But, your avatar is a… lady.
This only is going off only Ideology and not actual material events transpiring in ones life. If I own a bar and the state tries to pass a smoking ban that would kill my business off (as well as hurting MY family, customers, and employees) damn skippy I am going to vote against it AND try hard and campaign to get others to vote too, all while looking for legal loopholes within the law and ways to work around the law. And when the vote will go the states way and hurts MY business and livelyhood, damn skippy I will complain to.
It has nothing to do with consent, it is only trying to make my lot better for me with what I have to work with. My consent is for my concerns not the politicians, why sabotage it? 10 percent turnout or not, I would still have to deal with the fuck awful consequences of the smoking ban.
The state put up a law to vote on for IT’S concerns, I act accordingly for MY concerns, if liberty has any concerns it will act for them. Me, I am neither the state nor liberty (I am me) and just as they fight for their concerns and just as they are their own cause, I shall fight for my own; which can be nothing but me and my affairs. And I shall make my own cause me and my affairs.
A non vote in this case would do nothing for my cause, and only kill my well being and bury it in the grave of liberty.
Somewhere Stirner’s spook is smiling (don’t know where, as he managed to get kicked out of Heaven and Hell).
But give them a break. It’s hard to vote when you’re busy carrying a cross…
I didn’t retract it. The moderator did. In my experience, most people don’t listen, regardless of how eloquent one is, once an assertion is made. Whether or not it is more effective is completely subjective.
Regardless, my point still stands. You suggested that not voting is consent, which is akin to saying that if there are three of you, and the other two vote to rape you, that you consent to the rape by not voting, because you realized it was pointless to vote.
Yeah, and if two people vote to rape me, and I vote no, I guess I shouldn’t complain when I get raped, right?
It depends on why you voted. If they are going do what the vote says regardless of whether you vote or not and you believe your vote could actually make change it becomes difficult so claim you voted voluntarily.
Say there are 4 people instead, the result of the vote will happen whiter you choose to participate or not. You know that 2 of them will vote to rape you, you don’t know what the 3rd person will do. So if you don’t vote you will get raped regardless of what the 3rd person do. But if you vote no and the 3rd person does that also you could create a stalemate and prevent the rape.
Did you vote by voluntary choice in this situation? Hardly … you where coerced into voting and you can not be blamed for the result any more then if you didn’t vote.
Personally I don’t think this voting in self-defence idea is applicable when you are just one of millions of voters, your vote will not make a difference to the outcome. But it could still very well be the case that a lot of people actually vote because they feel they need to grab the gun and point it at someone else or it will be pointed at them.
If anyone debating this haven’t read/listened to Spooner’s “No Treason” yet you should definitely do so right now.
It is not very long and explains the principles behind democracy and voting brilliantly.
But what if insead of using the gun after obtaining it, you smashed it to bits?
I think that power corrupts, but there are people who believe that the existence of the state isn’t in their best interest (this forum is proof of that), so they could use that power to get rid of that particular “discomfort”
No, it depends on if not voting would mean you would not get raped (figuratively speaking, taxes and unjust laws are rape). But when has that ever happened?
Exactly. Imagine a town council being taken over by anarchists. And then imagine that they make a declaration stating that anyone that does not pay property taxes will not get their house taken away.
Complain, It’s your right!
But what is the basis of your complaint? That you lost? Fine, but all I’m saying is that you’re a sore loser. You were willing to take the win but not the lost.
That’s not very honest, especially when you are condemning the very nature of the game.
Yeah, but how is that an option? We basically have a shoot or be shot scenario, like soldiers on a battlefield. There is no third way out.
Even if you could destroy the gun I am not sure it is relevant to voting. The idea of voting as self-defence works in either case.
Voting for any other reason is still completely wrong in either case. If you believe that no more harm will come to you either way it is a crime to vote, even if you vote to destroy the gun. Don’t participate in evil if you have a choice…
How is voting for freedom, “evil”?
No as I said in my other response the perceived threat to your own person is the only thing that can justify participating in the system.
If you don’t believe your vote will make a difference to the amount of times you will be raped you shouldn’t vote either way, because if you do it for any other reason then to avoid a threat against yourself you willingly participate. Which means you have now accept the whole system, anything it will do to you as well as being an accomplice in all crimes it will commit.
OK, now I’m confused. You talk about the limits of our understanding as a limit to our reasoning in one thread, now you are talking about good and evil as if they existed objectively in this one.
Good or evil, I work to attain my ends. One of them is abolition of the state, or at least minimizing its influence on my life as much as is practical. If that requires me to vote, so be it. If there is a praxeological reason demonstrating more effective means, I’m all ears, but arguments from a moral standpoint don’t really impress me.
So your threshold is “belief”? You realize how funny that is? Because, I will just say this. Everyone that votes believes it will make a difference. Everyone that does not vote believes it will not make a difference. So, if you vote, you do not accept the system, and if you don’t that means you do not accept the system, using your reasoning.
You make a voluntary decision to join the secret band of murders and thieves that is the democratic government. It doesn’t matter what you vote for, every vote is a part in the system and every member in this criminal organisation is anonymous to everyone else and there vote is secret.
If you sit on the board of company that starts committing crimes (and blowing the whistle is not an option here). What should you do?
Remain on the board of a now criminal organisation and keep voting against the crimes or resign?
It is pretty clear to me that if you don’t resign you are just as much guilty as any other member of that company.
If you perceive yourself to have a free choice of whether you should vote or not it becomes a voluntary act to participate and just like staying on this company.
if you’re going to voluntarily participate in a vote on your own body, then what do you expect me to say to you?
If it was possible (even in theory) for the system to liquidate itself through its own political process, I would not be so convinced of the counter productivity of participating in this charade. However, the system cannot dissolve itself out of existence.
So when do you propose we start to withdraw our support? And don’t say you can do both: participate and withdraw your support. I can’t believe you don’t see the logical contradiction.
Give me that choice and I will go vote tomorrow!
But you don’t have this choice. Voting to get some right back after it is taken away is not voting for freedom. Tomorrow you will lose it again because you have never actually voted out the system itself.
So I can resign from voting, and the government will just leave me alone? No. That is why voting or not voting, is not considered consent, because it does not matter what I do, I still get extorted and enslaved. But hey, feel free to condemn people for voting. I am sure nothing I say to you will change your mind.
First of all you are still missing the point. Making a difference is not the issue. What is important here is the perception of threat to oneself and the belief that that threat can be avoided by the vote.
This is also just to simplify the argument. Grounds for self-defence is very difficult to evaluate objectively. Most of the principle are based on the subjective perception of threat and the ability to convince a court. All I am saying that if you vote because you believe that you avoid some perceived threat against you, then there may be ground for some degree of leniency in judgement. I am not saying how much leniency exactly, cause that is way to complex to answer here.
If you vote for any other reason then this there are however no grounds on which you could possibly be granted any leniency at all, you are fully responsible for all the crimes of the state as if you had been a member of any other criminal organisation.
So why vote then?
Like it or not, it is the participation that is at the basis of this entire system. If most people stopped participating then the system would collapse. You know this very well. So how can you say that you are not providing your consent, at least in some minimal way?
How can you defend the idea that you are willing to take the “wins” but not the “loses”?