What I'm saying is that if we adopt the system of voluntary associations 100%, what will the world look like in 100 years? It will probably look much like what it looks like now: voluntary associations will get larger and larger from entirely natural market forces until they become governments.
I don't see why. In any case though, you aren't making a compelling argument as to why we shouldn't do it. Wouldn't it be better to have freedom for 100 years and then have it POSSIBLY "become government" than to just keep the crappy government we have now?
To a certain extent, I think you're right. I think BOTH sides tend to overestimate the impact that such a change (and ANY political change, for that matter) would really have on the average individual's day to day life. However, I think the advantage mainly will come to the outliers. In a voluntary society, it would be MUCH easier to live "outside the system" if you so desired. Granted, the overwhelming majority of people would not desire, and for them, life would proceed largely as it did before. But for those who really and truly value freedom, the gains would be significant.
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This thing is about as utopian as the Communist workers' paradise. It shares the same flaw: who enforces property rights? Yes, he's saying voluntary associations can do so, but that's not a satisfactory answer because it only works if everyone agrees on what is whose in the first place. You can't contract to exchange things if you don't agree on who owns them, and your solution to that question can't be provided by an arbitration agreement in that very same suspect contract. Why? Because property rights are held by the owner against everyone in society, and you are only contracting with one, or a few, or even a lot of people. But nowhere near everyone.
It's not surprising it took the author 8 years to sell 1500 copies of this.
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Wouldn't it be better to have freedom for 100 years and then have it POSSIBLY "become government" than to just keep the crappy government we have now?
The human race began with no governments, and yet governments exist. Clearly they provide some advantage. I suspect that a large part of that advantage was the ability to force other, less organized people to become second class citizens within your own society. And if someone waved a magic wand and erased all national allegiances... well, that'd still be true.
So my answer is "no". I don't want to imply that the world's current political situation is a peaceful equilibrium, because it isn't. But my opinion is that if we were to start again from scratch, we'd wind up with a situation that was not really any better or worse, and yet a great deal of blood would be shed along the way.
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Because it happened before. The current system of governments around the world evolved out of voluntary associations. Why? Because the market said so. Because the sum of all free market forces said that this was a good system- and that having 200 or so voluntary associations was better than having hundreds of thousands of them.
Could we do better? Maybe. But probably not by instituting the same process that gave us the current system.
And if you think about it, there's very good reasons large associations would crowd out small ones. Look at business- large companies have great advantages of scale and efficiency over small ones.
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Could we do better? Maybe. But probably not by instituting the same process that gave us the current system.
If your point is that EVERY government to ever exist is a voluntary system, what other POSSIBLE process is there? Like, you keep tearing these ideas down. Do you have a better plan?
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The way I see it, reputation ultimately still cannot overcome force. If it's just one violent person, then ostracism by the rest of society will work. But what if this person gets a whole group of people to join him in using violent force? Now we've got a sort of gang- and the rest of society has no way to deal with this. Sure, they can refuse to do business with them, but this gang will simply respond by taking things by force. Don't want to sell me food? Fine, I'll just take it.
Unless, of course, there's another group out there using force in reply. But then, the bigger and/or smarter group will probably win. Now we've got bigger and bigger groups of people using violent force. Something like rival mafia families. But still, there will ever be the reality that having a bigger group leads to victory. So we get bigger and bigger groups. Clans. Cities. Duchies. Kingdoms. Empires. Government.
There is an old saying: Power abhors a vacuum. It is true. The absence of power can only be a temporary state, because someone will seize it soon enough.
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"Come here, submit to our authority, live under armed guards, have little freedom, work all day giving us a large percentage of the money, and we will offer you the food, clothing, and shelter that nobody else will currently willingly provide you."
sounds like college dorms
-- _foolmo_ 'To be foolmo'd is to be better opinion'd.' - Blairville
Doesn't sound like college dorms to me.........the only thing in common that I can see is the providing shelter part. But you pay with money, not with loss of freedom.
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No, I do not. I don't have to, because I'm reviewing a book, not writing one.
So, since you were saying that EVERY government is voluntary, was it pointless for the founders of America to revolt against the British? Did they not then use the same process that they were under before?
Was it pointless for South Korea to resist invasion by the Communist North because after all, both were voluntary systems that would probably end up in the same result anyway?
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SmartMuffin - Because anything less would be uncivilized - http://img.imgcake.com/smartmuffin/barkleyjpgde.jpg http://dudewheresmyfreedom.com/
Realize though, the North Korea was still created by a voluntary association of people. Mind you, it wasn't an association of the people in the country, so much as it was an association of people with military power I think. Voluntary organizations impose their rules over people who do not wish it to be so quite often, as is the case of tyrannical governments, mafias, and religions. Then you get other voluntary associations opposing them, such as rebels, police, and other governments providing military intervention. Freedom allows people to gain power, and power allows one to steal freedom. Not in an ideal society perhaps, but it's been done countless times throughout history. In order to protect freedoms held by the minority or the militarily inferior, people band together and create laws to restrict the freedoms used to take freedom from others. The larger the organization upholding the laws, the more powerful those laws, and thus protection of freedoms, becomes. The problem arises when people disagree which freedoms need to be protected.
