't find a
superlative super enough to describe them
- but he tries:
"The very face of Europe had been
changed. The land was dotted with rich
cities, surrounded by immense thick
walls [I wonder why?] which were
embellished by towers and gates, each
of them a work of art in itself. The
cathedrals, conceived in a grand style
and profusely decorated, lifted their
bell-towers to the skies, displaying a
purity of form and a boldness of
imagination which we now vainly strive
to attain....[He displays a bit of
`boldness of imagination' himself (to
be quite charitable) when he goes on to
say:] Over large tracts of land well-
being had taken the place of misery;
learning had grown and spread. The
methods of science had been
elaborated; the basis of natural
philosophy had been laid down; and
the way had been paved for all the
mechanical inventions of which our
own times are so proud. Such were the
magic [sic] changes accomplished in
Europe in less than four hundred
years." [46]
Just what were these "magic changes" of
which Kropotkin is so proud? He lists
about a dozen. [47] Among them are:
printing (neglecting to inform us that the
Gutenberg press was invented in the
middle of the 15th century, sometime after
the mediaeval cities "degenerated into
centralised states"); steelmaking (neglecting
to inform us that steelmaking had been
mentioned in the works of Homer and was
used continuously since that time);
glassmaking (neglecting to inform us that
the Encyclopaedia Britannica –to which he
contributed numerous articles– devotes to
the Middle Ages all of two sentences of a
27 page article on the history of
glassmaking); the telescope (neglecting to
inform us that it wasn't even invented until
1608); gunpowder and the compass
(neglecting to inform us that the Chinese
lay earlier claims to both of these
inventions); algebra (neglecting to inform
us that algebra was in common use in
ancient Babylonia and that, although being
introduced to mediaeval Europe by the
Arabs, no important contributions were
made by Europeans until the Renaissance);
the decimal system (neglecting to inform us
that the Hindus invented the system about
a thousand years before it gained any
ground in Europe in the 17th century);
calendar reform (neglecting to inform us
that although Roger Bacon suggested such
reform to the Pope in the 13th century, no
action was taken until 300 years later under
the reign of Pope Gregory XIII in 1582);
chemistry (neglecting to inform us of an
earlier work of his where he said chemistry
was "entirely a product of our [19th]
century." [48]) Indeed the only things he
mentions as products of the Middle Ages
which stand up under scrutiny are
counterpoint and, paradoxically, the
mechanical clock. To top it all off, he then
has the gall to cite Galileo and Copernicus
as being "direct descendents" of mediaeval
science [49] - somehow managing to ignore
the fact that Galileo spent the last eight
years of his life under house arrest for
supporting the Copernican theory, thanks
to that grand mediaeval institution, the
Inquisition.
You may be wondering why the people of
the Middle Ages let such a Utopia slip
through their fingers. Kropotkin cites
foreign invasions –notably those of the
Mongols, Turks, and Moors [50]– but
makes it quite clear that the "greatest and
most fatal error of most cities was to bass
their wealth upon commerce and industry."
[51] So here we have it laid bare for all to
see: Kropotkin's ideal community would
not only return us to the dark ages, but
would take away the one thing that could
bring us back - commerce and industry.
Rudolf Rocker, the darling of the anarcho-
syndicalists, similarly eulogises the Middle
Ages. He, too, felt that mediaeval man led a
"rich life" [52] which gave "wings to his
spirit and prevent[ed] his mental
stagnation." [53] But unlike Kropotkin –
who chalked up mediaeval solidarity to
man's innate "nature"– Rocker (correctly)
explains these "fraternal associations" by
means of a most unanarchistic concept -
Christianity:
"Mediaeval man felt himself to be
bound up with a single, uniform
culture, a member of a great
community extending over all
countries, in whose bosom all people
found their place. It was the
community of Christendom which
included all the scattered units of the
Christian world and spiritually unified
them....The deeper the concept of
Christianity took root in men, the
easier they overcame all barriers
between themselves and others, and
the stronger lived in them the
consciousness that all belonged to one
great community and strove toward a
common goal." [54]
So we see that the glue that held these
idyllic mediaeval communities together was
not Kropotkin's "mutual aid," but rather
Christian mysticism. Rocker was perceptive
enough to see this; Kropotkin apparently
was not. But what both of these men failed
to see was that mysticism is the necessary
glue of ANY communist society. The
mystical Garden of Eden is the ultimate
goal of every church of the communist
religion. Unfortunately, as every good
Christian will tell you, the only way you can
stay in the Garden of Eden is to abstain
from the "tree of knowledge." Communists
are apparently willing to pay this price.
Individualists are not. It is communism's
intention to carry religion to its ultimate
absurdity: it would sacrifice man on the
cross of altruism for the sake of - Man.
*****
I'd like to end my diatribe against
communism by quoting another one. This
is what one prophetic Frenchman, Pierre-
Joseph Proudhon, had to say about
communism eight years before the
"Communist Manifesto" appeared like a
spectre to haunt Europe - and like a good
French wine, his words seem to have
improved with age:
"Communism –or association in a
simple form– is the necessary object
and original aspiration of the social
nature, the spontaneous movement by
which it manifests and establishes
itself. It is the first phase of human
civilisation. In this state of society, –
which the jurists have called `negative
communism'– man draws near to man,
and shares with him the fruits of the
field and the milk and flesh of animals.
Little by little this communism –
negative as long as man does not
produce– tends to become positive and
organic through the development of
labour and industry. But it is then that
the sovereignty of thought, and the
terrible faculty of reasoning logically or
illogically, teach man that, if equality is
the sine qua non of society,
communism is the first species of
slavery....The disadvantages of
communism are so obvious that its
critics never have needed to employ
much eloquence to thoroughly disgust
men with it. The irreparability of the
injustice which it causes, the violence
which it does to attractions and
repulsions, the yoke of iron which it
fastens upon the will, the moral torture
to which it subjects the conscience, the
debilitating effect which it has upon
society; and, to sum it all up, the pious
and stupid uniformity which it enforces
upon the free, active, reasoning,
unsubmissive personality of man, have
shocked common sense, and
condemned communism by an
irrevocable decree. The authorities and
examples cited in its favour disprove it.
The communistic republic of Plato
involved slavery; that of Lycurgus
employed Helots, whose duty it was to
produce for their masters, thus
enabling the latter to devote themselves
exclusively to athletic sports and to
war, Even J. J. Rousseau –confounding
communism and equality– has said
somewhere that, without slavery, he
did not think equality of conditions
possible. The communities of the early
Church did not last the first century
out, and soon degenerated into
monasteries....The greatest danger to
which society is exposed today is that
of another shipwreck on this rock.
Singularly enough, systematic
communism –the deliberate negation
of property– is conceived under the
direct influence of the proprietary
prejudice; and property is the basis of
all communistic theories. The members
of a community, it is true, have no
private property; but the community is
proprietor, and proprietor not only of
the goods, but of the persons and wills.
In consequence of this principle of
absolute property, labour, which
should be only a condition imposed
upon man by Nature, becomes in all
communities a human commandment,
and therefore odious. Passive
obedience, irreconcilable with a
reflecting will, is strictly enforced.
Fidelity to regulations, which are always
defective, however wise they may be
thought, allows of no complaint. Life,
talent, and all the human faculties are
the property of the State, which has the
right to use them as it pleases for the
common good. Private associations are
sternly prohibited, in spite of the likes
and dislikes of different natures,
because to tolerate them would be to
introduce small communities within the
large one, and consequently private
property; the strong work for the weak,
although this ought to be left to
 benevolence, and not enforced,
advised, or enjoined; the industrious
work for the lazy though this is unjust;
the clever work for the foolish,
although this is absurd; and, finally,
man –casting aside his personality, his
spontaneity, his genius, and his
affections– humbly annihilates himself
at the feet of the majestic and inflexible
Commune! Communism is inequality,
but not as property is. Property is the
exploitation of the weak by the strong.1
Communism is the exploitation of the
strong by the weak. In property,
inequality of conditions is the result of
force, under whatever name it be
disguised: physical and mental force;
force of events, chance, FORTUNE;
force of accumulated property, etc. In
communism, inequality springs from
placing mediocrity on a level with
excellence. This damaging equation is
repellent to the conscience, and causes
merit to complain; for although it may
be the duty of the strong to aid the
weak, they prefer to do it out of
generosity, - they never will endure a
comparison. Give them equal
opportunities of labour, and equal
wages, but never allow their jealousy to
be awakened by mutual suspicion of
unfaithfulness in the performance of
the common task. Communism is
oppression and slavery. Man is very
willing to obey the law of duty, serve
his country, and oblige his friends; but
he wishes to labour when he pleases,
where he pleases, and as much as he
pleases. He wishes to dispose of his
own time, to be governed only by
necessity, to choose his friendships, his
recreation, and his discipline; to act
from judgement, not by command; to
sacrifice himself through selfishness,
not through servile obligation.
Communism is essentially opposed to
1 See footnote 4 in serial installment #2.
the free exercise of our faculties, to our
noblest desires, to our deepest feelings.
Any plan which could be devised for
reconciling it with the demands of the
individual reason and will would end
only in changing the thing while
preserving the name. Now, if we are
honest truth-seekers, we shall avoid
disputes about words. Thus,
communism violates the sovereignty of
the conscience and equality: the first,
by restricting spontaneity of mind and
heart, and freedom of thought and
action; the second, by placing labour
and laziness, skill and stupidity, and
even vice and virtue on an equality in
point of comfort." [55]
REFERENCES
[42] Ibid., p. 194.
[43] Ibid., p. 194.
[44] Ibid,, p. 194.
[45] Ibid., pp. 194-5.
[46] Ibid., pp. 209-10.
[47] Ibid., p. 214.
[48] Kropotkine, "Paroles," p. 333.
[49] Kropotkin, "Mutual Aid," p. 215.
[50] Ibid., p. 217.
[51] Ibid., p. 219.
[52] Rudolf Rocker, "Nationalism and
Culture," trans. Ray E. Chase (Los Angeles:
Rocker Publications Committee, 1937), p.
92.
[53] Ibid., p. 91.
[54] Ibid., p. 92.
[55] Proudhon, op. cit., pp. 248-51.
 non serviam #6
Contents: Editor's Word
Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism
and The Individualist Alternative (serial: 6)
Editor's Word
_____________
There are three main proponents of egoism
known today, Max Stirner, Friedrich
Nietzsche and Ayn Rand. Each of them
has a very distinct approach to egoism.
While Rand has a very conceptual
approach, asking "who is the right
beneficiary of a man's action" [1], Stirner
takes an almost opposite path, rejecting any
"justification" outside himself, in that the
root of his egoism is to find in the einzige -
the unique, individual person. Nietzsche
speaks about a "will to power" of a
thousand little emotional sub-selves that
make out the total self, while for Rand the
self is the mind –the intellect– alone.
Stirner is close to the existentialist camp in
his focus on the unique choice, by his focus
on the "creative nothing" which creates
itself, while Nietzsche, who believed
himself to descend from Polish nobility,
emphasizes "fate" [amor fati] and
belonging to the blood one is born into.
So, we see there are more than enough
choices of ones "egoism". Instead of
embracing one alternative and denouncing
the other two as the false –and possibly
even evil– egoisms, I will try to explain in
general outlines1 why I have chosen to
emphasize one of them - namely Stirner’s.
1 The field is now open: Anyone wanting to
express their unique path to egoism and
why it has taken the form it has is invited
to write such an article. If you want, make
it an autobiography. Myself, I plan a more
Stirner is often described as a nominalist,
one to whom concepts and/or universals
have no meaning outside groupings made
by observers. I have an opposite opinion
on that: For Stirner, the road to egoism is
seen as going through Idealism, not
outside. He recognizes ideals and thoughts,
only does not - surrender to them. Stirners
"anti-conceptualism" is to be found late in
his book: "The conceptual question 'what is
man?' - has then changed into the personal
question 'who is man?' With 'what' the
concept was sought for, in order to realize
it; with 'who' it is no longer any question at
all, but the answer is personally on hand at
once in the asker: the question ansers
itself." "... no concept expresses me, nothing
that is designated as my essence exhausts
me; they are only names." This is his
insistence on his uniqueness as an
individual. An insistence not found equally
strong by Nietzsche or by Rand. Where the
latter focusses strongly on abstract "Man",2
whose moral characteristics follow from
the possession of reason, the former at
times3 goes as far as negating the individual
in his quest for the "Ubermensch", the
super-man, which is supposed to fulfill
some longing to go beyond oneself and
beyond the transitory stage of Man: [2]
Man is but a rope over the abyss between
the animal and the Ubermensch.
So, Stirner is unique in his emphasis on
uniqueness. This is the central element in
comprehensive article later. This was a
start.
2 There is an open question of whether,
and if so to which degree, Stirner's criticism
of Feuerbach's "Man" is applicable to
Rand's concept of "Man" as in "qua man".
Perhaps subject for a later article.
3 Nietzsche is no systematic philosopher,
and so one can find support both for and
against egoism in his writing.
Stirner’s thought - the first-person and
particular viewpoint, the me-outlook, as
opposed to the third-person and general
viewpoint. The third-person, general
viewpoint is for him justified only insofar
as it is grounded in the me-outlook. "Away,
then, with every cause that is not altogether
my cause!"
Among the three, Stirner is the only one
who makes no claim for anyone as to how
A Critique of Communism
and
The Individualist Alternative
Ken Knudson
(serial: 6)
REVOLUTION:
THE ROAD TO FREEDOM?
It's true that non-violence has been a
dismal failure. The only bigger failure
has been violence.
–Joan Baez
There's an old story about a motorist who
stopped a policeman in downtown
Manhattan and asked him how he could get
to the Brooklyn Bridge. The officer looked
around, thought a minute, scratched his
head and finally replied, "I'm sorry, but you
can't get there from here. Some anarchists
are now wondering if you can get to the
free society from where we stand today. I
must confess that I, too, harbour some
doubts. But if there is a way, it is
incumbent upon all who wish to find that
way to carefully examine the important
end-means problem.
they should live, or what is suitable for
their "kind", but leaves it totally to
individual choice. This is why I prefer
Stirner.
[1] The Ayn Rand Lexicon
[2] Nietzsche, "Thus Spoke Zarathustra".
"The end justifies the means." Few people
would argue with this trite statement.
Certainly all apologists of government must
ultimately fall back on such reasoning to
justify their large police forces and standing
armies. Revolutionary anarchists must also
rely on this argument to justify their
authoritarian methods "just one more
time", the revolution being for them "the
unfreedom to end unfreedom." It seems
that the only people who reject outright
this article of faith are a handful of (mostly
religious) pacifists. The question I'd like to
consider here is not whether the end
JUSTIFIES the means (because I, too, tend
to feel that it does), but rather whether the
end is AFFECTED by the means and, if
so, to what extent.
That the end is affected by the means
should be obvious. Whether I obtain your
watch by swindling you, buying it from
you, stealing it from you, or soliciting it as a
gift from you makes the same watch
"graft", "my property", "booty", or "a
donation." The same can be said for social
change. Even so strong an advocate of
violent revolution as Herbert Marcuse, in
one of his rare lapses into sanity, realised
this fact:
"Unless the revolution itself progresses
through freedom, the need for
domination and repression would be
carried over into the new society and
the fateful separation between the
`immediate' and the `true' interest of
the individuals would be almost
inevitable; the individuals would
become the objects of their own
liberation, and freedom would be a
matter of administration and decree.
Progress would be progressive
repression, and the `delay' in freedom
would threaten to become self-
propelling and self-perpetuating." [56]
But despite the truth of Marcuse's
observation, we still find many anarchists
looking for a shortcut to freedom by means
of violent revolution. The idea that
anarchism can be inaugurated by violence
is as fallacious as the idea that it can be
sustained by violence. The best that can be
said for violence is that it may, in rare
circumstances, be used as an expedient to
save us from extinction. But the
individualist's rejection of violence (except
in cases of self-defence) is not due to any
lofty pacifist principles; it's a matter of pure
pragmatism: we realise that violence just
simply does not work.
The task of anarchism, as the individualist
sees it, is not to destroy the state, but rather
to destroy the MYTH of the state. Once
people realise that they no longer need the
state, it will –in the words of Frederick
Engels– inevitably "wither away" ("Anti-
Duehring", 1877) and be consigned to the
"Museum of Antiquities, by the side of the
spinning wheel and the bronze axe"
("Origin of the Family, Private Property
and the State", 1884). But unless anarchists
can create a general and well-grounded
disbelief in the state as an INSTITUTION,
the existing state might be destroyed by
violent revolution or it might fall through
its own rottenness, but another would
inevitably rise in its place. And why
shouldn't it? As long as people believe the
state to be necessary (even a "necessary
evil", as Thomas Paine said), the state will
always exist.
We have already seen how Kropotkin
would usher in the millennium by the
complete expropriation of all property.
"We must see clearly in private property
what it really is, a conscious or unconscious
robbery of the substance of all, and seize it
joyfully for the common benefit." [57] He
cheerfully goes on to say, "The instinct of
destruction, so natural and so just...will find
ample room for satisfaction." [58]
Kropotkin's modern-day heirs are no
different. Noam Chomsky, writing in the
"New York Review of Books" and
reprinted in a recent issue of "Anarchy",
applauds the heroism of the Paris
Commune of 1871, mentioning only in
passing that "the Commune, of course [!],
was drowned in blood." [59] Later in the
same article he writes, "What is far more
important is that these ideas [direct
workers' control] have been realised in
spontaneous revolutionary action, for
example in Germany and Italy after World
War I and in Spain (specifically, industrial
Barcelona) in 1936." [60] What Chomsky
apparently finds relatively UNimportant are
the million-odd corpses which were the
direct result of these "spontaneous
revolutionary actions." He also somehow
manages to ignore the fact that the three
countries he mentions –Germany, Italy and
Spain– were without exception victims of
fascism within a few years of these glorious
revolutions. One doesn't need a great deal
of insight to be able to draw a parallel
between these "spontaneous" actions with
their reactionary aftermaths and the
spontaneous "trashings" which are
currently in fashion in the United States.
But it seems the Weathermen really DO
"need a weatherman to know which way
the wind blows." [61]
The question of how to attain the anarchist
society has divided anarchists nearly as
much as the question of what the anarchist
society actually is. While Bakunin insisted
on the necessity of "bloody revolutions"
[62], Proudhon believed that violence was
unnecessary - saying instead that "reason
will serve us better." [63] The same discord
was echoed on the other side of the
Atlantic some decades later when, in the
wake of the infamous Haymarket bombing,
the issue of violence came to a head.
Benjamin Tucker, writing in the columns of
"Liberty", had this to say about accusations
leveled against him by Johann Most, the
communist-anarchist editor of "Freiheit":
"It makes very little difference to Herr
Most what a man believes in
economics. The test of fellowship with
him lies in acceptance of dynamite as a
cure-all. Though I should prove that
my economic views, if realised, would
turn our social system inside out, he
would not therefore regard me as a
revolutionist. He declares outright that
I am no revolutionist, because the
thought of the coming revolution (by
dynamite, he means) makes my flesh
creep. Well, I frankly confess that I
take no pleasure in the thought of
bloodshed and mutilation and death.
At these things my feelings revolt. And
if delight in them is a requisite of a
revolutionist, then indeed I am no
revolutionist. When revolutionist and
cannibal become synonyms, count me
out, if you please. But, though my
feelings revolt, I am not mastered by
them or made a coward by them. More
than from dynamite and blood do I
shrink from the thought of a
permanent system of society involving
the slow starvation of the most
industrious and deserving of its
members. If I should ever become
convinced that the policy of bloodshed
is necessary to end our social system,
the loudest of today's shriekers for
blood would not surpass me in the
stoicism with which I would face the
inevitable. Indeed, a plumb-liner to the
last, I am confident that under such
circumstances many who now think me
chicken-hearted would condemn the
stony-heartedness with which I should
favour the utter sacrifice of every
feeling of pity to the necessities of the
terroristic policy. Neither fear nor
sentimentalism, then, dictates my
opposition to forcible methods. Such
being the case, how stupid, how unfair,
in Herr Most, to picture me as crossing
myself at the mention of the word
revolution simply because I steadfastly
act on my well-known belief that force
cannot substitute truth for a lie in
political economy!" [64]
It is this issue of economics which
generally sorts anarchists into the violent
and non-violent wings of anarchism.
Individualists, by and large, are pacifists in
practice (if not in theory), whereas the
communists tend toward violent
revolution. Why is this so? One reason I
1
think is that individualists are more
concerned with changing the conditions
which directly affect their lives than they
are with reforming the whole world "for
the good of all." The communists, on the
1 There are exceptions of course. It is hard
to imagine a more dedicated pacifist than
Tolstoy, for example. On the other side of
the coin is Stirner, who quotes with near
relish the French Revolutionary slogan "the
world will have no rest till the last king is
hanged with the guts of the last priest." [65]
other hand, have a more evangelical spirit.
Like all good missionaries, they are out to
convert the unbeliever - whether he likes it
or not. And inevitably this leads to
violence. Another reason communists are
more prone to violence than individualists
can be found, I think, in looking at the
nature of the force each is willing to use to
secure and sustain his respective system.
Individualists believe that the only
justifiable force is force used in preventing
invasion (i.e. defensive force). Communists,
however, would compel the worker to pool
his products with the products of others
and forbid him to sell his labour or the
products of his labour. To "compel" and
"forbid" requires the use of offensive force.
It is no wonder, then, that most
communists advocate violence to achieve
their objectives.
If freedom is really what we anarchists
crack it up to be, it shouldn't be necessary
to force it down the throat of anyone.
What an absurdity! Even so superficial a
writer as Agatha Christie recognised that "if
it is not possible to go back [from
freedom], or to choose to go back, then it
is not freedom." [66] A. J. Muste used to
say that "there is no way to peace - peace
IS the way." The same thing is true about
freedom: the only way to freedom is BY
freedom. This statement is so nearly
tautological that it should not need saying.
The only way to realise anarchy is for a
sufficient number of people to be
convinced that their own interests demand
it. Human society does not run on idealism
- it runs on pragmatism. And unless people
can be made to realise that anarchy actually
works for THEIR benefit, it will remain
what it is today: an idle pipe dream; "a nice
theory, but unrealistic." It is the anarchist's
job to convince people otherwise.
Herbert Spencer –the great evolutionist of
whom Darwin said, "He is about a dozen
times my superior"– observed the
following fact of nature:
"Metamorphosis is the universal law,
exemplified throughout the Heavens
and on the Earth: especially throughout
the organic world; and above all in the
animal division of it. No creature, save
the simplest and most minute,
commences its existence in a form like
that which it eventually assumes; and in
most cases the unlikeness is great - so
great that kinship between the first and
the last forms would be incredible were
it not daily demonstrated in every
poultry-yard and every garden. More
than this is true. The changes of form
are often several: each of them being
an apparently complete transformation
- egg, larva, pupa, imago, for example
... No one of them ends as it begins;
and the difference between its original
structure and its ultimate structure is
such that, at the outset change of the
one into the other would have seemed
incredible." [67]
This universal law of metamorphosis holds
not only for biology, but for society as well.
Modern-day Christianity resembles the
early Christian church about as much as a
butterfly resembles a caterpillar. Thomas
Jefferson would have been horrified if he
could have foreseen the "government by
the consent of the governed" which today
is the hereditary heir of his Declaration of
Independence. French revolutionaries took
turns beheading one another until that
great believer in "les droits de l'homme",
Napoleon Bonaparte, came upon the scene
to secure "liberte, egalite, fraternite" for all.
And wasn't it comrade Stalin who in 1906
so confidently forecast the nature of the
coming revolution?: "The dictatorship of
the proletariat will be a dictatorship of the
entire proletariat as a class over the
bourgeoisie and not the domination of a
few individuals over the proletariat." [68]
The examples of these ugly duckling stories
in reverse are endless. For as Robert Burns
wrote nearly two centuries ago [69]:
The best laid schemes o' mice and men
Gang aft a-gley;
An' lea'e us nought but grief and pain
For promis'd joy.
REFERENCES
[56] Herbert Marcuse, "Reason and
Revolution: Hegel and the Rise of Social
Theory" (London: Routledge & Kegan
Paul, Ltd., 1967), p. 435. This quotation
was taken from the supplementary chapter
written in 1954. The original book was first
published by Oxford University Press in
1941.
[57] Kropotkine, Paroles, p. 341.
[58] Ibid., p. 342.
[59] Noam Chomsky, "Notes on
Anarchism," "Anarchy 116," October,
1970, p. 316.
[60] Ibid., p. 318.
[61] Bob Dylan, "Subterranean Homesick
Blues," 1965.
[62] Eltzbacher, op. cit., p. 89.
[63] Ibid., p. 57.
[64] Benjamin R. Tucker, "Instead of a
Book (By a Man Too Busy to Write One)"
(New York: Benj. R. Tucker, 1897), p. 401.
Reprinted from "Liberty," May 12, 1888.
[65] Max Stirner (Johann Kaspar Schmidt),
"The Ego and His Own: The Case of the
Individual Against Authority," trans. Steven
T. Byington (New York: Libertarian Book
Club, 1963), p. 298. "Der Einzige und sein
Eigentum" was written in 1844 and
translated into English in 1907, when it was
published in New York by Benj. Tucker.
[66] Agatha Christie, "Destination
Unknown" (London: Fontana Books), p.
98.
[67] Spencer, op, cit., pp. 323-4.
[68] Stalin, op. cit., p. 97.
[69] Robert Burns, "To a Mouse," 1785,
stanza 7.
 non serviam #7
Contents:
Editor's Word
S.E.Parker: Archists, Anarchists and Egoists
Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism
and The Individualist Alternative (serial: 7)
Archists, Anarchists and Egoists
Sidney Parker
I am an anarchist!
Wherefore I will not rule
And also ruled I will not be.
–John Henry Mackay
What I get by force I get by force, and what
I do not get by force I have no right to.
–Max Stirner
In his book MAX STIRNER'S EGOISM
John P. Clark claims that Stirner is an
anarchist, but that his anarchism is "greatly
inadequate". This is because "he opposes
domination of the ego by the State, but he
advises people to seek to dominate others
in any other way they can manage...Stirner,
for all his opposition to the State...still
exalts the will to dominate."
Clark's criticism springs from his definition
of anarchism as opposition to
"domination" in all its forms "not only
domination of subjects by political rulers,
but domination of races by other races, of
Editor's Word
_____________
Sidney Parker is the editor of the Stirnerite
magazine "Ego", and is the author of the
below article on "Archists, Anarchists and
Egoists". This article will be the first in a
series of articles sent to me by Sidney
Parker that I will reprint here. They have
previously appeared in the (out of print)
magazine "Ego"/"The Egoist".
females by males, of the young by the old,
of the weak by the strong, and not least of
all, the domination of nature by humans."
In view of the comprehensiveness of his
definition it is odd that Clark still sees
Stirner's philosophy as a type of anarchism
- albeit a "greatly inadequate" one. He is
quite correct in stating that the leitmotif of
theoretical anarchism is opposition to
domination and that, despite his anti-Statist
sentiments, Stirner has no principled
objection to domination. Indeed, he writes
"I know that my freedom is diminished
even by my not being able to carry out my
will on another object, be this something
without will, like a government, an
individual etc."
Is conscious egoism, therefore, compatible
with anarchism? There is no doubt that it is
possible to formulate a concept of
anarchism that is ostensibly egoistic. For
many years I tried to do this and I know of
several individuals who still claim to be
anarchists because they are egoists. The
problem, however, is that anarchism as a
theory of non-domination demands that
individuals refrain from dominating others
even if they could gain greater satisfaction from
dominating than from not dominating. To allow
domination would be to deny anarchism.
In other words, the "freedom" of the
anarchist is yet another yoke placed around
the neck of the individual in the name of
yet another conceptual imperative.
The question was answered at some length
by Dora Marsden in two essays that
appeared in her review for THE EGOIST
September 12, 1914 and February 1, 1915.
The first was entitled THE ILLUSION OF
ANARCHISM; the second SOME
CRITICS ANSWERED.
Some months before the appearance of her
first essay on anarchism Marsden had been
engaged in a controversy with the
redoubtable Benjamin Tucker in which she
had defended what she called "egoist
anarchism" against what she saw as the
"clerico-libertarianism" of Tucker. At the
premature end of the controversy Tucker
denounced her as an "egoist and archist,"
to which she replied that she was quite
willing to "not –according to Mr Tucker–
be called 'Anarchist'" but responded readily
to "Egoist".
In the interval between the end of the
controversy and the publication of her first
essay she had evidently given considerable
thought to the relation of egoism to
anarchism and had decided that the latter
was something in which she could no
longer believe. The gist of her new position
was as follows:
Every form of life is archistic. "An archist
is one who seeks to establish, maintain, and
protect by the strongest weapons at his
disposal, the law of his own interest." All
growing life-forms are aggressive:
"aggressive is what growing means. Each
fights for its own place, and to enlarge it,
and enlarging it is a growth. And because
life-forms are gregarious there are myriads
of claims to lay exclusive hold on any place.
The claimants are myriad: bird, beast, plant,
insect, vermin - each will assert its sole
claim to any place as long as it is permitted:
as witness the pugnacity of gnat, weed, and
flea, the scant ceremony of the housewife's
broom, the axe which makes a clearing, the
scythe, the fisherman's net, the slaughter-
house bludgeon: all assertions of aggressive
interest promptly countered by more
powerful interests! The world falls to him
who can take it, if instinctive action can tell
us anything."
It is this aggressive 'territoriality' that
motivates domination. "The living unit is
an organism of embodied wants; and a
want is a term which indicates an
apprehension of the existence of barriers –
conditions easy or hard– which lie between
the 'setting onwards' and the 'arrival', i.e.
the satisfaction. Thus every want has two
sides, obverse and reverse, of which the
one would read the 'not yet dominated',
and the other 'progressive domination'. The
two sides grow at the expense of each
other. The co-existence of the
consciousness of a lacking satisfaction, with
the corresponding and inevitable 'instinct
to dominate', that which prolongs the lack,
are features which characterize 'life'.
Bridging the interval between the want and
its satisfaction is the exercising of the
'instinct to dominate' - obstructing
conditions. The distinction between the
lifeless and the living is comprised under an
inability to be other than a victim to
conditions. That of which the latter can be
said, possesses life; that of which the
former, is inanimate. It is to this doministic
instinct to which we have applied the label
archistic."
Of course, this exercising of the doministic
instinct does not result in every life-form
becoming dominant. Power being naturally
unequal the struggle for predominance
usually settles down into a condition in
which the less powerful end up being
dominated by the more powerful. Indeed,
many of the less powerful satisfy the
instinct to dominate by identifying
themselves with those who actually do
dominate: "the great lord can always count
on having doorkeepers in abundance."
Marsden argues that anarchists are among
those who, like Christians, seek to muzzle
the doministic tendency by urging us to
renounce our desires to dominate. Their
purpose "is to make men willing to assert
that though they are born and inclined
archists they ought to be anarchists." Faced
with "this colossal encounter of interest, i.e.
of lives...the anarchist breaks in with his
'Thus far and no further'" and "introduces
his 'law' of 'the inviolability of individual
liberty'." The anarchist is thus a principled
embargoist who sees in domination the evil
of evils. "'It is the first article of my faith
that archistic encroachments upon the 'free'
activity of Men are not compatible with the
respect due to the dignity of Man as Man.
The ideal of Humanity forbids the
domination of one man by his
fellows'....This humanitarian embargo is an
Absolute: a procedure of which the
observance is Good-in-itself. The
government of Man by Man is wrong: the
respect of an embargo constitutes Right."
The irony is, that in the process of seeking
to establish this condition of non-
domination called anarchy, the anarchist
would be compelled to turn to a sanction
that is but another form of domination. In
the theoretical society of the anarchist they
would have to resort to the intra-individual
domination of conscience in order to prevent
the inter-individual domination that
characterizes political government. In the
end, therefore, anarchism boils down to a
species of "clerico-libertarianism" and is
the gloss covering the wishes of "a unit
possessed of the instinct to dominate -
even his fellow-men."
Not only this, but faced with the practical
problems of achieving the "Free Society",
the anarchist fantasy would melt away
before the realities of power. "'The State is
fallen, long live the State' - the furthest
going revolutionary anarchist cannot get
away from this. On the morrow of his
successful revolution he would need to set
about finding means to protect his
'anarchistic' notions: and would find
himself protecting his own interests with all
the powers he could command, like an
archist: formulating his laws and
maintaining his State, until some franker
archist arrived to displace and supersede
him."
Nonetheless, having abandoned anarchism
Marsden has no intention of returning to
an acceptance of the authority of the State
and its laws for this would be to confuse
"an attitude which refused to hold laws and
interests sacred (i.e. whole unquestioned,
untouched) and that which refuses to
respect the existence of forces, of which
Laws are merely the outward visible index.
It is a very general error, but the anarchist
is especially the victim of it: the greater
intelligence of the archist will understand
that though laws considered as sacred are
foolishness, respect for any and every law is
due for just the amount of retaliatory force
there may be involved in it, if it be flouted.
Respect for 'sanctity' and respect for
'power' stand at opposite poles, the
respecter of the one is the verbalist, of the
other - the archist: the egoist."
I agree with Dora Marsden. Anarchism is a
redemptionist secular religion concerned to
purge the world of the sin of political
government. Its adherents envisage a "free
society" in which all archistic acts are
forbidden. Cleansed of the evil of
domination "mankind" will live, so they
say, in freedom and harmony and our
present "oppressions" will be confined to
the pages of history books. When,
therefore, Marsden writes that "anarchists
are not separated in any way from kinship
with the devout. They belong to the
Christian Church and should be recognized
as Christianity's picked children" she is not
being merely frivolous. Anarchism is a
theory of an ideal society –whether
communist, mutualist, or individualist,
matters little in this respect– of necessity
must demand renunciation of domination
both in means and ends. That in practice it
would necessitate another form of
domination for its operation is a
contradiction not unknown in other
religions - which in no way alter their
essence.
The conscious egoist, in contrast, is not
bound by any demand for renunciation of
domination and if it is within his
competence he will dominate others if this is
in his interest. That anarchism and egoism
are not equivalent is admitted, albeit
unwillingly, by the well-known American
anarchist John Beverley Robinson –who
depicted an anarchist society in the most
lachrymous terms in his REBUILDING
THE WORLD– in his succinct essay
EGOISM. Throwing anarchist principles
overboard he writes of the egoist that "if
the State does things that benefit him, he
will support it; if it attacks him and
encroaches on his liberty, he will evade it
by any means in his power, if he is not
strong enough to withstand it." Again, "if
the law happens to be to his advantage, he
will avail himself of it; if it invades his
liberty he will transgress it as far as he
thinks it wise to do so. But he has no
regard for it as a thing supernal."
Robinson thus denies the validity of the
anarchist principle of non-domination,
since the existence of the State and its laws
necessitates the existence of a permanent
apparatus of repression. If I make use of
them for my advantage, then I invoke their
repressive power against anyone who
stands opposed to what I want. In other
words, I make use of an archistic action to
gain my end.
Egoism, conscious egoism, seen for what it is
instead of being pressed into the service of
a utopian ideology, has nothing to do with
what Marsden well-called "clerico-
libertarianism". It means, as she put it in
her controversy with Tucker, "....a tub for
Diogenes; a continent for Napoleon;
control of a Trust for Rockefeller; all that I
desire for me: if we can get them." It is not
based upon any fantasy for its champions
are well aware of the vital difference
between "if I want something I ought to
get it" and "being competent to achieve
what I want". The egoist lives among the
realities of power in the world of archists,
not among the myths of the renouncers in
the dream world of anarchists.
 A Critique of Communism
and
The Individualist Alternative
Ken Knudson
(serial: 3)
Why is it that Utopian dreams have a habit
of turning into nightmares in practice? Very
simply because people don't act the way the
would-be architects of society would have
them act. The mythical man never
measures up to the real man. This point
was brought home forcefully in a recent
letter to "Freedom" by S. E. Parker who
observed that our modern visionaries are
bound for disappointment because they are
"trying to deduce an `is' from an `ought'."
[70] Paper constitutions might work all
right in a society of paper dolls, but they
can only bring smiles to those who have
observed their results in the real world. The
same is true of paper revolutions which
invariably have to go back to the drawing
board once the reign of terror sets in. And
if communist-anarchists think that their
paper social systems are exempt from this,
how do they explain the presence of
anarchist "leaders" in high government
positions during the Spanish Civil War?
Hasn't everyone been surprised at
sometime or other with the behaviour of
people they thought they knew well?
Perhaps a relative or a good friend does
something "totally out of character." We
can never completely know even those
people closest to us, let alone total
strangers. How are we, then, to
comprehend and predict the behaviour of
complex groups of people? To make
assumptions about how people must and
will act under a hypothetical social system
is idle conjecture. We know from daily
experience that men don't act as they
"ought" to act or think as they "ought" to
think. Why should things be any different
after the revolution? Yet we still find an
abundance of revolutionaries willing to kill
and be killed for a cause which more likely
than not, if realised, would bear no
recognizable resemblance to what they
were fighting for. This reason alone should
be sufficient to give these people second
thoughts about their methods. But
apparently they are too carried away by the
violence of their own rhetoric to be
bothered with where it will lead them.1
There is but one effective way to rid
ourselves of the oppressive power of the
state. It is not to shoot it to death; it is not
to vote it to death; it is not even to
persuade it to death. It is rather to starve it
to death.
Power feeds on its spoils, and dies when its
victims refuse to be despoiled. There is
much truth in the well-known pacifist
slogan, "Wars will cease when people
refuse to fight." This slogan can be
generalised to say that "government will
cease when people refuse to be governed."
As Tucker put it, "There is not a tyrant in
the civilised world today who would not do
1 I am reminded here of a Herblock
cartoon which came out during the
Johnson-Goldwater presidential campaign
of 1964. It pictures Goldwater standing in
the rubble of a nuclear war and
proclaiming, "But that's not what I meant!"
I wonder if the Utopia which our idealists
intend to usher in by violent revolution will
be what they really "meant"?
anything in his power to precipitate a
bloody revolution rather than see himself
confronted by any large fraction of his
subjects determined not to obey. An
insurrection is easily quelled; but no army is
willing or able to train its guns on
inoffensive people who do not even gather
in the streets but stay at home and stand
back on their rights." [71]
A particularly effective weapon could be
massive tax refusal. If (say) one-fifth of the
population of the United States refused to
pay their taxes, the government would be
impaled on the horns of a dilemma. Should
they ignore the problem, it would only get
worse - for who is going to willingly
contribute to the government's coffers
when his neighbours are getting away scot
free? Or should they opt to prosecute, the
burden just to feed and guard so many
"parasites" –not to mention the lose of
revenue– would be so great that the other
four-fifths of the population would soon
rebel. But in order to succeed, this type of
action would require massive numbers.
Isolated tax refusal –like isolated draft
refusal– is a useless waste of resources. It is
like trying to purify the salty ocean by
dumping a cup of distilled water into it.
The individualist-anarchist would no more
advocate such sacrificial offerings than the
violent revolutionary would advocate
walking into his neighbourhood police
station and "offing the pig." As he would
tell you, "It is not wise warfare to throw
your ammunition to the enemy unless you
throw it from the cannon's mouth." Tucker
agrees. Replying to a critic who felt
otherwise he said, "Placed in a situation
where, from the choice of one or the other
horn of a dilemma, it must follow either
that fools will think a man a coward or that
wise men will think him a fool, I can
conceive of no possible ground for
hesitancy in the selection." [72]
There is a tendency among anarchists these
days –particularly in the United States– to
talk about "alternatives" and "parallel
institutions". This is a healthy sign which
individualists very much encourage. The
best argument one can possibly present
against "the system" is to
DEMONSTRATE a better one. Some
communist-anarchists (let it be said to their
credit) are now trying to do just that.
Communal farms, schools, etc. have been
sprouting up all over the States.
Individualists, of course, welcome these
experiments - especially where they fulfill
the needs of those involved and contribute
to their happiness. But we can't help
questioning the overall futility of such
social landscape gardening. The vast
majority of these experiments collapse in
dismal failure within the first year or two,
proving nothing but the difficulty of
communal living. And should an isolated
community manage to survive, their
success could not be judged as conclusive
since it would be said that their principles
were applicable only to people well-nigh
perfect. They might well be considered as
the exceptions which proved the rule. If
anarchy is to succeed to any appreciable
extent, it has to be brought within the
reach of everyone. I'm afraid that tepees in
New Mexico don't satisfy that criterion.
The parallel institution I would like to see
tried would be something called a "mutual
bank".2 The beauty of this proposal is that
it can be carried out under the very nose of
the man-in-the-street. I would hope that in
this way people could see for themselves
the practical advantages it has to offer
them, and ultimately accept the plan as
their own. I'm well aware that this scheme,
like any other, is subject to the law of
metamorphosis referred to earlier. But
2The reader can judge for himself the
merits of this plan when I examine it in
some detail later on in this article.
should this plan fail, unlike those plans
which require bloody revolutions for their
implementation, the only thing hurt would
be the pride of a few hair-brained
individualists.
-------
REFERENCES
[70] S. E. Parker, "Letters", "Freedom,"
February 27, 1971.
[71] Tucker, "Instead of a Book," p. 413.
Reprinted from "Liberty," October 4, 1884.
[72] Tucker, "Instead of a Book," p. 422.
Reprinted from "Liberty," June 23, 1888.

