Any Libertarians/Anarchocapitalists around these parts?

[Avram]

World seems pretty pretty bad from our POV right now doesn't it guys.

[vizi]

It always will be bad as long as we don't regularly kill out government.

[Denny Crane!]

lol yes on the UK side there is me and pestilent. In fact I am trying to persuade pestilent to form a political party with him as its head.

It is bleak, and the criticisms become more apparent everyday and if the arguements are made correctly I have never met a person I can't convince. I don't doubt I'd meet a few on these forums!

I do dislike ''anarcho capitalism'' if only for its connotations. I prefer voluntaryism or market anarchy.

[Helm]

It's always bad from your POV though, that's why you keep moaning on about taxation or whatever.

[Thorn777]

It's always bad from your POV though, that's why you keep moaning on about taxation or whatever.

And true.

[Denny Crane!]

It's always bad from your POV though, that's why you keep moaning on about taxation or whatever.

At least I can explain it logically. I have reasons for my beliefs helm and they bear up to examination. Unlike yours I might add. Feel free to adress Ummons points at your leisure, you have currently failed to do so.

Taxation is violence. If you support violence then we are at odds, since you don't support violence against animals I assume you are against violence against humans.

[Thorn777]

At least I can explain it logically. I have reasons for my beliefs helm and they bear up to examination. Unlike yours I might add. Feel free to adress Ummons points at your leisure, you have currently failed to do so.

Taxation is violence. If you support violence then we are at odds, since you don't support violence against animals I assume you are against violence against humans.

Who said violence is a bad thing per definition? The government has usually the monopole to use violence in a legal context(police, military etc), and as long as taxing in general makes sense to most people in a democracy you have a very tiny stick.

[Denny Crane!]

Who said violence is a bad thing per definition?

Great I like these arguements.

Violence isn't a bad thing if you don't accept morality, which judging by the setence below you don't. You think its okay if I rape children, kill grannies, beat random strangers in the street?

The government has usually the monopole to use violence in a legal context(police, military etc), and as long as taxing in general makes sense to most people in a democracy you have a very tiny stick.

Government isn't a thing, its a collection of people. Governments don't exist, people who call themselves governments exist. Either violence is wrong or it is right. You can't have inconsistent morality.

Do you understand where your morality and ethics comes from?

[Thorn777]

[quote=Seneca;4474399]

Great I like these arguements.

Me to.

Violence isn't a bad thing if you don't accept morality

Its not even a realistic question that accepting forms of violence excludes an acceptance of morality.

which judging by the setence below you don't. You think its okay if I rape children, kill grannies, beat random strangers in the street?

I dont know how you could come up with that by that sentence. What I was saying is that our elected rule have a monopole to act violent so it can fulfill its role. So the question you need to answer: why should taxation be abolished if the government has every right to so. I know the answer: because it would suit you, but guess what: most people disagree in these democracys.

Government isn't a thing, its a collection of people. Governments don't exist, people who call themselves governments exist. Either violence is wrong or it is right. You can't have inconsistent morality.

So what about the US foreign policys, what about the military, what about police? Give me a break.

Do you understand where your morality and ethics comes from?

Good question, I guess human instincts and from searching the fine line of a common mediator.

[Helm]

Taxation is violence. If you support violence then we are at odds, since you don't support violence against animals I assume you are against violence against humans.

Healthcare, military, education, public services, benefits, pensions, road maintenance, law enforcement. Someone has to pay for it all, and that someone is you, and me as well but I don't mind contributing my bit.

[Denny Crane!]

Healthcare, military, education, public services, benefits, pensions, road maintenance. Someone has to pay for it all, and that someone is you, and me as well but I don't mind contributing my bit.

Healthcare: Yes I will pay for it, and if I decide to fork up my own health I won't expect others to pay for it.

Education: Most experts in this will tell you state education is ruining children and innovation as well as dynamic education. Furthermore I am a bachelor and should not have to pay for other people to have their children educated.

