# Think Tank > Political Philosophy & Government Policy >  Statism 101

## menciusmoldbug

Affirmed: "Liberty" requires the State or something like it.

In the absence of an entity whose job it is to resolve disputes, define and defend property rights, punish acts of violence, and protect its borders against acts of foreign aggression, anarchy in the pejorative will reign, and few people will be very happy with this state of affairs.

I encourage discussion and refutation of this claim.

----------


## menciusmoldbug

@Cabal:




> That word you used at the end there -  "legitimate" - what does it mean? When a "statist" says that the State  is "legitimate," what is (s)he saying? When a non-statist says that the  State is "illegitimate," what is (s)he saying?

----------


## Conza88

_Re: "In the absence of an entity whose job it is to resolve disputes, define and defend property rights, punish acts of violence, and protect its borders against acts of foreign aggression, anarchy in the pejorative will reign, and few people will be very happy with this state of affairs."_

= How can the state say it _protects_ property, when it _must_ _violate_ property to _exist_?


Also:

"Suppose, for example, that we were all suddenly dropped down on the  earth de novo and that we were all then confronted with the question of  what societal arrangements to adopt. And suppose then that someone  suggested: We are all bound to suffer from those of us who wish to  aggress against their fellow men. Let us then solve this problem of  crime by handing all of our weapons to the Jones family, over there, by  giving all of our ultimate power to settle disputes to that family. In  that way, with their monopoly of coercion and of ultimate decision making, the Jones family will be able to protect each of us from each other. I submit that this proposal would get very short shrift, except perhaps from the Jones family themselves. And yet this is precisely the  common argument for the existence of the state. *When we start from the  zero point, as in the case of the Jones family, the question of who will guard the guardians? becomes not simply an abiding lacuna in the theory of the state but an overwhelming barrier to its existence.*" 			
 			 			 			 Murray Rothbard, Society Without A State 			

*Minarchism to Voluntarism in Ten Easy Steps* *A Guide for Constitutionalists*No Treason: The Constitution of No Authority by Lysander SpoonerFallacies of the Public Goods Theory & the Production of Security by Hans-Hermann HoppeOn the Impossibility of Limited Government and the Prospects for a Second American Revolution by Hans-Hermann HoppeAnatomy of the State by Murray RothbardMarket Anarchism As Constitutionalism by Roderick LongLibertarian Anarchism: Responses to Ten Objections by Roderick LongThe Public Sector, III: Police, Law, and the Courts by Murray Rothbard The Production of Security by Gustave de MolinariChaos Theory by Robert MurphyDo We Ever Really Get Out of Anarchy? by Alfred Cuzán

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> How can the state say it _protects_ property, when it _must_ _violate_ property to _exist_?


This question takes for granted a proposition that is false - namely, that "property" exists prior to and independently of the state. Instead, as my OP said, a state is tasked with the responsibility to "*define* and defend property rights." Think of states as sovereign corporations - they are owners of the land, capital, and people in a geographic region. Different states set up different laws and property rights, then enforce them to the extent that they see fit. But it is not sensible to speak of a state _violating_ a property right, for in the state's absence no property right is enforceable - and a non-enforceable right is no right at all.




> "Suppose, for example, that we were all suddenly dropped down on the  earth de novo and that we were all then confronted with the question of  what societal arrangements to adopt. And suppose then that someone  suggested: We are all bound to suffer from those of us who wish to  aggress against their fellow men. Let us then solve this problem of  crime by handing all of our weapons to the Jones family, over there, by  giving all of our ultimate power to settle disputes to that family. In  that way, with their monopoly of coercion and of ultimate decision  making, the Jones family will be able to protect each of us from each  other. I submit that this proposal would get very short shrift, except  perhaps from the Jones family themselves. And yet this is precisely the  common argument for the existence of the state. When we start from the  zero point, as in the case of the Jones family, the question of who  will guard the guardians? becomes not simply an abiding lacuna in the  theory of the state but an overwhelming barrier to its existence."             
> 
> 
>                                         Murray Rothbard, Society Without A State


Rothbard seems to be supposing that the current system of statism was somehow _decided_ upon. But this is nonsense of the highest order. As he suggests, the only people who'd support such a system would be the Jones family - but if the Jones family has all the guns, then theirs is the only set of opinions that matters. And so it is in the world today. Whether we like it or not, states own everything - not because they _ought_ to, but simply because they _can_. They have nuclear weapons, and tanks, and automatic weapons, and armies, and they put people in jail for not paying their taxes. If you want to live on land that a state owns, you have to pay your rent. Libertarians seems to accept this proposition when dealing with landlords. So start thinking of the state as your landlord. It owns everything there is and simply allows you to rent a bit of it.

----------


## Cabal

Right away, I'd take issue with your suggested euphemism for the State being just another dispute resolution organization. Anarchists, anti-statists, voluntaryists, or whatever one would like to call them do not dispute the potential demand for such things as defense of property rights, protection from violence and coercion, and dispute resolution in the absence of a State. What they dispute is the monopolization of these things by the State (not that this is the only negative associated with the State) and the fact that a State necessarily results in a violation of property rights, subjugation by violence and coercion, and injustice when it comes to dispute resolution. In effect, the State does not solve or satisfy these demands, but necessarily leaves them that much more unsatisfied by its very nature.

A State is the centralized monopolization of the use of legalized violence over a geographical location.

A State cannot claim to protect property rights when it necessarily violates property rights in order to exist. One of the most obvious and widespread violations along these lines is taxation, but this is really just the tip of the iceberg. 

A State cannot claim to protect from violence and coercion when it necessarily must initiate violence and coercion, or the threat thereof, in order to exist. One of the most obvious and widespread examples of this is the monopoly on law and police--extensions of its monopoly on the use of violence. This violence is used to violate the property rights of the citizens it claims (at least) partial ownership of.

The claim that anarchy in the pejorative will reign in the absence of the State is within the realm of possibility, but not a necessary consequence, whereas in the case of State, violations of property rights as well as the initiation of violence and coercion by the State are not only within the realm of possibility, but are necessary consequences. 

Also, happiness is very much a subjective thing, to be determined by individuals for themselves.

----------


## Cabal

> That word you used at the end there - "legitimate" - what does it mean? When a "statist" says that the State is "legitimate," what is (s)he saying? When a non-statist says that the State is "illegitimate," what is (s)he saying?


In the context of the post this was from, legitimate is to suggest that the State is just, or rightful in its existence and application. Anti-statists, by contrast, hold the State to necessarily be an immoral, or unjust institution by its very nature, and therefore illegitimate--in effect, the State has no rights; rights being moral claims (e.g. property rights).

----------


## fisharmor

Ok, so before I play this game tonight, I have two questions that I seriously want answers to from the apologists.

1) If it's a given that we need the state to resolve disputes, why is it not a given that we need the state to provide medicine, cellphones, new home construction, or tennis shoes?

2) What is your answer to the historical examples of statelessness?

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> Right away, I'd take issue with your suggested euphemism for the State being just another dispute resolution organization. Anarchists, anti-statists, voluntaryists, or whatever one would like to call them do not dispute the potential demand for such things as defense of property rights, protection from violence and coercion, and dispute resolution in the absence of a State. What they dispute is the monopolization of these things by the State


Are you familiar with the concept of a natural monopoly? Suppose I claimed that many functions classically associated with the State (defining and defending property rights, setting up laws regarding personal interactions, dispute resolution, etc) fell into this category. Why would you disagree?




> a State necessarily results in a violation of property rights


                           This statement takes for granted a proposition that is false -  namely, that "property" exists prior to and independently of the state.  Instead, as my OP said, a state is tasked with the responsibility to "*define*  and defend property rights." Think of states as sovereign corporations -  they are owners of the land, capital, and people in a geographic  region. Different states set up different laws and property rights, then  enforce them to the extent that they see fit. But it is not sensible to  speak of a state _violating_ a property right, for in the state's absence no property right is enforceable - and a non-enforceable right is no right at all.




> subjugation by violence and coercion


Are you familiar with a fellow named Thomas Hobbes? I claim that subjugation by violence and coercion would happen quite a lot even in the absence of a State. Indeed, I'm fairly confident that this sort of thing would happen _a lot more_ in the absence of a State. Do you disagree? If so, why?




> and injustice when it comes to dispute resolution.


What is "injustice"?




> In effect, the State does not solve or satisfy these demands, but necessarily leaves them that much more unsatisfied by its very nature.


That's a mighty strong claim. I'm afraid I'll need to hear an argument in its favor before accepting the conclusion, though. What about the nature of a State do you think causes "these demands" (which?) to be much more unsatisfied than they would be in its absence?




> A State is the centralized monopolization of the use of legalized violence over a geographical location.


Might quibble a bit over semantics (most States legalize the use of self-defense in certain situations), but basically agree.




> A State cannot claim to protect property rights when it necessarily violates property rights in order to exist. One of the most obvious and widespread violations along these lines is taxation, but this is really just the tip of the iceberg.


I've addressed this above. "Property rights" are not a thing-in-the-world. They do not exist prior to or without defense by some powerful entity or organization. In the absence of such an entity/organization (commonly called a "State"), the strongest men may violate "property rights" at will, until eventually they subjugate the population and become the State themselves. So we see that stateless societies are not stable - they collapse into statism almost instantly. And during the time that there is no formal State, the strongest men are likely to behave in a much more ruthless and cruel fashion than most modern First World States do today.

Note that this is not a _moral_ claim. I do not assert that States OUGHT to or SHOULD exist - only that they do and always will. It is certainly possible to destabilize or destroy a particular State temporarily, but this only creates chaos and disorder for a brief period of time and does not produce desirable living conditions for the people who live in that area. 




> A State cannot claim to protect from violence and coercion when it necessarily must initiate violence and coercion, or the threat thereof, in order to exist.


Um, I'm pretty sure it can, actually. Here's how it works: "Give me some of your money, and in return I will defend you from violence and coercion that _others_ might inflict upon you. If you don't give me money, I will inflict violence upon you." It would indeed be absurd to claim that States eliminate or punish ALL instances of violence and coercion (given that they are instigators of it themselves), but that is not what's claimed. Instead, States ideally provide a system of _organized_ violence and coercion, punishing _unapproved_ instances of those activities and providing a predictable system of laws and life for the people they own.




> One of the most obvious and widespread examples of this is the monopoly on law and police--extensions of its monopoly on the use of violence. This violence is used to violate the property rights of the citizens it claims (at least) partial ownership of.


Once more - "property rights" do not exist in the absence of the State; therefore, it is nonsense to speak of the State violating property rights. By definition, that can't happen. Property rights are whatever the State says they are, full stop.

To see why, consider a man in "his" home. If a man owns his home, he may do whatever he wants to in it, yes? Indeed, that is what ownership _means_ - the "right" to do with your property whatever you please. Yet we see - in every place, all over the world - that individuals do _not_ possess the right to do with "their" property as they please. Instead, the State makes dictates over what people may do, and the people are compelled to follow or face consequences imposed by States. Thus, it seems more accurate to say that the property in question _actually_ belongs to the State, but is being rented by various individuals who are subject to rules and regulations that the State dictates.




> The claim that anarchy in the pejorative will reign in the absence of the State is within the realm of possibility, but not a necessary consequence, whereas in the case of State, violations of property rights as well as the initiation of violence and coercion by the State are not only within the realm of possibility, but are necessary consequences.


One reason why I think we can say with some certainty that anarchy in the pejorative will likely reign in the absence of a State is that we have witnessed several examples of this phenomenon, and they weren't pretty:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchy...llapse_anarchy

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




> Also, happiness is very much a subjective thing, to be determined by individuals for themselves.


Agreed. I claim that most people will be happier - according to their own values - living under a strong, stable, and well-functioning state rather than in the absence of one.

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> In the context of the post this was from, legitimate is to suggest that the State is just, or rightful in its existence and application. Anti-statists, by contrast, hold the State to necessarily be an immoral, or unjust institution by its very nature, and therefore illegitimate--in effect, the State has no rights; rights being moral claims (e.g. property rights).


Alright, well I'm afraid we're about to find ourselves running around in a circle, because this definition makes me want to ask: What do the words "just," "rightful," "immoral," "unjust," "rights," and "moral" mean?

----------


## Conza88

> This question takes for granted a proposition that is false - namely, that "property" exists prior to and independently of the state.


"Property does not exist because there are laws, but laws exist because there is property."
— Frédéric Bastiat, Property and Law. (Source: bastiat.org)




> Instead, as my OP said, a state is tasked with the responsibility to "*define* and defend property rights." Think of states as sovereign corporations - they are owners of the land, capital, and people in a geographic region. Different states set up different laws and property rights, then enforce them to the extent that they see fit. But it is not sensible to speak of a state _violating_ a property right, for in the state's absence no property right is enforceable - and a non-enforceable right is no right at all.


That's not a definition of a state. How about you define your terms since you're not using the common one of "a territorial monopolist and ultimate decision maker (including conflicts involving itself) with the ability to tax". 

"The state operates in a legal vacuum. There exists no contract  between the state and its citizens. It is not contractually fixed, what  is actually owned by whom, and what, accordingly, is to be protected. It  is not fixed, what service the state is to provide, what is to happen  if the state fails in its duty, nor what the price is that the  “customer” of such “service” must pay. Rather, the state unilaterally  fixes the rules of the game and can change them, per legislation, during  the game. Obviously, such behavior is inconceivable for freely financed  security providers. Just imagine a security provider, whether police,  insurer or arbitrator, whose offer consisted in something like this: I  will not contractually guarantee you anything. I will not tell you what I  oblige myself to do if, according to your opinion, I do not fulfill my  service to you - but in any case, I reserve the right to unilaterally  determine the price that you must pay me for such undefined service. Any  such security provider would immediately disappear from the market due  to a complete lack of customers." 