Human rights and wrongs are not determined by Justice, but by Might.

–Ragnar Redbeard

Everyone who would be free must show his power

–Ibid
 non serviam #8
Contents: Editor's Word Editor's Word
Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism _____________
and
The Individualist Alternative (serial: 8) In this issue, Ken's article comes on its
own. Todays chapter is an exposition of his
ideas on egoism, viewed from a political
point of view. Nothing more needs to be
said. Enjoy!

A Critique of Communism
and
The Individualist Alternative
Ken Knudson
(serial: 8)

EGOISM: quotation. So what I have done in the

THE PHILOSOPHY OF FREEDOM
Many a year I've used my nose
To smell the onion and the rose;
Is there any proof which shows
That I've a right to that same nose?
–Johann Christoph Friedrich Schiller
The philosophy of individualist-anarchism
is "egoism." It is not my purpose here to
give a detailed account of this philosophy,
but I would like to explode a few of the
more common myths about egoism and
present to the reader enough of its essence
so that he may understand more clearly the
section on individualist economics. I am
tempted here to quote long extracts from
"The Ego and His Own," for it was this
book which first presented the egoist
philosophy in a systematic way.
Unfortunately, I find that Stirner's "unique"
style does not readily lend itself to
following pages is to dress up Stirner's
ideas in a language largely my own.
Voltaire once said, "If God did not exist, it
would be necessary to invent him."
Bakunin wisely retorted, "If God DID
exist, it would be necessary to abolish him."
Unfortunately, Bakunin would only abolish
God. It is the egoist's intention to abolish
GODS. It is clear from Bakunin's writings
that what he meant by God was what
Voltaire meant - namely the religious God.
The egoist sees many more gods than that -
in fact, as many as there are fixed ideas.
Bakunin's gods, for example, include the
god of humanity, the god of brotherhood,
the god of mankind - all variants on the
god of altruism. The egoist, in striking
down ALL gods, looks only to his WILL.
He recognises no legitimate power over
himself.1 The world is there for him to
1He does not, of course, claim to be
omnipotent. There ARE external powers
consume - if he CAN. And he can if he has
the power. For the egoist, the only right is
the right of might. He accepts no
"inalienable rights," for such rights –by
virtue of the fact that they're inalienable–
must come from a higher power, some
god. The American Declaration of
Independence, for example, in proclaiming
these rights found it necessary to invoke
the "Laws of Nature and of Nature's God."
The same was true of the French
Revolutionary "Declaration des droits de
l'homme et du citoyen."
The egoist recognises no right –or what
amounts to the same thing– claims ALL
rights for himself. What he can get by force
he has a right to; and what he can't, he has
no right. He demands no rights, nor does
he recognise them in others. "Right - is a
wheel in the head, put there by a spook,"
[73] says Stirner. Right is also the spook
which has kept men servile throughout the
ages. The believer in rights has always been
his own jailer. What sovereign could last
the day out without a general belief in the
"divine right of kings"? And where would
Messrs. Nixon, Heath, et. al. be today
without the "right" of the majority?
Men make their tyrants as they make their
gods. The tyrant is a man like any other.
His power comes from the abdicated
power of his subjects. If people believe a
man to have superhuman powers, they
automatically GIVE him those powers by
default. Had Hitler's pants fallen down
during one of his ranting speeches, the
whole course of history might have been
different. For who can respect a naked
over him. The difference between the
egoist and non-egoist in this regard is
therefore one mainly of attitude: the egoist
recognises external power as an enemy and
consciously fights against it, while the non-
egoist humbles himself before it and often
accepts it as a friend.
Fuehrer? And who knows? The beginning
of the end of Lyndon Johnson's political
career might well have been when he
showed his operation scar on coast-to-
coast television for the whole wide world
to see that he really was a man after all.
This sentiment was expressed by Stirner
when he said, "Idols exist through me; I
need only refrain from creating them anew,
then they exist no longer: `higher powers'
exist only through my exalting them and
abasing myself. Consequently my relation
to the world is this: I no longer do anything
for it `for God's sake,' I do nothing `for
man's sake,' but what I do I do `for my
sake'." [74] The one thing that makes a man
different from any other living creature is
his power to reason. It is by this power that
man can (and does) dominate over the
world. Without reason man would be a
pathetic non-entity - evolution having
taken care of him long before the dinosaur.
Now some people say that man is by
nature a social animal, something like an
ant or a bee. Egoists don't deny the
sociability of man, but what we do say is
that man is sociable to the extent that it
serves his own self-interest. Basically man
is (by nature, if you will) a selfish being.
The evidence for this is overwhelming.2 Let
us look at a hive of bees to see what would
happen if "reason" were suddenly
introduced into their lives:
"In the first place, the bees would not
fail to try some new industrial process;
for instance, that of making their cells
round or square. All sorts of systems
and inventions would be tried, until
long experience, aided by geometry,
should show them that the hexagonal
2 Many people cite trade unions as a
"proof" of man's solidarity and sociability.
Just the opposite is true. Why else do
people strike if not for their own "selfish"
ends, e.g. higher wages, better working
conditions, shorter hours?
 shape is the best. Then insurrections
would occur. The drones would be told
to provide for themselves, and the
queens to labour; jealousy would
spread among the labourers; discords
would burst forth; soon each one
would want to produce on his own
account; and finally the hive would be
abandoned, and the bees would perish.
Evil would be introduced into the
honey-producing republic by the power
of reflection, - the very faculty which
ought to constitute its glory." [75]
So it would appear to me that reason would
militate against blind, selfless cooperation.
But by the same token, reason leads to
cooperation which is mutually beneficial to
all parties concerned. Such cooperation is
what Stirner called a "union of egoists."
[76] This binding together is not done
through any innate social instinct, but
rather as a matter of individual
convenience. These unions would probably
take the form of contracting individuals.
The object of these contracts not being to
enable all to benefit equally from their
union (although this isn't ruled out, the
egoist thinks it highly unlikely), but rather
to protect one another from invasion and
to secure to each contracting individual
what is mutually agreed upon to be "his."
By referring to a man's selfishness, you
know where you stand. Nothing is done
"for free." Equity demands reciprocity.
Goods and services are exchanged for
goods and services or (what is equivalent)
bought. This may sound "heartless" - but
what is the alternative? If one depends on
kindness, pity or love the services and
goods one gets become "charity." The
receiver is put in the position of a beggar,
offering nothing in return for each
"present." If you've ever been on the dole,
or know anyone who has, you will know
that the receiver of such gifts is anything
but gracious. He is stripped of his
manhood and he resents it. Now the egoist
isn't (usually) so cold and cruel as this
description makes him out to be. As often
as not he is as charitable and kind as his
altruist neighbour. But he CHOOSES the
objects of his kindness; he objects to
COMPULSORY "love." What an
absurdity! If love were universal, it would
have no meaning. If I should tell my wife
that I love her because I love humanity, I
would be insulting her. I love her not
because she happens to be a member of
the human race, but rather for what she is
to me. For me she is something special: she
possesses certain qualities which I admire
and which make me happy. If she is
unhappy, I suffer, and therefore I try to
comfort her and cheer her up - for MY
sake. Such love is a selfish love. But it is the
only REAL love. Anything else is an
infatuation with an image, a ghost. As
Stirner said of his loved ones, "I love them
with the consciousness of egoism; I love
them because love makes ME happy, I love
because loving is natural to me, because it
pleases me. I know no `commandment of
love'." [77]
The lover of "humanity" is bewitched by a
superstition. He has dethroned God, only
to accept the reign of the holy trinity:
Morality, Conscience and Duty. He
becomes a "true believer" - a religious man.
No longer believing in himself, he becomes
a slave to Man. Then, like all religious men,
he is overcome with feelings of "right" and
"virtue." He becomes a soldier in the
service of humanity whose intolerance of
heretics rivals that of the most righteous
religious fanatic. Most of the misery in the
world today (as in the past) is directly
attributable to men acting "for the
common good." The individual is nothing;
the mass all.
The egoist would reverse this situation.
Instead of everyone looking after the
welfare of everyone else, each would look
after his own welfare. This would, in one
fell swoop, do away with the incredibly
complicated, wasteful and tyrannical
machinery (alluded to previously) necessary
to see to it that not only everyone got his
fair share of the communal pie, but that
everyone contributed fairly to its
production. In its stead we egoists raise the
banner of free competition: "the war of all
against all" as the communists put it. But
wouldn't that lead to (dare I say it)
ANARCHY? Of course it would. What
anarchist would deny the logical
consequences of the principles he
advocates? But let's see what this "anarchy"
would be like.
The egoist believes that the relationships
between men who are alive to their own
individual interests would be far more just
and equitable than they are now. Take the
property question for example. Today there
is a great disparity of income. Americans
make up about 7% of the world's
population, but they control over half of its
wealth. And among the Americans, nearly
one quarter of the wealth is owned by 5%
of the people.3 [78] Such unequal
distribution of wealth is due primarily to
the LEGAL institution of property.
Without the state to back up legal privilege
and without the people's acquiescence to
the privileged minority's legal right to that
property, these disparities would soon
disappear. For what makes the rich man
rich and the poor man poor if not the latter
GIVING the former the product of his
labour?
Stirner is commonly thought to have
concerned himself little with the economic
3Contrary to popular belief, this gulf is
getting larger. Since 1966, despite a
constantly mushrooming GNP, the
American factory workers' REAL wages (as
opposed to his apparent, inflationary
wages) have actually declined. [79]
consequences of his philosophy. It is true
that he avoided elaborating on the exact
nature of his "union of egoists," saying that
the only way of knowing what a slave will
do when he breaks his chains is to wait and
see. But to say that Stirner was oblivious to
economics is just not so. On the contrary.
It was he, after all, who translated into
German both Adam Smith's classic "An
Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the
Wealth of Nations" and Jean Baptiste Say's
pioneering work on the free market
economy, "Traite d'Economie Politique."
The few pages he devotes to economics in
"The Ego and His Own" are among his
best:
"If we assume that, as ORDER
belongs to the essence of the State, so
SUBORDINATION too is founded in
its nature, then we see that the
subordinates, or those who have
received preferment, disproportionately
OVERCHARGE and OVERREACH
those who are put in the lower
ranks....By what then is your property
secure, you creatures of
preferment?...By our refraining from
interference! And so by OUR
protection! And what do you give us
for it? Kicks and disdain you give to
the `common people'; police
supervision, and a catechism with the
chief sentence `Respect what is NOT
YOURS, what belongs to OTHERS!
respect others, and especially your
superiors!' But we reply, `If you want
our respect, BUY it for a price
agreeable to us. We will leave you your
property, if you give a due equivalent
for this leaving.'...What equivalent do
you give for our chewing potatoes and
looking calmly on while you swallow
oysters? Only buy the oysters of us as
dear as we have to buy the potatoes of
you, then you may go on eating them.
Or do you suppose the oysters do not
belong to us as much as to you?...Let
us consider our nearer property,
labour...We distress ourselves twelve
hours in the sweat of our face, and you
offer us a few pennies for it. Then take
the like for your labour too. Are you
not willing? You fancy that our labour
is richly repaid with that wage, while
yours on the other hand is worth a
wage of many thousands. But, if you
did not rate yours so high, and gave us
a better chance to realise value from
ours, then we might well, if the case
demanded it, bring to pass still more
important things than you do for the
many thousand pounds; and, if you got
only such wages as we, you would soon
grow more industrious in order to
receive more. But, if you render any
service that seems to us worth ten and
a hundred times more than our own
labour, why, then you shall get a
hundred times more for it too; we, on
the other hand, think also to produce
for you things for which you will
requite us more highly than with the
ordinary day's wages. We shall be
willing to get along with each other all
right, if only we have first agreed on
this –that neither any longer needs to–
PRESENT anything to the other....We
want nothing presented by you, but
neither will we present you with
anything. For centuries we have
handed alms to you from good-hearted
- stupidity, have doled out the mite of
the poor and given to the masters the
things that are - not the masters'; now
just open your wallet, for henceforth
our ware rises in price quite
enormously. We do not want to take
from you anything, anything at all, only
you are to pay better for what you want
to have. What then have you? `I have
an estate of a thousand acres.' And I
am your plowman, and will henceforth
attend to your fields only for a full
day's wages. `Then I'll take another.'
You won't find any, for we plowmen
are no longer doing otherwise, and, if
one puts in an appearance who takes
less, then let him beware of us. There is
the housemaid, she too is now
demanding as much, and you will no
longer find one below this price. `Why,
then it is all over with me.' Not so fast!
You will doubtless take in as much as
we; and, if it should not be so, we will
take off so much that you shall have
wherewith to live like us. `But I am
accustomed to live better.' We have
nothing against that, but it is not our
lookout; if you can clear more, go
ahead. Are we to hire out under rates,
that you may have a good living? The
rich man always puts off the poor with
the words, `What does your want
concern me? See to it how you make
your way through the world; that is
YOUR AFFAIR, not mine.' Well, let us
let it be our affair, then, and let us not
let the means that we have to realise
value from ourselves be pilfered from
us by the rich. `But you uncultured
people really do not need so much.'
Well, we are taking somewhat more in
order that for it we may procure the
culture that we perhaps need....`O ill-
starred equality!' No, my good old sir,
nothing of equality. We only want to
count for what we are worth, and, if
you are worth more, you shall count
for more right along. We only want to
be WORTH OUR PRICE, and think
to show ourselves worth the price that
you will pay." [80]
Fifty years later Benjamin Tucker took over
where Stirner left off:
"The minute you remove privilege, the
class that now enjoy it will be forced to
sell their labour, and then, when there
will be nothing but labour with which
to buy labour, the distinction between
wage-payers and wage-receivers will be
wiped out, and every man will be a
 labourer exchanging with fellow-
labourers. Not to abolish wages, but to
make EVERY man dependent upon
wages and secure to every man his
WHOLE wages is the aim of
Anarchistic Socialism. What
Anarchistic Socialism aims to abolish is
usury. It does not want to deprive
labour of its reward; it wants to deprive
capital of its reward. It does not hold
that labour should not be sold; it holds
that capital should not be hired at
usury." [81]
Franklin D. Roosevelt said in his second
inaugural address that "We have always
known that heedless self-interest was bad
morals; we know now that it is bad
economics." I've tried to show in this
EGOTIST, n.: A person of low taste, more interested in himself than in me.
From "The Devil's Dictionary" by Ambrose Bierce
section that self-interest is "good morals." I
now intend to show that it is also good
economics.
-----
REFERENCES
[73] Stirner, op. cit., p. 210.
[74] Ibid., p. 319.
[75] Proudhon, op. cit., pp. 243-4.
[76] Stirner, op. cit., p. 179.
[77] Ibid., p. 291.
[78] "At the Summit of the Affluent U.S.
Society," "The International Herald
Tribune." March 19, 1971, p. 1.
[79] "Newsweek," February 1, 1971 , p. 44.
[80] Stirner, op. cit., pp. 270-2.
[81] Tucker, "Instead of a Book," p. 404.
Reprinted from "Liberty," April 28, 1888.
 non serviam #9
Contents: Editor's Word
Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism
and The Individualist Alternative (serial: 9)
Editor's Word
_____________
The saga continues ... The chapter Ken
Knudson's article today, "Capitalism:
A Critique of Communism
and
The Individualist Alternative
Ken Knudson
(serial: 9)
CAPITALISM:
FREEDOM PERVERTED
Permit me to issue and control the money of
a nation and I care not who makes its laws.
–Meyer A. Rothschild
Roosevelt, in blaming the depression of the
'thirties on "heedless self-interest," played a
cheap political trick for which the world
has been suffering ever since. The great
crash of 1929, far from being created by
"free enterprise," was created by
government interference in the free market.
The Federal Reserve Board had been
artificially controlling interest rates since
1913. The tax structure of the country was
set up in such a way as to encourage
ridiculously risky speculation in the stock
market. "Protective tariffs" destroyed
anything that vaguely resembled a free
market. Immigration barriers prevented the
Freedom Perverted" is probably the most
challenging chapter to the readers of Non
Serviam, and I have no doubt that many
will wish to comment. Such comments do,
unless they are themselves articles, belong
on the list, nonserv. As Ken Knudson is
presently on vacation, it might take some
time beforehe replies.
Happy reading, and I look forward to a
good discussion.
free flow of the labour market. Anti-trust
laws threatened prosecution for charging
less than the competition ("intent to
monopolise") and for charging the same as
the competition ("price fixing"), but
graciously permitted charging more than
the competition (commonly called "going
out of business.") With all these legislative
restraints and controls, Roosevelt still had
the gall to blame the depression on the
"free" market economy. But what was his
answer to the "ruthlessness" of freedom?
This is what he had to say on taking office
in 1933:
"If we are to go forward, we must
move as a trained and loyal army
willing to sacrifice to the good of a
common discipline, because without
such discipline no progress is made, no
leadership becomes effective. We are, I
know, ready and willing to submit our
lives and property to such discipline
 because it makes possible a leadership
which aims at a larger good." [82]
We've been on that Keynesian road ever
since. The "larger good" has become larger
and larger until today the only cure the
politicians come up with for the economy's
ills is more of the same poison which made
it sick in the first place. The rationale for
such a policy was expressed by G. D. H.
Cole in 1933:
"If once a departure is made from the
classical method of letting all the
factors [of the economy] alone –and
we have seen enough of that method
[have we?] to be thoroughly dissatisfied
with it– it becomes necessary to
control ALL the factors...for
interference with one, while the others
are left unregulated, is certain to result
in a fatal lack of balance in the working
of the economic system.." [83] (My
emphasis)
Many people, on hearing the individualist
critique of governmental control of the
economy, jump to the erroneous
conclusion that we believe in capitalism.
I'm sorry to say that some anarchists –who
should know better– share this common
fallacy. In a letter to "Freedom" a few
months ago I tried to clear up this myth.
Replying to an article by one of its editors,
I had this to say:
"First let me look at the term `anarcho-
capitalist.' This, it seems to me, is just
an attempt to slander the individualist-
anarchists by using a supercharged
word like `capitalist' in much the same
way as the word `anarchy' is popularly
used to mean chaos and disorder. No
one to my knowledge accepts the
anarcho-capitalist label,1 just as no one
1 I have since been informed that "the term
`anarcho- capitalist' is now in use in the
up to the time of Proudhon's memoir
on property in 1840 accepted the
anarchist label. But, unlike Proudhon
who could call himself an anarchist by
stripping the word of its derogatory
connotation and looking at its real
MEANING, no one can logically call
himself an anarcho-capitalist for the
simple reason that it's a contradiction
in terms: anarchists seek the abolition
of the state while capitalism is
inherently dependent upon the state.
Without the state, capitalism would
inevitably fall, for capitalism rests on
the pillars of government privilege.
Because of government a privileged
minority can monopolise land, limit
credit, restrict exchange, give idle
capital the power to increase, and,
through interest, rent, profit, and taxes,
rob industrious labour of its products."
[84]
Now most anarchists when they attack
capitalism strike it where it is strongest: in
its advocacy of freedom. And how
paradoxical that is. Here we have the
anarchists, champions of freedom PAR
EXCELLENCE, complaining about
freedom! How ridiculous, it seems to me,
to find anarchists attacking Mr. Heath for
withdrawing government subsidies from
museums and children's milk programmes.
When anarchists start screaming for free
museums, free milk, free subways, free
medical care, free education, etc., etc., they
only show their ignorance of what freedom
really is. All these "free" goodies which
USA - particularly amongst those who
contribute to the Los Angeles publication
`Libertarian Connection'." It seems to me
that people accepting such a label must do
so primarily for its shock value. Very few
people like capitalists these days, and those
who do certainly don't like anarchists. What
better term could you find to offend
everyone?
governments so graciously shower upon
their subjects ultimately come from the
recipients themselves - in the form of taxes.
Governments are very clever at concealing
just how large this sum actually is. They
speak of a billion pounds here and a few
hundred million dollars there. But what
does a figure like $229,232,000,000.00
(Nixon's proposed budget) actually mean
to the taxpayer? Virtually nothing. It's just a
long string of numbers preceded by a dollar
sign. People have no conception of
numbers that size. But let me try to shed
some light on this figure by breaking it
down into a number the individual taxpayer
can't help but understand: the average
annual cost per family. This is a number
governments NEVER talk about - for if
they did, there would be a revolt which
would make the storming of the Bastille
look like a Sunday school picnic. Here's
how to calculate it: you take the
government's annual budget and divide it
by the population of the country; then you
multiply the result by the average size of
family (4.5 seems a reasonable number).
Doing this for the American case cited, we
come to $4,800 (i.e. 2000 pounds per
family per year!).2 And that is just the
FEDERAL tax bite. State and local taxes
(which primarily pay for America's "free"
education and "free" public highways) have
yet to be considered. I leave it as an
exercise to the British reader to see why
their "welfare state" also prefers to mask
budgetary figures by using astronomical
numbers.
One thing should be clear from this
example: nothing is for nothing. But the
Santa Claus myth dies hard, even –or
2 I am usually quite conservative in my use
of exclamation marks. When I used this
example in a recent letter to "Freedom",
the editors saw fit to insert one where I had
not. In keeping with their precedent, I will
do likewise.
should I say especially?– among anarchists.
The only encouraging sign to the contrary I
have found in the anarchist press of late
was when Ian Sutherland complained in the
columns of "Freedom": "I object, strongly,
to having a large section of my `product',
my contribution to society, forcibly
removed from me by a paternalistic state to
dispense to a fool with 10 kids." [85]
Unfortunately, I suspect that Mr
Sutherland would only replace the
"paternalistic state" by the "paternalistic
commune" - and in so doing would still
end up supporting those 10 kids. My
suspicions were nourished by what he said
in the very next paragraph about "laissez
faire" anarchists: "perhaps they should join
the Powellites." Perhaps Mr Sutherland
should learn what laissez faire means.
Laissez faire is a term coined by the French
physiocrats during the eighteenth century.
John Stuart Mill brought it into popular
