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| Statism Is Dead | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Feb 3 2012, 05:01 AM (761 Views) | |
| SirParagon | Feb 3 2012, 05:01 AM Post #1 |
Sparking!
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The following is a very partial summary (also, a lot is verbatim) of this youtube presentation from 2008, I'd like to share. It contributed a lot to my political ideology. 100% credit goes to Stefan Molyneux, bad-ass modern philosopher. -- Government Definition: a group of individuals within a geographical area who retain the monopolistic moral and legal right to initiate force a monopoly on violence Here are some painful fallacies... Argument from fear We need a violent monopoly because people like to use violence to achieve their ends? We need a violent monopoly to punish criminals because without consequences, people become more violent? We need overwhelming violence to reduce violence? (Cure headaches with decapitation...) Argument from Morality We need to use violence to achieve virtue? We need to initiate force against people to defend them from violence? We need to force voluntary and peaceful contracts through involuntary and violent contracts? (we never 'sign' a social contract, it isn't our choice) People won't be voluntarily charitable, but they will vote for the violent theft and transfer of their wealth? REMEMBER - Whatever judgement you apply universally to people you also apply to government as a whole! A statist will claim that anarchists are too idealistic; they say we rely on the assumption that all people can and should be non-violent. This is simply not true, the very axiom of anarchistic beliefs are that people are imperfect, for this reason we do not believe that a small group of people is capable of wielding near-infinite power over a society and remain uncorrupted... unlike the statists. Who are the real idealists? What does intellectual bankruptcy mean? When past failures are no longer analysed or understood, the failure of the war on drugs, the failure of the war on poverty, the failure of imperialism, the failure of higher educational standards, the failure of all the programs established beforehand is no longer analysed, we just push on. More of the same becomes the automatic response - MORE spending, MORE government control, MORE government management, MORE violence, MORE regulation, and MORE initiation of force. People simply cannot think in any other terms when addressing social problems. Dissent, questions and real criticisms are almost completely absent from the debate. Speeches then start to become more abstract and charisma is substituted for intellectual rigor... HOPE! YES WE CAN! DRILL BABY DRILL! CHANGE! BUILDING THE BRIDGE TO THE 21st CENTURY! ...Yet fundamentally, intellectual bankruptcy occurs when the core morality is no longer believable -The idea that government equals virtue? There is simply too much counter evidence which shows otherwise (corruption, violence, genocide, etc.) Core criticisms become incomprehensible. Pointing out the violence of statism causes people to 'short-circuit' so to speak, it cannot be rationally processed. Something is utterly intellectually dead if it must avoid criticism rather than respond to it. Intellectual bankruptcy is also amplified when the manipulation of language becomes the norm - we say 'government' and 'government programs' rather than saying 'the initiation of the use of force'. Haste (we have to decide NOW to make it happen NOW), scorn, ad hominem and patriotism emerge through intellectual bankruptcy. We notice a rise in chants rather than argument (yes we can!) and highly volatile emotional defensiveness (being offended when the violence of the state is pointed out). There is also an excess of psychologizing the opposition (your argument is not valid because you lack real world experience - you're too naive, you're too academic, you can't sympathize with the poor), the argument itself is never properly addressed. STATISM IS DEAD and nothing is more dangerous than a dying ideology. For example, when Christianity was dying in the 19th century it produced Marxism. When Republics are dying they produce imperialism (we saw this with Ancient Rome and the US today). The death of statism is very likely to produce Socialism/Fascism. An anarchist's solution: attack the core illogic/immorality and call all of statism by its proper name, a monopoly on violence. Edited by SirParagon, Feb 3 2012, 05:27 AM.
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| Cal | Feb 3 2012, 03:24 PM Post #2 |
I may not deserve to live, but I will protect those in my reach with my reverse blade!
