I am always interested in exploring ideas I have not encountered, or in exploring ideas further which I’ve touched but not dug into. I also think its vital to consider all sides - too many people have decided to close off their minds to ‘certain ideas’ without any logical foundation - based largely, IMO, on the unexamined assumptions that have been inculcated into them by external forces they often cannot even identify. I try to rid myself of all assumptions that cannot withstand scrutiny. Sometimes, I even succeed, which I consider remarkable. Thanks to evolution, man’s capacity for self deception is boundless and astonishingly powerful. I don’t think many people are actually aware of this basic truth about themselves, and even those who are, can barely manage to make a dent here and there once in a while.
I’ve read some Tucker, but not in a diligent way and not with any external input. Both would be helpful. Thanks much for the links - will be checking them out.
I went to a college with a very large SDS chapter last year (just transferred elsewhere). I’ll share my experience with them.
They accept non-anarchists but most (90%ish) are anarchists. On the plus side, I found quite a few of them to be intelligent and somewhat open to libertarian ideas. I introduced Rothbard to one of them and he basically became an ancap although he preferred the term “market socialist.” I was able to make some ground with a few others and convince them of some basic economic principles. I even met one SDSer who was a complete ancap and knew a good deal of Austrian economics, Rothbard, Mises etc.
On the minus side: most of them were only familiar with anarcho-communists; they were completely unaware of Spooner, Tucker and just about every individualist. Some were just petty idiots (90-99.9% of the world is) and were passive aggressive to me when they found out I was libertarian. And the worst part is that they got together to go to a lecture by some libertarian (I think it might have been David D. Friedman) and threw a pie at him while he was on stage. Yep, that’s right; they smuggled in a pie and threw it at the lecturer. A lot of the cooler people in SDS really objected to that though.
So my conclusion is that they’re not so bad of a group. They’ve got a healthy mix of intelligent people and blithering idiots. As far as right and left, I think we ought to just give up on all that stuff.
Thank you. I value personal experience much more than theory. That’s a balanced report, showing that while the SDS may have promise or potentially be allies, we shouldn’t necessarily assume they are libertarians, they understand free market economics, or that their philosophical roots are in individual liberty.
This is why I get worried about the automatic co-opting of leftist groups, because there is this general assumption that left is compatible and right is not.
What is compatible is a rational philosophy compatible with the NAP. Being anti-war or anti-state is not enough.
It’s not verbosity that is lacking - it is clarity.
I have just described how lots of ‘right wingers coming to libertarianism’ has, in the past, led to dilution of the fundamental principles of libertarianism and the institutionalization of quasi-Statists within ‘libertarian’ organizations, yet you still insist that this is an ‘unalloyed good’. The logic here is this: dilution of fundamental libertarian principles to the point of quasi-Statism is preferrable to associating with ‘socialists’ - even those opposed to the State.
This is what you just said. If it is not what you meant, I suggest you take the cap off and explain what you meant to say.
Dogmatism has its place, but taking it to the extreme of treating an anti-Statist as an enemy, and quasi-Statists as friends, makes zero sense to me.
Precisely. This is what I don’t understand. It makes no sense to ally with conservative statists and minarchists (which has lead to the dillution of the libertarian movement and its co-option by the political right) while outright rejecting other anarchists who happen to be socialistic.
Apparently anti-“left” takes precedence over anti-statism or anti-authoritarianism as such, to the point of allying with statists/authoritarian in the name of anti-socialism.
It’s the history that is involved. The left have traditionally favored some sort of collectivist approach even when advocating against the state. It’s the lack of individualism on the left that leads to skepticism of their true intentions. On the right although the minarchists advocate some state issues they are very indivdual oriented in their overall thinking. I think it is the lack of emphasis on the individual and the promotion of labor versus capital on the left that causes concern that the leftists don’t really desire the same thing as those whose focus is on the individuals freedom.
I can see this thread has pretty much come to an end. The challenges to agorism having been unanswered I think the outcome is exactly as I defined it my last post on this subject. Agorism as a strategy to grow the counter-economy and thus overthrow the state has been discredited, and the strategy of forming counter-institutions in the US has been shown to be the least likely approach to be effective. Agorism RIP.
Stop this immature declaration of victory when you’ve yet to present much resembling a sound argument or demonstrate that you even understand what you’re trying to critisize to begin with. All you’ve done is repeat the same sweeping assertions over and over again while being highly disingenous and insulting.
