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LolitaSama posted:I apologize in advance for rambling on a bit, but this gets me worked up. I know a bunch of people have already chimed in, but really good on you for coming to this realization. You actually made the conversion with a hell of a lot less impetus than I did, and that is all the more impressive. I know a ton of people on these forums have switched from the libertarian wing over the years, but you are the most vocal proponent I've yet met who actually realized that he was being hosed by the people he supported. It gives off a feeling of hope which is sometimes hard to come by. While I'm at it, I hope you don't beat yourself up too much that you ever believed in this garbage. Libertarian ideals really speak to people who are younger, because its an inherently selfish ideology. Its no wonder that Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged is most influential to people if they read it when they are young, and that is because it speaks to a world view where every problem is simple and everything is about you in a way that appeals to the teenage mind.
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Oct 1, 2014 05:59
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big government 
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The Mutato posted:Jrod has already discussed this. Based on a D/S curve, workers would have less demand for work the lower the wages are. This is also common sense. However, employers cannot just arbitrarily decrease wages, as competitors will simply undercut (overcut? the fact businesses are buying labor makes everything a little flipped upside down) them by offering higher wages. The market will find a point that is high enough for workers to agree to work for, and low enough that firms consider it profitable. Hey, I know this is a few pages back but this comment was so laughably absurd that I mistook it for sarcasm and only after reading another page or so of your posting realized it was in earnest. You completely miss the point that workers have a largely fixed need for income, and the workers who would be affected by minimum wage laws are the ones living close enough to the subsistence level that they have negligible room for downward adjustment. Subsistence-level workers won't work less hours if their wages go down, they will work more because food and shelter requires a set minimum amount of income and minimum-wage earners in general are already close to that line. Honestly just read what you quoted because the whole 'labor doesn't follow a conventional D/S curve' thing appears to have escaped you entirely.
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Oct 1, 2014 06:20
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AlternateAccount posted:Are the objectives of ending drug nonsense and constant war somehow unobtainable without "unshackling" these rich tyrants? I think we could probably manage them regardless, so tying these fears together doesn't make much sense. Ending drug nonsense and constant war does not require converting to libertarianism. Libertarianism isn't about ending either of those things. I mean I know that you're playing the idiot and all but how can you seriously believe that "the free market" would end war? War is loving profitable. Millenia of history has shown us that the free market wants the opposite of world peace. You'd have to be naive as gently caress to believe that a libertarian society would produce less or no war. Even if you go all-out ancap government-abolishing jrod libertarianism, you still wind up with militarized societies (DROs) that can and will go to war with each other
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Oct 1, 2014 08:25
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Caros posted:Err, to explain a little about that comment, Depart family of Origin is a term that originates from Libertarian philospher and in my opinion, cult leader, Stephan Molyneux. One of his things is that since all parents abuse their children, whether physically, emotionally or whatever, it is impossible to have a real relationship with them. Thus you should DeFOO and also you should send a lot of money to Molyneux. Cult leader indeed. His entire premise presupposes that the parents have taken the time to impart to the child skills and resources sufficient to make a successful launch. Something that doesn't actually happen in a stateless society with actually abusive or neglectful parents. Particularly for girls as we have multiple religions that advocate the denial of education to daughters. I am dead loving serious when I say that without state intervention I would be functionally illiterate. Neither of my parents would have taken the time to teach me and without reading so many doors are shut. Caros posted:Now the Charity angle is enormous bullshit, ... loving Miss America pageant ... Furthermore, there are significant mechanisms for male oriented college funding beyond sexist/fundy parents who only send their sons to college. The GI Bill and athletic scholarships, for example. And of course, plenty of charity scholarships are offered by exactly the same people who don't send their daughters to college. Caros posted:I personally think the 'giving no fucks' angle is more honest. The point if the exercise is to make them come out and say it. Just get it all out in the open so we stop pretending that libertopia is better for everyone and openly admit its about screwing over innocent children to save pocket change. Caros posted:
Yes it is their problem. The glorious free market requires informed consumers and rational actors to work. Without things like widespread literacy and basic education you don't have that. Prior to the state mandating education for children literacy levels were around 10%. Take the state away and education levels will decline. Faster for women and minorities than for the hallowed straight white male but they will decline for everyone. Even if I'd never used any of my education professionally and just started having babies as a stay at home mom my education would still matter because I would pass it on to my children in the form of academic help and teaching a love of learning. When looking at the math gender gap, for example, boys from countries with small or no gaps outperform boys for countries with a large math gap. http://m.livescience.com/17429-math-gender-differences-myths.html Making sure that every child is educated - no matter how poor or how much of an rear end in a top hat their parents are - is mandatory for the success of libertopia. Another entry on a long list of things states do that libertarians take for granted and have no plan to replicate in the absence of a state. Just with a twist because there is no loving way they can hand wave the problem away with the standard invocations since parental malice requires a state to correct.
