In a libertarian society...

Great Debates
141

First off, the “track” was a discussion about flood control, which you decided to switch to restaurant desegregation when you realized it wasn’t going the way you liked. Is this the topic you actually want to discuss or do you plan to switch it when you realize you’re wrong?

The idea behind libertarianism, as you’ve been told countless times now, is about individual liberty, free from government intervention–it says nothing for or against institutional racism.

So you are correct, there would be no laws stating that restaurants MUST serve people, just as there would be no laws saying restaurants CAN NOT server people.

But you were 100% wrong when you said “a place where you couldn’t get a meal if you were black.” An African American would be free to open are restaurant and serve only blacks if he/she felt that was a niche market. And whites could choose not to eat at a racist establishment if believed in desegregation.

The racists at the time of segregation didn’t just prevent blacks from going into restaurants, it prevented them from opening restaurants of their own to serve who ever they felt like serving.

Keep in mind what you said, “It was asshole racists.” Asshole racists happen to be liberal, conservative, communist and socialist, and even libertarian, it is independent of political leanings.

So let’s run through this again: libertarianism says that restaurants are free to serve who ever they want, independently of government intervention. If the community is made of up asshole racists, the restaurant will reflect the will of society, just like you said the government will.

Why? Do you have proof of that or is it simply your assertion based on your hatred of libertarianism? And how much is “much much more?” We have plenty of institutional racism, it was only recently that states allowed interracial marriage.

Here is a map showing states that continued to block interracial marriage as late as 1967. Is your assertion that libertarianism would have let it some how continue?

Is your goal to have less racism? Libertarianism says something about that as a goal. If someone wants to be a racist, and start a giant racist gated community, go for it. If it’s profitable it will flourish and there will be lots of little racist babies.

Then again, in a democracy, if there are lots of racists, and they want a racist government to ENFORCE gated communities, and use police power to keep blacks out, you end up with exactly the same thing. So which is better and which is worse if both end up with the same result?

Like Little Nemo, you’re arguing against libertarianism by acting as if the government is a benevolent and infallible force. Looking back through US history isn’t not hard to find cases where the government was neither. Libertarianism is against government coercion in all forms good and bad. It says restaurants can be racists, and it says gays can marry. Which of those does your government currently allow?

142

Of course government can be bad. It’s made of people.

Your Libertarian government would also be bad at times. But worse than that, it would be bad as a matter of design.

The price of a Libertarian government is allowing communities to institute racism. The only problem is that it offers nothing whatsoever in return. A Libertarian government means more people would die, more people would live under conditions of racism, more people would live in abject misery.

And it doesn’t do anything at all to balance the scales. Why should society pay the price of all the damage Libertarian nonsense would cause? For what exactly? So you can crow about how free you are? So you can laugh at the proles toiling for pennies because they’re too poor to leave Exxontown?

143

emacknight

You come in here and shoot down all government functions named by the rest of us. I sounds like you want to abolish government, but I’ve seen too many libertarian threads where libertarians will go, “libertarianism is not anarchy.” OK then, I have three questions for you.

  1. Do you believe in any form or forms of government?
  2. What should it’s/their purpose be?
  3. What makes your government functions legitimate?
144

If what you’re trying to say is that the Alabama state government is slightly less racist today than it was in the 1960s, congrats. You’ve scored a stunning victory for your side, assuming your side is willfully ignorant of the Civil Rights Movement, and institutional racism imposed on society by the government. I’ll ask again, was George Wallace a libertarian?

But let’s say that you’re right, and that thanks to the government we have less racism today. And that without the government we’d have more. Can you really same the same thing about discrimination against the LGBTTT community? Twenty-eight states currently have constitutional amendments prohibiting same sex marriage. Sodomy laws were still on the books in several states until 2003.

Well, no, technically as a matter of design it’s better because it protects of from ourselves.
Your government is made of people, who are inherently flawed, and desperate for power.

That’s bullshit and you know it. You’re making the same mistake as Little Nemo in that you fail to realize that the government can be both a shield and a sword.

