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SedanChair posted:I can hear Caros typing from here You hear it off in the distance at first. Like a thousand chattering insects writhing over tiled ground, growing louder and more feral as it builds in intensity... Sadly tho I'm visiting my wife's awful parents. Mods please refrain from banning him until I get a few kicks in. Tia.
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Oct 9, 2015 19:32
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jrodefeld posted:Note to mods: You know who I am. I'm a libertarian who is staring his own thread, which is acceptable according to the rules, I assume? There are two reasons I want to start a specific thread rather than retread over the "other" libertarian thread and just post comments there. In the first place, I want this discussion to be more narrow in scope. And I want to say something at the beginning that everyone will have a chance to read. On Caros's thread, he specifically poisoned the well from the very beginning by writing an OP describing libertarianism and its adherents in an unflattering and, from my perspective, misleading way. By the time I first posted on that thread, there had already been something like two hundred pages of people making GBS threads on libertarianism before I had a chance to defend it. And since the thread was almost entirely directed at me in particular (it would not exist without my having posted here in the past), you can understand how I'd like to have a bit more discretion about the framing of the debate when I am outnumbered 30 to 1. I really want to touch on your whole post, but I am stuck phone posting for the foreseeable future so I'll stick to what I can demolish from here. First off I'd like to clear the air. I did not make the libertarian thread to attack libertarians, but because of this exact thin you are doing right now. Despite calling it the jrodefeld appreciation station you were on one of your hiatus' when I made the thread. It was actually made after a similar libertarian poster came in to preach and drop a knowledge bomb only to get his sorry rear end banned as you are like to do here. Let me make it clear, the libertarian thread is for your own protection. You went a full year without a banning or a probation because of my thread. So why am I saying this? Well because you are doing it again. I want you to take two seconds to go and look at the section of the forums and tell me if you notice a theme. We don't have a 'debate me on this issue' or 'lets talk about this'. We have auspol, uspol, Canada's debt thread etc. we have threads about substantive issues that are not tied to a specific person. You open your post by whining about the rules but I have to say jrod it still amazes me that after years, literal years of posting on something awful you don't know a thing about the community here. I expect the mods will ban you. You will keep up the thread for a week or so and then get angry, or busy or whatever and your thread will drop off and a mod will get annoyed. Make a real libertarian thread if you hate mine that much, but at least learn that maybe, just maybe we have a way of doing things around here. I mean for crying out loud you still haven't learned to tag your posts to prevent them from being labeled as shitposts. And as an aside, you joined the other thread 28 pages in at this time last year. A little different from 200 no?
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Oct 9, 2015 19:56
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eNeMeE posted:Why do countries with more government regulation have improved healthcare costs for comparable or superior results? The U.S. Is no true free market and if they would remove all regulations on health care then everyone could get it and it would be incredibly cheap. Duh.
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Oct 9, 2015 20:38
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paragon1 posted:make them want to gently caress Jenna Bush Do you not? That aside you guys have it all wrong. It was clearly a result of the Mercury poisoning jrodefeld got when he failed to get his amalgam fillings out in time.
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Oct 9, 2015 23:15
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paragon1 posted:I was gonna go with that but that would imply a successful career in prior movies and lol. There but for the grace of an s go I.
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Oct 9, 2015 23:29
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Buried alive posted:Fixed. More realistically it's probably the 'huge' (comparatively) amount of mercury that gets released when you have them removed that gave him the 'tism but whatever. As an aside, this is a really weird post even for Jrod. Normally he hits a couple dozen times during one of his comebacks. Today he managed the grand total of one post before going off. I hope the overwhelmingly negative response didn't scare him away. 
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Oct 10, 2015 03:32
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Alright, wife's in bed, laptop has power and there is wi-fi I can crib off my phone. Lets do this. Lysaaaaaaander Spooooooner!jrodefeld posted:Note to mods: You know who I am. I'm a libertarian who is staring his own thread, which is acceptable according to the rules, I assume? There are two reasons I want to start a specific thread rather than retread over the "other" libertarian thread and just post comments there. In the first place, I want this discussion to be more narrow in scope. And I want to say something at the beginning that everyone will have a chance to read. On Caros's thread, he specifically poisoned the well from the very beginning by writing an OP describing libertarianism and its adherents in an unflattering and, from my perspective, misleading way. By the time I first posted on that thread, there had already been something like two hundred pages of people making GBS threads on libertarianism before I had a chance to defend it. And since the thread was almost entirely directed at me in particular (it would not exist without my having posted here in the past), you can understand how I'd like to have a bit more discretion about the framing of the debate when I am outnumbered 30 to 1. I've already covered the fact that the libertarian thread was intended more as a preserve for you people than anything else. I actually made it for some other long gone libertarian after he did the same thing you're doing now. The fact that I front loaded it with insults shouldn't really be taken with umbrage by the by, if only because every single political thread is loaded with insults. If you look at Canada politics we make fun of Stephen Harper, Angry Tom and Pothead Trudeau despite the majority of SA readers being left leaning. You would know this if you'd bothered to learn anything about the culture of SA over your time here instead of coming solely to D&D to jump face first into the dogpile that you know is waiting for you. And as I said I'd be happy to let you rework (or add) a chunk of your posting to the libertarian thread opening if you'd like. I'm really just looking out for your best interests because you will get banned again and end up giving mighty Lowtax more  if you keep opening up with posts like this one.quote:If there is any problem with me posting my own topic, I will cease and you can remove it. But if I don't break any clearly stated rules, I hope you would welcome a libertarian voice here in the service of a full discussion rather than a self serving bias-reinforcing circle jerk, something that is far too common. I think in a lot of ways this typifies your particular brand of libertarianism. You're treating this as you treat everything, as a system of perfectly logical rules that will result in a good outcome for you if followed the way you view them. In reality SA is a community of people, and as a community we not only have the obvious rules but also basic standards of community that you refuse to learn or acknowledge. You are interacting with the forums as if it is a rational system when it is in fact a group of people and prone to irrational behaviour, such as banning amusing libertarian posters before all the comedy has been mined. In this aspect you're not too far from a Sovereign Citizen and their 'magic words' view of the legal system. Just a minor gripe anyways. quote:I have no doubt that whatever confines I initially set out to limit the scope of discussion, it will soon expand out on dozens of directions covering every element of libertarianism. But I'd like to describe libertarianism a bit differently from how you may have heard it described in the past. The central theme of this OP is property, what is it, what constitutes legitimate property rights and what is the origin and function of private property rights? The real distinction between libertarians and nearly everyone else is not their opposition to the State since there are anarcho-communists and anarcho-syndicalists who also oppose the existence of States. It is not even our belief in the non-aggression principle. Rather, as you probably guessed, it is our understanding of private property that sets us apart. After all, how can you know what constitutes an act of aggression if you can't clearly articulate between what is mine versus what is yours? This is literally how you have described libertarianism multiple times over previous threads. Please stop treating your readers like children who are unaccustomed to the glory of libertarianism. We know what it is you are selling. We disagree with the contents, not the packaging. Now before you get into your rambling about how great property rights are I want to make sure everyone knows precisely what we're talking about, Property. As a former libertarian I think I can give a pretty solid definition of what property is from the libertarian viewpoint. Please correct me on this if I'm wrong: Property Rights are the right to sole use of a material or resource and the accompanying authority to use force in their defence. I think that is a pretty solid definition of Property Rights from the libertarian viewpoint. Much as governments are a monopoly on force within a geographic area (to a libertarian) a property right at its core is the right to sole use of something and the authority to use force to defend your claim. If you own your home and someone breaks in against your whim they are intruding on your sole use of the home and you can use violence against them or have someone use violence in their defense of your property rights. Likewise if someone attempts to attack you they are intruding on your right to own your own body and thus you can us violence to defend yourself against their intrusion. Now here is the crucial point about property rights. They are a fiction. What do I mean? I mean property rights do not exist in nature. There is no inherent ownership of objects by people. Down later you're going to quote Locke's theory of homesteading and to you I say this, that is an arbitrary system of determining who owns what that is no more or less correct than any other, because property rights by their very nature are an arbitrary fiction. Consider the description above: "The authority to use force in their defence". That description by itself puts the lie to any idea of property rights that exist in nature absent the human condition or societal agreement. The authority we're talking about doesn't come down from on high, god doesn't illuminate the ground around someone when their house is broken into while a booming voice says "Thou shalt defend thine property rights!" The authority is an understood human consensus, it is an agreement that what's yours is yours and what isn't is not. Still further in your post you talk about the abstract "Right" to healthcare and how if you have this right but there aren't enough doctors then your right to healthcare is sort of irrelevant. I'd argue that property "rights" are just as ethereal as a right to healthcare. To bastardize an old saying, if you sit down to dinner at a Japanese Sushi Restaurant with 80's rock band Prism but the band includes none of the original members, are you still eating with the band Prism? The answer is of course "Does society consider that band to be Prism?" They were total assholes by the way. That might have been a bit of a ramble, but my point is that while you might be (you aren't) technically correct that you have a right to certain property, if society doesn't agree with you then from a practical standpoint you do not have that right. If you claim to have a property right to a home through locklean homesteading but no one agrees with you, do you have that property right? If society agrees that you are my slave, does it matter that your particular theory of property rights doesn't allow for that? A key aspect of property rights is the right to defend what you believe to be yours, but in absence of the agreement of others you appear to the outside observer as a sociopath. If you walk into my house and claim that your theory of property rights says that it is your house... well I mean lets see how far it gets you? Furthermore there have been vast differences in the theory of property rights over the centuries. Several posters have already taken you to task for your incorrect suggestions that early humans lived with Locke style homesteading, when in fact property rights were something that was almost entirely absent from those societies. I however am going to present a different object, and with this I'm going to answer your question from the very end of your post. Sorry for going out of order. quote:I'll leave it here for now. I want to try, at least initially, to limit the discussion to property rights as understood by libertarians, and their need under conditions of scarcity. I'd like to hear competing theories of initial property acquisition that make more sense that the first-user principle if you reject that theory.  