Coincidance - Principia Discordia

COINCIDANCE 125
But, but—I asked—what do you really think of men?
"But, hon," she said innocently, "what do cattle think of butchers?"
And the line went dead with an abrupt click like a diaphragm falling from
a purse onto a cold metal floor.
NINTH CHORUS
"My neighbors' passions frighten me infinitely
less than do the law's injustices, for my
neighbors' passions are contained by mine,
whilst nothing checks the injustices of the law."
— Sade
A civilization based on authority-and-submission is a civilization without
the means of self-correction. Effective communication flows only one way:
from master-group to servile-group. Any cyberneticist knows that such a
one-way communication channel lacks feedback and cannot behave
"intelligently."
The epitome of authority-and-submission is the Army, and the contro!-
and-communication network of the Army has every defect a cyberneticist's
nightmare could conjure. Its typical patterns of behavior are immortalized in
folklore as SNAFU (situation normal—all fucked-up), FUBAR (fucked-up
beyond all redemption) and TARFU (Things are really fucked-up). In less
extreme, but equally nosologic, form these are the typical conditions of any
authoritarian group, be it a corporation, a nation, a family, or a whole
civilization.
Produhon was a great communication analyst, born 100 years too soon to
be understood. His system of voluntary association (anarchy) is based on the
simple communication principles that an authoritarian system means oneway
communication, or stupidity, and a libertarian system means two-way
communication, or rationality.
The essence of authority, as he saw, was Law—that is, fiat—that is,
effective communication running one way only. The essence of a libertarian
system, as he also saw, was Contract—that is, mutual agreement—that is,
effective communication running both ways. ("Redundance of control" is
the technical cybernetic phrase.)
Sade saw this, before Proudhon. "The rule of law is inferior to that of
anarchy; the most obvious proof of what I assert is the fact that any
government is obliged to plunge itself into anarchy whenever it aspires to
remake its constitution. In order to abrogate its former laws, it is compelled
to establish a revolutionary regime in which there is no law; this regime
finally gives birth to new laws, but this second state is necessarily less pure
than the first, since it derives from it" (Sade, p. 46).