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ThirdPartyView posted:Praxeology is the best ideology: "Everything I say is true because it is true!" Well duh, if it wasn't true then he wouldn't say that it's true, now would he? It just follows logically when you think about it. *the sound of synapses fusing* jrodefeld posted:I find it hard to believe that in this age of information, with smartphones and the internet constantly evolving, that a lack of information would be a major problem. We know, your incapacity to see glaring flaws in your own argumentation is a serious, though hilarious, problem.
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Oct 5, 2014 21:56
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I don't think it's fair to say "you can't be rich and moral"- even if you're disgustingly wealthy you can only do so much with that wealth. Sure you can give lots of it away but if every wealthy person suddenly liquidated their assets and dumped it into helping the poor, most of our economy would actually collapse. The majority of wealth itself is tied up into non-cash assets that rely on continuous, effectively permanent, investments. Companies, businesses, trade relations, all that poo poo would collapse. Could the wealthy be doing a lot more with this instead of just auto-moneying themselves even more? Sure, no argument there, but just "collapsing it all into liquid assets for immediate expenditure into helping others" wouldn't really work. The way the wealth is all tied up would just tear everything to pieces. The better answer is steady incremental changes to the system with incentive systems for helping others by using that wealth and criminalizing and penalizing harmful exploitative practices and standards. We want a robust and healthy economic system here. Just taking it all away would be destructive. Limiting the ability of money to buy influence and political power alone would accomplish more than just taking 90% of say Warren Buffett's money away to spend it all. e: also I would suggest we don't go down the slope of "oh well your ancestors made you wealthy so you're as guilty as they are." If we follow THAT train of logic then gently caress everyone is guilty of everything and that's just non-conducive to getting a loving thing done as everyone starts bickering over who's guilty of what for their forebears' actions. Sins of the father are not the sins of the son- sins of the son are theirs alone. If they choose to use their ancestry to be dicks then THAT is on their heads, the accident of birth alone to a wealthy family does not automagically create guilt. Reverend Catharsis fucked around with this message at 22:02 on Oct 5, 2014 |
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Oct 5, 2014 21:59
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But but I printed up all these armbands and sharpened the machetes already. 
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Oct 5, 2014 22:02
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Who What Now posted:There is no such thing as a "just" rich person. All the rich, without fail, got to where they are by unjustly stealing and exploiting from as many people as they could. One cannot both be moral and wealthy, and that you in fact equate the two as being inseparable shows your own morality is naive at best and much more likely repugnant at worst. At some point you stop accumulating wealth cleverly as a rich person and are just collecting wealth unto itself. Being Rich is not a mark of success at anything other than betrayal of the rest of humanity. Edit: jrodefeld posted:I find it hard to believe that in this age of information, with smartphones and the internet constantly evolving, that a lack of information would be a major problem. There is no internet or smart phones in your desired government as I've laid out repeatedly. GAME OVER. RuanGacho fucked around with this message at 22:10 on Oct 5, 2014 |
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Oct 5, 2014 22:03
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jrodefeld posted:I also suspect that there will be a possibility of appeal. If you felt your verdict was unfair you could appeal to another private arbitrator who was not connected with the DRO that rendered the verdict. If they overturned the previous verdict you would clear your name and the reputation of the DRO would be damaged. But it would cost more for you and the punishment or fine you make could escalate if you are found guilty again, since you would be drawing out the process. How does that make any sense? Why is it even vaguely in the interest of the judging DRO to let a private arbitrator that they did not contract with have juristdiction over the case?