Genghis Khan was a leader of various nomadic steppe peoples from ~1206 -1227. Over the course of his lifetime he greatly expanded his empire and rapidly improved the quality of life for his people. When Genghis came to power some of the people of his particular tribe were so desperately poor that they wore clothing stitched together from field mice. In many cases mongols of that period would wear clothing so long that it would literally rot off their skin over the course of weeks or months before they could procure something better. The man was the founding father of Mongolia, brought the Silk Road under control and is credited with largely making it passable. Perhaps one of his lesser known accomplishments was the imposition of a single rule of law over a very wide area, the Yassa code. The mongols were a meritocratic society where even men who had previously attempted to kill the great Khan in battle could rise high in the ranks if they proved their skill and loyalty. On top of all of that the mongol empire was actually religiously tolerant, believing that you can worship whoever you drat well please so long as you ask them to pray for the Khan while you're doing it. So why am I rambling about all of that? Because the Mongols, a 13th century warrior people had a system of property rights that makes as much sense to me as yours does. In Mongol culture everything belonged to the Khan. Every single thing alive in the world, every castle, every bit of gold or wine all belonged to the Khan, and when the Mongols came upon people they told them to submit to the obvious divine goal of the mongols (to bring everyone together as one) or to be crushed. The mongols then took (by force if necessary) huge amounts of loot from these societies, that was then given to the great Khan, who in turn gave it to his generals, who gave it to their officers and so on. Now I ask you, what is wrong with this principle of property rights? It is logically derived, particularly for the standards of mongols (Genghis Khan was a huge badass who got people to follow him en masse as he conquered). It deals with the problem of scarcity as everything belongs to the Khan to divide as he sees fit. It solves the problem of initial acquisition because everything belongs to the Khan and simply needs to be taken if he wills it. What is your issue with Mongol Based Economics (MBE)? You might say that this is reducto ad absurdum, and maybe it is... but please, explain to me why your theory of property rights is any more objectively correct than MBE. I'll agree with you wholeheartedly that making mountains of skulls from the bodies of the slain killed in your rampage across europe is a little disgusting by modern standards, but if we're arguing that something is an incorrect system of economics simply because society finds it morally reprehensible then I'd argue the same applies to Anarcho-Capitalism which wouldn't poll at 1% if it were brought to a vote. If your argument is that it's inefficient I will say gently caress you, that is a consequentialist argument and we're talking deontology here bitch. To my eyes MBE view of property rights is equally as valid from an outside viewpoint as your homesteading belief, or the version we as a society use now. If there is an objective morality out there then that could shed some light on things, but unfortunately if there is we don't know what it is. For all we know Khorne is sitting up on his throne of skulls being all pissed off shouting "The Goal of All Life is Death! The mongols had it right you fuckers!" and we'll never know. I'd like to hear you come up with a reason that Mongol Based Economics are somehow less valid than First-Use. Because as far as I can see both are utterly arbitrary if you ignore consequentialist arguments, and if you add in consequentialist arguments then first-use gets the everloving poo poo kicked out of it due to real world applications. quote:It is often stated by misinformed left-Progressives that libertarians or other free market advocates have a fetish for private property rights; that we elevate property as a right above human rights, that our insistence on private ownership creates conflict between those who have more and those who have less and encourages human greed and alienation between different groups of people. I personally believe Murray Rothbard jerked off into the deed of his house on a semi-regular basis, I'm not sure fetish even covers it. Paraphillia maybe? And yes your insistence on private ownership does create those conflicts which is why the only people who like libertarianism in any large numbers are the people who are statistically most likely to succeed in society (white males). quote:As to the first claim, this one is always amusing because it is so crystal clear to a libertarian that there is no meaningful distinction between property rights and human rights. But much more important is the fact that we recognize that a correct understanding of private property is essential to a flourishing, healthy society and that human progress is inexorably linked with a legal recognition of private property claims. News flash, this is not crystal clear to anyone else and is in fact an utterly arbitrary distinction made by you and you alone. Side note, do you realize how creepy you sound when you talk like this? "We realize that human rights ARE property rights, and we recognize that private property is so crucial to human progress! Why don't you? You loving peasents just accept me!" I might have added that last part but it is what you come off as. Many people have probably said this to you before, but libertarianism appeals to you because it gives you a false sense of accomplishment and a cultist belief that you understand how things really work. The same feelings you get from libertarianism are found in cultists and conspiracy theorists for the same reason. Incidentally this is another reason it appeals to modern white males, we feel that society isn't giving us what we promised. We grew up with fathers who made more than we do, in a society where white males succeeded as a general rule and there must be something wrong because it isn't that way any more. The search to deal with this feeling of powerlessness leads to destructive behaviour, like Anarcho-capitalism. quote:The reader should be disabused of the notion that libertarians have some obsession with private property or criticize public, or society-"owned" property based on any shallow ideological grounds. The reason we oppose socialism is that its core tenets are in conflict with observable reality. Were reality to be different than it is, libertarians would gladly abandon the concept of private property (outside of our physical bodies) as meaningless and of no use. For example, suppose we lived in a mythical "Garden of Eden", a paradise where everything that people desire was available in super-abundance. Everyone could satisfy all their needs an desires and no-ones use of any resource would in any way hinder anyone else's ability to use that resource. In such a theoretical world, property would cease to have any meaning in external objects outside of our physical bodies. Our bodies would remain scarce, and so we'd still need to have a property right in those (i.e. no assault, murder, rape). Fun fact, in this document where you talk about how you aren't obsessed with property you use the word property 43 times out of 2,500 words. It is your seventh most used word after "the of and to that is". Just thought I'd put that in perspective. Speaking as a consequential I will point out that we live in a society where we have the capability to feed, clothe, house and provide basic medical care to every person in the country (probably the planet) if we devoted those resources appropriately. Yes, scarcity will be a thing in human society for the foreseeable future, but as it currently stands the argument is not one of "Can we produce enough to meet basic needs" it is "What do we have to sacrifice to do so." Capitalism suggests we sacrifice in areas that many of us find abhorrent for reasons that don't make much sense to many of us in the search for profit. That aside, I do not consider my body property. Your entire argument about self ownership is nonsense to me because my body is fundamentally different from property. I cannot sell my body (my wife won't let me  ) in the same way that I can sell my house because I cannot physically give up possession of my body. Beyond that however, I refer you to my very large argument above where I discuss the fact that property rights are an utter fiction created by people. There is no property right to "Caros" out there, if only because we as a society honestly believe that is a stupid loving thing. You are certainly entitled to believe the way you want, but stop acting like something is a universal fact when it is in fact only part of your weird pseudo-cult and not accepted by anyone outside of it.quote:The reason property rights are so incredibly essential is that we live in a world of scarcity. In such a world, the desires, wants and needs of humans will always exceed the available goods needed to fulfill all our desires simultaneously. Therefore situations inevitably arise where two or more people want to use the same scarce resource to achieve two completely incompatible desired ends. This inevitable human conflict that arises from the reality of scarcity necessitated the acceptance of norms, or rules for determining who had the right to exclusive control over what scarce resource. Without this developing and widespread recognition by early human civilizations of basic private property rights, the emergence of modern industrial society, of production, commerce, agriculture and all the trappings of civilization would never have been possible. Humans would have remained perpetually in conflict, as primitive hunter gatherers living at a subsistence level. Hey cool guys! Jrodefeld is agreeing with me that property rights pretty much solely exist as a way for hairless monkeys to keep from killing each other over scarcity. Also, no, agricultural societies did not require private property to grow, in fact many early human civilizations lived in what can best be described as communes. I'll let other posters field this one. quote:This should not be controversial. If we can agree on the vital necessity of the recognition of private property rights for human evolution and survival, then what rules ought to be in place for the attainment of legitimate property that should be legally enforced? The libertarian answer is that the first user to appropriate a resource out of its naturally environment and transform and improve it for the furtherance of his well-being has the best claim to ownership of that scarce resource. This, as you already know, has been referred to as the homestead principle. And it predated John Locke as a recognized norm in primitive civilizations millennia before he coined the phrase for the modern science of economics to make sense of an existed social phenomena. Just what part of evolving from H. rhodesiensis to H. sapiens required the recognition of property rights.  I know that is probably a cheapshot and I do hope what you meant was 'evolution' as in societal evolution rather than physical. It still is funny to read anyone writing something liek that without a hint of irony. Also I'd like to ask you to stop begging the loving question so hard that it is getting disturbed by your kink. I think my favorite thing about this entire section however is how you talk about 'the libertarian answer' because that is what it is and looking at it from that perspective is a hell of a lot more honest than much of what you post. You aren't talking about some objectively correct answer, you're talking about your particular answer which is as correct as the one suggested by the mongols. That said, no, homesteading principle was not widely recognized among primitive humans. If anything most humans throughout the centuries have practices something significantly closer to MBE than homesteading. The romans, for example, ruled the world for centuries with a recognition of private property that in many cases can be boiled down as "Veni, vidi, vici." quote:Had any other principle of property ownership and use-rights been adopted, the human race would have died off. This is not hyperbole. Let's suppose not the first user of something has the right to exclusive control of a scarce resource, but rather that the fifth user was the one who had that right. How could we eat? If I'm the first person to claim ownership of a coconut tree, or a water spring, but I don't have any property right in that thing, then I wouldn't be able to justly use that scarce resource. I'd starve and die of thirst. We'd all have to wait around for the fifth user of everything. Naturally, humans desired above all else to survive and improve their condition. And it makes intuitive and logical sense to most people to give the earlier user precedence over a later user. This is wrong. I mean I could just leave it like that, but lets be clear, it is wrong for a variety of reasons. Early humans lived largely in commune with one another. Later humans may have used first use in some cases, but more often the term I would suggest is 'current use'. If I'm here farming this is my land. Stevicus down the way agrees that it is mine and we've got a militia or an army to back up our claim. When we go all Carthago delanda est on a certain city that will remain nameless then the outlying provinces use a property system that can best be described as 'ours now you fuckers'. If you have evidence that early humans lived in the way you suggest I would ask you to provide it. Anthropologists disagree with you on this issue and there is nothing to suggest that homesteading of the variety you are suggesting played a large or critical part in human history. Even when people did expand outwards I'd argue that homesteaders were working less off a theory of 'first use' and more of a theory of 'why don't you come and try to loving take it'. If I am a roman colonist the argument I use to decide what does and does not belong to me is not first use, it is "I'm roman, suck my balls." quote:Once this recognition of property rights was recognized, not perfectly but to a large enough extent, great strides in living standards were made immediately available to the human race. Suddenly a division of labor was possible, free exchange was made possible and barter soon led to the development of the first currency. People could save in excess of their immediate consumption needs because they knew that they had the legally recognized and enforceable right to their property. Conflict was reduced and peaceful cooperation was encouraged. Might I recommend you read Debt: The First 5000 Years before you talk any more. It is by no means an academic treatise on the issue and I'd highly suggest you read more on the subject afterwords, but it is a good introductory primer that contains enough narrative to keep you interested on a dry as gently caress subject that you'll be willing to search out other factors once you're done. I say this because what you're talking about here is completely and utterly ahistorical to modern understanding. I don't give Locke poo poo because he didn't know any better, you live in a modern society and absolutely should. Stop treating the words of a man who died three centuries ago as if they were fact. quote:Given the reality of scarcity, what humans need more than anything else are social rules and a legal system that facilitates ever greater material production such that people can attain more and more of their needs and desires. What we are essentially doing is moving towards less and less scarcity through greater and greater productive capacity in modern economies. This, of course, should be considered a great thing for human welfare all around. Social rules like taxes!? Statist. quote:Left-progressives frequently speak about the plight of the poor and the continuing social problems that exist throughout much of the world. However, the engine that drives the greatest and most robust increase in society-wide wealth for everyone is one in which property is private and the division of labor, capital accumulation, investment and a free price system are permitted to function unhampered. Industrialization and modernization is the engine that drives the greatest and most robust increase in society-wide wealth for everyone. The soviet union drastically increased the society wide wealth and overall conditions as they industrialized. You do not need to be a capitalist or worship private property to grow society. quote:I've asked for a better and more coherent method by which property should be acquired other than original appropriation and I have not heard an answer. Mongol Based Economics. Alternately, the system we have now. Alternately, any other system. While I'm at it can we bring this back to the genocide of native americans and how 'original appropriation' seems to cut off the moment it is inconvenient for modern libertarians? quote:I'm going to throw in a curve-ball here and talk about another so-called "property" right that isn't actually property at all. That is what is called Intellectual Property. Libertarians oppose the existence of so-called "intellectual property" at all. But why would that be? The reason is that property is only a coherent and useful concept when it applies to things that are scarce. Copying a movie cannot be theft if you owned the original that you made a copy from. No one else was deprived of any physical possession whatsoever. Since copying can be done, theoretically infinitely, without depriving anyone of their copy, there is no scarcity and no theft. Patents on inventions present a similar case. Ideas are not scarce. If you freely share an idea and someone emulates or improves upon that idea, society is all the better off. gently caress you. I make my life as a writer and eliminating intellectual property rights would essentially ruin me and impoverish my family. But who gives a poo poo about consequences right?  