Just one more reason never to trust hokey modern pretentious abstract political terms that try to cover up their idiocy with Greek or Latin roots:
http://current.com/groups/sex/89173976_arizonas-largest-prostitution-bust.htm
I swear this grass roots progressivism/ Maoism stuff runs deep within most people
I’m confused. How does the link relate to the topic?
This one?
I can only speculate, but I would have a hard time believing that anybody outside radio show hosts, newspaper columnists, and former legislative staffers would be a full fledged progressive.
Because progressive ideas have only trickled down from fairly elite and wealthy people (by no means does this debunk all of progressivism), and I see nothing “grassroots” about it. Speaking in an Indian context, the Communist Party of India consists of highly well educated intellectuals with high socio-economic family backgrounds, and the major progressive magazines like Frontline, Seminar, and Outlook are also written by fairly wealthy folks with multiple degrees. The United Progressive Alliance, the ruling party, is also full of rich technocrats at the top. NDTV, a rather metropolitan and cosmopolitan news network, has a lead anchor whose sister-in-law is a top member of the Politburo in CPI, and there are several other relatives between UPA and NDTV.
Maybe it’s different in the US, but you can’t convince me that Ted Roosevelt, FDR, Woodrow Wilson, and Lyndon Johnson were grassroots middle class people.
Sorry, Ross Levatter is an Agorist who writes for Cato
What exactly is wrong with this video and agorism itself?
I admit I wasn’t completely familiar with the term, but as a self-identifying anarcho-capitalist, I didn’t find anything particularly offensive in the wiki for agorism, nor the video. To quite the contrary; I found a lot myself and other Rothbardians may be able to identify with, but maybe there is more to the subject than I know.
Indeed. His so-called “crimes” are only such because the government says so. I don’t see any accusations that what he did actually harmed someone. In fact, he probably helped a great many people—$30,000 a month? Man.
Because progressive ideas have only trickled down from fairly elite and wealthy people (by no means does this debunk all of progressivism), and I see nothing “grassroots” about it.
Oh yes absolutely, we are saying the same thing in a different context. I just used the word “grass roots” as a buzzword that the intellectual aUniversalists love to use… like the word “organic” (food), or whatever. It was a goading sarcastic word for me.
I admit I wasn’t completely familiar with the term, but as a self-identifying anarcho-capitalist, I didn’t find anything particularly offensive in the wiki for agorism, nor the video. To quite the contrary; I found a lot myself and other Rothbardians may be able to identify with, but maybe there is more to the subject than I know.
A market is something you do in your own interests, with your own expertise, in your calculations. Agorism is an universalist concept that may very well be sending people (“activists”) down dangerous allies they have no business going down, other than taking a bullet for “the good cause”.
Plus it has a pseudo-pretentious name. I can promise you all these types of names(anarchy, agorism, ignostic, etc) are pop culture names without much use. These names should send off red flags to anyone.
Whoops. When I posted my last comment, I had only watched the video that Prateek posted, thinking it was the OP’s. That being said, I still don’t see the harm in the action’s commited by the subjects of the article, nor its relation to agorism. How do we know the prostitution ring was was activism, and not your standard “criminal” activity?
What? Is it even possible to do something that is not within one’s own interests?
Can you explain what you mean by universalism in this context? And is it agorism that is putting individuals in danger, or are the individuals putting themselves in danger, for a cause they (subjectively) deem worthy of the risks. I don’t know how effective the activism agorists advocate will be in bringing forth a voluntary society, but if people are so adamant as to sacrifice themselves for freedom, and they can make an impact doing so (at least getting publicity as to spread the idea of freedom), I can’t see the problem. I don’t think the state is so easily to be easily dismantled. There is probably no escaping danger when opposing it.
do we know the prostitution ring was was activism, and not your standard “criminal” activity?
Because the person Leavatter is a writer for Cato and a known promoter of Agorism. I’m not calling prostitution, or whatever, bad or good. I honestly don’t care about prostitution one way or the other.
What? Is it even possible to do something that is not within one’s own interests?
Nope, it is 100% impossible. Egoism is an ontological reality. That’s what makes it amusing, when someone (most) people self delude themselves by trying to be, and have tell them how to behave: “correct” communists, democrats, Christians, republicans, or in this case agorists. This is kind of the reason why socialist calculation can’t work. Agorism isn’t anything, it is a non thing, and when I become an agorist fit can be for no other reason than the good cause (mutualism, libertarianism, whatever), it is the cause that profits not you.