— Hans-Hermann Hoppe (Source: thedailybell.com)             



"A tax-funded protection agency is a contradiction in terms - an   expropriating property protector - and will inevitably lead to more   taxes and less protection. Even if, as some - classical liberal -   statists have proposed, a government limited its activities exclusively   to the protection of pre-existing private property rights, the further   question of how much security to produce would arise. Motivated (like   everyone else) by self-interest and the disutility of labor, but endowed   with the unique power to tax, a government agent’s answer will   invariably be the same: To maximize expenditures on protection - and   almost all of a nation’s wealth can conceivably be consumed by the cost   of protection - and at the same time to minimize the production of   protection." 
— Hans-Hermann Hoppe 



> Rothbard seems to be supposing that the current system of statism was somehow _decided_ upon. But this is nonsense of the highest order. As he suggests, the only people who'd support such a system would be the Jones family - but if the Jones family has all the guns, then theirs is the only set of opinions that matters. And so it is in the world today. Whether we like it or not, states own everything - not because they _ought_ to, but simply because they _can_. They have nuclear weapons, and tanks, and automatic weapons, and armies, and they put people in jail for not paying their taxes.


*Daily Bell:* What do you think of Ragnar Redbeard's Might Is Right? 
*Dr. Hans-Hermann Hoppe:* You  can give two very different interpretations to this statement. I see no  difficulty with the first one. It is: I know the difference between  "might" and "right" and, as a matter of empirical fact, might is in fact  frequently right. Most if not all of "public law," for instance, is  might masquerading as right.

The second interpretation is: I  don't know the difference between "might" and "right," because there is  no difference. Might is right and right is might. This interpretation  is self-contradictory. Because if you wanted to defend this statement as  a true statement in an argument with someone else you are in fact  recognizing your opponent's property right in his own body. You do not  aggress against him in order to bring him to the correct insight. You  allow him to come to the correct insight on his own. That is, you admit,  at least implicitly, that you do know the difference between right and  wrong. Otherwise there would be no purpose in arguing. The same,  incidentally, is true for Hobbes' famous dictum that one man is another  man's wolf. In claiming this statement to be true, you actually prove it  to be false. 



> If you want to live on land that a state owns, you have to pay your rent. Libertarians seems to accept this proposition when dealing with landlords. So start thinking of the state as your landlord. It owns everything there is and simply allows you to rent a bit of it.


Negative. *Does the State Resolve or Create Conflict?

*Further, of the state, defined as “the ultimate authority to which  in a given territory no recourse to a higher authority exists,”  Radnitzky states, “that coercion is not a characteristic that is implied  in its definition. If (per impossibile) the contract theory were a  tenable theory, then the institution would not be coercive and yet  qualify as a state.” *Certainly, one is free in one’s definitions, but not all definitions are fruitful.*

According  to Radnitzky’s definition, for instance, the founder-proprietor of a  settlement - a gated community - would have to be considered a state,  because he decides about membership (inclusion and exclusion) and is the  ultimate authority in all settler-conflicts. However, the founder of a  community does not exact taxes, but he collects fees, contributions or  rents from his follow-settlers. And he does not pass laws (legislates)  regarding the property of other, but all settler-property is from the  outset subject to his ultimate jurisdiction.

Similarly, it is  conceivable that all private land owners in a given territory transfer  their land to one and the same person, for instance, in order to so  establish the ultimate authority which according to Hobbes is necessary  for peace. Thereby, they sink from the rank of an owner to that of a  renter. *Radnitzky would also term such a proprietor, established  in this way, a state. But why? It is contrary to common terminology and  hence confusing.*

*And which purpose would be  served, to label something entirely different with the same name: namely  an institution, which derives its status as ultimate authority neither  from an act of original appropriation nor from a real estate transfer on  the part of original appropriators?* It is this difference in  the genesis of the institution, that lets us speak of (coercive) taxes  and tribute and of laws and legislation instead of voluntarily paid  rents and accepted community standards and house rules. *Why not, in accordance with conventional speech, reserve the term state exclusively for the former (compulsory) institution?*

However,  regarding this (compulsory) state, then, this must be kept in mind:  that its institution is even then ‘unjust’, if (per impossible) it  rested on unanimous agreement. Consensus does not guarantee truth. *A  state-agreement is invalid, because it contradicts the nature of  things. At any given point in time (and absent any pre-stabilized  harmony), a scarce good can only have one owner. Otherwise, contrary to  the very purpose of norms, conflict is generated instead of avoided.*

Yet  multiple ownership regarding one and the same stock of goods is  precisely what state-agreement implies. The consenting parties did not  transfer all of their land to the state but consider themselves as free  land owners (not renters). Yet at the same time they appoint the state  as ultimate decision-maker concerning all territorial conflicts and thus  make him the owner of all land. *The price that must be paid for this ‘unjust’ - contrary to the nature of things - agreement is permanent conflict.*

Conflict  is not unavoidable but possible. However, it is nonsensical to consider  the institution of a state as a solution to the problem of possible  conflict, because it is precisely the institution of a state which first  makes conflict unavoidable and permanent.

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> Ok, so before I play this game tonight, I have two questions that I seriously want answers to from the apologists.
> 
> 1) If it's a given that we need the state to resolve disputes, why is it not a given that we need the state to provide medicine, cellphones, new home construction, or tennis shoes?


It's not a given that we need the state to resolve disputes. The vast majority of disputes are resolved without the assistance of the state. This is a good thing, in my view.

However, in the absence of the state, some _other_ disputes (the ones that currently get resolved by the state) would instead by resolved by very violent and chaotic means, which would lead to a lot of killing and destruction that very few people would enjoy. Think of the state like a referee overseeing a game of basketball. Do you _need_ a referee to play basketball? Of course not. I used to play plenty of pickup games without a referee - we'd simply do the reffing and call fouls/out-of-bounds ourselves. This is fine when the stakes aren't high, but it wouldn't work very well in the NBA. See why?

In the same way, small disputes get settled outside of courtrooms all the time. However, when very wealthy and powerful individuals or corporations have a dispute with one another, it is desirable for a powerful judge/arbiter to exist who can dictate the result of the dispute without either side resorting to violence (which they almost certainly would do in the absence of said judge/State). This would produce more visible violence than most people want to see in their society.




> 2) What is your answer to the historical examples of statelessness?


I'm afraid I don't understand exactly what you're asking. Could you please elaborate a bit?

----------


## Conza88

> Agreed. I claim that most people will be happier - according to their own values - living under a strong, stable, and well-functioning state rather than in the absence of one.


I think the following strikes at the root.

"When dealing with the warlord objection, we need to keep our   comparisons fair. It wont do to compare society A, which is filled with   evil, ignorant savages who live under anarchy, with society B, which  is  populated by enlightened, law-abiding citizens who live under  limited  government.  *The anarchist doesnt deny that life might be better in society B.  What the anarchist does claim is that, for any given population, the imposition of a coercive government will make things worse. The absence of a State is a necessary, but not sufficient, condition to achieve the free society.*

 To put the matter differently:  It is not enough to demonstrate that a   state of private-property anarchy could degenerate into ceaseless war,   where no single group is strong enough to subjugate all challengers,  and  hence no one can establish order.  After all, communities living   under a State degenerate into civil war all the time.  We should   remember that the frequently cited cases of Colombia and now Iraq are   not demonstrations of anarchy-turned-into-chaos, but rather examples of   government-turned-into-chaos.

 For the warlord objection to  work, the statist would need to argue that a  given community would  remain lawful under a government, but that the  same community would  break down into continuous warfare if all legal and  military services  were privatized.  *The popular case of Somalia, therefore, helps neither side.*_  It is true that Rothbardians should be somewhat disturbed that the   respect for non-aggression is apparently too rare in Somalia to foster   the spontaneous emergence of a totally free market community.  But by the same token, the respect for the law was also too weak to allow the original Somali government to maintain order._

 *Bob Murphy*
Then there is also this for good measure regarding your previous points about property. Do you think the state needs to regulate language?

"Now, it is certainly correct that a market presupposes the  recognition and enforcement of those rules that underlie its operation.  But from this it does not follow that this task must be entrusted to a  monopolistic agency. In fact, a common language or sign-system is also  presupposed by the market; but one would hardly think it convincing to  conclude that hence the government must ensure the observance of the  rules of language. Just as the system of language then, the rules of  market behavior emerge spontaneously and can be enforced by the  invisible hand of self-interest. Without the observance of common  rules of speech people could not enjoy the advantages that communication  offers, and without the observance of common rules of conduct, people  could not enjoy the benefits of the higher productivity of an exchange  economy based on the division of labor." 			

 			 			 			 Hans-Hermann Hoppe, Fallacies of the Public Goods Theory and the Production of Security

----------


## fisharmor

> It's not a given that we need the state to resolve disputes. The vast majority of disputes are resolved without the assistance of the state. This is a good thing, in my view.
> 
> However, in the absence of the state, some _other_ disputes (the ones that currently get resolved by the state) would instead by resolved by very violent and chaotic means, which would lead to a lot of killing and destruction that very few people would enjoy. Think of the state like a referee overseeing a game of basketball. Do you _need_ a referee to play basketball? Of course not. I used to play plenty of pickup games without a referee - we'd simply do the reffing and call fouls/out-of-bounds ourselves. This is fine when the stakes aren't high, but it wouldn't work very well in the NBA. See why?


So..... you do realize you just offered an example of the market sorting itself out without state interference, don't you?
Can you come up with an example that actually supports your position?




> I'm afraid I don't understand exactly what you're asking. Could you please elaborate a bit?


You've decided that statelessness isn't possible, so I naturally assume that you've researched the historical examples where it actually happened and have found some reason why it doesn't count, or you're choosing to focus on titles that were used to show that it was something it wasn't, or that you're going to focus on interference by neighboring states instead of the stateless area itself.

So, since you already know about them, I would like to know what your answer is to those stateless societies.

----------


## fisharmor

Also, I just realized you didn't actually answer my question.
You backpedaled on the dispute resolution point, but it still sounds like you advocate having an ultimate dispute resolver.
Why then ought there not to be an ultimate medical authority, ultimate cellphone provider, ultimate home builder, or ultimate tennis shoe maker?

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> "Property does not exist because there are laws, but laws exist because there is property."
>  Frédéric Bastiat, Property and Law. (Source: bastiat.org)


"2+2=5"
saying things don't make them so




> That's not a definition of a state.


It's not? I kind of felt like it was.




> How about you define your terms since you're not using the common one of "a territorial monopolist and ultimate decision maker (including conflicts involving itself) with the ability to tax".


Are you sure? I don't feel like the definition I offered was in conflict with this description at all. "Territorial monopolist" is just another way of saying "sovereign corporation." The territorial monopolist/ultimate decision maker/sovereign corporation/State owns the territory over which it holds a monopoly in addition to everything inside of it (including the people and capital). 




> "The state operates in a legal vacuum. There exists no contract  between the state and its citizens. It is not contractually fixed, what  is actually owned by whom, and what, accordingly, is to be protected. It  is not fixed, what service the state is to provide, what is to happen  if the state fails in its duty, nor what the price is that the  customer of such service must pay. Rather, the state unilaterally  fixes the rules of the game and can change them, per legislation, during  the game. Obviously, such behavior is inconceivable for freely financed  security providers. Just imagine a security provider, whether police,  insurer or arbitrator, whose offer consisted in something like this: I  will not contractually guarantee you anything. I will not tell you what I  oblige myself to do if, according to your opinion, I do not fulfill my  service to you - but in any case, I reserve the right to unilaterally  determine the price that you must pay me for such undefined service. Any  such security provider would immediately disappear from the market due  to a complete lack of customers." 
> 
>  Hans-Hermann Hoppe (Source: thedailybell.com)


100% correct. Hoppe is a pretty bright guy. Strangely, however, we see that every single "security provider" in existence today is _not_ "freely financed," and that such security providers have _not_ disappeared from "the market" due to a complete lack of customers. What conclusions may we draw from these observations? The most obvious one would seem to me to be that _there is no market in security providers_. Instead, security provision is a natural monopoly - one group obtains power over a bunch of land, begins performing the functions of a state, _and then kills anyone who tries to compete with them_. Thus, there is no opportunity for a "market" to arise or for "competition" to work its famous magic, as it does in the production of cell phones and tennis shoes, driving down prices and driving up quality. Instead, we get $#@!ty governments, because exit costs and barriers to entry are so incredibly high.




> "A tax-funded protection agency is a contradiction in terms - an   expropriating property protector - and will inevitably lead to more   taxes and less protection. Even if, as some - classical liberal -   statists have proposed, a government limited its activities exclusively   to the protection of pre-existing private property rights, the further   question of how much security to produce would arise. Motivated (like   everyone else) by self-interest and the disutility of labor, but endowed   with the unique power to tax, a government agents answer will   invariably be the same: To maximize expenditures on protection - and   almost all of a nations wealth can conceivably be consumed by the cost   of protection - and at the same time to minimize the production of   protection." 
>  Hans-Hermann Hoppe


First, Hoppe makes an error in assuming that there is such a thing as "pre-existing private property rights," for reasons I've laid out earlier.

