Yes, I think I'm definitely in alignment with you and the hexbear community at large on what our goals shold be now.
I'm not totally sure I fall in the realm of anarchist, because I typically still want voting and some form of organizing, I just don't like the power structure and needless abstraction of representatives. I typically describe an ideal form of society as one composed of many small communities, that are sufficiently small for consensus democracies to be effective. That is, every rule is workshopped until it has unanimous support. So there are still rules, but through discussion and compromise, everyone supports every rule they follow. Travel and migration should be freely allowed, so people can find communities they are politically compatible with (perhaps by finding someone to trade houses with or asking to move in with someone). For projects that require scale to be reasonable, such as a form of currency for trading or a rail line or something, these communities can form coalitions, where decisions still require unanimity from a larger amount of people now, but only on the policies relevant to the coalition.
The point is, the above still follows what I think the spirit of anarchism is: spreading power as thinly as possible, treating individuals as equals and preventing them from being subjugated by another.
I don't think that what I described would be allowed to exist today due to imperialism, but I see it as an ideal that can be achieved eventually, as the contradictions of capital inevitably lead to a more equal and just society. That is, since socialism/communism are more stable than capitalism, eventually a society such as I described shouldn't have to be strong enough (militaristically nor controlling information) to defend itself against imperialism, and can then just peacefully exist.
I think he's had enough bad takes to be worth avoiding. Tbh I feel like all YT commentary channels are worth culling
Back in the GG days I was following various anti-woke sources/creators (read kotakuinaction, watched JP, shoe, Chris ray gun, etc.). Since then I've obviously left that whole sphere (I mainly attribute this to innuendo studios tbh), but it's interesting to see that Brianna Wu has made just everyone dislike her. I hope she sees the light someday, because honestly it feels pretty weird to still be disliking one of the people GG attacked.
Edit: other notable figures in my radicalization are Hasan and second thought, and my wife and I have had a bit of a radicalizing feedback loop. Then I discovered lemmy during the API thing, found out about hexbear because of everyone talking about how scary it is, and choosing to check it out myself and finding it incredible based.
I have a job in software development, and I enjoy the work I do, my coworkers, and the pay is quite good. However, management keeps the work environment very... unsympathetic. Despite it being a programming job it's very strict on working in office, and there's a vibe of everyone just being a mistake or two away from being fired. This came to a head for me when I had a child recently and when my spouse was a couple weeks from her due date she started struggling to get out of bed to use the restroom or get food. However, when I requested to work from home so I could just briefly help her out a couple times a day (a frequency and duration of break which is totally fine in the office), I was made to start my paternity leave early.
I worry about coming across as out of touch, since having paternity leave at all makes me super fortunate, but it feels absolutely terrible having to give that time up and spend it without my kid because of my company's resoluteness on this matter. (Side note: they've explained it to me as not wanting to make exceptions / "play favorites", while not acknowledging that they themselves can just make the rule that you can be remote at will, when your spouse needs help, etc.) It's enough for me to start looking at other opportunities when I am able, but I'm back at work without any bites. I just wish to work someplace that feels like it cares about its employees more. But man, job hunts are just so draining, and since my salary expectations are quite a bit higher than they were when I first got this job, the hunt hasn't actually gotten any easier from me having professional experience. I just want somewhere I can work remote so I can spend more time with my kids, and as a pie in the sky optional requirement I want a democratic workplace, where I can more realistically expect business decisions to be in the employees' best interests. But the very very few of those that exist are not really looking for new members, and with the kid already here I can't take a risk on starting a new co-op that could take months to years to become financially solvent, if ever.
Realistically I can just keep working here which I realize puts me in a much more fortunate position than so many fellow humans, but I can feel the stress increase as the employees continue to get spread thinner and thinner, while the company's massive success YOY does not proportionally scale to our own benefits or salaries increasing, and the parental leave incident has just left an incredibly sour taste in my mouth. I'm just not sure what to do.
I have a trans friend who lives in Italy and they are very very right leaning and transphobic over there. The friend herself spouts some pretty conservative takes every so often, like when she told my wife, who doesn't have a job, that she thinks those without jobs don't deserve housing or health care... Which was especially insulting because we'd been letting her stay with us for free as well.
Point is, I don't think Americans escaping to Italy makes sense
I'm not sure how it would happen to an entire country like the US - obviously no amount of "vote harder" will make that happen - but figured it's already being experimented with on more local levels.
I think theoretically the whole voluntary association part of anarchism would handle the issue of "forcing" (via authority) anarchism on others. Of course, that's easier said then done in a world where just picking up your life and moving somewhere else is so non trivial.
Side note, but it really feels like online communities can do anarchism much better, since the voluntary association bit is so much more feasible online. I could see a nice lemmy instance or something that's run by charging each member a tiny amount, enough to pay for hosting (I can't imagine it'd be more than a few cents per person), and the policies of the instance would be fully democratically decided on. Bans would be decided by the community, etc.
I consider myself pretty anti-authoritarian myself, and thought that's what anarchism was as well. The whole point in my mind of anarchy is to find small communities that can typically mostly agree on issues, and they then vote democratically (either direct democracy or something like consensus democracy to help against majority rule). So there's still rules, just no power structure. Is that an accurate representation of anarchism? And how would that compare to anti-authoritarianism?
I would not advise connecting without a VPN, for obvious reasons. The slow down is expected and the magnitude of it will be dependent on the server you're connecting to.
What I'd recommend is configuring the torrent client specifically to use the VPN, assuming it supports it (I personally use transmission inside a docker container so I don't know how you'll want to set it up with qbittottent)
I'm aware of stonetoss and Shaun. What's the specific beef this is referencing?
I'm part of the incremental community and also anarchism and socialism