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twodot posted:I think you're the person who doesn't understand what a contract is. I can sign a contract and then not follow through on it. If I don't do the thing in the contract, I'm almost never forced to do what's in the contract, instead I have to pay off the value that the other people lost by me not doing the thing I promised to do. In my post I specifically stipulated that bankruptcy should exist, so even if I'm obligated to pay someone a bunch of money, if I don't have it, I don't have to. Saying things like "You are returned to your owners and they can deal with you as they see fit." is operating far outside how contracts work. Nooooope, way to be wrongo. Historically, the normal way was go bankrupt, hey now you're a slave until you work off that debt. The process wasn't: have money, hmm I think I'll become a slave -> oops out of money, hey I file bankruptcy now I'm not a slave anymore either nyahahah. Anyone willing to have slaves wouldn't be that stupid.
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Oct 2, 2014 07:54
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Corvinus posted:Nooooope, way to be wrongo. edit: And I'll go a step further and say that absent a similar to current contract and bankruptcy system, I can't understand what contracting into slavery could possibly mean. twodot fucked around with this message at 08:08 on Oct 2, 2014 |
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Oct 2, 2014 07:57
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Jack of Hearts posted:Sure, I'll bite. What is the widely known and accepted link between fiat money and State warfare? Almost all major wars in the history of civilization were financed partially or mostly or entirely through inflation. That is just a historical fact. In fact, can you name a single major war of aggression that was fought in the past several centuries that was not financed with paper money?
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Oct 2, 2014 08:00
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I'm just gonna moosh together the last 200 posts or so. War is super profitable for sub-state entities, no taxation need be involved. War is literally men getting together and sneaking over to the next village to kill and steal. Where do taxes come into it? Only at the behest of bloodthirsty machine industrialists, who love to sell new forms of hot, leaden pills that smash into you. You need taxes for steel; you don't need them for flint or obsidian. e: jrodefeld: Spanish colonialism, fully backed with precious metal
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Oct 2, 2014 08:03
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Corvinus posted:I'm just blow away at how someone can be so delusional to think that namedropping a literal white supremacist and a literal cult leader as support for their position would positively influence the majority of people towards that position. Who, Molyneux? A white supremacist? Honestly? No hyperbole there. This is a tactic of people who have no arguments. They make random unsubstantiated assertions and label people while ignoring the main points being discussed. You don't have a coherent argument in favor of the minimum wage. I know this because I have read the last few pages and none have been forthcoming. Yes, it is much easier to call random libertarians "racist" and "cult leaders" than participate in a high minded debate on the merits of the issues being discussed.
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Oct 2, 2014 08:04
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jrodefeld posted:Who, Molyneux? A white supremacist? Honestly? No hyperbole there. This is a tactic of people who have no arguments. They make random unsubstantiated assertions and label people while ignoring the main points being discussed. No Hoppe is the white supremacist (previously documented exhaustively), Molyneux is the cult leader (previously documented exhaustively). Keep up.
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Oct 2, 2014 08:06
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jrodefeld posted:Almost all major wars in the history of civilization were financed partially or mostly or entirely through inflation. That is just a historical fact. Do you have any proof of this? You claiming that it is a historical fact does not make something a historical fact. What history book are you referencing? What source do you use when making these accusations? Or is the magic of the Free Market a substitute for facts and proof and empirical evidence? jrodefeld posted:In fact, can you name a single major war of aggression that was fought in the past several centuries that was not financed with paper money? How about the 100 Years War? How about the Mongol Conquest of China? Do you think that the Pope paid his Crusaders with paper money? What the hell even is your definition of "paper money"? Anything that isn't bitcoin? Or is it just whatever's convenient for your argument at the time?
