What is consensus?

Steve Kinney admin at pilobilus.net
Tue Dec 12 15:46:29 PST 2017



On 12/12/2017 07:02 AM, juan wrote:

> 	I wanted to comment on the quaker thing as well. The
> 	word consensus is  derived from and requires consent. Theocracy
> 	or religious fraud, especially of the jew-kkkristian variety
> 	has fuck to do with consent. By definition fraud destroys
> 	consent. 
> 
> 	By the way, jew-kristian theocracy is the very opposite of
> 	anarchism and cypherpunkry since its anti-philosophical
> 	root is an all knowing all seeing tyrant.

Back in the day Friends were one of many radical social movements that
appeared in response to the early development of the Industrial Age and
the first appearance of a "middle class."  These movements were shaped
in large part by the rapid spread of literacy and availability of books,
including bibles which common people could read and interpret for
themselves for the first time.  The Partition Act and other radical
social/economic changes in England and Europe during the 1600s turned
the world upside down - the origin of the word "revolution" - and the
stage was set for interesting times.

The Ranters, Diggers, Levellers, and many other factions are long gone,
but the Mennonites, Amish, Unitarians and Quakers remain with us today.
One thing all these movements had in common was their rejection of
Church and State authority, in preference for what would today be called
"human rights" and religious freedom.  All met and most survived violent
persecution by State authorities.

Early Friends called the Roman and Post-Roman churches the apostasy, in
reference to their self evident abandonment of the Christian teachings
of their own Bible in favor of collusion with State authority and the
financial interests of "hireling ministers."  Along with the other
groups mentioned above, Friends were religiously motivated anarchists
owing no spiritual /or/ material allegiance to any established
institution.  These groups developed institutions of their own, some
more anarchistic than others but all grounded in radical egalitarianism,
voluntary membership, and adherence to community standards developed by
the communities themselves.

In England the Friends existed in substantial numbers, and caused so
much trouble that William Penn, advocating on their behalf, was able to
obtain a Crown Charter for a colony in the New World expressly as a
dumping ground for English Quakers.  More than enough were eager to get
out from under Crown authority to quickly populate Pennsylvania with
Friends.

The Quakers considered the Native Americans as human as themselves, and
saw a clear reflection of their own methods of self-governance in the
tribal councils and federations process.  The Friends paid for the land
they took and engaged in normal commerce with the locals.  As a result,
Friends came to be known as "the honest white men" and still enjoy a
unique reputation among native communities.

Friends were among the earliest and most stubborn of pacifist
organizations, refusing to bear arms.  They also openly refused to use
the language and mannerisms of master and servant, hard wired into
English culture, and for this many were jailed, tortured and/or killed.
Their adamant rejection of merely human authority, in preference for
local self rule on a model often /mistaken/ for consensus by outsiders,
completes the picture of the most viable anarchist movement to emerge
from the Age of Enlightenment.

It's been a long, winding road since then with plenty of forks and dead
ends.  Our numbers have collapsed, in the U.S. midwest a conventional
"protestant" sect has co-opted our Society's name, but Friends are still
here:  A pale shadow of the Society's former self, banging along on two
or three cylinders but still capable of exercising social and political
influence /far/ beyond what our numbers would suggest.

We rarely advertise and never lay a high pressure sales pitch on anyone.
 Sociologists studying religious beliefs and attitudes in the U.S. find
that conventional churches have been largely abandoned by people who
want, ironically enough, exactly what the Religious Society of Friends
has to offer... but they don't know we exist.



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