Second, noticing that there's a problem doesn't tell you how to solve it.

http://radishmag.wordpress.com/2013/...archo-tyranny/




> The second interpretation is: I  don't know the difference between "might" and "right," because there is  no difference. Might is right and right is might. This interpretation  is self-contradictory. Because if you wanted to defend this statement as  a true statement in an argument with someone else you are in fact  recognizing your opponent's property right in his own body. You do not  aggress against him in order to bring him to the correct insight. You  allow him to come to the correct insight on his own. That is, you admit,  at least implicitly, that you do know the difference between right and  wrong. Otherwise there would be no purpose in arguing. The same,  incidentally, is true for Hobbes' famous dictum that one man is another  man's wolf. In claiming this statement to be true, you actually prove it  to be false.


This is an embarrassing bit of nonsense from Hoppe. Might makes right, and the notion that attempting to persuade others of this proposition requires a recognition of its falsehood is silly. The primary reason people engage in persuasion rather than aggression is that they care more about obtaining _agreement_ than they do about obtaining _compliance_. When the opposite preference holds, persuasion is discarded in favor of force (assuming that a sufficient power disparity exists for one party to compel compliance from the other). Think about how every courtroom in America operates. Do the police, judges, and lawyers try to _persuade_ people that the laws they're accused of having broken are good ideas and should be followed? No, they simply compel obedience and lock you in a cage or kill you if you disagree. That is how people behave when they possess enough might/power to get away with it. Then they call their behavior "right."




> However,  regarding this (compulsory) state, then, this must be kept in mind:  that its institution is even then unjust, if (per impossible) it  rested on unanimous agreement. Consensus does not guarantee truth. *A  state-agreement is invalid, because it contradicts the nature of  things. At any given point in time (and absent any pre-stabilized  harmony), a scarce good can only have one owner. Otherwise, contrary to  the very purpose of norms, conflict is generated instead of avoided.*


Such a statement could only come from one who hasn't practiced property law.

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

The simple fact of the matter is that multiple people own scarce goods all the time. There is nothing about the nature of things that prevents such forms of ownership from coming into being, and in fact they exist and have existed in almost every place and time throughout history.

Suppose there is a very valuable piece of property that I want. Let's call it a Babe Ruth baseball card. Unfortunately, it has a price I cannot afford. However, I have a friend who also wants the baseball card and cannot afford it on his own. He and I make an agreement - each of us will pay half the price of the card, and in exchange we will hold the card in common. Each of us then possesses a 50% interest in the indivisible card.

This sort of thing happens all the time, and refusing to recognize these agreements as valid is ridiculous. It would create a legal regime that has never existed in modern history in anything like a functional state. What happens when a married couple buys a house using money from a shared account?

I agree with the idea that legal regimes which promote conflict are generally less desirable than those that avoid it, but conflict avoidance is not an infinitely-valuable good. One way to dramatically reduce conflict, for example, would be to kill all of the humans. Yet I think you'd agree with me that this is not a good idea. Similarly, refusing to recognize as valid the concept of joint ownership over scarce goods may "avoid conflict" generated by disagreements over the details of these ownership arrangements, but the utility of recognizing them as valid radically outweighs the positive good of conflict avoidance to so obvious a degree that literally every single successful legal regime has done so. Why shouldn't my friend and I be able to buy the Babe Ruth baseball card that neither of us could afford on our own?

----------


## Cabal

> Alright, well I'm afraid we're about to find ourselves running around in a circle, because this definition makes me want to ask: What do the words "just," "rightful," "immoral," "unjust," "rights," and "moral" mean?


Ultimately you could just ask what the theory of morality or justice is that I'm referring to.

That theory of morality can be essentially summed up by self-ownership, and thus property rights, and thus NAP.

Given that the State must necessarily claim (at least) partial ownership over people, and thereby must necessarily be a violator of property rights by way of initiations of force, or the threat thereof, it is illegitimate/unjust/immoral/wrong/evil/pick your synonym.

From what I gather, without going through your previous response point by point and thus creating ever larger, and larger walls of broken text, the crux of your dispute seems to revolve around this issue of property rights. If you wish to refute property rights, I submit that you must first refute self-ownership given that self-ownership is the basis of property rights under this moral theory. Saying property rights are not a thing in the world is rather irrelevant. The number 2 is not a tangible thing in the world either. Would you contend that the number 2 is a fallacious concept on these grounds as well? Rights are not the capacity of defense, they are moral claims. A newborn baby has almost no capacity to defend itself from most things in the world, particularly other humans. This does not mean it's lack of capacity to defend itself from other humans gives those humans the right to harm it. A claim is either more invalid or more valid as a result of it's logical consistency, not as a result of who beats the $#@! out of who first, or more effectively. Effective violence =/= sound logic, let alone valid moral theory.

In anticipation to the usual response to this which tends to be an attempted refutation of self-ownership, I'll go ahead and take this opportunity to point out that one must exercise self-ownership when attempting to refute self-ownership, thereby contradicting themselves and making a self-detonating assertion. Unsurprisingly, statism vs. anti-statism almost always certainly comes down to this issue of self-ownership and property rights. But property rights are universal, and objectively true as a necessary consequence of self-ownership, and self-ownership, as explained, is logically irrefutable.

I'll take a bit of liberty here and guess that you don't go around robbing innocent people at gunpoint--or at least I hope this is true. If so, is the only reason you don't do this because it's against the law? Or is it because you understand that it would be morally wrong to rob innocent people at gunpoint? If you do understand that it is wrong to rob innocent people at gunpoint, and if you care about maintaining consistency, it must also be wrong for the State to rob innocent people at gunpoint.

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> I think the following strikes at the root.
> "When dealing with the warlord objection, we need to keep our   comparisons fair. It wont do to compare society A, which is filled with   evil, ignorant savages who live under anarchy, with society B, which  is  populated by enlightened, law-abiding citizens who live under  limited  government.  *The anarchist doesnt deny that life might be better in society B.  What the anarchist does claim is that, for any given population, the imposition of a coercive government will make things worse. The absence of a State is a necessary, but not sufficient, condition to achieve the free society.*


I'm afraid I can't agree. Are you familiar with the practice of colonialism? I strongly suspect that Somalia could benefit greatly from it. Good governance is an incredibly valuable thing.




> To put the matter differently:  It is not enough to demonstrate that a   state of private-property anarchy could degenerate into ceaseless war,   where no single group is strong enough to subjugate all challengers,  and  hence no one can establish order.  After all, communities living   under a State degenerate into civil war all the time.  We should   remember that the frequently cited cases of Colombia and now Iraq are   not demonstrations of anarchy-turned-into-chaos, but rather examples of   government-turned-into-chaos.


Am I understood to be defending all possible states? Let me correct the record, then - strong and stable states are desirable, weak and failing states are undesirable. The states of Colombia and Iraq were too weak to impose order and so collapsed. This is bad. Had the states been stronger and more able to impose order, the outcome would have been better.




> For the warlord objection to  work, the statist would need to argue that a  given community would  remain lawful under a government, but that the  same community would  break down into continuous warfare if all legal and  military services  were privatized.


Why must I argue that all states will be well-run in order to defend the institution of statism? Must Murphy argue that all businesses will be well-run in order to defend the institution of capitalism?




> *The popular case of Somalia, therefore, helps neither side.*_  It is true that Rothbardians should be somewhat disturbed that the   respect for non-aggression is apparently too rare in Somalia to foster   the spontaneous emergence of a totally free market community.  But by the same token, the respect for the law was also too weak to allow the original Somali government to maintain order._
> 
>  *Bob Murphy*


Somalia helps my side quite a bit, actually. Strong state = good, weak state = worse, no state = worst. As I said before - it sounds like Somalia could do with a healthy dose of colonialism.




> Then there is also this for good measure regarding your previous points about property. Do you think the state needs to regulate language?


No, and it's not clear why you ask. Nothing I've said suggests that it should.




> "Now, it is certainly correct that a market presupposes the  recognition and enforcement of those rules that underlie its operation.  But from this it does not follow that this task must be entrusted to a  monopolistic agency.


100% correct and indeed obvious. The existence of black markets serves as proof of this claim. Markets can exist in the absence of a state. So what?




> In fact, a common language or sign-system is also  presupposed by the market; but one would hardly think it convincing to  conclude that hence the government must ensure the observance of the  rules of language. Just as the system of language then, the rules of  market behavior emerge spontaneously and can be enforced by the  invisible hand of self-interest. Without the observance of common  rules of speech people could not enjoy the advantages that communication  offers, and without the observance of common rules of conduct, people  could not enjoy the benefits of the higher productivity of an exchange  economy based on the division of labor."             
>  
>                                         Hans-Hermann Hoppe, Fallacies of the Public Goods Theory and the Production of Security


The observation that governments are not _necessary_ for a market to exist is correct. The objection I'd raise is that markets which exist in the absence of government involvement tend to be much more violent, less trustworthy, and therefore less efficient than those that are effectively regulated by a government. The classic examples would be modern illegal drug markets and alcohol markets during Prohibition. Note that I'm not referring to the problems created by governmental attempts to enforce laws against these substances, which I agree are and were substantial and serve as strong signals that outlawing them is and was a bad idea. Instead, I point to the fact that the people running these illegal businesses were and are_ extremely violent_ to a degree that most people find shocking and appalling. Murders and robberies are common in these trades, because victims of the crimes cannot go to the government for protection or enforcement. This leads to anarchy (in the pejorative) and chaos.

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> So..... you do realize you just offered an example of the market sorting itself out without state interference, don't you?


...Yes. That is exactly what I said that I was doing. However, I also asked a question that you haven't answered: "This is fine when the stakes aren't high, but it wouldn't work very well in the NBA. See why?"

_Do_ you see why?




> Can you come up with an example that actually supports your position?


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




> You've decided that statelessness isn't possible


What? No I haven't. I'm afraid you've misunderstood. I've decided that statelessness isn't _stable_, because every historical example of statelessness has collapsed into statism before too long. I've also decided (though with less confidence) that statelessness isn't _desirable_, because most historical examples of stateless societies have been_ awful_.




> so I naturally assume that you've researched the historical examples where it actually happened and have found some reason why it doesn't count, or you're choosing to focus on titles that were used to show that it was something it wasn't, or that you're going to focus on interference by neighboring states instead of the stateless area itself.
> 
> So, since you already know about them, I would like to know what your answer is to those stateless societies.


My favorite example of what's called a "stateless society" is Iceland, but I don't agree that it was "stateless" in the same sense that modern-day anarcho-capitalists generally mean. Most historical "stateless societies" could more properly be labeled "tribal societies," imo. One thing that all "stateless societies" I'm aware of have in common is that they collapsed or were invaded and turned into societies with states imposing order on them.

 Somalia is the best example of a "stateless society" today, but I suspect that a state will form there before too long, probably propped up by the US State Department.

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> Also, I just realized you didn't actually answer my question.


Yes I did. You simply didn't recognize it as an answer. You asked: "If it's a given that we need the state to resolve disputes, why is it  not a given that we need the state to provide medicine, cellphones, new  home construction, or tennis shoes?"

I answered: "It's not a given that we need the state to resolve disputes."

I denied the premise of your question. Imagine if I were to ask whether you'd stopped beating your wife. You would deny that you'd ever done so in the first place. For me to say that "you didn't actually answer my question" would properly be seen as a dishonest attempt to make you admit to something you'd never done.




> You backpedaled on the dispute resolution point


Really? When did I do that? It seems pretty clear that you hold some radical misconceptions about what I think/believe. I encourage you to make a greater effort at understanding my view(s).




> but it still sounds like you advocate having an ultimate dispute resolver.


I do, yes!




> Why then ought there not to be an ultimate medical authority, ultimate cellphone provider, ultimate home builder, or ultimate tennis shoe maker?


Because I do not expect the absence of an ultimate medical authority/cellphone provider/home builder/tennis shoe maker to result in increased amounts of violence, death, and suffering. I do expect the absence of an ultimate dispute resolver to result in increased amounts of violence, death, and suffering. If this expectation were to change, my conclusion about the desirability of an ultimate dispute resolver would change.

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> From what I gather, without going through your previous response point by point and thus creating ever larger, and larger walls of broken text, the crux of your dispute seems to revolve around this issue of property rights. If you wish to refute property rights, I submit that you must first refute self-ownership given that self-ownership is the basis of property rights under this moral theory.


Oh, okay, well that's easy enough.

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

Slaves do not own themselves. They are owned by somebody else. Slavery is an institution that has existed for the vast majority of human history in the vast majority of places around the world. The idea of inalienable self-ownership is a recent development and is refuted by the fact that this supposedly inalienable right has been alienated billions upon billions of times.

Also, States today claim ownership of their citizens. People do not own themselves - they are more properly viewed as property of the State.

Note that nothing I have said here is a _moral_ claim. They are simply descriptive statements about how the world is as it exists. People do not always own themselves - they are often owned by other people.




> Saying property rights are not a thing in the world is rather irrelevant. The number 2 is not a tangible thing in the world either. Would you contend that the number 2 is a fallacious concept on these grounds as well?


"As well"? I have never said that property rights were a "fallacious concept." Indeed, I have said the precise opposite - states _establish_ property rights by defining and defending them. What I have objected to is the notion that these rights exist in the absence of enforcement.




> Rights are not the capacity of defense, they are moral claims. A newborn baby has almost no capacity to defend itself from most things in the world, particularly other humans. This does not mean it's lack of capacity to defend itself from other humans gives those humans the right to harm it. A claim is either more invalid or more valid as a result of it's logical consistency, not as a result of who beats the $#@! out of who first, or more effectively. Effective violence =/= sound logic, let alone valid moral theory.


There is no such thing as a "valid moral theory." Nietzsche/Hume were right, I'm afraid - moral realism is false, and we instead live in the abyss of moral nihilism. All moral theories are equally arbitrary. It is possible to call moral theories "valid" insofar as they are at least internally consistent - but they are not descriptions of anything that actually exists in the world. 




