User talk:Miguel/Sam Spade

why be hostile?

Moved from User talk:Miguel on 16:14, 2004 Mar 6 (UTC)

I think we both want what is best for the article. One of the things that is good for the article is for us not to be flaming one another. I want the article to make sense to you, to me, and to completely uninformed readers, and well as partisans and experts. IMO NPOV is achieved when nobody can reasonably dispute what is said. Clearly that is not the case at this time, on these articles.

Clearly you don't understand that I don't think your objections are reasonable.

I do understand that, but I do not agree.

I probably came across badly by assuming bad faith. I appologise. I am begining to get the impression that you are not so much intentionally trying to misinform as that your usage of terms is so idiosyncratic as to be nearly meaningless to me.

My usage of terms is not idyosincratic, it is mainstream outside your own segment of the US political spectrum.

I fear you are correct, particularly in regards to the EU.

Fear? Why do you find that idea threatening? And it is not in regards to the EU, but also most of Latin America and the whole 3rd world, for that matter.

I admit my relative ignorance of these ideologies. I am sincerely trying to learn about them. Thats one reason I love encyclopedias, is that I love to learn. Another reason I love them is that they are a bastion of objective truth.

If you don't know about these theories, by your own admission, then how can you honestly claim that the article is misleading?

Because it fails to inform me, and it uses terms in a way I cannot reconcile with references.

We have gone to extreme lengths, in anarchy, anomie, quoting the CIA World Factbook and the Oxford English Dictionary... Maybe you should expand your list of references?

Please, lets do everything within our power to do what is best for the article, and leave our political and other differences aside. I feel strongly that it is possible to work with those you disagree with, and even that divergent POV can assist the article in becomming NPOV by satisfying all sides. Please accept my appology for my agressive demeanor, and my word of good faith in wishing to work towards a quality article we can all be proud of. If we can't work w/o hierarchy to make this a quality article, it certainly doesn't augure well for anarchism in general. On the other hand... :) Sam Spade 04:21, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

You are a moving target, every time anyone addresses your unfounded concerns you come up with another equally unfounded concern out of nowhere.

It makes me sad that you feel my concerns are unfounded. Do you sincerely prefer to leave me (and my segment of the US population) uninformed?

They are unfounded because your single complaint is "what you wrote fails to convince me" or, equivalently, "this is totally opposed to my POV".

Your problem is that the content of the article is so contrary to what you believe to be correct that you cannot possibly fathom the notion that the article might already be describing legitimate political theories in neutral terms. Educate yourself! — Miguel 17:05, 2004 Mar 5 (UTC)

I am quite confident of my ability to learn. Learning is perhaps my primary goal in this existence, or at least a necessary part of my primary goal. It is the very attempt to educate myself (by reading the disputed articles) that caused the current trouble. I am reviewing outside sources, and I am becoming steadilly more educated. I understand that you do not wish to be a part of informing me. I also understand that I have upset you. I ask you to reconsider your decisions, but I also accept that you likely will not, and I again appologise for all unpleasentries, misunderstandings, accusations and awkward moments I may have caused. Believe me that I have been at all times sincere, and that I am sincere now in wishing you well. Sam Spade 20:50, 5 Mar 2004 (UTC)

If you want to educate yourself, why not start with A People's History of the United States, by Howard Zinn? I guarantee you it will be diametrically opposed to what you learnt in civics class, but please don't claim the book is Orwellian, because then the bottom will drop on your credibility.

I am not quite so confident of your ability to learn things that are contrary to what you already know (which would then force you to reevaluate what you know). You sound a lot like a common-sense conservative. Nothing wrong with conservatism IMHO, but there is no way to argue rationally against "common sense". If you don't agree with my description of your position you need to change your attitude and manners a little. In particular you need to stop seeing communist double-speak and Orwellian conspiracies everywhere and give people the benefit of the doubt. Maybe they're onto something. — Miguel 01:38, 2004 Mar 6 (UTC)

First of all, thank you for deciding to continue to communicate. Secondly, things are much more complicated than you seem to be suggesting ;).

My politics to not fit into any catagories that I know of, with the possible exceptions of radical and populist, which are broad. I took this test (http://www.politicalcompass.org/) and it told me that I am left/authoritarian. I do believe in common sense, but I disagree with essentially every position presented under "common-sense conservative", and I am neither a republican or a neo-con.

While I may have been impolite (I again apologise for assuming bad faith), my objections to the articles remain. My current impression is that those who believe in these Marxist/Anarchist type philosophies are sincere, and are also sincerely mistaken. I have been discussing this with everyone willing (and my friends are quite a bit more diverse than you may assume), and I have found a concensus.

It would appear that the lust for power and greed innate in the human spirit is not taken into account by those who ascribe to these "anarcho-communist" ideologies. Incentive is removed, as is the entreprenuerial spirit, both vital components of sucessful economics. No explanation as to the method of distribution, nor the removal of the means of production, nor the method of extracting labor is made.

I will look for your book, but do not assume it will be the start of my education on this subject. I have been studying Anarchism since I was less than 10 years old (reading encyclopdias has always been a hobby of mine:). I have had dozens of anarchist and/or socialist friends. I have read the Communist Manifesto by Marx and Engels. To be frank, I think my "ignorance" of how these theories are supposed to work (other than by leading to Totalitarianism) is based on overwhelming documentation, not from a lack of it.

I too am idealistic. I see a need for mandatory medical care, housing, work, and guidence for all. I also see a need for freedom, incentive, entreprenuership, and hierarchy. And I see a need for God. The need for focus on God in all things is disregarded in communism. God guides us to share what we have, and to care for others, not Marxism. Marxism only decieves, providing opium dreams of utopia to distract from the decent into stalinism.

I would like it if you did not leave the anarcho-communism pages. If it does not distress you over much, I would like you to be a part of its repair. I in no way intend to remove what I see as POV or propoganda. Rather I intend to word it in a NPOV manner, and evaluate it coherantly with legitamate, verifiable criticism. I am no bigot, no partisan. I want only coherent truth, verifiabity, and an article we can all agree with. :) Sam Spade 02:22, 6 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Anarchism is not and Anarcho-communism page, the way libertarian socialism could be argued to be. I am not involved in the latter because I do not know enough about the details of it.

You keep calling anything you disagree with, can't understant, or is contrary to your basic assumptions "what I see as POV or propaganda". First, "propaganda" is not the same as a POV. Second, describing a POV is not the same thing as writing from that POV. The first is NPOV, the second is not. Third, part of the problem might be our emphasis on absolute truth. I would also help if you would stop shielding every one of yor comments on talk pages behind the words "NPOV" and "verifiability". As an example, there is nothing on the anarchism article that I don't know to be verifiable, by the way, and your insistence on including certain examples of "chaos" as "anarchist organization" befuddles me. As Toby pointed out, a country descending into chaos without the intervention of self-described anarchists, and which organizes itself on the basis of brute force exercised by warlords does not fit anyone's definition of anarchism. If you want to put those examples in anarchy, fine, but then they are examples of anomie, which is one of the meanings of anarchy despite your protests to the contrary.

To summarize, anarchism is nothing more that the political theory based on "anarchy as an organizing principle". By the way, I will NOT go back to the anarchism page, which IMHO is now in a pristine state except for the "anarchist movements" section and the incomplete discussion of theories of anarchist organization. And that's all I have to say about this whole deal. — Miguel 16:36, 2004 Mar 6 (UTC)

So where do we start?

And the answer is NOT "anarchism".