Is the NAP really your biggest concern here? If Hoppe was saying that private property owners should remove advocates of homosexulity from their land to protect the libertarian order, you would be perfectly fine with that?
Considering he is writing for a conservative audience, they may well wish to do so. I see no problem with it, and I don’t really see a libertarian society without strong familial units going very far. Since no one will be forced to live there, I see no issue with it. He is simply making the point that a libertarian society will require functional family units, the same point exactly which Stephan Molyneux makes. Hoppe has conditioned his rhetoric for a different audience. How much of it he personally believes and how much of it was intended for conversion, I do not know, nor does it really bother me.
If you wish to treat this as ‘disgusting’, so be it, but there is nothing wrong with it from a libertarian perspective (insofar as the NAP is concerned.) The fact that used the phrase ‘advocate of’ also makes me wonder why people keep jumping on this quote. He seems to be referring to individuals who wish for the subsidisation or forced tolerance of ‘alternative’ lifestyles, as is certainly the case with all the “X rights” movements at present. Under a libertarian order, if you do not wish to live in the sort of society Hoppe envisions, you can simply pack up and go elsewhere, such as a city (although what will happen to these absent the state is another good question), which may not even be required in certain circumstances. No requirement for forced integration, and much cleaner than the current system, since no one can prevent this from occuring.
In my view, he is writing with individuals in mind who believe the only way to preserve their value systems (e.g. communitarians) is for the state to impose them on others. He is showing that the same can be achieved via covenants, which is correct, and I am going to agree with him to the extent that absent strong social units like the family, a libertarian society will have a harder time surviving. Personally I disagree with him that homosexuality cannot be reconciled with conventional familial structures, but again he used a particular phraseology, i.e. ‘advocates of alternative lifestyles’, so what he means precisely is open to interpretation.
I suppose the niggling bit is where he says it is required of a libertarian society - but in line with the above, one may ask what, specifically, is required for its continued existence? He seems to think a fairly patriarchal family structure is.
#1 he is talking about expelling people that disagree within a particular covenant-based community (i agree with block that this is hardly a libertarian notion)
I am going to interpret this in one of two ways. Block is rejecting this on account of the fact that that he is a thin libertarian, i.e. does not believe in values surplus to the NAP being required for one to be a libertarian. If, on the other hand, he is arguing that covenants violate the NAP somehow, he is simply wrong. They are ways of setting conditions under which an invitee, rentor etc may make use of the proprietor’s goods. If Block is making the assumption that tolerance (beyond the sort the NAP itself mandates, i.e. not harming others by initiating force against them) is required of libertarianism, he is then positing a thick version of libertarianism. In that case it becomes a question of what you think will be required for the long-run survival of a libertarian society, and if i were Block I would first seek clarification from Hoppe on how he meant the quote to be understood, as it isn’t one of his clearest pieces of writing.
I doubt Block has an issue with covenants per se, and if he thinks they cannot result in expulsion from the property if the covenant is violated, I wonder what role he thinks they serve, exactly? For instance, I see them as very useful means in effecting desirable social behaviours, e.g. limiting drug usage by prohibiting them within properties covered by a covenant.
@Malachi, that was an off the cuff statement he made, and it is a thymological question. I would disagree with him if the person in question did in fact intend upon creating a family, as it would expand their time horizons, but there are other things that do as well. I just think few of them are as powerful in influencing time preference as passing on wealth to secure the future well-being of your progeny. If he made the comment as a matter of praxeological law, I would disagree, but see below.
Therefore for Hoppes’ claim ARE NOT praxeologically true in an apriori manner because not one of these things can be determined to be true from the condition.
I can’t recall him ever making the argument that they are. He has written in DTGTF that TP is conditioned by a variety of biological and social factors. So why he would make such a statement as a statement of a praxeological nature, I do not know. I don’t believe he did. I think he used it as an illustration in one of his lectures to show how biological factors impact TP.
Hopefully that will clarify my position on the matter, though if Student would rather discuss Hoppe’s position another time, that is fine, and we can get back to the main theme in the OP, which isn’t Hoppe’s ideological predispositions.
