Wednesday, August 13, 2008

Anarchy





Anarchy means "without leaders"; not "without order"


That’s what V says in 'V for Vendetta' and I think I share his view on these.

In these first few days of my MBA I realized this.
Whenever I was put into groups I always fought the leader or rather the emergence of one. Well that’s strange for me because I don’t have any leadership skills nor the desire to be the leader. So why the need for all that? But then I realized that it’s the emergence of leader and not the place of one that I fight. And that’s because I don’t want one, I’m an anarchist.

And that’s where people don’t understand me, either they think that I fight the leader because I want to be one or they think that I prefer some kind of lawless or order less state where there is chaos all around. That they will be no order if there is no leader. But this is where they go wrong.
There has to be decisions made and somebody has to take them but you don’t need a leader to take them. If the group is functional it can take them.

Here’s what Wikipedia has to say about it –



Anarchy (from Greek: anarchía, "without ruler") may refer to any of the following: · "Absence of government; a state of lawlessness due to the absence or inefficiency of the supreme power; political disorder." · "A theoretical social state in which there is no governing person or body of persons, but each individual has absolute liberty (without the implication of disorder)." · "Absence or non-recognition of authority and order in any given sphere." It should be noted that "ruler," if used in the context of the third bullet point, has no explicit connection to the term "rules." In an anarchy, as defined by the last bullet point, it is possible to have rules (laws); however, these must be agreed upon by the participants in the system, and not imposed from above by a ruler (leader, authority). Some languages, such as Norwegian have two separate words for the two meanings. A state, free from coercive authority of any kind, is the goal of proponents of the political philosophy of anarchism (anarchists).

You don’t have view people as a herd who have to follow their shepherd to get somewhere, but as parts which come together to build something more than just the sum total of parts. And this body, this machine can go together to the place it likes with no one taking the decision for another and everybody taking decisions for the whole.

And this is what I like; I can get along with people, sacrifice and curb my own sentiments to go along what everyone decides. But what I hate is to be told what to do by someone, especially when I have no say in the decision or the authority to challenge it. And I want the same for others too; I don’t want to tell anything to anyone. But the basic premise here is that the other members in the group are sensible, thinking and value their autonomy as I do mine. Plus they don’t have the herd mentality or need to be told what to do. And of course no real benefits for being the leader.

And these of course are not attainable in real life, or maybe difficult to attain. And this is my fight all about. These things I keep fighting and will continue to do till I can, or maybe till I don’t become the herd or shepherd myself. But my basic fight maybe all about is to make people understand that they don’t need a leader to go somewhere, everybody together can do it as good as any leader.

And to highlight the basic problem in people I quote this dialogue from ‘The Joker’ or Late ‘Heath Ledger’ (May his Soul rest in peace).


“You see, nobody panics when things go according to plan. Even if the plan is horrifying. If I told people that a gangbanger was going to get shot, or a busload of soldiers was going to get blown up, nobody would panic. Because it's all part of the plan.. But when I say one little old mayor will die, everyone loses their minds!!
Introduce a little anarchy, you upset the established order, and everything becomes chaos. I am an agent of chaos. And you know the thing about chaos, Harvey? It’s fair!”