clans 3 of 3

CLANS 3 of 3

Clans are merely nations on a much smaller and decentralized scale, with the difference being that its members are all part of the military ( and with far more individual rights outside the military arena ).  And gangs are mostly just clans surviving within a nation state.  Even more decentralized, but following the same basic pattern of governance.  When we look at gangs we show fear and loathing.  Just look at the standard treatment of evil gangs after the Apocalypse in collapse/survivalism fiction.  In effect, these authors are portraying the clan as evil and the nation state as good, although I’d venture to guess they don’t look at it that way as their trees get in the way of the forest.  The nation state is, at its most basic, a tax on production to support a standing professional army.  With clans, the tax is not part of your production but rather the necessity to serve militarily ( differences such as rule of law and blood feuds are little more than the difference between the rule by kings and the rule by the militia ).  Citizens of the king think their way is great as it keeps them relatively safe, if not free.  They have traded freedom for security.  Clansmen ( or gangsmen ) look at their way as great, trading peace for independence.  You can’t judge one from the shoes of the other.  And with gangs, when you judge them from the point of view of a safe and secure debt slave living in suburbia, you miss the point of their independence.  Yes, their lives can end suddenly in blood and violence.  But the lives they live are more free.  It is the same as keeping your cat indoors, safe and bored, or letting her roam free and happy, soon to be eaten by feral dogs or coyotes.  That is the difference between citizens and gang members.

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The reason gangs seem so dangerous is because while generally behaving themselves out of self preservation, at times their violence can reach innocent citizens.  But that violence is certainly not as arbitrary as we make it out to be.  Gangs are tribes and tribes have two sets of behaviors.  One for fellow tribesmen and one for outsiders, who includes everyone else.  Citizens on the other hand, try to treat everyone the same, as fellow sheep protected by the shepherd.  The more liberal they are in political orientation, the closer to that model they adhere ( little brown people have just as many rights as Americans, etc. ) and the more course and conservative the more they adhere to the tribal labels but on a nation state level ( Americans are great, kill everyone else ).  Gangs just hate everyone not of their tribe and joining and staying in that tribe is much more work and sacrifice than a citizen who is just lucky where he was born ( or unlucky ).

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You think “jumping in” a gang member is unnecessarily violent ( earning their membership by, for instance, killing a rival gang member )?  It is nothing more than one proving themselves worthy of membership, the only option since they were not born and raised by the gang.  If every man must be a warrior, they must prove their combat effectiveness.  Which is why joining the armed forces does not make you a warrior.  Think gangs being violent towards women and civilians is uncivilized?  Not by the justice system of the gang, which is a strict black and white, us and them version of friends and enemies.  It is nothing more than a return to the historical norm where villages were raided and women were used as forced breeding using outside DNA ( again, species level positives can always be individuals negatives ), or killed, and children were sold into slavery or killed, and elders were usually just killed ( less mouths to feed ).  Fictionalized post-apocalypse gang behavior is really just the behavior all of us will adapt once the Dark Age we are entering decentralizes political organization and energy is so scarce there can be no more professional armies.

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