I spend, on average, about 800 hours writing a full length novel. In absence of intellectual property rights I would post that novel, and then instantly see copies of it being published by other companies who sell it to the end consumer without giving me a dime. But there is no scarcity or theft right Jrodefeld? I mean I put in the equivalent of about twenty weeks working on it but who gives a poo poo right? And no crowdfunding is not a functional replacement for sales for a whole variety of reasons. quote:Society has been made incalculably poorer and many corporations unjustly wealthier than they ought to be because of this grotesque State-monopoly privilege known as intellectual "property". Please explain why any drug company would make a drug absent the ability to make money by the monopoly of that drug. Please explain how I wouldn't be living destitute in the gutter if people could get a free or drastically discounted copy of my new releases the moment they hit the shelves. quote:Therefore things that are not scarce can indeed be held in the "commons", and in fact society is much better when we have socialism for ideas and computer data for example. Psst, scarcity isn't as severe as you think and socialism is just as successful with things like healthcare. quote:Left-progressives frequently rail about the need for a legally mandated "right" to a service like healthcare forgetting or never understanding in the first place how the services needed to supply the growing human need are most efficiently produced and allocated. You might have an abstract "right" to a heart surgery, but if the sort of economic system and the State regulations and mandates heaped upon it don't produce enough hospitals, doctors and medical equipment, you won't get the care you need despite what politicians might claim. Speaking of which... I want to make something absolutely, perfectly clear to you Jrodefeld. This does not happen in any significant numbers. I went googling and I could barely find more than a few dozen cases over the course of the last decade in which patients died on waiting list. And even that number, scary as it is, is misleading. Winnipeg for example, has had twelve people die while waiting for care in a three year period. Of those not a single one was an emergency patient. Of those the wait time was between 52 and 57 days, significantly below the recommended benchmark of 180 (a number used in the US) of those each patient was waiting because a team of trained medical professionals said that it was safe for them to wait. Of those all twelve had other serious medical issues that contributed to their deaths. Finally and perhaps most strongly, when the doctor was asked if their wait times would have been shorter with unlimited resources his answer amounted to "Maybe" because heading into heart surgery without proper research and preparation can actually increase mortality rates. Moreover, it is important to remember that the US absolutely does ration care. People bitch about waiting lists in Canada because they are an obvious sign of rationing limited care. You wait because we only have X doctors. In the US there is care rationing, but rather than simply waiting lists (and you do have those) the rationing takes place in the cost of care. 45,000 die annually in the US due to inability to receive medical care. Tens of millions have no insurance and thus no real access to medical care outside an emergency room. The US rations care as much as a UHC country, you just do it really, really poorly. quote:If you're concern is largely for the material well-being of society's most vulnerable, surely you'd want the economy to be as physically productive as possible? The problem facing the poor is not that they make $8.50 and not $15 an hour. The problem is that they don't have enough basic "stuff" to give them a reasonable standard of living. And why don't they? They economy is not physically productive enough to provide them with needed and desired goods or there are artificial impediments to employment and/or entrepreneurship that constrains their available options. Capitalism is as much responsible for this failure as anything else. One of my favorite examples of the utter failure of capitalism is the great depression. One day the economy is booming along and everything is great. The next factories are shutting their doors, workers are being laid off and so forth. What changed? Did a war start? A natural disaster? Did we run out of fuel? No. The market simply decided that it was time to go backwards for a little while and ruin lives for no good reason. We have the ability to produce the basic 'stuff' we need to give people a reasonable standard of living. The resources are there, the factories are there, it is the allocation that is corrupt. quote:A problem with "democracy" and all forms of collective ownership either of the factory or of public spaces is that use for such resources is heavily constrained by the need for consensus to act. If all workers owned factories together, endless meetings and deliberations would be required to make any decisions about the use of capital and production. Furthermore, conflict is enhanced rather than reduced. Who would REALLY have the final say on the use of collectively owned property? Well, no one does. All this wasted energy determining the best use of scarce resources leads to a tortoises pace to decisions that otherwise would be made by individual owners of these resources rather rapidly. This leads to paralysis and loss of productive capacity. If everyone can determine the use of property they own and put it to productive use immediately or trade it to another in an exchange immediately, the economy is made wealthier and decisions are made quickly by individuals who bear the personal responsibility for risking their capital and ONLY their capital in the effort. Scare quotes around democracy? Really? Hans Hermann Hoppe is that really you? Tell me more about the natural social elite and time preferences. That aside this post is actually pretty disgusting. Why should the people who do all the work have any say in what they're working on! gently caress that, this one guy should be the one to determine what happens because he jammed his dick in the soil. Believe it or not there are plenty of union factories that run far more efficiently than factories run by fiat of a single power mad individual. quote:I've spoken about the Tragedy of the Commons in the past, but that is one more effect of property not being privately owned. When no one has a financial incentive to maintain the capital value of a piece of property, everyone has an incentive to overuse that property, even towards ecological destruction. This was the story of the American Buffalo which was hunted to the brink of extinction when it was a part of the "commons" yet made a major comeback once private entrepreneurs homesteaded the animals and judiciously decided which to kill for meat and which to breed to replenish the livestock for future generations and future profit opportunities. You realize that it was capitalism that utterly ruined the american buffalo while the 'socialist' native americans were completely capable of not murdering the poo poo out of their food source for no reason. The tragedy of the commons here is that a bunch of entitled pricks decided to reap a huge profit or kill for sport. Cool story tho. quote:If we lived in an alternate universe without scarcity, then collective ownership of everything would make sense. No libertarian would dogmatically demand we maintain the concept of private property and homesteading with legal arbitration services if all goods existed in superabundance. If scarcity ceased being a limiting factor, then property would similarly cease being an important concept. There is a reason we don't parcel out oxygen rights for the air we breath. Oxygen is not scarce in any practical sense as it applies to human needs. Every human can breath as much as they want without limiting the ability of anyone else to breath as much as they want. I'd like you to talk more about your arbitration services. Walter Block discussed them on his interview with Sam Seder and they sounded insane. We've previously discussed DRO's and I think we can both agree that those are crazy as gently caress. Have you come up with some new alternative to deal with the necessity of a legal system, preferably one that isn't laughably bad? quote:I'd like you to explain to me the problem with the libertarian understanding of private property. And how, in a world of scarcity, that socialism is a feasible or coherent system? How could the human race have survived without the first-user principle of property acquisition being at least tacitly acknowledged? The problem is that no one likes it. Your proposed system of private property is about as anathema to most modern people as Mongol Based Economics. As a result it will not be implemented in any significant scale because people think the idea of totally unregulated markets and a total obviation of social government is loving insane. If you're talking "People who own something own it" then you're talking the system you have now and no one really disagrees with that. Its when you start getting into the crazy weeds of taxation is theft and government is immoral that people tell you to go suck a lemon. Socialism is feasible and coherent because mixed economies with significant socialist elements are the norm throughout the world and have been for some time. Moreover countries that trend more socialist are happier and in many ways more prosperous than those who are not. Human society survived without first-user because first user is largely an irrelevant concept made up well after the fact. Hope this helps. quote:Left-Progressives always tout the "successes" of social democracies like Sweden or the social welfare State in the United States, but they always (as Scott Horton likes to say) "truncate and antecedents". You know what the best way to attain a small fortune? Start with a large fortune and squander some of your wealth. In example after example, left-progressives tout the relative wealth of modern-day Sweden or post FDR United States forgetting or never understanding that these countries that remain reasonably wealthy and can bear the burden of the socialistic demands on the economy have all, without any notable exceptions, had a lengthy history of laissez-faire free market fueled growth for decades and decades before their governments made a left turn and decided to implement a welfare State. This is a nonsense argument that effectively argues from a position that because countries started out as capitalists any success they've had with socialist programs (Social security reducing elderly poverty from 66% to 13%) happen only because capitalism. This is basically the same argument that cackles about how socialism can never work because an impoverished, brutalized country ruled by a strongman dictator only 'mostly' caught up with the US in the aftermath of the second world war rather than overtaking it. Just as an aside, Jrodefeld, how do you attribute the incredible growth of the Soviet Union in terms of wealth. The soviets were a barely functional 'industrial' country when they came to power, decade upon decade behind the US in terms of industrial and scientific technology. The suffered the brunt of ALL total losses from both world wars, totaling tens of millions of soviet citizens and yet despite all that they still managed to become a super power running neck and neck with the US in a large number of fields throughout the 20th century. I'll happily agree that the US won that race, but lets not pretend they started at the same place. quote:This is absolutely true of the United States from the Industrial Revolution until the Progressive Era of the early to mid 20th century and it is also true of Sweden which had an incredibly laissez-faire free market economy during much of the same period of time and, even after their nominal shift leftward during the mid-20th century, the bulk of the socialist program so loved by leftist commentators is barely forty years old. Pot, meet kettle. I'm done here. Time to relax. Edit: I do find it funny that the thread is named for a question I asked myself through the entirety of this post. Even Jrodefeld agrees with me that property rights are an arbitrary fiction, and since that is the case I find myself wondering why should we care about property rights, in particular why should I care more about them than the wellbeing of people in general. Another good question is "Why does first-use homesteading mean taxation is theft" but if he gets back I'm sure I'll see an answer. Caros fucked around with this message at 06:18 on Oct 10, 2015 |
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Oct 10, 2015 05:54
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Jack of Hearts posted:Hey Caros: you're cool. But don't become Reverse Jrod by posting a billion words as response to his billion words. I like your effort posts on actual issues, but beyond that, gently caress him, just get a bunch of zingers in, that's what the thread is for. Little late to 'become' that since it's pretty much my shtick. Besides, I'm stuck in the backwoods part of fucknowhere. What else am I going to do?