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Oct 5, 2014 22:12
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Caros posted:Here, I'll repeat this for the upteenth time since you've still refused to acknowledge that I have said anything on the subject. If taxation is not theft I suppose I'll just start "taxing" my neighbors directly since I'll spend the money on socially beneficial things. You can use all the euphemisms that you like but that doesn't change the fact that taxation involves taking money from American through the threat or use of violence. Your argument is akin to me saying that this specific group of people are permitted to kill people who haven't ever harmed them or anyone else. But don't you dare all it murder! If anyone else in society killed someone in such a manner it would be called murder. But for this specific group of people, it is NOT murder. Morality must be universal for it to be logically consistent. If the State taking money from people under the threat of violence is legitimate then you must logically endorse the Red Cross doing the same thing. If not, you are being logically inconsistent. Also, "society" cannot determine that my property rights are invalid. I do not consent to this violence being perpetrated against me. If 60% of society wants to agree to a social contract, or to being subjugated by an authority, let them do it and keep me out of it entirely. You know, "society" has determined that black people ought to be lynched. Since "society" decided that black people have no property in their own bodies, then that action is clearly not murder and is excusable, right? Caros posted:
I know well about Gabriel Kolko's views. The New Left had a lot of good attributes to it and a lot to recommend it. I find it quite strange that you think that libertarians like Rothbard should not use the historical work of someone like Kolko because their ultimate end goals for society are different. On this particular issue, Kolko and leftists like him had much in common with libertarian anarchists and laissez faire radicals of the early 20th century. I really strongly believe that the condemnation of corporatism and crony capitalism is quite the same between market anarchists and radical leftists. I don't know all the specifics of Kolko's politics, but many leftists are anti Statists as well, they just proposed left-anarchism, workers owning the means of production, egalitarianism and things like that. But their insights into the failures of the current regime of State and Corporate collusion is as insightful as any libertarian in my view. Plus it certainly bolsters my argument to point out that a central position taken by libertarians is shared by other accomplished intellectuals and historians. If Rothbard says something, you could criticize him of interpreting history selectively to conform to his ideological views. If a historian with opposing views, a defender of Socialism, comes to the same conclusion about a historical event, that only lends credibility that that interpretation of history is correct.
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Oct 5, 2014 22:13
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jrodefeld posted:I find it hard to believe that in this age of information, with smartphones and the internet constantly evolving, that a lack of information would be a major problem. Argumentum ad Ignorantiam or Argument from Incredulity - This is just about textbook for either of these. I find it hard to believe, therefore I don't feel the need to actually address the point in any meaningful sense.
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Oct 5, 2014 22:15
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Who What Now posted:There is no such thing as a "just" rich person. All the rich, without fail, got to where they are by unjustly stealing and exploiting from as many people as they could. One cannot both be moral and wealthy, and that you in fact equate the two as being inseparable shows your own morality is naive at best and much more likely repugnant at worst. Wow, a straight up Marxist. You're going to have to make a pretty strong argument as to why becoming wealthy and being moral are mutually exclusive things. You've stated them as facts but you haven't offered anything in the way of evidence or even a logically compelling argument. Suppose I invent the automobile, or I'm like Henry Ford and innovate and improve the manufacturing process such that I am the first to make cars affordable for the masses. I put my product on the market and people buy it in overwhelming numbers. This makes me quite a lot of money. What did I do wrong? What about this scenario makes me an immoral person? Who did I exploit? By turning a profit on creating the first mass produced automobile, I sent a signal that encouraged others to get into this line of production and serve the demand in the market for this new product. I don't know how good your reading comprehension is, but I never equated "rich" with "moral". The post you are referring to actually made it explicitly clear that I was differentiating between those who earn their wealth legitimately, by not using force, and those who earn their wealth illegitimately. People have different abilities, different intelligence levels, and different opportunities in their lives. This naturally means that some will be more accomplished than others. This doesn't make them better people. But it also doesn't mean that we can steal their property from them.
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Oct 5, 2014 22:37
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jrodefeld posted:Wow, a straight up Marxist. You're going to have to make a pretty strong argument as to why becoming wealthy and being moral are mutually exclusive things. You've stated them as facts but you haven't offered anything in the way of evidence or even a logically compelling argument. Your very method of spreading everything you're wrong about is statist and you've yet to address how it exists in your suggested societal structure. Hurry up and explain how the internet exists by your methodology. For every 5 minutes you take to reply I'm adding 1 BTC to your bill for breach of contract.
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Oct 5, 2014 22:43
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jrodefeld posted:Also, "society" cannot determine that my property rights are invalid. I do not consent to this violence being perpetrated against me. If 60% of society wants to agree to a social contract, or to being subjugated by an authority, let them do it and keep me out of it entirely. With society, property rights don't exist in the first place. Property rights only exist in relation to society, as they are set of rules for governing the interaction of people and objects in a society. The fact that you have been brought up in a way that makes you strongly internalise these rules does not make them natural rights. What's wrong with the following view of the State (largely inspired by http://world.std.com/~mhuben/faq.html): The State is a big DRO that owns a large amount of territory. People who voluntarily choose to remain on this territory implicitly consent to the authority of the StateDRO, including laws, taxes, etc. (If you're unhappy with the "implicit contract" part of this, remember that the StateDRO owns the land, so anyone inside it is trespassing and violating the property rights of the StateDRO). Those who do not consent are free to leave and find another StateDRO or unclaimed territory to mix their labour with. The incentive to stay is the opportunity to do business, be protected by the police and legal system, and various rights like freedom of speech and the right to vote. As a condition of owning land inside the StateDRO, landowners agree to waive certain ownership rights regarding that land, so their ownership of it is not considered "true" ownership by your definition. Those who are born in the territory of a state are considered unable to consent to such a contract until they reach the age of majority, until which time their parents and the StateDRO both have some custodial rights and responsibilities (laid down in the law of the StateDRO). When they are old enough to consent, they may withdraw their consent by leaving the territory of that StateDRO and finding another. In what sense is the above interpretation of life in modern social democracy incompatible with your political philosophy?
