this post was submitted on 06 May 2026
46 points (83.8% liked)
Memes
55674 readers
506 users here now
Rules:
- Be civil and nice.
- Try not to excessively repost, as a rule of thumb, wait at least 2 months to do it if you have to.
founded 7 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
We're not here to be liked. We're here to destroy hierarchy and its inherent oppression of life.
Marx is talking about Bakunin, not you
The question anarchists never seem to ask themselves is why hierarchies form in the first place, and what problem they solve. There’s a reason why in over a century of anarchist theory, no large scale or long lived applications of these ideas exist in the real world.
Hierarchies play a structural purpose facilitating scaling of organization. These are cognitive and organizational tools that enable large groups to coordinate effectively. It’s a form of abstraction, providing mental shortcuts that enable us to engage with complex systems at a meaningful level of detail, without being overwhelmed by their inner workings. Our ability to abstract is what allows us to manage the near infinite complexity of the world.
We don’t perceive people as trillions of individual molecules. Instead, we view them as individuals with intentions, ideas, and actions. Doing so allows us to focus our attention on relevant interactions rather than microscopic details. In fact, focusing on a manageable level of detail also governs our self-perception as well. Our minds don’t concern themselves with the granular operation of our organs, digestion, blood flow, or muscle contractions within our bodies. The decision to pick up a cup is processed at the level of intent, not the orchestration of muscular movements required to accomplish the task.
Similarly, using a phone app for internet browsing involves operating at an abstract level, interacting with website addresses and content, rather than the complexities of phone hardware, software execution, or network protocols. This abstraction allows us to utilize sophisticated tools effectively by focusing on the relevant layer of interaction.
The same principle applies to groups of people trying to accomplish a shared task. A team working on a shared goal can be viewed as a single unit. Outsiders don’t need to know every internal decision or workflow. They only need to understand the group’s inputs and outputs in order to engage with it effectively. This abstraction is enabled through delegation where groups nominate representatives to interface with other groups, and these representatives can then form higher-level teams of their own. These nested layers allow organizations to scale without requiring everyone to grasp every detail of every project.
Hierarchies naturally arise in systems that necessitate both specialized labor and complex coordination. We can see an example of this when we examine the multifaceted operations within a manufacturing plant. Instead of each worker individually constructing an entire product, the workflow is partitioned into distinct sets of responsibilities.
The production of any product involves a series of key roles. Design engineers initiate the process by conceptualizing and blueprinting the product, detailing specifications for each component. Material handlers then take over, procuring and transporting the necessary raw materials to various workstations. On the assembly line, teams of workers are responsible for producing individual parts and their assembly into the final product. Simultaneously, specialized technicians maintain the machinery for continuous operation. Quality control inspectors ensure standards are met by examining finished goods at various stages. Supervisors play a crucial role in overseeing specific sections of the production line, ensuring adherence to schedules and acting as communication nodes for their teams, addressing immediate issues. Ultimately, production managers coordinate the entire flow of work across departments, optimizing resource allocation and ensuring that all production stages align with overall targets.
A hierarchical structure, with its clear division of labor and defined lines of authority, maximizes efficiency by allowing individuals to develop deep expertise in their specific roles while establishing clear channels for communication and accountability across the entire production process. The partitioning of work arises out of strategic necessity for managing the complexity inherent in large-scale manufacturing. As a direct consequence of this inherent demand for both focused expertise and effective collaboration, a selection pressure emerges that favors the hierarchical organizational model. The example of the advantages observed in structured production environments are not unique to manufacturing. Hierarchies are a common feature across diverse industries, political structures, and pretty much every type of endeavor where large numbers of people with different types of skills need to collaborate to achieve common goals.
Conversely, the limitations of horizontal structures become apparent when considering communication overhead. In a flat organization, every decision requires consensus among all members. Meetings grow unproductive as more people join, and time is inevitably wasted on debates irrelevant to most participants. Specialists spend hours explaining context to non-experts, making any meaningful progress impossible. Countless studies show that large groups of people struggle to function horizontally. Complex tasks, like coordinating a national healthcare system or a general strike, demand roles and delegation. Hierarchies streamline communication by compartmentalizing responsibilities where engineers can focus on technical problems, organizers on logistics, and representatives on inter-group coordination.
The same need for managing complexity through structured roles extends to the realm of political organization. A party acts as a hierarchical abstraction layer. It synthesizes grassroots input into actionable policies, balancing decision making with accountability through feedback from below. Centralizing expertise allows for efficient use of resources necessary for effective action. The division of labor afforded by hierarchies allows movements to manage complexity, specialize labor, and act decisively. Meanwhile, flat structures limit organizing potential to small, disconnected groups that cannot meaningfully challenge existing power structures which are themselves hierarchical.