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Oct 10, 2015 06:47
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Jack of Hearts posted:Fair enough. I do go overboard at times I'll admit, but it's worth mentioning I banged that whole thing out in about thirty minutes including eating an orange. When its poorly-thought-out-bullshit I don't have to bring sources which cuts down on the actual time. Plus I got to use Mongol Based Economics which I'm unreasonably proud of. 
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Oct 10, 2015 06:59
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Hello Sailor posted:What changed you, if it's not too personal a question? Its a long story that you can find in the libertarian thread, but the short answer is that I had a very good friend who lived in the US who found out she had cancer. Considering her age and the stage at which it was discovered her survival rate with treatment was something like 95% over five years, 90% over 10 years and so on. It was the type of cancer you get better from. The problem is that she lived in the US and wasn't wealthy. As a Canadian I'd taken my healthcare for granted and never really looked at the US system. I'd just figured up to that point that if we got rid of our UHC we could just take the money I spent in taxes on that and use it to pay for the care I'd need just like the US does. This instance however was eye opening. She found out she was sick, but simply couldn't pay. She received some treatment as she scraped together funds through charity projects but it wasn't enough to pay for what she needed and I had to watch a good friend of mine waste away from a preventable disease. If she were in Canada she would have received treatment almost immediately (in fact it would have been discovered sooner since she wouldn't have been worried about paying for a checkup) and I'd probably still have my friend here today. Once I came to realize that private medical care was disgustingly immoral and inefficient it wasn't hard to make the jump to realizing that maybe having certain things as public goods is not a bad idea after all. Edit: Incidentally to the discussion above, I've been pondering doing a let's read of Atlas Shrugged for laughs for a while now as a warm up exercise before I start work on a given day. Would anyone be interested in reading that? jrodefeld posted:If any ancestors of Native American tribes can demonstrate evidence that certain property was stolen from their ancestors, then it should be returned to them. This can't be some abstract and vague assertion though. People who doubtless occupy the disputed lands today had nothing to do with previous Americans treatment of Native peoples. However, if they are in possession of stolen land, they can be made to move because the earlier user of a good has precedence. If the earlier user did not freely trade away land rights, then he or his direct descendants have a better claim to just ownership than subsequent owners even if they had no knowledge that they were being sold stolen goods. What qualifies as a abstract or vague assertion? We know that prior to the introduction of Europeans to North America the land was owned in its entirety by native americans. While it is impossible (due to genocide and the passage of time) to determine who specifically is descended from the tribe that might have owned this particular spot it seems to me remarkably simple to figure out who has Native American heritage and who does not. Since most modern people can agree that the entire conquest of North America was essentially one giant theft it seems remarkably simple to say that we should all get the gently caress out and let them sort out the property rights amongst themselves. And before I go on lets be clear about the bolded part. What you're talking about is impossible. Even you would agree (I should hope) that trading freely with someone who doesn't understand the concept of what is being traded is impossible. This is a fundamental aspect of our current contract law, that a contract simply cannot be valid if it is not properly understood by one side. Likewise a total lack of consideration on one side (say... trading the island of manhattan for $700 worth of beads) is also valid grounds for getting rid of a contract. Native American groups by and large didn't make any sorts of fair trades for land. They made trades they didn't understand for things that were utterly worthless by comparison to what they were giving up and in many cases these trades were made under duress of being killed by disease or straight up genocide. Even if you exclude all that, do you think it would be fair to say the US should give up on large sections of land in the deep south?  The dark green lands are lands that were treaty signed as tribal land that were then stolen outright from native americans as part of a forced relocation that killed thousands. There is absolutely no question that this was theft and we know exactly which tribes the land was stolen from. quote:Let's suppose I own a Rolex watch (I don't) and someone steals it from me. Then he sells it to you and you have no knowledge that the watch was stolen. But suppose I see you wearing the watch and I know that the watch is in fact my property and I can prove it. Maybe my initials are engraved on the back or something. Lets suppose a group of people, say... white men, systematically murder you and everyone like you while stealing up your land for themselves. Jrodefeld you're making our point for us here, the land was stolen and every single person living in north america is party to the theft and genocide of native american peoples. I know that is hard to accept as truth but it is. The difference is that we don't have a social and economic system that says that if something is provably taken by force that it must be returned, we have a society that acknowledges the lovely things that it has done but that also realizes it is incredibly impractical to reverse them at this point in time. If you are sticking by your morality instead of trying to worm your way out on a technicality you have to admit that Native Americans should have a claim to some or all of North America. quote:But those who wish to overturn existing property rights must have the burden of proof on them to prove just ownership and the farther back in history the alleged theft took place the harder it is to prove it. The exception to this is property owned by the State. State property is inherently illegitimate because a "state" cannot homestead land. Only individuals can do that. States violate property rights and, even if the original owners whose land was stolen by the State cannot be identified, the property must still (according to libertarian theory) be transferred to private hands. Assumes facts not found in evidence. I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you haven't read my post before you wrote this, but you might want to seriously consider going to do that before you post anymore because I've already talked about this with you. As I discussed earlier, property owned by the state is only legitimate if we accept your premise that homesteading is the way property rights should be developed, something no one in this thread has acquiesced as fact. Until such time that you have people agreeing on the subject it might behoove you to stop stating such things as fact and instead couch your statements in more vague language such as "I believe" so that you don't come off as quite so pompous and insufferable. Incidentally your arguments that individuals need to meet the burden of proof to claim their property rights is yet another example of how your view of property rights is specifically designed as one that exists to be most advantageous to you. Native Americans had their own view of property rights, one that was largely communal in nature, and one that was inconsistent with the property rights as viewed by europeans. What you are doing here is framing the argument in such a way that you know it will be impossible for them to provide evidence that they were stolen from, despite the blatantly well understood fact that native americans were stolen from. No one in this thread, even you I would hope, is going to seriously argue that the Native Americans weren't systematically robbed and largely exterminated in the European conquest of North America. By putting the burden of proof at a level that amounts to "Well do you have a deed for the land?" You are setting a bar that is impossible for Native Americans with their alternate view of property rights to meet. To circle back to Mongol Based Economics, this is like a Russian Prince going to the Kublai Khan a generation after his father's death and saying "Well we know that Subutai raped and pillaged our land for a number of years, could we have that back?" Its not like they have a reciept, and even if they did the two peoples have vastly different views on property rights and it is absurd to expect them to have common ground on that front. quote:The only just way to do this, in my view, is to follow the principle of syndicalism. If no original owner (or descendant) can be identified as having homesteaded the land when it was seized by the State, then the second most just way to allocate the property into private hands is to grant it to the workers who work the land. Or you could... you know, give it back to the Native Americans who were clearly and unashamedly robbed of their land. Also just going to reiterate this in case anyone missed Jack of Heart's post on the issue. The factory owners aren't the ones working the factory you loving weirdo. Caros fucked around with this message at 19:39 on Oct 10, 2015 |
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Oct 10, 2015 19:28
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The factories to the factory owners
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quote:But those who wish to overturn existing property rights must have the burden of proof on them to prove just ownership and the farther back in history the alleged theft took place the harder it is to prove it. The exception to this is property owned by the State. State property is inherently illegitimate because a "state" cannot homestead land. Only individuals can do that. States violate property rights and, even if the original owners whose land was stolen by the State cannot be identified, the property must still (according to libertarian theory) be transferred to private hands. Doublepost but who gives a poo poo in hellthread... I'm curious Jrodefeld, do you believe a corporation can homestead? For example if Shell goes drilling for oil in the arctic, is that their oil? Shell isn't owned by one person but as a communal group (shareholders). I mean we clearly know that a factory owner paying someone has to count as jaming his dick in the earth to claim it because otherwise every factory owner ever would have to go down and work on the line for his claim to be mixing his labor with the soil to be valid. What about partnerships. If I start a business with my friend it could be impossible to determine who owns what specific thing in the business but at the same time you clearly have to have the possibility of partnerships for your society to function. So why is state land impossible? State land is ultimately just a very, very, very large partnership isn't it?
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Oct 10, 2015 20:08
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Helsing posted:
Just... walk away. And leave a scathing review on yelp.
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Oct 10, 2015 22:29
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Ravenfood posted:If you're his slave, you're his property (that you legally sold yourself to, I guess) so by running, you're stealing (yourself) from him and therefore violating his property rights, so he is well justified in shooting you. He may chose not to to protect his property value, but he could. Of course keep in mind that this still doesn't make sense because even though he owns you and controls your labor he doesn't actually have sole right to use of your body and as a result you're not his property in the way that libertarians think of as property.
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Oct 11, 2015 01:03
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CommieGIR posted:And now we await Jrods return. I have to admit that this seems pretty mellow by his usual standard. Last time he posted a thread like this he had something like 52 posts in a day. One part of me wants to think he's cooling off... the other read his OP again and thinks maybe not so much.
