Topic: Libertarian my ass! - page 3. (Read 9520 times)

It's always the people with excellent English, for a non-native speaker, that consider their English "poor." You've a better grasp of English grammar and spelling than most native speakers I talk to. Certainly better than my Spanish.
Then I suppose you'll have to forgive me that I believe it won't be at all, outside of relatively small groups. It's just not a suitable system for organizing people above the Dunbar limit. Humans are fine with sharing with people they consider "us." Family, and occasionally friends. That's why it works OK on the Kibbutz or in Aragón, but every time it's been tried on a larger scale, it requires a state to force people to share with strangers. To me, "voluntary socialism" is just as much a contradiction in terms as "Anarcho-capitalist" is to you.

The defining factor of pre-private-property societies is their size: they are universally much smaller than an average city. Tribal communities had (and still have) no problem sharing amongst themselves, because they all know each other. Dunbar's number again. Bees and Ants, of course, are very poor examples of "anarchist" societies, as they are very hierarchical, and have rigid caste systems. A worker bee is always a worker bee. She can never become a Queen. As well, they destroy anyone who isn't "us."

Eh. Linguistic drift. Words get co-opted all the time here in the US. We're used to it, we just move on to another word. I'd like to see them try to fuck up the meaning of "Voluntaryist," though.

These are actually the same "flavor." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agorism

I think there are two flavors of anarcho-capitalism.

1) Anarcho-capitalism as a free market ideology.

2) Anarcho-capitalism as the idea and action of counter-economics, with the goal of hollowing out the state, and establishing a more egalitarian society. In this sense, "anarcho" and "capitalism" shouldn't be a contradiction in terms even for lefties.

You aren't talking to me are you? If so, what do you define as being right wing? Is supporting the legalization of all narcotics, or all substances for that matter, right wing? (And no, I don't use drugs, I just think it's wrong for say Chuck Schumer to want to stick some derp in jail for the crime of getting high as if it is any of his business.) Is being atheist right wing? Is being indifferent to abortion and homosexuality (as in, not opposing but not encouraging - more or less simply not caring because I believe people should be able to do what they want so I won't intervene) right wing?

If so, then I guess I'm one big right winger. And I am a capitalist too. I distinguish myself from anarchist in that I believe in a central government to represent our international interests as well as provide defense, in addition to providing policing to maintain civilization. However I am opposed to all forms of forced welfare as well as the idea of protecting one from themselves (e.g. by banning narcotics, soft drinks, etc.)

I got a better idea though: I think the right vs left labels need to die. Personally I don't even like the libertarian label because it doesn't do much to distinguish what I consider to be very separate areas of libertarian thought. I only use that label because people such as yourself are so entrenched in the right vs left game, that when talking to people such as yourself it is necessary to use short terms to indicate that I am not part of that system.

I already got a lot of esteem for you - not because we agree on some important points, but because we disagree on some important points and still your debating in an intelligent and civilized way. And you are not making fun of my very poor english


Obviously no real anarchist would try to equalize wealth by force. That's why anarchists and communists fighted to death despite the fact that they initially cooperated in the First International. As Rudolph Rocker's said:


I also disagree with you on the fact of the "less able stealing from the more productive". I think this is unrealistic and won't happen, as mid-sized (Aragón, Spain) and small-sized (Israel Kibutz's) anarchist experiences has demonstrated. How it would work on a large scale, we don't know - we can just speculate.

I personally believe that capitalism and its wild competition, its perpetual growth goal, etc. is profoundly self-destructive. I think that "nature's way" is cooperation. While Darwin was right pointing out that nature is a fight for survival, this does not invalidate the fact that the vast majority of animals and pre-private property societies cooperate in order to survive. Just look at bees, aunts, etc... Kropotkin wrote a wonderful anthropological essay about that.

As per Kropotkin:


Last but not least: I'm also surprised by the US conception of "liberal" as left-wing. While it is true that the first liberals (Enlightenment age free-thinkers) have inspired both left and right wing philosophies, and that they were more "left-wing" oriented in the sense I explained above (position on inequality), the historical truth is that modern liberalist theories were prolifically developed by "lassaiz-faire" supporters of industrial capitalism of the likes of Adam Smith, Locke and more recently Hayek, Mises, etc. Therefore, XIX Century inspired liberalism is pro-capitalist and right-wing. This is commonly accepted in Europe (all right wing parties except fascists call themselves "liberals"), while in US you call liberals left-wing supporters. Quite curious indeed, and with no historical basis IMO.

You've earned a bit of esteem in my eyes by this... that you refuse even force by proxy as "filthy" speaks well of you. And yes, perhaps a single-issue vote, against a specific measure, might help achieve some goal or another, but as you said, it is a filthy practice, voting, and I consider what few benefits it may offer insufficient to offset the distaste.

