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The Forum > Article Comments > If you don't step on my toes, I won't step on yours > Comments

If you don't step on my toes, I won't step on yours : Comments

By Melody Ayres-Griffiths, published 9/1/2012

A beginner's guide to libertarianism.

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Refreshing to read an article by a woman, that doesn't ask for more money to be given to them by someone else.
Posted by vanna, Monday, 9 January 2012 7:02:40 AM
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Who's Ron Paul?
Posted by Anton LaVey, Monday, 9 January 2012 8:07:48 AM
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"libertarianism abhors discrimination"

Unless it involves someone you don't like, or someone not from your "side"

Libertarians regularly are silent on important social issues, when their side has no interest in the individual or group being discriminated against.

In Australia, we see this constantly, for instance, where are the street marches and outrage now of the libertarians, that we saw regularly under the previous government? Nothing has changed and much is worse, for instance, there is less freedom of speech, we have now a concocted review of the "hate media" (punish) and no questioning of the "love media" (reward).

We have a government intolerant of criticism and of any questioning of their behavior.

Where's the outrage?

It has little to do with principle and everything to do with which side you have chosen. The libertarians in Australia have no credibility in the community, at least conservatives are consistent and reliable.

So when libertarians do dabble and insist on "action now!", there is much suspicion it is just some fashionable distraction and they will soon lose interest.
Posted by rpg, Monday, 9 January 2012 8:37:01 AM
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Very good article. Nice to see someone offering an alternative to the stultifying nanny state.
Posted by DavidL, Monday, 9 January 2012 8:37:18 AM
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"If public education encouraging individuals to voluntarily contribute to superannuation funds does not work in some cases, it then becomes up to the community to house and care for those who become destitute in their old age."

Maybe the phrasing but I only see it as a community responsibility where it's overwhelming circumstance which leads to the destitute state, rather than ongoing individual choices along the way (a failure to heed the publci education). Unfortunately we don't start from a clean slate, those working now have had their ability to provide for their own age substantaily impacted by the existing non-libetarian tax system.

Nor do I agree that the issue of a communities right to impose a spelt out tax system on members of the community is as clear cut as the author suggests. The community should never have the right to take from my income to give to another (government bonus and incentive schemes) regardless of how clear the plans are in advance.

There is a practical balancing act between keeping society running and respect for individual autonomy. Whilst I do think that we need a tax system, that we do need to care for those genuinely unable to help themselves, that we need to fund a police force and minimise the impact of the profit motive on essential services I also think that governments have become way to keen to overstep the mark in taking money from individuals to give to others for all sorts of reasons which often have little to do with meeting the survival needs of those others.

R0bert
Posted by R0bert, Monday, 9 January 2012 9:25:31 AM
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Melody Ayres Griffiths,

Libertarianism, like Freedom and God, has as many meanings as there are people. Each one of us has an idea of God not equal to the one of anybody else.

We have to say that everyone is a libertarian of a kind, his or her kind, and his or her libertarianisms are not comparable or compatible with the libertarianism of anybody else.

In my readings there have been libertarians like Pierre-Paul Prudhon, Peter Kropotkin, Emma Goldman and lately the economic libertarian Friedrich Hayek and many, many others who haven’t made an entry into the history books but for their killing or attempts to kill Kings or Politicians.

Hopefully in next article to OLO you will better define your kind of Libertarianism
Posted by skeptic, Monday, 9 January 2012 9:58:24 AM
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I thought I was going to enjoy this. I would say I was a Libertarian and disagree with much of what you have written. I started to read with more and more slack jawed incredulity, albeit right through to the end. As a caveat, to say Ron Paul is not a libertarian is disingenuous, for example he stated he would not have supported the Racial Discrimination Act because he thought business owners (you try and infer that a person opening a corner store is some sort of corporation but I am calling your bluff there) had the right to decide whom their clientele should be. I agree with that. If someone wants to open a female only gym in Australia, let them.... wait a minute ! They already have. If Government wants to allow a female only, Government funded (public money) swimming pool, I would disagree with that but they have, Coogee Women's Pool.