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Oct 2, 2014 08:10
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jrodefeld posted:Almost all major wars in the history of civilization were financed partially or mostly or entirely through inflation. That is just a historical fact. In fact, can you name a single major war of aggression that was fought in the past several centuries that was not financed with paper money? The Mongol invasion of Europe. Edit: Wait, for clarity, are you talking about paper money period or fiat paper money? You were talking about fiat currency in your earlier posts. If it's just "money that happens to be represented on paper" then just roll my answer back to the initial Mongol expansion into China. Rhjamiz fucked around with this message at 08:27 on Oct 2, 2014 |
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Oct 2, 2014 08:11
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jrodefeld posted:Who, Molyneux? A white supremacist? Honestly? No hyperbole there. This is a tactic of people who have no arguments. They make random unsubstantiated assertions and label people while ignoring the main points being discussed. Your reading comprehension is poo poo. First, I never touched any argument about min wage, second was covered by SedanChair. And third, Stefan Molyneux openly associates and speaks for groups that are known hate organizations as per Southern Poverty Law Center, which is one of the most mainstream and sane civil rights organizations.
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Oct 2, 2014 08:14
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twodot posted:I don't understand why you think this is related to what I said. I agree previous societies that had slavery were bad. What I said was that contracting into slavery would work ok, as long as you had a similar to current contract and bankruptcy system. You can argue that is impossible, but my stance is based on that stipulation. It sounds more like you are attempting to describe something other than slavery. Once you contract into slavery, you can't just break contract and be like, "peace!" or that renders the whole institution moot. No contractor is going to fork over cash to pay your debts if you can then just declare bankruptcy and walk away at any time.
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Oct 2, 2014 08:15
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jrodefeld posted:Almost all major wars in the history of civilization were financed partially or mostly or entirely through inflation. That is just a historical fact. In fact, can you name a single major war of aggression that was fought in the past several centuries that was not financed with paper money? Forgive me for not taking you at your word when you stamp your feet insisting that your understanding of things is based in HISTORICAL FACT. Some evidence would be nice, especially if you want to make a case tying together fiat currency with violent military episodes. [/quote]
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Oct 2, 2014 08:16
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Jesus Ho Chi Minh Christ in a poodle skirt, Jrod. You literally answered my question with "the milk of human kindness"?! Are you loving with me? Are you HIGH? "Well I guess you'll just have to hope for charity!" Holy screaming cockmonglers. I'm sorry if I seem a bit taken aback by this but you have effectively said "well in libertopia the same thing, faceless charity from others! Only it won't be evil government State it will be good wholesome private rich people who for unnamed and unknown reasons will take care of you, not because of RULES but the GOODNESS OF THEIR HEARTS." gently caress me with a rake, I knew you believed some crazy poo poo but to see you tell it to me personally just.. Blows my loving mind. You have turned governmental efforts to combat poverty- which I'll grant you are sometimes hosed up because bureaucracy CAN be inefficient at times but exists for really good reasons like checks and balances- into a sport for the wealthy to do on their off days, when they FEEL like it. Except in your world there's no state taxes or anything to incentivize them to do this with tax breaks, we're relying expressly on how they feel that day to determine whether or not we live or die. Because we have no economic power, and therefore no influence, and no protection, no property save for ourselves which we have already agreed is worth fuckall we are relying solely on the largesse of the powerful and provably uncaring for the most part idle rich. So relying solely on the largesse of the minority of powerful and rich people who DO care. Holy drat. I can't tell if this is insane or flat out suicidal. It's like saying we can trust the sharks to take care of the tuna.
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Oct 2, 2014 08:18
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Rhjamiz posted:It sounds more like you are attempting to describe something other than slavery. Once you contract into slavery, you can't just break contract and be like, "peace!" or that renders the whole institution moot. No contractor is going to fork over cash to pay your debts if you can then just declare bankruptcy and walk away at any time.