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Oct 5, 2014 22:47
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Jrod also argued that filthy rich got to be filthy rich with the state. Nevermind feudal lords and warlords of old that were filthy rich, perpetuated war to get richer and never needed a state.
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Oct 5, 2014 22:50
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jrodefeld posted:Wow, a straight up Marxist. You're going to have to make a pretty strong argument as to why becoming wealthy and being moral are mutually exclusive things. You've stated them as facts but you haven't offered anything in the way of evidence or even a logically compelling argument. Wow, if I didn't know better I'd say you were trolling, but you really do lack even the most basic level of self-awareness, don't you? jrodefeld posted:Also, "society" cannot determine that my property rights are invalid. I do not consent to this violence being perpetrated against me. If 60% of society wants to agree to a social contract, or to being subjugated by an authority, let them do it and keep me out of it entirely. Planes leave for Somalia every single day. Or any number of other nations that have very very weak States. You're free to actually put your money where your mouth is and go Galt from this State-run hellhole, but somehow I doubt you'll do it. What you don't want to admit is that you love everything that the State gives you, stability in your life, basic protections, everything that makes modern life possible really, but you don't want to pay a dime for any of it. You want to be a leech on society, taking as much from it as you can while giving as little as possible back in return. You simply aren't honest enough to admit it, and you erroneously believe that you can take a moral high ground to justify your wish to be a parasite by cloaking yourself in articles and books from Libertarian authors. Who What Now fucked around with this message at 23:00 on Oct 5, 2014 |
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Oct 5, 2014 22:50
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jrodefeld posted:If taxation is not theft I suppose I'll just start "taxing" my neighbors directly since I'll spend the money on socially beneficial things. You can use all the euphemisms that you like but that doesn't change the fact that taxation involves taking money from American through the threat or use of violence. Your argument is akin to me saying that this specific group of people are permitted to kill people who haven't ever harmed them or anyone else. But don't you dare all it murder! If anyone else in society killed someone in such a manner it would be called murder. But for this specific group of people, it is NOT murder. Morality must be universal for it to be logically consistent. If the State taking money from people under the threat of violence is legitimate then you must logically endorse the Red Cross doing the same thing. If not, you are being logically inconsistent. Also, "society" cannot determine that my property rights are invalid. I do not consent to this violence being perpetrated against me. If 60% of society wants to agree to a social contract, or to being subjugated by an authority, let them do it and keep me out of it entirely. You know, "society" has determined that black people ought to be lynched. Since "society" decided that black people have no property in their own bodies, then that action is clearly not murder and is excusable, right?[/quote] Wow, you sure did shut down my argument based on a single sentence I had referring you to previous arguments. Now how about you go back and try and rebut the paragraphs long arguments in which I explained this in detail. You know what, gently caress it, I'll explain it again. We both agree that in your libertopia that people are permitted to use violence defensively. This includes 'defensively' removing people from their property. However, despite your assertion of universal morals, the determination of what belongs to who is very much a thing determined by society. You might track it back through self-ownership and homesteading, but the fact is that your 'morality' needs to be accepted by the vast majority of people for it to have any effect. That is to say, if you attempted to apply your homesteading theory today, whether it be in the USA or Somalia or anywhere else, it would only be effective if it were already accepted by other people. It doesn't matter that you say that it is universally true, the only determining factor on whether your use of force to defend your property is successful is the agreement of those around you. Now there is two options here: 1. You can accept what I've stated above is true. or 2. You can prove to me that there is some way of implementing your moral view of property rights on society without society agreeing with them. It's possible that you are going to come up with some insanely creative never seen before argument to explain how 2 is correct. For the purposes of this post and explanation I will assume you do not. If we assume that option #1 is true, then we have agreed that property rights ultimately derive from an agreement between people. If people agree something belongs to you, then you are allowed to defend it. If people do not, then your defensive force would be seen as inappropriate at best. This is pretty much the whole basis behind our current set of property laws which derive from hairless monkeys trying to decide who owns what rather than some odd universal standard. Now since we agree that property is decided as an agreement between people, we can extend that to government. Just like people can agree between one another about what belongs to whom, they can also agree on what behavior is socially acceptable. Murder isn't unacceptable because of some universal moral restraint, but because everyone agrees that it is unacceptable. This is why there in