On the traditional left-right scale, I don't even measure. Nor, I think, would you. We are to either side of a different axis, one perpendicular, if you will, to left/right. This axis goes from anarchist (we'll call it anti-state, to include both of us, since you prefer to use anarchist to mean communist anarchist) to totalitarianism at the other end. When this axis is combined with the traditional left/right axis, the resulting Cartesian coordinate set is called a "nolan chart":

We both want maximum freedom, where we disagree is in the minor things - how we think society will organize itself absent the force of the state. You think that people will mostly cooperate, while I think that people will mostly compete.

It would be nice if we could all just cooperate, but I don't think it's within human nature. Between our natural desire to better ourselves, and the Dunbar limit, Communism just isn't viable beyond a small community. That's not to say that individual companies would not be set up as coops, and they may even be able to compete with traditional hierarchical company structures (but at least one person would disagree), or that communities couldn't organize cooperatively, or that mutual aid societies wouldn't exist. In fact, I expect them to take up much of the social load that is currently borne by the taxpayer. I don't even think that unions wouldn't be a powerful force. Collective bargaining is just as important to the proper functioning of capitalism as is the capitalist himself. But these things will be pockets, islands of cooperation in a vast sea of competition.

So we've placed me. But you, and your comrades, have consistently skirted around several issues. I'll settle for you responding to this one:

The fact that I never voted in my life could mean that I agree with you. I do not have the guts to vote, it's a too filthy mechanism for me.

Nevertheless, I still think that "working inside the system" can be positive to achieve specific goals that make our day-by-day life better.


I had no doubt that you were Right, my friend. About "left and right" in politics I recommend you Norberto Bobbios Left & Right. In that book he analyzes how these two terms have evolved since their first use in 1789, and how the very key fundamental that remains constant is the distinct position on inequality.

And now a Wikipedia quote:


So, according to Wikipedia (which is not a source I would 100% commit to) you would be considered an "economic-libertarian". For historical reasons I prefer the word "liberal" or "economic liberal", even if I know that the word "liberal" is associated to the left in US - not so much in Europe.

Those with weak principles perhaps, or who are still deluded enough to think working within the system will get you anywhere.

This is the first I have ever heard or seen of this definition of right and left. But, under that definition, you're damn right I'm Right. Inequality is a product of nature. You said it yourself: Mankind is not all equal. Some are taller, some shorter, some smarter, some stronger. Some have a head for finance, some do not. Some are risk-takers, some are not. Generally, those who do not have a head for finance, or do not take risks, end up working for those who do.

I'm all for equalizing opportunities. That's why I'm anti-State. But when you try to equalize wealth, you only end up with fail. You'd need to continually steal from the more productive, and give to those less able. Then what are you doing, but trying to compensate for physical or mental inequalities? And eventually, the result is exactly the opposite of your goal. Opportunities are quashed, along with the drive to take them. Why bother, when anything you do to stick out from the crowd will just be cut off and siphoned to those who didn't take the opportunity you did? Meanwhile, the apparatus you've set up to equalize wealth has itself become the most powerful player in the game, and we're back to square one.

Is not bad to work with the tools you are given - this is even more true with Bitcoin which is a powerful tool that empowers people, freeing them from the banker's slavery. Some anti-state libertarians would still vote in local elections to a candidate that could really improve what they believe fundamentals aspects of their immediate surroundings - corect?


1) Right and left wing are still valid terms, even tough modern politicians tend to say that these are obsolete terms in an attempt of erasing all historical memory, class consciousness and revolutionary spirit.

2) The fundamental difference between right and left is not very clear for the majority of the people nowadays due to a lack of political culture, yet it is very simple: it's just a philosophical position on equality and inequality.

• For left, inequality is an artificial construction of men; therefore left will work toward abolishing/diminishing the inequality in society (inequality of wealth, not physical inequality).
  
• For right, inequality is a product of nature, thus is not only not negative but its necessary for people to "work their asses off" in order to improve their condition. In fact, what would be a capitalist system without inequality fueling competitiveness?

This is of course linked again with Rousseau, who thought that the only natural inequality was the physical one: one man being taller than the other, etc.

And yes, according to the traditional sense of the words "left" and "right" a capitalist supporter will always be right wingish, while an anarchist will always be left wingish. As explained above, the terms have nothing to do with being more or less authoritarian, pro-state, etc. They are just related with a position on what's the natural outcome of nature: equality or inequality.

And now just a short quote from Rousseau's Discours sur l'origine et les fondements de l'inégalité parmi les hommes (Discourse on the Origin and Basis of Inequality Among Men)

Where exactly are you getting this from?  And I don't mean this as a hypothetical; there must be some publication somewhere which has mislead you.  You should take a moment to actually understand; nobody who identifies with AnCap considers themselves anywhere close to either "wing".  If you've always laughed about it, it's troubling knowing you've been under a misconception for some time.  I'm well aware the current system we're under is slavery, which is why I advocate anarchism to begin with.  There's nothing I despise more than wage slavery; if the government sanctions on monopolies and oligarchies are torn down, you'll see the poor and the rich classes coincide and melt into one another; people work for themselves, not a boss, or their boss, or their boss.  The free market is exactly that: a market without government intervention.  How this translates into wage slavery is beyond me.