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Oct 2, 2014 08:18
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jrodefeld posted:Almost all major wars in the history of civilization were financed partially or mostly or entirely through inflation. That is just a historical fact. In fact, can you name a single major war of aggression that was fought in the past several centuries that was not financed with paper money? Rome was almost at its maximum extent before it started taking the concept of currency seriously. It conquered for ideological reasons, for slaves, for goods and precious metals. It did that without any paper money, without minting many coins at all, and inflation wasn't a thing until way late, as the Empire started falling apart. Nobles and various feudal entities fought wars by borrowing coinage, and/or by paying in loot, or just loving stealing money from undesirables with wealth or confiscating land. In Europe, banknotes (proto paper money) only started becoming a thing in the late 1690s. There are a metric asston of European wars before the 1800s that predate widespread paper money. Jesus wept, you're so ignorant it hurts my brain. Corvinus fucked around with this message at 08:40 on Oct 2, 2014 |
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Oct 2, 2014 08:20
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twodot posted:Your stance appears to be "contracting into slavery is impossible", in which case why do we care about the impossible to have contractual slavery? I've been saying this whole time, as long as we have a modern understanding of contracts, I don't see how slavery could be a problem. If it's not a problem because the version of slavery you are talking is outright impossible with modern contracts, that's fine with me. Hmm, therefore if Libertarianism allows for people to sell themselves, then the law needs to be altered to properly permit slavery to exist.
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Oct 2, 2014 08:22
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Corvinus posted:Hmm, therefore if Libertarianism allows for people to sell themselves, then the law needs to be altered to properly permit slavery to exist.
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Oct 2, 2014 08:25
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Y'all are like, a oval office hair away from discovering the concept of wage slavery
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Oct 2, 2014 08:27
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twodot posted:Your stance appears to be "contracting into slavery is impossible", in which case why do we care about the impossible to have contractual slavery? I've been saying this whole time, as long as we have a modern understanding of contracts, I don't see how slavery could be a problem. If it's not a problem because the version of slavery you are talking is outright impossible with modern contracts, that's fine with me. Look, either we are going with modern laws, and therefore (presumably) any contract where you sign away your freedom forever is automatically invalidated, or you are talking about a system that allows it and presumably enforces its contracts. By the very nature of the beast, you cannot break a slavery contract. But yes, SedanChair, I would probably agree that we are all currently wage slaves and would love to break this system.
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Oct 2, 2014 08:35
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jrodefeld posted:Almost all major wars in the history of civilization were financed partially or mostly or entirely through inflation. That is just a historical fact. In fact, can you name a single major war of aggression that was fought in the past several centuries that was not financed with paper money? I'll give you an easy one: Spain conquered the many kingdoms of South America without having to leverage inflation or new taxes to wage these wars. The inflation came later, after years of importing boatloads of silver and gold from the conquered peoples Any organization with a sufficiently large war chest (whether from taxes or from profits gathered from the people that you protect under a DRO contract) can wage war upon another organization and profit from it through the direct acquisition of goods. Hell, we even have an example of a non-state entity waging war during that time period: the Dutch East India Company waged war many times throughout its history despite being a private organization that did not A) raise taxes or B) print fiat currency
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Oct 2, 2014 08:41
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twodot posted:What? No it doesn't. You can enter into a contract where you agree to do whatever someone says for forever. Then you can break that contract. I don't understand what your confusion is. If you think Libertarianism wants/needs contracts that are somehow enforced through the laws of physics I don't know what to tell you. Doesn't breaking a contract violate the non-aggression principle, according to most libertarians? This seems like the most obvious test of personal property rights. If you own yourself, then you have to be able to sell yourself. If at any time you can just break a contract in which you sold yourself, then you can't ever really sell yourself, which renders the entire idea of personal ownership moot. QuarkJets fucked around with this message at 08:46 on Oct 2, 2014 |
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Oct 2, 2014 08:44
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Rhjamiz posted:you are talking about a system that allows it and presumably enforces its contracts. twodot posted:The real question is "What do we do with people who break their slavery contract?". There are certainly horrible answers to this question, but applying our existing rules for contracts <snip> seems pretty ok to me. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Specific_performance (You could still seek damages of course) I completely agree that contractual slavery would be horrible under certain systems, but without a specific proposed system, the current system seems to handle it just fine. quote:By the very nature of the beast, you cannot break a slavery contract. edit: QuarkJets posted:Doesn't breaking a contract violate the non-aggression principle, according to most libertarians? twodot fucked around with this message at 08:48 on Oct 2, 2014 |
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Oct 2, 2014 08:45