Because honestly, no morality is truly absolute. You will always have people arguing over which freedoms are most important, and how much restriction of freedom is acceptable to protect the vital freedoms. Anarchy leads nearly inevitably to government because that's what people desire. Unfortunately, governments become twisted and bloated over time, which of course leads us to our current problems. That doesn't imply that governments are inherently bad, just that governments are (obviously) not infallible. As the power and size of any organization rises, so too does its potential for corruption. Balancing the need for power and the need for accountability is a very tricky business.
Anyways, I just felt like leaping in here. As usual, I'm not exactly good at putting my thoughts out there well, so I'm sure there are some very bad choices of words in there.
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Walking around where? All the land is owned by private individuals who will not allow rapists to come onto their property.
Well, they'd have to use force to keep them out. These people have already proven that they don't respect another person's rights, so why wouldn't they just walk where they chose if not opposed by an application of force?
Could happen. It'd be hard though. It also could happen right now under a state. And much like a real fugitive, he wouldn't be able to just change his appearance, he would need to obtain a whole new identity (complete with intact reputation) somehow. His best chance would be to attempt to flee to somewhere so far away that it might not even use the same reputation services, although this would also be difficult, as who is going to offer him transport? Who will allow him to use their roads?
Well, them sneaking back into society isn't likely but is doable... But it sounds to me you'd advocate having them be forced to stay in the woods or something, assuming there even are woods not privately owned at that point. And it seems to me that if you're on the bad rep list of the guy who owns the roads in your town, you're rightly ****ed. Be on one guy's bad graces and you can't function in society. Monopolies on roads would be more or less enforced by geography, you can only have so many roads in one place, and privately owned roads wouldn't be able to intersect another companies' roads if they didn't want them to.
The prisons would be like hotels, basically. Prisoners would check into them voluntarily because the prisons would be the only places willing to transact business with those on the "violent criminal" list. The prisons would basically say "Come here, submit to our authority, live under armed guards, have little freedom, work all day giving us a large percentage of the money, and we will offer you the food, clothing, and shelter that nobody else will currently willingly provide you."
That would work with some people sure. But someone who didn't want to submit could see simply continuing their damaging acts to obtain food/shelter. If they don't choose to submit in this case, they'd have to be beaten or killed. Repeat theft could carry a death penalty. Simply, I think there'd be a significant number of criminals who'd rather commit crimes than to willingly give up their freedoms. And in general, this seems to be a system for having group pressure remove the rights of others through a choice that isn't really a choice. In the end, what I'm asking is what protects the citizens from some maniac with a gun? If the only answer to that is weapons of their own, you basically have a wild west survival of the fittest scenario, which would end up terribly.
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This also already happens. Here's a little experiment for you. Dress up like a bum, walk into a police station, and say that an officer assaulted you. See how seriously they take you and how far you get.
Yeah, this is downright terrible. My feelings have always been that more power equals more accountability, so such claims should be taken more seriously than an accusation against an ordinary citizen, instead of less.
Furthermore, the reputation services will have stated rules, as I said, it's like a credit score. Your credit score only falls if you do things that make you a credit risk, and you have means to dispute and appeal. The reputation list would be the same way. You list would also specify exactly what you did. So let's say that you failed to return a library book on time. You'd get a very small ding on your record, and if someone viewed it, it would say "failed to return library book on time." I somehow doubt that this would cause most people to say "well that's a terrible person so I'm totally cool with someone raping them."
Presumably for such a reputation system to work it would be widely accepted. There'd almost certainly only be a handful of them for any scale larger than a single town. Basically, the rules surrounding the reputation system would become a soft version of law. Lets say for example their record instead says something like "is gay" which gave them a huge ding in that system run by the people in that town. Speaking out against such a system would almost certainly get you dinged in response, the guys who make the rules would be pretty damned powerful. And it's not like people could just leave the town because they're not allowed to use the roads!
As opposed to the giant ones that we get from government? And governments are capable of worse ones. Like say, slaughtering six million Jews? Or starving five million Ukranians to death? Or systematically murdering every college educated person in the country with machetes? Or creating weapons that could destroy the world a hundred times over? The evils that individual deranged psychopaths commit are statistically insignificant when compared to the evils that government has, and will continue to commit.
Not going to touch this. The only real difference is scale, a group of deranged people can do more damage than a single deranged person. Government is just a tool in essence. And like any tool, it can be used for good or for bad.