If I knew how to profit better in the black market and didn’ because it wasn’t the “right” thing to do, than “right” profits not me. If I didn’t know how to profit and I enter the black market because it is the “agorist” thing to do than “agorism” (or mutualism) profits from it, probably not me. If I go into a black market because I feel that is the best way I am to profit, it is neither the right thing to do nor the agorist thing to do, it is simply my thing to do; there is no “half” egoism about it.
Can you explain what you mean by universalism in this context? And is it agorism that is putting individuals in danger, or are the individuals putting themselves in danger, for a cause they (subjectively) deem worthy of the risks.
It is just one of those organizing things that is in the zeitgeist of left wing intellectualism. This is the stuff they love to do. It is more or less tryig to make a movement out of individualism and markets by telling you to how to operate the individual and the market, which is funny. And yes, it is individuals putting themselves at risk for these silly little causes. Like I said, if they entered the black market (like a mafia assassin or whatever) “for themselves” and their profit, they wouldn’t be agorists. If a bunissman (as most do) knew how to do somethings under the table and did them, he wouldn’t be an agorist, he would be an individual making decisions for himself.
I think you’re contradicting yourself. You make distinctions between different types of profit, and I think they are unfounded. As you noted earlier, but seemed to contradict later, if one goes into a black market, for any reason (including activism) whatsoever, it is because they believe they are going to profit from their actions. Doing something for a movement and doing something for oneself are not mutually exclusive.
If I am a supporter of, say, agorism, and agorism is “profiting” from my actions, am I not also profiting from my actions? Praxeologically, I don’t how how you can come to any other conclusion, but to say that the individual is attempting to maximize personal profit, in the broadest sense.
Is agorism necessarily leftist? I didn’t get that from the wiki article, but like I said, I’m new to the philosophy.
I don’t know if it’s more trying to tell individuals and markets to act in a certain way, as it is trying to institute a market where there is currently a violent monopoly.
Activism on the part of a voluntary society is a “silly little cause”? I can see your point if you think the movement is ineffectual towards its goals, but beyond that, I think I’m misunderstanding you.
As I noted earlier, it’s impossible to enter a black market and do it for any other reason than to maximize personal profit.
I don’t know why acting on behalf of agorism implies acting contrary to one’s own self. Maybe you can explain.
Is agorism necessarily leftist? I didn’t get that from the wiki article, but like I said, I’m new to the philosophy.
I only know it to be associated with left-anarchism, and after reading the wikipedia article it strengthens my association of the two.
As you noted earlier, but seemed to contradict later, if one goes into a black market, for any reason (including activism) whatsoever, it is because they believe they are going to profit from their actions. Doing something for a movement and doing something for oneself are not mutually exclusive.
You are correct. I was trying to illustrate (which is why it came out to sound like a contradiction) what is going on. That is If I signed up for the army to be a a patriot “for my country”, or if I were to be an agorist “for freedom” it is the same thing; you are doing it for yourself. The contradiction is more of an illustration, when you see yourself in a shady dark ally with a bag of cocaine and a couple of thugs, or in a war zone with bullets flying everywhere because you did it for “freedom” or “country” you didn’t…you did it for yourself, did you make the correct decision? These are dramatic examples to be sure, but still..we are talking about black markets, these are not markets one normally would wnat to seek out. It may be worth double checking with oneself why they are doing what they are doing.
If I am a supporter of, say, agorism, and agorism is “profiting” from my actions, am I not also profiting from my actions? Praxeologically, I don’t how how you can come to any other conclusion, but to say that the individual is attempting to maximize personal profit, in the broadest sense.
Once again, on a literal level you are true. I am more or less illustrating (or at least trying to) what happens when you take the claim “agorist”. It is how Socialism doesn’t really exist in concordence with actual civilization, it is just some hampered retarded market.
I don’t know why acting on behalf of agorism implies acting contrary to one’s own self. Maybe you can explain.
There is no acting on behalf of agorism. There is only acting within one’s self, agorism is a non-thing. If you try to act as an agorist, you just end up a confused mess. If it something that gives good advice that is one thing (e.g. “there is no such thing as doing right or wrong, if you can, if it is within your power it is possible to profit from a black market”), but when it actively tells you to go to a black market “for freedom” because that is what “good” people do, your brain is tied in knotts around odd phrases.
Agorism tells the individual how it ought and ought not act (in mere stagnant language no less, which is apparently suffecient), with no regard to the actual individual and full regards for itself. Don’t vote, go into the black market, or whatever. How the hell does agorism know what you ought and ought not do? How does agorism know what is best for you? Is what is best for you, best for agorism? If so, so be it.
