All that I ask is that, if you use a hypothetical, then I get to hypothesize, too. For example, if you say that there is a mean wealthy man who wants to buy up all the property in the neighborhood, then I get to say that there is a friendly philanthropist who will thwart him. If you get to suppose, then we all get to suppose.
Otherwise, I welcome questions about my beloved philosophy, and will gladly go all the way down to the basics if necessary. I’ll check back in the morning to see if there are questions.
In the meantime, I’ll start with one from a Pit thread:
Well, it does sound like they will go to war. But in libertarian philosophy, force as a response is not wrong. Only initial force is wrong.
I’m not sure I get the Stricker part. There doesn’t seem to be a question.
Whoo hoo! First guy to view one of Libertarian’s threads.
Well um, so err ah, um, as far as the LP stand on civil rights go I’m all with you on that; but could you explain to me why we should privetize the roads, among other methods of reducing government size?
Why is it that the government of Libertaria is permitted to coerce people who do not consent to be governed if the guiding principle of Libertaria is non-coercion.
For instance, in a previous thread you had stated that Libertaria will only govern those who consent to be governed. Which should mean that only those who consent to the Principle of Non-Coercion should have to abide by it.
However, you also stated that if I (a non-consenting person) were to coerce a Libertarian (as in someone who has consented to be governed by Libertaria) the Libertarian government would then punish me. Is this not coercing me to follow Libertarian laws despite the fact that I have not consented to them?
You also said that if I were to have fled to Authoritaria, Libertaria would be obliged to make war against Authoritaria in order to get me back (theoretically speaking, of course, obviously, I doubt if the Libertarian government would bother in real life unless it was really major). Given this, is not Libertaria coercing Authoritaria into submitting to its will?
Okay.
I’ve heard tell Libertarians beleive government shouldn’t give welfare to people.
So what would be the alternative?
What if churches or charities Didn’t help them?
And what is the “hypothetical” likelyhood of this? It seems to me that you’re trying to pre-weasel out of some difficult but likely questions that will nuke your whole argument from the start.
If you really want to educate people on your philosophy, you might not limit the discussion from the beginning.
So, let’s say that there is a mean wealthy man who wants to buy up all the property in the neighborhood and there is no friendly philanthropist because the mean wealthy man ruined him and he jumped off a bridge before Clarence the angel came to show him what life would be like without him. What then in Libertaria?
While I agree with most libertarian principles, one thing I’ve always been uneasy about is privatization of the road system and the practical workings thereof.
It seems very impractical and wasteful to have competing privately-owned road systems, and it would be pretty much impossible in densely-populated areas. But having a single profit-oriented entity control most or all of the major roads in an area would give that entity quite a bit of control over that area, which is probably asking for trouble.
The same basic idea also applies to things like telephone and electrical lines.
So my question is, how would the system of roads work in a purely libertarian society? If you can address utilities (phone, power, sewer, water, etc.) in general as well, that would be great.
Cool thread, by the way. Looking forward to reading all the questions and answers!
Well, the question as I see it is “does libertarian philosophy lead to war in this situation?”
The Stricker part is important. Stricker is a noncontracting party to either Libertaria New York (“LNY”) or Libertaria Los Angeles (“LLA”). Stricker damages the property of Fred, a LNY contracting party. He then flees and barricades himself Sally’s basement – unbeknownst to Sally, an LLA contracting party who is on vacation.
The point is thus: Sally is an innocent party here. She didn’t hurt anyone or damage anyone’s property. But under the terms of libertarian philosophy as you’ve described it, LNY is required to initiate force against Sally’s property in order to bring Stricker to justice.
This leads to LLA’s demand that LNY make Sally whole, which LNY is not obligated to do because Sally has not contracted with them. This in turn leads LLA to try to make Sally whole by initiating force against LNY. Which leads to war between LNY and LLA.
The ultimate initial force is, of course, Stricker. But that’s going to be cold comfort to Sally, who again is a wholly innocent party. Sally will rightfully see LNY’s damage to her property as an initiation of force against her, even if it is a retaliatory force against Stricker.
So the question is, is this the result in a perfect libertarian world? If not, why not?
IANALibertarian, but what is the purpose of some of these hypotheticals? Couldn’t you introduce crazy hypotheticals into a discussion of our current system of government and project equally confusing results? What if the President decided to launch a nuclear strike against Finland for no reason? What if the entire Supreme Court got together and decided to make a bunch of stupid crazy rulings unless they got big pay raises? What if the voters elected Emeril Lagasse president? I can understand why Libertarian would want to keep the more unlikely hypotheticals out of the debate.