You'll say I should, do you pay for Africas children to be educated? Or Brazils?

Public services: I'll pay privately.

Benefits: Sources of violence, poverty and crime. I'd prefer not to participate in the destruction of society.

Roads: I already pay for them, I'll pay for them without the government.

[Helm]

There's no reason why we can't pay/use. It'd drive costs down for everyone, reward those that do things better and cheaper and encourage innovation.

What about the people who can't afford pay for all these things themselves? What about people who couldn't afford say to have their children educated? Do they just go uneducated like in some African country? Is this just for the sake of you having a little bit of extra money a year you could easily live without?

You can argue that it should be funded by some kind of charity, but thing is people who will moan about things like this aren't liable to give such a charity a penny of their money, so why should I be feeling sorry that you're having your money forcibly removed?

[Avram]

What about the people who can't afford pay for all these things themselves? What about people who couldn't afford say to have their children educated? Do they just go uneducated like in some African country?

My belief on the matter of education is that education is not entirely entailed in formal education and the pieces of paper you get after so many years of schooling. Rather I believe that education is the experience and skill sets one accumulates in his lifetime. A child learns whether he is reading a book at home, talking to his friends, playing, playing video games (a lot of us here can say we learnt a lot of history thanks to TW mods), watching TV, and observing the world in general. The elementary subjects, reading, writing, arithmetic and their corollaries, can easily be learned at home and outside the school. No formal schooling is required for a child to learn.

Thus I don't think education can be judged by any set of standards. The only standard education might be judged by (and probably the reason you want the poor to get an education) is the standard of employability in the market, including self employability i.e ability to think and use one's own labor to achieve economic ends with the means provided by circumstance.

Surely we can agree thus far.

Now in viewing education in these terms it becomes obvious that one can learn just as much in the workforce as they can at school. This makes something like compulsory education, the idea enforced onto us by governments that children must be incarcerated in a state institution for ten years of their life or else, an obvious act of aggression on the part of the state. Furthermore some people would be better off never receiving a formal education. They might acquire knowledge as master tradesmen, craftsman or other such very highly sought after skills in terms of economic demand which they would have missed out on spending ten years of their life in a state institution. This distorts the purpose of formal schooling away from actual academic endeavors since schools must slow down to try and teach certain skills to children who do not want to learn them and have no benefit in learning them only to meet certain arbitrarily decided standards.

As it stands today all children are being coerced into schools for their own supposed good, and the result is a distortion of the lives of those not suited for school and the wrecking of proper schooling for the truly educable.

Moreover something must be said about the fact that public schools and the state bureaucracies and standards which they obey, by their very nature, promote uniformity and discourage diversity or individuality. This means, especially when schooling is compulsory, that a large number of individuals and parents will not be able to ever provide their children with the kind of education they deem better. Instead they must adhere to the curriculum the state provides.

On the contrary if the schooling system were entirely private there would be more diversity, more variety and more people's needs in terms of formal education would be met. All the other benefits of private competition such as lower prices and better quality service would also arise i.e even poor people will pay less for education then they currently do with they tax dollars.

The correct solution to all this is to lift any child labor laws we have, lift any minimum wage laws we might have, get rid of public schools, get rid of compulsory attendance laws and watch our economy and children prosper.

To sum up by quoting Rothbard

The government has attempted to indoctrinate and mould the nation's youth through the public school system, and to mould the future leaders through State operation and control of higher education. Abolition of compulsory attendance laws would end the schools' role as prison custodians of the nation's youth, and would free all those better off outside the schools for independence and for productive work..... The miasma of government, of moulding the youth of America in the direction desired by the State, would be replaced by freely chosen and voluntary actions — in short, by a genuine and truly free education, both in and out of formal schools.

Is this just for the sake of you having a little bit of extra money a year you could easily live without?

You can argue that it should be funded by some kind of charity, but thing is people who will moan about things like this aren't liable to give such a charity a penny of their money, so why should I be feeling sorry that you're having your money forcibly removed?