English usage with the publication in 1848
of his "Principles of Political Economy,"
where he examined the arguments for and
against government intervention in the
economy. The "con" side of the argument
he called laissez faire. "The principle of
`laissez faire' in economics calls for perfect
freedom in production; distribution of the
returns (or profit) to the factors of
production according to the productivity of
each; and finally, markets in which prices
are determined by the free interplay of
forces that satisfy buyers and sellers." [86] I
find it difficult to see how any advocate of
freedom could possibly object to a doctrine
like this one. Unfortunately, what
happened in the 19th century was that a
handful of capitalists, who were anything
but believers if freedom, picked up this
nice sounding catch phrase and decided to
"improve" upon it. These "improvements"
left them with the freedom to exploit
labour but took away labour's freedom to
exploit capital. These capitalists, in
perverting the original meaning of laissez
faire, struck a blow against freedom from
which it still suffers to this day. The
capitalist who advocates laissez faire is a
hypocrite. If he really believed in freedom,
he could not possibly condone the greatest
invader of freedom known to man:
government. The capitalist necessarily relies
on government to protect his privileged
RIGHTS. Let us look at the foremost
advocate of capitalism today, Ayn Rand.
Her book "Capitalism: The Unknown
Ideal" has two appendices. The first is on
"Man's Rights" where she say,
"INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS ARE THE
MEANS OF SUBORDINATING
SOCIETY TO MORAL LAW." [87] (Her
emphasis) Once again we are back to
"rights" and "morals" which Stirner so
strongly warned us about. And where does
this lead us? Directly to Appendix Two,
"The Nature of Government," where she
says that government is "necessary"
because "men need an institution charged
with the task of protecting [you guessed it]
their rights." [88] Let's see what some of
these precious rights are:
I. Chapter 11 of Miss Rand's book is
devoted to a defence of patent and
copyright laws. In it she calls upon
government to "certify the origination
of an idea and protect its owner's
exclusive right to use and disposal." [89]
Realising the absurdity of PERPETUAL
property in ideas ("consider what would
happen if, in producing an automobile,
we had to pay royalties to the
descendants of all the inventors
involved, starting with the inventor of
the wheel and on up." [90]), she goes
into considerable mental acrobatics to
justify intellectual property for a
LIMITED time. But by so doing, she
only succeeds in arousing our suspicion
of her motives, for it seems strange that
a mere lapse of time should negate
something so precious as a man's "right"
to his property. Admitting that "a
patented invention often tends to
hamper or restrict further research and
development in a given area of science
[91], our champion of the unhampered
economy nevertheless manages to justify
governmental "protection" to secure the
inventor's "rights." As for copyrights,
our millionaire author thinks "the most
rational" length of time for this
governmental protection would be "for
the lifetime of the author and fifty years
thereafter." [92] How does she justify all
this? The way she justifies most of her
inane arguments - by quoting herself:
"Why should Rearden be the only one
permitted to manufacture Rearden
Metal?" [93] Why indeed?
II. Capitalists are fond of proclaiming the
"rights" of private property. One of
their favourite property rights is the
right to own land without actually
occupying it. The only way this can
possibly be done is, once again, by
government protection of legal pieces of
paper called "titles" and "deeds."
Without these scraps of paper, vast
stretches of vacant land would be open
to those who could use them and
exorbitant rent could no longer be
extracted from the non-owning user as
tribute to the non-using owner.
There is much talk these days of a
"population explosion." It is claimed
that land is becoming more and more
scarce and that by the year such and
such there will be 38.2 people per square
inch of land. But just how scarce is
land? If all the world's land were divided
up equally, every individual would have
more than ten acres apiece. Even
"crowded" islands like Britain and Japan
have more than an acre per person on
average. [94] When you consider how
few people actually own any of this land,
these figures seem incredible. It's no
wonder then that the absentee landlord
 is a strong believer in property rights.
Without them his vulnerable land might
actually be used to the advantage of the
user.
III. Capitalists have always been great
believers in the sovereign "rights" of
nations. Ayn Rand, for example, thinks
it perfectly consistent with her brand of
freedom that the United States
government should tax the people
within its borders to support an army
which costs tens of billions of dollars
each year. It is true that Miss Rand
opposes the war in Vietnam. But why?
Because "IT DOES NOT SERVE
ANY NATIONAL INTEREST OF
THE UNITED STATES." [95] (Her
emphasis) So we see that our advocate
of "limited government" wouldn't go so
far as to limit its strongest arm: the
military. Eighty billion dollars a year for
national "defence" doesn't seem to
phase her in the least - in fact, she
would like to add on a few billion more
to make "an army career comparable to
the standards of the civilian labour
market." [96]
As every anarchist knows, a frontier is
nothing more than an imaginary line
drawn by a group of men with vested
interests on their side of the line. That
"nations" should exist is an absurdity.
That a highwayman (in the uniform of a
customs official) should rob people as
they cross these imaginary lines and turn
back others who haven't the proper
pieces of paper is an obscenity too
indecent to relate here - there may be
children reading. But if there are
children reading, perhaps they can
enlighten their elders about the obvious
- as they did when the emperor went out
in his "new" clothes. The nationalists of
the world are strutting about without a
stitch of reason on. Can only a child see
this?
IV. The cruelest "right" –and the one least
understood today– is the exclusive right
of governments to issue money. There
was a time about a hundred years ago
when nearly everyone was aware of the
currency question. For several decades
in the United States it was THE political
issue. Whole political parties formed
around it (e.g. the Greenback and
Populist parties). William Jennings
Bryan, the three-time Democratic
candidate for the presidency, rose to
fame with his "easy money" speeches;
next to Lincoln's Gettysburg address,
his "cross of gold" speech is probably
the best-known public oration of 19th
century America. Yet today virtually
everyone accepts the currency question
as settled. Governments issue the
money people use and they never give it
a second thought - it's just there, like the
sun and the moon.
The capitalist is vitally interested in the
government's exclusive right to issue
money. The capitalist is, by definition,
the holder of capital; and the
government, by making only a certain
type of capital (namely gold) the legal
basis of all money, gives to the capitalist
a monopoly power to compel all holders
of property other than the kind thus
privileged, as well as all non-proprietors,
to pay tribute to the capitalist for the use
of a circulating medium and instrument
of credit which is absolutely necessary to
carry out commerce and reap the
benefits of the division of labour. A
crude example of how this system works
is given by the Angolan "native tax."
The Portuguese whites in Angola found
it difficult to get black labour for their
coffee plantations, so they struck upon a
rather ingenious scheme: tax the natives
and the natives, having to pay their tax
in MONEY, would be forced to sell
their labour to the only people who
 could give it to them - the whiteman.
[97]
The same thing goes on today on a
more sophisticated level in our more
"civilised" societies. The worker needs
money to carry out the business of
everyday life. He needs food, he needs
housing, he needs clothing. To get these
things he needs MONEY. And to get
money he has to sell the only thing he's
got: his labour. Since he MUST sell his
labour, he is put into a very bad
bargaining position with the buyers of
labour: the capitalists. This is how the
capitalist grows rich. He buys labour in a
cheap market and sells his products
back to the worker in a dear one. This is
what Marx called the "surplus value
theory" of labour. His analysis (at least
here) was right; his solution to the
problem was wrong.
The way Marx saw out of this trap was
to abolish money. The worker would
then get the equivalent of his labour by
pooling his products with other workers
and taking out what he needed. I've
already exposed the weak points of this
theory. What is the individualist
alternative?
-----
POSITIVISM, n: A philosophy that denies our knowledge of the Real and affirms our
ignorance of the Apparent. Its longest exponent is Comte, its broadest Mill and its thickest
Spencer.
"The Devil's Dictionary", Ambrose Bierce
REFERENCES
[82] Quoted from Charles A. Reich's article
in "The New Yorker" magazine, "The
Greening of American," September 26,
1970.
[83] G. D. H. Cole, "What Everybody
Wants To Know About Money" (London:
Victor Gollancz Ltd., 1933), pp. 526-7.
[84] Ken Knudson, "Letters", "Freedom,"
November 14, 1970.
[85] Ian S. Sutherland, "Doomsday &
After," "Freedom," February 27, 1971.
[86] "Laissez Faire," "Encyclopaedia
Britannica," 1965, vol. XIII, p. 606.
[87] Ayn Rand, "Capitalism: The Unknown
Ideal" (New York: Signet Books, 1967), p
320.
[88] Ibid., p. 331.
[89] Ibid., p. 131.
[90] Ibid., pp. 131-2.
[91] Ibid., pp. 132-3.
[92] Ibid., p, 132.
[93] Ibid., p. 134.
[94] "Geographical Summaries: Area and
Population," Encyclopaedia Britannica
Atlas," 1965, p. 199.
[95] Rand, op. cit., p. 224.
[96] Ibid., p. 229.
[97] Douglas Marchant, "Angola,"
"Anarchy 112," June, 1970, p. 184.
 non serviam #10
Contents: Editor's Word
Sidney Parker: The Egoism of Max Stirner
Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism
and The Individualist Alternative (serial: 10)
Editor's Word:
_____________
Stirner is a philosopher who is easy to
misunderstand, as Sidney Parker shows in
his article "The Egoism of Max Stirner"
below. Ones first attention to Stirner very
often comes from political or ideological
motivations. And so, with the expectation
of finding an author whose idea is a
flaming insurrective rhetoric, one finds -
just that. And if one is a critic, like Camus
mentioned by Parker, or even a
contemporary like Moses Hess [1], one is
easily led to believe that Stirner is just
advocating a new idea for which to live and
breathe, a new Object which is supposed to
be the new centre of ones attention, a new
idea which is to be universalized and put in
the service of a political ideology - the Ego.
But if we read what he has written, we find,
like in "The False Principle of Our
Education" that his main focus is the
discovery of the self as truly Subject, and
not just an Object. In the False Principle
Stirner makes the distinction between
learning as an Object into whom
knowledge is stuffed from without, and
learning as a Subject acquiring knowledge
for itself. In "Art and Religion" we find
him speaking of the conception of [future]
self set up as an Ideal: "Here lie all the
sufferings and struggles of the centuries,
for it is fearful to be outside of oneself, having
yourself as an Object set over and against
oneself able to annihilate itself and so
oneself."
Further clues can be given in that Stirner
speaks of himself as No-thing [2], "In the
Unique One the owner himself returns to
his creative nothing, of which he is born."
No thing, neither as some kind of thought,
nor as a percept, am I.[3] So, we conclude
that Stirner's unnameable Unique One is
the Subject.
Looking at the consequences of this, one
sees that indeed we all are Subjects, actors
who pursue this and that by our own
creation. In this, we are egoists already.
However, unless this is a condition of
which we are conscious, it will do us little
good, and we might as well follow this
Ideal as that, in that we do not know
ourselves from within, but only as
"intimate objects".
The famous formula from Gal. 2.29, "Not
I live, but Christ lives in me" is quoted and
paraphrased by Stirner as the basic teaching
of the possessed: "Not I live, but X lives in
me." This is where Stirner's philosophy is
of interest. For while Luther may say "Here
I stand, I can do naught else!", Stirner
teaches the liberation from fixed ideas in
creating oneself each day anew.
As the quote at the end of this edition of
the newsletter shows, this is also the way to
finding a well of love that can be consumed
with all ones selfish desire without ever
going dry.
[1] Hess’ criticism of Stirner boils down to
"Ego[ism] is empty." But as is evident,
Hess' criticism is of Ego as object, and he
has not grasped the subtlety in Stirner's
description of the Subject as no-thing.
Thus Hess simply shows his lack of
understanding.
[2] I am taking the liberty of utilizing the
English language here.
[3] Notice the affinity with some of
Buddhism's teachings. In the teaching of
Buddha you are told to seek through the
phenomena to see if you find the Self
The Egoism of Max Stirner
Sid Parker
(The following extracts are taken from my
booklet entitled THE EGOISM OF MAX
STIRNER: SOME CRITICAL
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTES to be
published by the Mackay Society of New
York)
Albert Camus
Camus devotes a section of THE REBEL
to Stirner. Despite a fairly accurate
summarization of some of Stirner's ideas
he nonetheless consigns him to dwelling in
a desert of isolation and negation "drunk
with destruction". Camus accuses Stirner of
going "as far as he can in blasphemy" as if
in some strange way an atheist like Stirner
can "blaspheme" against something he
does not believe in. He proclaims that
Stirner is "intoxicated" with the
"perspective" of "justifying" crime without
mentioning that Stirner carefully
distinguishes between the ordinary criminal
and the "criminal" as violator of the
"sacred". He brands Stirner as the direct
ancestor of "terrorist anarchy" when in fact
Stirner regards political terrorists as acting
under the possession of a "spook". He
furthermore misquotes Stirner by asserting
that he "specifies" in relation to other
human beings "kill them, do not martyr
them" when in fact he writes "I can kill
them, not torture them" - and this in
relation to the moralist who both kills and
tortures to serve the "concept of the
'good'".
there, a search that will ultimately end in
failure. Stirner provides the positive side of
this coin by providing the I as he who fails
in this search.
Although throughout his book Camus is
concerned to present "the rebel" as a
preferred alternative to "the revolutionary"
he nowhere acknowledges that this
distinction is taken from the one that
Stirner makes between "the revolutionary"
and "the insurrectionist". That this should
occur in a work whose purpose is a
somewhat frantic attempt at rehabilitating
"ethics" well illustrates Stirner's ironic
statement that "the hard fist of morality
treats the noble nature of egoism altogether
without compassion."
Eugene Fleischmann
Academic treatment of Stirner is often
obfuscating even when it is not downright
hostile. A marked contrast is Fleischmann's
essay STIRNER, MARX AND HEGEL
which is included in the symposium
HEGEL'S POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY.
Clearly preferring Stirner to Marx,
Fleischmann presents a straightforward
account of his ideas unencumbered by
"psychiatric" interpretations and ad hominem
arguments. He correctly points out that the
"human self" signifies for Stirner "the
individual in all his indefinable, empirical
concreteness. The word 'unique' [einzig]
means for Stirner man as he is in his
irreducible individuality, always different
from his fellows, and always thrown back
on himself in his dealings with them. Thus,
when he talks of 'egoism' as the ultimate
definition os the human 'essence' it is not at
all a question of a moral category . . . . but
of a simple existential fact."
Fleischmann contends that "Marx and
Engels' critique of Stirner is notoriously
misleading. It is not just that ridicule of a
man's person is not equivalent to refutation
of his ideas, for the reader is also aware
that the authors are not reacting at all to
the problems raised by their adversary."
Stirner is not simply "just another
doctrinaire ideologue". His "reality is the
world of his immediate experience" and he
wants "to come into his own power now,
not after some remote and hypothetical
'proletarian revolution'. Marx and Engels
had nothing to offer the individual in the
present: Stirner has."
In his conclusion Fleischmann states that
Stirner's view that the individual "must find
his entire satisfaction in his own life" is a
reversion "to the resigned attitude of a
simple mortal". This is not a serious
criticism. If I cannot find satisfaction in my
own life, where can I find it? Even if it is
my satisfaction that I experience, any
satisfaction that the other may have being
something that he or she experiences - not
me. If this constitutes being a "simple
mortal" then so be it, but that it is a
"resigned attitude" is another matter.
Benedict Lachmann & Herbert Stourzh
Lachmann's and Stourzh's TWO ESSAYS
ON EGOISM provide a stimulating and
instructive introduction to Stirner's ideas.
Although both authors give a good
summary of his egoism they differ
sufficiently in their approach to allow the
reader to enjoy adjudicating between them.
Lachmann's essay PROTAGORAS -
NIETZSCHE - STIRNER traces the
development of relativist thinking as
exemplified in the three philosophers of its
title. Protagoras is the originator of
relativism with his dictum "Man (the
individual) is the measure of all things".
This in turn is taken up by Stirner and
Nietzsche. Of the two, however, Stirner is
by far the most consistent and for this
reason Lachmann places him after
Nietzsche in his account. For him Stirner
surpasses Nietzsche by bringing
Protagorean relativism to its logical
conclusion in conscious egoism - the
fulfilment of one's own will.
In fact, he views Nietzsche as markedly
inferior to Stirner both in respect to his
style and the clarity of his thinking. "In
contrast to Nietzsche's work," he writes,
THE EGO AND ITS OWN "is written in
a clear, precise form and language, though
it avoids the pitfalls of a dry academic style.
Its sharpness, clarity and passion make the
book truly shattering and overwhelming."
Unlike Nietzsche's, Stirner's philosophy
does not lead to the replacement of one
religious "spook" by another, the
substitution of the "Superman" for the
Christian "God". On the contrary, it makes
"the individual's interests the centre of the
world."
Intelligent, lucid and well-conceived,
Lachmann's essay throws new light on
Stirner's ideas.
Its companion essay, Stourzh's MAX
STIRNER'S PHILOSOPHY OF THE
EGO is evidently the work of a theist, but
it is nonetheless sympathetic to Stirnerian
egoism. Stourzh states that one of his aims
in writing it "is beyond the categories of
master and slave to foster an intellectual
and spiritual stand-point different from the
stand-point prescribed by the prophets of
mass thinking, the dogmatists of socialism,
who conceive of the individual only as an
insignificant part of the whole, as a number
or mere addenda of the group."
Stourzh draws a valuable distinction
between the "imperative" approach of the
moralist and the "indicative" approach of
Stirner towards human behaviour. He also
gives an informative outline of the critical
reaction to Stirner of such philosophers as
Ludwig Feuerbach, Kuno Fischer and
Eduard von Hartman. Stourzh mars his
interpretation, however, by making the
nonsensical claim that Stirner's egoism
"need in no sense mean the destruction of
the divine mystery itself." And in line with
his desire to preserve the "sacredness" of
this "divine mystery" he at times patently
seeks to "sweeten" Stirner by avoiding
certain of his most challenging remarks.
A Critique of Communism
and
The Individualist Alternative
Ken Knudson
(serial: 10)
MUTUALISM:
THE ECONOMICS OF FREEDOM
There is perhaps no business which yields a
profit so certain and liberal as the business
of banking and exchange, and it is proper
that it should be open as far as practicable
to the most free competition and its
advantages shared by all classes of people.
–Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, 1837
When it comes to economics, most
anarchists reveal an ignorance verging on
the indecent. For example, in the first piece
of the first issue of the new "Anarchy" the
California Libertarian Alliance talks in all
seriousness of "Marx's `labour theory of
value', which causes communist
REFERENCES
Camus, Albert: THE REBEL: AN ESSAY
ON MAN IN REVOLT. Knopf, New
York. 1961
Fleischmann, Eugene: THE ROLE OF
THE INDIVIDUAL IN PRE-
REVOLUTIONARY SOCIETY:
STIRNER, MARX AND HEGEL in
HEGEL'S POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY.
Cambridge University Press, London. 1971
Lachmann, Benedict and Stourzh, Herbert:
TWO ESSAYS ON EGOISM. To be
published by The Mackay Society, New
York.
governments to repress homosexuals." [98]
Now, passing over the fact that Adam
Smith developed the principles of this
theory long before Marx was even born, I
can't for the life of me see what the labour
theory of value has to do with the
repression of homosexuals - be they
communist, capitalist, or mercantilist.
Kropotkin was no better; in his "Conquest
of Bread" he shows a total lack of any
economic sense, as he amply demonstrates
by his rejection of the very foundation of
any rational economic system: the division
of labour. "A society that will satisfy the
needs of all, and which will know how to
organise production, will also have to make
a clean sweep of several prejudices
concerning industry, and first of all of the
theory often preached by economists –The
Division of Labour Theory– which we are
going to discuss in the next chapter....It is
this horrible principle, so noxious to
society, so brutalising to the individual,
source of so much harm, that we propose
to discuss in its divers manifestations." [99]
He then fills the next two pages of perhaps
the shortest chapter in history with a
discussion of this theory "in its divers
manifestations." In these few paragraphs he
fancies himself as having overturned the
economic thought of centuries and to have
struck "a crushing blow at the theory of the
division of labour which was supposed to
be so sound." [100] Let's see just how
sound it is.
Primitive man discovered two great
advantages to social life. The first was
man's ability to gain knowledge, not only
through personal experience, but also
through the experience of others. By
learning from others, man was able to
acquire knowledge which he could never
have gained alone.
This knowledge was handed down from
generation to generation - growing with
each passing year, until today every
individual has at his fingertips a wealth of
information which took thousands of years
to acquire. The second great advantage of
social life was man's discovery of trade. By
being able to exchange goods, man
discovered that he was able to concentrate
his efforts on a particular task at which he
was especially good and/or which he
especially liked. He could then trade the
products of his labour for the products of
the labour of others who specialised in
other fields. This was found to be mutually
beneficial to all concerned.
That the division of labour is beneficial
when A produces one thing better than B
and when B produces another thing better
than A was obvious even to the caveman.
Each produces that which he does best and
trades with the other to their mutual
advantage. But what happens when A
produces BOTH things better than B?
David Ricardo answered this question
when he expounded his law of association
over 150 years ago. This law is best
illustrated by a concrete example. Let us say
that Jones can produce one pair of shoes in
3 hours compared to Smith's 5 hours. Also
let us say that Jones can produce one
bushel of wheat in 2 hours compared to
Smith's 4 hours (cf. Table I). If each man is
to work 120 hours, what is the most
advantageous way of dividing up the work?
Table II shows three cases: the two
extremes where one man does only one job
while the other man does the other, and
the middle road where each man divides
his time equally between jobs. It is clear
from Table III that it is to the advantage of
BOTH men that the most productive man
should devote ALL of his energies to the
job which he does best (relative to the
other) while the least productive man
concentrates his energies on the other job
(case 3). It is interesting to note that in the
reverse situation (case 1) –which is also the
least productive case– the drop in
productivity is only 6% for Jones (the best
worker), while for Smith it's a whopping
11%. So the division of labour, while
helping both men, tends to help the least
productive worker more than his more
efficient workmate - a fact which
opponents of this idea should note well.
These figures show something which is
pretty obvious intuitively. A skilled
surgeon, after many years invested in
schooling, internship, practice, etc., may
find his time more productively spent in
actually performing operations than in
washing his surgical instruments in
preparation for these operations. It would
seem natural, then, for him to hire a
medical student (say for 1 pound per hour)
to do the washing up job while he does the
operating (for say 3 pounds per hour).
Even if the surgeon could wash his own TABLE III
instruments twice as fast as the student,
this division of labour would be profitable TIME NECESSARY TO PRODUCE THE
for all concerned. SAME AMOUNT OF GOODS WHILE
WORKING ALONE (HOURS)

