Split Thread Libertarianism

[lightfire22000]

Really? That's news to me. The evidence that government works seems pretty good to me.

I don't see any compelling evidence that our current government works.

 

[ponderingturtle]

I don't see any compelling evidence that our current government works.

How are you defining works?

It certainly works a lot better than less involved goverments in the past have. Large scale infarstructure for example did not work very well as private enterprise.

 

[drkitten]

Yeah, but it's a bizarre response:

It's a bizarre response to a bizarre argument; the whole point is to point out the bizarreness of the argument.

You can rob pillage and murder to your heart's content... because the police are private contractors?

Apparently, yes. At least in lightfire's version of AnCap.

He wrote:

You'd just be allowed to secede your property from their jurisdiction.

Think about that. I can, by unilateral action, simply state that any particular authority has no authority over me. No court, no police, no military, no nothing. And apparently they have to respect this particular action of mine in his bizarre universe.

So, yes, if the police are private contractors -- and I have "secede[d] my property [sic] from their jurisdiction," under what basis can they act?

I mean, sure, the stuff I took was under their jurisdiction once, before I stole it -- but I then seceded it and left them empty-handed.

As far as I can tell, Libertarians aren't arguing that people can perpetrate shenanigans without fear of being stopped.

Libertarians in general aren't. But lightfire specifically is.

 

[drkitten]

When one believes that he needs to use force to defend himself, he certainly is moral for using it.

Because no one ever has mistaken beliefs.

Indeed, in Libertopia, no one is ever delusional. In fact, the State provides anti-psychotic medication to all the paranoid schizophrenics precisely because otherwise they might mistakenly believe they need to use force to defend themselves from the people who are transmitting thoughts into their head and otherwise harming them.....

... and if the State didn't provide such medicine, then they'd be moral in killing all the people who are transmitting thoughts.

 

[drkitten]

No, that's stealing other people's property.

No, it's not. I "secede[d]" it from their jurisdiction. It's not theirs any more. And their court doesn't have authority to demand it back.

Unless, of course, you're planning to have your group of thugs shoot it out with mine.

 

[lightfire22000]

No, it's not. I "secede[d]" it from their jurisdiction. It's not theirs any more. And their court doesn't have authority to demand it back.

Unless, of course, you're planning to have your group of thugs shoot it out with mine.

You still don't own the people and you can only make laws on your property. Another person's thugs could definitely shoot it out with you. That prospect defines property in the first place.

 

[paximperium]

You still don't own the people and you can only make laws on your property. Another person's thugs could definitely shoot it out with you. That prospect defines property in the first place.

And that's suppose to be a good thing?

 

[drkitten]

You still don't own the people

Sure I do. I claimed a property right in them, and opted out of any jurisdiction that can disagree with me.

Sucks to be my newly captured slave, doesn't it?

you can only make laws on your property.

Good thing you're my property, then.

Another person's thugs could definitely shoot it out with you.

They could. But that's exactly what "government" is supposed to prevent -- not to encourage.

That prospect defines property in the first place.

Hardly. Other people's thugs could still shoot it out with me in situations that have nothing to do with property. "Honor killings," for example, or vengeance. Or simply because they don't like having my type around here. What "property" were the thugs who murdered Matthew Shepard defending?

 

[lightfire22000]

Sure I do. I claimed a property right in them, and opted out of any jurisdiction that can disagree with me.

Sucks to be my newly captured slave, doesn't it?



Good thing you're my property, then.



They could. But that's exactly what "government" is supposed to prevent -- not to encourage.



Hardly. Other people's thugs could still shoot it out with me in situations that have nothing to do with property. "Honor killings," for example, or vengeance. Or simply because they don't like having my type around here. What "property" were the thugs who murdered Matthew Shepard defending?

Except you don't own me and I'm not on your property. People recognize each other's property. When they do, they're free to secede it. If they don't, there's a war. The prospect of force often defines property. It's a fact. That doesn't mean that force is exclusively about property.

 

[paximperium]

Except you don't own me and I'm not on your property. People recognize each other's property. When they do, they're free to secede it. If they don't, there's a war. The prospect of force often defines property. It's a fact. That doesn't mean that force is exclusively about property.

I recognize Dr. Kitten's right to own slaves if he recognizes my right to do so. In fact a bunch of us will gang up and enslave others. What are you going to do about it?

 

[drkitten]

Except you don't own me and I'm not on your property. People recognize each other's property.

Bingo. In other words, the whole Libertarian idea of "inherent right" to property fails utterly.

What defines property is what people -- more accurately, society -- defines as such. When society defined Negro slaves as property, they were property, and the courts acted to enforce that despite the fact that they were human beings. The Dred Scott decision is the classic example of this. When the courts stopped recognizing this (more accurately, when they were instructed by the people through the government), slaves stopped being property and, legally speaking, became people with rights of their own.

When they do, they're free to secede it.

Wrong! Just because I -- or people, or society -- recognize a particular piece of property as belonging to you doesn't mean that we recognize that you're "free to secede it [sic]." (By the way, "secede" is still an intransitive verb, despite your continued attempts to mangle grammar.)