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Caros posted:Goddamnit, I realy wanted to loving sleep but I can't let this go unanswered. What moral claim does anyone else have on my justly earned property? Whether or not a wealth transfer is popular or not has no bearing on the legitimacy of the transfer. And why on earth would you assume that the private sector who need to match the State dollar for dollar in replacing State monopolized social services with private alternatives? Do you honestly have such a low opinion of our species that you think the only feasible way we have prevent our grandparents corpses from piling up on the streets is to point guns at everyone and steal their property, give it to an "elite" who are above the moral laws that govern mere mortals and permit them to redistribute it in politically motivated ways? That is the best the human species has to offer to deal with taking care of the sick and elderly? Honestly? Furthermore how can you prove that you are not falling for the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy? Sure people are doing better now than they were a century ago but how do you know that this progress is due to State actions? And, more importantly, how can you be sure that had the market worked in the absence of State intervention, high taxation and redistribution, that poverty rates wouldn't have continued to decline at a faster rate than under the Great Society and War on Poverty? It is not as if poverty rates were stagnant for the first fifty to sixty years of the twentieth century and only started to shift once government intervened. It is a matter of historical record that the poverty rate fell substantially every single decade. Here is the poverty rate since 1959: http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/images/2010/Sep/s17-pove-char-480.png Here is a relevant link: http://www.economicsjunkie.com/us-poverty-rate-how-the-great-society-programs-reversed-its-decline/ Since poverty rates were declining every single year before the Federal Government created their welfare programs, why would we not expect these numbers to continue to decline?
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Oct 2, 2014 08:47
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Whacky Libertarian logic, ok, whatever. But as sort of a history buff, being so loving wrong as to be not even wrong, and then repeatedly asserting falsehoods just gets under my skin. I'd be happy as a clam if jrod was mod challenged to prove his absurd historical assertions (with backing evidence) or be banned. Maybe I'll go find a geology thread somewhere and straight-faced claim that the earth is flat and plate tectonics are a hoax. Then proceed to work myself into a huff when I get laughed out.
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Oct 2, 2014 08:48
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twodot posted:Unless you are proposing rewriting physics, contracts can always be broken, the only question is what happens after the contract is broken. Well sparky, if we go by "all of human history" as to what will happen? The slave dies. Possibly dies HORRIBLY. A "merciful" master might just cripple or hobble them, a generous one might just have them savagely beaten. But if you keep slaves you must have measures in place to KEEP them- and that means the implied threat of violence. Otherwise there's not much to keep them in place aside from some ridiculous sense of "honor" or "fairness."
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Oct 2, 2014 08:48
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Reverend Catharsis posted:Well sparky, if we go by "all of human history" as to what will happen? The slave dies. Possibly dies HORRIBLY. A "merciful" master might just cripple or hobble them, a generous one might just have them savagely beaten. But if you keep slaves you must have measures in place to KEEP them- and that means the implied threat of violence. Otherwise there's not much to keep them in place aside from some ridiculous sense of "honor" or "fairness."
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Oct 2, 2014 08:50
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jrodefeld posted:Do you honestly have such a low opinion of our species that you think the only feasible way we have prevent our grandparents corpses from piling up on the streets is to point guns at everyone and steal their property, give it to an "elite" who are above the moral laws that govern mere mortals and permit them to redistribute it in politically motivated ways? Seems to have worked pretty drat well so far. The alternatives, which had been in use since time immemorial, were to either have enough kids willing to care for you (while voluntarily becoming a burden for them) when you become old or die. I mean I do agree with you in a sense: it would be way better to just have a guaranteed minimum income for everyone instead of only the very old. But if you think that an ancap society would do better at caring for the elderly than what we have now, then you're insane and have no knowledge of history
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Oct 2, 2014 08:54
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twodot posted:I definitely agree that a system where we killed people for breaking contracts would be a bad system. I would also say that a system where people were killed for breaking contracts couldn't meaningfully have consensual contracts, so I'm not sure it's relevant to the situation. If, for whatever insane reason, we lived in a society that enforced modern slave contracts, it would probably function much like Legal Guardianship. You would probably become, effectively, a Man-Child in a legal sense. Except worse, because now you have no legal rights, no personal rights in this society. The contract holder owns you, and running away just gets you brought back to your legal guardians. Again, as far as society is concerned, there is no breaking this. You can run away all you like, but you'll just be dragged back to your parents. Rhjamiz fucked around with this message at 08:56 on Oct 2, 2014 |
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Oct 2, 2014 08:54
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Rhjamiz posted:If, for whatever insane reason, we lived in a society that enforced modern slave contracts, it would probably function much like Legal Guardianship. You would probably become, effectively, a Man-Child in a legal sense. Except worse, because now you have no legal rights, no personal rights in this society. The contract holder owns you, and running away just gets you brought back to your legal guardians. "What if someone sold themselves into slavery" "The sort of slavery you are talking about would be impossible under any sane contract system" "What if we were operating under an insane contract system?" Obviously we shouldn't do that.