There are more serious practicle things to consider that I implied but may not have spelled out, such as “black markets” naturally attract barbarians and there is no reason to enter one if you are actually productive. There really are a very high and dispraportionate amount of scum in black markets who are there because they are marginilized by society due to their undesierable social qualities and low productivity. I see no reason to enter such a market if I don’t have to. Furthermore I find it highly distasteful for intellectuals to be telling people o do such things
The implication in your posts seems to be that everything “black market” is highly dangerous, but those are just the most prominent examples. Agorism can also include things like voluntarily working for an employer who doesn’t comply with normal corporate regulations, or selling pirated DVDs, or whatever. In the strictest sense, an agorist transaction is simply one in which there’s no intervention from a third party.
I understand your point now. This is what I was ignorant of. I had thought agorism not to moralize actions, but to suggest a strategy of state defiance. As the latter, I certainly can appreciate the philosophy, but as the former, a universal guide of action, it seems less appealing.
I think the main problem is that so many labels have emerged from the anti-statist camp, all the way from anarcho-capitalists to libertarian socialists, that the they tend to lose meaning, and it becomes difficult to define what they are. I especially get annoyed at the left right paradigm being applied to philosophies such as Rothbard’s. It’s perverse, especially when you consider that Rothbard himself spoke out against that same paradigm. It just leads to a lot of confusion.
It does both, as the two are connected. What is a “strategy” other than as a guide for action (universal or not), and how is a guide for action that is completely divorced from ethics (construed as none other than a normative guide to action) a coherant concept?
Additionally, if a given individual has chosen a particular set of goals and values, what sense does it make to lambast them for going against themselves, since at such a point one is talking about methods of persueing what the individual has already identified as their interest? It seems like the only way to maintain that would be to postulate some true-self/false-self dualism in which everything externally aquired or influenced cannot constitute one’s interests, at which point the only thing that could qualify as authentic self-interest would be some sort of neutralized instinct that one attempts to completely separate from environment.
I’m trying to understand your recent outbursts on ‘left’ libertarians William. I’m having a difficult time.
what sense does it make to lambast them for going against themselves, since at such a point one is talking about methods of persueing what the individual has already identified as their interest?
An astute observation.
how is a guide for action that is completely divorced from ethics (construed as none other than a normative guide to action) a coherant concept?
If I tell you to be a good pianist (one ought) practice 5 times a day for 1 hrs a day, and you call that ethics, fine. I just call it advice with a pretentious and outdated name.
what sense does it make to lambast them for going against themselves
You can never go against yourself, it is impossible. Unless of course, we are talking in poetic terms to illustrate action. And that is what I am doing, illustrating an action, as I already pointed out. And frankly, agorism is an incoherent concept that has the potential to lead many wide-eyed kids into silly actions. I was simply telling people to check themselves before they wreck themselves yo. Likewise, I would tell them to simply get rid of the name “agorism” what good does it do you, unless you’re trying to get in with the cool kids on campus of course.
authentic self-interest would be some sort of neutralized instinct that one attempts to completely separate from environment.
To be clear: EVERYTHING is authentic self interest, once again poetic illustration. That means you’re not doing things for agorism or liberty or whatever, you’re doing it for self. Likewise “agorism” is only acting in “agorisms interests” and telling you what is in “agorisms interests”. Or to use a more appropriate name “universalist social signaling encouraging people to use the black market”. It is a manipulation device.
So when you try to act for the “sake of agorism”, or to be “an agorist” what the hell are you doing and why? Is agorism trying to be a “brainpolice”? See if anything I am trying to give advice or illustrate action, not give ethics.
Oh, and you can’t really separate oneself from the environment, it is kind of impossible.
I’m trying to understand your recent outbursts on ‘left’ libertarians William. I’m having a difficult time.
Interest of the week/month I suppose. I was around an awful (and I stress awful) lot of them for the holidays, so I am probably venting. That said, as far as politics is concerned, they have always bothered me more as they are more in control of dialogue, culture, signaling devices, etc. Not only that they simply make less sense, as they tend to be nothing other than the inheritors of functioning theological terms. The “right” really isn’t much other than a disorganized boogy man, you may even bring up the argument that leftism IS politics. They are universalists and a cancer that by it’s own nature has to spread, because that is what leftism is, I have yet to see it prove itself to be anything else. It is leftism or bust, it can’t just leave itself alone and it won’t let you separate from it.