> In anticipation to the usual response to this which tends to be an attempted refutation of self-ownership, I'll go ahead and take this opportunity to point out that one must exercise self-ownership when attempting to refute self-ownership, thereby contradicting themselves and making a self-detonating assertion.


Must one? Then I see that you are using a rather trivial definition of "self-ownership." For neither you nor I could deny that a man may be called a slave, and treated as a slave, and brutally whipped if he disobeys the orders of his master, yet still retain control over his body in the sense that you are talking about here. Would you then contend that the treatment of this so-called slave does not represent any infringement upon his supposed right to self-ownership? After all, the slave must "exercise self-ownership" when attempting to claim that his right to self-ownership is being violated, thereby contradicting himself and making a self-detonating assertion!




> Unsurprisingly, statism vs. anti-statism almost always certainly comes down to this issue of self-ownership and property rights. But property rights are universal, and objectively true as a necessary consequence of self-ownership, and self-ownership, as explained, is logically irrefutable.


I agree that there is a sense in which what you call "self-ownership" is logically irrefutable. However, the implications of applying this principle consistently are ones that I suspect you would not find desirable - no man or woman could ever complain of being enslaved, for example, because the right to self-ownership would entail no more than that one exercise conscious control of his or her body, which even the most brutally oppressed slaves continue to do.




> I'll take a bit of liberty here and guess that you don't go around robbing innocent people at gunpoint--or at least I hope this is true. If so, is the only reason you don't do this because it's against the law? Or is it because you understand that it would be morally wrong to rob innocent people at gunpoint?


You do realize that these are not the only two possibilities, right? It would not be morally wrong to rob innocent people at gunpoint because nothing is morally wrong. However, the fact that it's against the law is not the _only_ reason I do not go around robbing people. I live in Texas, and lots of people here own guns, so robbing people is actually pretty dangerous even aside from the fact that it's against the law.




> If you do understand that it is wrong to rob innocent people at gunpoint, and if you care about maintaining consistency, it must also be wrong for the State to rob innocent people at gunpoint.


Conclusion absolutely follows logically from the premise, but the premise is incorrect. It is not morally wrong to rob innocent people at gunpoint, because nothing is morally wrong.

----------


## Cabal

> Must one? Then I see that you are using a rather trivial definition of "self-ownership." For neither you nor I could deny that a man may be called a slave, and treated as a slave, and brutally whipped if he disobeys the orders of his master, yet still retain control over his body in the sense that you are talking about here. Would you then contend that the treatment of this so-called slave does not represent any infringement upon his supposed right to self-ownership? After all, the slave must "exercise self-ownership" when attempting to claim that his right to self-ownership is being violated, thereby contradicting himself and making a self-detonating assertion!


Being called a slave is a claim. In order for that claim to be valid, one would have to make a valid case. Fortunately, one cannot make a case for this without first denying self-ownership. So again, one must refute self-ownership. You've already conceded this is impossible.

The fact that people can take a given action doesn't mean anything. I can say 2+2=5. I can write this equation down. My doing so means nothing; it doesn't make the equation valid.

By enslaving someone and initiating violence upon them against their will, this is again a claim of ownership, and an implicit denial of self-ownership. The aggressor is claiming a right over the victim. Once again, in order for this claim to be valid, one must be able to refute self-ownership. 




> because the right to self-ownership entails no more than that one exercise conscious control of his or her body, which even the most brutally oppressed slaves continue to do.


That is not all the extent of what it entails by any means. Any initiation of violence against someone's person, and thus property, without consent is an implicit denial of this self-ownership, as it is a property rights claim--it necessarily interferes with one's ability to freely exercise the self-ownership you've already conceded is true. The aggressor is claiming ownership to rightfully do as they will with the victim, and they are also claiming that the victim has no right to be free from such initiations of violence from the aggressor because the aggressor's rights over the victim are more valid than the victim's rights over themselves. This, of course, is in contention with the victim's claim of ownership which is, as you have conceded irrefutable. So what you have, essentially, is two contending property rights claims, but as mentioned, you've conceded to the validity of self-ownership, so the aggressor has no valid claim, and is thus wrong to attempt to act as if their claim were valid just as they are wrong to attempt to have a greater claim than the victim over themselves. These are the necessary implications.

----------


## NorthCarolinaLiberty

> It would not be morally wrong to rob innocent people at gunpoint because nothing is morally wrong.  
> 
> ...because nothing is morally wrong.



I'll be over to rob you next week.  I'm sure it won't bother you.

Do you have lots of good stuff?  I don't want to waste my time if you don't.

----------


## Weston White

Is it arguable that anarchism is itself an unorganized governance formed by voluntarism that intends to align with the subjectively based theories of utilitarianism or consequentialism?

Is it arguable that without a polis form of organized governance (be it structured as a timocracy, monarchy, or aristocracy) there is no universally valid mechanism for which distributive or rectificatory justice to occur?

Is it the case that without an aware and active citizenry all forms of government will over time devolve, regardless; e.g., timocracy into democracy or ochlocracy; monarchy into autocracy or tyranny; aristocracy into oligarchy or plutocracy; and anarchism into adhocracy or panarchy?

It is for the existence of an organized entity, termed ‘government’, which might regulate acts of right from those that are wrong; enforce a virtuous means to its just ends; and punish negative cause and effects.

Imagine an ungoverned nation where the majority of the population, with literal impunity, acted with the same self-interested morality as present day street gangs, crime organizations, or robber-barons.  These classes of sordid individuals currently care not about the public’s interests, nor would they care one iota about the NAP should it ever become a reality—and in fact the only thing keeping them in check is an organized system of governance (albeit, at present through rabid corruption also furtively enables the continuing expansion of their lawlessness), i.e., our common law republic of constitutionalism.

----------


## Weston White

> The fact that people can take a given action doesn't mean anything. I can say 2+2=5. I can write this equation down. My doing so means nothing; it doesn't make the equation valid.


Yet according to the new Obama Common Core standards of pragmatism a mere consensus may change 2+2=4 into 2+2=5.

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> Being called a slave is a claim. In order for that claim to be valid, one would have to make a valid case. Fortunately, one cannot make a case for this without first denying self-ownership. So again, one must refute self-ownership. You've already conceded this is impossible.


I agree that there is a sense in which what you call "self-ownership" is  logically irrefutable. However, the implications of applying this  principle consistently are ones that I suspect you would not find  desirable - no man or woman could ever complain of being enslaved, for  example, because the right to self-ownership would entail no more than  that one exercise conscious control of his or her body, which even the  most brutally oppressed "slaves" continue to do.




> The fact that people can take a given action doesn't mean anything. I  can say 2+2=5. I can write this equation down. My doing so means  nothing; it doesn't make the equation valid.


I disagree that people being able to take a given action doesn't mean anything. If people can take a given action, this demonstrates that they can take the action in question. Do you know what a tautology is?

The symbols we've chosen to represent different numerals are 100% arbitrary. If a society were to decide that it wanted to use the symbol "5" to represent the concept we've been referring to with the symbol "4" and vice versa, it would indeed become true that 2+2=5.

What you may have meant to say is that there are certain facts about the nature of reality and the structure of the universe that humans are not capable of altering, and that some of these facts are mathematical in nature. I would agree with this.




> By enslaving someone and initiating violence upon them against their will, this is again a claim of ownership, and an implicit denial of self-ownership. The aggressor is claiming a right over the victim. Once again, in order for this claim to be valid, one must be able to refute self-ownership.


Please define: "self-ownership"

As the term has heretofore been used, it appears to entail no more than that a person exercises conscious control over his or her body, and that this control is inalienable. If there are _additional_ implications to the term, then earlier claims made about its irrefutable nature fall apart.

So let's say I "own" a few "slaves." I have a gun, they don't, and I tell them to do what I say or I'll kill them. I do not deny that these individuals possess "self-ownership" in the sense that they exercise conscious control over their bodies. And yet - if they attempt to exercise that control in ways I disapprove of, I will kill them. I am happy to agree that this "claim of ownership" is not "valid," because who cares? Apparently, whether a thing is "valid" has no impact whatsoever on how the world works, like phlogistons, or underpants gnomes.

Most of the "slaves" do what I tell them to for the rest of our lives, never disobeying. A few disobey, and I kill them.

Did these slaves continue to possess "self-ownership," or did I successfully strip them of it? This isn't a rhetorical question, I'm genuinely curious to know what you would think.




> That is not all the extent of what it entails by any means. Any initiation of violence against someone's person, and thus property, without consent is an implicit denial of this self-ownership, as it is a property rights claim--it necessarily interferes with one's ability to freely exercise the self-ownership you've already conceded is true.


You are very badly confused about what I have conceded is true. The only sense in which I have agreed that "self-ownership" cannot be refuted is a very limited one - people exercise conscious control over their bodies. It does not logically follow from this that any initiation of violence against a person without consent is an implicit denial of this "self-ownership." The sense of "self-ownership" being denied by an initiation of violence against a person is much broader, and I _do_ deny the existence of that sort of "self-ownership." I deny its existence because it does not exist - people are enslaved all the time. YOU are a slave - you are property of your government. The government may do whatever it wants to you, and there is nothing you can do to stop it.




> The aggressor is claiming ownership to rightfully do as they will with the victim, and they are also claiming that the victim has no right to be free from such initiations of violence from the aggressor because the aggressor's rights over the victim are more valid than the victim's rights over themselves.


It might be useful for us to excise the word "right" from our discourse. It only seems to be confusing you.

There is no such thing as a "right." "Rights" do not exist. They are not a thing-in-the-world. Thus: "The aggressor is claiming ownership to rightfully do as they will with  the victim, and they are also claiming that the victim has no right power to  be free from such initiations of violence from the aggressor because the  aggressor's rights powers over the victim are more valid stronger than the victim's  rights powers over themselves."

This is a more accurate formulation of what's being asserted by a slave-owner (i.e. all governments everywhere).




> This, of course, is in contention with the victim's claim of ownership which is, as you have conceded irrefutable.


You are using the word "ownership" in an inconsistent fashion. I'm not even sure you realize that you're doing it. If you don't recognize that you are using the word inconsistently, it will not be possible to correct your understanding.




> So what you have, essentially, is two contending property rights claims, but as mentioned, you've conceded to the validity of self-ownership, so the aggressor has no valid claim, and is thus wrong to attempt to act as if their claim were valid just as they are wrong to attempt to have a greater claim than the victim over themselves. These are the necessary implications.


Conclusion absolutely follows logically from the premise, but the  premise is incorrect. "Self-ownership" in the sense that you are now using the term is not "valid" (i.e. it does not exist in the world and is not irrefutable but is instead amply refuted at all times and in all places). If "self-ownership" in the sense that you mean it were indeed irrefutable, then you would be correct about the necessary implications.

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> I'll be over to rob you next week.  I'm sure it won't bother you.


The recognition that a thing is not morally wrong does not imply that it should not or will not bother a person.

For example, I'm sure you would agree that there would be nothing morally wrong with you accidentally eating poop because you thought it was chocolate ice cream. And yet I'm very confident that it would bother you.

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> Is it arguable that anarchism is itself an unorganized governance formed by voluntarism that intends to align with the subjectively based theories of utilitarianism or consequentialism?


Yes. I would agree with this definition, in fact. However, I would argue that "unorganized governance" is necessarily inferior to its opposite - "organized governance." We see this in every hierarchical organization of human beings imaginable, from families to sports teams to businesses. Families tend to be better with a head of household, sports teams benefit from the existence of coaches, and large businesses make more money with a CEO. My claim is that societies function better with a strong state in place to prevent violence (except that which it inflicts itself).




> Is it arguable that without a polis form of organized governance (be it structured as a timocracy, monarchy, or aristocracy) there is no universally valid mechanism for which distributive or rectificatory justice to occur?


Yes. In fact I would agree with this claim.




> Is it the case that without an aware and active citizenry all forms of government will over time devolve, regardless; e.g., timocracy into democracy or ochlocracy; monarchy into autocracy or tyranny; aristocracy into oligarchy or plutocracy; and anarchism into adhocracy or panarchy?


I think so, yes. The quality of a nation's or a society's citizenry is the most important factor contributing to its success or failure, imo. 

"For _Forms of Government_ let fools contest;
Whate'er is best administer'd is best"

Milton Friedman was fond of pointing out that Sweden's success under a largely socialist system of government was no great argument in favor of socialism. ANY form of government would do fairly well, he argued, if it was tasked with governing Swedes.




> It is for the existence of an organized entity, termed ‘government’, which might regulate acts of right from those that are wrong; enforce a virtuous means to its just ends; and punish negative cause and effects.


+1, with the caveat that the government must first _define_ acts of "right" and "wrong," in addition to "virtuous," "just," and "negative." Sometimes governments define these terms in a way that their subjects become unhappy with - this is what I would call "bad governance." What I call "good governance" tends to promote the public welfare according to the values of the public in question. "Good governance" in Texas would not be the same thing as "good governance" in California.




> Imagine an ungoverned nation where the majority of the population, with literal impunity, acted with the same self-interested morality as present day street gangs, crime organizations, or robber-barons.  These classes of sordid individuals currently care not about the public’s interests, nor would they care one iota about the NAP should it ever become a reality—and in fact the only thing keeping them in check is an organized system of governance (albeit, at present through rabid corruption also furtively enables the continuing expansion of their lawlessness), i.e., our common law republic of constitutionalism.


Indeed. This is the argument for statism in a nutshell. Though I do wonder what it would mean for the NAP to "become a reality."

