Having my cake and eating it, too

These lines are written by a coward: Unlike many a Substacker that displays their full name I choose to be anonymous.

By being anonymous, I expect to be able to voice my anarchic thoughts, complain about our system and the warmongering evil of governments, and then get into a suit like the good boy that I am, and shake an ambassador’s hand while fawning pleasantries about some country and marveling at the politician’s distinct charisma.

Even worse, I hate our tax system and like to think that I avoid the government handouts that justify this murderous robbery, yet I applaud it if friends get government funding for a project and don’t mind if I benefit from this by proximity as well.

It’d be so nice to use this post as mental gymnastics to rationalize this hypocrisy. To soothe the cognitive dissonance with some rationalization. And yet… There is no defending it. I see the anonymity afforded to me by the Internet (and obscurity) as a comforting blanket, and I’m not willing to give up on society’s benefits while silently waiting for it to unravel.

Need for destruction

A lot of what fuels this, admittedly delusional, blog is a need for destruction. Seeing the destruction of systems that work so well for many of us would be a source of pleasure for me.

I’ll be glad to argue that it’s because our countries’ governments are worse killers than any criminal band ever in existence, or that states that claim to be “socialist” let their elderly beg on the streets as if that were a cute little glitch in their otherwise exemplary systems. I can act outraged that children on the other side of an imaginary line are kind of ok to let starve just because that meaningless, random line is between us and them in a world where nothing is further away than a twenty-hour flight and there are enough calories for everyone.

It would feel righteous to say that I’m (anonymously) fighting on behalf of hungry children in Africa. But that’s not really why I long to see our institutions collapse… In fact, I have to ask myself whether I would resent our collective governments if they solved the issues listed above democratically, using “sound governing principles”. I want to believe I’d be happy for these millions of improved lives, but would I be?

Don’t tell me what to do

I long for the collapse of our governments, the melting of our countries, and the erasure of our borders for one simple reason: I despise authority. I have a severe allergy to being told what to do by anyone, even if it’s in my best interest. School is not a time I’ll ever miss.

And governments exercise a silent, slow, absolute authority unasked. You cross a line and have to show a paper booklet identifying yourself. You ignore a letter and it’ll cost you. You are obliged to be organized, to pay for some vague participation in society using a pricing system that is as senseless as it’s overpriced and holier than thou. There are plenty of rules you can break without hurting anyone that will land you years of confinement. And it’s all done under the smug guise of democracy: YOU are in control like a grain of sand on the beach and you better partake in the “democratic process”, otherwise anything you dislike is your own damn fault.

I’m not your boss either

Just as I despise authority from others, I have a similar dislike for exerting authority. It’s tedious and boring. I’m certain that a well-set-up, digitally aided anarchy would solve all the problems our institutions currently do without exerting obligations on participating individuals. But building is much harder than destroying, hence I long for destruction for now. Anonymously.

Photo by American Heritage Chocolate on Unsplash