Anarchists tend to argue that hierarchy necessarily leads to oppression, but this conflates hierarchy as a structural tool with the way this tool is applied under capitalism. The actual problem lies with lack of accountability of those at the top of the hierarchy to those at the bottom within power structures that serve private profit rather than collective needs.
You guys gotta a get rid of the butthole logo
Butthole is not negotiable.
fair enough. most communists want to achieve a stateless society.
(as long as you are not the ancap/anarcholib type, all love retracted from those)
Fuck ancaps, its wild that they even exist.
Yes the terrible oppression of the child by their parent, the nurse by the doctor, the nuclear power janitorial staff by the safety staff
epistemic authority ≠ oppressive hierarchy - stop with the strawmans and go read some theory..
I’ve read anarchist theory, from Bakunin to Kropotkin to Stirner and beyond. My disagreement is not because I have failed to encounter “theory”; it is because I find anarchist theory weak, abstract, and far less applicable to actual social transformation than the Marxist tradition of scientific socialism.
And no, it was not a straw man. The claim made was not “some hierarchies are oppressive” or “illegitimate authority should be abolished.” The claim was that hierarchy is inherently oppressive. That is a much stronger and much worse claim.
If hierarchy as such is inherently oppressive, then the relation of parent and child, doctor and nurse, teacher and student, engineer and apprentice, safety inspector and worker, commander and soldier, party and masses, all become oppressive by definition. That is obviously false. These are not all the same social relation. Their content depends on material conditions, class character, function, ownership, accountability, and historical role.
What you are doing by saying “epistemic authority ≠ oppressive hierarchy” is the same semantic retreat anarchists have hid behind for generations. The moment useful, necessary, or socially productive hierarchy appears, you rename it “epistemic authority,” “coordination,” “expertise,” “delegation,” or some other softer term, then pretend it is no longer hierarchy. But changing the label does not change the social relation. As Engels put it: “These gentlemen think that when they have changed the names of things they have changed the things themselves.”
A useful analysis does not ask whether “hierarchy” exists in the abstract. It asks: what kind of authority, serving which class, under what mode of production, with what relation to property, discipline, expertise, coercion, and social necessity?
A capitalist boss commanding workers for private profit is not the same thing as a surgeon directing an operating room, a revolutionary army maintaining discipline, or a workers’ state organizing production and defense. Treating all hierarchy as inherently oppressive collapses real material distinctions into moralistic abstraction.
That is in my view the core weakness of anarchism: it mistakes the abolition of domination for the abolition of hierarchy (and thus authority) as such. The aim should be to abolish class rule, exploitation, and the material basis of oppression. Not to pretend complex society can function without organization, discipline, expertise, or authority. The question thus is not whether authority and as such hierarchy exists. It is which class controls it, for what purpose, and under what social relations.
I won't retread what QinShiHuangsSchlong already said very well, I want to expand by saying I don't find it compelling at all when someone uses the "read theory" argument. Essentially, it says "I can't argue with you well, so I recommend you look into those who can." Demeaning someone and then giving them homework is a horrible way to get them to do so!
One of the best ways to comprehend theory is to try to simplify it for others, and be capable of clearly expressing your points without relying on "quote-mining" or "phrasemongering."
This isn't an argument against theory, but in favor of more effective discussion, as I was once extremely guilty of dumping recommendations for Marxist theory without properly explaining it, causing the argument to slide off like water on a windowpane. It also assumes a lack of competence on the other party's part, which can quickly backfire if it indeed turns out that they know what they are talking about (such as QinShiHuangsSchlong here).
Frankly, I feel like I'm alone in this take, but I think people shouldn't spend so much attention basing their politics primarily on references to philosophers who died more than a century prior.
These are important figures for historical study, but we don't base our modern understanding about genetics on the work of Darwin and Mendel: we base these on the work of Watson, and Crick, and Franklin, and Margulis, and Sanger, and hundreds (or thousands) of people who carried the work forward since.
We still teach starting with the early folks to give context. But they aren't the basis for our beliefs.
This goes for Marxists AND anarchists (and everyone else): sell your ideas in the modern age.