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Oct 11, 2015 06:25
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jrodefeld posted:What needs to be done then is for such an African country to implement wise reforms which enable the internal wealth of the society to expand. History teaches that for prosperity to be generated most effectively, certain features must apply to the system of government a society chooses. In the first place, property rights must be legally recognized and arbitration of disputes must be based on these rights. If people are constantly fearing for their lives or afraid of thieves, then needless to say they won't save much money. Second, the money itself must be relatively stable. This doesn't have to be a hard money standard per se, although the libertarians would make the case that that would be best, but it surely cannot be a Zimbabwe style inflation machine where the currency loses value at a rapid pace. And Third, the State must be kept to a minimum, keeping the peace but staying out of the affairs of the private economy allowing entrepreneurs to set up and establish businesses quickly without interference. So today I want to talk about the Soviet Union. Jrodefeld, would it surprise you to know that from 1950-1978 the Soviet GDP actually grew at a GDP rate above 4% an amount that was pretty much equal to OECD countries? Its true! Now I can understand how you could be skeptical of this fact seeing as your entire cultish belief structure tells you it is impossible, but it is in fact reality. So of your conditions that violates... Well it violates #1 because even though soviets had personal property the means of production were out of private hands. It violates #3 because... well duh. #2 I'd say they violated because even though Soviets did have the ruble it had a lot of trouble over this period. The big question is of course, how is this possible. The soviets were generating wealth just as efficiently as Britain or the US or France during this period, which should be impossible except... yeah it turns out the way you expand your economy is industrialization. During this period the Soviets evolved from a largely rural state into a world superpower as they built upon the pre and wartime industrialization that they had begun. None of your factors there are significant compared to simply just expanding the overall wealth by increases in productivity. As another poster brought up, it doesn't matter whether you are Capitalist, Communist, hell you could be a monarchist but when the steam engine is developed your economy grows because you can make more things. Then when you industrialize further you make more things. When you reach the information age you can make more things. It is the advance of technology that allows for this, not any particular financial ideology. I suppose for me the biggest laugh of all of it comes in a really simple point of fact. The Soviet Union was a world superpower for about four and a half decades. How do you rationalize that with the fact that socialism is completely and utterly worthless. quote:This doesn't have to be some libertarian anarchist paradise, but the last half century has taught us (some of us at least) that liberal reforms of previously authoritarian nations have lead to drastic reductions in poverty and the creation of considerable wealth and middle classes. Look at the example of Hong Kong and how it compared to Mainland China for one example. The more economic freedom a nation has, the more prosperity can be generated. Are you STILL using this idiot talking point Jrod? Fully half of all housing in Hong Kong is public housing. The single largest expenditure in the life of almost everyone and fully half of it is government controlled. Hong Kong provides universal healthcare. Oh and lets not forget Hong Kong was a trading port in a very wealthy region of the world that could not otherwise be exploited by capitalism, of course it is going to compare well to a largely agrarian society. The example of Hong Kong is not one that can be used as an exemplar because it could not be exported to other places, it is uniquely successful because of its circumstances. Using Hong Kong is like saying "Hey we found a mountain of gold underneath this small communist enclave. They are all now billionaires, I guess communism is the best ideology after all." quote:The reason people are starving in places like Africa is that they lack the sort of economies and political policies that allow them to produce enough goods and services to effectively feed their populations. Just taking money from richer people and giving it to poorer people in Africa doesn't solve this essential problem. Agreed. Simply saying "Capitalism bitches" doesn't solve this essential problem either because "Communism bitches" would do a job about as well. quote:Even Foreign Aid has proved disastrous. It would be better in the long run to teach people in the Third World about free market economics and private property where they can reform their societies along the lines of laissez-faire and follow the example of Hong Kong and other small nations who grew very wealthy even surrounded by authoritarian States. Yes, lets teach those savages about free markets and private property. Clearly the problem is that they are uneducated and have poor time preferences, not the systematic rape of their countries by capitalist nations or the fact that their countries simply do not have the necessary capital to engage in the sort of modernization that would bring the productivity to increase their quality of life. Truly if we just prolethyze about great and mighty "Mar'Khet" they will pull themselves up by their bootstraps. Also you know gently caress all about foreign aid. quote:Let me clarify one thing though. I don't oppose collective ownership of businesses if they are voluntarily formed. I recognize that peaceful collectives can function well in some circumstances. But taking an anecdote and extrapolating it out to how an entire economy might function if ALL businesses where democratically controlled and collectively owned is beyond foolish. I shop at a health food co-op and it is great, but do I think this is how a business like Google should operate? Of course not! Employees at Google might have some fantastic ideas but if they are unsatisfied with the decisions made by the board of directors and CEO, then they can break away and start their own business based on their own ideas, risking their own capital. And this happens all the time. You realize this is literally what you do all the time. You take small scale anecdotes about how "I trade with you and that makes us both better off" and expand it to encompass nearly every single human interaction both in and outside of the economic spheres. Also please explain why it would be beyond foolish for all businesses to run this way. If it works for one business why can't it work well for all. Conversely don't you think it is fair to say the same about capitalist markets, that while they might work great for say... iPhones, they might also be total dogshit when it comes to healthcare? You're so close Jrod. I believe you can realize that maybe mixed economies are the way to go! Please! quote:I can't believe that you don't think that having to achieve democratic consensus for every single business decision would not slow down decision making and make the market inefficient. In the first place, what would make you think that every employee SHOULD have a say in decisions about how the business should be run? As an employee, you might know how to do a few specific tasks well, but are you going to have any educated idea about how to compete against Microsoft in the market? Which advertisement campaign is market tested and most efficient? Perhaps efficiency is not the only weighing factor to be discussed, have you ever considered that? Perhaps things like equality and quality of life matter more to people than the overall efficiency of something. Perhaps some people (maybe even a majority) might value the ability of everyone to have a say in the greater society more heavily than efficiency at all costs. Moreover I think the same complaints you are raising here can be equally applied to the sole ownership model. The owner might suck rear end at trying to compete against microsoft in the market and perhaps the employees would know better seeing as they are the ones who make and likely use the product. Alternately perhaps the workers might agree that they don't know poo poo about it and instead choose to delegate some of their decision making on specific subjects to trained individuals. Seriously, is it so hard for you to believe that people might say "Yeah okay steve you're trained at marketing we're going to let you handle marketing" while still retaining the right to replace him if Steve fucks the dog? Why is that worse than simply having it called down from on high that this is how it will be? quote:There is a division of labor in the economy, and successful businesses hire specific marketing research people to help the ownership make important decisions about the company. And VERY successful businesses are headed by CEOs who are often visionary and uniquely gifted in anticipating consumer demand. What if Steve Jobs decided to democratically survey each and every Apple employee and go with whatever the majority wanted when designing the iPhone? Evidence is not the plural of anecdote. The majority of CEO's are not Steve Jobs. In addition I'm actually a believer in what is called the trends and forces theory of history. Absent Bill Gates there would have been a "Macrosoft" or something else created by someone in the same general window because we had reached a point where an OS was a requirement for the expansion of computers. Absent Steve Jobs there would have still been an iPhone because all of the technology required to build it had already been independently developed. Incidentally almost every single piece of technology that went into the first iPhone was developed at a public university on a government grant. quote:If people want to voluntarily form co-operatives in the free market, that is perfectly fine. Up to a certain scale they can work reasonably well, and in some sectors of the economy better than others. But the impetus behind much of leftism is the notion that the entrepreneur/employee relationship is either inherently exploitative or someway or another seriously defective and should be generally looked upon with suspicion is what I am opposing. It is inherently exploitative. Hope this helps.
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Oct 11, 2015 08:33
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jrodefeld posted:Define "oppression". There's no reason to respond to a post like this but it makes a clear point nonetheless. You know the libertarian ideology fairly well by now after all that I've posted. You obviously cannot think that any libertarian would support a fascist police state. Remember the loving non-aggression principle I remind you of every other post?! It is literally the starting point of libertarian ethics. Have you ever heard of a fascist police state that doesn't aggress against people? DRO's which you publicly supported in one of the earliest posts I can recall you making on these forums were essentially a fascist police state. Here, let me remind you: A Huge Misogynist posted:Well, let’s look at ‘break and enter’. If I own a house, I will probably take out insurance against theft. Obviously, my insurance company benefits most from preventing theft, and so will encourage me to get an alarm system and so on, just as occurs now. I've bolded the most obviously fascist parts of this. In particular I'd like you to turn your attention to the second to last bolded area. That section says, more or less, that if you as a free person, decide to give food to or help someone who isn't covered by one of the voluntary (that you are required to have) DRO's that you yourself will be kicked off the DRO and thus become a non-person. Lacking DRO coverage in this society is death, and as other bolded sections point out there will be roaming gangs who will report your position so that you can be found at all times lest to commit a crime. I'd like to say that to me personally, any system the claims to know who criminals are before they even become criminals seems very, very dystopian to me. But hey I don't talk about throwing Vagina boomerangs like Molyneux so the gently caress do I know. If you've completely disassociated from DRO's then I'll ask again as I did earlier. What is your replacement for DRO's. Surely you have to have some sort of justice system in mind as it is of course one of government's most vital functions.
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Oct 11, 2015 08:43
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jrodefeld posted:This of course does NOT apply in metropolitan areas and in current heavily populated areas where there are always clear laws about property transfers. After all, cities don't allow property to be available for homesteading if an old man dies and has no heir. There are specific methods for addressing this in most cities and States. I have to ask, what is the point of your entire homesteading argument when it is more or less utterly irrelevant in the modern era? Nearly every bit of land on earth is claimed by someone or some government. There is no homesteading going on and hasn't been for centuries. If you're trying to describe a libertarian system wouldn't it make more sense to come at it from an angle of say... starting from present day and working outwards? This bothers me mostly because to use homesteading in North America you have to essentially go back to when we were stealing this land from native americans, and if you go back that far then you're running into the issue that we stole this land from the native americans, but its okay because we didn't give them a receipt.
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Oct 11, 2015 08:48
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spoon0042 posted:oh yeah, I want my refrigerator to verify my voice print before giving me access to my brita pitcher, this is totally rational If you haven't read it the article itself is so much worse. For example, in this theoretical society if your spouse decided to murder you (Which is determined because his insurance lapsed) then the 'police' would come and forcibly relocate you to prevent you from being murdered. If you decided you wanted to maybe not be forcibly relocated against your will then you would be dropped from DRO coverage and would starve to death. Fun times.
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Oct 11, 2015 08:53
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Sharkie posted:Jrod please prove that starving people don't have the right to take food from people that have plenty. Oh that one is simple. Stefan Molyneux literally thinks that women are the source of all problems in the world. In particular women who choose assholes rather than 'nice guys' help to propagate violence throughout the world. Worst of all however are single mothers, because having a child without having a father there is literally child abuse and these women should be ashamed of themselves. Why yes Molyneux hates his mother, why do you ask? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4Xm6YW2gNw Edit: Jrod do not loving get into a conversation about tone because of these posts. I'm merely pointing out some fun facts about Molyneux that you continue to deny. If you think his DRO idea is garbage then just stay on target and talk about something else, I only brought it up to explain why someone might think you were in favor of fascism.
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Oct 11, 2015 09:16
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Cemetry Gator posted:Yeah, some cities have ordinances. It's not "Oh, hey, your lawn is looking a little shaggy today," it's more like "the grass is over 12" high, maybe you should mow the lawn." They're just taking after Ayn Rand. Oh... wait. Are we talking real lawns or lawns? team overhead smash posted:Okay, you don't seem to have realised the problem I was drawing up that the premise and conclusions to your argument are simplistic strawmen that do not represent either reality or the views of 'left-progressives'. This is a really good post by the way and deserves to be on every page until it is addressed. Caros fucked around with this message at 03:32 on Oct 12, 2015 |
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Oct 12, 2015 03:29
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VitalSigns posted:He won't answer those points that the US and Britain did not become developed industrial powers using laissez-faire. Hell he never even answered your healthcare posts from last year Caros. I know you're right. But there is always hope. Right? Right?