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Oct 1, 2014 08:35
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LolitaSama posted:It's a den of intolerance and they'd sooner lose every election from now to judgement day than renounce their bigotry. God, don't I just wish. It genuinely warms my heart to see someone fall away from libertarianism, especially someone I personally dogpiled along with the rest of D&D back in 2012. Would that it was because the opposing arguments were so solid that you couldn't help but see the light, but hey, the Republicans becoming so openly toxic that it was literally impossible to ignore works too 
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Oct 1, 2014 10:06
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So to summarize the action so far: 
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Oct 1, 2014 13:50
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wateroverfire posted:So to summarize the action so far: Look at you forget the Libertarian reaction to Hurricane Katrina. "Looks like they shouldn't have built a city below sea level." 
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Oct 1, 2014 14:10
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wateroverfire posted:So to summarize the action so far: To summarize this post:  edit: National Defense requires an absolutely massive bureacracy in the modern world, and adequate national defense could not be achieved with a small government. You have to employ and house full-time soldiers, own enough property and equipment and staff to run bases, accomodate part-timers, enforce awol restrictions, manage supply contracts and transportation lines, provide medical and dental care on base and afterwards, provide some kind of schooling to those who want it, oversee defense industry manufactures and contracts. I'm definitely missing a ton of poo poo. And if you don't have the bureacracy, along with good salaries and benefits to compete with the glourious job creators, then you'll get nothing but fuckups and have massive desertion problems. I know quite a few extremely bright students who went into the military before or during college specifically because the benefits were excellent, it paid for their schooling, and there were an absolute ton of different jobs to do, from IT to logistics, healthcare to policework, on and on, and it was a good way for them to get experience in those fields. Grand Theft Autobot fucked around with this message at 14:25 on Oct 1, 2014 |
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Oct 1, 2014 14:13
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"We're not against disaster relief, we're just against paying for it."
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Oct 1, 2014 14:13
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Private charity solves all problems. Nevermind that the Red Cross regularly complains that their response is hamstrung because people don't donate until after a disaster occurs.
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Oct 1, 2014 14:36
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Grand Theft Autobot posted:To summarize this post: None of that is precluded by a "small" government unless you decide for some reason to define small that way, though. I was talking to a supplier the other day about buying a thing from them, and they quoted me $500 dollars. When I mentioned that another supplier had the same thing for $300 they told me they had a GSA contract to supply that item and since by contract the government had to get their lowest price, that was the price they could offer. In my version of "small" government (though I'm not a Libertarian) the government isn't buying for $500 what it could buy for $300 instead.
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Oct 1, 2014 14:58
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wateroverfire posted:So to summarize the action so far: There is also the vigorously ignoring how libertopia will ensure children are educated enough to have the skills to survive in libertopia as anything other than chattel. Cause it won't.
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Oct 1, 2014 15:03
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McAlister posted:There is also the vigorously ignoring how libertopia will ensure children are educated enough to have the skills to survive in libertopia as anything other than chattel. This is a feature, not a bug.
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Oct 1, 2014 15:22
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wateroverfire posted:So to summarize the action so far: So did you completely miss Jrod and Mutato's posts, or are you making a concious decision to pretend that they don't exist and didn't post in this thread? Just curious. -EDIT- wateroverfire posted:None of that is precluded by a "small" government unless you decide for some reason to define small that way, though. The way you buy things and the way a government buys things are so radically different that it's nonsensical to compare the two in any way, shape or form. DO you read those "If the government were a household of four, here would be it's budget" email forwards and think it's some sort of sage wisdom and epic burn against big government too? Who What Now fucked around with this message at 15:38 on Oct 1, 2014 |
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Oct 1, 2014 15:35
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McAlister posted:There is also the vigorously ignoring how libertopia will ensure children are educated enough to have the skills to survive in libertopia as anything other than chattel. Do tell, I guess? Your society sounds like it's being organized by a dumb person.
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Oct 1, 2014 15:35
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wateroverfire posted:Do tell, I guess? Your society sounds like it's being organized by a dumb person. AKA a libertarian
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Oct 1, 2014 15:38
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Raskolnikov38 posted:AKA a libertarian Or someone who likes arguing against straw men for some reason. Who What Now posted:So did you completely miss Jrod and Mutato's posts, or are you making a concious decision to pretend that they don't exist and didn't post in this thread? Just curious. Why would I address their posts? Nobody else seems to be. Alternately, if you've got a quarrel with what they're writing go take it up with them? Raskolnikov38 posted:-EDIT- How do you understand the government procurement process to work? In what way does that justify spending (in this example) about 2/3 more than what the item could be purchased for privately?