Now, my questions are these:
You said in one of the other threads
I could be a smartass and say “Did you type that with a straight face,” but I know you’re a little sensitive where your philosophy is concerned (don’t chew my face off for this, you admitted as much in this post) so my sincere question is, do you think it is easier for an evil person to exploit our current system of government than it would be for said evil person to exploit a Libertarian government? How so? Wouldn’t a government with such little power have a much harder time dealing with evil people? Or is dealing with evildoers also the responsibility of the individual?
The minorities in our society (religious, ethnic, political, etc.) can expect some degree of protection from our government. Under Libertarianism, I understand that it’s wrong for a member or members of the majority to coerce members of the minority. But sometimes mobs rule. What is the Libertarian government going to do about it? What deters people from going apeshit and really doing a job on the minority?
The question that came to me while reading through that Pit thread: Dude, what happened to this?
For the most part, I really like Libertarian ideas; I think they make a whole lot of sense.
My problem comes in getting from here to there. I agree that if we could poof create a new society and get to pick the government, that it would ideally be Libertarian. I get completely lost, however, when I try to work out a way to get from here [here being the current US government] to a Libertarian one. Sure - you can make small changes in that direction, but I’m not seeing how supporting changes in the drug laws, say, and pushing for priviatization of various currently govenment activities will get us to Libertarianism without a huge mess somewhere in the middle.
So I guess my question is - is there a smooth way to get from here to there?
They were giant intelligent squids, Arnold. This is important. However, it’s best for Libertarian to summarize that point, since it was his original thread.
FWIW, I myself am a (small ell) libertarian, but we disagreed (and continue to) on the squid thing.
Libertarian, I have a hypothetical for you: suppose it’s time to vote in the presidential election, and, though the Libertarian candidate is a good guy/gal the polls predict that s/he doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of winning. You’re going to stick to your guns and vote for him or her, though(on principal, to encourage the formation of a major3 party system, whatever your reasons). Supposing that all Libertarians feel the same, and vote the same (for the lib instead of another candidate), who is more likely to be hurt from the loss of your votes? The Dems or the Republicans?
Do you think that the philosophical, rather than pragmatic, leanings of many Libertarians alienate voters for Libertarian candidates because of the extremism of Libertarian philosophy? By extremism, I don’t mean that Libertarians are going to go around slaughtering innocent people or anything. But what I mean is that it seems that privatization of almost every government service, such as roads, would take a long time to do without creating total chaos. (I could very well be wrong.) But I do find that the Libertarians more closely approximate my views, and those of a significant number of Americans, than the Republicans or Democrats. That is, I am a hard-liner on most of the Bill of Rights (although somewhat moderate on the Second Amendment), and I find that the Republican Party has been hijacked by religious fundamentalists and neo-fascists (e.g., people like John Ashcroft, or supporters of John Poindexter’s Total Information Awareness Program), so their views are abhorrent to me. Yet, at the same time, I don’t like the Democratic reliance on government programs, or their greater support for welfare, due to my capitalist/individualist values. And neither party really seems to support the legalization of drugs, which I think would reduce drug-related crime and protect individual privacy. Most Democrats and Republicans even argue for the continued illegality of marijuana, a drug which, although harmful to individual health, doesn’t predispose users to criminal behavior. So, because of my views on these issues, I would very much like voting for moderately Libertarian candidates. However, I don’t support privatization of ALL government services, or legalization of victimless crimes that put people at risk (like drunk driving). So to reiterate my question, do you think that the radical hyper-philosophical nature of Libertarianism alienates voters who support many of its basic political platforms? (The enumeration of my personal political views in this post isn’t intended to spark a debate on them, but merely to give examples for the way I think many voters feel in order to help explain my question.)
Reducting government size is not in and of itself a goal of libertarianism. The goal is to reduce coercion. And so it naturally follows that when coercive elements of government are eliminated, there being so many and all, the size of government will decrease. (That is assuming that elements for defense are already large enough; if not, the size could increase.)
Roads should be privatized in order to reduce the coercive collection of taxes. If you’re paying your taxes voluntarily, then there is no coercion. But if not, then there is. For libertarian government, you give your consent that you will pay. Your consent is sacred. If you want to be governed, then pay. If not, don’t. No one can force you to be governed.
In libertarianism, as in the Declaration of Independence, the legitimacy of government is derived from the consent of all those who are governed.
The alternative would be private charity. If none of us, including family, friends, neighbors, houses of worship, and other charities would not help, then people would get no help.
Well, the archangel Gabriel blasted the mean man with trumpet sounds until he relented. Why should you get to suppose whatever you want, but I may suppose nothing? Does that really sound fair to you?
