Sure I'm happy to debate aspects of anarchic philosophy itself, but the fact of the matter is that essentially all anarchist philosophy has moved in a collectivist (now communist) direction and any remaining "individualist anarchist" strains are no longer considered anarchist (such as "anarcho capitalism"), since one of the few things anarchists seem to agree upon is the critical importance of mutual aid. You're absolutely right to question authority as it surrounds mutualism - that's what anarchists do all the time!

> You can't have collectivism without this. Any collectivist system (which is all human societies to differing degrees) faces two fundamental problems of self interest. The free-rider problem and the problem of people who put in more than they get out leaving the collective. This requires coercion.

I disagree, and so do many writers, and so does history.

First off, the "free rider" problem is a problem under capitalism, not anarchism. We have ample evidence of "free riders" being supported even in ancient societies with high scarcity, such as highly genetically deformed people who lived to a remarkably old age, which means despite their inability to labor, someone was feeding them. Same for people who had traumatic injuries. The idea of a "free rider" is only a problem in a society that believes everyone needs to justify their existence through labor, such as capitalism. Mutualist anarchist societies don't have this problem. Especially a modern day one, now that we've achieved post-scarcity (all scarcity today is artificially enforced).

Second, no human coercion is necessary to ensure collective bounty. Humans are intrinsically motivated to create bounty, if nothing else by hunger. And, being social creatures, we are also intrinsically motivated towards collectivism - ample anthropological evidence for this throughout every continent humans have lived on.

My proposition to you is that capitalist society is motivated by self-preservation to convince you that what I'm telling you is silly and impossible. The system has glaring faults that we all feel, so it can only continue if it can convince everyone that it's The Only Way.

A great resource that covers these historical facts in detail is Graeber's "The Dawn of Everything." If that's too lengthy, the founder of Food Not Bombs wrote a new version of The Anarchist Cookbook that's available as a free PDF https://www.foodnotbombs.net/anarchist_cookbook.html . Ignore the recipes, they're genuinely terrible. The first couple chapters are a good short introduction to the history of anarchy, and as I recall include ancient examples.