If you eliminate formal regulators (rules, laws, authoritative bodies), you haven't eliminated regulation or governance. Instead, informal forms of power take over—those who are most forceful, persuasive, or socially connected regulate what happens. This is the "tyranny of structurelessness": when no open, accountable structures exist, structure remains—it just becomes invisible, unaccountable, and often dominated by the "sharkest shark."

So, "no regulator" doesn't mean freedom from regulation; it means the emergence of undemocratic, unchecked power by whoever can grab and wield it.

I find people tend to get it when you raise cases of market activity outside the law: everyone knows the mob buys and sells things but there are still rules.