First off, I take offense at being labeled "right wing." I am not a right winger, not in the least. I advocate personal freedoms, as well as economic ones. I don't care who you sleep with, what you smoke, or who you pray to.

Secondly, if you understood AnCap, you'd understand that ignorance is the last thing you will find among it's adherents.

Finally, I've yet to see a socialist explain how to get around the whole "you have to work to survive" thing, and I don't expect you to be any different.

Why the hell an anti-capitalist would be attracted to Bitcoin is beyond me.

This is something that I've always laughed about, right wing capitalists calling themselves libertarian. The term that they came up with, "anarcho-capitalist", is a hilarious oxymoron. They have even taken to using the anarchist and anarcho-syndicalist flags, replacing the red with gold. I'm not making that up. As explained by the OP, to the libertarian the free market is wage slavery, which is directly equivalent to chattel slavery.

I don't have time to read it, but I can imagine the amount of ignorance that is displayed in this thread from those who misuse the term. Page one was bad enough.

Ironically, you're making the same mistake they are: conflating "laws" with "government."

One distinction I make between anarchism and libertarianism is that libertarians are fine with just enough laws to keep things civil and make sure that people aren't making each others lives miserable. But we don't need laws that protect us from ourselves.

I get annoyed when liberals act as though we treat any and all regulation as the boogyman. It's not true, we'll accept reasonable regulation, for example the EPA prevents dumping toxic substances from ground water, or the FCC regulating spectrum use. Unacceptable regulations would be like sugar tariffs, or any tariff for that matter because tariffs don't do anything except raise the price of domestic goods while doing nothing to help us compete with the global economy, and in fact make it harder to do so, which while protecting perhaps a few sugar industry jobs, will cost us many more jobs elsewhere.

Not at all. Justice is a decidedly inexpensive service to provide, and it is typical for the fees to be included in the judgment amount. In an AnCap society, you get justice, and the other guy pays for it.

While I can certainly see a market for low-cost legal services, and find it likely that a union would provide such for it's members, an isolationist policy like that would be ruinous. Are workers really "workers" if they can't find any work?

I find it funny that this technology has attracted anti-capitalists.

They have always wanted to abolish money.

"...houses, fields, and factories will no longer be private property, and that they will belong to the commune or the nation and money, wages, and trade would be abolished."

— Peter Kropotkin, The Conquest of Bread

4. The End of the Money Trick
Two features of capitalism are essential to its existence—the wages system and a thorough and all-reaching system of money relationships. Unfortunately men are now so used to living by money that they find it difficult to imagine life without it. Yet it should be obvious that no libertarian and equalitarian society could make use of money. Syndicalism, as well as ending the wages system, also aims at the destruction of money relationships.

WAGES. The abolition of all wages and the establishment of the principle of equal income for all. What that income would be cannot be expressed in money terms, the only terms known to capitalist society, but it should certainly be more than double the present average wage.

EDUCATION. Education will be free to all able to benefit from it and wishing to enjoy it, free from kindergarten to university. Classes would be smaller, equipment improved and new schools built. The recent trend of education from coercion and terrorism to freedom and co-operation of teacher and scholar would be accelerated.

MEDICINE. Medical treatment would be free—medicine, attendance, clinics and hospitals. But the new society would increase the health of all, not by a new flood of physic, but, in main, by a better diet, right working and living conditions and the end of industrial fatigue.

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:b3QPiFzdlAcJ:libcom.org/library/principles-of-syndicalism-tom-brown+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

Karl Marx hypothesized that, as the productive forces and technology continued to advance, socialism would eventually give way to a communist stage of social development. Communism would be a classless, stateless, moneyless society based on common ownership and the principle of "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxism

It is embarrassing that someone in the 21st century can hold these views.

Just watched this amazing documentary - really really beautiful. Thank you, I did not know it.

Myrkul (and the others, by the way): I really recommend you to watch that. You will hear directly from anarchist's who actually made a revolution about work, money, freedom...

To expand on that, you'd probably have an "agency" that gives a fuck about all other agencies and says that Earth belongs to everyone because it is natural common heritage. And most workers would be in this agency because they aren't wealthy.

I believe you describe a society in which you are as free as you are wealthy. You can have justice, as long as you can pay for it.

The fact is that we never actively worked to make that model of anarchist society possible: we always assumed that anarchy was "impractical" and we created all kinds of states to impose and maintain the order...

Proudhon wrote: "Freedom is the mother, not the daughter of order"

This is a very profound sentence that reflects the beliefs of Proudhon and the other anarchists on human nature... And by the way: aren't politics always about how we deal with what we believe it's human nature?

But the truth is that it's never been empirically proved that an anarchist society is not feasible - it's just speculations, and the very few anarchist experiences we had in History (as per Aragón, Spain 1930-1938) worked pretty well until the enemies wiped them out by force.



I would say that we are pretty much looking at it - but still there have been major improvements in terms of freedom in the last centuries.