No its not for my sake. Its for your sake, its for the children's sake its for everyone's sake.

You shouldn't be feeling sorry that I'm having my money forcibly removed. I don't' need that and I'm not asking for that. You should be feeling sorry that people the world over are being forced to do with less when they can do with more. This includes the very poor and the very rich. And while libertarians might encourage a individualistic and self centred philosophy this comes from the wisdom that what is good for you barring any acts of agression must be, no matter what, good for everyone else too.

You should feel sorry that by the world adhering to the notion of public education we have higher rates of teenage crime, depression and suicide than ever before. You should feel sorry that kids who might otherwise be outside earning money for their struggling family or those with single moms or whatever, are instead forced to spend their time gaining skills they have no interest in and might not be particularly good at in some state run isntitution. You should feel sorry for the kid who is real bright but is forced to feel frustrated and unwanted as his teachers don't give him the academic oppurtunities he deserves but are instead forced to go slow for the rest of the class who doesn't even wanna be there.

Thats who I feel sorry for, not myself, I'm doing just fine.

[BNS]

There are actually quite a number of us libertarians much to my surprise. There is even a market anarchist from the UK of all places.

It is pretty unfortunate the direction the world is heading. But it is to be expected, statists will always use times of weakness to expand the corrosive reaches of government. They promote a false fearful sense of urgency on the populace by the way of skewed facts and reasoning, then proceed to tell us that big brother could take care of us if only we surrendered more power to the institution.

It's always bad from your POV though, that's why you keep moaning on about taxation or whatever.

The left also moans, don't pretend to be exclusive. Except we use objectivity in our reasoning and the left uses warm fuzzy feelings.

[chamaeleo]

Hagbard Celine will set it all right, just you wait!

[Avram]

Pretty sweet to know there are some sensible people around here. I was looking through the thread titles and I saw all these One World One Government threads and the like

D:

btw while the word capitalist does have bad connotations these days I don't think libertarians should concede its use. Rather they should promote the term as a positive one. A lot of Austrian literature currently emphasizes the word capitalism as the process of bringing prosperity and riches to all etc. which I think is the right way to go when it comes to that

[Denny Crane!]

Pretty sweet to know there are some sensible people around here. I was looking through the thread titles and I saw all these One World One Government threads and the like

D:

btw while the word capitalist does have bad connotations these days I don't think libertarians should concede its use. Rather they should promote the term as a positive one. A lot of Austrian literature currently emphasizes the word capitalism as the process of bringing prosperity and riches to all etc. which I think is the right way to go when it comes to that

It is perhaps not the word capatilism that has the negative connotations but the word anarchism. Sorry if I ddin't make that clear but I do think its the case.

Etymologically speaking anarchism suits the philosophy but not todays culture. Anarchism will always draw the wrong impression.

Furthermore it ties itself, unjustifiably so, to mutualism and anarcho syndacilism and of course the crazy g8 protestors.

Should we give it up? Well it might not be right, it might be sensible. I'd probably like to hear from you and others before making my mind up on that as well as reading a bit more about the types I'm not familiar with.

[Avram]

Who said violence is a bad thing per definition? The government has usually the monopole to use violence in a legal context(police, military etc), and as long as taxing in general makes sense to most people in a democracy you have a very tiny stick.

Yeah he shoulda said aggression not violence, and I'm almost certain that's what he meant. Take that into account and then you gotta change the point there bud

[Denny Crane!]

Yeah he shoulda said aggression not violence, and I'm almost certain that's what he meant. Take that into account and then you gotta change the point there bud

No I meant violence, agression is violence in a different context.

[Avram]

No I meant violence, agression is violence in a different context.

How odd. Whats your position when it comes to punishment?

Healthcare, military, education, public services, benefits, pensions, road maintenance, law enforcement. Someone has to pay for it all, and that someone is you, and me as well but I don't mind contributing my bit.

There's no reason why we can't pay/use. It'd drive costs down for everyone, reward those that do things better and cheaper and encourage innovation.