TABLE I Jones Smith

--------------------------------------------------
PRODUCTIVITY RATES Case 1: 180=120+60 320=200+120
Case 2: 186=96+90 340=160+180
Time Necessary to Produce … Case 3: 192=72+120 360=120+240
--------------------------------------------------
A: One Pair of Shoes (Hours)
B: One Bushel of Wheat (Hours)
If the earth were a homogeneous sphere,
A B equally endowed with natural resources at
------------------------------------------- each and every point of its surface, and if
Jones: 3 2 each man were equally capable of
Smith: 5 4 performing every task as well as his
------------------------------------------- neighbour, then the division of labour
would have no ECONOMIC meaning.
There would be no material advantage to
TABLE II letting someone else do for you what you
could do equally well yourself. But the
PRODUCTIVITY UNDER DIVISION division of labour would have arisen just
OF LABOUR the same because of the variety of human
------------------------------------- tastes. It is a fact of human nature that not
all people like doing the same things.
A: Hours of Shoemaking Kropotkin may think this unfortunate, but
B: Hours of Farming I'm afraid that's the way human beings are
C: Shoes Produced built. And as long as this is the case, people
D: Bushels of Wheat are going to WANT to specialise their
labour and trade their products with one
A B C D another.
-------------------------------------------------- -----
Jones 120 0 40 0
Case 1 Smith 0 120 0 30 REFERENCES
Total 120 120 40 30
-------------------------------------------------- [98] "Libertarian Message to Gay
Jones 60 60 20 30 Liberation," "Anarchy," February, 1971, p.
Case 2 Smith 60 60 12 15 2.
Total 120 120 32 45 [99] Kropotkin, "Conquest of Bread," pp.
-------------------------------------------------- 245 & 248.
Jones 0 120 0 60 [100] Ibid., p. 250. & p. 184.
Case 3 Smith 120 0 24 0
Total 120 120 24 60
--------------------------------------------------
 non serviam #11
A Critique of Communism
and
The Individualist Alternative
Ken Knudson
(serial: 11)
Given the advantages of the division of
labour, what is to be the method by which
man exchanges his products? Primitive
man devised the barter system for this
purpose. But it wasn't long before the
limitations of this system became apparent:
"Let Peter own a horse; let James own
a cow and a pig; let James's cow and
pig, taken together, be worth precisely
as much as Peter's horse; let Peter and
James desire to make an exchange;
now, what shall prevent them from
making the exchange by direct barter?
Again, let Peter own the horse; let
James own the cow; and let John own
the pig. Peter cannot exchange his
horse for the cow, because he would
lose by the transaction; neither –and
for the same reason– can he exchange
it for the pig. The division of the horse
would result in the destruction of its
value. The hide, it is true, possesses an
intrinsic value; and a dead horse makes
excellent manure for a grapevine;
nevertheless, the division of a horse
results in the destruction of its value as
a living animal. But if Peter barters his
horse with Paul for an equivalent in
wheat, what shall prevent him from so
dividing his wheat as to qualify himself
to offer to James an equivalent for his
cow and to John an equivalent for his
pig? If Peter trades thus with James
and John the transaction is still barter,
though the wheat serves as currency
and obviates the difficulty in making
change." [101]
Thus currency (i.e, money) was born. Many
things have served as money throughout
the ages: slaves, gunpowder, and even
human skulls, to name but a few. The New
Hebrides used feathers for their money and
in Ethiopia salt circulated as the currency
for centuries. But by far the most popular
medium of exchange became the precious
metals, gold and silver. There were several
reasons for this: (1) Unlike feathers or
skulls, they have intrinsic value as metals.
(2) They are sufficiently rare as to impose
difficulty in producing them and
sufficiently common as to make it not
impossible to do so. (3) Their value
fluctuates relatively little with the passing of
time. Even large strikes –such as those in
California and Alaska– failed to devalue
gold to any appreciable extent. (4) They are
particularly sturdy commodities, loosing
relatively little due to the wear and tear of
circulation. (5) They are easily divisible into
fractional parts to facilitate small purchases.
For these and other reasons, gold and silver
became universally recognised as standards
of value. Certain quantities of these metals
became the units by which man measured
the worth of an object. For example, the
pound sterling, lira, and ruble were
originally terms for metallic weight while
the drachma means literally a handful.
As long as these metals served purely as
just another commodity to be bartered –
albeit a very useful commodity– there was
no inherent advantage in possessing these
metals as such. It was not until
governments declared them the sole
LEGAL medium of exchange that gold
and silver became intrinsically oppressive.
Governments, by emonetize gold and
silver automatically emonetized every
other item of capital. It is this monopoly
1 money to barter for such other products
which has been the chief obstacle in
preventing men from obtaining the product
of their labour and which permitted the
few men who controlled the money supply
to roll up such large fortunes at the
expense of labour.
As long as the monetary structure was
directly tied to gold and silver, the volume
of money was limited by the amount of
gold and silver available for coinage. It is
for this reason that paper money –backed
by "hard money"– came into being. The
paper money was simply a promise "to pay
the bearer on demand" its equivalent in
specie (i.e. gold or silver). Hence the words
"note" and "bill," which imply debt.
Governments were at first reluctant to
issue paper money. But the scarcity of
money in an increasingly commercial world
soon forced them to recant. The men of
wealth, well aware of the threat that "easy
money" posed to their "hard money,"
insisted that such money be based solely on
the wealth they already possessed.
Governments readily fell into line. In the
1 A natural question arises here: "That may
have been true up until 40 years ago, but
haven't governments since abandoned the
gold standard?" The answer is no. As long
as the United States government promises
to buy and sell gold at $35 an ounce and as
long as the International Monetary Fund
(which stabilises the exchange rates) is
based on gold and U.S. dollars, the world
remains on the gold standard.
United States, from 1866, anyone issuing
circulating notes was slapped with a tax of
10% until it was completely outlawed in
1936. The British government was even
more severe; it gave the Bank of England
monopoly rights to issue "bank notes" as
early as 1844. [102]
When a man is forced to barter his
products for money, in order to have
that he might want, he is put at a
disadvantage which the capitalist is all too
ready to exploit. William B. Greene was
one of the first to observe this fact:
"Society established gold and silver as a
circulating medium, in order that
exchanges of commodities might be
FACILITATED; but society made a
mistake in so doing; for by this very act
it gave to a certain class of men the
power of saying what exchanges shall,
and what exchanges shall not, be
FACILITATED by means of this very
circulating medium. The monopolisers
of the precious metals have an undue
power over the community; they can
say whether money shall, or shall not,
be permitted to exercise its legitimate
functions. These men have a VETO on
the action of money, and therefore on
exchanges of commodity; and they will
not take off their VETO until they
have received usury, or, as it is more
politely termed, interest on their
money. Here is the great objection to
the present currency. Behold the
manner in which the absurdity inherent
in a specie currency –or, what is still
worse, in a currency of paper based
upon specie– manifests itself in actual
operation! The mediating value which
society hoped would facilitate
exchanges becomes an absolute
marketable commodity, itself
transcending all reach of mediation.
The great natural difficulty which
 originally stood in the way of
exchanges is now the private property
of a class, and this class cultivates this
difficulty, and make money out of it,
even as a farmer cultivates his farm and
makes money by his labour. But there
is a difference between the farmer and
the usurer; for the farmer benefits the
community as well as himself, while
every dollar made by the usurer is a
dollar taken from the pocket of some
other individual, since the usurer
cultivates nothing but an actual
obstruction." [103]
The legitimate purpose of money is to
facilitate exchange. As Greene shows,
specie –or money based on specie–
accomplishes this purpose, but only at a
terrible price to the user. The solution to
the problem is to devise a money which has
no value as a COMMODITY, only as a
circulating medium. This money should
also be available in such quantity as not to
hamper any exchanges which may be
desired. The organ for creating such a
currency Greene called a "mutual bank".2
Before considering the operations of a
mutual bank, I'd like to look at how an
ordinary bank functions. Let us say that Mr
Brown, who owns a farm worth a few
thousand pounds, needs 500 pounds to buy
seed and equipment for the coming year.
Not having that kind of money on hand, he
goes to the bank to borrow it. The bank
readily agrees - on the condition that at the
end of the year Brown not only pays back
the 500 pounds borrowed, but also 50
pounds which they call "interest." Farmer
2 Proudhon's bank, "la banque du peuple,"
is essentially the same. For a detailed
account of the workings of each bank see
Greene's "Mutual Banking" and
Proudhon's "Solution of the Social
Problem" and "Revolution in the
Nineteenth Century."
Brown has no choice; he needs MONEY
because that is all the seed dealer will
accept as "legal tender." So he agrees to the
conditions set down by the bank. After a
year of hard work, and with a bit of luck
from the weather, he harvests his crops and
exchanges (i.e. "sells") his produce - for
money. He takes 550 pounds to the bank
and cancels his debt. The net result of all
this is that some banker is 50 pounds richer
for doing a minimal amount of work
(perhaps a few hours of bookkeeping) at
no risk to himself (the farm was collateral),
while Mr Brown is 50 pounds out of
pocket.
Now let's see where Greene's idea leads us.
A group of people get together and decide
to set up a mutual bank. The bank will
issue notes which all members of the bank
agree to accept as "money." Taking the
above example, Mr Brown could get five
hundred of these notes by mortgaging his
farm and discounting with the bank a
mortgage note for that sum. With the
notes, he buys his seed from Smith and
some tools from Jones. Smith and Jones in
turn exchange some of these newly
acquired notes for some things they need.
And so on until the end of the year when
Brown exchanges his farm produce and
receives for them - mutual bank notes.
Does all this sound familiar? It should, for
up until now, from all outward
appearances, there has been no difference
between our mutual bank and an ordinary
specie bank. But it's here, however, that the
change comes in. Mr Brown goes to the
mutual bank with his notes and gives the
bank 500 of them plus ONE OR TWO
extra to help pay for the operating
expenses of the bank over the past year.
The bank cancels his mortgage and Mr
Brown walks away thinking how nice it is
to be a member of such a wonderful bank.
Now notice that it was never mentioned
that Smith and Jones were members of the
bank. They may have been, but it wasn't
necessary. Smith, the seed dealer, might not
belong to the bank and yet be willing to
accept its notes. He's in business, after all,
and if the only money Brown has is mutual
money, that's all right with him - as long as
he can get rid of it when HE wants to buy
something. And of course he can because
he knows there are other members of the
bank pledged to receiving these notes.
Besides, Brown will need at least 500 of
them eventually to pay off his mortgage. So
Smith accepts the money, and he too
profits from this novel scheme. In fact, the
only one who seems to be any the worse is
the poor usurous banker. But I'm afraid he
will just have to find himself an honest job
and work for his living like everyone else.
John Stuart Mill defined capital as "wealth
appropriated to reproductive employment."
In our example above, farmer Brown's 500
pounds is capital since he intends to use it
for creating new wealth. But Mr Brown can
use his capital in any number of ways: he
may decide to use it to buy seeds for
planting corn; or he may decide that his
ground is better suited for growing wheat,
or he may decide to invest in a new tractor.
This 500 pounds, then, is liquid capital or,
as Greene called it, disengaged capital.
When Mr Brown buys his seeds and tools,
these things are still designed for
"reproductive employment," and are
therefore still capital. But what kind of
capital? Evidently, frozen or engaged
capital. He then plants his seeds and
harvests his crops with the aid of his new
tractor. The produce he grows is no longer
capital because it is no longer capable of
being "appropriated to reproductive
employment." What is it, then? Evidently,
it is product. Mr Brown then takes his
goods to town and sells them at market
value for somewhat more than the 500
pounds he originally started out with. This
"profit" is entirely due to his labour as a
farmer (and perhaps to some extent his
skill as a salesman). The money he receives
for his goods become, once again, liquid
capital. So we have came full circle: liquid
capital becomes frozen capital; frozen
capital becomes product; product becomes
liquid capital. And the cycle starts all over
again.
A society is prosperous when money flows
freely - that is when each man is able to
easily convert his product into liquid
capital. A society is unprosperous when
money is tight - that is, when exchange is
difficult to effect. Mutual banking makes as
much money available as is necessary.
When a man needs money he simply goes
to his friendly mutual bank, mortgages
some property, and receives the notes of
the bank in return. What this system does
is to allow a man to circulate his CREDIT.
Whoever goes to a mutual bank and
mortgages some of his property will always
receive money, for a mutual bank can issue
money to any extent. This money will
always be good because it is all based on
actual property which, if necessary, could
be sold to pay off bad debts. The mutual
bank, of course, would never give
PERSONAL credit, for to do so would
give the notes an element of risk and
render them unstable. But what about the
man with no property to pledge? Greene
answered this question as follows:
"If we knew of a plan whereby,
through an act of the legislature, every
member of the community might be
made rich, we would destroy this
petition and draw up another
embodying that plan. Meanwhile, we
affirm that no system was ever devised
so beneficial to the poor as the system
of mutual banking; for if a man having
nothing to offer in pledge, has a friend
who is a property holder and that
friend is willing to furnish security for
him, he can borrow money at the
mutual bank at a rate of 1% interest a
year; whereas, if he should borrow at
the existing banks, he would be obliged
to pay 6%. Again as mutual banking
will make money exceedingly plenty, it
will cause a rise in the rate of wages,
thus benefiting the man who has no
property but his bodily strength; and it
will not cause a proportionate increase
in the price of the necessaries of life:
for the price of provisions, etc.,
depends on supply and demand; and
mutual banking operates, not directly
on supply and demand, but to the
diminution of the rate of interest on
the medium of exchange. But certain
mechanics and farmers say, `We
borrow no money, and therefore pay
no interest. How, then does this thing
concern us?' Harken, my friends! let us
reason together. I have an impression
on my mind that it is precisely the class
who have no dealings with the banks,
and derive no advantages from them,
that ultimately pay all the interest
money that is paid. When a
manufacturer borrows money to carry
on his business, he counts the interest
he pays as a part of his expenses, and
therefore adds the amount of interest
to the price of his goods. The
consumer who buys the goods pays the
interest when he pays for the goods;
and who is the consumer, if not the
mechanic and the farmer? If a
manufacturer could borrow money at
1%, he could afford to undersell all his
competitors, to the manifest advantage
of the farmer and mechanic. The
manufacturer would neither gain nor
lose; the farmer and mechanic, who
have no dealings with the bank, would
gain the whole difference; and the bank
–which, were it not for the competition
of the mutual bank, would have loaned
the money at 6% interest– would lose
the whole difference. It is the indirect
relation of the bank to the farmer and
mechanic, and not its direct relation to
the manufacturer and merchant, that
enables it to make money." [104]
Mutual banking, by broadening the
currency base, makes money plentiful. The
resulting stimulus to business would create
an unprecedented demand for labour - a
demand which would always be in excess
of the supply. Then, as Benjamin Tucker
observed:
"When two labourers are after one
employer, wages fall, but when two
employers are after one labourer, wages
rise. Labour will then be in a position
to dictate its wages, and will thus
secure its natural wage, its entire
product. Thus the same blow that
strikes interest down will send wages
up. But this is not all. Down will go
profits also. For merchants, instead of
buying at high prices on credit, will
borrow money of the banks at less than
one percent, buy at low prices for cash,
and correspondingly reduce the prices
of their goods to their customers. And
with the rest will go house-rent. For no
one who can borrow capital at one
percent with which to build a house of
his own will consent to pay rent to a
landlord at a higher rate than that."
[105]
Unlike the "boom and bust" cycles we now
experience under the present system,
mutualism would know nothing but
"boom." For the present "busts" come
when the economy is "overheated" and
when there is so-called "overproduction."
As long as most of humanity lead lives of
abject poverty, we can never speak
realistically of "over-production." And as
long as each hungry belly comes with a pair
of hands, mutualism will be there to give
those hands work to fill that belly.
-----
REFERENCES [102] "Money," "Encyclopaedia
Britannica," 1965, vol. XV, p. 703.
[101] William B. Greene, "Mutual [103] Greene, op. cit., p. 180.
Banking," from Proudhon's "Solution of [104] Ibid., pp. 196-7.
the Social Problem," ed. Henry Cohen [105] Tucker, "Instead of a Book" p. 12,
(New York: Vanguard Press, 1927), p. 177. Reprinted from "Liberty," March 10, 1888.