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Oct 2, 2014 08:59
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jrodefeld posted:It is not as if poverty rates were stagnant for the first fifty to sixty years of the twentieth century and only started to shift once government intervened. It is a matter of historical record that the poverty rate fell substantially every single decade. EVERY SINGLE YEAR for the four years before the Great Society bills were passed and by only about 1% per year, please don't look at the data too closely and notice that the poverty rate fell twice as fast after those programs were passed oh god Look, I agree that we can't be 100% certain that any particular program has had its intended effect. It's entirely possible that programs like Medicaid and Food Stamps did not significantly reduce poverty, but merely made the symptoms easier to bear with while people got back on their feet. But we can't go backwards. The poverty rate did fall faster after the implementation of the Great Society. Was it actually due to those bills? Probably, but we can't be totally sure, so I guess we should just get rid of all state programs and let the free market sort everything out QuarkJets fucked around with this message at 09:08 on Oct 2, 2014 |
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Oct 2, 2014 09:01
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twodot posted:That's bad, but I don't see how consensual slavery makes it worse (assuming we have sane mechanisms to deal with people who break their slavery contracts). You don't? Pretend your boss is a very well endowed gay man and likes the look of your rear end. Do you see a difference now? Now pretend its possible for you to be made pregnant if a gay man has anal sex with you. Still not seeing any differences between actual slavery and wage slavery? Let's try this again. Imagine the world you've been describing only instead of being yourself you are my youngest half sister ( she's 4. I'm coming up on 40). Your name is Gabrielle and you are the latest failure from the latest wife of a woman-hating man who keeps trying to father a proper ( not gay ) son and keeps getting girls. Since there is no state, there is nothing forcing him to send you to school. So he won't. You'll never learn to read, write, or do complex math. You will be taught to cook, clean, submit, and get some tutelage in things like playing piano to make you properly decorative. Disobedience will be met with corporal punishment. Probably worse than I got since you won't be going to school so no need to keep up appearances. Since you won't have learned to read you won't have access to books that describe a better life, open the doors of the mind, and allow self improvement through study. Since you won't go to school you won't have the positive attention and encouragement of state paid school teachers who believe you aren't inherently worthless and stupid due to being female thus offering a counter to the messages you get at home. And on top of it, if you try to leave home in an-cap libertopia you face the added burden of not being able to pay your DRO contract anymore so the stateless society actively solidifies his control over you where the state run society I grew up in was instrumental in giving me the tools by which I gained my freedom. You cool with that? If not, how would your stateless society ensure children get access to education even when they have malicious or neglectful parents? If so, is there any level of a use where you draw the line or dies anything go rather than pay taxes to prevent it?
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Oct 2, 2014 09:03
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McAlister posted:You don't? quote:If not, how would your stateless society
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Oct 2, 2014 09:06
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twodot posted:On what basis are you making this assertion? To my limited knowledge, this sort of thing requires a court to find you incompetent, if that did happen, I don't really have a problem with someone being granted guardianship. If we're supposing a system where you can by contract give away rights, we are once again in a system far outside of how contracts currently work. From my view the discussion is unfolding like this: So then we've concluded that voluntary slavery is illegal (and for good reason) as well as impossible under any system that doesn't actively enforce it (obviously). Cool. I'm glad we agree?
