The Political Thread

[TordelBack]

I mightn't agree with every last detail of that Tb but its a damn fine answer and gives me a lot to chew over.

Likewise, Prodigal. I know that you are right, that dialogue and engagement are the only way to make progress with extremists, and that setting up absolutes of 'evil' for humans is a fool's game. I also strongly disapprove of advocating violence or censorship, both usually being counterproductive.

However, the clarity with which the Nazi ideology can be viewed in the light of history makes it very hard for me to see it as anything other than an exception to my normal way of thinking. I can imagine myself as an extreme loyalist, seeing uppity popish bog-trotters intent on destroying the expression of my identity, or a hard-line Israeli, or a disaffected third-generation Moroccan in the banlieues looking to violence for a sense of agency:  I can abhor it, but I can see how people end up there, and maybe how you could one day carve out some compromise, some fix. 

As Jim explains better than I could, I just can't see a middle ground with people who - with all the evidence before them - define themselves in terms of the extermination of their inferiors. It's the nature of the aspiration, the transparency of it all.

[The Legendary Shark]

Violence in defence is always valid

Isn't that what they think they are doing?

My apologies.

Proportionate physical violence in defence of physical violence is always valid. Physical violence in defence of non-physical violence is not valid.

If someone thinks I don't deserve to live because I'm a white male I have no right to punch them for expressing that opinion - and if I do I must face the consequences. If, on the other hand, that person tries to kill me because I'm a white male, I have every right to use as much force as necessary to stop them, which right I can pass on to or share with third party protectors, be they government agents, private contractors or fellow citizens/volunteers.

[Hawkmumbler]

Theres no point pondering on garbage hypothetical situations like white genocide Shark when there are actual racial supremacists calling for racial segragation and purging of POC's and queer people.

[The Legendary Shark]

I can't claim to be gay so I didn't think it was proper to use that as an example. However, if it makes the argument more acceptable to you, I'm willing to pretend:

If someone thinks I don't deserve to live because I'm gay I have no right to punch them for expressing that opinion - and if I do I must face the consequences. If, on the other hand, that person tries to kill me because I'm gay, I have every right to use as much force as necessary to stop them, which right I can pass on to or share with third party protectors, be they government agents, private contractors or fellow citizens/volunteers.

Better?

[Leigh S]

So who is responsible for investigating, pursuing and prosecuting the citizens who gang together to kill in the name of Islam or white supremacy?  Do I have to contract that out, or can I do it myself - will all the various contractors/volunteers share information? Do I really have to wait until I am dead before responding - what if they are just planning, or inciting others to do so on their behalf?

I can't claim to be gay so I didn't think it was proper to use that as an example. However, if it makes the argument more acceptable to you, I'm willing to pretend:

If someone thinks I don't deserve to live because I'm gay I have no right to punch them for expressing that opinion - and if I do I must face the consequences. If, on the other hand, that person tries to kill me because I'm gay, I have every right to use as much force as necessary to stop them, which right I can pass on to or share with third party protectors, be they government agents, private contractors or fellow citizens/volunteers.

Better?

[The Legendary Shark]

Seriously? You think that barring a government from instigating violence automatically means the eradication of laws, police and courts?

[TordelBack]

Unless those bodies have powers to levy taxation and enforce its collection, probably. If you have to pay cops (for example) directly it's little different from a protection racket; if you're waiting on voluntary contributions, good luck. And as we've been here before I won't ask how a series of bodies with those powers differs from a government, except in scale.

But look, I'm really not starting all that again Sharky. Your position re non-defensive violence is a noble one, and one I wish I could share. I would note that we are talking about punching: painful, potentially dangerous but essentially as much symbolic as harmful: it's even the basis of several sports, which shooting people or running them over are definitely not. If people were advocating shooting unarmed Nazis, I'd be right with you.

[The Legendary Shark]

Thanks, Tordels. You are, as ever, the voice of reason.

I think most if not all of us regard the existence of ideologies like Naziism as a shameful stain on the collective soul of humanity and would wish such horrid movements didn't exist. We all have ideas how to get rid of them and I'd like to end on that note rather than the usual round of me trying to explain how Austrian economic theory works.

Down with Fascism (and such)!

[Leigh S]

Seriously? You think that barring a government from instigating violence automatically means the eradication of laws, police and courts?

Where do I say that?  I'm asking how the reduction in Governments power allows such investigation and control to be better handled.

