I don’t have solutions you need, but it doesn’t prohibit me from thinking about the world where they exist. Or, I don’t know, speaking about it in Lemmy.
Comment on Disgusted
hansolo@lemmy.today 19 hours agoI’ve also travelled a lot, and while visa stuff can be a nightmare, this also sounds like it’s coming from a super selfish reasoning. As if a democratically elected government of people in a place should have no right to its own sovereignty so that YOU don’t have to deal with paperwork?
What’s funny is the exact scenario you all want already exists in Sub-Saharan Africa. Borders effectively don’t exist at all for anyone willing to get off the bus, walk 50 meters into the bush, then 200 meters forward and back to the road. I’ve accidentally crossed several borders dozens of times.
But then when it comes to countries that struggle to find work for their own people, they also get flooded by people from places where no government functions at all. Specifically Nigerians in South Africa and Ghana. Legally present, and subject to xenophobic attacks because there no hope for them in Nigeria because it’s a hot mess.
So… That’s the ideal situation? And people can’t leave that open border situation fast enough because the places that are stable are flooded by people fleeing instability.
Honestly, I’m asking, how is it supposed to work without literally magic being involved?
Unpigged@lemmy.dbzer0.com 18 hours ago
hansolo@lemmy.today 15 hours ago
Ok, but I’m really asking. How is it supposed to work? Why doesn’t it work in practice?
Everyone who talks about some world with no borders seems to have some idea in mind, as if it’s some .ml instance FAQ or something.
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 15 hours ago
As if a democratically elected government representing people in a certain place should have no right to its own sovereignty
I mean, “democratically elected” does a lot of heavy lifting in countries that are choked out by fascist governance and fear-mongering media. “Sovereignty” also has a weird way of being used to weaponize self-determination into surveillance-state policing and xenophobic policy.
But then when it comes to countries that struggle to find work for their own people, they also get flooded by people from places where no government functions at all. Specifically Nigerians in South Africa and Ghana. Legally present, and subject to xenophobic attacks because there no hope for them in Nigeria because it’s a hot mess.
Why is it that a French citizen traveling to Germany or Spain is considered benign, but a Libyan citizen traveling to Germany or Spain is considered part of a “flood” that has some kind of existential threat to the locals? Why does Libya’s dogshit government get raised as a reason why this Libyan visitor can’t stay at my hotel or eat at my restaurant or work in my office?
Does being born in Country A stain someone’s soul in a way that makes them incompatible with Country B?
how is it supposed to work without literally magic being involved?
You don’t need magic to not have borders. If anything, you need a certain degree of magic to rigidly enforce borders. You need mass surveillance to track the identities of everyone entering and leaving your country. You need to engineer increasingly complex systems of identification, digital fingerprinting, financial controls, regulation on business and social activities, and prohibitions enforcement pursuant to a constantly shifting web of sanctions. You need an enormous body of labor to manage these rules and enforce them. You need prisons to hold all the trespassers. You sprawling bureaucracies to figure out who is “legal” and to change the legal status in a timely manner.
None of this shit works as intended. Legal residents routinely get harassed because records aren’t properly maintained and distributed. Illegal residents slip through blind spots in the system. Black market trade grows faster than the regulated trade, because there’s a larger profit margin in it. Legal business activity suffocates under the higher costs of compliance.
You ask how no-borders are supposed to work? I’d say, incredibly easily! Do nothing. Boom! You’ve achieved your goal.
I ask you how closed-borders are supposed to work? You’re going to spend several lifetimes and untold fortunes trying to achieve this fantasy.
ayyy@sh.itjust.works 15 hours ago
You just did the “but what about war?” thing.
hansolo@lemmy.today 12 hours ago
No, I did the “explain it to me, because it doesn’t work in real life” thing.
rockSlayer@lemmy.blahaj.zone 15 hours ago
As if a democratically elected government representing people in a certain place should have no right to its own sovereignty so that YOU don’t have to deal with paperwork
Most people I know that want an end to borders also want the end of government.
But then when it comes to countries that struggle to find work for their own people
If people are struggling to survive but there are no jobs to be found, it’s because the work that needs to be done isn’t profitable. The work needs to be done to benefit society, but the ruling class demands that all work must be profitable.
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 15 hours ago
Most people I know that want an end to borders also want the end of government.
Idk about that. The line I’ve always seen is that most people want a system which protects-but-does-not-bind. And what they recoil at is a system that binds-but-does-not-protect.
I want the border to be frictionless for me. But I don’t want the border to be frictionless for people I don’t like.
rockSlayer@lemmy.blahaj.zone 14 hours ago
But I don’t want the border to be frictionless for people I don’t like
And therein lies the rub: if their government doesn’t like you, the border then binds you but does not protect you. Borders exist because it projects power onto people within, and gives arbitrary rules for entry without. If you want truly free movement, you can’t have projections of power
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 14 hours ago
if their government doesn’t like you, the border then binds you but does not protect you.
Okay, but that’s just why this is the most important election of our lives and you need to turn out to vote or we’ll be under the boot of the vile fascist-communist government of the Other Party That Doesn’t Like Me.
Borders exist because it projects power onto people within
I mean, that’s a very narrow perspective. Borders exist as a compromise between neighboring governments, indicating where one set of legal codes ends and another begins.
