Why not voting is productive to an anarchist but not a statist.

I'm sure we've all heard how if you don't vote you can't be productive in changing anything, especially in the political realm.... well, that's just not the case. It's rather clear that pure anarchists see things almost completely opposite or inverted from voters. So I'm going to explain why that is in the specific case of the productivity of voting.

Voting is indirect action. You are literally taking action that selects someone else to take action for you. We usually call this representation. It's a nice way of saying "I'm passing off the responsibility of the actions I want taken to someone else."

Of course the flip side to that is that voting in national elections creates a facade of effecting change throughout a large geographic area. This gives the vote a feeling of having more power then individual action taken locally. This is probably why we see voters turning out in droves for national elections if compared to local. The voter strives to be productive so they vote when they think they can effect the most change.

Anarchist see direct action as much more productive then indirect. First because direct action is constant. Everyday we can take direct action to effect change. Voting comes around once in a term of years and has no control of the actual actions taken by a representative. Which leads me to the second main reason direct action is preferred. The individual can constantly make changes to their actions. Once a vote is taken the individual looses it's ability to choose action themselves. Until a vote comes around again and maybe the next guy will do what the voter wants him to do.

What's an example of direct action? Using the law against it's self is direct action that can be used to manifest anarchist results in the court itself. Personally I was just assigned Juror duty. If I am selected I could attempt to nullify statist law. Who knows what the effect of that attempt could be, but it's certainly direct action with a very high chance of producing something that aligns with my goals(anarchy).

Voting in state elections is indirect action that is in direct opposition to pursuing the end goal of anarchy. I've said this in a few PodCasts. An action that passes responsibility and/or ownership of self off to another will net a negative gain for anarchy. So when some suggest we should vote a great response is "you are suggestion I take action that will result in the opposite of my desired outcome". Most people don't take such actions.

Why would a voter suggest anarchist take counter productive actions? Well they don't share the same end goal. In fact their end goal is fundamentally the opposite. The means to get to opposing ends will require fundamentally different actions based on the end desired. Typically anarchists were once statists or voters so we often can understand the voter while not agreeing. It's often much harder for a voter to understand an anarchist based on probably never being one themselves.

Voting perpetuates the manifestation of the subconscious tyrant of individuals. Instead of a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other this is an on/off switch to a little King Henry the 8th living in all our heads. The vote itself and the campaigns leading up to them bring out all the King Henry the 8th complexes to the maximum. Voting is the choice to take action to rule others. Thus a reality of rulers is created. Which is the opposite of anarchy. So again voting is not productive for an anarchist.

By: Neil Sollenberger

Host of An Anarchist Conversation