Two Types of Statists: Divide and Conquer!

[Saan]

@AJ

Getting rid of monopoly - however daunting a task it may be - seems much easier than trying to get everyone to follow the NAP in order to do away with monopoly power. At least, it seems you’d want to get rid of monopoly as the most logical and practical first step for getting everyone to follow the NAP.

I agree, what is the next step. The majority of people do not understand that the State is a Monopoly. To the masses a monopoly is Wal-Mart, and predatory pricing and any number of economic fallacies turned to political advantage. How to convince people rulers are not necessary only rules?

[K.C_Farmer]

@Snowflake

Arguing in favor of the state is itself a concession. In claiming that one ought to admit to a state, there is an implicit valuation of choice; that one ought to choose the state over alternatives. Statists who advocate this sort of voluntary state fall into the anarchist camp, even if they don’t realize it.

I.e. saying that one ought to give up their freedoms to a monopoly power presupposes that each individual has legitimate self ownership.

The only ground left for statists is for the involuntary state: that a state should be imposed on people whether they like it or not and their opinions dont matter. It seems to me, that if one’s opinion doesn’t matter, then you can never make an argument for the involuntary state since it doesn’t matter what we end up believing.

I.e. the involuntary state should persist whether we can justify it or not. But if something has no justification I don’t know how you can advocate it.

Thoughts? Please be harsh. Don’t take my side just b/c im an anarchist :P. This is a realization I had while dreaming and may be complete hogwash and/or just the tip of the iceberg for some larger theory.

Cheers mises people!

Where the adversary that formidable, I’d be inclined to agree. The statist plays both sides - voluntarism and involuntarism. These are simply means. Their end is dominion. They can concede reason in exchange for power. They also know how easy it is for people to abandon reason in favor of some measure of security, and therefore prey upon fear and ignorance. In otherwords, it takes little or nothing to hold a statist position while it is extremely difficult to beat them despite the fact that there is no good reason for a state to even exist.

Techinically I think your position is sound, but you need more than sound reasoning to defeat a statist. Oh, you may win the debate, but they still hold their power. Having solid reasoning makes for an excellent foundation, but we have much more work to do to topple the statists. The greatest of these efforts is the elimination of fear and ignorance. Overcoming ignorance takes persistence. Overcoming fear takes faith. The difficulty is that most people lack one or the other or even both.

[The_Late_Andrew_Ryan]

Ok I’m sorry but I’m too lazy to go through and read all the comments so if these have been adressed then simply ignore them

@Snowflake

Arguing in favor of the state is itself a concession. In claiming that one ought to admit to a state, there is an implicit valuation of choice; that one ought to choose the state over alternatives. Statists who advocate this sort of voluntary state fall into the anarchist camp, even if they don’t realize it.

I.e. saying that one ought to give up their freedoms to a monopoly power presupposes that each individual has legitimate self ownership.

I agree with you but one could say that the majority is all that matter and if the majority then give their consent (or the vast majority) then you could still say that this is all that matters. You have just made the argument very shaky for them but at the moment it is still solid enough for them to stand on

@Snowflake

The only ground left for statists is for the involuntary state: that a state should be imposed on people whether they like it or not and their opinions dont matter. It seems to me, that if one’s opinion doesn’t matter, then you can never make an argument for the involuntary state since it doesn’t matter what we end up believing.

I.e. the involuntary state should persist whether we can justify it or not. But if something has no justification I don’t know how you can advocate it.

I find your above argument far more compelling than this… In fact I find this a very bad argument. Gravity exists, it exists wheter or not we want it to exist, advocating it or not advocating it will not affect it. Even if the state is involuntary that doesn’t mean that it’s not good or moral based upon your beliefs and of course you have to make sure that it stays that way, it may be involuntary but you have to keep it as voluntary as possible and convince people that they should keep this institution around.

There are a million utilitarian justifications for the state, all that can be defeated, but they are still there. Your first argument is a nice little weapon, but the below is only good for piercing specific kinds of armor (AKA the moral kind) but chances are that if a statist has retreated to that position then he will have more or less abandoned morality as his weapon.

Hope that helps you make a revised argument

[K.C_Farmer]

@The Late Andrew Ryan

@Snowflake

Arguing in favor of the state is itself a concession. In claiming that one ought to admit to a state, there is an implicit valuation of choice; that one ought to choose the state over alternatives. Statists who advocate this sort of voluntary state fall into the anarchist camp, even if they don’t realize it.

I.e. saying that one ought to give up their freedoms to a monopoly power presupposes that each individual has legitimate self ownership.

I agree with you but one could say that the majority is all that matter and if the majority then give their consent (or the vast majority) then you could still say that this is all that matters. You have just made the argument very shaky for them but at the moment it is still solid enough for them to stand on

I’d go as far enough to say that they don’t even require a majority from their perspective.

[Snowflake]

@The Late Andrew Ryan

I agree with you but one could say that the majority is all that matter and if the majority then give their consent (or the vast majority) then you could still say that this is all that matters.

Right, this would mean the statist has to rely on the voluntarism of some and coercion of others. It puts their position as somewhere between the two mentioned in the OP. The point is, if if the statist wants you to voluntarily consent to a state, it is no longer a state because the organization will be the result of voluntary cooperation (at least for you).

@The Late Andrew Ryan

Gravity exists, it exists wheter or not we want it to exist, advocating it or not advocating it will not affect it.

Except arguments for/against gravity don’t presuppose it. What I’m saying is that it doesn’t make sense to build the case for coercion since the coerce-ee’s opinion doesn’t matter anyway. This is because argumentation is all about convincing someone. If you convince someone that they should serve the state, this is voluntary. There is no other way the argument for the state can play out, which is why I say statists of the second camp can’t even argue.

While, to recap, statists in the first camp are actually voluntarists even if they don’t know it.