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Oct 12, 2015 05:15
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Ugh, I was literally about to go to sleep you rear end in a top hat. I'ma be quick.jrodefeld posted:You skirt the issue of taking a stand on which rules are best for society by stating that since all property rights are arbitrary, you know "whatever society democratically decides" should rule the day. I'm not skirting anything, I'm saying facts. The rules that are best for society are entirely arbitrary to that society. If I were living in a society in which a majority thought it was proper to enslave a minority by force for no wages then that sort of presupposes the idea that I grew up in a society where that was a normal and morally correct thing to do. My morality is a facet of how I was raised. If I was raised as a mongol I would fully believe in the divine right of the Khan to murder the everloving poo poo out of anyone who doesn't submit and offer tribute at the mere sight of his armies, whereas by contrast, having been born in the 1980's I happen to think that idea is hilariously antiquated. Morality is subjective. quote:The first user principle is not arbitrary because it is derived logically from a previous moral principle, which is that of individual self-ownership. Let's term it "body-ownership" since "self" can be misleading to some people. What we are referring to here is that people should have the right to control over their own physical bodies. I hate to break it to you Jrodefeld, but this argument is bunk. You are arguing that first user principle isn't arbitrary because it is logically derived from a moral principle, but that moral principle is itself arbitrary. We can see this clear as day by the very fact that different societies across history, even different societies in this day and age have vastly different opinions on what is and is not moral. The mongols did not think murder of non-mongols was an immoral act, but I certainly do. I think slavery is a horrible act, but much of the united states thought it was a grand old thing for centuries. As did the aztecs. As did... actually most of humanity at one point or another. You are making an argument that you're logically deriving this, but to that I ask, from where! Where does your objective morality derive and how can you prove that it is objectively true. And when I say objectively true I mean it needs to be provable in the same way that 2+2=4 you need to be able to objectively and unequivocally prove that individual self ownership is a universal law which is patently absurd. I mean lets take something unobjectionable. Murder is bad. We'd both agree that this is morally wrong, but is it objectively wrong? Well if I'm religious, yes, god says thou shalt not kill. If I'm not religious then who the gently caress knows. Most people don't like murder but frankly that is for utilitarian reasons more than anything else. For all we know the universal rule is that "The goal of all life is death" and Khorne is up there on his skull throne screaming "Kill each other you fuckers". Why is your moral principle of "Self ownership" more valid than the mongol moral principle of "obedience and submission to the Great Khan". The fact that it appeals more to you has nothing to do with its universal morality and the simple reality of it is that we have no way of knowing what objective morality is. Your guess is as good as the mongols, and absent objective, provable morality your entire argument hinges on a moral system that is as arbitrary as anything else. If the morals underpinning it are arbitrary then it doesn't matter what logic you use to derive first user principles. If I start from a moral belief of the white man's burden I can easily find my way to the logical endpoint that slavery is a just and moral system to help the negro, but that sure as gently caress doesn't make me right. quote:Whether or not you quibble over the use of "property right" as applied to peoples right to control their bodies, the claims are the same. I (as should everyone) should have the right to control my body as I see fit unless my actions aggress against another persons body or property (leaving aside our differences about what constitutes just property titles external to our bodies). Therefore, what I choose to eat or ingest should be up to me and me alone. When I go to sleep and get up in the morning should be my determination. When or if I exercise, who I decide to date or have sex with, are all things that individuals should have the final say on. Why? Sorry, I hate to be pedantic but why? My 'quibbles' aren't some minor thing you can just shrug off, they are an attack at the very underpinning of your entire system of thought. I don't even necessarily disagree with the idea that everyone should be able to use their body as they see fit but you are again assuming facts not in evidence. You are stating a personal preference, not an objective fact, and absent that objective reality it doesn't matter what train of logic you use to 'prove' your point. quote:Do you agree with this so far? I agree that your argument roughly matches up with the morality in which I was raised. I don't agree that it is in any way universal or that it forms the basis for the later facets of your argument. quote:Do you accept the principle that people ought to have the final say in the use of their physical bodies so long as they don't harm others? Stop with the Socratic bullshit please. As an aside I think this is lovely in theory but that applies to a lot of libertarian ideas in general. The problem is that humans are not perfect spheres on friction less surfaces and "so long as they don't harm others" is a phrase so open to interpretation that I could strap the state of Florida to some sort of star trek warp engine and fly through it. quote:If you do NOT accept self-ownership, then your moral theory has some very serious problems that you have to account for. There would be no principled reason to oppose slavery or rape or murder. Sure you could try and make a utilitarian case for why it would be a net negative for society to permit these things, but it is easy to imagine situations where utilitarians could argue for such violations of human rights. Maybe slavery was found to be incredibly efficient in certain circumstances? What if an economist could demonstrate that a certain level of enslavement of physically gifted individuals would slightly raise the GDP if they were forced to work in certain jobs without pay? You really don't understand how morality works do you. Morality is nothing more than a system of social mores developed by hairless apes to keep people from engaging in what is anti-social behavior. Aztecs murdered the poo poo out of people and that was moral for the Aztecs. Mongols raped so hard that one out of every two hundred living men is a direct line descendant of mighty Genghis Khan, and that was moral for them. Homosexuality was immoral less than a century ago and is now just another aspect of human existence. My moral theory cannot 'have problems' because morality is just a reflection of the preferences of a group of people. It can 'have problems' to an outside observer, you can certainly disapprove of my moral choices (I think yours are disgusting!) but that doesn't change anything from my perspective. As for the rest of your argument, sure there would be a principled reason to oppose murder or slavery, because they are wrong! For example, it is possible to believe that people shouldn't be allowed to inject heroin directly into their bloodstream while at the same time thinking that murder is wrong. In fact 86% of americans are in favor of keeping heroin as a controlled substance, and I guarantee you that the number opposed to murder is 99% or higher. Hell there are people who are in favor of executions while opposed to murder, figure that one out. Human morality is not a logical system Jrodefeld, it is a system of preferences that in many cases is based off nothing more complicated than a gut feeling. For example, why do I think stealing is wrong? Is it because I carefully and logically considered the economic effects of theft and weighted them against logical first principles? Hell no! Its because when I was three I probably got smacked with a wooden spoon for trying to take something and my mom told me stealing was wrong. Now you're entirely welcome to try and logic your way into your own particular moral system (which is super weird btw) but the system you end up with is still essentially as arbitrary as any others. I think murder is wrong because murder is wrong. You think murder is wrong because it violates self-ownership, but that is just passing the buck because then we get to the question of "Why is a violation of self-ownership wrong" to which the only answer I've ever heard a libertarian come up with is "Because it is." Give me a reason why Self-Ownership is or should be inviolate that doesn't boil down to "Because people think it should be." quote:Or imagine a eugenicist arguing that it was okay to murder all mentally handicapped persons because they don't contribute much to society from a productivity standpoint, they require a huge amount of care for their entire lives and they "contaminate" the gene pool if they reproduce by passing along so-called "inferior" genes to future generations. Wait, are we talking about Hans Hermann Hoppe again? quote:If you give up on the right of self-ownership, then what are you left to fall back on if a consequentialist has a stronger case in a given situation? I am quite sure that you didn't decide that murder is wrong because you studied the utilitarian effects and long term consequences for society for killing different groups of people some might consider "undesirable". Like most decent people, I assume that your view is that people have certain rights as human beings that ought to be respected, which includes not being murdered, raped or enslaved. For this I'm just going to refer you to my above comments. I don't believe murder is wrong because of utilitarian or consequentialist reasons, I believe it is wrong because the culture in which I was raised instilled in me the belief that murder is wrong. It is a belief, one not based in facts or logic but in cultural indoctrination. Much like your belief that the 'right' of self-ownership is something that exists and is or should be inviolate. Mind you I believe most of these things have their roots in utilitarian arguments to begin with. To take another example, the taboo against incest is largely based around the very real issues that result from that behavior. People consider sex with siblings to be wrong because it is something we are taught (often without question at a young age) but it no doubt originated due to a combination of social problems and genetic issues way back in the day. Likewise morality regarding murder is almost certainly derived from the huge issues that murder brings to the table, but for most people that consequentialist argument was lost centuries before and has simply become "Thou shalt not kill" even for no other reason than "Thou shalt not". quote:This conception of "Natural Rights" had a great deal of influence on the founding of the United States and the drafting of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. It animated most abolitionists who fought to end slavery and grant equal rights to blacks in the United States. Appeal to authority or appeal to nature, take your pick. I couldn't give two flying fucks what rich slave owners or Lysander Spooner and his ilk thought centuries ago. In particular I couldn't give a single gently caress about his backwards thoughts on natural law. quote:Whether or not these rights exist in nature, or are mere practical constructions of man is not as important as you think it is. We argue for certain ethical rules for civilized society based on our reason, the coherence of our arguments and the nature of man. Pretty much all religious and spiritual traditions teach that there is something inherently immoral about the taking of an innocent life. There has been a long-standing acknowledgment of the principle of self-ownership throughout the centuries. I disagree, I think the distinction between something existing in nature (and thus being in essence an immutable law) or whether they are constructions of man no different than any other 'right' or 'law' is immensely important. Moreover your appeal to authority (religion in this case) doesn't mean much to me. Unless we're arguing theology, which we aren't, we are talking about human institutions that largely existed to constrain problematic behavior. Religion was a good way to impose social control over people and to prevent anti-social behavior. Pointing to them and acting as if that somehow means murder is inherently immoral is a fallacy. To top it all off your 'long standing acknowledgement' is just baffling to me. I'm going to go back through some of the top empires in human history: Egypt - Famously owned a shiton of slaves. Assyrian/Persian - May or may not have abolished slavery under Cyrus the Great. Still had tons of debt slaves and almost certainly had a lot of 'servants' Seleucid -Loved them some slaves. Rome - You better believe these guys loved some slaves Abbasids - "Conquests had brought enormous wealth and large numbers of slaves tot he muslim elite" Mongols -  I could go on but I figure you get my point at this point. Slavery is an institution as old as loving time. The idea that there has ever been some historical acknowledgement of the principle of self ownership is a loving joke. If you look at any human living he is probably descended both from slaves and slave owners at some point in his genealogy, and even societies that didn't have slaves had serfs, plebs or other such underclasses that the concept of self-ownership was a distant myth to. Please stop stating wildly ahistorical nonsense as fact. quote:I hope you do agree with me that people should have the right to control their own bodies and not have force used against their bodies. Sure. That doesn't mean I agree with any of your other assumptions derived from this relatively basic concept. quote:So when determining how people are to acquire legitimate property outside of their physical bodies, the reason the libertarian principle of "original appropriation" makes the most sense is that there exists a tangible link between a person's ownership over his or her physical body and the external object that is brought into ownership. By plucking an untouched object out of nature and transforming it for your use, to further the attainment of your goals, you have thus imprinted your "self", which you own if you believe in self-ownership, onto a material object. Like a sculptor who carves a statue or a painter who paints a picture, the object that is transformed has an impression of you in it. So in what sense could any other person have a better claim over the use of