It is a vulgar mistake to think that most people in Eastern Europe are miserable.

–Paul Samuelson in 1987,

Nobel Laureate in Economics
 non serviam #12
Contents: Editor's Word
Ken Knudson: A Critique of Communism
and The Individualist Alternative (last: 12)
S.E. Parker: On Revisiting "Saint Max"
Editor's Word
_____________
And so the curse is broken. This issue
contains the last part of Ken Knudson's
eminent article "A Critique of Communism
A Critique of Communism
and
The Individualist Alternative
Ken Knudson
(serial: 12th and last)
AN AFTERWORD TO COMMUNIST-
ANARCHIST READERS
What generally distinguishes you from your
communist brother in some authoritarian
sect is your basic lack of dogmatism. The
state socialist is always towing some party
line. When it comes to creative thinking his
brain is in a mental straitjacket, with no
more give and take in his mind than you
will find in the mind of a dog watching a
rabbit hole. You, on the contrary, pride
yourself on being "your own man." Having
no leaders, prophets, Messiahs, or Popes to
refer to for divine guidance, you can afford
to use YOUR mind to analyse the facts as
YOU see them and come up with YOUR
conclusions. You are, in your fundamental
metaphysics, an agnostic. You are broad
and The Individualist Alternative" which
has been carriying the weight of the
newsletter since its conception. As Ken
stated to me when we agreed to publish it
in Non Serviam, it had a curse on it in that
any magazine which had tried to publish it
in its entirety was discontinued before they
managed that. Not only has the article not
brought about the discontinuation of Non
Serviam, but it has also been well received.
So I say thank you to Ken for a job well
done.
minded to a fault...how else could you have
read this far?
But when it comes to economics, your
mind suddenly becomes rigid. You forget
your sound anarchist principles and
surrender without a struggle the one thing
that makes you an anarchist: your freedom.
You suddenly develop an enormous
capacity for believing and especially for
believing what is palpably not true. By
invoking a set of second hand dogmas
(Marxist hand-me-downs) which condemn
outright the free market economy, you
smuggle in through the back door
authoritarian ideas which you had barred
from the main entrance. In commendably
searching for remedies against poverty,
inequality and injustice, you forsake the
doctrine of freedom for the doctrine of
authority and in so doing come step by step
to endorse all the fallacies of Marxist
economics. A few years ago S. E. Parker
wrote an open letter to the editors of
"Freedom" in which he said:
"The trouble is that what you call
`anarchism' is at best merely a hodge-
podge, halfway position precariously
suspended between socialism and
anarchism. You yearn for the ego-
sovereignty, the liberating
individualism, that is the essence of
anarchism, but remain captives of the
democratic-proletarian-collectivist
myths of socialism. Until you can cut
the umbilical cord that still connects
you to the socialist womb you will
never be able to come to your full
power as self-owning individuals. You
will still be lured along the path to the
On Revisiting “Saint Max”
S. E. Parker
Increasing academic attention to the
philosophy of Max Stirner has not meant
any greater accuracy in interpretation. A
case in point is an essay by Kathy E.
Ferguson which appeared in a recent issue
of the philosophical review IDEALISTIC
STUDIES [1] entitled "Saint Max
revisited". Ms Ferguson makes some
perceptive remarks. She writes of Stirner's
view of the self as being "not a substantive
thing .... but rather a process" which cannot
be confined within any net of concepts or
categorical imperatives. It is "an unbroken
unity of temporal experience that is
ontologically prior to any essence later
attributed to [it] .... or any role, function or
belief that [it] .... might embrace." Stirner,
she says, calls "the irreducible, temporal,
concrete individual self .... the Unique One;
the Unique One is both nothing, in the
sense of having no predicate affixed to it as
lemonade springs and cigarette trees of
the Big Rock Candy Mountains." [106]
This article was written for you in hopes of
relieving you of your schizophrenic
condition. The fact that you call yourself an
anarchist shows that you have an
instinctual "feeling" for freedom. I hope
that this article will encourage you to seek
to put that feeling on a sound foundation. I
am confident that when you do, you will
reject your communist half.
-----
REFERENCES
[106] S..E. Parker, "Enemies of Society: An
Open Letter to the Editors of Freedom,"
"Minus One," October-December, 1967, p.
4.
a defining essence, and everything, in that it
is the source of the creative power which
endows the whole of reality with meaning."
More's the pity then that these suggestive
insights are followed by a whole series of
misinterpretations os Stirner's ideas. Some
of these have their origin in that hoary old
spook "the human community as a whole",
others in what appears to be a sheer
inability to grasp what Stirner's egoism is
about. Here are a few examples.
Ferguson considers that Stirner was an
anarchist. As evidence for this belief she
cites John Carroll's "Break Out From The
Crystal Palace" and John P. Clark's "Max
Stirner's Egoism". Carroll's conception of
an anarchist, however, embraces not only
Stirner but also Nietzsche (who called
anarchists "decadents" and blood-suckers)
and Dostoyevsky, although he admits that
the latter's anarchism is "equivocal".
As for Clark, he certainly regards Stirner as
an anarchist and claims that Stirner's "ideal
society is the union of egoists, in which
peaceful egoistic competition would replace
the state and society" (a piece of doubtful
extrapolation). However, he does not
appear to be very convinced by his own
claim for he comments that "Stirner's
position is a form of anarchism; yet a
greatly inadequate form" because "he
opposes domination of the ego by the
state, but advises people to seek to
dominate others in any other way they can
manage. Ultimately, might makes right."
Since Clark defines anarchism as being
opposed to all domination of man by man
(not to mention the domination of "nature"
by human beings) it is clear that Stirner's
"anarchism" is not "greatly inadequate" but,
given his own definition, not anarchism at all.
It can be seen, therefore, that Ferguson's
effort to include Stirner in the anarchist
tradition is not very plausible. Stirner did
not claim to be an anarchist. Indeed, the
one anarchist theoretician with whose
writings he was familiar, Proudhon, is one
of his favourite critical targets.
Undoubtedly, there are some parallels
between certain of Stirner's views and
those of the anarchists, but, as I discovered
after many years of trying to make the two
fit, in the last analysis they do not and
cannot. Anarchism is basically a theory of
renunciation like Christianity: domination is
evil and for "true" relations between
individuals to prevail such a sin must not be
committed. Stirner's philosophy has
nothing against domination of another if
that is within my power and in my interest.
There are no "sacred principles" in
conscious egoism - not even anarchist ones
....
Ferguson also falls victim to a common
mistake made by commentators on Stirner:
that of confusing the account he gives of
ideas he is opposing with his own views.
She writes that Stirner "speaks with great
disdain of .... commodity relations" and
gives as an example a passage in THE
EGO AND HIS OWN containing the
words "the poor man needs the rich, the rich
the poor .... So no one needs another as a
person, but needs him as a giver." What
she ignores is that this passage occurs in a
chapter in which Stirner is describing the
socialist case before subjecting it to his
piercing criticism. It is not possible,
therefore, to deduce from this passage that
it reflects his "disdain" for "commodity
relations", any more than it is possible to
deduce from his poetic description of the
argument from design that he believes in a
god.
Ferguson claims that Stirner does not
recognize the "sociality" of human being
and that "anthropologically and
psychologically, it must be acknowledged
that human being are born into groups."
But Stirner quite clearly does acknowledge
this fact. "Not isolation", he writes, "or
being alone, but society is man's original
state .... Society is our state of nature." To
become one's own it is necessary to
dissolve this original state of society, as the
child does when it prefers the company of
its playmates to its former "intimate
conjunction" with its mother. It is not, as
Ferguson contends, "our connection with
others" that "provides us with our initial
self-definition", but our awareness of
contrast to them, our consciousness of being
separate individuals. In other words, "self-
definition" is a product of individuation, not
socialization.
Nor is Stirner an advocate of "the solitary"
as she implies. Both in THE EGO AND
HIS OWN and his REPLY TO CRITICS
he rejects such an interpretation of his
ideas. Nor is he a moralist - he is an
amoralist. Presenting as evidence for his
belief in "moral choice" an erroneous
statement by John Carroll will not do. Nor
does he reject "all socially (sic) acquired
knowledge" if by that is meant "culture"
(acquired by individuals, not by "society").
On the contrary, he states "I receive with
thanks what the centuries of culture have
acquired for me."
Ferguson questions why the conscious
egoist should not "wish to be free" from
ownness. Why not "take a leap of faith into
something like Christianity as did St
Augustine or Kierkegaard?" Precisely
because ownness is the condition for what
she calls "the ontology of the self as
process" - that is, ownness is me possessing
me. Were I to abandon it by committing
myself to the nonsense of Christianity, this
would not be my self, but a "redeemed self"
shaped according to an image prescribed by
others.
You cannot enslave a free man; the most you can do is kill him.
In her concluding remark Ferguson backs
away from the challenge of Stirner's
egoism. "Ownness is not a sufficient base
for human life," she claims, because
"authentic individual life requires that we
have ties to others." She admits that such
ties can become stifling and that Stirner
sees this danger, but contends that "he
does not see the necessity or possibility of a
liberating sociality." She thus ends up
indulging in that half-this and half-that
waffle that Stirner so unerringly dissected
140 years ago. Once one begins to think in
terms of "authentic individual life" then
that "authenticity" has to be distinguished
from that "inauthentic". Once it is defined
one is once again subjected to that "rule of
concepts" that Stirner is so "startling acute"
in rejecting. "Liberating sociality" based
upon "authenticity" is simply a verbalism
disguising the intent on deciding our lives
for us. It is a philosophical confidence trick
for which no conscious egoist will fall.
[1] Vol XII, No. 3, 1982
–Robert A. Heinlein
 non serviam #13
Contents: Editor's Word
S.E. Parker: Preface
John C. Smith: Last and First Words
Paul Rowlandson:
Stirner, Youth and Tradition
Frank Jordan: In Praise of Max
Editor's Word
_____________
This issue of Non Serviam is an end and a
beginning. This issue (#13), and issue 14,
do together contain the last issue of Sid
Parker's "Ego", whose place in the world is
now taken over by Non Serviam, and it is
also a proper demarcation of the
Preface
S.E. Parker
Although the first edition of the Ego and
His Own (Der Einzige und Sein
Eigenthum) bore the date 1845, it in fact
appeared towards the end of October 1844.
This year is therefore the 150th anniversary
of its publication.
Otto Wigand, its Leipzig Publisher, was
well aware that such a work might feel the
weight of the disapproval of the Saxon
Censorship Board and resorted to a ruse
which he hoped would enable the book to
be distributed even if the censors
condemned it. As soon as the copy he was
legally obliged to deposit at the
Government Office was receipted Wigand
set about delivering the remaining copies to
booksellers so that any confiscators would
find his warehouse empty. To a large
degree he succeeded. Nonetheless, the
establishing of Stirner in Cyberspace. As
you will see from Sid's preface below, this
is the 150th year that Der Einzige und Sein
Eigentum has existed. It is also one of the
first years that the English version of the
book is available electronically [FTP
etext.archive.umich.edu, and change
directory to /Pub/Politics/Non.Serviam].
The texts below are invited "appreciations"
of Stirner's book, written for the
commemorative issue of "Ego". If it
appeals to you, you might be interested in
knowing that Sid Parker will not lay off
totally, but continue with some 1-2 A4
page "viewsletters", and will send these to
interested persons writing to him at 19 St.
Stephen's Gardens, London W2 5QU.
censors still managed to seize 250 copies of
the 1000 printed. After a few days,
however, the confiscation order was
withdrawn on the grounds that Stirner's
book was "too absurd" to warrant
censorship. In other words, the censors
could not understand it! The Ego and His
Own was also banned in Prussia,
Kurkessen and Mecklenburg Schwerin, but
although these bans were never lifted, this
did not stop copies being obtained and
read by anyone interested.
Since then The Ego and His Own has been
reprinted many times and has been
translated into many languages.
Throughout its existence it has provoked
outrage and won admiration. All too often,
however, both the outraged and the
admiring have tried to fit Stirner's views
into the conceptual imperatives of this or
that ideology. He has been labelled many
things, ranging from anarchist to fascist.
No doubt passages can be found in his
book that appear to lend support to each of
these extremes, but the more one
understands what it is that Stirner is actually
saying, the less these labels can be fixed.
The contributors to this commemoration
fortunately do not indulge in such a futile
game. They are content to record their own
reactions to The Ego and His Own and its
value for them.
Contributors ...
WM. FLYGARE: "This 1/5.6 billionth:
Swedish-American. Boston '17-'46. Chicago
'46-'51. Kyoto '51-the end. BA & MA
(philosophy and buddhism) plus attempts
at music and theatre to learn my inabilities.
Drafted into English teaching '51-'90.
Some minor publications along the way.
Highly independent ... and dependent,
enjoy being alone without loneliness, my
being remarried ('65), with two daughters
(25 and 28), two cats, a love-bird, and a
plum-tree. Eclectic: atheist in fact, animist
in fancy, affinity for persons, allergic to
people. Own house ('69 at last) with a
window overlooking 'rooves' onto green
hills and a variety of skies. Retired to
studying, versing, digesting my haps, and
being glad for my failures-n-good fortune."
FRANK JORDAN: "A life-loving,
aesthetically minded outsider, passing from
a 'Nietzschean' into a fully conscious
'Stirnerite'."
SVEIN OLAV NYBERG: "Born 1966;
PhD student in mathematics; editor of
Non Serviam; almost as selfish as the two
cats that own him; has been interested in
Stirner for the ten years he has known
about him."
S.E. PARKER: "Born 1929, Birmingham,
England. Now retired after thirty three
years with British Rail. Has worked his way
through the Young Communist League
(1944-1946), the British Federation of
Young Co-operators (1946-1947), and
virtually all the different varieties of
anarchism (1947-1982), to emerge as his
own man, the penny of conscious egoism
having finally dropped. Editor and
publisher of Minus One/Ego/ The
Egoist/Ego 1963-1994."
PAUL ROWLANDSON: "Currently
earns a living as a lecturer in a pseudo-
academic subject at a University College on
the North West Frontier of the United
Kingdom."
JOHN C. SMITH: "Needs no
introduction."
 Last and First Words
John C. Smith
The Ego and His Own didn't exactly take
the world by storm when it first appeared
in 1844 and hasn't since. But its publication
certainly caused a stir among the Young
Hegelian circle in which the author moved.
Karl Marx, for one, was so provoked by
Stirner's book that he, together with
Engels, devoted some two thirds of their
book, The German Ideology, to vilifying
Stirner, seeing him as a dangerous
challenge to their creed of social salvation.
In this country it is hardly ever mentioned
in polite society. Any new edition is largely
ignored by literary editors. Yet it is
reprinted regularly and never lacks readers.
Some, like the anarchist Herbert Read, for
example, have to admit "One book in my
youth I have never wholly forgotten. To
say that it had great influence on me would
not be correct, for influences are absorbed
and become part of one's mind. This book
refused to be digested - to use our vivid
English metaphor: it stuck in the gizzard,
and has been in that uncomfortable
position ever since. I refer to Max Stirner's
Der Einzige und Sein Eigentum, The Ego
and His Own as it was called in the English
translation, published in 1913." (The
Contrary Experience)
The main religio-political ideologies,
Christianity and Marxism, have failed to
provide an answer to the world's ills. The
human selfishness they were meant to
triumph over has triumphed over them.
Christianity, which promised individual
salvation (freedom from the sin of
selfishness) and brotherhood, has lost out
to commerce. Shopping has replaced going
to church. New temples, indoor shopping
malls which are usually ugly and
unnecessary, have sprung up all over
Britain. The early Christian churches at
least served a useful communal purpose
and were beautiful to look at.
In the Soviet Union the very
understandable desire for personal reward
undermined and eventually overthrew the
state socialist system. There have been the
inevitable attempts to explain this away by
Marxist purists asserting, as did G.K.
Chesterton about Christianity, that
Marxism has not failed because it has never
been tried. But, of course, it was tried, the
theories that were espoused in Russia
before the 1917 Revolution being more or
less the same as what these apologists
would call "real socialism."
It need hardly be said that the lesser
religions of anarchism and national
socialism have also failed to deliver the
goods. Anarchism, offering individual
autonomy and group solidarity, is also
concerned with a perfect society free from
the sin of selfishness. It is, ostensibly, a
morally purer religion than either Marxism
or national socialism since anarchists reject,
in theory, involvement in existing political
and social structures. They also complicate
matters by insisting on self rule for the
individual. This has ensured that anarchism
has never enjoyed a mass following.
Except for the fact that national socialism
originated as a scheme for the salvation of
white Europeans it is, as Roger Scruton has
pointed out, very similar to Marxist
socialism. Its famous promoter, Adolph
Hitler, was more than a bit bonkers. This,
along with a similar obsession with a
selfishness-free society, ensured that it has
suffered the same fate as that of Marxism.
If the collectivist panaceas have been tried
and seriously found wanting, what about
the 'individualist' answers? Of these,
existentialism of the kind propounded by
Jean-Paul Sartre in his earlier, non-political
phase appears to have the most in common
with Stirner's ideas. Sartre rejected the
Christian God and the Hegelian Absolute,
his central doctrine being that man is what
he makes of himself and "an insistence on
the actual existence of the individual as the
basic and important fact instead of a
reliance on theories and abstractions."
(Readers' Companion To World Literature)
As Stirner himself was more concerned
with the projectionist rather than what was
projected he would not have found too
much to disagree with in this, but a closer
examination of Sartre's position reveals that
he and Stirner are worlds apart. For
instance, Stirner confidently abandoned
God whereas Sartre found it "extremely
embarrassing that God does not exist ...
man is in consequence forlorn, for he
cannot find anything to depend on either
within or outside himself." (Existentialism
and Humanism)
Sartre later sought to overcome this
"embarrassing" forlornness by committing
himself to the collectivism of Marxism
while still clinging to the shell of his
individualist existentialism. He hovered
uncertainly between the two for the rest of
his life. Stirner never made this mistake. He
stubbornly, famously and usefully refused
to be anything other than himself.
The fact is, as Stirner himself could have
pointed out, all of the foregoing answers
are based on a flawed analysis - the lack of
understanding of the difference between
"egoistic" and "egotistic". Recently, Brian
Walden observed that the utopian
mentality reveals a faulty perception of
individuality. And more recently Matt
Ridley commented that most utopians are
hopelessly naive about human nature: "I
believe that ... human beings are and always
have been driven by three cardinal
ambitions –for wealth, for reputation and
for status– and that you ignore such facts at
your peril. Look no further than Russia for
proof. Marxism fails precisely because it
indulges a fantasy that human beings will
abandon these three and replace them with
the greatest good of the greatest number."
Nevertheless, Ridley has left out something
important. It is the perennial appetite for
self-delusion –to be other than what you
are– that mostly fuel these power drives.
Most people, as Nigella Lawson observes,
"need to escape the resented meagreness of
their own existence ... They want magic and
mysticism. They want to have others –
other worlds, other beings– dictate what is,
what they are and not to have any
responsibility for themselves." Given these
facts it is not therefore surprising that Max
Stirner's impassioned defence and
celebration of his individuality is unique.
Based as it is on the revolutionary stance
that self interest is the basis of all human
endeavour The Ego and His Own may not
be that last word on the subject of human
selfishness, but it contains some essential
first words without which we would be
even more in the dark than we are.
 Stirner, Youth and Tradition
Paul Rowlandson
Young people are subject to the
psychological malady of 'militant
enthusiasm'. It strikes between the ages of
16 and 25, the time of life when we are
most keen to sacrifice our all for a Cause,
the particular cause being determined by
the fashionable enthusiasms of the day.
That is why young men are useful in armies
- they are easily fired up to go over the top.
They are useful too, in religious
organizations, because they will go out and
proselytize in the rain, or sign away their
lives to religious orders.
Stirner described this period, when the boy
has become a youth: "One must obey God
rather than man ... from this high stand-
point everything 'earthly' recedes into
contemptible remoteness; for the stand-
point is the heavenly."
As a youth in the late 60s and early 70s I
was influenced by the passions of the time.
As a child I was packed off to the fire and
brimstone "washed in the blood of the
Lamb" Congregational church in Oak Vale,
Liverpool, by my parents, who themselves
never went to a church except for
weddings and funerals.
I remember a visiting preacher throttling a
live chicken in the pulpit to make a point I
had long forgotten. It was a church parade
day and I was a member of the church
scout troop, which I hated. Some of the
Church elders must have thought that the
preacher had overdone it because I
remember we were asked by some of them
what we thought of the chicken-throttling.
I can't remember being upset by it, which is
surprising. It was shortly after this incident
that I was sent off to the local Anglican
church for some civilized religion.
I wasted a lot of time during my school
years by my involvement with CND, the
Young Communist League, the Syndicalist
Workers Federation, and other radical
organisations. I took part in various silly
demonstrations, including the then
obligatory Aldermaston marches and some
sort of anti-Vietnam war demo from Hyde
Park to Trafalgar Square.
Most of my reading was of the radical sort -
Marx, Alexander Berkman, Proudhon,
Anarchy magazine, Direct Action,
Solidarity, and such. I left school with two
'O' levels as a result.
The young mind is bombarded by other
people's thoughts. From childhood to
adolescence we absorb ideas and
viewpoints from other people, whether in
person, through print, or through radio and
television. The selection of what goes in is
more or less random, within certain limits,
varying according to time, culture and
geography.
Christianity was perhaps the major
ingredient in my case, as it was (and still is,
though less so) with most English youths.
It is an easy thing for an uninformed mind
to contrast the "idealism" of Christianity
with the "injustices" of the world. I
remember thinking how like Christianity
Marxism was, and how hypocritical of
Christian society to deny us the benefits of
communism.
However, there was a growing realisation
of a divergence of interests, an awareness
that I had reservations and doubts about
the activities and enthusiasms with which I
was then engaged. For example, as a
teenager I was a pirate radio enthusiast,
which I found hard to reconcile with my
anarcho-communist beliefs. There were
several other discrepancies. I was a strange
sort of anarchist for I always had a high
regard for the Police, and frequently found
myself uncomfortable with my comrades'
description of them as 'pigs'.
I have always been an enthusiast for quirky
or idiosyncratic publications. As a youth I
favoured the iconoclastic. As an older man
I now seek the reactionary, the traditional,
the ultra conservative publications.
Revolutions pleased me then, Tradition
pleases me now.
The most unusual journal I ever came
across was Minus One (the precursor of
Ego - Ed). I subscribed immediately. Here
was something different.
I very soon thereafter acquired from Minus
One a copy of the Libertarian Book Club
1963 edition of The Ego and His Own.
Even the physical attributes of the book are
extraordinary. It is a substantial book,
printed on high quality paper, bound in
signatures, with a plain thick green cover,
and a plain typeface. It looks and feels a
_serious_ book.
My reading of The Ego and His Own had a
powerful and continuing influence. Here
was a mind I connected with straight away.
Its effect was that of a mental spring
cleaning. The "wheels in the head", the
ideas and opinions which I had
accumulated, lost their power, although, as
Stirner says, "Daily experience confirms the
truth that the understanding may have
renounced a thing many years before the
heart has ceased to beat for it."
Nevertheless, the effect was that I now
possessed the wheels in the head rather
than them possessing me.
Stirner takes no hostages. The demolition is
thorough: "the Good cause, God's cause,
the cause of mankind, of truth, of freedom,
of humanity, of justice, my people, my
prince, my fatherland, even the cause of
Mind, and a thousand other causes."
For a time I was cause-less, but eventually
started restocking. I acquired some causes
of my own, but this time they belonged to
me. I could run with them or discard them
as I wished.
It is probably as difficult to go without
causes as it is to do without interests. A
cause is, after all, simply a compelling
interest grown large. But one of the
benefits derived from reading Stirner is the
ability to prevent their possession of their
owner. My final authority is myself.
There are occasions in life we think of as
watersheds. Nothing is ever quite the same
again. My discovery of The Ego and His
Own was such an event. It became
impossible to think again in the way I
thought before I read the book. There is no
other book like it.
Pope John Paul II once commented that
the faithful have a right not to be disturbed
by the speculations of the so-called radical
theologians. Should the man or woman in
the street be exposed to Max Stirner? I
think not. People will go to almost any
lengths to avoid thinking for themselves.
The Ego and His Own would no doubt
unhinge many of them, which might make
life more difficult for the rest of us.
Fortunately there appears to be a small elite
which can absorb and benefit from Stirner
without going off the rails - those who can
see through not just the Emperor's new
clothes but the old ones as well.
 In Praise of Max
Frank Jordan
What is arguably the most iconoclastic
work of philosophy ever written was
published in the year 1844. This work was
entitled The Ego and His Own (In original
German: Der Einzige und Sein
Eigenthum). The author of this seminal
work called himself Max Stirner, which was
a pseudonym of Johann Caspar Schmidt.
Stirner was a member of the Young
Hegelians, but the ideas he put forward in
Der Einzige, his one major work, easily
outstripped and went far beyond anything
that his friends and contemporaries had to
say in their criticisms of the various
idealistic trends in society, as they
understood it.
Whether the subject be God, Spirit, Family,
Morality, The People, The State, and so on,
all of these Stirner ruthlessly and logically
breaks down and shows they are nothing
more than idealistic 'spooks,' falsely created
in substitution for the true needs of the
ego, and usually interpreted in altruistic
fashion. Only Nietzsche, in his many
writings, approaches anywhere near the
same 'dizzying' extremes and idol-smashing
that is a constant theme in Stirner's book.
The main difference between the two
thinkers, I believe, is that Stirner's book is a
complete statement, consistent within
itself, whereas Nietzsche's insights have to
be dug out from beneath his overall works,
and they are usually aphoristic in style and
content.
The impact of Stirner's book provoked a
most virulent attack against it by no less a
thinker than Karl Marx, along with Engels.
In their massive work, The German
Ideology, they devoted two thirds of it to
attacking line by line, and blow by blow,
Stirner's book. They constantly refer to him
as 'Saint Max', 'Don Quixote', and other
rather absurd appellations, all to try to
exorcise him and his book. But, in the end,
they fail miserably, after having tried every
intellectual trick they had in their mental
store, hoping to promote Marxist socialism
and discredit Stirner's pure egoism.
Various theorists have proven, quite
consistently, that Marxism as it eventually
developed would not have been possible
without Marx and Engels psychologically
reacting against the egoistic philosophy of
Stirner in the way that they did. As recent
history shows, Marxism can now be seen as
a failed attempt at trying to mould the
individual psyche into a social-procrustrean
bed of ideology.
Beside the effect Stirner had on Marxism,
various other thinkers and theorists have
tried to adapt the views expressed in Der
Einzige to bolster their own causes. For
examples: anarchists, fascists (especially the
case of Mussolini), the situationists of the
swinging Sixties, surrealistic and dadaistic
artists like Max Ernst, psychologists like
Erich Fromm. Even the very popular
science fiction trilogy of Wilson and Shea
called Illuminatus acknowledges a great
debt to Stirner throughout the plot. And
we must not forget the existentialist tag
Stirner has been given!
Ultimately, of course, despite the diverse
thinkers who are attracted to, and 'turned
on', by Stirner, the uniqueness of The Ego
and His Own stands like a lone mountain
which cannot be levelled down to fulfil
some else's rather shallow and hollow-
sounding ideals.
As long as men can, and will, think and act of a unique one to all other receptive unique
for themselves there will always be a place ones.
for Max Stirner's uplifting and stirring
book. His work speaks from the position I thank you, Max Stirner.