And lol if you think private corporations wouldn't have come up with nuclear power and weaponry if it hadn't already been invented.
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Doesn't sound like college dorms to me.........the only thing in common that I can see is the providing shelter part. But you pay with money, not with loss of freedom.
It's called a joke. But I guess this topic is 2 SRS at the moment.
-- _foolmo_ 'he says listen to my story this maybe are last chance' - ertyu quoting Tidus
So, since you were saying that EVERY government is voluntary, was it pointless for the founders of America to revolt against the British? Did they not then use the same process that they were under before?
Was it pointless for South Korea to resist invasion by the Communist North because after all, both were voluntary systems that would probably end up in the same result anyway?
All these were natural free market forces acting within the system of voluntary associations. The point is that the system of voluntary associations is not a panacea. Actions by players within that system can still be good or bad (read: efficient or inefficient, or moral/immoral, pick your poison).
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Well now we're just arguing semantics, aren't we? Just to be clear, you DO concede that South Korea is far better off than North Korea, regardless of whether you label them both "voluntary" associations or not, yes?
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From an economic point of view, to the extent that a voluntary association fulfills the role of government, it also creates to that extent the harmful losses of efficiency of government.
Indeed, you can argue that the world is already governed by voluntarism, and free market forces have shaped it into 200 or so voluntary associations we call governments. If you want to leave one of them, you can. Don't tell me that you can't escape taxation, because everything you earned you earned subject to the laws of that country, which you voluntarily subjected yourself to. If you didn't want to be taxed, you could have left earlier or not worked. If you got your property from someone else, they agreed to those laws.
Regulators are inefficient not because they work for government, but because they regulate.
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Change that 50% to 95% and soon those who wish to use drugs are completely unable to function in that community.
True! Although the system we basically have now is that it 51% can cause drug users to be completely unable to function in that community. I'm not saying AnCap is perfect. Contrary to what red sox says, we are NOT utopians. I'm just saying it's better than the current oppressive statism that we have now.
Well, then that rapist, a person known to use violence to achieve their ends, is now walking around completely unrestricted.
Walking around where? All the land is owned by private individuals who will not allow rapists to come onto their property.
Perhaps he changes his appearance enough to slide back into society.
Could happen. It'd be hard though. It also could happen right now under a state. And much like a real fugitive, he wouldn't be able to just change his appearance, he would need to obtain a whole new identity (complete with intact reputation) somehow. His best chance would be to attempt to flee to somewhere so far away that it might not even use the same reputation services, although this would also be difficult, as who is going to offer him transport? Who will allow him to use their roads?
or a system of imprisonment is established to protect the populace from the rapist.
The prisons would be like hotels, basically. Prisoners would check into them voluntarily because the prisons would be the only places willing to transact business with those on the "violent criminal" list. The prisons would basically say "Come here, submit to our authority, live under armed guards, have little freedom, work all day giving us a large percentage of the money, and we will offer you the food, clothing, and shelter that nobody else will currently willingly provide you."
Or perhaps something worse happens. Perhaps the people of this town don't like the victim. They're on a negative rep list for almost everyone in the town
This also already happens. Here's a little experiment for you. Dress up like a bum, walk into a police station, and say that an officer assaulted you. See how seriously they take you and how far you get. Furthermore, the reputation services will have stated rules, as I said, it's like a credit score. Your credit score only falls if you do things that make you a credit risk, and you have means to dispute and appeal. The reputation list would be the same way. You list would also specify exactly what you did. So let's say that you failed to return a library book on time. You'd get a very small ding on your record, and if someone viewed it, it would say "failed to return library book on time." I somehow doubt that this would cause most people to say "well that's a terrible person so I'm totally cool with someone raping them."
Which is of course, essentially a small war.
As opposed to the giant ones that we get from government?
The thing is, humans on the whole are capable of real atrocities.
And governments are capable of worse ones.
but I really do not trust everyone to not band together to commit acts I would really, really rather not see happen.
Like say, slaughtering six million Jews? Or starving five million Ukranians to death? Or systematically murdering every college educated person in the country with machetes? Or creating weapons that could destroy the world a hundred times over? The evils that individual deranged psychopaths commit are statistically insignificant when compared to the evils that government has, and will continue to commit.
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Setting aside the fact that there are MANY governments worldwide which don't even pretend to be voluntary, the idea that "you could leave or not work" is pretty facetious. How exactly is an 18 year old with no resources supposed to leave the country? I've explained in these topics MANY times the incredibly complicated and costly efforts the US government makes you go through in order to renounce your citizenship (which is required to escape the tax net).
From an economic point of view, to the extent that a voluntary association fulfills the role of government, it also creates to that extent the harmful losses of efficiency of government.
If this is true, then it's a net wash anyway, so we have nothing to lose by trying it, right?
