I also see the issues you are adressing. The anarchist philosophy seems to be based on the belief that all humans are good, and left to themselves will create only good things. Sure, there are a lot of good folks but also a lot of power trippers and psychos. If left unchecked what we would get is more like "Lord Of The Flies". We actually already have that in our government, banking system and corporations. I'm absolutely not supportive of the current form of government, but anarchism is not the answer in my opinion.

The whole libertarian/anarchy thing seems to me like an exercise in social darvinism. It seems based on the idea that the folks who have money are superior because they are smart and work hard (which is BS), and the dumb workers are just blood suckers. I've had many discussions with people calling themselves anarchists/libertarians. Most of them argued like that in one way or another. Maybe there are other kinds but it boils down to the whole thing being a dogma and nothing more. 
There is no ideal solution. I try to just deal with people as they come and do what's right for me in any given situation. Most "isms" end up being a big circle jerk among their followers and usually there is some underlying agenda, that feels fishy to me. If I get cought up in the "isms", then I will be part of the dialectic and it really doesn't fit me. Anyhow, I appreciate your post. It adresses the right points.

I upvoted this one because I really appreciate the candor and honesty in approaching this. While I disagree with the premise, it's a needed discussion and was initiated quite well.
I read through and had comments, but they've been handled quite ably by others here. So I'll take my anarchy somewhere else and play. :) 
Really, thanks for your polite interaction @jaredcwillis. It's greatly needed in these discussions.

> I do feel that we need to bring some balancing views to the platform, quickly. 

I for one would welcome carefully argued thought-provoking articles explaining why the state is necessary or just. Been looking for seven years and counting though so I'm not holding my breath.

> I am simply questioning the mechanism to control chaotic elements that are outside of societal norms.

Sorry, I don't see a substantive question or criticism here. 

> Now, under anarchism, the possibilities for investigation and reaction are endless. You don't dial 911 anymore. Inevitably, somebody in the community will emerge as being the most capable of dealing with the perpetrator. This person will likely (through no fault of their own) become a leader in the community, a protector.

Hold up. It sounds as though you're not yet familiar with the writings of ancaps on private defence. The tl;dr version is that you're assuming that defense must be a kind of ad-hoc grassroots project. It needn't be. It can also be (and imo is likely to be) a highly organised, capitalised endeavour.  I recommend starting with David Friedman's The Machinery of Freedom. I made an illustrated primer video here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTYkdEU_B4o

> This is how society started. We didn't have rules or laws or forms of government, and then to combat problems the strongest, meanest and most capable were given leadership.

You're conflating society with the state. You're describing how you think the state got started. Not how society got started here. The two are not interchangeable.

If you've watched the vid above you'll understand by this point that an ancap order does not mean no law/rules. So I hope you can see why I think this passage is off base.

> what is to prevent false accusations being levied by a (seemingly) reputable member of a community and the accused being punished based on public opinion and mob mentality?

The existence of a sophisticated industry of law, dependent on reputation, and highly responsive to the values of its customers, is what would prevent the frivolous accusations kind of situation you're worried about here.

> What is to protect the vulnerable elements of a community from the less-than-honorable members?

See previous answer.

> Under an anarchist system, those that are most capable or have the most resources are able to operate in their daily lives most effectively

The same is true now. The difference is that under a stateless order, the wealthy have to do without the biggest multiplier of their power: the state (see [public choice theory](http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/watkins/publicchoice.htm) for more).

> Their ability and standing does not change, but systems that are in place (such as public education and infrastructure like road systems, public transit, public utilities, and waste disposal) that assist in providing necessities to poverty-stricken communities would go away. 

At this point I notice I'm starting to get frustrated by your writing: you're positing highly contentious opinions (in this context) as though they were fact, without even attempting to support them. What reason do you have to suppose that these things would 'go away'. When you answer, bear in mind the examples around the world of local communities repairing their own roads after years of frustration at the state failing to do so for them. Bear in mind too the various laws enforced by the state that make it harder for local communities to do exactly this kind of thing (permits, licenses, etc).

> Quite simply, anarchism suffers from bad branding.

Your post attempts to point out problems under a stateless order. If you had compellingly done so, this would be more than a matter of bad branding.

> The term anarchy conjures images of violence, chaos and dystopia.

Sure. And people expressing opinions to that effect as though they were fact, based on little to no research into the topic certainly doesn't help.

If you'd like to improve your chances at civil dialogue with anarchists imo the best thing you can change right now is to recognise for yourself when you're expressing a doubt that something could work, or an ignorance of how it could work, and instead of declaring 'X couldn't possibly work', as you've done in this post, instead ask anarchists how they believe it would work. You'll get much more good will that way.

I'm afraid you are correct.  The current public, as a whole, wants socialism.  They have no motivation to change until it is too late.  Funny thing about motivation, it comes whether you are ready or not.  Good post.

Anarchy starts in the everyday life, where you buy your food, what you do for a living, what kind of information you are reflecting to your social contacts, the people you surround yourself with. Its about individual consciousness and responsibility, not about some punks wrecking a mansion they just squatted.

There are a lot of things about anarchy that I find myself agreeing with. That being said, I also can agree with some of the questions you posit in your article.  Sometimes when I'm reading anarchists talking about the subject, I see an underlying belief that people are generally good, or at least that the large majority of folks are altruistic. 