Domenico Losurdo, Michael Parenti, Assata Shakur, J. Sakai, Frantz Fanon, Antonio Gramsci, Roland Boer, Jones Manoel, Mao ZeDong, Xi Jinping, Deng Xiaoping, Chen Yun, Cheng Enfu, Li Shenming, Wang Weiguang, Hou Huiqin, Zhang Weiwei, Samir Amin, Walter Rodney, Vijay Prashad, Gabriel Rockhill, Zak Cope, John Bellamy Foster etc.
Foundational theory also clearly still applies unlike much of early genetics work:
Marx’s theory of surplus value, the value produced by labor still exceeds the wages paid to workers, resulting in profit for capitalists.
Marx’s theory of class struggle society is still shaped by antagonistic class interests.
Marx and Engels’ theory of the state, the state still remains in place protecting class rule and property relations.
Lenin’s theory of imperialism, monopoly capital, finance capital, export of capital, sanctions, debt, unequal exchange, and spheres of influence are still central to the world system.
Marx’s theory of capitalist crisis, capitalism still produces recurring crises, unemployment, overproduction, austerity, and financial instability.
Engels’ argument in On Authority, revolution, large-scale production, war, and state power cannot be handled through pure spontaneity or anti-organizational moralism.
Marx and Engels’ theory of ideology, ruling-class ideas still dominate media, education, culture, academia, and “common sense.”
Lenin’s theory of organization, capitalism is organized, armed, global, and disciplined, so serious opposition to it also requires organization, strategy, and discipline.
And so on...
Marxism is not mainly a list of old opinions; it is a method for studying society, class power, exploitation, imperialism, ideology, and historical change. In that sense it is less like treating Darwin or Mendel as the final word on genetics, and more like still learning Newtonian mechanics in physics. Newton was not the final word, but you do not understand physics by skipping the foundations.
Also, most people do not actually have a meaningful grasp of the foundational works in the first place. They have half-remembered summaries, liberal caricatures, or internet slogans. And Marxism has not been “superseded” as capitalism’s core relations remain intact across much of the world: wage labour, surplus value extraction, class rule, imperialism, and crisis. Much of the foundation is still clearly very relevant.
I want to clarify my point. I'm definitely not dismissing the importance of these figures or the value of reading them.
What I'm saying is that I think people put too much emphasis on what their opinions were rather than just learning from their ideas and synthesizing them with the ideas of their contemporaries and intellectual progenitors.
To go back to my example, there's a meme among creationists that Charles Darwin recanted his theory of evolution on his deathbed. It's baseless, but more importantly it's irrelevant. The value of his ideas are not dependent on what he believed. He's notable because he contributed to a framework on which we hang a larger understanding.
Similarly, I think Marx et. al. contributed ideas that are still very useful to our collective discourse. But their opinions are not prophesy, and I think people should focus more on the collective wisdom of the fields that they birthed rather than the specific opinions they personally held.
QinShiHuangsSchlong beat me to the punch, there are countless modern Marxists and Marxists since Lenin that have continued to apply the Marxist method to new eras and new conditions. Marxism-Leninism is referred to as an immortal science because it's based on an ever-adapting framework for understanding the world, dialectical materialism, which in all this time have proven adaptable and fundamentally correct. We may teach Marxism in a new way with new conditions as we discover new eras, but the baseline is still applicable and necessary.
Perhaps I didn't communicate this well, but that was kind of central to my point: the work they did has grown enough beyond their initial writings that we don't really need to fixate so much on the original texts.
For instance, I really liked China Mieville's "A Specter, Haunting". He kind of summarized The Communist Manifesto, and I thought it was more readable than the original. It was easier for me to engage with, and he placed it in modern context.
To put my point another way, I think we should focus more on the ideas rather than the thinkers.
You can smug post all you like doesn't make this
any less silly and detached from reality.
Not really, all of you love to be disingenuous and apply what I said to random shit and not human constructs to make it appear silly so you feel superior instead of directly engaging with what I said.
They are all directly engaging with your claim and disproving via instances of human hierarchy that exist.
I did engage I provided examples off the top of my head of non oppressive (and some would say necessary/positive) hierarchy. You're the one refusing to engage, smug posting instead of engaging with the fact that if non oppressive (or necessary/positive) hierarchy exists then the idea that hierarchy is inherently oppressive is silly. I also engaged by further expanding my thoughts in the reply to zeezee on top of engaging with the idea of "epistemic-authority" and how in my view that is merely a semantic retreat substitutimg changing the name for changing the thing.
This was not engaging it was mocking, you can fuck around all you want I see what you are doing.
Definitely not the most polite tone you're right maybe I was being a bit mean but it was still engaging with your point more than your smug posting reply was engaging with anything at least.
