Topic: What's so special about the NAP? - page 15. (Read 20458 times)

This is basically an argument between a tiny minority imposing its will upon society "for their own good", versus individual freedom and responsibility.

Freedom allows for voluntary segregation, true, and that is what tends to happen in most societies.  But, if you want to argue extremes, then what you are arguing for is the equivalent of the Taliban.

And, as an American, I don't see anyone "forcing" segregation.  The only force I see, in American society at least, is on the part of the liberal Taliban, forcing integration.

I think you're missing a point. It takes two individuals to mutually agree to self segregate. Nothing in today's society precludes that. When both parties don't want to mingle, they don't. Nobody is forcing anyone to not self segregate.

But in your society, you're forcing segregation. How? It's simple. In your society, the enforcers are the individuals within society. And thus, those individuals who insist on segregation and enforce it are doing just that.

And that's the problem with NAP in general.

If society would self-segregate, in the absence of laws preventing it, then that indicates that those laws are oppressive, does it not?

This illustrates my point: Laws are nothing more than opinions, violently enforced.

You understate the impact that returning to legal discrimination and lynchings would have.  If the consequence is a return to a segregated society, does that change where you stand? 

That, right there, is straight-up ridiculous. That implies that you believe that the large majority of people would segregate, if allowed to. If this were true, segregation would still be legal, because laws outlawing it would not have passed.

They are one and the same.  A lot of people believe the NAP says that its wrong to stop racial discrimination.  Some believe it entitles mobs to lynch people. So any society based on the NAP is going to be based on segregation of races.

What the hell did you all do to this thread?

You separated off all discussion of the NAP and now you're talking about racism instead?

My final statement on the matter:

I dislike racial discrimination. In fact, I despise it. However, as a believer in the Non-Aggression Principle, I cannot find a way to enforce any restrictions against it without violating the bigot's rights by forcing him to do business with someone he does not want to. I am also a firm believer in negative rights. One can have a right to be free from something, for example coercion, but not a right to something, for example my property. If a person can be said to have a right to be free from racial discrimination, unfortunately enforcing that right would require that one aggress against others, violating their right to own their property and actions. The right to be free from coercion trumps the right to be free from discrimination, because to enforce the right to be free from discrimination would be to give them the right to someone's property.

The way to fix one rights violation is not with another, more egregious one, but by offering alternatives. If you feel so strongly that you would attempt to make it illegal, instead, why not put that effort to good use and supply the discriminated against with the service they are being denied? Not only do they get what they want, you make a profit on the deal, and the bigot loses money. If you set up shop directly across the street, or even next door to him, and consistently undercut his prices, you may even drive him out of business, without once violating the NAP.

Aggression is easy, violence is the quick solution. Non-aggression is harder, but ultimately more rewarding. By forcing him to do business with those he hates, you have not helped the bigot see the error of his ways, you have only given him cause to hate you, too. But by out-competing him by doing what he refuses to, you have shown him that your way is better, and he will either fail, or change his ways voluntarily. Now, which is the bigger win, holding a gun to a man's head and forcing him to deal with someone he hates, or getting him to do it willingly, with a smile on his face?

Funny. I believe you just made a typo, and yet it works! Because he's never thought things we say are true. He just can't accept all those little and big truths about the world that are inconvenient to his belief system.

The saddest thing of all, though, is his approach. He takes an ideal out of thin air, and then just insists beyond all reason that he can slap it across the world and make it magically work. I much prefer simply looking at all the problems in the world and all its complexity, and individually trying to tailor a solution to those problems that will work, long term.

Yeah, myrkul has already said that discrimination never did blacks any harm.  I'm not sure if he is an out and out racist that is afraid to be known as such or just an immature guy who hasn't thought things through.  Either way, his ideal society seems to be based on Jim Crow.

EDIT: fixed the damn type.  Freudian slip

He is a sensitive fellow.

Racial discrimination and lynching are what you want to allow.  That is a simple matter of fact supported by your posting history.

If that is inflammatory to you, perhaps you need to re-think what you stand for?

Inflammatory language highlighted for your reading pleasure. Good bye, Hawker.

Your proposal is a return to the good old days of legal racial discrimination and to allowing lynching.  That is evil - no inflammatory language is needed.

I support property rights and the right of private citizens to defend themselves and others. Make of that what you will. Using inflammatory language doesn't suddenly make my position evil. As I said, I'm done arguing this with you. Continue, and I will cease discussing anything with you.

Lets agree not to do that.  If you are for allowing racial discrimination and you are for allowing people to be killed by mobs without the benefit of a trial, its very clear what type of society you are comfortable with.  I don't think you like the bad consequences of your ideas but you can't use semantics to hide them.

Since I can't seem to convince you otherwise (I suspect the difficulty lies in our differing definition of "lynch"), I'm just going have to to let you keep your misconceptions. I'll not argue this point any further.

I will, however, point out that you are using that quote out of context (one of the advantages of using digital books is that I can easily copy and paste large swathes of text):

You really do exactly what Friedman complains about don't you: "When I put such questions to other libertarians, one common response is a frantic attempt to reinterpret the problem out of existence."  Stop doing that - playing with definitions to avoid people seeing where you stand is weak-minded.

Please Google "define: lynch" and the first hit is Verb:   (of a mob) Kill (someone), esp. by hanging, for an alleged offense with or without a legal trial.

That's exactly what you want to allow. The fact is that you do want to allow racial discrimination and lynching in your ideal society.  

There are two arguments:

1. Violating the NAP has bad consequences.

2. Violating the NAP is immoral.

Since I'm not a consequentialist, I don't find the consequentialist argument convincing one way or the other.

As for the argument from morality, all moral claims are opinions. They are preferences, nothing more. You can't say my opinion is wrong any more than I can say yours is wrong. That's because opinions aren't the kinds of things that can be right or wrong. That being said, I reject any opinion that violating the NAP is moral, outside of immediate life threatening situations when your actions don't threaten the life of another person and you also compensate the victim. If you are literally about to starve to death, steal some bread but be prepared to work it off. I doubt you'll have to steal though because I'll be glad to give you some of my bread. However, if you are dying because of liver failure, don't take my liver.

If you reject my opinion like I reject the opinions of those that wish to violate the NAP, we have irreconcilable differences. We can either try to coexist peacefully or we can go to war. There's nothing more to it than that.

 

It looks like I scared Ben away.  That's too bad, our conversation was starting to potentially actually go somewhere substantive.  Hopefully he's writing an in-depth response.