Also, he explains later in the book that inherent "pre-anarchy" property rights would be assumed to be valid, unless an active dispute was already in progress while the transition to market anarchy is taking place. It makes no sense whatsoever that just because we transitioned to market anarchy, some random dude would show up and claim he owns your house. In any case, if he did, he would have to file suit against you and the odds of his winning would be incredibly minimal.
Rothbard actually deals with this much more specifically in Man, Economy, and State. Goods that are originally "unowned" become "owned" by some combination of occupancy and use.
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SmartMuffin - Because anything less would be uncivilized - http://img.imgcake.com/smartmuffin/barkleyjpgde.jpg http://dudewheresmyfreedom.com/
Regulators are inefficient not because they work for government, but because they regulate.
Disagree.
Government is an inefficient regulator because it has no incentive to be efficient. Private groups are often regulators (private security at a club, referees at a sports match, a ski instructor or something) but they have an incentive to work well and improve.
Though any form of regulator introduces the possibility of corruption (referees are a good example).
“Won’t the Mafia take over?” It is paradoxical that the fear of rule by organized crime families causes people to support the State, which is the most “organized” and criminal association in human history. Even if it were true that under market anarchy, people had to pay protection money and occasionally get whacked, this would be a drop in the bucket compared to the taxation and wartime deaths caused by governments. But even this concedes too much. For the mob derives its strength from government, not the free market. All of the businesses traditionally associated with organized crime—gambling, prostitution, loan sharking, drug dealing—are prohibited or heavily regulated by the State.16 In market anarchy, true professionals would drive out such unscrupulous competitors.
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Yep. Murphy referenced NBA referees in either one of his other articles I've read, or the book I linked, can't remember which. He also stated that you can see voluntary regulation work by simply watching a game of pick-up basketball among inner-city youth (not exactly a demographic known for its orderly respect of property rights). They know what the rules are, and they largely self-enforce them, without any trappings of government.
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SmartMuffin - Because anything less would be uncivilized - http://img.imgcake.com/smartmuffin/barkleyjpgde.jpg http://dudewheresmyfreedom.com/
Hands on your head is best because your hands are visible and farthest away from any potential weapons. Hands at your sides, say you move one of them up too fast, officer blows you away, says he thought you were reaching for a gun, you're dead, and he gets a month off with pay before returning to the job.
Well yeah, if a cop has his gun pointed at me or or is telling me to freeze/etc. then my hands are on my head (or in the air). This article says that you should do that even around a cop who is simply passing by or asking you a question, which comes off as a sign of disrespect to me.
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Okay, so I’m going to try and start this one over, from the top. Red sox is one of the more reasonable guys we have around here, and if I’m getting this much pushback from HIM, I’m certainly not convincing anyone else.
I think the key when thinking about private law is the concept of “reputation.” I’m pointing this out now, in the beginning, in the hopes that you’ll keep it in mind throughout everything else I have to say. People like Dr. Murphy and Murray Rothbard and Walter Block usually mention it, but it’s usually buried in the body somewhere rather than stated in the very beginning. I just want you to keep this one notion in your head: In a voluntarist/AnCap society, your reputation would be everything. Given the lack of a state to force people to transact with others, and to provide very extreme reputation-tracking services (think of say, the sex offender registry), the importance of keeping a good reputation would be critical, as businesses would refuse to transact with those who have especially negative reputations (or would only transact with them under much less favorable terms to the individual). Consider it like your credit score. A private law company would keep track of exactly what each individual has done, and would assign them a score based on their past behaviors.
What this allows is for community standards to be upheld, but the communities in question would be based on voluntary association, not random coincidence of where you happen to have been born, where you happen to live, etc. The easiest way to see the DIRECT benefits of this and a way in which it WOULD substantially differ from the current statist paradigm is to consider our current “victimless crimes,” such a drug use, prostitution, gambling, etc. Let’s just say for the sake of argument, that when it comes to the use of marijuana, the population is evenly split. Half the people in your local community absolutely loathe marijuana users to the point where they would refuse to do business with anyone known to be a marijuana user. The other half just plain don’t care one way or the other. Whether or not someone uses marijuana is of no interest to them.
So, on this one particular block, we have four residents, Joe, Steve, Dave, and Tom. Joe regularly smokes marijuana. Steve is greatly opposed to marijuana, and believes that something must be done in order to stop Joe from smoking it. So Steve walks over to Dave, who happens to operate a private law company that specializes in drug use (Note: Whether such a company could even be economically viable would depend on the amount of people in the local community who cared about drug use at all. Most likely, such a business model would not be profitable in say, San Francisco). Steve tells Dave, “Joe is smoking marijuana. You need to do something about it.” So Dave calls up Joe and says “Hey Joe, I want you to know that you’ve been accused of smoking marijuana, what do you have to say about that?” At this point, Joe has a choice. He can freely admit that he does, in fact, smoke marijuana. Assuming this “confession” was not coerced, that would probably be enough basis for Dave to then report Joe’s marijuana use to Joe’s reputation tracking company. Or perhaps Dave publishes his own “known drug users” registry free for any and all to view. Joe could also dispute the charges, at which point Dave would be responsible for conducting something resembling a trial, in which both parties made their case, and Dave arrived at a verdict. Either Joe would be exonerated of the charges, or he would be added to the drug user registry.