such a scarce resource that the one who initially transformed it? Until he or she voluntarily gives it up in a contractual exchange of course. It doesn't make the 'most sense'. For one thing lets be perfectly clear. For something that 'makes the most sense' it seems really odd that it has never been used in all of human history as a theory of property rights. For something so glaringly obvious humanity has had plenty of chances to see it and has missed time and time again. Doesn't that in and of itself make you wonder? In addition, even if we accept your silly premise that you own yourself, how does that translate into you owning the fruits of your labor. I mean I want you to read the part I've bolded above and try and imagine you are a person on a street who is hearing this for the first time. That sounds like something out of a loving Harry Potter book, not a legitimate basis for uprooting all of our society according to your weird, cultist beliefs. Why does you taking an apple give you ownership of it? Why should it? You've already agreed with me in your previous posts that property rights are arbitrary and subject to human agreement. If you pluck that apple and no one else agrees with you then as the rubber meets the road you have no property right because property rights are fiction. The argument that you have the 'best claim' is entirely subjective here and honestly boils down to your arguing "Finders keepers." Property rights are arbitrary. They are a thing that solely exists because people choose to believe they exist, and they do that to solve conflicts and deal with material scarcity. With that in mind why is an argument that again, boils down to "First come first serve" more valid to the group (who ultimately determine these things) than one based around need? Need before greed is the standard loot system in World of Warcraft, not free for all for a very good reason after all. quote:Now, collective ownership is not impermissible in a libertarian society. Individuals can freely contract with a group of others to enter into a partnership over the ownership of a piece of land, or a factory. There is nothing wrong with this. But someone had to originally have a claim on whatever property they are considering making into a collective. And that person, or people, who originally homesteaded the property must voluntarily enter into a contractual partnership to have a collective ownership. A group of people cannot simply decide that they ought to own part of some land and force the original owner to vacate the land they homesteaded. Oh how nice of you. After you wildly and utterly destroy the way of life preferred by billions to serve your weird little cult you'll let us set up collective ownership if we want to. How nice. Alternately, you can simply go get hosed because no one is going to agree to your Mammon worshiping cult. As to the latter part of your statement... reality disagrees wholeheartedly. Not only is homesteading not something that exists in reality in any significant amount (nor will it) but the group can indeed simply decide that they ought to own some part of the land. We have that now in fact, its called eminent domain. Just because you personally don't like something does not mean that it is an immutable fact of nature that it is abhorrent. I don't like peas but I don't think society should obliterate all peas (well I do but I also realize that is unrealistic.) quote:If you do accept people's right to universal control over their physical bodies so long as they don't hurt others, and you don't have to accept the phrase "ownership" to accept this general idea, then you ought to accept the notion that property rights in external objects should be in some way linked to this antecedent principle which hopefully has been agreed to. Why? Again, what is the mechanism that goes from one to the other. Your argument is "I own myself" ----> "Therefore I own my labor" ----> "Therefore..." but I can stop you at point two. Even if we acknowledge that you own yourself, I don't have to, nor 'ought' I accept the notion that property rights should be linked to your weird obsession with owning yourself. Property rights are whatever people say they are. Property rights could literally be decided by a modified version of this:  We could literally have a property system based entirely around the Magic: The Gathering card Thieves Auction with slightly revised text and that would be just as arbitrary as the system you are talking about. Your proposed system is based off a faulty premise that self-ownership is an objective moral principle from which you can derive other facets of existence. In reality self-ownership is a concept as nebulous as thou shalt not kill, it is something we might agree upon today, but it is ethereal, it isn't an immutable fact but a consensus agreement. You can't logically derive the first user principle as the ideal property rights system from self-ownership because self-ownership is neither an objective universal constant nor a logical position. Its an opinion, and if you're starting from an opinion you can just as easily derive "Blacks should be slaves" as you can "homesteading is the poo poo." Really the only argument you have to play is a consequentialist one. You can certainly make the argument that in the world we live in you think a system of property derived from the subjective belief in self-ownership and first use would be best, you just can't make a solid argument that first use is somehow special because I agree with the basic concept of self-ownership. I believe that people should have access to medical care if we as a society have the ability to provide it. Full stop, I think if we live in a society where that is possible (and we do) that it should go without saying. That is as solid a starting point as your self-ownership argument.
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Oct 12, 2015 09:41
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jrodefeld posted:I'll end this by mentioning that Hans Hermann Hoppe actually wrote about this principle. I don't want to hear anything about how you think Hoppe is a racist or whatever else. That is a different discussion and I am not interested in going down that path. The fact remains that I agree with this principle wholeheartedly. Not to belabor but it isn't just we who think Hoppe is a racist. In the libertarian thread you yourself showed that you were leaning that was when it was pointed out to you that he hosts an annual conference for Race Realists. Just making sure everyone is aware.
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Oct 12, 2015 09:44
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Dr. Stab posted:I don't know. You could derive a set of morals from the idea that everyone has a right to be happy. It makes a lot more sense than picking some secondary thing like property and then also asserting that this maximizes happiness. This pretty simply deals with the issue of why using something as simple as 'maximize happiness' can be problematic.
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Oct 12, 2015 20:47
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I hate to go back to something I've already discussed, but I've had a question about this rattling around in my brain since last night:quote:Whether or not these rights exist in nature, or are mere practical constructions of man is not as important as you think it is. We argue for certain ethical rules for civilized society based on our reason, the coherence of our arguments and the nature of man. Pretty much all religious and spiritual traditions teach that there is something inherently immoral about the taking of an innocent life. There has been a long-standing acknowledgment of the principle of self-ownership throughout the centuries. quote:Do you accept the principle that people ought to have the final say in the use of their physical bodies so long as they don't harm others? Can anyone actually think of any society in history that has acknowledged the principle of self ownership? I mean clearly there aren't any that acknowledge it by name, but I mean just any that acknowledge the definition I've included above. Because while I had an easy time thinking of counter examples I can't actually think of any examples in his favor. Modern social democracies would probably be the closest, but even with those there is an understanding that Self-ownership isn't unassailable and is subject to a variety of social factors. For example, I can't think of a society on earth where general suicide is accepted. Sure there are some that allow assisted suicide (which they should.) but I actually can't think of a modern society where you won't be forcibly hospitalized if you attempt to take your own life and fail, which is something that runs totally counter to the idea of Self-Ownership because I should be allowed to destroy something I own. Then there are issues with drugs as we've discussed above (I personally think heroin use should be decriminalized but still limited to specific conditions for safety reasons, for example). There are also more nebulous things such as noise violations. Am I 'harming' someone by playing stupidly loud music at one in the morning? Sort of points out how harm is a very subjective term that could included or exclude a variety of things. So yeah... can anyone think of a society that has acknowledged the principle of self ownership? I'm drawing a blank.
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Oct 12, 2015 21:57
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Muscle Tracer posted:I never understood this critique. Maybe there's an actual meaningful argument that it's a hugely hyperbolic version of, but even in the most mathematical system of utilitarianism I don't see how a concept of diminishing returns, or setting a mandatory minimum bound below which no individual should be driven, or targeting median rather than mean happiness, don't all render the utility monster utterly pointless. Oh I don't think that is accurate, I just think it serves as a wonderful illustration as to why basing all of human existence off of a single concept is a bad idea, regardless of if that concept is self ownership or maximize happiness. People are complicated and can't be explained so easily was my point.
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Oct 12, 2015 23:00
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Muscle Tracer posted:Yeah, and I guess my response is driving the same point—pretending anything about people is simple is rarely going to end well. Excellent. Well yeah, utility monsters don't actually exist. The post was tongue in cheek.
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Oct 12, 2015 23:52
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Not to exploit what is undoubtedly a difficult situation, but how the gently caress do conjoined twins fit into Self-Ownership? I mean I know its pretty much the ultimate niche case, but my wife brought it up to me earlier and my brain is now totally fried.
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Oct 13, 2015 06:00
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Pththya-lyi posted:The pig is in the poke I am very confused.
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Oct 14, 2015 07:21
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WhiskeyWhiskers posted:Sex can be sold as a commodity, discuss Ayn Rand in terms of marginal utility. Someone help me out. I know there is a joke about time preferences here.
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Oct 15, 2015 04:15
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God I'm so sick and you've posted so much. I think for once you're sheer verboseness has outdone my ability to respond to all of your crazy poo poo Jrodefeld. Bravo, today I will have to pick and choose.jrodefeld posted:Cato puts out a yearly report where they rank the countries of the world according to their "economic freedom", i.e. correlation of policies with libertarian ideology. This year, the United States ranks 16th. Where do I even begin with this. Well to start with the top country on your list of countries isn't a loving country. So... yeah that sort of says a lot about the validity of your data. To give you the benefit of the doubt Cato actually judges it by 'economies' not countries. On top of that I'm not sure why you think posting the opinion of Cato is something that we would find persuasive. To be clear I know the data you're talking about, and I also know what is wrong with it. In particular the issue with the Cato EFW data is that it is completely loving arbitrary. The metrics used to make up this chart are 100% subjective and weighted in a way that depends entirely on the whims of the group writing them. For example, the score given to a country is based off of five factors: Size of Government, Legal System and Property Rights, Sound Money, Freedom to Trade Internationally and Regulation. Each of those five sections are themselves made up of between one and nine subsections which themselves can be made up of between one and six subsections. Size of government for example has A-D sections with D having two subsections. Legal System and Property Rights has nine sections with no subsections while Regulation only has A-C with a total of 16 subsections between them. Confused yet? On top of the frankly ridiculous format used to determine their sections Cato then ascribes a score between 1-10 to each of the sections and subsections, which in term average out to determine the score for the top factor. Thus, for example, Hong Kong gets a 9.4 in Size of government because it has an average of 9.4 between its sections of Government consumption, transfers and subsudies, government enterprises and investment and Top marginal tax rate. Stay with me, we're almost done. So what is wrong with all of that? Well the simple fact is that it is made up numbers in made up categories without any science to back it up. Cato defines Economic Freedom in its ideological way (the libertarian ideology of course) which means that things like hours regulations, minimum wage, collective bargaining (unions) and other such terrifying things count against a country even though most normal people would say that ability to be in a union can increase the economic freedom of that person. Moreover there is no weighting to any of it. Black market exchange rates (which is a category for some reason) is actually more important than impartial courts on their scoring system, because Black market exchange rates is one of four while impartial courts is 1 of 9 and thus its impact is split. Does that seem crazy to you? It should. The Cato institute 'study' on economic freedom means nothing because it is an ideological talking point. It exists so that libertarians can do exactly what you are doing and go "Look at how free these places are compared to us! Don't you want to be free!" devoid of any context or meaning.