If you accept violence in defence of certain commonly held rights (to life and property as big examples), how does it matter if  it is Government or some other group, and if it is in the hands of individuals and collectives, how do they do the job more efficiently than a single entity - how would you manage to over see such undertakings as defending against plots from extremists without an over arching "control" that could similarly be abused?

I agree that the Government shouldnt have power to visit violence on me if I abide by the commonly held laws - If I dont go out to hurt others or steal their stuff, or put at risk lives and "stuff" by my recklessness or negligence.  I'd like a world where there was more accountability, but I think as we have moved towards a more libertarian and less statist world things have got worse, not better in that regard - the US rapes the world to serve business and economic interests that are much harder to hold to account because the real decisions are being made by the unelected - I'm all for reforming Governments to stop such abuse of power.  I just don;t see how handing power to people to govern themselves wouldnt inevitably mean that those same people with an interest in power would have even greater access to the instruments of control - Without a clear "democratic" process to see whos hands are on those instruments, what seems like freedom could just as easily (and in my view more easily) be abused as the current system

[Jim_Campbell]

I'm asking how the reduction in Governments power allows such investigation and control to be better handled.

[Goaty]

I am saying UK and US governments are so shite, US got Trump and what the hell happens with Brexit?! I kept see Brexit this, and Brexit that in media almost every day!

[The Legendary Shark]

I'm asking how the reduction in Governments power allows such investigation and control to be better handled.

You might be asking that now (and the answer is that such things would be handled in a more humane and fairer way) but in your previous post you asked,

So who is responsible for investigating, pursuing and prosecuting the citizens who...

(My emphasis)

The implication here is that there can be no recognisable form of policing or judicial process without the current government monopoly. This is not true.

You later add,

Do I really have to wait until I am dead before responding...

Of course not. What I propose is limiting government, and its monopolies, to common or natural human law levels. Limited power is not the same as powerlessness and does not lead to disconnection of already integrated services or general decay of inter-agency cooperation..

To oversimplify the idea myself, I want a police force (and government, if we must) that can only step in when there is a good reason to do so, when people are threatened - which is what most people believe we have right now but which I can say, from direct personal experience, we do not.

...how does it matter if  it is Government or some other group...

This is the crux of the problem. Government can write legislation and present it as Law. Not just Law but Law which is equal or even superior to common or natural human law. Thus a Fascist government can pass legislation allowing the legal construction and operation of anything from television stations to death camps. As part of the machinery of state, police and courts are compelled by that legislation to not only tolerate such things but also actively protect and even serve such things.

Common or natural human law, which is fundamental to all praxeology, outlaws murder except in the most extreme cases of self-defence. Legislation authorising the construction and operation of death camps, then, is fundamentally invalid. If the government monopolised services swear allegiance to the government or head of state, their allegiance, and therefore the rules by which they are bound, are necessarily fluid and in jeopardy of being hijacked by a bloodthirsty government at any time. Perhaps the simplest change to the current system that could be made, and one which I feel would be welcome and is a necessary step forward, would be to change the oaths made by public servants and officials from swearing allegiance to the Queen and/or her government to swearing allegiance to the people. This would create a minimal, largely symbolic but nevertheless important firewall between an abusive government and the people.


Of course, the death camp is the extreme example but simply authorising police to chase down and forcibly arrest a driver with a faulty light is example enough. A faulty light might be dangerous but so long as no actual loss, harm or damage has been caused there is no natural law need or authorisation to initiate violence against the driver. In such a circumstance, the only lawful course is to request the driver with the faulty light to stop and advise them to repair it - which right each and every one of us has and which many of us have used ourselves. (For example, many of us have flashed our lights at other drivers who may have forgotten to turn on their headlamps but few, if any of us, have chased those drivers down, forced them to a halt and taken their money or vehicle away from them as punishment.)

But I stray from the point, which is the current asymmetry of rights and powers between the government and its mechanisms and the people. Most if not all of you believe that government is necessary, I do not but that's unimportant for this discussion. The question is, do you want a government that can arbitrarily decide that you are its enemy and bring all its machinery to bear against you for whatever reason it legislates/magics into existence or do you want a government bound by basic human laws?

If we must have a government, then I want the latter kind.

[Prodigal2]

A great sharing of opinions on this subject and a reflection of this place as a whole-this really is one of the best places on the inter-web. If I had met you fine folk a few years back I would seriously have liked to talk to you about a job role (TB you have missed your vocation entirely fella).