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Now, in the current statist way of doing things, Joe is about to be sent to jail. He hasn’t committed aggression against anyone, but due to the simple fact that Steve didn’t approve of his marijuana use, he is about to be forcibly deprived of his freedom (and probably raped). This seems rather egregious, even if 51% of the population believes it is appropriate (my guess is that currently this is not the case, however, government is incredibly inefficient and unresponsive when it comes to ACTUALLY serving popular opinion). So let’s ask, how would this be different in a voluntarist society?
In the voluntarist society, Joe would be placed on the “known drug user” registry, and would continue to enjoy his freedom. He would not be forcibly detained. He would not be sexually assaulted. He would not be fined (as his actions did no provable damage to any other person). However, Steve, who is opposed to marijuana, might likely have a personal policy of not transacting with known drug users. If Steve operates a lawn-care business, he could very well refuse to mow Joe’s lawn, for any price, due to his personal belief that drug users are immoral people who should be shunned by society. Meanwhile, Tom (our last guy on the street) might be a plumber. Tom might also be completely neutral towards marijuana, believing it is everyone’s own personal decision and not minding whether someone smokes it or not. Tom would still freely transact with Joe, despite his appearance on the “known drug user registry”. This way, everyone’s desires are satisfied to the maximum extent possible. Those who oppose drugs are able to, through the free market, find out who the drug users are and shun them from society, and those who do not, are not forced to do so.
The same logic can apply to traditional crimes with a logical victim as well. That situation is actually even more simple. Given that nearly everyone finds rape to be abhorrent, anyone who was convicted or rape would likely be shunned by all of society, and would find it virtually impossible to live a reasonable life.
I’m going to stop here for now and allow you guys to comment and raise any further objections. Please note, I’m probably going to compile a lot of this stuff for a DWMF update sometime soon.
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Setting aside the fact that there are MANY governments worldwide which don't even pretend to be voluntary, the idea that "you could leave or not work" is pretty facetious. How exactly is an 18 year old with no resources supposed to leave the country? I've explained in these topics MANY times the incredibly complicated and costly efforts the US government makes you go through in order to renounce your citizenship (which is required to escape the tax net).
In exchange for the right to be on our land (remember, all land is owned by the King!), you agree to pay taxes. Valid contract, binding, next. If you don't agree to the contract, that's fine, you can leave or pay the penalty (going to jail). Is it onerous to get out of? Yes. But it'd likely be just as difficult with voluntary associations to get out of a voluntary association. Especially as we can view governments as just a large voluntary association.
And sure there are governments that pretend not to be voluntary, but what they say doesn't even matter. Under voluntarism, they are the arbitrators of their own contracts, are they not? What external authority is going to stop them? None. If you were born in the wrong place, well you got unlucky, didn't you? No more relief is possible that if you got unlucky on the roulette table.
If this is true, then it's a net wash anyway, so we have nothing to lose by trying it, right?
Sure, but of course we're already doing it.
Also, he explains later in the book that inherent "pre-anarchy" property rights would be assumed to be valid, unless an active dispute was already in progress while the transition to market anarchy is taking place. It makes no sense whatsoever that just because we transitioned to market anarchy, some random dude would show up and claim he owns your house. In any case, if he did, he would have to file suit against you and the odds of his winning would be incredibly minimal.
Rothbard actually deals with this much more specifically in Man, Economy, and State. Goods that are originally "unowned" become "owned" by some combination of occupancy and use.
In other words, a legal system of property rights does exist, and it is not "natural." One cannot get away from the arbitrariness of setting property rights.
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Honestly, any system where the average citizen is expected to use force against others is not a system I would call ideal.
When you vote for say, a law making marijuana illegal, you ARE using force against others. You are giving the authority to an agent to act on your behalf to use force against others. The fact that you won't do it yourself just makes you a coward. Same thing as when you vote for warmongering politicians.
I already know shopkeepers who would deny service to anyone under 30 if they could. People are rarely logical in practice.
Individuals are often illogical. That's the beauty of the market though. The market on the whole, is. A shopkeeper who refused to sell to those under 30 would likely face some stiff competition from one who would be willing to serve anyone. IF there was in fact a significant market for "stores where no young people are allowed in" and he could stay in business, then hey, more power to him. If the 20-somethings don't like it, let them start their own store.