fact was a time when it was perfectly okay to murder a black person, as disturbing as that is today. Morality is subjective. Stealing is wrong because people agree that it is wrong. Taxation is not wrong because people have decided that it is in fact, not wrong. Really I could go on but the more I type the more I realize that this sort of argument is one of the most pointless. We can argue about the minimum wage, or social security etc, about policy and we might get a teeny-tiny bit somewhere. But you have a world view in which your morality is absolute, which is an almost religious view and one I have zero chance of shaking you from. quote:I know well about Gabriel Kolko's views. The New Left had a lot of good attributes to it and a lot to recommend it. I find it quite strange that you think that libertarians like Rothbard should not use the historical work of someone like Kolko because their ultimate end goals for society are different. On this particular issue, Kolko and leftists like him had much in common with libertarian anarchists and laissez faire radicals of the early 20th century. Except for the blatant part in which he explains in detail how he does not agree with you and in fact finds your ideology so revolting that he would actively be leading the charge against you. You and Kolko have next to nothing in common in general and when it comes to practical solutions you run directly counter. quote:I really strongly believe that the condemnation of corporatism and crony capitalism is quite the same between market anarchists and radical leftists. I don't know all the specifics of Kolko's politics, but many leftists are anti Statists as well, they just proposed left-anarchism, workers owning the means of production, egalitarianism and things like that. But their insights into the failures of the current regime of State and Corporate collusion is as insightful as any libertarian in my view. His 'insights' are wrong for the same that the 'insight' of many of your historians are wrong. Kolko approaches history with an ideological bent and unsurprisingly gets answers and finds connections that agree with the picture he is trying to paint. When you look at the history of the great depression as a whole you don't find this sort of thing because that isn't the goal of most historians.
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Oct 5, 2014 22:58
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bokkibear posted:With society, property rights don't exist in the first place. Property rights only exist in relation to society, as they are set of rules for governing the interaction of people and objects in a society. The fact that you have been brought up in a way that makes you strongly internalise these rules does not make them natural rights. I asked this exact same argument quite a while ago, and I'm eager to see if Jrodefeld has an answer for it. JROD! Answer this post!
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Oct 5, 2014 23:04
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Vahakyla posted:Jrod also argued that filthy rich got to be filthy rich with the state. Nevermind feudal lords and warlords of old that were filthy rich, perpetuated war to get richer and never needed a state. But they were the state...
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Oct 5, 2014 23:11
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jrodefeld posted:If taxation is not theft I suppose I'll just start "taxing" my neighbors directly since I'll spend the money on socially beneficial things. You can use all the euphemisms that you like but that doesn't change the fact that taxation involves taking money from American through the threat or use of violence. YOU can't tax your neighbor because you do not have the authority to do so. It's like this. At work, my boss can tell me what to do, but I can't tell my boss what to do, nor can I just tell my coworkers what to do. My boss can move me to another team, but I cannot move my boss to another team, nor can I move my coworkers to another team. Why? Because my boss has been granted the authority to do such things while I have not. You do not have the authority to tax. Now, at this stage, I won't get into a discussion about where the state's authority comes from, because that's besides the point. Most people in our society recognizes the government's right to demand that we act or behave in a certain manner and dole out the consequences if we fail to meet those expectations. There will always be a debate about that authority and the extent of that authority, but our society believes this authority exists, for the most part. Now, I do want to address this, because it's a Libertarian canard, and it's a frustrating one at best, to say taxation is based upon the threat of violence is absurd. Yes. You can have "violence" perpetrated against you if you don't pay your taxes, but only if you go so far. At some level, for every action, violence will be perpetrated against me. For example, my boss threatens me with violence all the time. She asks me to do my job, and if I don't my job, I will be fired. If I get fired, I will not make any money, and I will run out of my money. I will not be able to pay for food and housing, and so I will die of starvation or exposure on the streets of my city. Ergo, my boss is threatening to starve me or leave me to die in the elements! quote:Your argument is akin to me saying that this specific group of people are permitted to kill people who haven't ever harmed them or anyone else. But don't you dare all it murder! If anyone else in society killed someone in such a manner it would be called murder. But for this specific group of people, it is NOT murder. Do you think about what you say before you say it? Do you examine your arguments? Because I looked at your argument for five seconds, and then came up with my authority argument. So, yes, I can be logically consistent and say the Red Cross does not have the authority