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Oct 15, 2015 16:19
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jrodefeld posted:gently caress you and get the gently caress off of my thread. I don't have any goddamn patience for your loving poo poo anymore. If you'd like to give me an E-mail I'll send you all my personal details so that you can come and fight me. That said, if you're going to whine about people dogpiling you I have some suggestions. I am still happy to debate you in any format you'd like, 1 on 1 with a moderator of your choice. My offer even still stands to buy you a webcam or microphone in case you are somehow too poor to avoid something that goes for like twenty bucks at best buy. I will even stay up until the unreasonable hours you usually seem to be online! If you're too busy (coughchickenshitcough) to do that then maybe you can convince mods to open a 1 on 1 Jrodefeld debate thread where only one poster can argue with you at a time so you can't complain about all the people piling on and being mean to you? I don't know if they'd go for it but it's better than nothing right? I'm sure there is some other solution that you could go through that doesn't involve you acting like a tough guy to something awful posters. jrodefeld posted:Oh I see. Ever getting help from anyone somehow makes me a hypocritical libertarian? For the record, I only ever borrowed $1000 from my grandparents which I promptly paid back, but way to bring up a red herring. quote:There is another example that involves myself. In my early 20s I dealt with some fairly serious medical issues. My family, especially my grandparents were able to help me out financially as I could only work part time and needed to pay bills to see some doctors. My parents wanted me to apply for Social Security disability. I never was able to complete the lengthy process. I kept being denied even though I had explicit doctors notes explaining why I couldn't work a full time job. I even spoke to a disability lawyer about the situation. He said that it can take up to three YEARS to get on disability and he would have to fight the bureaucracy every step of the way. Being on State assistance is a full time job in many ways. Right off the bat I want to make sure everyone knows the context for the first part of this post. Because it is amazing. Jrodefeld was arguing against universal health care policies under the argument that people would get help when they needed it. In his case meemaw and poppop covered his medical bills when he needed them to. People have rightly made fun of him for this because Jrodefeld seems incapable of understanding the concept that some people don't have grandparents that can swoop in to save the day, or that some people have medical issues more than $1,000 and that they might need some kind of help, perhaps some sort of social assistance if you would. It might be a bit petty to snark on this point, but gently caress him. I have no patience for people who will work to keep other people from getting medical care because of a misplaced economic belief. quote:Let's get this straight though. I am not obligated to answer every single post on YOUR schedule. I've wasted far more time than I should on these forums. It's like you are unaware that unlike apparently some of you, I actually have a day job, family obligations and other hobbies. If I don't post here every loving week or every month, it doesn't make me a "coward" who had to concede defeat. I agree your time here has been a waste for you but it has been comedy gold for us. Also Jrod, this may shock you but the vast majority of SA posters are gainfully employed. I probably make multiple times your annual income, I just also work from home instead of at a K-Mart (or wherever... do they even still have those?) so I can afford to spend time calling you out on your bullshit. And yes, it does kind of make you a coward. He isn't wrong in saying that you have a specific style of post. You go on a rant about a topic, people start challenging you, people get annoyed when you handwave off their response and start asking you about your watermelon fetish and how HHH is a racist gently caress. Perhaps most crucial of your habits however is your insistence on trying to get the last word. You've done it multiple times today in fact. You don't want to talk about vaccines, but here are all the reasons people should be worried about vaccines. You aren't interested in talking about racism, but here are all the reasons HHH isn't a racist. If you don't want to talk about something then don't. Simply say "I'm not interested in talking about racism because it is a topic that has been done to death and we clearly disagree" and then move on. You set the argument and people here would likely respect you more if you just refused to get side tracked than if you talk about how much you're not going to talk about vaccines before posting a thousand word screed on how vaccination is the devil. quote:I don't care what the gently caress you do. Just don't aim those loving guns in my direction. You don't really care about the State violence committed on your behalf. If there is a social problem you are concerned about, go fix it! Work in the market, create something, innovate. Don't use the political process to terrorize your fellow man into complying with your social designs. Taxation isn't theft and you have never had a gun pointed at you in your entire life you insufferable simpleton. I absolutely care about state violence comitted on my behalf, like violence overseas. I don't consider arresting someone for tax evasion violence because I (and society) consider him to be a loving thief. quote:This is what sociopaths do. Civilized people interact with others on a voluntary basis. Civilized people have paid taxes since the concept of civilization has existed. The fact that you don't like them does not mean we are beholden to your skewed worldview. quote:There is a reason I am trying to be really clear about what rights people have and what constitutes just property titles. If there is clarity on these fronts, it means you can't weasel your way out of it when it is inconvenient for you. You all want to make things very vague, so you can justify State coercion without constraint. And you have failed! At no point in the last week have you adequately explained why your version of property rights should be uber alles. Indeed you have conceded the fact that property rights are a fiction created by people, yet you still seem incapable of understanding the fact that if people can create one fiction to solve social problems (property) then they are well within their ability to allow for taxation. quote:For a principled person, there is a threshold that must be met if the State is to seize property. The property must be proven to be invalid for some clearly defined reason. It shouldn't be a vague justification or a democratic whim of the majority. See this is why everyone calls you a backwards watermelon fucker. You're being a little passive aggressive shithead here. Fun fact Jrodefeld, 95% of americans believe that paying taxes is their civic duty, which means you just insulted 95% of your fellow citizens by calling them unprincipled. Do you think that maybe insulting the vast majority of people is maybe not a coherent strategy to making your case? And I hate to break it to you, but the democratic whim of the majority is the only reason we have property. If people disagreed with the concept of private property we could have full communism now. People decide what does and doesn't belong to others by social consensus, and social consensus says your taxes aren't yours. Suck it up buttercup.
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Oct 15, 2015 16:50
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jrodefeld posted:I'm not talking about vaccines other than to say that I stand by my view that I oppose the State forcing people to take them against their will. I never said vaccines are "bad", or that people shouldn't take them. I stated something that is true, namely that there is a real danger to granting pharmaceutical companies carte blanche to produce vaccines that the State then MANDATES the public to take. The incentive structure is such that it encourages an overproduction of vaccines and pressure to give more and more vaccines at younger and younger ages, beyond the reasonable demands of public safety. Where's your skepticism of big money and distrust of corporate greed when it comes to vaccine production, Progressives? gently caress YOU gently caress You gently caress you gently caress you fuckyoufukyoufcuaklsdafklgbnkl;erfge!!! Jrodefeld people can go back and check this sort of thing. You spent nearly twenty posts in the libertarian thread talking about the dangers of vaccines. You went on a rant about Thimerisol, and how unsafe it is to have so many vaccines back to back. You rambled on about how ineffective they were despite medical evidence showing that you were up your own rear end. You posted an honest to god quack doctor talking about how measles "Isn't really that bad" because the death rate in modern america is so low. You made false claims about the chicken pox vaccine causing an increased rate of shingles. You talked about how you had measles as a kid and it really wasn't that bad. All of this culminated in people making fun of you for getting your amalgam fillings drilled out because your dentist told you that you needed to have them out to keep from getting dangerous (HA) amounts of mercury in your system. When I pointed out to you that not only is this not true, that in fact having the fillings removed actually introduces far more mercury to your system in one large dose than the entire length of the fillings, you quietly shut up about the topic. The last thing you had to say about it was this: quote:I don't think that the American Dental Society is secretly poisoning everyone. I think the detrimental health effects of Mercury fillings, where they exist, are subtle and most people probably won't notice any issues. With that said, given the advances in composite fillings, there is no longer any need to use mercury fillings so we shouldn't use them. Now to be clear you posted that after being confronted with this link from the American Dental Association which says, in part: quote:Dental amalgam is considered a safe, affordable and durable material that has been used to restore the teeth of more than 100 million Americans. It contains a mixture of metals such as silver, copper and tin, in addition to mercury, which binds these components into a hard, stable and safe substance. Dental amalgam has been studied and reviewed extensively, and has established a record of safety and effectiveness. Why should anyone take you seriously about anything. You were shown, unambiguously that your stated position on this issue is inconsistent with all known, reputable science on the issue. I linked you scientific study after scientific study (and there are literally dozens of them) and the last thing you had to say on the subject was some middling bullshit response about how you still think the effects exist (though subtle of course). You are incapable of accepting data that does not conform to your worldview. I think even a normal stubborn headed person, when confronted with overwhelming evidence and no contrasting theory would at least admit that "Yeah I could be wrong" but you won't. You refuse to admit that you were probably had by a dentist who convinced you to undergo unnecessary procedures. And this is true of everything you talk about. What is the point of even talking to you about something as nebulous as economics when you refuse to even acknowledge the possibility that you might have been scammed when faced with cold, unassailable facts. And this applies to your position on vaccines as well. You are wrong on vaccines. Every reputable pediatrician in the country says that our current vaccination schedule is safe and effective. The american pediatric society isn't in the pocket of big vaccine and your scaremongering on the issue is frankly offensive and disgusting. I refuse to let you get the last word on this issue because to do so would allow you to continue spreading misinformation and fear that will ultimately lead to the injury and death of children. What the gently caress is wrong with you Jrodefeld? Fight me.
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Oct 15, 2015 17:12
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Literally The Worst posted:he challenged me first, i get first crack at this and I choose to set up a boxing match Now I'm just imagining this ending up like the Uwe Boll vs Lowtax match. Turns out Jrodefeld is this seven foot tall beast of a professional boxer who just beats the poo poo out of you.
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Oct 15, 2015 17:14
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Sephyr posted:You're laughing now, but remember that they can pass the hat around their grandparents to secure capital and hire the fearsome meth-head bum Shingles who lives just off-campus to provide extra non-coercive muscle. (remember that tyrannical sate measures like decent rehab clinics and mental care would further strangle the economy by ending this entrepreneurial option for voluntary security deals) This reminds me of my favorite An-Cap argument. I once had an An-Cap argue that Ross Ulbright did nothing wrong because there is nothing immoral about hiring someone to murder another person. The killer is in the wrong, sure, but you're just engaging in voluntary exchange.
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Oct 15, 2015 17:25
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Hey, JRode? Quick question: Since you've quoted this list in support of your views, it would be fair to say that you agree with the Cato institute's rankings here, yes? And, a follow-up: Can you guess why Nolanar bolded those two specific countries on your list? Because I can. Or, to put it in terms you might comprehend; Two of these things are not like the others, two of these things just doesn't belong. [/quote] No no, you see the UAE is absolutely really high up there in economic freedom. Did you know that they paid them nearly $4 a day? Amazing. In fact they were so concerned that they might drop something important that they actually confiscated the passports of the foreign workers they brought in to build it so that they wouldn't lose them or leave the country before they earned all the money they could! Isn't that great of them? I mean of course there are the fees that you have to pay when you start working in the country, and there are the dangers of working on a huge building without proper equipment. But these are small prices to pay for FREEDOM!
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Oct 15, 2015 18:26
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TLM3101 posted:Dammit, Caros! I was counting on the fact that JRod doesn't know poo poo about poo poo to have him defend literal slave-states and you have to go and let the cat out of the bag early! Sorry. Want me to go back and edit my posts to talk about pies or something? Its not like he's going to read this until 2am anyways.
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Oct 15, 2015 18:49
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Mods, please change thread title to "Why Should We Care About Property Rights? Because I will fight you!"
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Oct 15, 2015 21:08
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"Respect the Non-Aggression Principle or I'll kick your rear end!" "You wouldn't be so tough without your MEN WITH KEYBOARDS!"
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Oct 15, 2015 21:18
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Literally The Worst posted:the funniest part was the implication that i have friends Wait... are we not friends?
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Oct 15, 2015 21:24
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