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If you don't step on my toes, I won't step on yours : Comments
By Melody Ayres-Griffiths, published 9/1/2012A beginner's guide to libertarianism.
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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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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.