to tax. quote:Also, "society" cannot determine that my property rights are invalid. I do not consent to this violence being perpetrated against me. If 60% of society wants to agree to a social contract, or to being subjugated by an authority, let them do it and keep me out of it entirely. First off, the right to life and the right to property are two different rights. I guess if you really want to make your argument, you claim that killing a person is violating the property of their body, but that's... troublesome at best. Especially since bodies are not property, since they do not function in any way, shape, or form like property does. For example, I cannot trade my body for goods and services (prostitutes trade the act of sex). I cannot sell my body. I cannot give my body to another person. I guess, once I'm dead, I could possibly do that, but then I'm dead. My body is no longer part of this mortal coil. But while I'm alive, and in a pre-lynched state, my body is not property, and to say that it is really just... I don't know. Secondly, your rights are essentially determined by society, since without recognition, your rights mean nothing. And in fact, your rights are often times forfeited. For example, if I commit an act of capital murder in the state of Texas, my right to life has been forfeited. The State can take my life! The state may seize my property under certain conditions. The state can limit my right of free association. They can remove my right to move about freely. They can even take my liberty and put me into prison. So, if you say you have a right to property, but nobody else believes you, then do you really have that right? Now, maybe from a moral standpoint, depending if it is a natural right or not, but in essence, no, you don't have that right. So, while you can protect your right to your property, if me and my tribe want it, we can just kill you. One of the functions of the State is to protect your rights and assert them for you. Taxation is a way for the state to say "You have benefited from our services, and therefor, in order to preserve society, we must take this money from you." By living here, you agree to those rules. I mean seriously. Why don't you move to a place without taxation, or at the very least, with a minimal state? jrodefeld posted:I find it hard to believe that in this age of information, with smartphones and the internet constantly evolving, that a lack of information would be a major problem. Do you know that there are websites dedicated to posting examples of people posting articles from the Onion and other satirical news sites and believing them to be real. Recently, one of my friends on Facebook was espousing about the evils of microwaves! Here, have a source! http://literallyunbelievable.org/ What evidence do you have that people are growing more sophisticated in fact checking? Yes, you might be doing that, but if the amount of websites out there dedicated to the evils of microwaves have anything to say to that... https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=microwaves+are+dangerous And hey! Go into Walgreens and see if they have homeopathic medications on sale. And did you hear about those parents who aren't vaccinating your kids. And yes, the FDA does gently caress up, but guess what, those drugs get pulled and recalled. And guess what - it's the exception, not the norm. Please, Jrodefeld. Before you post, please think about what you're saying. Take a look at reality. You can't argue that you're right from a position of total fantasy because it works better with your worldview.
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Oct 5, 2014 23:25
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They aren't taxes, they're scaling contract fees.
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Oct 5, 2014 23:26
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Cemetry Gator posted:And hey! Go into Walgreens and see if they have homeopathic medications on sale. Actually, homeopathic medicine would never be successful on the free market because no rational self-interested consumer would pay to take placebos. You're so afraid that people would be bamboozled by homeopathic remedies without the state to protect you, but if you just consider it logically you'll see that's impossible because no one would buy it.
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Oct 5, 2014 23:34
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VitalSigns posted:Actually, homeopathic medicine would never be successful on the free market because no rational self-interested consumer would pay to take placebos. You're so afraid that people would be bamboozled by homeopathic remedies without the state to protect you, but if you just consider it logically you'll see that's impossible because no one would buy it. You forgot to mention that this is because people who are in pain make the most rational decisions of all.
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Oct 5, 2014 23:38
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VitalSigns posted:Actually, homeopathic medicine would never be successful on the free market because no rational self-interested consumer would pay to take placebos. You're so afraid that people would be bamboozled by homeopathic remedies without the state to protect you, but if you just consider it logically you'll see that's impossible because no one would buy it. Obviously, in Jrodefled's vision of society, all the stupid and gullible people that are loving up his arguments would die off and then the things that killed them would be unprofitable, so us smart people would be able to enjoy a perfect society where there are no wars and nobody ever fights with each other and when we do, we take them to private courts that will rule fairly because the idea of someone spending money to influence a decision is just unheard of, and then we all go home and give our money to the elderly so they don't starve to death.