----------


## Cabal

> So let's say I "own" a few "slaves." I have a gun, they don't, and I tell them to do what I say or I'll kill them. I do not deny that these individuals possess "self-ownership" in the sense that they exercise conscious control over their bodies. And yet - if they attempt to exercise that control in ways I disapprove of, I will kill them. I am happy to agree that this "claim of ownership" is not "valid," because who cares? Apparently, whether a thing is "valid" has no impact whatsoever on how the world works, like phlogistons, or underpants gnomes.


To say you own slaves is a property rights claim over those slaves. You're saying you own them, thus you're saying they are your property, thus you're saying you have a right to treat them as your property. And you do deny their self-ownership if you attempt to make them your slaves--if you attempt to initiate violence against them to force them to do something. You are claiming that your right to treat them as your property is more valid than their claim to a property right in themselves. You are applying force to resistance, your force is your claim over them, their resistance (or lack of voluntary consent) is their claim over themselves. These claims are not evaluated by who is holding the biggest gun, they are evaluated by moral theory.

If you don't care then why are you having this conversation? You seem to self-refute quite a bit. If validity is irrelevant, then it follows truth is irrelevant. By engaging in debate, you're inherently refuting this by first conceding that truth must exist, and demonstrating a preference for truth and thus validity.

Morality isn't gravity--it doesn't describe, it prescribes; it doesn't say someone does behave one way or another, it says someone should (or should not) behave one way or another. It's a way to judge and evaluate action; morality is optional, but that doesn't mean it's irrelevant. Similarly, I don't have to use the scientific method to evaluate something, but I can choose to if I'm interested in reaching an accurate conclusion about it. Thus, if I wish to determine the morality of an action, I will use a theory of morality to do so. Mathematics has no impact on life until we apply mathematics to the world, and then it can become quite useful for certain tasks. The more valid our mathematics are in these applications, the more accurate our results will invariably be when we apply mathematics.




> Did these slaves continue to possess "self-ownership," or did I successfully strip them of it? This isn't a rhetorical question, I'm genuinely curious to know what you would think.


Self-ownership can never be denied. Even if one were to sell their body, they are not physically capable of forfeiting their self-ownership to anyone else. I suppose you could possibly make an argument about voluntary suicide being a forfeiture of self-ownership, but that's another matter.




> I deny its existence because it does not exist - people are enslaved all the time.


This means approximately $#@! all. If people conclude that 2+2=5 all the time, that doesn't mean that 2+2=5 is valid. 




> There is no such thing as a "right." "Rights" do not exist. They are not a thing-in-the-world.


This again. Lovely. As already explained, this is irrelevant. Lots of things do not tangibly exist in the world. This, again, means approximately $#@! all. 

Your preferences are not a thing-in-the-world, so you must not have preferences.
Science is not a thing-in-the-world, so science must not exist.
Math is not a thing-in-the-world, so math must not exist.
Faith is not a thing-in-the-world, so faith must not exist.
Language is not a thing-in-the-world, so language must not exist.
Truth is not a thing-in-the-world, so truth must not exist.

You are exercising property rights over the device you're using to make the very denial of property rights you're making. The consistent self-refutation you engage in is mind-boggling.

----------


## menciusmoldbug

Your misunderstanding of my views and beliefs is so radical that I'm afraid this conversation cannot possibly be productive. Every time I attempt to explain a position or fact, you promptly either forget it or fail to integrate it into your understanding of my worldview, forcing me to repeat myself over and over and over. Your brain seems to be broken in an irreparable way - or at least in a way that I don't know how to repair. I suspect the root causes of the problem are a combination of mild autism and insufficient IQ. Once/if we learn how to breed brighter humans, I'm confident that anarchist ideologies will simply go away once and for all. Fingers crossed!

----------


## NorthCarolinaLiberty

> The recognition that a thing is not morally wrong does not imply that it should not or will not bother a person.


Then why should it bother you?

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> Then why should it bother you?


...I think you may have misunderstood my remark. There is no objective reason why it "should." However, people generally dislike being robbed. It very often bothers them. Are you perhaps under the mistaken impression that this fact is contingent upon a recognition of moral realism?

----------


## NorthCarolinaLiberty

[QUOTE=menciusmoldbug;5465258However, people generally dislike being robbed. It very often bothers them. [/QUOTE]

Why?

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> Why?


Because people tend to enjoy having things, and they are less fond of not having things. After a person is robbed, they have fewer things than they had before.

----------


## Reece

> This question takes for granted a proposition that is false - namely, that "property" exists prior to and independently of the state. Instead, as my OP said, a state is tasked with the responsibility to "*define* and defend property rights." Think of states as sovereign corporations - they are owners of the land, capital, and people in a geographic region. Different states set up different laws and property rights, then enforce them to the extent that they see fit. But it is not sensible to speak of a state _violating_ a property right, for in the state's absence no property right is enforceable - and a non-enforceable right is no right at all.


If the state is the one that "define[s]... property rights," then you are correct.  There obviously cannot be property rights in an anarchy.  But, I doubt you actually believe that.  If, for example, the state declared all of your stuff to be mine (hoorah!), I assume you would be outraged.  Would the state have the right to do this?  What if the state took everything from everyone?  Does the state have this right too?  If not, then the state simply cannot "define" property rights.  It enforces what it (and the majority of the population) sees as property rights.  It makes the decisions on who will control what.

Now, suppose I am on an island (with no state), and build myself a hut from unused resources.  Clearly, I would have control of the hut.  I assume you would agree that I had a right to my hut, and that anyone that takes it from me would be a thief.  Even if the island was filled with barbarians, it is silly to say that there was no property independent of the state, unless if you literally define property as state-necessary.  The barbarians may indeed take control of my hut, but by the very essence of taking it from me, I did have control of it for a period of time.  If the barbarians take my hut and say it is to "defend" me, they violated my property right in my hut.

"a non-enforceable right is no right at all" - What do you mean by non-enforceable?  In my above example, I would not defend my hut.  But, I clearly would have the ability to do so.  I could risk my life and possibly stop the barbarians.  I might even be able to offer myself as a slave to another group of people in order for them to help defend my hut.  So do you just mean that the cost is too high?  But that is extremely subjective.  I could easily steal a calculator or something from someone at my school.  In order for them to catch me, they would have to spend a ridiculous amount of money to conduct a search - it might not even be possible!  So did the student never have a right to that calculator?  The right certainly seems non-enforceable.  What about historical examples, like slavery?  Did the slaves (say, in the late 1700s) not have a right to be free, because it was not reasonably enforceable for them (a slave revolt would be way too costly)?

You putting defining rights in the hands of the state causes far more problems than I think you realize.  I would back up, and instead make the claim that property rights are better enforced under a state.

As for how control of resources would be allocated in an anarchy, it really would not be all that different from the current situation.  In both cases, it rests on the population agreeing to it.  Look at the comment sections under a local news article of a thief or a murderer.  There is always (in my experience) outrage.  People call the guy a "scumbag" and various other names.  Is it really reasonable to say that these people would completely lose their sense of justice if the state disappeared?  Of course not.  If I stole a chainsaw from a store people would be just as outraged.  People would have no problem with an agency walking into my house and taking the chainsaw back.  But, if a rogue agency walked into my house and stole my chainsaw, people would obviously be outraged the opposite way.  Clearly then, the public has an opinion on who owns what _before the state makes their decision in court_.  If a state court makes a ridiculous decision in court (like "The 'robber' had a right to the chainsaw, because he _really_ wanted it."), people would be outraged.  In an anarchy, the robber would similarly be condemned.  But just like in the state, people still have a sense of justice.  They usually think the robber has a right to go to court.  And so, the agency couldn't just take the loot and be done with it.  They would have to go to a judge who was trusted by the public (even if there was popular support for going in and getting the guy, competitors would still be a limiting factor on doing this without a trial - imagine if they took the case to court and found the opposite result.  The competitor would be hurt substantially).  This would actually bring about the interesting scenario of competition in who can be the most just.  It's really a fascinating subject when you think about it.  Unlike now, judges would not only be significantly hurt if they made a bad decision, but there would actually be competing judges trying to find if their competitors were corrupt!  Contrast that to the current corrupt system.  Obviously this is only a quick look into the topic, and just my perspective on it, so take it with a grain of salt.

----------


## acptulsa

> Also, I just realized you didn't actually answer my question.
> You backpedaled on the dispute resolution point, but it still sounds like you advocate having an ultimate dispute resolver.
> Why then ought there not to be an ultimate medical authority, ultimate cellphone provider, ultimate home builder, or ultimate tennis shoe maker?


Your question, though valid, is completely irrelevant to the purpose of this thread.  The purpose of this thread is to split hairs to the degree where people who essentially agree with each other can have a nice, fun knock down drag out fight with each other.




> Yet according to the new Obama Common Core standards of pragmatism a mere consensus may change 2+2=4 into 2+2=5.


And the liberals wonder why libertarians overreact and start talking about doing away with government altogether.  Because it's as easy as denouncing mass psychosis, once you tyrants have given government _this_ bad a name.

----------


## NorthCarolinaLiberty

> Because people tend to enjoy having things, and they are less fond of not having things. After a person is robbed, they have fewer things than they had before.



Go get some more.

By the way, anybody else find it funny that the OP could not even moderate his own thread?  It only took one page for his  _Oooo, look at me and my world view, and everybody else is a retard._

And what's the title of this thread?  Statism 101?  LOL.  Yeah, we're the bozo class, absorbing the thoughts of narcissistic instruction.  Probably just could've called the thread Introduction to Dipshitism.

So anyway, inviting people for discussion and then extoling yourself and calling people retarded is a neg rep in my book and a neg rep for you.

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> If the state is the one that "define[s]... property rights," then you are correct.  There obviously cannot be property rights in an anarchy.  But, I doubt you actually believe that.  If, for example, the state declared all of your stuff to be mine (hoorah!), I assume you would be outraged.  Would the state have the right to do this?


I'd encourage you to read more of this thread before responding to posts I've made herein. The answer to your question hinges on how we choose to define "right." There are two reasonable definitions that lead to very different answers.

1) If we think of the word "right" as referring to some objectively extant property in nature, then the answer is no, because "rights" in this sense do not exist - nobody has any "rights" whatsoever. "Rights" are simply fictional entities, somewhat akin to unicorns or dragons. People talk about them, but when they do they are simply confused about what is real and what is not.

2) If we think of the word "right" as referring to a _legal_ or _political_ right, then the answer is yes. The word "right" in this sense is synonymous with the word "power." Does the state have the "right" (power) to transfer property between citizens on a whim? Obviously - states do this sort of thing all the time. You are correct that the victims of these forced transactions are very often outraged - and yet the transfers take place nonetheless. This is because states tend to be radically more powerful than the citizens they own. These citizens/slaves sometimes construct moral systems according to which such transfers are illegitimate in order to justify their feelings of outrage - that is the origin of the definition of "right" referred to in the paragraph above.




> What if the state took everything from everyone?  Does the state have this right too?


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collect...e_Soviet_Union

Again, the answer hinges on how we are defining "right." Taking everything from everyone is harder than taking something from everyone, but attempts are still made from time to time (mostly under what we'd call capital-C Communist regimes), and they largely succeed. Thus it might be said that the state does indeed have this "right" (power).

Note that a recognition of this simple fact about reality does not entail an _endorsement_ of the practice. As someone who has voted for Ron Paul four times, I hope I needn't defend my libertarian bona fides against accusations that I'm some sort of Communist sympathizer. Like most libertarians, I believe that economies generally function better/more efficiently under conditions approximating laissez-faire; I think economic freedom is a good thing, and I want to live under a government that provides lots of it. I think the redistribution of wealth is generally a bad thing, and I want to live under a government that doesn't do much of it. However, I am not under the illusion that I have a _right_ to economic freedom or a _right_ not to have my wealth redistributed.




> If not, then the state simply cannot "define" property rights.  It enforces what it (and the majority of the population) sees as property rights.  It makes the decisions on who will control what.


"Mak[ing] the decisions on who will control what" is what it means to "define property rights." Thus it seems to me that the first and third sentences here contradict one another. If you don't agree, I'd like to know why.




> Now, suppose I am on an island (with no state), and build myself a hut from unused resources.  Clearly, I would have control of the hut.  I assume you would agree that I had a right to my hut, and that anyone that takes it from me would be a thief.


Not at all, no. It is this central fiction that I dispute. There is no such thing as a "right" to a hut, nor is there some objectively correct notion of "thief" written into the rules of the universe. Different cultures have developed radically different norms about property throughout human history, and the notions of "property" and "theft" are 100% arbitrary. In fact, according to the classical anarchist position, "property" _is_ "theft"!

Neither claim ("violation of property rights is theft" or "property is theft") is correct, because both rest on an understanding of reality that is fundamentally false - the idea that notions of "property" and "theft" are objective facts about reality, rather than arbitrary rules made up by people.




> Even if the island was filled with barbarians, it is silly to say that there was no property independent of the state, unless if you literally define property as state-necessary.


I literally define property as state-necessary (or at least "something-resembling-a-state"-necessary, where the state-characteristic in question is the monopolization over the use of force). Go back to the second definition of "right" that I offered above. A property "right" is properly understood as an enforceable property claim - and in order for a property claim to be enforceable, the person doing the claiming must have power on his or her side to enforce it. This power may theoretically be held individually, but it is far more common for it to be backed up by a state.

If the barbarians have hand axes and you own an automatic rifle with virtually unlimited ammo, then it might indeed be reasonable to say that you hold property in this situation independently of "the state," because you have a monopoly over the use of force on the property - anyone who tries to take it from you will be unsuccessful. In this scenario, you ARE "the state."




> The barbarians may indeed take control of my hut, but by the very essence of taking it from me, I did have control of it for a period of time.  If the barbarians take my hut and say it is to "defend" me, they violated my property right in my hut.