I take it you've never been to some of the worse areas in the states then? I had a friend who used to live in the sates beaten up pretty bad for being atheist, and nobody in the town gave a damn about him. Another friend lost his friends and family because he decided as he grew up that he didn't want to be a Jehova's witness. And just look at how women are treated in the hardcore middle eastern countries.
I've never experienced anything like that, no. You're right about the middle east, that is a good example of a society that culturally is CLEARLY not ready for voluntarism. Even America is probably not ready right now at this exact moment. It's like I've always said about Ron Paul. If Ron Paul were elected President based on a cult of personality and most of his voters didn't truly agree with his positions, nothing would really change (because Congress and the Courts would still be full of power-mad statists). For a voluntarist society to work, you'd have to have a majority of people who accepted the principles of voluntarism. The middle east obviously has a LONG way to go to get there.
I'm just looking at historical examples.
What historical examples? How can there be "historical examples" of the problems of a system that has never been tried? As far as the "power vacuum" theory goes, I just don't buy it. There is less centralized power in South Korea than there is in North Korea, is there not? And yet, this "vacuum" has not resulted in them becoming a dictatorship like North Korea, now has it? My position is rather simple, and I would dare to say, more logically consistent than yours and red sox. My claim is that more freedom = better society. Always and absolutely. Your guy's claim is that more freedom = better society to some arbitrary and ill-defined point at which all of a sudden the trend reverses. Presumably Barack Obama knows exactly where that point is and we can trust him to grab power that far and no more, right?
Can you really tell me that there are not groups out there that would pay vast sums of money for nuclear weaponry?
At this point in society today, perhaps. Although who would sell it to them? I can't imagine any corporation would be stupid enough to develop nuclear weapons and sell them to, say, the Westboro Baptist Church, a group that is crazy enough that most people would consider them likely to actually use them. I'm not sure any organization large enough to have the ability to manufacture something as complicated as a nuclear weapon would be short-sighted enough to sell it to someone likely to use it.
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SmartMuffin - Because anything less would be uncivilized - http://img.imgcake.com/smartmuffin/barkleyjpgde.jpg http://dudewheresmyfreedom.com/
Honestly, any system where the average citizen is expected to use force against others is not a system I would call ideal. Plus, not everyone is capable of using force. It really does sound like your system advocates trading a large number of incarcerations for a smaller number of deaths. However, I think the number of deaths would be higher than one might expect.
Also, I was using wild west less as a reference to the historical wild west and more as a descriptive term, which was perhaps poorly chosen on my part.
This is somewhat true, although try looking at it from the perspective of the guy who owns the roads. What are the odds that he would refuse profitable business for fleeting and insignificant reasons?
I already know shopkeepers who would deny service to anyone under 30 if they could. People are rarely logical in practice.
It seems two of your objections basically cancel themselves out. On the one hand, you question whether shunning would work, and on the other hand, you’re concerned that it would work TOO well. Both are possible, but the safest assumption is that the reasonable middle ground will occur.
The thing is, the two concerns don't apply to the same people whatsoever. I think shunning wouldn't work against those who tend to violate the rules of society, but would work disastrously well against the average person. Middle ground will occur, sure, but so will every other part of the spectrum. The extremes would also occur, and I suspect they would occur far more than would be preferable.
Once again though, think from the perspective of the people who operate the roads. If they have a gay person in their town and want that gay person out, wouldn’t it be in their best interest to LET him use the road to leave? In any case, once again, we’re talking about a situation where in a statist society 51% of the population can enforce tyranny on the others, while in a voluntarist society, the required percentage is much MUCH higher.
Well, wanting them to leave would probably be the logical way for such a group to do things. People who hate others without real reason don't tend to be logical however. Even today, that one chicken restraunt doesn't serve anyone on sundays despite that losing them tremendous amounts of money. But changing things a bit, what if one person does something that offends the owner of the roads personally? They could be barred from the road with minimal losses, and there'd be little reason for the rest of the populace to come to bat for that one guy. If they did though, the road owner could really flip out and just declare the roads private property (considering he owns them) and unless the people were willing to forcibly take the roads from him the town would more or less break. In a voluntarist society, you don't need a majority of the people to enforce tyranny, you only need one powerful person (or a small group of powerful people).
For the purposes of this discussion, let’s assume that Congress is completely and totally representative of the American people. We can’t get a measly two thirds of Congress to agree on ANYTHING. You really think that in America, there would be significantly large communities where such overwhelming majorities would see fit to COMPLETELY shun people based on trifling matters like “is gay” or “smokes marijuana?”
I take it you've never been to some of the worse areas in the states then? I had a friend who used to live in the sates beaten up pretty bad for being atheist, and nobody in the town gave a damn about him. Another friend lost his friends and family because he decided as he grew up that he didn't want to be a Jehova's witness. And just look at how women are treated in the hardcore middle eastern countries.
And which has it done more of? Are large groups of deranged people coming together for nefarious ends more or less likely under an AnCap society than under a state?
