I have not been around this forum for quite some time - used to post quite a bit, but the rants and raves and the adolescent attempts to prove one was smarter than the other (in which I all too frequently engaged, truth be told), often at the expense of the important topic under discussion, drove me off.
Recently, in my wanderings, I had occasion to read through Konkin’s work (NLM). Also recently, had occasion to post some stuff here. While here, happily, I ran across this agorism thread, and, as Konkin’s work had been thought provoking, I thought I’d see what everyone had to say. I was looking for information. What I found more closely resembled an elementary school food fight than a substantive discourse. That has continued up to the more recent posts.
So I started with no preconceived notions, and no position on any of this (had never heard of the Libetry Colony for example) short of some interest in, and lots of agreement with, what Konin had to say. Definitely had some skepticism as to its potential efficacy, however. This thread SHOULD have provided info to address my concerns, given me various perspectives on agorism, etc. Unfortunately, I know no more now than I did upon my first read.
But the point is - I came at this without being on one “side” or another - I am on liberty’s side and unutterably opposed to the State. That’s the only side that it makes ANY sense for a thinking man to be on, IMO.
Now, you say Max ‘storms into these forums bashing alternatives to his Liberty Colony idea’ - my reading of THIS thread (I can only speak to this one) is that it was the pro-agorist camp - somebody named MacFall - who brought up the Liberty Colony and began ridiculing it, with Niccolo and others (not yourself at that stage) gleefully jumping on that particular bandwagon, tee-hee, tee-hee. It was like a bad memory from junior high school. Stupid juvenile bullsh*t.
Max and some others were asking what appear to be legitimate questions and which were in fact inline with the questions I developed reading Konkin’s work, and were making assertions and challenges. That is, they were NOT “bashing” agorism (though from a confirmed agorist’s point of view, it may subjectively have FELT like that) rather they were CHALLENGING it.
A PhD candidate above all - and I am well aware of the significance of this status - must understand the difference between bashing and challenging, and between childish responses and adult ones. In the adult world, when someone acts childishly, you do not descend upon the instant to that level and ‘fight fire with fire’. You maintain an adult bearing, and respond as an adult. If, that is, you are a serious person worthy of regard.
If, when one’s ideas are under challenge, one feels the need to instantly devolve into schoolboyish name calling and ridiculing - make no mistake, this is precisely what occurred here - this undermines the perception of those ideas, which is often for all practical purposes the same as undermining the ideas themselves.
In other words, from where I sit - and I continue to hold myself out as an objective and thoughtful observer - agorism is being tainted by this sort of treatment. It deserves better from its adherents than this, IMO.
Here’s a suggestion: collect the questions being asked about agorism by Max and others and create a new thread which posts the answers explicitly. That way, you can stop saying they’ve been answered already, and he can stop saying they haven’t, which activity at least appears to consume the majority of communication in this thread. I sure as hell have seen precious few actual answers in this thread, although innumerable posts have said those answers have been made.