sometimes 'tween man and man

like shed
rain on a parch'd plain
in a language imperfect ployless elemental
like bread
intellect-play at bay
something as 'tween man and dumb-animal
is said

–Wm. Flygare 90.197

 non serviam #14
Contents:
Wm. Flygare: "To My Sweetheart"
Svein Olav Nyberg: The Choice of a New Generation
“To My Sweetheart”
With an Addition to Bartlett
Wm. Flygare
On this 150th birthday of The Ego and His
Own (1844, dated 1845), what intrigues me
is the dedication. What was Mary's
contribution to John-n-Mary's only issue - a
book?
Stirner (42.2; p358) speaks of using life up
like a burning candle. In the John-n-Mary
romance –a roman candle– their wedded
life (1843-1846) ended in her long-life life-
long rancour against a "sly" man whom she
"neither loved nor respected." In affairs of
the heart, as well as in practical affairs, both
were losers, the woman more than the
philosopher who had two worlds to live in.
It would seem, then, that the inspiring
young Mary deserves a gratitude that the
older embittered one would be loath to
accept, her wound a secret she would not
tell.
The Ego and Hos Own appears a vast
commentary to the Goethe poem alluded
to at the beginning and end. Its absence in
publications of The Ego is unfortunate. In
Stirner's time this poem was "a favourite
with everyone" (Schopenhauer's Councels
and Maxim #5) but it is little known now.
Like Smith, Stirner is "in love," certainly
with the "tyranny of words" (43.3; p.389).
Unlike elsewhere in his work, there are
poetic parallels and flights, external pattern,
redundance, etymological word-play,
elations, and hyperbole, his pen often
shouting as if against the loud-voiced
among "The Free Ones". These features
have made the work most variously read
and can detract. Parler sans accent. But as to
the diagnostic content: Stance is
circumscribed by circumstance. In their
desperate drive for impossible certainty and
acceptance, and hope to qualify, the driven
drive the driven, mental straight-jackets
nicely laced. In adolescence, the rarely
curable brain-smudge received in
childhood festers into visions and
conversions that lead to "normal" madness
and its "stealthy malice" (7.2; p.46). Now
instead of talk about the prophylaxis and
solace offered by The Ego and His Own,
Stirner himself: I have tried to ferret out his
key observations in sober and concise form
as "an addition to Bartlett" since Bartlett's
"Familiar Quotations" is one of a number
of well-known reference works which
neglect this exorcist of "spooks", some of
whose phrases deserve to be "familiar."
Reference is to a yet unpublished
paragraph-numbering system and to pages
in Reclam 3957(6), the only currently stable
publication:
What have we gained, then, when for a
variation we have transferred into ourselves
the divine outside us? Are we that which is
in us? As little as we are that which is
outside us. I am as little my heart as I am
my sweetheart, this "other self" of mine.
(4.20; p.34)
... out of confidence in our grandmothers'
honesty we believe in the existence of
spirits.
But had we no grandfathers then, and did
they not shrug their shoulders every time
our grandmothers told about their ghosts?
(5.1&2; p.36)
... over each minute of your existence a
fresh minute of the future beckons to you,
and, developing yourself, you get away
"from yourself," that is, from the self that
was at that moment. (5.13; p.39)
Man, your head is haunted ... You imagine
... a spirit-realm to which you suppose
yourself to be called, an ideal that beckons
to you. You have a fixed idea! (7.1; p.46)
... it is only through the "flesh" that I can
break tyranny of mind; for it is only when a
man hears his flesh along with the rest of
him that he hears himself wholly, and it is
only when he wholly hears himself that he
is a hearing (vernehmend) or rational
(vernunftig) being. (10.12; p.68)
Because the revolutionary priests or
schoolmasters served Man, they cut off the
heads of men. (14.24; p.68)
Many a man renounces morals, but with
great difficulty the conception, "morality."
(15.12; p.96)
... every effort arrives at reaction ... a new
master set in the old one's place, and the
overturning is a - building up. (17.32&35;
pp.120&121)
... if a "tie" clasps you, you are something
only with another, and twelve of you make a
dozen, thousands of you a people, millions
of you humanity ... I answer, only when
you are single can you have intercourse
with each other as what you are.
(21.34&36; p.148)
I do not want to have or be anything
especial above others, ... but - I do not
measure myself by others either, ... The
equal, the same, they can neither be nor
have. (21.52; p.152)
It is not thinking, but my thoughtlessness
(lit., thought-rid-ness), or I the unthinkable,
incomprehensible, that frees me from
possession. (23.15; p.169)
What the craving for freedom has always
come to has been the desire for a particular
freedom ... The craving for a particular
freedom always includes the purpose of a
new dominion. (24.13&14; p.176)
But the habit of the religious way of
thinking has biased our mind so grievously
that we are - terrified at ourselves in our
nakedness and naturalness; it has degraded
us so that we deem ourselves depraved by
nature, born devils. (24.21; p.178)
I am present. (24.22; p.180)
Thousands of years of civilization have
obscured to you what you are ... Shake that
off! ... and let go your hypocritical
endeavours, your foolish mania to be
something else than you are. (24.30; p.181)
You want to be "in the right" as against the
rest. That you cannot; as against them you
remain forever "in the wrong". (26.12;
p.207)
What is the ordinary criminal but one who
has ... sought despicable alien goods? ... You
do not know that an ego who is his own
cannot desist from being a criminal, that
crime is his life. (28.6; p.221)
Everything sacred is a tie, a fetter. (31.24;
p.239)
For only he who is alive is in the right.
(31.24; p.239)
I never believed in myself; I never believed
in my present, I saw myself only in the
future ... a proper I ... a "citizen," a "free or
true man" ... an alien I ... An I that is
neither an I nor a you, a fancied I, a spook.
(31.5; p.247)
But I love ... because love makes me happy
... because loving is natural to me, because
it pleases me. I know no ''commandment
of love." (39.15; p.324)
I sing because - I am a singer. But I use
(gebrauche) you for it because I - need
(gebrauche) ears. (39.37; p.331)
That a society (such as the society of the
State) diminishes my liberty offends me
little. Why, I have to let my liberty be
limited by all sorts of powers and by every
one who is stronger; nay, by every fellow-
man; and, were I the autocrat of all the
R..... , I yet should not enjoy absolute
liberty. But ownness I will not have taken
from me. And ownness is precisely what
every society has designs on, precisely what
is to succumb to its power. (41.7; p.342f)
We are equal only in thoughts, only when
"we" are thought, not as we really and bodily
are. I am ego, and you are ego: but I am
not this thought-of ego; this ego in which
we are all equal is only my thought. I am
man, and you are man: but "man" is only a
thought, a generality; neither I nor you are
speakable, we are unutterable, because only
thoughts are speakable and consist in
speaking. (41.15; p.348)
Henceforth, the question runs, not how
one can acquire life .. but how one is to
dissolve himself, to live himself out. (42.6;
p.348)
Possibility and reality always coincide.
(42.3; p.368f)
No sheep, no dog, exerts itself to become a
"proper sheep, a proper dog". (42.47;
p.372)
I receive with thanks what the centuries of
culture have acquired for me; I am not
willing to throw away and give up anything
of it ... But I want still more. (42.53; p.372)
All truth by itself is dead, a corpse; it is
alive only in the same way as my lungs are
alive - to wit, in the measure of my own
vitality. [...] The truth is a - creature. (43.64;
p.398-399)
No idea has existence, for none is capable
of corporeity. [...] What, am I in the world
to realize ideas? (45.5&13; pp.408&411)
 The Ego and Its Own
The Choice of a New Generation
Svein Olav Nyberg
Knowledge must die, and rise again
as Will and create itself anew each
day as a free Person.
–The False Principle of Our Education
Those of us who have reached adulthood
during the eighties have not avoided
noticing all the literature and the ideas
about self-love that has been around. Even
the nursery-eyed girls with the concerned
looks sometimes stutter that they think you
should be allowed to love yourself as much
as you love your neighbour. Most of this
literature and most of these ideas come
from psychology. Wayne Dwyer reasons
that since loving your neighbour as yourself
will not amount to much love of the
neighbour unless you love yourself first,
you should therefore love yourself.
Psychologically, the link is claimed that
other-love is impossible without self-love.
So we should think we are at a magic time
in history; the omni-present Society gives
us permission to love ourselves.
But there are those of us who are not such
well-bred rats conditioned to do whatever
we are told benefits our neighbour. We do
not love ourselves to please our abstract or
concrete neighbours, but just love
ourselves, plain and simple. Our kind of
people see these trends as nothing other
than the old hogwash in a new disguise.
Not only shall you sacrifice yourself to the
good of your neighbour, but you shall do
so under the illusion that you do it for
yourself. We penetrate deeper, we go into
philosophy.
Philosophically, also, it has been a decade
of praising the self. Why, has not the
notorious Ayn Rand sold more books and
increased her organized following more
than ever? Has not the libertarian
community accepted selfishness as a rule?
Again, ever more illusion! Randian self-love
is the love of Man your Essence within
you, and the hate of the Evil un-Man in
you, lurking at the boundaries of the Omni-
Good Rational Thought. Libertarian ideas,
furthermore, are in this respect nothing
more than the ghost of departed
Objectivists.
It is amidst all this confusion that a young
man of today will find himself as he picks
up his first copy of The Ego and Its Own.
Usually, as in my case, he will have a
background in libertarian thought, and
smile at the thought that "Here we have the
guy who is even more consistent than
Rand. Wow, these ideas will be useful for
my libertarianism!" As the reading of the
book proceeds, the young libertarian will
look at the pages in amazed horror; is not
this Stirner guy just picking libertarianism
logically apart before his very eyes? Oh
horror! No, this must surely rest on a
misunderstanding. Stirner never knew
modern libertarianism, did he? So, he is
really running loose on something else.
Yes? But, no, realisation dawns that
libertarianism –after all a very logical and
aesthetic system which even works - given
a faint "best of society" premise– is without
the foundation our young libertarian wants.
Rights are spooks, his head is haunted and
his pride is hurt.
There are now two possible lessons to
learn; either to learn from Stirner to speak
to others about selfishness - universalize
that we are all (and implicitly ought to be)
selfish, and to use this as a new basis for
libertarian idealism, or - to delve into
oneself to find one's own cause.
Now, what is not supposed to be my cause!
From society we learn that selfishness
consists in filling your wallet and emptying
your balls as best as you can. From religion
we learn that our true interest lies in the
contemplation of ideas and renunciation of
the body. But these are both very one-sided
goals, and do violence to me. They are both
follies of one and the same type - formal
egoism. Formal egoism is what arises when
you conceive of yourself as an object, a
sum of predicates, and not as beyond
predicates - as an Einzige. Modern man
hypostatizes –makes objects of–
everything, including himself. For a
modern man the choice is only which object
among the objects is to be chosen as the
ultimate value. So why not the object he
knows as "me"? But when you serve the
interests of an object, you need a recipe, a
guideline - some rules. These might be
explicit, or they might be, as for most
people, implicit. The formal egoist then
serves the himself-object as best he can
according to the predications of what
selfishness means –and, mind you, he
might even have so much success as to
attain some predicated goals that he thinks
a selfish man should attain– but he never
gets to the bottom of his interests. He is
formally indistinguishable from the selfish
man, but in reality never attains anything
more than being a boy scout at satisfying
the himself-object.
Stirner is a good teacher of lessons. In A
Human Life he shows the dialectical
development towards a full understanding
of one's own cause. One starts out as a
child who thinks that all that matters is -
matter. Thereafter the procession goes to
the realm of the Mind –ideas– where all
importance and values are to be found in
the relation to the idea. Only thereafter
does it dawn that there is something
beyond all the material and spiritual
objects, yet more immediate, namely I,
myself.
It is easy to come to the protest "Now what
is the I?" As Stirner answers, I am not a
"what" but a "who". Grasping this
distinction, and why Stirner emphasises it,
is essential to understanding Stirner, and is
why The Ego and Its Own is so different
from any other book about selfishness.
A question that seems to have puzzled
both the older and the younger generation
is "If Stirner was such a self-loving man,
why did he bother to write a book that
gave him so much trouble and so little
reward?" I do not propose to answer this
question in specifics, but instead look at
how he has developed his theory of
relations to other people.
Stirner has been described as a man who
has taken the full consequence of being-
alone in the world, and sometimes even a
solipsist. I take these descriptions as
coming from people not fully
knowledgeable about Stirner. Stirner does
not advocate the life of the Sole Ego on the
hill, out of contact with other people.
Rather, he seems to derive much
enjoyment from the company of his peers,
and even babies with their competent
smiles. But it is easy to be intoxicated by a
book such as Stirner's, and fail to read what
is written. What Stirner actually writes
about, is that there are basically two
(opposite) forms of interaction, namely that
of standing as an I against a You, versus
meeting one another qua predicate-filled
objects. The understanding of this
demands that one understands the
difference between the Einzige that one is,
and the objects we are conditioned by
culture to see ourselves as.
The meeting of the I against the You
actually comprises more than half of
Stirner's book. This, I propose, is the key to
why he wrote the book. All around him he
saw, and met, people whose only mode of
interaction was qua object-to-object. He
met "good citizens", "Christians" and even
"Humans", all playing out a social role
according to the predicate of the day. But
meeting one another with that veil of
predicates removed was a scarcity, as it is
today.
Meeting Einzig to Einzig is scary. The you
stand there all for and by yourself with no
predicate to hide behind. That is why
people continually choose to interact via
predicates - object-to-object. But this is
nothing different from the mad-man at the
asylum who is unable to face the world as
anyone but "Napoleon". We live, as Stirner
put it, in a mad-house among mad-men.
This is why Stirner wrote his book: It is a
therapy for all of us who out of the fear of
seeing ourselves as pure and nakedly
ourselves. A therapy so that he might speak
and otherwise interact with us as the
Einzige we are, and not as a thousand
"Napoleon"s.
Do you dare accept the therapy offered by
Stirner?