And we don't, by and large. There's even case law on that particular subject. Society has officially recognized your right to property while at the same time officially denying your self-declared freedom to withdraw from society's jurisdiction.

Don't like that? Tough noogies. If you want society to recognize your property, you need to recognize their rules under which they will grant recognition. If they say "we will recognize your property if you do X, Y, and Z," you need to do X, Y, and Z or they won't recognize your claim to property, and can and will enforce their will upon you, including taking "your property" away from you, since it has no actual owner.

If they don't, there's a war.

Not at all. You haven't had the right to secede (in the USA) for more than 100 years. Funny, but there hasn't been a war about that.

 

[drkitten]

I recognize Dr. Kitten's right to own slaves if he recognizes my right to do so.

Done. Shall we find lightfire and explain how he is in fact our property "jointly and in common with right of survivorship?"

 

[lightfire22000]

I recognize Dr. Kitten's right to own slaves if he recognizes my right to do so. In fact a bunch of us will gang up and enslave others. What are you going to do about it?

Provide a fight that you wouldn't want because you'd get killed. Anybody who tried to own slaves would get killed. Once they all got killed, no one would enslave others. Once you coerce and seize property, you become government and should be abolished anyways.

 

[rocketdodger]

You still don't own the people and you can only make laws on your property. Another person's thugs could definitely shoot it out with you. That prospect defines property in the first place.

This is what I just don't get about certain Anarchist types -- they completely fail to realize that total freedom for everyone is an extremely unstable state. That is, such a state will rapidly transition to something else regardless of what you do.

I have libertarian leanings myself but you have to be literally ignorant of mathematics if you think total freedom is a sustainable option.

So you have to then ask "is it better to submit to a small band of thugs that can't protect you, or a large band of thugs that can?"

I will choose the large band, thank you very much. Because there will always be thugs, and I would rather be on the winning side.

 

[lightfire22000]

This is what I just don't get about certain Anarchist types -- they completely fail to realize that total freedom for everyone is an extremely unstable state. That is, such a state will rapidly transition to something else regardless of what you do.

I have libertarian leanings myself but you have to be literally ignorant of mathematics if you think total freedom is a sustainable option.

So you have to then ask "is it better to submit to a small band of thugs that can't protect you, or a large band of thugs that can?"

I will choose the large band, thank you very much. Because there will always be thugs, and I would rather be on the winning side.

I'm not stating ideals as much as I'm stating the way things naturally are. A natural anarchy is the only way to explain revolutions.

I apologize for not doing a better job of preventing the thread from going off topic.

 

[rocketdodger]

Provide a fight that you wouldn't want because you'd get killed. Anybody who tried to own slaves would get killed. Once they all got killed, no one would enslave others. Once you coerce and seize property, you become government and should be abolished anyways.

LOL.

Yeah -- all those black slaves my ancestors brought over from Africa didn't put up any fight at all. They just walked into the shackles, or so I hear.

*rolls eyes*

Let me tell you how it would be: If you knew drkitten and maximus were after you, you would probably try to find some buddies. And to get along with those buddies, you would have to agree to a certain set of rules -- if nothing else, "when the shooting starts, we shoot maximus and drkitten -- don't shoot me too and then steal my stuff in a doublecross."

And guess what -- as soon as you agree to some rules that limit your own freedom, you are back to where we are today. So what exactly is your argument? That smaller groups are better? Why, given that the larger groups will always consume the smaller ones?

 

[rocketdodger]

A natural anarchy is the only way to explain revolutions.

Not at all. They could just as easily be explained by those at the bottom of the pecking order wanting to be at the top -- which is indeed the explanation for a great many of them.

Or do you really think that all revolutions in history end up being better for everyone? I don't mean to Godwin, but it was revolution that brought Hitler to power. And if you don't want to Godwin, just look at the Cultural Revolution in China.

 

[lightfire22000]

Not at all. They could just as easily be explained by those at the bottom of the pecking order wanting to be at the top -- which is indeed the explanation for a great many of them.

Or do you really think that all revolutions in history end up being better for everyone? I don't mean to Godwin, but it was revolution that brought Hitler to power. And if you don't want to Godwin, just look at the Cultural Revolution in China.

Since one government only comes into power because it overthrew another government, every government is illegal to somebody. Since people are capable of revolt against government, anarcho-capitalism and natural law are the only rational forms of government.

This goes back to social contract theory 101.

 

[drkitten]

Since one government only comes into power because it overthrew another government

False. What happens, for example, when a new colony is founded?

Since people are capable of revolt against government, anarcho-capitalism and natural law are the only rational forms of government.

Except by your own (laughably stupid) argument, they're also illegal, and therefore illegitimate.

This goes back to social contract theory 101.

... which you obviously failed.

 

[drkitten]

Not at all. They could just as easily be explained by those at the bottom of the pecking order wanting to be at the top -- which is indeed the explanation for a great many of them.

Or do you really think that all revolutions in history end up being better for everyone? I don't mean to Godwin, but it was revolution that brought Hitler to power. And if you don't want to Godwin, just look at the Cultural Revolution in China.

Or the Russian Revolution, or the French Revolution, or the Viet Cong, or,....