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Oct 1, 2014 15:48
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wateroverfire posted:None of that is precluded by a "small" government unless you decide for some reason to define small that way, though. jrodefeld, against whom the posts these last few pages have been made, is an anarcho-capitalist. He believes the very concept of a State with a monopoly on force is immoral by definition because it usurps without explicit consent the individual's right to use retaliatory force against aggressors. He believes that taxation is theft and therefore the State, simply by collecting the taxes it needs to run a government however "small" is the greatest mass violator of human rights. If you want to propose some flavor of minarchism and debate that, then propose it and let's do it. But accusing people of strawmanning when they are attacking the actual positions of the only libertarian-leaning poster who has bothered to assert a positive definition of his ideal society is ridiculous. Rather than quoting post after post aimed at jrodefeld's ideas and blathering about #notalllibertarians, why don't you actually be specific about what ideas you're defending instead of forcing us to guess how you differ from jrod. VitalSigns fucked around with this message at 15:52 on Oct 1, 2014 |
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Oct 1, 2014 15:50
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VitalSigns posted:Ah see, right there you've proven that the regulatory standards are agreed upon by private companies based on their experiences, who obviously have a rational interest in following those standards even without redundant and tyrannical enforcement by state power. First, I'm not trying to prove anything, I'm describing an observed process, and one I participate in (and thus can't be completely objective about). And that's why however much I think Libertarianism is crap, I just can't throw what I described out. Most people and most companies, really do genuinely want to do things right and safely. 95% percent of the time if something is explained, they'll comply with regulations and international treaty recommendations without having to be forced to. I used a cargo securing example earlier so I'll run with that. IMO CSC code prohibits "over the top" sometimes called "friction loop" lashings for ocean transport. Now that lashing type is what truck drivers use for nearly everything. So when you get a trucking company securing something heavy and OOG (out of grade) to a flat rack for ocean transport they'll often use friction loops. They then fail the third party survey and boy they get pissed. If why *(at end of post) is explained to them 95% of the time, they stop arguing and just do it. And even better, they continue to do it right after that even when they aren't inspected. But this isn't the only way things could and should happen, sometimes it doesn't work that way. We've got the dozens of examples in this thread, like the USS smoke stack pollution thing. It cannot be universalized to be an abstract rule that always holds, because when it doesn't work the exceptions are a big deal with severe consequences. And ignorance (occasionally willful and intentional, but usually not) is often a cause. VitalSigns posted:Since violating these basic rules is not in the rational self-interest of an insurance company that wants to maintain long-term solvency and profitability, Yes it absolutely is in the self interest of companies (and not just insurance companies) to follow regulatory rules voluntarily if they want to maintain long-term solvency and profitability. The problem is longterm solvency and longterm profitability are not always the goals of companies. We're structured to reward short term and that creates very different incentives (it incentivises breaking the rules). So between the exceptions to how the process normally occurs and the increasing emphasis on short term profits enforcement by government is a necessity. And the exceptions/short-term emphasis create situations like the derivatives market imploding and collapsing the economy or more concretely (what I'm directly familiar with) poo poo blowing up (like this example https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BythKAcY24Q). But I don't think they can acknowledge any of this. To acknowledge this breaks their myth. It breaks FREEDOM as a perfect literally true center of history. * For trucking, when lashings become loose the driver can stop and tighten the lashings, ratchet the straps chain binders etc. Friction loops depend on the lashing being tight, because what they do is increase the force of friction between the piece and truck bed by pulling it down. Well for ocean transport, stowage location is unknown and often inaccessible, usually nobody can check or tighten the lashings. Additionally a repetitive force acts on the piece, the rolling motion of the vessels. The rolling of the vessel causes the lashings to stretch and loosen (even metal chains!) over a voyage (which could be long). When friction loops loosen, they do not increase the friction between the piece and flat rack (because they aren't pulling it down anymore) and cease to do anything. Consequently direct lashings or half loops should be used for ocean transport. Bar Ran Dun fucked around with this message at 15:55 on Oct 1, 2014 |
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Oct 1, 2014 15:50
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BrandorKP posted:Yes it absolutely is in the self interest of companies (and not just insurance companies) to follow regulatory rules voluntarily if they want to maintain long-term solvency and profitability. The problem is longterm solvency and longterm profitability are not always the goals of companies. We're structured to reward short term and that creates very different incentives (it incentives breaking the rules).  Come on man, I even cited AIG in that post as an example of good corporate governance and a reason why self regulation can work on the insurance market 
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Oct 1, 2014 15:54
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QuarkJets posted:Ending drug nonsense and constant war does not require converting to libertarianism. Libertarianism isn't about ending either of those things. Holy poo poo, the level of deliberate obtuseness in this thread is loving staggering: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-aggression_principle "NAP is the foundation of libertarian philosophy." And yes, there's massive scale strawmanning. It's like asking every Republican to answer for the very worst, out-of-context Rush Limbaugh quotes you can possibly dig up. Complete nonsense. Do you really think the average libertarian is an advocate for children as property? And there are a million articles dealing with why and how secondary education is an overpriced clusterfuck, the short version being "unlimited money chasing a good" and there are well-reasoned approaches to reducing the cost of college to get back to the situation mid-century where people could actually be expected to afford it without staggering debt. These ideas aren't new or hard to find, but it's far less fun than building little straw-boxes.