If a property "right" can be violated with impunity, then of what value is the right? In my view, "rights" are only important to the extent that they are both a) enforceable and b) enforced. "Rights" in the absence of enforcement may as well be phlogistons or phantoms - they have no effect on the real world.




> "a non-enforceable right is no right at all" - What do you mean by non-enforceable?


I mean a so-called "right" that cannot be enforced. "Rights" are properly understood as claims backed up by the use of force/power. Thus, it may be sensible to say that I have a "right" to live in "my" house, because if a non-state actor attempts to remove me without my consent, I can alert the state/police, and they will punish the person who tried to take my house, then restore me to it. But this is a contingent right (as all "rights" are). In the absence of this enforcement mechanism, it would not make any sense to say that I have a "right" to live in "my" house.




> In my above example, I would not defend my hut.  But, I clearly would have the ability to do so.


In that case, we might think of you as possessing a deferred "right." Consider, for example, the situation in a football game where a flag has been thrown, indicating a penalty, but a team chooses not to enforce the penalty because they gained more ground on the play without it. They have a "right" to the penalty yards, but they choose not to take them.




> I could risk my life and possibly stop the barbarians.


If you could only _possibly_ stop the barbarians, however, and have no intention of trying, then you do not in fact possess the right in question at all. "Rights" require the potential for enforcement in order to exist.




> I might even be able to offer myself as a slave to another group of people in order for them to help defend my hut.


And I trust you recognize that this is basically the situation that every human on the planet finds himself in today. Everyone is a slave to the people defending their huts.

Libertarians sometimes seem to recognize this fact with their rhetoric but then fail to deal with the situation rationally. They correctly recognize that "taxation is slavery," but then their brains go haywire - they think "SLAVERY IS BAD/EVIL/ILLEGITIMATE" and begin devising ways to break their bondage without stopping to consider the possibility that some forms of "slavery" are a _good_ thing. For example, I'd argue that the relationship between babies/young children and their parents is essentially that of a slave/master, and I view that fact as a good thing. Similarly, the relationship between citizens and their states is essentially that of a slave/master, and I also view _that_ fact as a good thing. To a much weaker extent, the relationship between bosses/workers can also be viewed as that of a slave/master, and that too can be a good thing.

Basically, my point is that some human groups function best when the relationships between their members are EXTREMELY hierarchical (think families, states, and some businesses). Other groups function best when the relationships between their members are EXTREMELY egalitarian. And still other groups function best when the relationships between their members are somewhere in between. There is NO OBJECTIVE REASON to thoughtlessly rebel against the existence of master/slave relationships _per se_. Each instance of such a relationship must be considered on its merits independently. The reason why lots of people instinctively reject/rebel against these relationships has its roots in evolutionary biology/psychology and the mating habits/tribal organizations of our ancestors.




> So do you just mean that the cost is too high?  But that is extremely subjective.  I could easily steal a calculator or something from someone at my school.  In order for them to catch me, they would have to spend a ridiculous amount of money to conduct a search - it might not even be possible!  So did the student never have a right to that calculator?  The right certainly seems non-enforceable.


If the cost of enforcement is too high, then the supposed "right" in question does not exist. Thus it is indeed correct to say that the students at your school have no inherent "right" to "their" calculators - and this is borne out by the fact that some students probably do have their calculators stolen without repercussions. However, it might be said that the students have a _legal_ "right" to their calculators - that is, if it can be demonstrated that they acquired or possessed a calculator in ways recognized by the rights-enforcing body as legitimate, and that the transfer of that calculator to someone else was made through means considered illegitimate by the aforementioned rights-enforcing body, then the rights-enforcing body will demand the return of the calculator and punish a failure to make it.

In the same way, people may be said to have a legal "right" not to be raped, robbed, or killed. If these "rights" are violated, the state will generally make an effort to identify the perpetrator of these crimes and punish them for breaking the rules it has set up. This may act as a deterrent against people considering one of these acts. However, if a person is really dedicated to committing one of these acts, it's usually true that nobody can _prevent_ them from acting beforehand. Thus we see that people do not have some fundamental or objective "right" not to be raped/robbed/killed. Rights are not self-enforcing.




> What about historical examples, like slavery?  Did the slaves (say, in the late 1700s) not have a right to be free, because it was not reasonably enforceable for them (a slave revolt would be way too costly)?


No, slaves do not always have a right to be free. You do realize that the institution of human slavery continues in the present day, correct? And not just in the "taxation is slavery" sense. There are actual "slaves" in the classical fashion on the planet right now. The notion of slavery as an illegitimate or inherently unjust institution is a radically recent development and one that the vast majority of geniuses throughout human history would have considered absurd. Read a bit of Aristotle if you want to have your mind blown. Or click here.




> You putting defining rights in the hands of the state causes far more problems than I think you realize.


But I am not "putting" rights in the hands of the state at all. I am simply recognizing that that is where they in fact reside. "Rights" are not mine to define or dole out as I please - "right" is simply another word for power. States have a lot; you and I do not.




> I would back up, and instead make the claim that property rights are better enforced under a state.


I do indeed make this claim. The alternative is for individuals to try and enforce their "property rights" by themselves, which I claim would necessarily lead to a state of anarchy in the pejorative, chaos, and lots of violence. The enforcement of "property rights" is best done by organizations so overwhelmingly powerful that no one would think to challenge them. Gee, I wonder what we might call them. Hmm.




> As for how control of resources would be allocated in an anarchy, it really would not be all that different from the current situation.


I'd go a step further. You're speaking as if the existence of an anarchistic system were a hypothetical. I claim, on the contrary, that that is _precisely the situation the world is in today_. The first lesson students in any good international relations course are taught is that the world exists in a state of anarchy - there is no "world government" (though lots of powerful people would like to create one, and thought for awhile that they'd succeeded with the UN).

Thus, relations between states are of _precisely the same form_ that anarcho-capitalists argue would exist in their "hypothetical" anarchist society. It is possible - indeed, it is very helpful and clarifying - to view states as _sovereign corporations_. Many anarcho-capitalist thinkers have come up with various different labels for the organizations that they imagine would replace "states" in what they imagine is a fictional anarchist society. What they fail to recognize is that the supposedly fictional society they want to create _already exists_. D'oh.

The reason states take the form they do is that the provision of services normally associated with statehood forms a natural monopoly. Competition in governance does not take place within a geographic region because the state/dispute resolution organization/protection agency in power _brutally slaughters_ anyone who tries to compete with them on a level playing field. If anarcho-capitalists were ever successful in abolishing the state somewhere, it would almost instantaneously re-emerge, one way or another (either invasion by a foreign state or the setting up of a new government by locals, much like what happened with the illegal writing of the Constitution and abolition of the Articles of Confederation). But there would be a lot of suffering and instability during the interim. That is why I am not an anarcho-capitalist.




> In both cases, it rests on the population agreeing to it.


This is simply false as an empirical matter. Popular support may make the gears of government run more smoothly, but it is by no means a _necessary prerequisite_. The idea of governmental legitimacy being dependent upon consent by the governed is an_ incredibly_ recent phenomenon. You do realize that the reason you've heard of John Locke is that his ideas were _new_, right? My guess is that you've never heard of Robert Filmer. ("[L]et's say that Barack Obama is yellow light, and John McCain is green  light.  George W. Bush is blue light.  Trent Lott is violet.  Pat  Buchanan is ultraviolet.  Hitler is an X-ray.  Filmer is a freakin' _gamma ray_ shot out of some vast, galaxy-munching _black hole_ on the other side of the friggin' _universe_.  He's so right-wing, you need special equipment just to _observe_ him.")




> Look at the comment sections under a local news article of a thief or a murderer.  There is always (in my experience) outrage.  People call the guy a "scumbag" and various other names.  Is it really reasonable to say that these people would completely lose their sense of justice if the state disappeared?  Of course not.


Of course not. Everybody has a sense of "justice," and everybody wants to see their government enforce it.

The problem is, of course, that everybody has a _different_ sense of justice. When people _disagree_ about what "justice" entails, there is conflict, and there is uncertainty. Conflict plus uncertainty leads to _violence_, and I am not a fan of violence.




> If I stole a chainsaw from a store people would be just as outraged.  People would have no problem with an agency walking into my house and taking the chainsaw back.  But, if a rogue agency walked into my house and stole my chainsaw, people would obviously be outraged the opposite way.  Clearly then, the public has an opinion on who owns what _before the state makes their decision in court_.  If a state court makes a ridiculous decision in court (like "The 'robber' had a right to the chainsaw, because he _really_ wanted it."), people would be outraged.


Indeed, there would be outrage. And yet the decision stands.




> In an anarchy, the robber would similarly be condemned.  But just like in the state, people still have a sense of justice.  They usually think the robber has a right to go to court.  And so, the agency couldn't just take the loot and be done with it.


It _couldn't_? As in, it could not get away with doing so? Are you sure you want to defend that proposition?




> They would have to go to a judge who was trusted by the public (even if there was popular support for going in and getting the guy, competitors would still be a limiting factor on doing this without a trial - imagine if they took the case to court and found the opposite result.  The competitor would be hurt substantially).


What competitors? Remember - governance is a natural monopoly. There are no competitors, and this is by design, not an accident.

Also, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soverei..._United_States




> This would actually bring about the interesting scenario of competition in who can be the most just.  It's really a fascinating subject when you think about it.  Unlike now, judges would not only be significantly hurt if they made a bad decision, but there would actually be competing judges trying to find if their competitors were corrupt!  Contrast that to the current corrupt system.


Oh, you mean this system?

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and guess that you haven't been to law school.




> Obviously this is only a quick look into the topic, and just my perspective on it, so take it with a grain of salt.


Here is a not-so-quick look from my perspective: http://mencius.xmas.ratry.ru/

Start from the bottom, quit when you have an aneurysm.

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> Your question, though valid, is completely irrelevant to the purpose of this thread.  The purpose of this thread is to split hairs to the degree where people who essentially agree with each other can have a nice, fun knock down drag out fight with each other.


Not even remotely, no. The purpose of this thread is that I do _not_ agree with many of the posters here, and I'm quite confident that I'm right and they're wrong. I'd be happy to learn otherwise, but I strongly suspect that those individuals who make an effort to understand my views are likely to have an epiphany, and I enjoy spreading the dark enlightenment.

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> By the way, anybody else find it funny that the OP could not even moderate his own thread?  It only took one page for his  _Oooo, look at me and my world view, and everybody else is a retard._
> 
> And what's the title of this thread?  Statism 101?  LOL.  Yeah, we're the bozo class, absorbing the thoughts of narcissistic instruction.  Probably just could've called the thread Introduction to Dipshitism.
> 
> So anyway, inviting people for discussion and then extoling yourself and calling people retarded is a neg rep in my book and a neg rep for you.


I have not called anyone a retard. You seem very confused, loud, and angry. I would encourage you to calm down and read more books.

----------


## Cabal

> Go get some more.
> 
> By the way, anybody else find it funny that the OP could not even moderate his own thread?  It only took one page for his  _Oooo, look at me and my world view, and everybody else is a retard._
> 
> And what's the title of this thread?  Statism 101?  LOL.  Yeah, we're the bozo class, absorbing the thoughts of narcissistic instruction.  Probably just could've called the thread Introduction to Dipshitism.
> 
> So anyway, inviting people for discussion and then extoling yourself and calling people retarded is a neg rep in my book and a neg rep for you.


I didn't find it particularly funny. Sad, perhaps, and unsurprising, but not particularly funny. In any case, I'm inclined to agree with the -rep treatment; seems like an appropriate response.

----------


## menciusmoldbug

> I didn't find it particularly funny. Sad, perhaps, and unsurprising, but not particularly funny. In any case, I'm inclined to agree with the -rep treatment; seems like an appropriate response.


What sort of response do you think that I should have made instead? I feel like you should agree that productive discourse between us is impossible. I made a claim about reality:




> You are very badly confused about what I have conceded is true.  The only sense in which I have agreed that "self-ownership" cannot be  refuted is a very limited one - people exercise conscious control over  their bodies. It does not logically follow from this that any initiation  of violence against a person without consent is an implicit denial of  this "self-ownership." The sense of "self-ownership" being denied by an  initiation of violence against a person is much broader, and I _do_  deny the existence of that sort of "self-ownership." I deny its  existence because it does not exist - people are enslaved all the time.  YOU are a slave - you are property of your government. The government  may do whatever it wants to you, and there is nothing you can do to stop  it.


You responded by making the opposite claim about reality:




> Self-ownership can never be denied. Even if one were to sell their body,  they are not physically capable of forfeiting their self-ownership to  anyone else.


This is the source of our fundamental disagreement, and it is not amenable to resolution via argumentation. I even anticipated your response in an attempt to fix the misunderstanding:




> You are using the word "ownership" in an inconsistent fashion. I'm  not even sure you realize that you're doing it. If you don't recognize  that you are using the word inconsistently, it will not be possible to  correct your understanding.


But you nevertheless continued to assert that "self-ownership can never be denied," which I have conceded is true in a limited sense but assert is false in the sense that you seem to mean when drawing implications from it. There is no way for the discussion to move forward without your understanding what you do not yet seem to understand. But not only do you fail to understand it, you seem to be oblivious to the fact that there's something you don't understand. What's worse, you respond with _hostility_ (-rep) to having someone point it out. This is an airtight epistemological loop from which one may never escape - learning and growth become impossible, and intellectual stagnation is assured.

----------


## Reece

> I'd encourage you to read more of this thread before responding to posts I've made herein.