If you want truly free movement, you can’t have projections of power
Free movement is power projection. It’s just projection by the people (and their attendant organizations and ideologies) doing the moving.
The whole neoliberal One Big Global Market wet dream was about projecting the power of Western financial and regulatory authorities around the globe. Open Borders can be as much about projecting power as closed ones. And whether you believe that’s good or bad really hinges on whether you believe you’re aligned with the people doing the power projection.
You absolutely could describe the Russian invasion of Ukraine (or the US invasion of Iraq/Afghanistan/Libya/Syria) as a kind-of Open Borders policy under the Bush Doctrine. The borders are simply open to those with a big enough battering ram to kick through the door.
hansolo@lemmy.today 15 hours ago
Most people I know that want an end to borders also want the end of government.
So, not exactly an unbiased same, eh?
If people are struggling to survive but there are no jobs to be found, it’s because the work that needs to be done isn’t profitable. The work needs to be done to benefit society, but the ruling class demands that all work must be profitable.
Explain how the “ruling class” does this to a rural subsistence farming village in Burkina Faso or Mali or Ghana. I’d love to see you explain it.
rockSlayer@lemmy.blahaj.zone 14 hours ago
not exactly an unbiased same
There’s no such thing as “unbiased”. If you see something you think is unbiased, that thing just reflects your bias.
Explain how the “ruling class” does this to a rural subsistence farming village
So here’s the thing. I want an end to borders and government, but the reality is that these social constructs exist and are acted upon regardless of my political desires. Those subsistence farming villages are a part of geopolitical governments, so it impacts them based on how the ruling class interacts with their government. The IMF is a concoction from capitalists to project neo-colonial power on the Global South. To get a loan from the IMF, countries are literally required to privatize vast swaths of their public services and public property, they’re required to loosen labor laws, and they need to open themselves up to foreign companies that extract their resources to make a profit that is not reinvested into that country.
ayyy@sh.itjust.works 15 hours ago
Generations of pillaging, murder, theft, slavery, pollution, and political meddling. Also the occasional genocide. Have you ever read a single history book about Africa that wasn’t written by a colonizer?
hansolo@lemmy.today 12 hours ago
Funny, I’ve never actually read any history books about Africa written by a coloniser. I have done a translation of a local novel depicting the horrors of colonialism to get the perspective out there.
I’m deeply aware of colonialism, and I personally would love if the AU would take the bold step of undoing the Berlin Conference borders. However, that’s part of why the existing borders are largely seen as immaterial with regard to human movement. When I try to drive a car across a border, I need letters and insurance and papers. When my friend drives his car across borders, he drives through a village and no one cares. It’s two separate worlds at some level.
Still, you can’t be like Trump and blame everything on the same Boogey man. There’s plenty of African nations that did a descent job of shaking of colonialism. Yet the same problems remain. Shit, tell me why Ethiopia has these issues, having never been truly colonized.
kestrel7_7@lemmy.world 16 hours ago
This post and the one you’re responding to are basically restating the screenshot in the OP, and you’re the person who’s being unpleasant.
These laws harm more they help and you’ve provided several examples in your post, you just apparently don’t see them.
hansolo@lemmy.today 15 hours ago
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I’m genuinely asking how it’s supposed to work. It’s a real question.
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I’m providing real life evidence that it’s not so simple.
If exposing you to reality in hopes of a real answer and not just “uh, like, anarchy, I guess” or restating lofty quotes from Marx is “unpleasant” then that’s not on me, friendo.
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surewhynotlem@lemmy.world 19 hours ago
Fuck that. Everyone is my people.
dragonlover@lemmy.zip 18 hours ago
Exactly, sick of the fuck you got mine mentality. There is enough in the world to go around for everyone, it’s the uneven distribution and monetization of basic resources that makes it so some people in some countries starve.
So many if the world’s woes today come from people vying for money, and for land and resources to…make more money.
If someone is sick you treat them. If someone is hungry you feed them. If someone is thirsty you give them water. I don’t care what nationality they are, what country they are from, what language they speak, what gender they are, what sexuality they are, what disability they have, if they are a human being they deserve basic dignity, respect, and basic needs. Borders are arbitrary.
surewhynotlem@lemmy.world 14 hours ago
Careful there. They nail people to trees for crazy talk like that.
hansolo@lemmy.today 15 hours ago
Have you ever been to an intentional community that doesn’t vet new members?
No. Because they don’t last long. I’m down with the oneness of existence and beings. Most people aren’t, though. Many people are a hot mess and don’t know how to deal with themselves or others.
And I promise you that the vast majority of the world does not want you showing up there. For real, test this by moving to rural Texas, or a Mormons-only area of Arizona, or Cairo, or rural DRC without cultural entree or any value provided to a suspicious community and see how that goes. Yes, people might chill out after months or years of you proving not a threat, but as a species, we’re pretty paranoid.
surewhynotlem@lemmy.world 14 hours ago
I’ve not met that level of hostility in my travels. But I also never moved to bumblefuck nowhere. I’m guessing if people have never left their town, having people come into the town is a big deal.
hansolo@lemmy.today 11 hours ago
Hostility isn’t the right word. It’s more just wary suspicion of an outsider. Which can easily and quickly escalate. But in small towns, it can without an outsider as a scapegoat.
Generally, you want someone to host you and provide some sort of cultural landing pad. Even as a tourist if you’re only there to look at stuff.