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Oct 1, 2014 15:57
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AlternateAccount posted:Holy poo poo, the level of deliberate obtuseness in this thread is loving staggering: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-aggression_principle Right, because every system in practice invariably lives up to its stated ideals!  Enlightened dictatorship is actually the best form of government by the way. It's fundamentally incapable of hurting anyone or failing to achieve perfection in every facet of governance, because if it did it wouldn't be enlightened, duh!You're just trolling now, right? No one is this dumb. AlternateAccount posted:Do you really think the average libertarian is an advocate for children as property? jrodefeld specifically cited Rothbard as one among the most vastly accomplished libertarian economists by the way, so I don't see what's strawmanny about quoting the guy 
VitalSigns fucked around with this message at 16:04 on Oct 1, 2014 |
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Oct 1, 2014 16:02
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AlternateAccount posted:Holy poo poo, the level of deliberate obtuseness in this thread is loving staggering: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-aggression_principle quote:Do you really think the average libertarian is an advocate for children as property?
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Oct 1, 2014 16:05
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VitalSigns posted:
I know. But things are always more complicated. Take AIG's other insurance divisions. Most of those were run right. I could get specific, but I probably shouldn't.
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Oct 1, 2014 16:07
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Vahakyla posted:South Carolina made me realize that libertarianism is loving stupid Good on you, Vahakyla. I recall our arguments in the Minimum Wage and other threads, and I remember you as a very staunch libertarian. Your story is great. Similar things happened in my life, though somewhat in reverse. I grew up (and am still) remarkably privileged, and surrounded by family who believed that they were absolutely entitled to that privilege. I came to see our privilege as largely the result of historical accident, and sustained by the reinforcement mechanisms we've institutionalized in society. My own successes are largely the result of my natural talents and family connections, and I've never had to work particularly hard to achieve top grades or lucrative and prestigious jobs. I could just as easily have wound up on the other side of the coin (and obviously still could at some point), and these thoughts all ran together to make me the radical I am today.
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Oct 1, 2014 16:08
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STOP POINTING OUT THAT MY IDEOLOGY IS BACKED BY THE SOCIO-ECONOMIC EQUIVALENT OF HITLER
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Oct 1, 2014 16:13
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BrandorKP posted:But things are always more complicated. Take AIG's other insurance divisions. Most of those were run right. Well yes, but they were regulated too. It was only in the CDS market that Greenspan insisted the government leave it to self-regulation. Doctor Spaceman posted:Aside from relying on a twisted, obtuse definition of aggression and violence it's still only an abstract principle. A consistent definition of aggression would be nice. Rothbard teaches us that physically restraining an infant from crawling away is aggression against his self-ownership and enslavement, but this thread also has that oft-repeated Ayn Rand quote where she specifically exempts exterminating the savage races who are too barbarous to know what to do with the land they inhabit from the definition of aggressive force, since you can't forcibly violate a right that a people is too primitive to possess in the first place 
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Oct 1, 2014 16:13
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They also don't count economic coercion as agression.