Reading back over I would like to perhaps clarify one point. I have been responsible for facilitating quite a bit of stuff down the years where compromise was the goal. However I heartily agree with the statement that you cannot compromise with nazis. I would talk with them but compromise would never be my goal.

On the subject of a limited violent response, say a single punch to "punchtuate" an entirely understandable moral abhorrence, my only observation is that violence tends to escalate very, very quickly perhaps beyond original intent. One punch conceivably could lead to spiraling life threatening violence in a very short space of time (In America this can also involve assault rifles that came free with your morning breakfast cereal).

[Leigh S]

With all respect LS, if you want to insinuate meaning, I'm at a loss to argue that.

Nowhere do I say or even imply we wouldn't have laws - I'm saying how do you make the laws apply without the concensus of an over arching agreed authority.  I am asking who is responsible for making such happen if Government has reduced/removed powers due to them being handed to "the people" so I have not changed my question at all - if there is no over arching "authority" that is recognised by some common law, how do you organise the oversight and prosecution of dangerous extremists, the kind of people who would welcome power being put in (or closer to) their hands?  It seems to me your problem with Government is the poweers you ascribe to it, rather than Government itself, though if I follow you, you seem to believe that Government inevitably will take these powers because it becomes bad spontaneously, and all the good people working there are caught in the wheels of empowerment.  Your answer (to empower even more people) might seem counter productive if that is the case.

You explicitly (no assuming here) state you would prefer no Government, so the original question stands - if it isnt the responsibility of a Gvt (because you would ultimately prefer not to have one), then who does these things?  I'm not implying you dont want laws and protection, I am asking how you organise such a system effectively (both times)

I agree Government should alway be made to be accountable to the people, and in a generality, it is this way - at least to the degree that most people feel it is the "best" solution and enough voters arent spooked to teh point the system falls apart - the person with the faulty tail light is going to be stopped and asked to get it fixed in my experience; he isnt going to be carted off. 

What you seem to want is what I and most people would like - a system where you cant abuse the citizenship, or your power or position and work directly for teh benefit of the people - now, we have seen a move from that ideal, and that is directly due to the thinking that Government isnt important and is an obstacle to "good business". Such moves create a very real danger of emboldening extremists and bringing the system into such a state as it isnt viewed as working for the people and we get what - Trump and Brexit seem to me to be the "fuck the system" vote, as opposed to a "fix the system" vote that we desperately need

I'm asking how the reduction in Governments power allows such investigation and control to be better handled.

You might be asking that now (and the answer is that such things would be handled in a more humane and fairer way) but in your previous post you asked,

So who is responsible for investigating, pursuing and prosecuting the citizens who...

(My emphasis)

The implication here is that there can be no recognisable form of policing or judicial process without the current government monopoly. This is not true.

You later add,

Do I really have to wait until I am dead before responding...

Of course not. What I propose is limiting government, and its monopolies, to common or natural human law levels. Limited power is not the same as powerlessness and does not lead to disconnection of already integrated services or general decay of inter-agency cooperation..

To oversimplify the idea myself, I want a police force (and government, if we must) that can only step in when there is a good reason to do so, when people are threatened - which is what most people believe we have right now but which I can say, from direct personal experience, we do not.

...how does it matter if  it is Government or some other group...

This is the crux of the problem. Government can write legislation and present it as Law. Not just Law but Law which is equal or even superior to common or natural human law. Thus a Fascist government can pass legislation allowing the legal construction and operation of anything from television stations to death camps. As part of the machinery of state, police and courts are compelled by that legislation to not only tolerate such things but also actively protect and even serve such things.

Common or natural human law, which is fundamental to all praxeology, outlaws murder except in the most extreme cases of self-defence. Legislation authorising the construction and operation of death camps, then, is fundamentally invalid. If the government monopolised services swear allegiance to the government or head of state, their allegiance, and therefore the rules by which they are bound, are necessarily fluid and in jeopardy of being hijacked by a bloodthirsty government at any time. Perhaps the simplest change to the current system that could be made, and one which I feel would be welcome and is a necessary step forward, would be to change the oaths made by public servants and officials from swearing allegiance to the Queen and/or her government to swearing allegiance to the people. This would create a minimal, largely symbolic but nevertheless important firewall between an abusive government and the people.