I read about the first 10 posts - I thought that would be sufficient to understand what was going on.  I don't really have time to read through 30 more posts that don't relate to my arguments right now   I'll try to get through them later.




> The answer to your question hinges on how we choose to define "right." There are two reasonable definitions that lead to very different answers.
> 
> 1) If we think of the word "right" as referring to some objectively extant property in nature, then the answer is no, because "rights" in this sense do not exist - nobody has any "rights" whatsoever. "Rights" are simply fictional entities, somewhat akin to unicorns or dragons. People talk about them, but when they do they are simply confused about what is real and what is not.
> 
> 2) If we think of the word "right" as referring to a _legal_ or _political_ right, then the answer is yes. The word "right" in this sense is synonymous with the word "power." Does the state have the "right" (power) to transfer property between citizens on a whim? Obviously - states do this sort of thing all the time. You are correct that the victims of these forced transactions are very often outraged - and yet the transfers take place nonetheless. This is because states tend to be radically more powerful than the citizens they own. These citizens/slaves sometimes construct moral systems according to which such transfers are illegitimate in order to justify their feelings of outrage - that is the origin of the definition of "right" referred to in the paragraph above.


Okay, so in that case any thief has a right to what they take (using definition 2)?  I'm not one to argue over definitions, so I'll accept this definition for the conversation.  I'll keep away from using the word "rights" when meaning ethical obligations.




> Again, the answer hinges on how we are defining "right." Taking everything from everyone is harder than taking something from everyone, but attempts are still made from time to time (mostly under what we'd call capital-C Communist regimes), and they largely succeed. Thus it might be said that the state does indeed have this "right" (power).


I agree.




> Note that a recognition of this simple fact about reality does not entail an _endorsement_ of the practice. As someone who has voted for Ron Paul four times, I hope I needn't defend my libertarian bona fides against accusations that I'm some sort of Communist sympathizer. Like most libertarians, I believe that economies generally function better/more efficiently under conditions approximating laissez-faire; I think economic freedom is a good thing, and I want to live under a government that provides lots of it. I think the redistribution of wealth is generally a bad thing, and I want to live under a government that doesn't do much of it. However, I am not under the illusion that I have a _right_ to economic freedom or a _right_ not to have my wealth redistributed.


You say economies generally function "better" and economic freedom is a "good thing."  I'm assuming this isn't only for yourself and that you also care about others under the system.  So, if you think it is "good" for people to be economically free, can you also see where me and other anarcho-capitalists are coming from when we say it is "good" for people to have control over things they mix their labor with, without interference from others?  You don't have to agree with it, I just wanted to point out that ethics isn't just imaginary.




> "Mak[ing] the decisions on who will control what" is what it means to "define property rights." Thus it seems to me that the first and third sentences here contradict one another. If you don't agree, I'd like to know why.


No, I see property rights as an ethical obligation.  I don't think anyone can define an ethical obligation, just try to figure out what it is.  So, judges rule on their opinion of the law, for example.  Since we are using a different definition of rights, this isn't relevant anymore.




> Not at all, no. It is this central fiction that I dispute. There is no such thing as a "right" to a hut, nor is there some objectively correct notion of "thief" written into the rules of the universe. Different cultures have developed radically different norms about property throughout human history, and the notions of "property" and "theft" are 100% arbitrary. In fact, according to the classical anarchist position, "property" _is_ "theft"!
> 
> Neither claim ("violation of property rights is theft" or "property is theft") is correct, because both rest on an understanding of reality that is fundamentally false - the idea that notions of "property" and "theft" are objective facts about reality, rather than arbitrary rules made up by people.


Then again, the same anarchist said "property is liberty!"  I'll let him speak on what he meant:




> I protest that in criticizing property, or rather the whole mass of institutions of which property is the pivot, I have never intended either to attack individual rights, based upon existing laws, or to contest the legitimacy of acquired possessions, or to demand an arbitrary division of goods, or to place any obstacle to the free and regular acquisition, by sale and exchange, of property, or even to forbid or suppress, by sovereign degree, ground rent and interest on capital.
> 
> I think that all these manifestations of human activity should remain free and voluntary for all: I ask for them no modifications, restrictions or suppressions, other than those which result naturally and of necessity from the universalization of the principle of reciprocity which I propose."


But, yes, people disagree on what property is (including me and Proudhon).  As I said, it really depends on the group of people you live with.  Obviously right now, most people think the state has the "right" (and by that I mean an ethical one) to tax people.  I think they are wrong on property.




> I literally define property as state-necessary (or at least "something-resembling-a-state"-necessary, where the state-characteristic in question is the monopolization over the use of force). Go back to the second definition of "right" that I offered above. A property "right" is properly understood as an enforceable property claim - and in order for a property claim to be enforceable, the person doing the claiming must have power on his or her side to enforce it. This power may theoretically be held individually, but it is far more common for it to be backed up by a state.
> 
> If the barbarians have hand axes and you own an automatic rifle with virtually unlimited ammo, then it might indeed be reasonable to say that you hold property in this situation independently of "the state," because you have a monopoly over the use of force on the property - anyone who tries to take it from you will be unsuccessful. In this scenario, you ARE "the state."
> 
> If a property "right" can be violated with impunity, then of what value is the right? In my view, "rights" are only important to the extent that they are both a) enforceable and b) enforced. "Rights" in the absence of enforcement may as well be phlogistons or phantoms - they have no effect on the real world.
> 
> I mean a so-called "right" that cannot be enforced. "Rights" are properly understood as claims backed up by the use of force/power. Thus, it may be sensible to say that I have a "right" to live in "my" house, because if a non-state actor attempts to remove me without my consent, I can alert the state/police, and they will punish the person who tried to take my house, then restore me to it. But this is a contingent right (as all "rights" are). In the absence of this enforcement mechanism, it would not make any sense to say that I have a "right" to live in "my" house.


In a non-state scenario you would have power over your house.  That's all a right is.  If you have power over the house, you have a right to the house.  You might lose that right when the barbarians invade, but you still had power over the time period beforehand.  Otherwise, how long must you control an item to own it?  Must you have more power than surrounding people?  Suppose I hide a gold coin in my pocket.  Don't I have a right to it?  Countries like Mexico could be wiped out by the US, so "power" can't just mean the ability to stop everyone from invading.




> In that case, we might think of you as possessing a deferred "right." Consider, for example, the situation in a football game where a flag has been thrown, indicating a penalty, but a team chooses not to enforce the penalty because they gained more ground on the play without it. They have a "right" to the penalty yards, but they choose not to take them.
> 
> If you could only _possibly_ stop the barbarians, however, and have no intention of trying, then you do not in fact possess the right in question at all. "Rights" require the potential for enforcement in order to exist.


Again, does this mean then that by power you just mean "power to take" and not "who currently has control over?  If so, wouldn't only the strongest person in the world (not "strongest" like weight lifting, but most guns and tanks  ) have the right to everything (that they choose not to take)?  That would probably be the US right now.




> And I trust you recognize that this is basically the situation that every human on the planet finds himself in today. Everyone is a slave to the people defending their huts.
> 
> Libertarians sometimes seem to recognize this fact with their rhetoric but then fail to deal with the situation rationally. They correctly recognize that "taxation is slavery," but then their brains go haywire - they think "SLAVERY IS BAD/EVIL/ILLEGITIMATE" and begin devising ways to break their bondage without stopping to consider the possibility that some forms of "slavery" are a _good_ thing. For example, I'd argue that the relationship between babies/young children and their parents is essentially that of a slave/master, and I view that fact as a good thing. Similarly, the relationship between citizens and their states is essentially that of a slave/master, and I also view _that_ fact as a good thing. To a much weaker extent, the relationship between bosses/workers can also be viewed as that of a slave/master, and that too can be a good thing.
> 
> Basically, my point is that some human groups function best when the relationships between their members are EXTREMELY hierarchical (think families, states, and some businesses). Other groups function best when the relationships between their members are EXTREMELY egalitarian. And still other groups function best when the relationships between their members are somewhere in between. There is NO OBJECTIVE REASON to thoughtlessly rebel against the existence of master/slave relationships _per se_. Each instance of such a relationship must be considered on its merits independently. The reason why lots of people instinctively reject/rebel against these relationships has its roots in evolutionary biology/psychology and the mating habits/tribal organizations of our ancestors.


I don't think taxation is slavery.  I think it is theft.  And I think theft is unethical.  I disagree with the parents/children example - a slave can be beaten to death, a child cannot (cannot in the same sense a bully can't beat me to death - they could, but they would be in big trouble by society) - I don't think parents even spanking their kids is a good thing, but that's another matter.




> No, slaves do not always have a right to be free. You do realize that the institution of human slavery continues in the present day, correct? And not just in the "taxation is slavery" sense. There are actual "slaves" in the classical fashion on the planet right now. The notion of slavery as an illegitimate or inherently unjust institution is a radically recent development and one that the vast majority of geniuses throughout human history would have considered absurd. Read a bit of Aristotle if you want to have your mind blown. Or click here.


Yeah, I just meant slavery in the US - although I guess there are likely a few people still forced to do stuff in the US too.  It was a quick example I didn't really think out.




> I do indeed make this claim. The alternative is for individuals to try and enforce their "property rights" by themselves, which I claim would necessarily lead to a state of anarchy in the pejorative, chaos, and lots of violence. The enforcement of "property rights" is best done by organizations so overwhelmingly powerful that no one would think to challenge them. Gee, I wonder what we might call them. Hmm.


Haha   I'll get into this further in my next comments.  (btw I edited a few comments out above, on rights, because it stemmed from my initial confusion on what you meant.)




> I'd go a step further. You're speaking as if the existence of an anarchistic system were a hypothetical. I claim, on the contrary, that that is _precisely the situation the world is in today_. The first lesson students in any good international relations course are taught is that the world exists in a state of anarchy - there is no "world government" (though lots of powerful people would like to create one, and thought for awhile that they'd succeeded with the UN).
> 
> Thus, relations between states are of _precisely the same form_ that anarcho-capitalists argue would exist in their "hypothetical" anarchist society. It is possible - indeed, it is very helpful and clarifying - to view states as _sovereign corporations_. Many anarcho-capitalist thinkers have come up with various different labels for the organizations that they imagine would replace "states" in what they imagine is a fictional anarchist society. What they fail to recognize is that the supposedly fictional society they want to create _already exists_. D'oh.


Not exactly.  I would note two differences for democracies (off the top of my head):

1) The government leaders are only there for a short period of time, and cannot pass on control of the government to their children easily.  Long term costs will not bear on them as much as it would if they "owned" the government.  In fact, they will usually get paid the same amount regardless of whether they start a war.  Furthermore, they cannot just take money out of the system and pocket it easily.  It usually has to be funnelled through other people (pay defense contractors, who then pay you in some way).  Any company would directly feel the costs they have to pay.

2) The "customers" cannot switch or opt out of the service.  When the government raises taxes to pay for the war (or print off the money or whatever), the taxpayers have no option other than leaving the country in order to stop paying.  If a company raises prices, the demand for their service would drop, and people would likely stop paying them.

Perhaps also of interest is patriotism - I don't think people would be as patriotic toward a capitalistic company!




> The reason states take the form they do is that the provision of services normally associated with statehood forms a natural monopoly. Competition in governance does not take place within a geographic region because the state/dispute resolution organization/protection agency in power _brutally slaughters_ anyone who tries to compete with them on a level playing field. If anarcho-capitalists were ever successful in abolishing the state somewhere, it would almost instantaneously re-emerge, one way or another (either invasion by a foreign state or the setting up of a new government by locals, much like what happened with the illegal writing of the Constitution and abolition of the Articles of Confederation). But there would be a lot of suffering and instability during the interim. That is why I am not an anarcho-capitalist.


I don't think defense (for example) would be a natural monopoly.  But, even if it was, I don't think it would become a state.  Popular support would be a limiting factor, as would potential competitors.  If it was a natural monopoly, any competitor entering into the field would be extremely dangerous to the former monopoly - it's an all or nothing deal at this point (if the competitor took over 50% of the market, it is likely the former monopoly would completely lose its presence in the market).  So, any move toward totalitarianism would be very dangerous.  They would never be able to accumulate the power to be able to be totalitarian.  Entrepreneurs would be willing to fund competitors if the natural monopoly became brutal or was making a large profit (there would be a clear opportunity for wealth).  Remember, most people are against murder and theft - how many people do you honestly think would be willing to pay a gang of murderers?  They would  quickly start paying the competitor.  The only thing the competitor could do would be to force people to pay.  So, in a very short period the company would have to start forcing other people to not protect others and force their customers to pay.  This is a radical change.  People would, almost without a doubt, rebel.  And all the monopolies of the future would remember that.




> This is simply false as an empirical matter. Popular support may make the gears of government run more smoothly, but it is by no means a _necessary prerequisite_. The idea of governmental legitimacy being dependent upon consent by the governed is an_ incredibly_ recent phenomenon. You do realize that the reason you've heard of John Locke is that his ideas were _new_, right? My guess is that you've never heard of Robert Filmer. ("[L]et's say that Barack Obama is yellow light, and John McCain is green  light.  George W. Bush is blue light.  Trent Lott is violet.  Pat  Buchanan is ultraviolet.  Hitler is an X-ray.  Filmer is a freakin' _gamma ray_ shot out of some vast, galaxy-munching _black hole_ on the other side of the friggin' _universe_.  He's so right-wing, you need special equipment just to _observe_ him.")


Well, I was referring to the US (the "current situation").  But even other places can't have too many people against you across the board - the soldiers, police, etc. have family members in the population.  The US is very different from other examples.  The morality of the people might be much lower in very primitive places, for example.  Also, the current level of statism is different.  People are usually willing to put up with small changes, but not giant ones.  Nobody is willing to go up in arms to drop the income tax by 1%.




