As of late, I’ve had a few discussions with unrelated individuals that more or less have the same theme to them: You participate in society/a group or organization, yet you espouse anarchist and self reliant ideals. Isn’t that hypocritical? I personally hate this argument, and I feel that it is a low effort attempt to win an argument by avoiding the merits of what I am saying, and instead attempting to malign my apparent actions with my ideals.
The first reason is simple: We live in reality. No ideals are wholly realistic. All ideals or utopian in nature. I would love to live in my ideal anarchist utopia where everyone agrees to consensual relationships, and there is almost no coercion. I espouse those ideals because I genuinely believe that we all would be better off if we lived that way, hence why I talk about those ideals to people, write about them here, and I do my best to live those ideals in the real world. Of course I am nowhere near perfect. And even if I was perfect, there is a bit of a paradox of having everyone live in a reality that I imagine, because in itself, there is a little coercion denying people who want to live in a coercive society, to live in a purely consensual society. The reality is we have to come to a compromise that balances out those desires.
The second reason is that, again, the argument that “You want to destroy the Matrix, yet you participate in it”, is not an argument as to what the ideal we are discussing is about. I am making an argument about reality ought to be. I’ll give an allegory: You and your friends are discussing where to eat dinner. The group consensus is split between two options. When asked where you want to eat, you give a third option. It would be really strange if the group turned to you, and stated “why would you even discuss dinner plans if you didn’t want to get what we wanted to get?” You were asked for your opinion of what dinner plans ought to be, and you voiced your opinion on the matter. Maybe the place you advocated for is not considered as good as the other places, maybe it’s too far away, too expensive, whatever other possible reason could be. However, again, questioning the participation in the discussion, rather than the merits you brought to the table, is not a good argument.
Finally, I have noticed that those who argue that sort of position tend to be insitutionalists; People who believe that institutions are important as a going concern, and should be upheld, sometimes at individual expense. I do believe that at times, institutions are important, and that participating in institutions and organizations is important. However, I believe that those sorts of groups and organizations should always exist for the benefit of uplifting and assisting the individual, and should never come at the expense of the individual, in any sort of capacity. I believe institutions and organizations need to be put to pasture when the overall entity becomes a going concern. When the protection of a non-person entity becomes more important than an actual person, whatever that entity is needs to be put down, as by its very nature will be tyrannical and coercive.
In essence, this is a form of an ad hominem attack. Instead of actually arguing the merits of what is being discussed, and instead discussing something irrelevant to the discussion in order to win the discussion.