I would contend you are more liberal (in the Hayek sense, not the Liberal conservative abomination we have) then libertarian, which is not a value judgement just an observation.
Posted by Valley Guy, Monday, 9 January 2012 10:39:22 AM
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Hmm, person that speaks of Ron Paul as if everybody knows he who he is, like Jesus or the Queen, but I'd never heard of him until I read the article. And I still don't know who he is or why he's (apparently) famous.

Seriously, who the fudge is Ron Paul?
Posted by Anton LaVey, Monday, 9 January 2012 6:12:41 PM
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I also appreciate this refreshing change from the constant diet of nanny-state fascism that dominates public discourse in Australia. The author is right that there is widespread misunderstanding of the philosophy of freedom.

However I thought the author’s philosophy somewhat homespun; she could benefit from developing her understanding of some of the core concepts of freedom.

If we start with the value of freedom as a moral and political ideal, then the question is what limitations on freedom can be justified. If we say people should be free to do as they please unless they are infringing the rights or liberties of others, this only begs the question how rights or liberties are to be defined.

If we define “right” as it is most commonly used in Australia today, to mean whatever the government legislates it to mean, then obviously no one has a right to freedom. Your right to keep the fruits of your labour is limited by the government-granted “right” of others to live at your expense.

It is also not correct that libertarianism intrinsically opposes discrimination. Discrimination is just preference by another name – with a pejorative connotation attached to it. All human action intrinsically involves “discrimination”, because it intrinsically involves preferring one thing over all the alternative possible actions.

For example, by exercising a sexual preference, one thereby disqualifies as potential partners anyone who does not answer that description. Does that mean libertarians oppose freedom of sexual preference? No. Why not? Because people in general don’t have a “right” to become one’s sexual partner; nor to equal treatment, nor equal opportunity.

Similarly, every time you buy some butter, or a house, you adversely impact the liberty of others “to do the same”. That is indeed the purpose of the transaction. Does that mean libertarians oppose the freedom to buy goods and services, or think government should decide what house you can buy? No. Why not?

Again, your right to be free cannot come down to whether the state thinks that harm to others is “probable”. What if you believe, or know, it’s not probable?
(cont.)
Posted by Peter Hume, Monday, 9 January 2012 6:14:28 PM
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If the answer is that the state gets to decide, then obviously no-one has a right to any freedom. Freedom will be only what is left over after the state has taken and done whatever it wants, unilaterally deciding in its own discretion, with any appeal being decided by its own agents, and its subjects being forced to pay all its costs of any intervention, which is precisely the unfree situation we have now in Australia. The only limitation will be what it can get away with; there will be no limitation on principle.

Thus liberty must be defended on a principle; not by mere expedience, which only ever tends one way – towards less freedom!

In order for these fundamental questions about freedom to be answered without falling back to a blank warrant for total arbitrary power – the opposite of freedom - there is a need for a theory of rights and of the state, which the author’s article lacked.

A common libertarian standard is that freedom means the freedom to do what you want, *so long as you are not initiating aggression or fraud against anyone else*. This would solve all the above problems.

But it then raises a more fundamental issue about the justification of the state itself. Since the state is a compulsory territorial monopoly of the use of force, all its actions are based on a claimed right to initiate aggression – the source of all its revenue and jurisdiction.

So although it’s a refreshing change to hear someone speak up for liberty once in a while, I feel the author needs to do more work to come to terms with the more fundamental ethical and pragmatic issues to do with freedom, rights, and the state.

For a concise introduction to libertarian philosophy see: http://economics.org.au/2010/11/government-is-criminal-the-paragraph/
and the links therein to methodological individualism, subjective utility and praxeological synonyms.

On discrimination, please see Walter Block’s provocative “The Case for Discrimination”
http://www.lewrockwell.com/block/block169.html

On the Anatomy of the State, see:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard62.html
Posted by Peter Hume, Monday, 9 January 2012 6:15:56 PM
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