I did not insist that was unalloyed good. I insisted that right wingers coming to libertarianism NOW is an unalloyed good. Please don’t put words in my mouth.
That is the logic of the strawman.
No it is not. It is what you are claiming I said.
Not only is it not what I meant, it is not what I wrote. It is a failure of comprehension, that from my perspective, has been wholly created by you.
Another strawman. I am looking for adherents to the NAP. Not anti-(this)-state socialists who would replace the state with another state like SDS, which is not for anarchy, but participatory democracy. Which has no foundation on austrian or free market economics, which organizes within their group into a black caucus, and a female caucus. That campaigns for “workers rights” and protests for defunding the war, so the state can fund their educations.
Again, the left is as bankrupt as the right. I’m seeing growth in libertarianism from the right, more people coming from that end of the spectrum to the NAP, and then there are from the left. It seems the libertarian love affair with the left is the age old story of unrequited love. They’ll accept your company and support, but they will not march under your flag.
There are many things you do not understand. Read my post to Ozzy.
But ultimately, if they don’t accept the NAP, if they aren’t willing to stand shoulder to shoulder when the $$$t hits the fan, then they aren’t “with us” regardless if they are from the right or the left. I’m not looking for allies. That’s cover for people who aren’t confident and motivated in their beliefs. I am looking to recruit resources, manpower and passion. Passion for the NAP and liberty. Not for workers rights. Not for collectivist caucuses. Not for state funding of education.
Socialists are not allies. There should be no argument on this point. Neither socialists or fascists are allies. Playing the “left better than right” game has yielded nothing in the last 30 years. What has grown libertarianism has been a little old country doctor from the right, named Ron Paul. He is the one who has galvanized libertariansism on the campuses. He is the one bringing up Lysander Spooner on network TV.
That doesn’t validate the right, but it certainly undermines the notion that the right has nothing to offer libertarianism in opportunities or platforms.
I had you figured for the scarecrow, but that doesn’t mean you HAVE to post strawmen.
The fact that the right has so long been a heel on the libertarian movement is a fact that can’t be disregarded. Talk to someone about libertarianism in the states and you hear, “oh.. republican-lite?”
The Left is where libertarians should focus for the mere fact that conservatives tend to be much more steadfast in their beliefs as opposed to the left who not only do not want their government to be violent - and cringe when you show the gun in the room - but they’re looking for something more radical.
In the zogby poll I linked to in the Ron Paul/xenophobe/racist thread, most self-described conservatives are against secession, far more so than self-described leftists. If the right is a pool full of liberty fish, then they certainly are funny about jumping from the water.
That is equivocation. They were not socialists in the sense he is referring to them.
That aside, I am very doubtful about the so-called “right”. They seem to attached to things like the war on drugs, national unity, mercantilistic concerns &c. and too bound to these beliefs to make for good conversion material. Their collective of choice supersedes the market.
What Jon said. And, Rothbard worked for Pat Buchanan and Ron Paul. So don’t lecture me on how Rothbard was this great leftist, because he was a right winger prior to libertarian, and one could argue, he was right leaning at the end of his life as well.
I don’t do drugs. I worked around addicts for a year. It was incredibly depressing seeing man reduced to animal.
I don’t care what the public thinks. Since when did the masses become authorities on political philosophy? These are the same people who believe in the system, why do we allow them to define the boundaries and definitions we use to market our agenda and philosophy?
That’s a generalization. And I imagine you have limited experience. Of the newer libertarians on this board, I, banned, NitroAdict, KingMonkey and several others are here due to Ron Paul. Most of, if not all of us are anarchists now. The evidence staring you in the face contradicts your supposition.
If that is the recent poll DiLorenzo linked to in teh LRC Blog, then big deal. Only 1 in 5 Americans believe in secession at all, which is a depressingly low number. It’s not that the right are a pool full, but that many former right wingers and conservatives like myself were raised with an intellectual, rather than emotional (leftist) approach to politics. That is why when someone like Paul makes good sense about money, about taxes and small government, we “get it”. That’s why when we come here, and are exposed to ideas about anarchy, “we get it”. We aren’t asking stupid questions like
WAT WILL HAPPENZ TO THE POOR PEOPLES?
We’re more apt to ask how sophisticated issues like abortion are reconciled with anarchy. How the provision of defense and law will occur.
I think a fundamental issue is that your limited life experience and circle of social interaction leads to the assumption that all rightists are Bush Republicans, or Compassionate Pro-War conservatives. That couldn’t be further from the truth.