More likely I would expect, given the forces arranged against them would be less organized until government sprang up again. The scales of each individual problems would be smaller of course, but it would cause more damage overall due to the frequency. I will admit I have no real idea whether or not I am correct about this, I'm just looking at historical examples. And places like some African countries where the power vacuum has been filled with petty warlords despite the constant pressure from the far stronger militaries of more developed countries.
Power, yes. Weaponry, no. War is incredibly costly and inefficient. That’s why it’s the specialty of governments, because government is the only institution that doesn’t care about costs or efficiency.
The companies would be unlikely to directly fight eachother, sure. But selling weaponry to various groups would be quite profitable, would it not? Plenty of organizations have built up the money and manpower to set to war with their enemies, not that they really can in this era. Can you really tell me that there are not groups out there that would pay vast sums of money for nuclear weaponry?
Anyways, red sox is as usual making the points I'd like to make better than I am, but I'll stay around none the less.
The way I see it, reputation ultimately still cannot overcome force. If it's just one violent person, then ostracism by the rest of society will work. But what if this person gets a whole group of people to join him in using violent force?
Well, keep in mind that you will still have the right to defend your property yourself. In the event that a known violent criminal accosts you, and you happened to use force in your defense (say deadly force even), it is highly likely that a private judge would find you innocent of any wrongdoing. Now, I won’t say that a large criminal gang is impossible in such a system, but I would say that it’s unlikely. Such a gang would have to be completely vertically integrated to supply literally all of its needs. I mean, even Tony Soprano still had a regular non-mafia psychiatrist, right? I guess the creation of a TES style “thieves guild” would be possible, but I would say highly impractical.
Well, they'd have to use force to keep them out. These people have already proven that they don't respect another person's rights, so why wouldn't they just walk where they chose if not opposed by an application of force?
Once again, you would be allowed to use force to defend yourself and your property, so long as the force used was commiserate with the threat, as decided by a private judge or arbitration court.
But it sounds to me you'd advocate having them be forced to stay in the woods or something, assuming there even are woods not privately owned at that point.
Basically, yes. Although keep in mind, this is a voluntary choice. If they CHOOSE not to check themselves into a prison, they would have to find some unowned land to occupy. It’s possible such land may still exist, but it would be like, completely barren and unhospitable places in like the Mojave desert or something. Keep in mind that banishment was a common punishment among early human societies, and depending on the location, was often the equivalent of a death sentence. If you live in the jungle and get banished from your tribe, the odds of you surviving on your own in the jungle for any significant amount of time are somewhat low.
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SmartMuffin - Because anything less would be uncivilized - http://img.imgcake.com/smartmuffin/barkleyjpgde.jpg http://dudewheresmyfreedom.com/
And it seems to me that if you're on the bad rep list of the guy who owns the roads in your town, you're rightly ****ed. Be on one guy's bad graces and you can't function in society.
This is somewhat true, although try looking at it from the perspective of the guy who owns the roads. What are the odds that he would refuse profitable business for fleeting and insignificant reasons? There would still be a scale of crimes, you know. While I’m sure the average shopkeeper might refuse to do business with a convicted rapist, I don’t think he would refuse to do business with everyone who once got a speeding ticket. That would be a poor business model. And on the flip side, freely allowing murderers and rapists to use your roads would ALSO be a poor business model, as the average citizen would find your roads to be unsafe and would choose not to use them. It seems two of your objections basically cancel themselves out. On the one hand, you question whether shunning would work, and on the other hand, you’re concerned that it would work TOO well. Both are possible, but the safest assumption is that the reasonable middle ground will occur.
Repeat theft could carry a death penalty.
In a practical sense, you’re right. Although it’s not really a “death penalty” as much as it is “someone will probably shoot you and probably get away with it.” Even now though, we basically already have this. In MOST states, you can legally shoot an intruder into your house at night, claim self defense, and get away with it. Even if the intruder had no criminal record whatsoever. Even if the intruder never planned on murdering or assaulting you. Say his only intention was to come in, grab your Xbox, and leave. Did he not just receive the death penalty for theft?
If the only answer to that is weapons of their own, you basically have a wild west survival of the fittest scenario, which would end up terribly.
You should do more research on the actual wild west. The perceptions of it are all basically propaganda created by Hollywood. Studies have shown that many frontier towns in the “wild west” were FAR safer and had FAR less crime than the major American cities of the same period, and were safer than many international cities today.
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SmartMuffin - Because anything less would be uncivilized - http://img.imgcake.com/smartmuffin/barkleyjpgde.jpg http://dudewheresmyfreedom.com/
Lets say for example their record instead says something like "is gay" which gave them a huge ding in that system run by the people in that town. Speaking out against such a system would almost certainly get you dinged in response, the guys who make the rules would be pretty damned powerful. And it's not like people could just leave the town because they're not allowed to use the roads!