> Of course not. Everybody has a sense of "justice," and everybody wants to see their government enforce it.
> 
> The problem is, of course, that everybody has a _different_ sense of justice. When people _disagree_ about what "justice" entails, there is conflict, and there is uncertainty. Conflict plus uncertainty leads to _violence_, and I am not a fan of violence.


Yes, there are very different views of justice.  Most people, like you, are not a fan of violence.  A lot of people, for example, think abortion is murder.  But most of these people are horrified even when people say that abortion clinics SHOULD be attacked.  So, I find it very unlikely that these people would then go on to support these battles over justice in an anarchy.  Plus, they would have to pay for the battle directly too - something both sides would want to avoid.




> Indeed, there would be outrage. And yet the decision stands.


Exactly!  That is in a state-courts situation.  People were upset.  How many people would use the "Supreme" Court in an anarchy after THAT (really, the whole "Supreme" thing and the robes all seems creepy anyway).




> It _couldn't_? As in, it could not get away with doing so? Are you sure you want to defend that proposition?


Oops - nice catch.  Yes, they definitely could.  I do think it would be a very rare occurrence though (if it ever even happened).  It would be pretty damaging to their reputation - why not offer a list of reputable judges to go to if they were so sure he took it? 




> What competitors? Remember - governance is a natural monopoly. There are no competitors, and this is by design, not an accident.
> 
> Also, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soverei..._United_States


In courts?  How are courts a natural monopoly?  I could even go to a judge in Hawaii if I wanted.  I can see how defense might be considered one, but "opinions on the law" seems pretty easy to have competition in.




> Oh, you mean this system?
> 
> I'm gonna go out on a limb here and guess that you haven't been to law school.


I'm confused here.  Forum shopping has increased corruption.  I haven't been to law school, but I have heard of forum shopping before.  I'm assuming you don't disagree that this system can be pretty corrupt.  Are you trying to connect this to what an anarcho-court system would be like?  If so, I don't think that works either.  I'm not saying the judges would have to earn a reputation of helping or hurting one side (that's one of the big problems with this system!), I'm saying they would have to earn a reputation of being fair (the opposite of this system).




> Here is a not-so-quick look from my perspective: http://mencius.xmas.ratry.ru/
> 
> Start from the bottom, quit when you have an aneurysm.


I'll save the link (for the summer... ) - thanks!

----------


## fisharmor

> ...Yes. That is exactly what I said that I was doing. However, I also asked a question that you haven't answered: "This is fine when the stakes aren't high, but it wouldn't work very well in the NBA. See why?"
> 
> _Do_ you see why?


I understand your point now.  It supports statelessness.
Take contracts for instance. It's entirely possible - in fact frequently practiced - to name a dispute resolver in a contract.  This would be the same concept as playing a game with foreknowledge that the NBA has final dispute resolution power.
There is therefore no need to have the state resolve contract disputes.
Just as LeBron James is free to leave the NBA and play only basketball games governed by other entities, people are free to sign contracts to be mediated by whomever they choose.




> Because I do not expect the absence of an ultimate medical authority/cellphone provider/home builder/tennis shoe maker to result in increased amounts of violence, death, and suffering. I do expect the absence of an ultimate dispute resolver to result in increased amounts of violence, death, and suffering. If this expectation were to change, my conclusion about the desirability of an ultimate dispute resolver would change.


Medical authorities and home building codes are in place for ostensibly the very reason of decreasing suffering.  It sounds like you might be someone who trusts the market to sort these things out, and that you may see the FDA, AMA, and building codes as unnecessary to health and safety.

Is this the case?  If you do not trust the market in these areas, then since you don't believe in their necessity for the same reasons as the rest of society (i.e., to prevent death and suffering), then for what reason do you not support them?

If you DO trust the market in these areas to clean up unwanted death and suffering, then what is different about dispute resolution?  What makes this your pet issue that you do not trust to the market?




> Your misunderstanding of my views and beliefs is so radical that I'm afraid this conversation cannot possibly be productive. Every time I attempt to explain a position or fact, you promptly either forget it or fail to integrate it into your understanding of my worldview, forcing me to repeat myself over and over and over. Your brain seems to be broken in an irreparable way - or at least in a way that I don't know how to repair. I suspect the root causes of the problem are a combination of mild autism and insufficient IQ. Once/if we learn how to breed brighter humans, I'm confident that anarchist ideologies will simply go away once and for all. Fingers crossed!


This is uncalled for.  *You're the new guy here*, so let me explain something to you.
You started a thread we've all seen a hundred times before here.
You started going down a road we've all seen people start down at least fifty times here.
We're all pretty well aware that statists don't have any arguments we haven't seen before.

You're not going to convince any of us.  And we're not going to convince you either.
This conversation isn't meant to do that: it's meant to be a debate, and debate is for viewers.
If you want to convince them, then change your tone.  You're not doing yourself favors.

Furthermore, you're not Jesus Christ and we're not going to pick through your words to try to gain some kind of special insight which is going to make us see the error of our ways.
If every single participant here is failing to understand your views.... guess what, buckaroo, the problem probably isn't with us.




> Your question, though valid, is completely irrelevant to the purpose of this thread. The purpose of this thread is to split hairs to the degree where people who essentially agree with each other can have a nice, fun knock down drag out fight with each other.


I'm beginning to see that, though I maintain there isn't much yet of the main antagonist's views with which I agree.

----------


## Conza88

*Statism 101:*


"Please Convince Me of Statism!"

----------


## NorthCarolinaLiberty

> I have not called anyone a retard.


                            Check here:  




> I suspect the root causes of the problem are a combination of mild autism and insufficient IQ.







> I would encourage you to calm down and read more books.


My insufficient IQ hardly matches yours, Professor Pedantic.  What reading do you recommend for an imbecile's brain?





> The answer to your question hinges on how we choose to define "right." There are two reasonable definitions that lead to very different answers.


You excluded just a few other definitions of rights.






> Affirmed: "Liberty" requires the State or something like it.



"Or something like it."  In other words, the whole collection human history and experience, ranging from complex states to simple tribes.

I don't even see anything to refute.  Got anything else today besides Sociology 101?

----------


## NorthCarolinaLiberty

> I didn't find it particularly funny. Sad, perhaps, and unsurprising, but not particularly funny. In any case, I'm inclined to agree with the -rep treatment; seems like an appropriate response.



Yeah, Mucous Bug sounds like a real dullard.  Maybe something to do with parroting all his college professors and textbooks.

----------


## Lord Xar

It always amazes me when the newly minted sycophants of the state come here and try to push buttons, and feign like they are seeking common ground. They always end up getting served, lashing out, and trying to remind everyone how intellectually superior they are. They can't understand why nobody else is as easily brain washed as themselves when served a heaping bowl of statism propaganda.....

----------


## osan

> Affirmed: "Liberty" requires the State or _something like it_.


Is this a joke?  If not, FAIL ALERT.




> In the absence of an _entity_ whose job it is to resolve disputes, define and defend property rights, punish acts of violence, and protect its borders against acts of foreign aggression, anarchy in the pejorative will reign, and few people will be very happy with this state of affairs.


Entity?  _Entity?_ What say we begin at the beginning:


												E'ntity. n. s. [_entias_, low Latin.]

1. Something which really is ; a real being. 


												2. A particular species of being. 








This, the definition as per the Johnson dictionary of 1785, would suggest without equivocation that the "state" is not in any way an "entity".  The Webster dictionary of 1898, however, allows for concepts as entities:

																		En'ti-ty (en'ti-ty), n.; pi. Entities (-tiz). [LL. enti-tas, fr. L. ens, entis, thing, prop. p. pr. of esse to be : cf.


						A real being, whether in thought or in fact.





Because "the state" does not exist _in sé_, it is incapable of doing anything whatsoever.  Neither can it define, defend, resolve, or do anything else of the sort which you suggest.  It is mere and insubstantial concept in this regard and can do NOTHING.  The ONLY actors are people and those exist solely as individuals.  You suggestion that "the state" does those things you list is absurd on its face.

The "something like it" to which you refer is but one thing: the individual.  That is all it has ever been and unless we hand such functions over to computers or space aliens take over, the individual is all it shall ever be.

Use of terms such as "the state" as a shorthand is a precariously dangerous practice precisely because people lose sight of that which it actually represents and fall into the trap of semantic drift where a concept takes on characteristics different from the original set.  Today, people cognitively regard "the state" as an actual physical entity that exists in its own right.  This, of course, is pure nonsense and yet this grave error suits the agents of this great nothing very neatly.  It is better for such people that the rest actually believe that "the state" is substantial and by some tacit virtue authorized to compel behavior and that such authority is always proper and correct no matter how capricious and arbitrary an otherwise intelligent adult might find it.

The reality behind "the state" is nothing other than a group of individuals acting in accord with a script.  "The state" is naught but a play written by men and acted out by them with the aid of guns and muscle to force someone's will upon the rest.









> I encourage discussion and refutation of this claim.


Refuted.




> This question takes for granted a proposition that is false - namely, that "property" exists prior to and independently of the state.


"The state" is a comparatively modern concept.  People have been around way longer than the notion of a "state".  A person walks a creek bed, sees a pretty stone, picks it up... VOILA!  Property.  Your assertion is, once again, absurd _prima facie_.





> Instead, as my OP said, a state is tasked with the responsibility to "*define* and defend property rights." Think of states as sovereign corporations - they are owners of the land, capital, and people in a geographic region. Different states set up different laws and property rights, then enforce them to the extent that they see fit. But it is not sensible to speak of a state _violating_ a property right, for in the state's absence no property right is enforceable - and a non-enforceable right is no right at all.


Everything you assert rests on the false premise that "state" exists.  Pure, utter, catastrophic FAIL up one side and down the other.  You are confusing function with material existence.  More FAIL.  You are in dire need of rethinking your position based on a reevaluation of the premises under which you choose to labor.





> Rothbard seems to be supposing that the current system of statism was somehow _decided_ upon. But this is nonsense of the highest order. As he suggests, the only people who'd support such a system would be the Jones family - but if the Jones family has all the guns, then theirs is the only set of opinions that matters. And so it is in the world today. Whether we like it or not, states own everything - not because they _ought_ to, but simply because they _can_. They have nuclear weapons, and tanks, and automatic weapons, and armies, and they put people in jail for not paying their taxes. If you want to live on land that a state owns, you have to pay your rent. Libertarians seems to accept this proposition when dealing with landlords. So start thinking of the state as your landlord. It owns everything there is and simply allows you to rent a bit of it.


This brand of logical pretzel twisting is enough to make one's head hurt.

I sure hope this is all sarcasm.

----------


## NorthCarolinaLiberty

> It always amazes me when the newly minted sycophants of the state come here and try to push buttons, and feign like they are seeking common ground.





> Is this a joke?  
> This brand of logical pretzel twisting is enough to make one's head hurt.
> 
> I sure hope this is all sarcasm.



This thread is almost as silly as people who have fused the definitions security and freedom into one definition.  Reminds me of those Animal Farm characters that were indistinguishable at the end.  The current catchphrase for all of this doubletalk is going 8,000 miles to "fight for our freedom."

----------


## ProIndividual

> Affirmed: "Liberty" requires the State or something like it.
> 
> In the absence of an entity whose job it is to resolve disputes, define and defend property rights, punish acts of violence, and protect its borders against acts of foreign aggression, anarchy in the pejorative will reign, and few people will be very happy with this state of affairs.
> 
> I encourage discussion and refutation of this claim.


LOL. Please explain how dispute resolution service (law and arbitration) and property rights were in existence for thousands of years previous to the state, and how that doesn't $#@! all over your "affirmed" premise.

Without a state, anarchy (not in the pejorative) will flourish. With a state you eventually have a failed state, which leads to the anomie (or anarchy in the pejorative) most minarchists and totalitarians wish to blame on the lack of a state. It's like blaming a lack of HIV for someone dying of AIDs, and not blaming the HIV for the AIDs related death.

Affirmed: All states devolve and collapse into the chaos of anomie eventually (and this is almost always violent chaos). 

Affirmed: You can't blame the chaos of a failed state on a lack of a state.

Affirmed: If you don't have a state, you still have society, law, courts, roads, trade, defense, property rights, etc. (see anthropology and history - start with stateless legal and defense "systems" that lasted for thousands of years in an open, free, and competitive market environment before the state was invented).

----------


## ProIndividual

> [B]This question takes for granted a proposition that is false - namely, that "property" exists prior to and independently of the state. .


I can see you're not very familiar with the history and anthropology of stateless societies. Property rights pre-exist the state by thousands of years, and this is indisputable FACT. Ireland is a great example of a society where private property not only existed, but was the main component...and it was stateless for close to 2,000 years during this property-loving time.

Now that you know that, you are an anarchist, correct? (We've had this debate before, and we know that isn't the crux of your statist beliefs.)

----------


## ProIndividual

> Go get some more.
> 
> By the way, anybody else find it funny that the OP could not even moderate his own thread?  It only took one page for his  _Oooo, look at me and my world view, and everybody else is a retard._
> 
> And what's the title of this thread?  Statism 101?  LOL.  Yeah, we're the bozo class, absorbing the thoughts of narcissistic instruction.  Probably just could've called the thread Introduction to Dipshitism.
> 
> So anyway, inviting people for discussion and then extoling yourself and calling people retarded is a neg rep in my book and a neg rep for you.


Of course they turned to ad hominem...statists are fundamentally illogical, or inconsistent in their logic. That's why they're statists to begin with. They're trying to win a logic debate with people who are actually consistently logical. It's impossible.

----------

