Episode #194 ... Do we really need the police? - Anarchism pt. 3 - (Gelderloos, Security)

Hello, everyone. I'm Stephen West. This is Philosophize This. Apologies for the episode not being out on Monday. I woke up with COVID Sunday morning. No complaints. Just saying my voice might still be recovering from that heads up. Patreon.com/philosophize this for an ad free RSS of the show. Find it in your Patreon settings. Could never do this without you. For updates on new episodes, check out Instagram at philosophize this podcast, all one word. Hope you love the show today. So back in episode 188 of this podcast, we started talking about the philosopher Byung Chul Han. He is a modern day philosopher, South Korean born, clearly one of the favorites we've covered on the show as of late for his overall pessimistic outlook that really doesn't feel too pessimistic because it still leaves room for all of his great loves in this world, his love of gardening, his love of working with his hands, his love of sitting at home on a quiet evening, and just playing his piano, being a handsome gentleman. But the point of bringing him up here today is that when we covered his philosophy in that episode, if you recall, he had a lot to say about the rise of narcissism in modern society. Narcissism was an important part of his analysis of what you see when you look out at the world, and you pay attention to how a lot of people are acting these days. He talked about how if you're just born into the world as it's set up today, how you can be otherwise a totally good person, no bad intentions, but just in practice, you spend very little time actually caring or trying to understand the lives of people around you who are truly different from you. It really is a modern sort of trap to fall into, he thinks. You're born. You're told you can be whatever you want to be in this world. Don't let anybody tell you otherwise. And you're told that when you go throughout your day to day life, you gotta be as authentic of a person as you possibly can be all throughout that process. Don't worry too much about the haters if they try to get in your way. And with all this time people are saving, not worrying about the haters in the modern world, you know, those pesky other opinions out there, he says the natural thing to do for people is just to channel all that attention back to the only place people really have left to focus. They channel it all back into focusing on themselves. This often turns for the average person into a hyperfocus on yourself, a heightened focus on your personal achievements and your career, a heightened focus on self improvement of all kinds. What could be wrong with that after all? In this world where you are obviously a personal brand and a personal product, why shouldn't you be always looking to …