“And what we're trying to communicate –the ultimate secret, the philosopher's stone, the
elixir of life– is just the power of the word No. We are people who have said Non Serviam, and
we're trying to teach other's to say it.”

[...]

“Sink me, nobody of this tub agrees with anybody else about anything, except maybe what the
fellow with the horns told the old man in the clouds: Non Serviam.”

“I don't know Latin,” I said, overwhelmed by his outburst.

"I will not serve," he translated.

–From Shea & Wilson's Illuminatus

 non serviam #15
Contents: Editor's Word
Dora Marsden: Thinking and Thought
S.E. Parker: Comment to Ken Knudson
Editor's Word
_____________
I am delighted to include an essay by a
female champion of egoism in this issue of
Non Serviam, made available electronically
by another egoist woman, Sunniva
Morstad. It first appeared in "The
Freewoman", No. 5, Vol. 1, August 15th
1913. Like Stirner, she builds a case for
egoism through a criticism of the
absoluteness of language - a thought which
should not be unfamiliar for the many on
Non Serviam who have adopted
Korzybski's "General Semantics" as a
Thinking and Thought
Dora Marsden
It is strange to find searchers coming here
seeking thoughts, followers after truth
seeking new lamps for old, right ideas for
wrong. It seems fruitless to affirm that our
business is to annihilate thought, to shatter
the new lamps no less than the old, to
dissolve ideas, the "right" as well as the
"wrong". "It is a new play of artistry , some
new paradox," they reflect, not
comprehending that artistry and paradox
are left as the defences of power not yet
strong enough to comprehend. If a man
has the power that comprehends, what uses
has he left for paradox? If he sees a thing
as it is, why must he needs describe it in
terms of that which is not? Paradox is the
guideline. I personally think this approach
to egoism via a criticism of language
deserves more attention, and would
therefore be very happy to receive articles
written from different points of view on
this relation. Since Non Serviam is now
also going to go on paper to the
unprivileged without email access, I will
include some longer good discussion posts
which would otherwise have been most
fitting for the discussion list Nonserv, in
Non Serviam. The first such post is a
comment by Sid Parker to Ken Knudson's
serial [2] here in Non Serviam.
[1] Sidney Parker: "Archists, Anarchists and
Egoists". Non Serviam #7
[2] Ken Knudson: "A Critique of
Communism and The Individualist
Alternative". Non Serviam #1-12
refuge of the adventurous guesser: the
shield of the oracle whose answer is not
ready. Searchers should not bring their
thoughts to us: we have no scruple in
destroying their choicest, and giving them
none in return. They would be well able to
repair the depredations elsewhere,
however, for nowhere else, save here, are
thoughts not held sacred and in honour.
Everywhere, from all sides, they press in
thick upon men, suffocating life. All is
thought and no thinking. We do the
thinking: the rest of the world spin
thoughts. If from the operation of thinking
one rises up only with thoughts, not only
has the thinking-process gone wrong: it has
not begun. To believe that it has is as
though one should imagine the work of
digesting food satisfactorily carried through
when the mouth has been stuffed with
sand.
The process of thinking is meant to co-
ordinate two things which are real: the
person who thinks and the rest of the
phenomenal world, the world of sense. Any
part of the process which can be described
in terms unrelated to these two –and only
two– real parties in the process is
redundant and pernicious, an unnecessary
by-product which it would be highly
expedient to eliminate. Thoughts, the entire
world of ideas and concepts, are just these
intruders and irrelevant excesses. Someone
says, apropos of some change without a
difference in the social sphere, "We are
glad to note the triumph of progressive
ideas." Another, "We rejoice in the fact that
we are again returning to the ideas of
honour and integrity of an earlier age." We
say, leprosy or cholera for choice. Idea,
idea, always the idea. As though the
supremacy of the idea were not the
subjection of men, slaves to the idea. Men
need no ideas. They have no use for them
(Unless indeed they are of the literary breed
- then they live upon them by their power
to beguile the simple). What men need is
power of being, strength in themselves: and
intellect which in the thinking process goes
out as a scout, comparing, collating, putting
like by like, or nearly like, is but the good
servant which the individual being sends
afield that he may the better protect,
maintain and augment himself. Thinking,
invaluable as it is in the service of being, is,
essentially a very intermittent process. It
works only between whiles. In the nadir
and zenith of men's experience it plays no
part, when they are stupid and when they
are passionate. Descartes' maxim "Cogito
ergo sum," carried the weight it did and
does merely because the longfelt influence
of ideas had taken the virtue out of men's
souls. Stronger men would have met it, not
with an argument, but a laugh. It is
philosophy turned turtle. The genesis of
knowledge is not in thinking but in being.
Thinking widens the limits of knowledge,
but the base of the latter is in feeling. "I
know" because "I am." The first follows
the second and not contrariwise. The base
–and highest reaches– of knowledge lie not
in spurious thoughts, fine-drawn, not yet in
the humble and faithful collecting of
correspondences which is thinking, but in
experienced emotion. What men may be,
their heights and depths, they can divine
only in experienced emotion. The vitally
true things are all personally revealed, and
they are true primarily only for the one to
whom they are revealed. For the rest the
revelation is hearsay. Each man is his own
prophet. A man's "god" (a confusing term,
since it has nothing to do with God, the
Absolute - a mere thought) is the utmost
emotional reach of himself: and is in
common or rare use according to each
individual nature. A neighbour's "god" is of
little use to any man. It represents a wrong
goal, a false direction.
We are accused of "finesse-ing with terms."
No accusation could be wider off the mark.
We are analysing terms; we believe, indeed,
that the next work for the lovers of men is
just this analysis of naming. It will go
completely against the grain of civilisation,
cut straight across culture: that is why the
pseudo-logicians loathe logic - indeed, it
will be a matter for surprise that one
should have the temerity to name the word.
So great a fear have the cultured of the
probing of their claims that they are
counselling the abandonment of this
necessary instrument. They would prefer to
retain inaccurate thinking which breeds
thoughts, to accurate thinking which
reveals facts and in its bright light
annihilates the shadows bred of dimness,
which are thoughts. Analysis of the process
of naming: inquiry into the impudent word-
trick which goes by the name of
"abstraction of qualities": re-estimation of
the form-value of the syllogism; challenging
of the slipshod methods of both induction
and deduction; the breaking down of
closed systems of "classification" into what
they should be - graded descriptions; these
things are more urgently needed than
thinkable in the intellectual life of today.
The settlement of the dispute of the
nominalist and realist schoolmen of the
Middle Ages in favour of the former rather
than the latter would have been of infinitely
greater value to the growth of men than the
discoveries of Columbus, Galileo and
Kepler. It would have enabled them to
shunt off into nothingness the mountain of
culture which in the world of the West they
have been assiduously piling up since the
time of the gentle father of lies and deceit,
Plato. It is very easy, however, to
understand why the conceptualists
triumphed, and are still triumphing, despite
the ravages they have worked on every
hand. The concept begets the idea, and
every idea installs its concrete authority. All
who wield authority do it in the name of an
idea: equality, justice, love, right, duty,
humanity, God, the Church, the State.
Small wonder, therefore, if those who sit in
the seats of authority look askance at any
tampering with names and ideas. It is a
different matter from questioning the of one
idea. Those who, in the name of one idea
do battle against the power of another, can
rely upon some support. Indeed, changing
new lamps for old is the favourite form of
intellectual excitement inasmuch as while it
is not too risky, is not a forlorn hope, it yet
ranges combatants on opposing sides with
all the zest of a fight. But to question all
ideas is to leave authoritarians without any
foothold whatsoever. Even opposing
authorities will sink differences and
combine to crush an Ishmaelite who dares.
Accordingly, after three quarters of a
thousand years, the nominalist position is
where it was: nowhere, and all men are in
thrall to ideas - culture. They are still
searching for the Good, the Beautiful and
the True. They are no nearer the realisation
that the Good in the actual never is a
general term, but always a specific, i.e. that
which is "good for me" (or you, or anyone)
varying with time and person, in kind and
substance; that the Beautiful is likewise
"beautiful for me" (or you, or anyone)
varying with time and person, in kind and
substance, measured by a standard wholly
subjective; that the True is just that which
corresponds: in certainties, mere verified
observation of fact; in doubt, opinion as to
fact and no more, a mere "I think it so" in
place of "I find it so." As specifics, they are
real: as generalisations, they are thoughts,
spurious entities, verbiage representing
nothing, and as such are consequently in
high repute. The work of purging language
is likely to be a slow one even after the
battle of argument in its favour shall have
been won. It is observable that egoists, for
instance, use "should," "ought," and
"must" quite regularly in the sense which
bears the implication of an existing
underlying "Duty." Denying authority, they
use the language of authority. If the
greatest possible satisfaction of self (which
is a pleasure) is the motive in life, with
whose voice does "Duty" speak? Who or
what for instance lays it down that our
actions must not be "invasive" of others?
An effete god, presumably, whose power
has deserted him, since most of us would
be hard put to it to find action and
attitudes which are not invasive. Seizing
land –the avenue of life– is invasive: loving
is invasive, and so is hating and most of the
emotions. The emphasis accurately belongs
on "defence" and not on "invasion" and
defence is self-enjoined.
No, Duty, like the rest, is a thought,
powerless in itself, efficient only when men
give it recognition for what it is not and
doff their own power in deference, to set at
an advantage those who come armed with
the authority of its name. And likewise with
"Right." What is "right" is what I prefer
and what you and the rest prefer. Where
these "rights" overlap men fight is out;
their power becomes umpire, their might is
their right. Why keep mere words sacred?
Since right is ever swallowed up in might
why speak of right? Why seek to acquire
rights when each right has to be matched
by the might which first secures and then
Comment to Ken Knudson
S.E. Parker
K.K. prefers a "consumers' dicatorship" to
a "producers' dictatorship" on the grounds
that "consumers are finicky people - they
want the best possible product at the
lowest price. To achieve this end they will
use ruthless means."
I do not know what consumers he is
writing about, but they are certainly not the
ones I know. A few, certainly, will use
"ruthless means" to obtain the cheapest
and best product. The majority, however,
seem to be quite content not only to buy
expensive trash, but even unwilling to look
for shops where theycan get identical
products at cheaper prices. For example,
we have two supermarkets where I live.
One, on average, charges higher prices than
the other. They are about three minutes
walking time apart. Yet the higher pried
one continues to prosper because most of
its customers are not prepared to go round
the corner to what the cheaper priced one
is like. Not only this, but a smaller shop in
the neighbourhood, run by a company that
are rip-off merchants of the first order, not
only flourishes, but has extended opening
times! So much for the "ruthless
customer"!
retains it? When men acquire the ability to
make and co-ordinate accurate
descriptions, that is, when they learn to
think, the empire of mere words,
"thoughts", will be broken, the sacred
pedestals shattered, and the seats of
authority cast down. The contests and
achievements of owners of "powers" will
remain.
It is clear to me that K.K. has merely
exchanged the idealized "producer" for the
idealized "customer", he has replaced the
myth of the socialist with the myth of the
"free marketeer" - and is therefore just as
utopian as the anarcho-communist he
criticizes so well.
"The only way to realize anarchy is for
a sufficient number of people to be
convinced that their own interests
demand it."
This statement does not show why people
will find anarchy in their interests, it only
shows that Ken Knudson thinks they
should find it in their interests. (I am
reminded of an observation about Ayn
Rand made by an American conservative to
the effect that "Miss Rand believes in
people acting according to their self-
interest so long as she can define what that
interest is.")
KK claims that people are pragmatists and
that until they can be made to realize that
"anarchy actually works for their benefit, it
will remain ... an idle pipe-dream." As I
understand it, pragmatism is concerned
with what works. If anarchy is still a "pipe-
dream" it is plainly not working. So how
does one show that it will work? By
convincing people that it will! But, if
people are pragmatists, and will only be
convinced by something that "works", then
one is in the invidious position of trying to
convince them that what is not working
now will work at some indefinite time in
the future if only they will be convinced
that it will, despite the fact that, as
pragmatists, they are only to be convinced
by seeing something that actually works!
Methinks that here he has fallen right into
the trap that Stirner pointed out; the belief
that because something is conceivable it is
therefore possible.
KK looks to the founding of the mutual
banks as a way to achieve his ideal society,
but how many of these have been
established and worked succesfully since
Proudhon advocated them over a hundred
years ago? If they were in the interest of a
"sufficient number of people" who have
grasped their value as a means to realize
anarchy why hasn't that "sufficient
number" been forthcoming? Could it be
that most of those who have had them
explained to them did not find them in their
interests? What basis does he have for
assuming that even if a large number of
people became consciously self-interested
they will find their interests coincide with
those of anarchism? His faith I do not
doubt, but where is the evidense?
The power of the tyrant, KK writes,
"comes from the abdicated power of his
subjects". The supposition that at some
time or another these subjects decided to
"abdicate" their power to a tyrant smacks
suspiciously of the myth of the "social
contract". In any case, he is assuming that
if these subjects had the power to grant to
a tyrant and that they were to repossess it
they would then be as powerful as those
whom they granted it. Again, an act of
faith. It is plain to me that since individuals
are genetically unequal, so their power –
their competence as Stirner called it– is also
unequal. Even were they tyrant –or
democratic governments– thus rendered
"powerless" this inequality of power would
soon be expressed in a new hierarchy –of
function if not formal status– and the division
between ruler and ruled re-established. The
"dominant five-percent", like the poor, we
always have with us.
What Stirner wrote about idols is true. I
know that, Ken Knudson knows that, and
so do a few others, but why does he believe
that everyone will cometo know that? This
is the sort of belief called the "Everest
fallacy" - i.e. because some people have
climbed Everest, all people can climb it.
"We egoists raise the banner of free
competition." "We" egoists do nothing of
the kind. If I benefit from "unfree"
competition why should I renounce my
egoistic satisfaction in that fact in favour of
a system from which I benefit less? Implicit
in this kind of assertion is the assumption
that everyone's interest can be served by
one way of going on. If one accepts the
Stirnerian concept of "the unique one" this
is manifest nonsense.
KK rejects "frontiers" as absurd. No doubt
from a global anarchist perspective they are.
But why suppose that an egoist will reject
frontiers out of hand? Making one's
"fatherland", "motherland" or "homeland"
holy is, of course, so much spookery.
Nonetheless, an egoist might find the
existence of frontiers something of use to
him. I, for example, live on an
overcrowded island called Britain. Do I
want this country swamped by hordes of
immigrants as the result of doing away with
frontiers? I do not. And if my support,
pragmatic support, of a barrier against such
a horde steps on the intellectual/moral toes
of some liberal, libertarian or anarchist
dreamers, that is their lookout. It is my
egoism that concerns me, not some abstract
"egoism" pressed in the service of some
universalistic fantasy. There are more ways
of viewing one's egoistic interests than are
dreamed of by anarchists....
There is more I could write on these topics,
but I think I have put the cat among
enough pigeons for the moment.
Sid Parker

What is laid down, ordered, factual, is never

enough to embrace the whole truth: life always
spills over the rim of every cup.

–Boris Pasternak
 non serviam #16
Contents: Editor's Word
John A. Marmysz: A Prolegomena
To Any Future Nihilistic Philosophy
Editor's Word
_____________
One of the most amusing books I have
ever read is Kant's Metaphysics of Morals.
Here Kant bases his moral teaching on one
of his famous transcendental arguments; IF
morality is not to be meaningless, then its
laws must be necessary and universal, and
IF a law is necessary and universal, then its
base must be deontological. Many believe
this argument shows that morality's truth is
thereby proven; proven from the absolute
truth of deontology. I,1 on the other hand,
find it amusing to see what pains people go
to, IF they regard moral concepts as
absolute. Morality, I say, is meaningless
A Prolegomena
to
Any Future Nihilistic Philosophy
John A. Marmysz
Years ago, I got into an argument with a
woman over the merits of an ethics based
upon rational principles versus the merits
of an ethics based upon personal
preference. She was a Kantian; I was a
nihilist. There didn't seem to be any
common ground for us to share. Being
younger and much less aggressive in my
technique of debate than she, I came away
from the interaction feeling like I was the
other than as personal and artistic
expression.
This issue main features an article taking
issue with Kant's program of reification, "A
Prolegomena To Any Future Nihilistic
Philosophy". Its author, John Marmysz, is a
philosopher with interests in logic, ethics
and social philosophy. He is a member of
the North American Nietzsche Society and
the Society for the Philosophic Study of
Contemporary Visual Arts. His interests
reflect in his work as a movie theatre
manager at the Clay Theatre in San
Francisco and a teacher of logic at the
Santa Rosa Junior and Menlo colleges.
This issue's article is a consequence of his
interest in "the social ramifications (both
positive and negative) of a 'nihilistic point
of view' as explored by Nietzsche and
many anarchist thinkers.
1
We say "I", as We want to refrain from
using the Royal "We".
loser. My suggestions were dismissed by
this woman with a condescending laugh.
She would then reassert her own points like
they were established facts, gesturing in the
air as if to illustrate the "common sense"
she spoke.
Well, years have passed and woe be it to
that woman if our paths ever cross again.
You see, my philosophic self confidence
has strengthened over time and now, in
retrospect, I recognize the flaws, errors and
sophistries utilized by rationalists in
general, but which were especially
prominent in the arguments of the Kantian
in question. Allow me then to draw the
battle lines and replay the incident the way
it would occur today, showing the full force
of the nihilistic viewpoint and the weakness
of the opposition. Far from committing the
"straw man" error, I will simply show that
the rationalists "Kant" provide satisfactory
rebuttals to the nihilistic critique.
Kant placed a great deal of emphasis on
morality's rational properties. According to
his view, anyone, by an exercise of reason,
can deduce the principles and rules that
govern correct moral action. Using a kind
of naturalistic argument, he concluded that
reason, like an organ, must exist for a
purpose, and that purpose is to deduce
moral imperatives. To live morally is to live
in accordance with that imperative
deducible by "pure" reason alone - namely
the "Categorical Imperative"; the "Golden
Rule" by a different name. For Kant,
morality possessed a distinct form that
could be "summarized" into an overarching
principle and the basis for moral action lay
in adherence to this principle.
Now, the alert nihilist will pull in the
reigns. "Whoah, Kantian! Can we slow
down and talk about 'reason' for a minute?"
Kant and his overzealous advocates
cavalierly assert that humans are essentially
"rational beings", as if "reason" is some
sort of tangible thing that can be
identified by pointing at it. But it is difficult
to see the similarity between an organ and
"reason". Furthermore, there are some
organs, like the appendix or tonsils, which
serve no real purpose and which we can do
quite fine without. My first mistake when
arguing with "Ms. Kantian" was to indulge
her and not challenge her exercise in the
reification of "reason".
But even if I did allow her this step, can't
many things –including incompatible
conclusions– be reasoned? Take for
example arguments for the existence of
God. Suppose someone had the audacity to
propose that since God is a perfect being,
and since perfection implies existence, God
must exist. This argument is perfectly
"reasonable". It moves quite logically from
its premises to its conclusion. An equally
"reasonable" competitor, however, might
argue that if an all powerful and wholly
"good" God existed, he wouldn't allow
"evil" in the world. There is evil in the
world. Therefore an all powerful and
wholly "good" God does not exist. Case
closed...at least until the next "reasonable"
argument from the other side is voiced. If
there is a God, he certainly works in
mysterious (not reasonable) ways.
Everyone's got reasons, and everyone
reasons, but the existence of a faculty called
"reason" does not follow from any of this.
Rather than a thing or a faculty, it may be
more accurate to talk about the process of
"reasoning". When we speak about reason,
it seems that what we are really talking
about is the process of offering reasons in
support of a belief, point of view, or
conclusion. Reasoning involves the process
of argumentation, and arguments can be
convincing in two major ways: (1) they can
appeal to rationality or (2) they can appeal
to intuition. The arguments of a logician
illustrate the rational end of the scale. His
exercises in the formulae of allowable
inference are nearly devoid of content,
representing rational, formal relationships
between variables. At the opposite end of
the scale –the intuitive end– are the
"arguments" of the TV telethon host. His
ability to convince is based almost totally
on formless content. He cries and puts his
arms around crippled children, counting on
the persuasive power of emotion, accessed
by intuition, to trigger an empathic
response in others. Somewhere in between
these extremes paces the trial lawyer who
mixes appeals to rational legalism with
emotional appeals to justice and fair play.
The skilled formulation of convincing,
rational arguments is learned by devoting
much time, effort and many resources to
academic studies. It is through this
scholarly process of legitimation that one
earns the privilege to be taken seriously in
the activity of convincing others rationally.
Because of the time, effort and resources
involved in "earning degrees", a minority of
the individuals in a population will pursue
this course. The obstacles emplaced are
sufficient to deter most people from
completing (or even attempting) a program
of academic study. The result is that the
skill of rational argument, and the privilege
that accompanies it, will be concentrated in
the hands of a relatively small number of
individuals.
The power to convince through appeals to
intuition, on the other hand, is not granted
only to those who are trained formally.
When a person appeals to intuition, he
does so on the assumption that others
share his intuition and that this shared
knowledge is sufficient evidence for further
statements. For the purposes of persuasion,
humans often appeal to specific emotions,
accessed by intuition, in order to activate
empathic responses in others, thereby
"moving" (convincing) them. It is because
humans share a similar range of emotional
responses that such a tactic seems to work.
In any case, the ability to move others
emotionally is present in all members of
the species to some degree or another
(...even mentally defective humans have the
power to provoke empathy, though
whether they are responsive to the same
effects is an open question). The appeal to
intuition/emotion, then, is a much more
democratic tool than the appeal to
rationality.
Whether an appeal leans more towards
rationality or more towards intuition, it is
being made on behalf of something, and
the person making the appeal is attempting
to convince others of that something. The
arguer's conclusion, in this case, is just that
belief which the arguer believes to be true
and which he wishes others to accept as
well. If asked to justify this belief, the
arguer may provide his reasons for belief or
he may simply assert the belief as
"intuitively" true.
The individual who argues for a moral
belief attempts to justify an "ought" on the
basis of what he feels "is" the case. For
instance, I may say "I feel that it is wrong
to torture children with cattle prods, so you
ought not to torture children with cattle
prods", thereby making a prescriptive,
moral statement by way of a descriptive
one. Arguing for a moral belief entails
working towards the imperative from the
indicative; from what "is" to what "ought"
to be. The move from "is" to "ought"
makes the "is" necessary by universalizing it
and creating a statement with imperative,
or action directing, force. A moral
statement, then, is dependent upon a
statement of (perceived) fact. But this
perceived fact (or premise or reason or
what have you) is subject to acceptance or
rejection as well, and if not accepted as
intuitively true by a listener, the arguer may
be called upon to support his belief in that
"fact" with further reasons. This process of
reason giving (or reasoning) will go on
indefinitely until the arguer and listener
arrive at commonly held beliefs that they
both accept as intuitively true (or until they
agree to disagree). Moral arguments are an
especially clear case in which the
acceptance or rejection of a conclusion is
less dependent upon the reasons given for
that conclusion than on the acceptance or
rejection of certain "moral intuitions"
about what is in fact true or false about the
world.