It is made up of illusionists who will do nothing but give you moral imperatives (expressed in absolute stagnant words, in an ever changing ever unique environment, of all things!), and their moral imperatives are nothing but spirit, and spirit is nothing if I say it ain’t so.
William, you are great. Rage on. Rage on.
Then your anti-moralism is merely semantic in nature (a theme I’ve found to be rather common with “moral nihilists”), and you’d still have a problem reducing it to “advise” when it comes to ethics in the context of individual self-improvement.
My point is that there’s no real distinction once someone has internalized a given concept. It also follows from this that it makes no sense to critisize people for being motivated by concepts that they have identified with. This is a common dead-end that the Stirnerite rebellion against all universals leads to. It’s mostly pretentious finger-wagging at other people for making use of universals in their language, while never being able to explain how anyone could possibly function without using them or be a “unique” in Stirner’s dubious sense. There simply is no authentic self divorced from the social context that such concepts come from in the first place.
Which is exactly part of why Stirner’s notions fail. The notion of a total rebellion against “external” determinants of thought represented in those pesky universals is elitist nonsense. Seriously, any understanding of language after the 1930’s makes that silly.
Then your anti-moralism is merely semantic in nature (a theme I’ve found to be rather common with “moral nihilists”), and you’d still have a problem reducing it to “advise” when it comes to ethics in the context of individual self-improvement.
Than let’s just use the term “moral egoist” at every time every piece of advice I utilize, I note, and I do is an ever changing ethic (supposedly by the inescapable definition of the word, as much as a square must have four sides) “all and all unto itself” and at every moment unique. These ethics are than applied not even to a person, but an ever evolving mutant which is different from everything else at every moment in time, interacting with everything in an ever unique manner. These “ethics” come not from a person but from my communication and reaction to absolutely every unique thing around me at any given point in time that has been processed. It is “universally true” in the fact that every moment the universe is 100% “correct” at any given point in ever changing time (as contextualized, defined, and valued by…moi!).
Ethics, if you insist that they are: are ever changing, ever unique, and always correct. I don’t understand how you can possibly think such a thing can be stated in words and/or is worth stating. I don’t understand how you think words can suffice for any ethic you would think is worthwhile, unless you wish to bastardize, judge, and control people’s actions as simply as possible. I would imagine this would be an even greater concern once politics are involved. You are simply listing something that is not worth caring about.
Likewise we can say ethics are at best not worth noting if it is nothing other than option to or not to take advise. When I tell my friend to “shave his beard”, I’ll be sure to file that under my “ethical” statements cabinet next time. Even still if he “listens”, he really isn’t “listening to me”, he is doing a completely independent action in a situation via his own power calculating perhaps hundreds of other things (perhaps the “chair for my purpose” in the room played an affect on his decision) at the time, who knows. The valuation just can’t be discussed. Words don’t quite cut the mustard I’m afraid. There is simply no use in discussing ethics in philosophical discourse.
Oh, and just in case: the world must lie outside the world. Everything is as it is and happen as it does happen. If there is value in this world, than it is of no value. Propositions are incapable of expressing things of higher value. You can make no ethical proposition, etc,etc
τὰ ὄντα ἰέναι τε πάντα καὶ μένειν οὐδέν”
-Heraclitus, a wise old codger if there ever was one
This is a common dead-end that the Stirnerite rebellion against all universals leads to.
You do remember the phrase “render unto Ceasar” correct?
There simply is no authentic self divorced from the social context that such concepts come from in the first place.
But what is important is what is labeling the context. What is determing the logical facts in place. What is categorizing them, and why is it doing the categorizing. Is something universally sublime, or do you feel sublime towards something?
You are always your authentic self doing the contextualizing. We are in the world of Nietzsche, the world of perspectivism. I think (?) the only arguments people could try to counter with this may be some form of scientism, and I don’t think any of us are in that camp. There is no authentic social context without self. Society is something that is contextualized by one’s will. I and Thou is theology.
Logic; if that is your criterion for ethics, isn’t so much to concern itself with assertions, but simply that which can be unasserted. Ethics do not belong in such a category as philosophy if they are to exist at all. It is the wrong “language game” at best they are important nonsense.
And while I get my immense joys and profits out of reading old Aristotle’s teleological system, this is some form of personal psychology (or art, etc) and nothing more…or less. The “teleology” is the semantic trick, everything exists by sheer neccessity.
NOTE: I have been a little hot towards you, and I do apologize for that. Despite, I think, my intense aesthetic differences, I do find many of your posts quite valuable and interesting.