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Oct 2, 2014 09:08
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twodot posted:Presumably my boss wants to have sex with me, and presumably I don't want to have sex with him. So he attempts to have sex with me and I stop him. What is different between here and a regular boss that sexually harasses me? Actual slaves don't get to say no, dear. Read better.
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Oct 2, 2014 09:12
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McAlister posted:Actual slaves don't get to say no, dear. twodot posted:The real question is "What do we do with people who break their slavery contract?".
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Oct 2, 2014 09:15
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twodot posted:How many times do I have to re-post this? Voluntary Slavery is impossible under a contract system that doesn't allow people to do awful poo poo because, gasp, Voluntary Slavery is awful poo poo.
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Oct 2, 2014 09:18
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jrodefeld posted:What moral claim does anyone else have on my justly earned property? The maintenance of the system that permitted you to earn that wealth in the first place. For example, you mentioned you work from home using the Internet due to health problems. The core technologies that make the Internet possible were invented by the US gov on the taxpayers dime and then they laid the Internet backbone with more taxpayer money. You are now using this public infrastructure to keep yourself afloat. You owe society for creating it and allowing you to use it. Oh, and you won't get a cent in charity from me if you end taxes. Not one red cent. I'm perfectly willing to pay my fair share in a taxing situation where we are all working together and doing our fair share. But like hell am I going to shoulder not simply my share but also your share. If you get to skip out on your obligations then I'm skipping out on mine too. But you'll get a poo poo ton more charity from me if you up my top marginal rate to something punitive. If I can't keep the money anyway i'd rather direct its use so I'll give all the top bracket away to my preferred charities rather than pay punitive rates.
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Oct 2, 2014 09:27
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So, many pages later, it seems like my response to "How does the Libertarian model of voluntary contracts between employees and employers deal with the fact that the relationship between labor and wages doesn't follow a 101-level supply/demand curve?" seems to be "If I could understand this question I wouldn't be a Libertarian".
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Oct 2, 2014 09:38
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twodot posted:How many times do I have to re-post this? In the current system my body isn't my bosses property, I'm not breaking a contract if I say no, and if he retaliates against me for saying no I have the possibility of suing him for it so that the bad poo poo happens to him, not me. In your system your rear end is literally, legally, your bosses property. Whatever financial distress coerced you into signing the slave contract is still present because part of the definition of the word "slave" is not being paid for your work so unless its time for libertarian word definition roulette again your money problems haven't gone away. Not only does saying "no" have vastly worse repercussions as an actual slave than it does as a mere wage slave, you also lose the moral high ground because having sold your physical body to him you can't criticize what he does with his own property. Furthermore, you realize all that blather about contract breaking won't save you from rape, right? He's not going to ask politely and respect a declaration of contract breaking. Maybe he'll drug your gruel and you'll just wake up with a sore rear end and an std. Won't be a crime. Your rear end was legally his property. Unlike wage slavery where that is definitely a crime. Edit: typo and double quote. Double edit: Still not getting a libertarian explanation about how children are guaranteed access to education in libertopia at least as good as what the state provides now. McAlister fucked around with this message at 09:46 on Oct 2, 2014 |
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Oct 2, 2014 09:40
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jrodefeld posted:Almost all major wars in the history of civilization were financed partially or mostly or entirely through inflation. That is just a historical fact. In fact, can you name a single major war of aggression that was fought in the past several centuries that was not financed with paper money? Hey, can you provide examples of a stateless society fending off a better funded state-backed aggressor like I asked you three pages ago? You don't get to shift the burden of proof on the poo poo you pull out of your rear end.
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Oct 2, 2014 09:48
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jrodefeld, are you the sort who changes his mind when confronted with better arguments, or are you the kind of person who would ignore a better argument to maintain his original position? I'd like to join the discussion with you but if I'm willing to change my mind when confronted with good arguments or evidence and you are not, it would be a somewhat disingenuous debate.
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Oct 2, 2014 13:09
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