Right *now *it seems like the government is preventing racism, but 50 years ago it was the tool of racist assholes to keep white men on top, and everyone else on the bottom. Maybe you’ve heard of Apartheid in South Africa, but then again maybe you haven’t.

And while anti-discrimination laws seem like a great idea, it’s easy to see how they can go too far. In Germany it’s illegal to deny the Holocaust. Canada is struggling to define how it applies hate crime legislation.

It’s unfortunate that libertarianism won’t stop racists from being racist. But it also means people can draw pictures of Mohamed, and criticize the government. It means people can create little racist enclaves, but it also means the government can’t create ghettos.

The government can be both a sword and a shield. Giving it more power allows it more opportunity to to both.

When you see anti-government protesters in Syria, Libya, Egypt, Yemen, do you picture a bunch of libertarians that want freedom to be racist? Would reducing government oppression there mean more misery or less?

Technically speaking, if Saudi women were allowed to drive there would be more vehicular deaths, thank Allah the government has the strength to prevent that from happening. Unfortunately those uppity libertarians over there got women the right to vote so who knows what will happen next.

Maybe it’s tired of paying for all the damage caused by government intervention?

It’s so brutally disingenuous to only highlight the defensive actions of the government, while willfully ignoring the offensive role it plays. Flood control seems like a great idea for those living down river, who risk losing their land every year. Hard not to imagine their glee when the government uses other people’s money to provide them with protection.

And how heartless must libertarians be to object to such a benevolent government, to stand by and laugh while properties are flooded.

Until you realize there are people upriver who have their land taken by the government, and subsequently flooded to make a reservoir.

Interstate highways seem like a great idea, until you realize there were people that made their livelihood off the hold highway, or have their land taken, or their income used on another massive boondoggle. Or watch as government money, once the income of hardworking Americans, flows to political allies that conveniently own construction companies.

Right now the Provincial Government in Quebec is dealing with a massive corruption scandal that funneled tax payer’s money to construction companies, to the mob, and then back to politicians.
According to the leaks of the report, civil servants colluded with construction companies to find loopholes in the tendering process, allowing the firms to charge more for public-works contracts.

A subway system is great as long as it’s built in the right areas, and not diverted where the Mayor gets the most political kick backs.

Are you guys completely unaware of the Big Dig in Boston?

Even the military starts out as an obvious necessity. Until defense contracts are used as pork spending to prop up uncompetitive companies with non-competitive bids, that funnel their way back to political campaign contributions. And to justify more spending is easy if you create a war, where ever it may be.

The government you praise today for fighting discrimination against blacks was actively helping to discriminate against them for centuries, and is today actively discriminating against gays. Is that really what you’re trying to argue in favour of?

145

Yes, I would argue for it. Because it demonstrates that the arc of history is towards a more progressive society that, despite imperfections, is capable of becoming more perfect. Your Libertopia is incapable of that change, because it values the property owner over the peasant, the rich over the poor, and the powerful over the powerless. I would much prefer the society where power is determined not by property, but by the will of the majority. Some may call that tyranny; I call it justice.

146

All of the progress against racism in this country has been driven by government. The big, federal government that Libertarians complain so much about. It’s the small, local governments that have historically been the ones trying to promote racism. This fact does not exactly inspire faith in the mantra that small governments are better than big governments.

147

Either emacknight has me on mute, or he’s just ignoring me. I’ll try one more time.

  1. You seem to hate government, so if you had your way, would we have any government? (I.E. city or other local, state, and/or federal)
  2. You seem to be against any government action, so if you wouldn’t abolish all government, what actions would the government engage in?
  3. Why would these be legitimate?

For any government action listed you shoot it down as favoring one group at the expense of another. So let’s hear how your government wouldn’t be that way. Assuming you believe in some form of government that is.

148

Simple question… Would you libertarians provide free and unfettered access to antibiotics?

149

Are you sure the things you are describing are more progressive or more libertarian? Or said another way the libertarian aspects of progressiveness, which I believe you are in favour of.