I'm not responding seriously to mocking and dont act like I should? Lol wild.
You don't have to respond, but I do want to echo QinShiHuangsSchlong's point: many hierarchies exist due to necessity or sheer practicality in a way that far supercedes any problems arising from being a hierarchy. For example, horizontally organizing a nuclear power plant is a recipe for disaster, and managing and coordinating the production and logistics chain of sufficiently complex but useful technology like smartphones requires vertical elements to administration.
The fact of this then brings us to the Marxist critique, that hierarchy isn't the problem inherently, but class and the products of class society.
Thanks, Cowbee. But I'll just stop talking. Its not fun. I fucken hate BrainInABox, and you are the only one out the gate who is interested in discussion. Everyone else is mocking, and then wants to respond in detail once I call it out and at that point I'm already turned off to discussion.
I understand, but once you cool down I think it's worth revisiting, if not with anyone here, on your own.
It wasn't mocking it was a genuine point delivered not as polite as could be (there is a difference). You said hierarchy is inherently oppressive I countered pointing out it seems silly to call the hierarchy between parent and child oppressive or between safety staff and other staff at dangerous industrial locations or between doctors and nurses. If these examples are not oppressive and in many cases actually positive it then brings into dispute the idea of oppression as some inherint or intrinsic aspect of hierarchy as opposed hierarchy simply being a useful social construct that can be used in many ways depending on outside factors such as class content etc.
You added all of this after the fact. The original response was a one liner meant to be a zinger. I really dont see how else I was supposed to read that. Yes, this has a point, I just don't ever see hierarchy being used by anarchists in any other context than community and governmental. With that context, we can see exactly what I meant. But it honestly doesn't matter. This place loves to dogpile instead of talking. We factually cannot exchange ideas because everything is binary and you are either ML or wrong lmao.
You made a statement about the intrinsic nature of a social relation: that hierarchy is inherently oppressive. I do not believe that relation holds such an intrinsic attribute, so I responded by listing several examples of hierarchy that, in my view, do not inherently contain oppression. To me, saying oppression is inherent to hierarchy is similar to saying flammability is inherent to liquid. There are many flammable liquids, but liquid as such is not inherently flammable; that depends on other factors, such as chemical composition. Likewise, there are many oppressive hierarchies, but that does not mean oppression is intrinsic to hierarchy as such. The fastest way to challenge a universal claim like that is to list counterexamples.
You could have read/responded to that in several ways. For example, you could have explained what you mean by hierarchy if you do not think the relation between nuclear plant staff, doctors and nurses, or parent and child counts as hierarchy. You could also have explained why those examples should be distinguished from the kind of hierarchy you are criticizing, or shown where oppression exists in those examples in a way I may not recognize. Those would all be substantive responses to the point I was making.
Also, I very much did not dogpile you and had no intention of doing so. I was the first person to respond, and at no point did I insult you. My first response may not have been as polite or elaborated as possible, but it was meant as a counterargument, not as mockery or an attempt to shut you down.
Oh my God, you precious little baby
What's up shit talker. Thats all you do. Is look for dogpiles to talk shit in.
Given how you respond to people actually trying to engage with you by throwing a little tantrum, why the fuck wouldn't I just shit talk you
Because you can scroll through my comments and see its not my default interaction with anybody but you and the libs. Its cool though thats just who you are to me, a wanker
I can scroll through your comments and see you chucking a tantrum when anyone disagrees with you, "wanker".
Also, learn what a liberal is, moron
Wild I could say the same about you, and besides, I never interact with you until you talk shit to me. Thats our every interaction.
This post specifically posits the opposite viewpoint tho. That anarchism exists to spin chaos for the proletariat so that the bourgeois class can deepen their depravity and inequality. Just more leftist purity tests from jank.
Marx was also writing based on observing specific conditions in specific places 150 years ago. The point of Marxism is that it's a way to coherently frame the things you're currently observing as intersectionally as possible and test them against prior studies while checking your own personal biases. Most of my organising as a Marxist is in anarchist or democratic socialist orgs because they're easier to start in the surveillance state that developed after Marx said this. They just don't scale up as easily as an ML org like PSL, which maintains the same message with discipline in cities across the US. That higher level of organisation is equally important to anarchism's ease with local organisation, more secure and more able to centralise and use resources.
Thats cool that was the point of Marx. What is the point of Jank posting this right here, right now? Does it help? Does it enlighten leftists? Or unify us in any way? Or is this just derisive because it sounds like what Marx is referring to as anarchist is what we call anarchic capitalists today.