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Oct 1, 2014 16:23
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VitalSigns posted:jrodefeld, against whom the posts these last few pages have been made, is an anarcho-capitalist. He believes the very concept of a State with a monopoly on force is immoral by definition because it usurps without explicit consent the individual's right to use retaliatory force against aggressors. He believes that taxation is theft and therefore the State, simply by collecting the taxes it needs to run a government however "small" is the greatest mass violator of human rights. Well, 1) JRod is trolling the poo poo out of this thread and has sat back to watch the show (I imagine) and 2) so many of the posts since Jrod decided to peace out are smug jabs directed at some stupidity "they" (however defined) supposedly believe that the discussion clearly stopped being about what Jrod thinks a long time ago. It's just a bunch of people waving tribal totems and competing to out-hate the libertarian now. VitalSigns posted:If you want to propose some flavor of minarchism and debate that, then propose it and let's do it. But accusing people of strawmanning when they are attacking the actual positions of the only libertarian-leaning poster who has bothered to assert a positive definition of his ideal society is ridiculous. Right at the moment I'm defending the idea that none of the ridiculous straw manning going on is actually demanded by libertarianism, and that the stupid gotchya "what about ROADS (or whatever)" questions have fairly obvious resolutions. Maybe the thread will get better and we can discuss more interesting things but I'm not holding my breath.
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Oct 1, 2014 16:24
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Well they do have fairly obvious solutions its just that no one actually enjoys or wants toll roads except for the people that own toll roads. And idiots.
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Oct 1, 2014 16:27
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wateroverfire posted:Well, 1) JRod is trolling the poo poo out of this thread and has sat back to watch the show (I imagine)
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Oct 1, 2014 16:28
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Talmonis posted:They also don't count economic coercion as agression. How could you even cast it as aggression? Call it "The act of society not giving me X thing that I need?"
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Oct 1, 2014 16:28
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Raskolnikov38 posted:Well they do have fairly obvious solutions its just that no one actually enjoys or wants toll roads except for the people that own toll roads. Toll roads are not a bad alternative when borrowing is expensive and raising taxes is infeasible. Here in Chile for instance a lot of new roads are built by private companies with their own capital in exchange for the toll concession because roads are expensive and Chile can't borrow gobs of money at 0% real interest rates.
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Oct 1, 2014 16:33
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wateroverfire posted:How could you even cast it as aggression? Call it "The act of society not giving me X thing that I need?" More like "Hormel fired me for complaining about the pig brain disease I contracted while working for them."
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Oct 1, 2014 16:33
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VitalSigns posted:Right, because every system in practice invariably lives up to its stated ideals! Is this where I am supposed to apologize for believing in a principle because you think it's idealistic?
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Oct 1, 2014 16:35
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wateroverfire posted:How could you even cast it as aggression? Call it "The act of society not giving me X thing that I need?" Yes. Are you saying that's an impossible definition? While climbing, I come across somebody dangling from a rope over a precipice. "Oh I'll haul you up" I say, "but only if you promise me a million dollars in exchange and agree to work off your debt to me if you don't have the cash." With no other option, he agrees. Is this a legitimate contract to you, agreed to voluntarily without any coercion? Do I legitimately own this person now (or, if you believe in the statist concept of bankruptcy courts, am I at least entitled to everything he can't shield in bankruptcy?) VitalSigns fucked around with this message at 16:42 on Oct 1, 2014 |
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Oct 1, 2014 16:36
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Grand Theft Autobot posted:More like "Hormel fired me for complaining about the pig brain disease I contracted while working for them." That would be retaliation not coercion.
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Oct 1, 2014 16:36
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wateroverfire posted:Toll roads are not a bad alternative when borrowing is expensive and raising taxes is infeasible. Here in Chile for instance a lot of new roads are built by private companies with their own capital in exchange for the toll concession because roads are expensive and Chile can't borrow gobs of money at 0% real interest rates. I know the last time you tried to actually get improvements going on down there didn't go so well but we promise you, Henry Kissinger is finally out of the white house.
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Oct 1, 2014 16:39
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wateroverfire posted:That would be retaliation not coercion. Oh then I guess a mugging isn't coercion either. If you hand over your money it was a voluntary decision, and if you don't then getting shot is retaliation, not coercion. Well then. The way you use words doesn't make any sense. A worker injured in the performance of his duties is entitled to compensation. A policy of discouraging workers from collecting what is legally owed to them by putting economic sanctions on anyone who tries is coercion: the boss is using his position of power to pressure the worker to relinquish his property. Unless you also don't think it's coercion for a boss to demand blowjobs from his secretary or she gets fired and kicked out of company housing along with her entire famil...oh. Ohhhhhhh, gotcha. VitalSigns fucked around with this message at 16:56 on Oct 1, 2014 |
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Oct 1, 2014 16:40
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wateroverfire posted:How could you even cast it as aggression? Call it "The act of society not giving me X thing that I need?" The act of society preventing me from taking thing X that I need. Property rights are all about excluding the rest of us from using a thing by force.
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Oct 1, 2014 16:52
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