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Oct 5, 2014 23:40
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asdf32 posted:Ok so the actual current support base for socialism/leftism is what? And don't answer by telling me it's the people you think would benefit from socialism. That's not necessarily the current base. A Pew survey published in 2011 found that people with incomes under $30k were more likely to have a positive view of "socialism" and a negative view of "capitalism" (as they understood the terms). Black and young people responded in the same way, and people with incomes over $75k were less than half as likely to favor socialism over Captalism. So basically what you'd expect. If you want to see a microcosm of this, look at the neighborhoods and ZIP codes where Sawant's votes came from: "Conlin, considered the establishment candidate, handily won nearly all the well-heeled waterfront neighborhoods, while the socialist Sawant ran strong in Seattle’s less-wealthy interior." There were exceptions, but overall poor people and minorities chose the socialist candidate. OwlBot 2000 fucked around with this message at 23:49 on Oct 5, 2014 |
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Oct 5, 2014 23:43
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OwlBot 2000 posted:A Pew survey published in 2011 found that people with incomes under $30k were more likely to have a positive view of "socialism" and a negative view of "capitalism" (as they understood the terms). Black and young people responded in the same way, and people with incomes over $75k were less than half as likely to favor socialism over Captalism. No no, unfettered capitalism is all the rage with the poor, and it's only coddled middle class whites who support social policies, which is why President Romney cleaned up among poor and minority voters, utterly crushing Barack Obama's support base consisting of well-fed white men from the suburbs.
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Oct 5, 2014 23:47
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jrodefeld posted:Wow, a straight up Marxist. You're going to have to make a pretty strong argument as to why becoming wealthy and being moral are mutually exclusive things. As I mentioned, it is pretty obviously impossible to morally be wealthy in an unfair system. You can't say that you deserved to win a competition when most competitors were at a disadvantage to begin with. Even if you didn't actively exploit anyone, you are still choosing to hold onto most/all of the rewards from a "victory" that many/most people couldn't have achieved in the first place. If it helps to break it down into a more simple scenario, use the analogy I gave. What about this is difficult to understand? edit: It isn't making the money that's immoral; it's choosing to keep enough of it that you're incredibly wealthy in a society where millions of people live in poverty. Having wealth - not making wealth - is immoral. Ytlaya fucked around with this message at 00:08 on Oct 6, 2014 |
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Oct 6, 2014 00:05
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I earned that land grandpappy won by vanquishing the savage red man. Why won't you statists just let me live in peace with my fellow man?
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Oct 6, 2014 00:12
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jrodefeld posted:Wow, a straight up Marxist. You're going to have to make a pretty strong argument as to why becoming wealthy and being moral are mutually exclusive things. You've stated them as facts but you haven't offered anything in the way of evidence or even a logically compelling argument. Any use of luxury goods is immoral and represents a betrayal. You and I are both guilty of spending money on personal luxuries when we could be using it to lift up the poor. As your expenses increase, your immorality increases. Now every once in a while you find somebody like Warren Buffett who lives a personally modest lifestyle, no more lavish than that of a doctor or a judge or something. He's a rare bird, wealth tends to corrupt you and make you prize the trappings of it.
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Oct 6, 2014 00:32
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OwlBot 2000 posted:A Pew survey published in 2011 found that people with incomes under $30k were more likely to have a positive view of "socialism" and a negative view of "capitalism" (as they understood the terms). As you said, nobody seems to know what socialism anymore. But in a generation basically nobody will care about THE GAYS or weed or most other culture war Moral Majority issues, which is consistent small government and is totally rad. But our peers pushing for/hopefully getting GMI is what will totally forestall any desire for a true red revolution, because their skewed idea of socialism will make them think they already won it. 
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Oct 6, 2014 01:47
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This poster loves police brutality, but only when its against minorities!
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If taxation is considered theft then a factory owner taking the excess worth of a workers labour absolutely is theft. Now, I already know what Jrod is going to say, because he's said it many times before, is that the worker has low time preference, and thus it is only fair that the owner should take that excess worth as his own as recompense for the "risk" of providing a product to consumers. And yet what he either doesn't understand or refused to acknowledge is that this logic applies equally well to the State. Taxation is fair recompense for taking on the risk of providing a stable foundation upon which all of society rests.