Of course, the death camp is the extreme example but simply authorising police to chase down and forcibly arrest a driver with a faulty light is example enough. A faulty light might be dangerous but so long as no actual loss, harm or damage has been caused there is no natural law need or authorisation to initiate violence against the driver. In such a circumstance, the only lawful course is to request the driver with the faulty light to stop and advise them to repair it - which right each and every one of us has and which many of us have used ourselves. (For example, many of us have flashed our lights at other drivers who may have forgotten to turn on their headlamps but few, if any of us, have chased those drivers down, forced them to a halt and taken their money or vehicle away from them as punishment.)

But I stray from the point, which is the current asymmetry of rights and powers between the government and its mechanisms and the people. Most if not all of you believe that government is necessary, I do not but that's unimportant for this discussion. The question is, do you want a government that can arbitrarily decide that you are its enemy and bring all its machinery to bear against you for whatever reason it legislates/magics into existence or do you want a government bound by basic human laws?

If we must have a government, then I want the latter kind.

[The Legendary Shark]

Laws would be discovered and applied through courts (not governmental diktats), as traditionally happened.

That is to say, arguments are aired in courts and settled by legal experts (judges). The government does not have to decide who these judges are, just as it does not decide who are the best doctors, architects or engineers. The education and experience of individuals, and the acceptance of the parties involved, decides on who can be a judge. The government also has no blanket laws which must be enforced equally in every case. Laws are discovered from the unique facts of individual cases and remedies tailored to each individual circumstance based on unique facts and previous cases. The courts become independent of government control and are de-monopolised, although there is nothing to prevent previous or future relevant legislation being taken into account as an advisory source. Under independent courts, law and law making returns to the people and the judges.

The overarching agreed authority you seek is provided by the courts, the law and society itself. In the case of dangerous criminals, the police would look after them until trial, much the same as happens today, and there will still be prisons and remedies. The big difference is that the victim will take centre stage and the most important factor will be restitution, not punishment.

Under our current nonsensical system, the victim suffers twice - once under the crime itself and then under taxation (theft) the victim is expected to pay for the criminal's incarceration, punishment and/or rehabilitation. Under Libertarian punishment, the perpetrator is expected to not only recompense the victim but to also pay for their own punishment, thus easing the burden on society and not punishing the victim further.

And yes, you are correct when you say that I believe government will always become bad. It has to, it's in its nature. Imagine, for a moment, that I could make you the Ruler of the World. What would you do with that power? You would, no doubt, wish to do all manner of good and worthy things. And how would you pay for all these noble projects? Through taxation*, probably.

But say that just one person decides he doesn't like one of your projects, or doesn't want to contribute to the upkeep of your palace or the wages of your agents and refuses to pay up. What do you do then? If you let him off you risk other people getting the same idea and the failure of your worthy projects. You therefore have to bring force to bear, you have to do something you would never do in your private life, you have to initiate violence. It is your only choice; to use force or to let it go.

Government has violence at its very core and cannot exist without it. I am not talking about organisation here, private companies organise huge and disparate concerns perfectly well for 365 days every year without threatening violence** on their staff or customers or locking them up and stealing their stuff to keep them in line. The organisational skills of human beings are apparent in every aspect of our lives and violence or the threat of violence is not needed to make large organisations run smoothly. No, it's not the organisational side of things that's wrong - it's the violent side.

The answer, in my view, is not to gather around six hundred people (usually the most corrupt, power-hungry sociopaths we can find) together and give them (somehow) rights and powers that the rest of us do not possess and then let them "run the country" because they're going to make a pig's ear of it. At least, they always have until now and I see no sign that these people want to stop ruling and start serving or pass up the opportunity to feather their own nests at our expense.

If you want to have six hundred flawed people in charge of you then that's fine - just don't allow them more rights and powers than you have because they'll abuse them. As we have seen, they must abuse them or they cannot govern. If you want to give up your right to say "no" to these people then you are perfectly free to do so - but what right does anyone have to force me to give up that right also? So long as I am causing no actual loss, harm or damage, so long as I am acting honestly and without violence, what right does anyone have to rule me and to force me to act against my will or conscience?

When I employ violence, I must be stopped and pay restitution. When the government employs violence, it must be treated exactly the same because otherwise there are two standards of justice and no such thing as the rule of law.

Treating the government as a group of ordinary people abiding by the same laws and adhering to the same responsibilities as the rest of us, which is exactly what it is, is the best "fix" the system could hope for.

*Although there are other ways which do not rely on taxation, which can of worms we have previously discussed on this thread.

**Although governments can bring violence to bear on workers for their own spurious reasons, mainly to protect the criminally run economy through strike bans, minimum wage edicts and demands for payment (for licenses and such) and what have you, but that's a separate can of worms again.