I think the truth is that the average person is NOT these things. We as a society look at elite athletes, people who are courageous and brave, and we honor them *because it's not normal behavior.* If the self-discipline and dedication required to be an elite athlete were normal, it wouldn't be seen as special, and we wouldn't watch sports events to see them do what they do. We hold up the guy who jumped in to save a drowning child or we remark about how in the Midwest people stop to help those stranded on the side of the road because those aren't "normal," they're above and beyond.

At some point, those who want liberty really want to just be left alone to live. A lot of people don't necessarily plan to hurt others, but they'll take advantage if it helps them. They'll steal if they can get away with it. They'll cheat if they can do it without getting caught. And that's not even counting how the actual predators in society will act. 

I think where the disconnect happens, though, is that people tend to think, "Who will protect us? How will we deal with criminals?" Perhaps the focus should be on personal responsibility for things such as safety and self-defense. When someone asks the question "What happens if a woman is raped?" I don't start thinking about who's going to punish the rapist. I think, "Why does anyone need to be in a position where they CAN be victimized? Why not teach people to stand up and protect themselves?" Not everyone agrees with the idea that an armed society is a polite one, but as a woman, I carry a gun, I train with it, and I am situationally aware. I don't expect anyone else to be responsible for protecting me, I protect myself. Perhaps the key is personal responsibility in a lot of areas that we've been conditioned to depend on the State for.

Of course...personal responsibility is work. It requires discipline and effort, and those are also things that many people aren't interested in doing...which is why I'd also have to agree that people will take socialism over anything else because the average person is..let's face it...lazy. ;)

Then again, I don't have all the answers. I'm just thinking out loud here. Great discussion going on.

This is a great post for encouraging the free flow of ideas in an open-minded way. I would say that I idealize anarchy in many ways, but at the same time recognize many of the oversimplification and logical fallacies made in many anarchist arguments. Particularly, many of the posts seem to be demagoguery circle-jerking rants without much deep critical thinking analysis.

One topic that anarchists seem to avoid is externalities in network economics game theory. The world is made up of highly complex networks with countless variables that incentivize all kinds of different behaviors and interactions among different people. You can't just blindly follow a reductionist non-aggression principle. 

The non-aggression principle is the 1st Law of Robotics according to Isaac Asimov, but he realized its incompleteness and had to add the 0th Law. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Laws_of_Robotics

I also highly recommend listening to Professor Thaddeus Russell's criticisms of the NAP here: http://lionsofliberty.com/2016/08/17/237/

The Decline of the West Podcast is also pure gold for understanding the complexity of many of the issues involved. http://www.declinecast.com/

I would like to see anarchists come up with real intellectual solutions for many of the problems we face rather than simply circle-jerking about how much the world sucks from a reductionist point of view while avoiding the hard questions. I agree with many of the points of anarchists, but also recognize the naivety of futile idealism without any real world actions.

Eventually, when I have the time, I will get around to a post about an analysis based on dynamic networks and game theory.

Right on. I agree that figuring out how to control violence is the problem that anarchism doesn't address. I think it is better to figure out how to create state based non-violent police forces, no small task either, but something that seems to me to have a better shot for something that we could create in the long run.

You start off your article claiming that articles about anarchy will not drive traffic to the site, and may drive traffic away.  Instead of presenting numbers or evidence of such.  You cite your feelings, which does not show anything.  I feel that people would prefer to go to an uncensored site as opposed to a censored one.  I just made an argument as convincing as yours.
You then make up words  words like anarchos, right before you say that you're not trying to be combative.   I'm not trying to be combative, but I'm going to call you a feeler.  You then claim to be playing devil's advocate which means that you don't really believe what you're writing.  

Some of your article says we need to do this or we need to do that.  It's not clear who this we is.

The meat of your post then is an argument against anarchy, which provides no barring on your original claim.  For example, horoscopes are invalid, but I see no reason why they would take away from use of steemit.  Steemit is set up to make sure that the exposure that horoscopes see will be proportional to people's interest.  It also is clear from your writing style that you have just read people's posts on the internet, and as such don't know what you are talking about.   

I'm not being condescending, but I want to put things in terms you understand.  I feel that feelers need to read more books.

I see a slew of strawman arguments based on your observations without facts supporting them. There isn't much to argue here, as you really haven't presented any arguments.

Anarchism, as most advocates will point out, doesn't mean 'no laws', it means 'no rulers'.

Most of your questions above are answered very simply, by the fact the the true law always exists, and an anarchist society, like any, would only thrive if the real natural law was observed.

The (basic) common-law, as it's known, would still be the framework of law under anarchism. This is law that was natural to the people - and was written and enacted by them,  not by government or by lawyers (until later on).

An anarchist society would still have to have the laws of contract, trust, tort and so on - because these are the laws of morality, and morality is what makes humanity human.

An anarchist society would still have juries to make collective decisions (e.g. infrastructure) because that's the only way to make lawful decisions. It' s all just natural law, and it's very logical and well established.

The only thing such a society would lack is people who claim the right to break the law, under the guise of 'government'.

Anarchism isn't a fringe-belief, it's basic morality and adulthood... It could be better understood though...