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Oct 6, 2014 01:57
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jrodefeld posted:Morality must be universal for it to be logically consistent. If the State taking money from people under the threat of violence is legitimate then you must logically endorse the Red Cross doing the same thing. If not, you are being logically inconsistent. This is the beating heart of the problem in my opinion. You keep thinking that 1) you are being totally consistent and that 2) rigid consistency is automatically a good thing. Consistency is nice but morality is morality, and doesn't have to be logical. This is something most of us have started grasping by age 5 at which point we know we're supposed to tell the truth but not tell grandpa he smells bad and always say we like our christmas present. I brought up the example earlier of balancing freedom of speech with other rights. How would your society deal with a criminal kingpin who's the head of a gang that's committing violence on others but hasn't personally done any of it himself? Can you punish him for being the obvious cause of violence, or do you have to leave him alone because he hasn't done it himself? OwlBot 2000 posted:A Pew survey published in 2011 found that people with incomes under $30k were more likely to have a positive view of "socialism" and a negative view of "capitalism" (as they understood the terms). Black and young people responded in the same way, and people with incomes over $75k were less than half as likely to favor socialism over Captalism. So basically what you'd expect. Well she's a Microsoft programmer. So there's that on my side. Some neighborhoods did flip sides. It would be more interested to have actual satistics on the individuals, instead of the neighborhoods. quote:As you can see, the patterns of voting and income do correlate. But look closely. The correlation isn’t perfect. Some well-to-do neighborhoods did in fact vote socialist. asdf32 fucked around with this message at 02:30 on Oct 6, 2014 |
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Oct 6, 2014 02:08
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asdf32 posted:This is the beating heart of the problem in my opinion. You keep thinking that 1) you are being totally consistent and that 2) rigid consistency is automatically a good thing. This is basically why I stopped midway through my explanation of it to him. JRodefeld seems to believe that morality can be logically determined and universally applied instead of just being a facet of what hairless monkeys agree is right and wrong. Like, I'd be curious to hear Jrodefeld's opinion on the morality of adultery, or abortion, or viewing child pornography or a million other things. Does he have universally derived logical decisions for all of this?
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Oct 6, 2014 02:12
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So basically, there are different degrees/types of libertarians, but past a certain point being libertarian absolutely requires ignoring history, and for that matter ignoring the present. The (usually ignored) response to a huge portion of liberterians' proposals is, "We already tried that. We (sort of) stopped because people died."
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Oct 6, 2014 02:18
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Caros posted:This is basically why I stopped midway through my explanation of it to him. JRodefeld seems to believe that morality can be logically determined and universally applied instead of just being a facet of what hairless monkeys agree is right and wrong. As long as you define morality as the generally agreed upon principles and social mores of a society you can fit a pretty workable logical framework around the term, but "because enough people said so and the right people didn't say no" is a highly unsatisfying conclusion. Accurate, but unsatisfying.
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Oct 6, 2014 02:20
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Caros posted:This is basically why I stopped midway through my explanation of it to him. JRodefeld seems to believe that morality can be logically determined and universally applied instead of just being a facet of what hairless monkeys agree is right and wrong. Jrod thinks the internet is powered by liberty and freedom, I dont know why anyone expects anything but gurgling between misses copy pastes. Also he now owes me $14,496 worth of BTC at current exchange rates. Tick tock Jrod. RuanGacho fucked around with this message at 02:31 on Oct 6, 2014 |
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Oct 6, 2014 02:28
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asdf32 posted:http://blogs.seattletimes.com/fyi-guy/2013/12/12/who-voted-for-socialist-sawant-income-map-has-some-surprises/ I already said the correlation wasn't perfect, but (as the article said, this is where I quoted it from) "Conlin, ... handily won nearly all the well-heeled waterfront neighborhoods, while the socialist Sawant ran strong in Seattle’s less-wealthy interior." In general, poorer people voted for Sawant and richer people voted for Conlin. Being poor makes you more likely (but not guaranteed!) to support Socialism, and being rich makes you less likely (but not guaranteed!) to oppose Socialism. People vote for candidates for many reasoIf somebody says "white men are richer than black women" you can't disprove it by pointing to Oprah and Beyonce.  Filtering out older white people from this chart (who grew up with racism, Reagan and McCarthyism) would make this correlation even more pronounced, but even here you can see that the poorer you are, the less likely you are to support capitalism and the more likely you are to support Socialism. So that handily disproves any suggestion that the white Middle Class is, has been or will be the primary support base for socialism. 
