How would anarchists deal with nuclear facilities "after the revolution"?

Question

I've heard this question raised a few times by anarchists and non-anarchists alike. This is really the only cogent argument I've ever seen against anarchy, but presumably we could find a solution.

Answer 1

maybe i don't understand the question.
nuclear facilities are a known threat. people who are capable of dealing with them and who know the dangers would be highly motivated to deal with them as best as possible. people who are not capable of dealing with them are highly motivated to support the people who are.
are all those people going to die? if so then we're screwed. but a revolution is hardly the only, and far from the most likely, way for all those exact people to be dead.
or maybe the point is that there won't be the tools to "deal with them", that there won't be electrical power, or other things that current safety measures rely on? so that there would be nothing to keep all the bad stuff contained... but i guess that assumes that there's anything that will ultimately keep it contained now. we're already living in a world with so much pollution of various toxic sorts that at least that kind of a revolution would stop the production of *more*, for whatever that would be worth.

Comments

That last bit is what I'm getting at. Presumably there would still be a few people around with knowledge of how to deal with nuclear material. Presumably a society that decided to embrace anarchy would be enlightened enough to want to no longer utilize nuclear material for any purposes. So... I guess what I'm looking for is some kind of technical answer. How would the material be made as harmless as possible. Would it be moved to (a) different location(s)? How could the people who move the material be protected from radiation? How would this society make sure the material is left alone for thousands of years?

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2Aqfp5iMnw

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you seem to be positing a particular kind of so-called revolution. maybe you could be more explicit about it? people move radioactive materials now, so if people moved it later, why wouldn't they use the same safety measures?
unless structurally those safety measures were no longer available/possible, which would only happen under certain conditions. are you assuming a rupture, during which all current power options stop? or a plague, in which all current experienced and/or knowledgeable people die? or both? or something else?

in either of those cases there are many many causes of extreme toxicity that will happen. just the decomposition of so many bodies in one place will be overwhelming on whatever local level (consider the toxicity of new orleans as a beginning).
it's true that nuclear waste lasts longer than other kinds, but consider what happened in chernobyl, which is now, bizarrely enough, a wildlife refuge (not necessarily a healthy one, but...), because humans are afraid to develop there.
at any rate, these "post-revolutionary" questions need a bit more fleshing out to be approached at all usefully.

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i voted this down because it was irritating and not funny to me. a bunch of white guys putting mud on their faces and acting like they're anarchists is tedious. i wish it were funny, but it was just playing to tired stereotypes. plus it didn't say anything interesting about the OP question.
OTOH i couldn't finish it. maybe the last 2 minutes really make the whole clip sing.
in which case, sorry.

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I'm not actually trying to posit a revolution as instigating the hypothetical anarchist society. I hesitated to use the term, but decided to go with "after the revolution" in quotes to get at the most common expression for a future anarchist society. I was being intentionally vague because I am skeptical that a revolution could ever lead to an anarchist society, tho I won't rule it out. The means to reach such a society are not pertinent to this question, IMO.

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*I guess what I'm looking for is some kind of technical answer. How would the material be made as harmless as possible. Would it be moved to (a) different location(s)? How could the people who move the material be protected from radiation? How would this society make sure the material is left alone for thousands of years?*

actually, to back up, i'm not sure what this has to do with an anarchy101 site. as you say, these are tech questions, and if anything would be challenging to people who want us to go immediately to a primitivist way of life, and i don't think there are any straight up primmies who come here. perhaps i will be proven wrong.
or maybe you could explain to me why people would think that an anarchist society would be any *less* capable than the society we have now, of allowing people who care and know what to do to address the problem?

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force-feed the toxic waste to the people that made it, then launch their cancer-ridden bodies at the sun?

boy, creating things capable of destroying all life on earth sure was a bad idea.

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maybe they were trying to create a permanent need for a specialized elite to make sure their creations don't kill us all.
 
its like the evil villain who has bombs set to detonate when his heart stops beating.

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It's strange that this is an answer and yet it says it's been edited by dot, even though dot's page says No One not even them will be editing questions. Perhaps I'm confused.

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it shows that things have been edited if
a) i change the tags, which i might do under certain circumstances,
or b) if i accidentally hide and then reshow a comment, answer, or question,
or c) if i make an answer a comment, which i will do even though i'd rather not have to.

also i didn't intend to say that i wouldn't edit my own answers or comments. i need editing frequently. ;)