I tried to define slave labor and account for those kinds of contingencies…
I’m not trying to draw distinctions. Any forced labor or labor through duress (extortion, intimidation, etc.) is slavery in my scenario.
“Property rights” seems to indicate that there is a certain set of “rules” that extend from one another that can be applied uniformly and universally and from which a uniform and universal ethical/moral conduct can be deduced, the NAP. Which means that property rights can lead to a uniform ethical code.
It looks like we cannot place property rights after ethics/morals in society and still develop a uniform universal ethical/moral code. But neither of the two result in the scenarios I would think.
Paradox(?): In a stateless society, if ethics (NAP) are placed before property then the buyer could do many things as his morals will vary. But, he cannot buy the good with the reasoning that it is within the ‘property realm’ alone because if he did then ‘property rights’ would be placed before ethics.
But, the same buyer could place property rights before ethics and buy the good since he is not aggressing, but he cannot not buy the good out of respect for the slave’s property rights as this is a moral decision and hence would mean that his decision is made not on the purchase of goods (property), but on the treatment of the laborer (a moral decision).
Your examples of fingerless children that stitch clothes and mine ore are not necessarily working involuntarily. But then you define slavery essentially as involuntary servitude. So it’s a little hard to tell exactly which definition you are going with. But even if we go with the involuntary servitude, my point still stands:
Take Rothbard’s example of when an industry has been nationalized. Are mailmen immoral? They are employed by a group that gets its income from aggression. Rothbard says no, that so long as the position would exist in a free society, it is okay.
Now, what about the consumers of the USPS? Anybody who uses the USPS to deliver mail is guilty of supporting a group that gets its revenue almost entirely by aggression. Should everyone just stop using the USPS? Maybe ideally, but who else can they use?
The only difference I see is one of degree, not of kind. That, in America, we are not 100% slaves, but something like 40-60%. Should America have boycotted the USSR? Was it moral to buy any products from there? Was it immoral? Does it matter if someone is 99% slave versus 100%?
That said, I understand and share people’s distate for buying products of slave labor. But making a distinction between 50%, 99%, and 100% slavery is just arbitrary.
You seem confused about where property rights come from. They can only originate through something like the ethic of reciprocity or law (e.g. statutory or customary law). And even though they can originate through the golden rule, eventually there is conflict, and law must outline the exact details of property rights.
We have property rights now, and our situation is not uniform and universal. In fact, it’s just the opposite. If we take property rights as the foundation by itself, then we should be equally satisfied with either a statist or anarchist society. After all, there would be property rights.
But, we do not want just any society, we want one based off of the NAP. The NAP must precede property rights, not only because it leads to them in the first place, but because without the NAP, we would have no way to measure the justness of a society.
Well, I think this is what Murray Rothbard was getting at, that when you are in a statist matrix, the aggressive rules are not your fault. So long as you are not complicit in the aggression, you are not acting hypocritcally. In other words, Rothbard renting a rent-controlled apartment is not hypocritical. Now, depending upon one’s point of view, it could be right or it could be wrong. But at least it’s not hypocrisy.
You don’t see how you are making, by yor own words, arbitrary distinctions? You constantly have to refer to the state which I try to make not a part of the hypothetical. And your mention of current times is a distinction between the hypothetical duress that I am concerning with this.
Again, because we have a state .. I know this. I don’t need help elaborating on it…
Okay.
But, if subjectivism reigns, then you cannot justify a uniform ethical code. Admission of property rights as having priority over ethics is what creates the uniform standard so that everyone (theoretically) could agree to something. This is what I am trying to point out. You cannot just keep saying “Subjectivism, subjectivism, NAP first.” It lacks justification for “why” the ethic of reciprocity is legitimate.
My point is that we are all making arbitrary distinctions. What difference does it make if you buy a good that was produced under a system of 50% slavery or 100%? It’s a difference of degree, not kind. Any distinction is arbitrary.
Then I have no idea what your point was, as it sounded like you were saying:
But maybe this is not what you were talking about.
Good luck with your uniform ethical code. Last I checked, every single criminal objects to the dominant ethical code in any given area. You cannot convince a Marxist that the NAP and property are just if they fundamentally oppose property. You cannot convince the mafia that their actions are wrong if they just don’t care about your sense of right and wrong. You cannot convince Michael Savage that imperialism is wrong.
Don’t waste your time with people who view the world differently than you at a fundamental level. The vast majority of people recognize the value and justness of the golden rule to some extent, some more than others. Appeal to the people who have underlying similarities in their worldview and try to show them how their lives would be improved economically in a decentralized nation. Show people the moral double standard that is the state, and teach people economics so that they can understand that a centralized economy makes everyone poorer.
People can make the leap after that to anarchism. But you can never have a universal ethical code.