The government created and enforced segregated schools, so both libertarians and progressives aligned in their desire to reverse that.

Right now the government is responsible for discrimination against the LGBTTT community, and again both libertarian and progressive policies align.

It’s not that Libertopia is incapable of change, it’s that it doesn’t need to. Why? Because it doesn’t allow conservatives to use tyranny of the majority (meaning rich white landowners) to prop up their power.

In a more extreme example I mentioned women not being allowed to drive in Saudi Arabia. That’s the [conservative] government actively oppressing a group, and that requires progressives to march and protest and eventually repeal that law. Libertopia wouldn’t have had the law in the first place.

So to say, “there would be much, much more institutional racism” requires ignoring that it’s the government that puts those policies in place. Conservatives have to first put in the racist policy, and then progressives have to take it out. You’re acting as if progressives are great because they undid what conservatives started. Libertarianism blocks conservatives from making the first move, isn’t that something you’d like?

150

Huh? Why would you think so. The antibiotics have to be produced by someone, at considerable expense. Why would you think that others would be entitled to “free” access to them?

151

For the common good?

152

Ok let me put it another way. Who would be providing the “free” access in that scenario? The company that produces them? The government? Some charity organization?

In a libertarian society, only the third possibility is viable.

153

Libertopia wouldn’t need that law-individual landowners can just ban women from driving across their property on their private roads, other people with the same ideas about women would buy up the nearby land, and suddenly women are effectively banned from driving in that area of the country.

154
  1. Good public relations.
  2. A realization that if there are more people, there are more customers for other products sold by the same company.
  3. A touch of empathy.
155

I want you to think about this statement. Do you believe the power of “rich white landowners” is derived from their majority numbers, or from their wealth?

156

Which would imply that there would be areas allowing women to drive, that they are free to move to. Does a woman in Saudi Arabia have that option?

Ultimately in this scenario market forces would either allow or deny women from driving. If a community that allowed women drivers made more money it would grow and prosper, while a community that banned it would shrivel. Unless of course that community had assess to huge amounts of oil…

What’s better and what’s worse? Which is faster and which is slower?

I guess it only took Libyans 8 months to overthrow the government they had for 42 years.

157

Well, I want you to think about this: Zimbabwe.

Do you need more help?

In the US the RWL were able to prevent blacks and women from voting, and use the government to keep them down. Hard to become either rich or a landowner if the government won’t allow you to buy land.

Think, for just a moment, how RWL solidified and ensured their power. Think about the laws in place, and the police that enforced them.

You aren’t actually arguing against libertarianism, you’re arguing against conservatism. And once conservatives are in power you are actually arguing in favour of libertarianism.

Like I said before, it would be great if the government were a benevolent and infallible force, it’s not.

158

In neither case was power secured through “tyranny by the majority”. Or have you abandoned that argument?

159

What are you going on about now? You were the one that brought up tyranny of the majority, and suggested it as a good thing. I pointed out how it can be used as a very bad thing like current voters supporting a constitutional ban on SSM.

Lobohan tried to suggest that it was the government that protects minorities, which was also shown to be false.

Then you came back and mentioned rich white landowners, who had no problem using the government to secure their power.

The funny/sad thing about a majority in democracy is that it’s based on those allowed to vote, not actual numbers within a society. Prevent women, blacks, and the poor from voting and rich white men become a rather large voting block.

Meanwhile, in Zimbabwe, the rich white landowners were in a minority position, and had their land taken by the government and given to the majority. Sort of like what happens when the government confiscates land for the betterment of society, which you were all for a few posts back.

Even though you so desperately want to, you can’t have it both ways. Give the government power to confiscate land, and you’ll have to accept some times it’s best for society, and sometimes it’s best for those in power.

Here’s another look at the problem Canada is facing with progressive hate crime legislation:
http://www.ottawasun.com/2011/10/15/the-wrong-way-to-fight-hate

160

Far preferable to Libertopia, where wealthy property owners have all the power. At least in a democracy, the majority has a chance to do what is in their interest.