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First off, kudos on a great topic worth replying to, I've been hoping for more quality lately, glad to see a topic worth debating or at least an argument worth reading. The argument presented is more about why imperialism sucks, not so much on why anarchism is a great alternative. When you point out the cons of an ideology without listing the cons of the supposed alternative, you’re not playing fairly. Now that all the cons of imperialism have been stated, allow me to throw in my main beef with anarchism. Most people that support the ideology/movement to anarchism usually likes to push aside the main issue with it, which is and always has been civil liberties. On a fundamental level civil liberties are simply necessary. The initial intent of a federal government (or monopoly on violence if you wish) is to ensure every person has/had basic freedoms that allow a person to be treated fairly and have an equal playing field when it comes to their personal pursuit of happiness. Granted this initial intent has expanded overwhelmingly to far left and right regulations that give people an excuse to cling to proposed solutions such as anarchy. The real solution is to go back to the intent of basic freedoms. If you take them away then you’re depending on a people who are so used to regulations that they wouldn’t know how to react. If you keep an animal in captivity until it becomes an adult and then throw it into the wild, what happens? Usually a negative impact on the animal, that isn’t saying the wild is a bad thing, just shows how the radical differences in an environment usually leans toward negatives. We as a nation are slowly moving toward more regulation, which I’m against (in this form and way anyway). The solution (in my opinion) is to slowly take a few steps backwards, and since I’m a complete opportunist I’ll go ahead and say I’m voting for Ron Paul because of that. That having been said, if you’re intent was for this not to be debated (or at least in the way I'm trying to), but more of a masters level thesis then don’t feel the need to reply to my ranting. Edited by Cal, Feb 3 2012, 03:30 PM.
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| SirParagon | Feb 3 2012, 11:41 PM Post #3 |
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Sparking!
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So we assume violence protects civil liberties, isn't that one of the inherent fallacies? Don't get me wrong, you definitely bring up some valid concerns regarding the mindset of today's society. I just feel it doesn't matter how a women gets married after being raped, the rape was stopped, that's what is important. I also feel that comparing humanity to wild animals is lowering the standard a bit too far. Humans adapt, wild animals do not. This is purely philosophical, not actually trying to answer how society would operate without a state because there's no way of knowing. |
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| Cal | Feb 3 2012, 11:50 PM Post #4 |
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I may not deserve to live, but I will protect those in my reach with my reverse blade!
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I don't know how else you can enforce civil liberties unfortunately. The wild animal thing was just an analogy I thought of off the top of my head, you're right in your point there but I think it has some merit nonetheless.
I sometimes do that too, I figured you wouldn't appreciate my reply, but I love this type of discussion lol. As I said before, granted what you said is 100% taken form the video, that would be some great material for a masters level thesis. Edited by Cal, Feb 3 2012, 11:52 PM.
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| SirParagon | Feb 3 2012, 11:58 PM Post #5 |
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Sparking!
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If anything is certain it's that we cannot have a peaceful and productive society without first addressing how children are raised. Naturally, children raised in a system of violence are most likely going to convey a violent ideology.
Edited by SirParagon, Feb 4 2012, 12:00 AM.
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Feb 4 2012, 01:16 AM Post #6 |
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In the impossible "perfect government", everyone has civil liberties that cannot be taken away. The one flaw in this is, what if someone violates another person's civil liberties? If everyone had undeniable civil liberties that could never be taken away, they could do what they want and keep their rights. So, to keep more control and order, we 'enforce' regulations that you must follow in order to retain your civil liberties and not violate anyone else's. Without these regulations (AKA laws), how would we ensure our civil liberties are not violated? This sounds good in theory, except it leads to excessive use of violence, and outrage over hearing that authorities have used excessive violence. This is statism taken to the extreme. Anarchy attempts to oppose this over-excessive use of violence, by taking away strictly enforced regulations. This means that authorities cannot use excessive violence on the people, which sounds good. However, no regulations mean that there is nothing stopping the authorities from using excessive force on people. Anarchy and statism both sound perfect in theory, but in real life, have their pros and cons. The most logical choice of government would be to find a middle ground between statism and anarchy, in which regulations to protect civil liberties are put in ground, except these laws are not enforced by violence. It's nearly impossible to find a way to enforce laws without violence, which is why statism is used instead. This is not to say that I fully support statism, but it's a more logical choice. |
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| SirParagon | Feb 4 2012, 01:44 AM Post #7 |
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Sparking!
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The mistake many people make is assume that the 'what about this?' problems are already being solved under the current system. Solving issues through force is never sustainable, the very act of forcing feeds the fire. What do you think is a better idea - having a tooth-ache tended to by a dentist or taking pain-killers? Getting to the root of the problem (no pun intended) or covering it up? You shouldn't fear the dentist, he/she is here to help.
Edited by SirParagon, Feb 4 2012, 02:07 AM.
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