David: Of course, no one's saying that these two things aren't very different in character. One is progressive and the other is reactionary. But both involve power and control. If the oppressed don't organize and gain power, they simply continue to be oppressed. By abstractly putting oneself beyond the notion of power itself, you just simply play into the hands of the ruling class, who will use coersion no matter what.
Joe: Hierarchical authority is a type of social relationship whereby one group of people (usually a minority of the population) has power over others. Examples include capitalism (bosses&capitalists have power over workers), patriarchy (men have power over women), white supremacy (whites have power over blacks) and the state (a ruling elite has power over the majority of the population). This instiutionalized subordination (authority) is vastly different from when the dominated refuse to obey the rulers and use force to defend themselves from the ruler's coercision. For example, take rape - a specific instance of patriarchy (which is a form of hierarchical authority). If the dominated - the rape victim - uses pepper spray to deter her attacker that is a very, very different thing from the authority the rapist exerts while dominating his victim. To equate the two, as Engels does, is semantic bullshit.
David: I think Engels is simply pointing out that if the working class do not take power as a class, they will continue to be subjugated and viewed as commodities in the form of labor power. The example being used is an individual one. Women cannot collectively use pepper spray against all potential attackers all at once, and, though their has been much successful organizing against patriarchy within capitalism, it is guaranteed to reproduce itself in some form as long as the capitalist system still stands. A form of patriarchy was held over by the bourgeoisie from the old days because it was a useful mechanism whereby to extract a greater surplus value by creating wage differentials based on gender. Imperialism (that is, the division of the world into spheres of interest in order to build monopolies) also encouraged rape and assault, in my opinion, because it created a culture of violence through war against thrid-world people.
But, even in the example of a woman using pepper spray, the issue of power is still there. When a woman defends herself by pepper spraying her attacker, she is taking power away from the attacker, weakening him, and putting power into her own hands. Taking control of the situation, exercising authority over her attacker. We can use whatever words we want to describe them, but the same thing's going on. It's a situation where "authority" and "control" are actually worthwhile, progressive things.
If we really wanted an end to *all* authority and control immediately, just for the sake of eliminating them, we'd have to advocate women stop defending themselves from attackers, African Americans stop defending themselves from the cops, workers stop organizing against the bourgeoisie!
Best, David