OwlBot 2000 fucked around with this message at 02:42 on Oct 6, 2014 |
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Oct 6, 2014 02:37
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Taxation is theft, but that's okay because it does good. Just like the starving child stealing bread. No action is wrong if it has a net benefit. Deciding that taxation is wrong because it is inherently wrong, and disregarding any positive consequences seems crazy. Why is stealing itself wrong? Because it hurts people? What if we came up with a form of stealing that benefited the people stolen from? Why would that be wrong? Taking another approach, stealing isn't permissible because if we permitted stealing, then ownership would have no meaning, and society as we know it would collapse. But, taxation does not have this problem, provided that the taxes are being spent on the common good. This kind of stealing doesn't have the same effect as the other kind of stealing. Morality is a social construct. It is consistent only as far as everyone must agree to the same rules in order for the rules to work. They are not fundamental or universal or even logical. I only think that killing other people is wrong because evolution decided that some animals do better when they work together, so they developed a tendency to help each other and an aversion to hurting each other. Morality is just how we describe the drives we have as a result of this evolutionary process.
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Oct 6, 2014 02:46
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OwlBot 2000 posted:A Pew survey published in 2011 found that people with incomes under $30k were more likely to have a positive view of "socialism" and a negative view of "capitalism" (as they understood the terms). Black and young people responded in the same way, and people with incomes over $75k were less than half as likely to favor socialism over Captalism. So basically what you'd expect. If I'm not mistaken, polls have shown pretty strong support for certain elements of socialism (such as universal healthcare) among all income levels when such things are framed with no reference to socialism.
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Oct 6, 2014 02:54
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So what is the support like for removing the minimum wage by income level? I know what it is for increasing it: "A majority of voters at all income levels support raising the minimum wage. Support is highest among those making less than $75,000 a year (77% favor an increase)." Sounds like just another policy that elitist, middle-class snobs think is good for poor people. Keep dreaming, leftists, poor people will never support policies that materially benefit them, no matter how much you want them to  I do not know why ASDF32wanted to argue that leftist economic policies are more popular with the white Middle Class than with people of color and the poor. It seems like an odd thing to believe unless you just hate socialists and think they could never be right about anything, but it's also very easy to disprove. OwlBot 2000 fucked around with this message at 03:08 on Oct 6, 2014 |
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Oct 6, 2014 03:02
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Dr. Stab posted:No action is wrong if it has a net benefit. Um careful,
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Oct 6, 2014 03:34
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RuanGacho posted:Jrod thinks the internet is powered by liberty and freedom, I dont know why anyone expects anything but gurgling between misses copy pastes. Also he now owes me $14,496 worth of BTC at current exchange rates. Tick tock Jrod. Didn't you know? The internet was created by the invention of ethernet, which was created by a private company. Point: Jrode
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Oct 6, 2014 03:37
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OwlBot 2000 posted:I do not know why ASDF32wanted to argue that leftist economic policies are more popular with the white Middle Class than with people of color and the poor. It seems like an odd thing to believe unless you just hate socialists and think they could never be right about anything, but it's also very easy to disprove. "College leftists" is the go-to critique of Conservatives who can't defend their ideas so they resort to pablum about Real America and make scoffing sounds about their opponents being affluent and out of touch, all the while slobbering on the balls of the idle rich. Dr. Stab posted:Taxation is theft, but that's okay because it does good. Just like the starving child stealing bread. That's a consequence of state meddling. If the state permitted a flourishing market in children, those young ones whose parents cannot afford to feed them will be sold to those eager to acquire a willing and able pair of little hands or asscheeks. Actually hey, how do children who are abused by their owners get protection? The owners obviously aren't going to be paying premiums on their behalf, so even if a DRO were to hear about it, it would obviously be a poor business decision to spend resources on an investigation without compensation, especially since it could involve a war with the child-owner's DRO, which would of course support the owner's right to use force to keep trespassers away from his property.
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Oct 6, 2014 04:00
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So, those upper brackets that go for socialism, why do they support it? Or to flip it, the lower brackets that went the other way, why did they do that? jrodefeld, I'm curious what you thought about the feudalism and the modern state inheriting old contracts and properties? You're hurting my feelings, I thought it was actually a legit clever point to spot. Or that all wealth and property are irrevocably stained with blood, that one keeps me up at night. I'll say that the weirdest thing about Libertarianism is that it makes me instinctively embrace Legalism, I guess as its logical antithesis. Qin DRO: coercion is humanity's friend; could I abandon a friend? I think it's the constant arguments about coercion and aggression framing the argument. If I slip into thinking like that, then the bleak conclusion is that while humans hate being coerced, they love being coercive. Even if they don't have power now, even the meekest person is wishing for an opportunity to kick the poo poo out of someone.
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Oct 6, 2014 04:39
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