From: jamesd@netcom.com (James A. Donald)
Date: Fri, 9 Sep 94 16:15:09 PDT
To: doug@OpenMind.com (Doug Cutrell)
Subject: Re: Black Cryptoanarchy (KKK, monopolies, contract killing)
In-Reply-To: <aa965b86020210030197@[198.211.130.8]>
Message-ID: <199409092315.QAA02725@netcom7.netcom.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


Doug Cutrell writes
> The argument seems to be that in
> a free society, natural cooperative processes will provide a form of
> "autoregulation" to discourage the widespread development of oppression of
> specific classes of individuals.

Actually the argument is that who I choose to associate with is
no damned business of the state.

If you want a utiltarian argument, no problem:  Obviously laws
regulating who can associate with who, can be used, will be used,
and are being used to oppress those minority groups that are out
of favor with the state.

For example jews and Asians are not "protected groups" and the
anti discrimination laws are enforced in a selective fashion to
harass businessmen of Korean origin in California.

Obviously if some individuals choose not to associate with some
group for irrational reasons it will harm those who so choose
more than it harms the group - but only the state can enforce 
discrimination with guns, and it does, thus only state sponsored 
discrimination is significant in practice.

Plenty of Koreans have been put out of business by the state.

How many homosexuals have been put out of business by private
discrimination?

But I piss on utilitarian arguments.  From the fact that anti
discrimination laws violate peoples rights, we could have immediately
inferred that the unjust use of force would follow, and that 
this would lead to undesired and unintended outcomes, without
bothering with the specific details.


> Moreover, it seems to me that
> cryptoanarchy may in fact facilitate a new type of "mob rule".  For
> example, imagine the development of a multitude of secret "crypto-posse"
> organizations.   Individuals could join any number of these secret
> societies, which might require some sort of dues payment for participancy.
> They might be fleeting in duration, forming spontaneously to achieve some
> specific aim (thus my term "posse").

That is the plan.

Consider the excellent and great campaign of intimidation
and harassment against Cantor and Segal.  We really trashed those guys.

Hurray for cybervigilantes and Silicon cowboys.


>  Virtually everything about these
> organizations could be secret -- their size, power, and even their very
> existence. 

Right on.

It is called "freedom of association".  You will just have to get
used to it.

> If there is a reason why these concerns are unfounded, I would very much
> appreciate hearing refutations.  I certainly don't want any of these
> possibilities to materialize, but I don't see any way around them in a
> completely "cryptoanarchic" society.

Most of us hope, desire, and intend, that your worst fears will
be realized.

As for contract killings - what else is new.  Just as today you will
have to start by asking "who has motive and money to put out
a contract on X".  Of course you could prevent contract killings
by requiring everyone to carry government "escrowed" tape recordings
to record all their conversations and requiring them to keep a diary
at all times alibing their all their activities.  This would also
make it much easier to stamp out child pornography, plutonium
smuggling, and social discrimination against the politically
correct.



 ---------------------------------------------------------------------
We have the right to defend ourselves and our
property, because of the kind of animals that we              James A. Donald
are.  True law derives from this right, not from
the arbitrary power of the omnipotent state.                jamesd@netcom.com