Now, a Kantian would have us believe that
the process of moral reasoning proceeds in
a straight-forward, deductive, rational
fashion. A person concerned with a moral
question, according to the Kantian, is
capable of deriving his conclusion from
one of the formulations of the "Categorical
Imperative". Any act that is immoral will
undermine the Categorical Imperative and
involve that person in a logical
contradiction. For instance, when a
Kantian asks, "Is it wrong to torture
children with cattle prods?",
his answer might proceed something like
this: "The Categorical Imperative states
that one should act only in a manner such
that an action can be willed as a universal
rule for all of mankind. So, what if
everyone tortured children with cattle
prods? Well, I was once a child. If I was
tortured with a cattle prod I would feel a
lot of physical and emotional pain. Since
pain is something that I wish to avoid, I
cannot possibly will the torturing of
children as a universal rule, since it would
entail willing something for myself that I
do not will for myself. I would, in effect, be
involved in a contradiction. Case closed."
This all seems very "reasonable", but as has
already been pointed out, so are many
other things. A masochist might reason
quite differently and become involved in
no contradiction whatsoever.
But further than this, the Kantian has taken
for granted what is really at issue. From
where does this "Categorical Imperative"
originate, and why should we accept it as a
guiding principle? The Categorical
Imperative sounds strangely similar to one
of those intuitions that you either share or
don't share with someone. To say that it
springs from "pure" reason is like telling
non believers "You are just not thinking
hard enough!", when in fact it is, perhaps,
the Kantian who is not thinking hard
enough about what motivates his desire to
make universal moral statements in the first
place.
The purpose of any moral judgement is to
compel certain human behaviors and to
constrain others, so all moralities are, in
effect, coercive. The argument involved in
justifying an intuition is meant to convince
others that it is proper to act in accordance
with that intuition, so limiting the number
of allowable actions that may be pursued.
The move from "is" to "ought", then,
seems motivated by the desire to control
other people's actions. In any moral debate,
a few people try to get a lot of other people
to constrain their actions.
There is a tremendous power imbalance in
our society. A relatively small group of
people possess the power to influence the
vast majority of people by way of
controlling the legitimate definitions of
correct action. Those few who are allowed
to participate in the battle of competing
moral arguments are the ones who are
entitled to define the permissible realm of
actions in the population. Those trained
and skilled in the use of rationality are the
ones granted access to the moral battlefield,
while those not so trained are locked out of
the arena. Since the ability to use appeals to
rationality can be concentrated in the hands
of the few, training in rationality is an
expedient method to assure that not
everyone will be allowed to have their
voices heard over the din of combat. It is
one of the ways that an unequal power
balance is maintained. To put it simply,
rational arguments are considered
legitimate because only a few people have
the ability to skilfully formulate them, while
intuitive appeals are delegitimated because
many people can convincingly utilize them.
It should be stressed that there is nothing
inherent in rationality that makes it more
coercive than intuition when used in
argument. The point is simply that the
privilege of rationality over intuition is a
convenient method by which to assure that
the many will act in accordance with the
wishes of the few. Since both rational and
intuitive appeals ultimately rest on premises
arrived at intuitively, the privilege of
rational arguments over intuitive ones does
not make the moral debate any less based
in intuition. This privilege does provide an
arbitrary and controllable standard by
which to grant authority to one opinion
over another. The desire to coerce is
exhibited in the desire to make moral
statements. Rationality is simply an
effective way to make a small range of
those moral statements legitimate.
Nietzsche wrote, "The greatest danger that
always hovered over humanity and still
hovers over it is the eruption of madness -
which means the eruption of arbitrariness
in feeling, seeing and hearing, the
enjoyment of the mind's lack of discipline,
the joy of human unreason." Why is the
lack of rationality seen as such a danger?
Well, without the standard of rationality (or
some such controllable standard) to judge
moral arguments by, an effective means of
social control disappears. If "anything is
permitted", then no one has the legitimacy
to control anyone else. There is no "right"
or "wrong", only differing perspectives and
preferences. This is a danger to those who
assert that there exist certain fixed,
absolute, independent and "naturally
occurring" truths because it redistributes
the definitional power previously
concentrated in their hands amongst the
entire population. The perspectival
character of existence is such that no two
interpretations of a situation are equal, and
all interpretations ultimately rest upon
feeling, emotion, intuition and non-rational,
idiosyncratic responses. The implication of
this state of affairs is that no one
perspective has ultimate authority over any
other. What follows for the moral debate is
that the battlefield of conflicting views is
prone to be invaded by those who had
previously been judged "unfit for service".
Such a change would allow for the
dismantling of social hierarchies,
promoting a situation in which all members
of the species would share common
freedom to act and explore the infinite
alternatives and possibilities open to them,
giving us a fuller and richer picture of what
it is to be human.
The creation of, and submission to, moral
judgements is closely associated with men's
tendency to live socially. If social living
depends upon the few coercing the many,
then the elimination of universalized moral
judgements might mean the collapse of
society. But the fear that such an
eventuality inspires is not necessarily well
founded. The only alternative to an unequal
relationship between the few and the many
is not necessarily a "war of one against all".
There are those who see an alternative in
voluntary co-operation between individuals
(the anarchy of Stirner, Proudhon, Bakunin
and more recently Bob Black), and those
who value a kind of individualist, non-
intervention between humans (Nietzsche
and many recent "Post-modern" authors).
The element of coercion may never be
eliminated completely when it comes to the
area of human interaction (simply by
asserting a preference to someone, the seed
of hierarchical ranking seems to be
present), but by eliminating the tendency
towards universalizing intuitions, humans
would be less prone to restrict the available
pool of perspectives on situations and
would in fact be more likely to expand this
pool, resulting in a more diverse, rich and
full picture of the world.
A professor I studied under once said to
me that the more deeply one explores what
it means to be rational and logical, the less
certain one becomes of how to draw the
definitional lines between the rational and
non-rational domains. My reasonable,
Kantian opponent might perhaps still be
unconvinced by my brief monologue, but I
would hope that one thing is very clear.
Without a clear definition of reason and
rationality, the rationalists are fighting a
losing battle against us mighty nihilists. The
nihilistic perspective offers a coherent and,
if you insist, "reasonable" account of the
emergence and use of morality as a social
control device. It offers a damaging critique
of rationalism in general, but also promises
to expand and deepen our understanding
of the world and of humanity.
...But of course, that's just my perspective.

I do not want to wage war against what is ugly.

I do not want to accuse; I do not even want to
accuse those who accuse. Looking away shall be
my only negation.

–Nietzsche, Gay Science

 non serviam #17
Contents: Editor's Word
Chris Sciabarra: Ayn Rand - The Russian
Radical
Editor's Word
_____________
"Stirnerism" exists as a part of many
intellectual movements; Anarchists have
their Stirnerite fringe, there tend to be
some who love Stirner in every libertarian
circle, and Stirnerites often hang out with
Objectivists, as they are the only other ones
who do also speak warmly about
selfishness.
Stirnerite thought is, though, a fringe
minority view in these movements, and –
while acknowledged– is seldom integrated
into the dynamics of these movements'
rhetoric. The lesson is recognized, but not
learned.
When Chris M. Sciabbarra told me a year
ago about a book he was writing, "Ayn
Rand: The Russian Radical", where he
sought to establish Rand's intellectual and
philosophical roots in Russian dialectical
thinking, that immediately struck me as
both a profound insight, and an opening
for an approach from Objectivism to
"Stirnerism". Of particular interest I find
his statement that the dialectical heritage, as
taken up by Rand, is one where mere
interpretation of the world is not enough.
Philosophy must have as its end a praxis.
Mapping this back to Germany of one and
a half century ago, this fits better into the
thoughts of the rebellious young Hegelians
than into the "purer" dialectics of the old
Hegelians.
So I invited Dr. Sciabarra to write a piece
for Non Serviam about the central theses
of his book, the results of which appear
below. And well, as a little sales plug, I can
mention that his book will be available this
August from Penn State Press.
Dr. Sciabarra is a Visiting Scholar in the
New York University Department of
Politics, and has previously authored
"Marx, Hayek, and Utopia".
Have an enjoying read and a good summer!
 Ayn Rand
The Russian Radical
Chris Sciabarra
Ayn Rand is one of the most widely read
philosophers of the twentieth century. Yet,
despite the sale of nearly thirty million
copies of her works, and their translation
into many languages, there have been few
book-length, scholarly examinations of her
thought. My book provides the first
analysis of Rand's Russian roots and of her
place in intellectual history. Its central
theme is captured most fully by the title:
Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical. The book
addresses two fundamental questions:
–In what sense can Rand's philosophy be
understood as a response to her Russian
past?; and
–In what sense can Rand's philosophy be
understood as a contribution to twentieth
century radical social thought?
By answering these questions, I provide a
new interpretation of Rand's Objectivism
with regard to its intellectual origins and its
significance for the history of social theory.
It is my belief that Rand achieved a unique
synthesis that emerged from her rejection--
and absorption--of key elements in the
Russian tradition. What she rejected was
the Marxist and religious content of
Russian thought. What she accepted was
the dialectical revolt against formal dualism.
In her distinctive integration of a libertarian
politics with a dialectical method, Rand
forged a revolutionary link. She projected a
dialectical sensibility while formulating a
fundamentally non-Marxist, radical critique
of statism.
Moreover, the book attempts to grasp
Rand's Objectivism as a developing "text"
over time. The existential conditions from
which it emerged and to which it speaks are
partially constitutive of its very significance.
By grasping these conditions and factors,
my book provides an enriched appreciation
of Rand's contributions.
Rand was born and reared during a
revolutionary period in Russian history.
That context is the key to understanding
the peculiar character of her philosophy,
her essentially dialectical mode of inquiry,
and her radical critique of power relations
in contemporary statist society. By the time
she graduated from the University of
Leningrad in 1924, Rand had been exposed
to a dialectical revolt against dualism that
profoundly influenced her literary craft and
philosophical project.
In the book, I explore Objectivism on
three distinct levels: (1) its intellectual
roots, (2) its formal structure, and (3) its
radical social implications.
Rand's Russian nature was not reflected
merely in her heavy foreign accent or in the
mammoth size of her novels. She was
Russian in more fundamental ways. In the
sweeping character of her generalizations,
and in her passionate commitment to the
practical realization of her ideals, Rand was
fully within the Russian literary and
philosophic tradition. Like most of Russia's
great literary figures, she was an artist,
social critic, and non-academic philosopher
who constructed a broad synthesis in her
battle against the traditional antinomies in
Western thought: mind vs. body, fact vs.
value, theory vs. practice, reason vs.
emotion, rationalism vs. empiricism,
idealism vs. materialism, etc. And like most
of Russia's indigenous philosophers, she
presented an exhaustive, all-encompassing
theoretical totality. Her system is as much
defined by what she accepted in Russian
thought as by what she rejected. In her
intellectual evolution, Rand both absorbed
and abolished, preserved and transcended,
the elements of her Russian past.
In Part One, I discuss the process by which
this assimilation may have taken place.
Though Rand used genuinely inductive and
deductive techniques to fashion her unique
synthesis, she also responded to real,
concrete circumstances. Abstracting Rand's
philosophy from this context damages our
understanding of its historical importance.
Living in Russia during its celebrated Silver
Age, Rand witnessed a burst of
Nietzschean and neo-Hegelian thought: the
Symbolist movement, Russian Religious
Renaissance, and Russian Marxism each
attempted to resolve various manifestations
of dualism. Rand's most memorable
philosophy professor at Leningrad
University was N. O. Lossky, the
distinguished Hegelian neo-Idealist. My
book examines the motif of synthesis in
Russian culture, and in Lossky's thought,
and, by relying on new historical evidence,
it documents the means by which Rand
may have absorbed such themes.
I contend that Rand's revolt against
dualism was the central animating force of
her project. Hence, in Part Two, my focus
switches from the historical to the
synchronic. I examine the formal structure
and content of Rand's system. Part Two
reconstructs Rand's project in each of the
major branches of philosophy: ontology,
epistemology, philosophical psychology,
aesthetics, ethics, and politics. I argue that
Objectivism is inherently dialectical and
non-dualistic.
In Part Three, I examine Rand's radical
assessment of the nature of power as
manifested in all social practices and
institutions. I scrutinize Rand's attempt to
trace the internal relations between culture,
education, sex, race, and the neo-fascist
welfare-warfare state.
DIALECTICS
IN RAND'S PHILOSOPHY
To claim that Rand is a "dialectical" thinker
requires some elucidation. The best way in
which to understand the dialectical impulse,
is to view it as a technique to overcome
formal dualism and monistic reductionism.
Dualism attempts to distinguish two
mutually exclusive spheres, though it often
leads theorists to emphasize one sphere to
the detriment of another. In this regard,
one can differentiate between genuine
philosophical dualists who see two, co-
equal principles at work, and philosophical
monists, who accept the dichotomies
defined by dualists, and reduce one polarity
to an epiphenomenon of the other. Wolf
Heydebrand explains that these dualistic
forms can be found in nearly every branch
of philosophy: in ontology, in the radical
separation of body and mind, or matter and
consciousness; in epistemology, in the
radical separation of the real object and the
datum present to the knowing mind; in
ethics, in the radical distinction between
good and evil.
Dialectical method is neither dualistic nor
monistic. A thinker who employs a
dialectical method does not embrace either
pole of a duality, nor the middle of two
polar extremes. Rather, the dialectical
method anchors the thinker to both camps.
The dialectical thinker refuses to recognize
these camps as mutually exclusive or
exhaustive. He or she strives to uncover
the common roots of apparent opposites.
He or she presents an integrated alternative
that examines the premises at the base of
an opposition as a means to its
transcendence. In some cases, the
transcendence of opposing points of view
provides a justification for rejecting both
alternatives as false. In other cases, the
dialectical thinker attempts to clarify the
genuinely integral relationship between
spheres that are ordinarily kept separate
and distinct.
In Rand's work, this transcendence of
opposites is manifest in every branch of
philosophy. Rand's revolt against formal
dualism is illustrated in her rejection of
such "false alternatives" as materialism and
idealism, intrinsicism (or old-style, classical
"objectivism") and subjectivism,
rationalism and empiricism. Rand was fond
of using, what Thorslev has called, a "Both-
And" formulation in her critique of
dualism. Typically, Rand argues that Both
X And Y share a common premise, Z. Her
characteristic expression is: "Just as X
depends upon Z, so too does Y depend
upon Z." Moreover, Rand always views the
polarities as "mutually" or "reciprocally
reinforcing," "two sides of the same coin."
This is not merely an expository technique.
Rand was the first to admit that a writer's
style is a product of his or her "psycho-
epistemology" or method of awareness. By
her own suggestion, one can infer that such
an expository style reflects a genuinely
dialectical methodology.
Rand's resolution aims to transcend the
limitations that, she believes, traditional
dichotomies embody. In some instances,
Rand sees each of the opposing points of
view as being half-right and half-wrong.
Her dialectical approach also recognizes the
integral relationships of mind and body,
reason and emotion, fact and value, theory
and practice. For Rand, these factors are
distinctions within an organic unity.
Neither can be fully understood in the
absence of the other since each is an
inseparable aspect of a wider totality.
It is this emphasis on the totality that is
essential to the dialectical mode of inquiry.
Dialectics is not merely a repudiation of
formal dualism. It is a method that
preserves the analytical integrity of the
whole. While it recommends study of the
whole from the vantage point of any part, it
eschews reification, that is, it avoids the
abstraction of a part from the whole and its
illegitimate conceptualization as a whole
unto itself. The dialectical method
recognizes that what is separable in thought
is not separable in reality.
Moreover, dialectics requires the
examination of the whole both systemically
and historically. From a systemic
perspective, it grasps the parts as
structurally interrelated, or "internally
related," both constituting the whole, while
being constituted by it. For example, Rand,
as a dialectical thinker, would not
disconnect any single theoretical issue, such
as the problem of free will, from its
broader philosophic context. She
necessarily examines a host of connected
issues, including the efficacy of
consciousness, the nature of causality, and
the reciprocal relationships between
epistemology, ethics, and politics.
From a historical perspective, dialectics
grasps that any system emerges over time,
that it has a past, a present, and a future.
Frequently, the dialectical thinker examines
the dynamic tensions within a system, the
internal conflicts or "contradictions" which
require resolution. He or she refuses to
disconnect factors, events, problems, and
issues from each other or from the system
which they jointly constitute. He or she
views social problems not discretely, but in
terms of the root systemic conditions
which they both reflect and sustain.

The dialectical thinker seeks not merely to
understand the system, but to alter it
fundamentally. Hence, a dialectical analysis
is both critical and revolutionary in its
implications. Thus, Rand, as a dialectical
thinker, does not analyze a specific racial
conflict, for example, without examining a
host of historically-constituted epistemic,
ethical, psychological, cultural, political, and
economic factors that both generate
racism--and perpetuate it. In Rand's view,
racism--like all vestiges of statism--must be
transcended systemically.
The dialectical sensibility then, is readily
apparent in every aspect of Rand's project,
in her literary credo, philosophic approach,
and social analysis.
From a literary standpoint, Rand
recognized her own novels as organic
wholes in which every event and character
was expressive of the central theme.
Moreover, her fiction was integral to the
evolution of her grand philosophic
synthesis.
Philosophically, Rand recognized
Objectivism as a coherent, integrated
system of thought, such that each branch
could not be taken in isolation from the
others. Her theories provide a basis for
both critical analysis and revolutionary
social transformation.
And from the perspective of social theory,
Rand's analysis of contemporary society
was multi-dimensional and fully integrative.
Rand focused on relationships of power,
examining their historical genesis and their
long-term deleterious effects on the
stability and cohesiveness of the social
order. She refused to view societal
problems as separate from one another,
and proposed a resolution which was
comprehensive and fundamentally radical
in its implications. In Rand's view, every
aspect of the totality was both a
precondition and effect of every other
aspect, and their joint constitution as a
totality.
Thus, Rand's dialectical method was
dynamic, relational, and contextual. It was
dynamic because it viewed specific factors
in terms of their movement over time. It
was relational because it traced the inter-
relations between and among factors. It
was contextual because it related these
factors to their wider, systemic context.
THEORY AND PRACTICE
One area that is of particular interest to
dialectical thinking is the synthesis of
theory and practice. Their unity was one of
the most significant themes in the history
of Russian thought. Nearly every great
Russian writer embraced a critical praxis as
the central, motivating task of philosophy.
Theoretical contemplation was considered
incomplete and one-dimensional; it
required consummation in the quest for
truth-justice (iskaniye pravdy). This cultural
predisposition toward political criticism
and action provided fertile ground for the
implantation of Marx's revolutionary
doctrine, encapsulated in the credo: "The
philosophers have only interpreted the
world in various ways; the point is to
change it."
Ayn Rand gives full expression to this
radical, dialectical impulse in Russian
thought. She recognized that philosophical
contemplation was insufficient. Her initial
theoretical musings emerged as a response
to the dualities she confronted in the
Russia of her youth. Her positive
formulations constituted a critical revolt
against Russian religious mysticism and
communist politics. Just as Marx's
dialectical method was "in its essence
critical and revolutionary," so Rand's
dialectical sensibility led her toward a
comparable, radical resolution. But Rand's
project was neither theocratic nor
communist in its political implications; it
was profoundly secular, humanistic, and
libertarian.
Like her dialectical forebears, Rand refused
to disconnect any part from the totality
which gave it meaning. Rand's critical
method recognized the fundamental
relatedness of all social phenomena. She
adamantly opposed reification in social
inquiry. Where some attempted to
universalize a historically specific concrete,
Rand saw "frozen abstractions." Where
others asserted certain premises as true and
without need of proof, Rand saw "frozen
absolutes" and "false axioms." Where still
others sought to combine two or more
issues which needed to be analyzed and
considered separately, Rand saw "package-
dealing." She rejected the modern tendency
to "think in a square," the contemporary
disposition to accept a constricted, narrow
definition of a social problem, without
understanding the principles underlying the
issue, or the various links between issues.
Everywhere that she looked, Rand
attempted to identify the principles which
united seemingly separate and fragmented
spheres of human existence. She observed
facts, identified the essential issues,
integrated the data from diverse areas of
inquiry, and articulated the basic principles
at work. Her dialectical methods uncovered
startling connections between economics,
psychology, sex, art, politics, and ideology.
Rand's dialectical assault on contemporary
statist relations of power is a case in point.
This analysis can be comprehended on
three distinct levels. While it is possible to
abstract and isolate these various aspects, it
must be understood that they are
interrelated constituents of a single totality.
Below is a diagram of how Rand
conceptualized such power relations.
RAND'S MULTI-LEVEL ANALYSIS OF
POWER RELATIONS
| LEVEL THREE (L3): STRUCTURAL |
| (ECONOMIC/POLITICAL) |
| | |
| | |
| LEVEL TWO (L2): CULTURAL
|
| (LINGUISTIC/IDEOLOGICAL)
|
| | |
| | |
| LEVEL ONE (L1): PERSONAL
|
(PSYCHO-
EPISTEMOLOGICAL/ETHICAL)
On L1, Rand examines relations of power
between persons. She focuses on the
psycho-epistemological and ethical
principles at work in exploitative inter-
personal relations. The psycho-epistemic
and normative aspects are two, coextensive
vantage points on the same phenomenon.
These aspects are so closely related that
they constitute a double-edged sword. On
this first level of analysis, Rand
comprehends the significance of the
master-slave duality (how each presupposes
and requires the other), the "sanction of
the victim," and human alienation.
On L2, Rand considers many of these
distortions in social interaction as by-
products and reflections of cultural
practices. She argues that modern
intellectuals have mounted an assault on
the integrity of concepts and language
which has the effect of ideologically
legitimating social, political, and economic
exploitation. She traces the impact of such
conceptual (or "anti-conceptual") and
linguistic subversions on every area of
culture, including art, literature, music,
education, religion, sex, and race.
On L3, Rand views exploitative social
relations within the structural context of
statist interventionism. The relations of
power at this level are mediated through a
variety of economic and political structures
and institutional processes. Rand examines
the essential role of the predatory state in
creating conditions of economic
dislocation, class (both inter-group and
intra-group) struggle, social fragmentation,
and brutality.
Each of these three levels of analysis seeks
to uncover another facet of modern statist
power relations. Each is internally related
to and implicit in the others. Each level
incorporates personal, cultural, and
structural dimensions. Each level is a
relation between real people. Thus:
–The codependent relationship of master
and slave (L1) is reproduced on a cultural
level (L2), and on a structural level (L3);
–The distortion of concepts and language
(L2) provides ideological legitimation for
the codependency relationship (L1) and for
the structural context within which it
occurs (L3);
–The sustenance of the predatory state (L3)
requires individuals whose autonomy has
been fundamentally thwarted (L1) and
whose conceptual and linguistic practices
have been distorted (L2).
For every problem that Rand analyzes, one
can see these three levels at work. In my
book, I document many examples, the
most prominent of which is the issue of
racism.
What must be emphasized is that for Rand,
the goal of all social analysis is
emancipatory. In each aspect of her
developed critique, change and
transcendence beckon. Rand proudly
declared that she was a philosophical
"innovator" and a "radical" for capitalism,
with everything that this implied. She wore
these labels as terms "of distinction . . . of
honor, rather than something to hide or
apologize for." In keeping with her
revolutionary fervor, she sought to uncover
the "fundamental" roots of contemporary
social problems, "boldly proclaiming a full,
consistent, and radical alternative" to the
status quo.
---------------------
All endnotes have been deleted for the
purposes of this abridged introduction. All
material: Copyright 1995 by Chris M.
Sciabarra

The self must become concrete, and this it becomes through the process of action. [...]
[T]he abstract man, as only general self, is abstract as long as he is not yet a proprietor.
Only as proprietor is man a particular and real man.

–August von Cieszkowski

In 'Teleology of world history',
ch.3, "Prolegomena to Historiosophie"