Once again though, think from the perspective of the people who operate the roads. If they have a gay person in their town and want that gay person out, wouldn’t it be in their best interest to LET him use the road to leave? In any case, once again, we’re talking about a situation where in a statist society 51% of the population can enforce tyranny on the others, while in a voluntarist society, the required percentage is much MUCH higher. For the purposes of this discussion, let’s assume that Congress is completely and totally representative of the American people. We can’t get a measly two thirds of Congress to agree on ANYTHING. You really think that in America, there would be significantly large communities where such overwhelming majorities would see fit to COMPLETELY shun people based on trifling matters like “is gay” or “smokes marijuana?”
Not going to touch this. The only real difference is scale, a group of deranged people can do more damage than a single deranged person. Government is just a tool in essence. And like any tool, it can be used for good or for bad.
And which has it done more of? Are large groups of deranged people coming together for nefarious ends more or less likely under an AnCap society than under a state?
And lol if you think private corporations wouldn't have come up with nuclear power and weaponry if it hadn't already been invented.
Power, yes. Weaponry, no. War is incredibly costly and inefficient. That’s why it’s the specialty of governments, because government is the only institution that doesn’t care about costs or efficiency. The idea that private companies would go to war over trifling matters is laughable. Really really think about it for a second. Let’s say that Microsoft and Apple have a dispute over some patent. It would have to be one HELL of a patent for the two companies to decide that the most profitable way to resolve their dispute is with a goddamn war. How many hundreds of millions of dollars do modern wars cost? Private companies can’t afford to throw that kind of money away.
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SmartMuffin - Because anything less would be uncivilized - http://img.imgcake.com/smartmuffin/barkleyjpgde.jpg http://dudewheresmyfreedom.com/
Well, keep in mind that you will still have the right to defend your property yourself. In the event that a known violent criminal accosts you, and you happened to use force in your defense (say deadly force even), it is highly likely that a private judge would find you innocent of any wrongdoing. Now, I won’t say that a large criminal gang is impossible in such a system, but I would say that it’s unlikely. Such a gang would have to be completely vertically integrated to supply literally all of its needs. I mean, even Tony Soprano still had a regular non-mafia psychiatrist, right? I guess the creation of a TES style “thieves guild” would be possible, but I would say highly impractical.
You can defend yourself, but what good is that when 10 armed criminals invade your home? To defend yourself, you need equal or greater force, which you can only get by teaming up with other people. But once you do that, you have......dun dun dun......government!
As for vertical integration, you don't need it when you just use force to take what you want.
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Congratulations to SuperNiceDog, Guru Winner, who was smart enough to pick your 7 time champion, Link.
Power, yes. Weaponry, no. War is incredibly costly and inefficient. That’s why it’s the specialty of governments, because government is the only institution that doesn’t care about costs or efficiency. The idea that private companies would go to war over trifling matters is laughable. Really really think about it for a second. Let’s say that Microsoft and Apple have a dispute over some patent. It would have to be one HELL of a patent for the two companies to decide that the most profitable way to resolve their dispute is with a goddamn war. How many hundreds of millions of dollars do modern wars cost? Private companies can’t afford to throw that kind of money away.
To the victor go the spoils. There are plenty of things that are not trifling that companies (or nations) go to war over. And governments that don't care about costs or efficiency lose wars, governments that do care about them win wars.
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Congratulations to SuperNiceDog, Guru Winner, who was smart enough to pick your 7 time champion, Link.
There are plenty of things that are not trifling that companies (or nations) go to war over.
What companies have ever gone to war? The only one I can think of that would even come close is the East India Company, and they were SO far in bed with the government that it would be corporatism bordering on fascism. The Pinkertons were really more of a police agency that had some decent power in various localities, but not a huge national presence at any given time.
You're right that the MORE efficient government wins the war, but the war itself is inefficient for BOTH sides. Tell me, in which 20th century war exactly was the winning party far better off than they were before the war? There are no "winners" in war. Everyone loses.
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SmartMuffin - Because anything less would be uncivilized - http://img.imgcake.com/smartmuffin/barkleyjpgde.jpg http://dudewheresmyfreedom.com/
Also, war is an amazing catalyst for invention. Both world wars lead to huge strides in the creation of new things.
That's because war gives government an incentive to be efficient and to innovate. Like red sox mentioned, the efficient government is the one that wins the war. So while normally, there is no motivation for efficiency, the life-or-death scenario that war allows the government to put their massive amount of resources to good use.
Now, if only there was a way we could put those resources to use WITHOUT killing millions of soldiers and millions more innocent... I dunno, maybe it's just me, but the free market seems self-motivated enough without killing and destroying civil rights.
Set those resources free, and the competition for profits will provide your "hude strides" just the same as the competition for land or body count does.
