You're right! I mean, that's the common anarchist sensibility that I think is in everyone other than explicit reactionaries. Anyone with a reasonable head on their shoulders wants a more equal, just world, with fewer hierarchies, and the debate mostly remains around how many of these hierarchies can be eliminated.
Where I'd draw the difference is that anarchists are aware of the complicated nature of power. The use of power, and being in a position of power, are not nearly as advantages or productive, for the entity using it or for anyone else, as many people would believe. I don't have time to defend this point and it'll just dissolve into sectarian squabbling; it's just a crucial piece of information that will help you understand the perspective. So anarchists drastically adjust their threshold for when they think it's appropriate to use power (and step into or continue a hierarchy).
For example of a similar principle, a poor soul might be convinced to support a US invasion of a country with egregious and horrifying human rights abuses without much pushing. We won't be, because we've seen this line so so many times before, and even when almost all the evidence that's reaching our ears clearly says "we need to invade to stop this", we have a strong enough counter that's willing to question the validity of that evidence and the epistemological skewing that happens when you're in the imperial core. It's the same with power - when all signs point to the necessity of a particular hierarchical relationship, anarchists have a little voice in their head that says "be more skeptical of this than you think you need to".
Anarchists also tend to much prefer the exercise of collective power. For example the state can raise wages or a union striking can raise wages, but the latter is preferable because it manifests the real value of that labour to the rest of society and changes the material conditions - it now simply costs that much to produce that commodity - instead of relying on the state's method of inspection and enforcement (the material conditions aren't forcing you to pay your workers, you just have to pretend to pay them for the guy with the big stick).
EDIT: I should also say your point is why I don't like the just/unjust distinction. We're all going to draw those lines in different places so it's less a matter of finding the precise splitting point and more a matter of pushing in the right direction relative to the reigning ideology in our society.
You're right! I mean, that's the common anarchist sensibility that I think is in everyone other than explicit reactionaries. Anyone with a reasonable head on their shoulders wants a more equal, just world, with fewer hierarchies, and the debate mostly remains around how many of these hierarchies can be eliminated.
Where I'd draw the difference is that anarchists are aware of the complicated nature of power. The use of power, and being in a position of power, are not nearly as advantages or productive, for the entity using it or for anyone else, as many people would believe. I don't have time to defend this point and it'll just dissolve into sectarian squabbling; it's just a crucial piece of information that will help you understand the perspective. So anarchists drastically adjust their threshold for when they think it's appropriate to use power (and step into or continue a hierarchy).
For example of a similar principle, a poor soul might be convinced to support a US invasion of a country with egregious and horrifying human rights abuses without much pushing. We won't be, because we've seen this line so so many times before, and even when almost all the evidence that's reaching our ears clearly says "we need to invade to stop this", we have a strong enough counter that's willing to question the validity of that evidence and the epistemological skewing that happens when you're in the imperial core. It's the same with power - when all signs point to the necessity of a particular hierarchical relationship, anarchists have a little voice in their head that says "be more skeptical of this than you think you need to".
Anarchists also tend to much prefer the exercise of collective power. For example the state can raise wages or a union striking can raise wages, but the latter is preferable because it manifests the real value of that labour to the rest of society and changes the material conditions - it now simply costs that much to produce that commodity - instead of relying on the state's method of inspection and enforcement (the material conditions aren't forcing you to pay your workers, you just have to pretend to pay them for the guy with the big stick).
EDIT: I should also say your point is why I don't like the just/unjust distinction. We're all going to draw those lines in different places so it's less a matter of finding the precise splitting point and more a matter of pushing in the right direction relative to the reigning ideology in our society.