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Sept. 25, 2016 - Sargon of Akkad - Carl Benjamin
46:05
Answers for Libertarians
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I'm not in good old Blighty at the moment, so the quality of this video is going to be very poor, so I do apologise.
But I wanted to address that guy T's questions for statists video, because I think I can help shed some light on the various questions that he and his libertarian colleagues were asking.
Before I start though, I just want to explain my position regarding libertarianism.
I'm not a libertarian, but of all of the ideological groups on the internet, I find them probably the least objectionable, by a long way.
And if I had to, if I had to suddenly commit to one of these ideological groups, it would probably be libertarianism.
So I'm really not doing this to be confrontational, and I'll be reading the comments, of course.
And so if libertarians have any questions for my responses, I'm more than happy to answer them.
Hey, statists!
Okay, so statist is definitely the first thing I want to address.
There is no such thing as a statist.
No one identifies as a statist.
So saying, hey, statists, means you're not addressing anyone.
I mean, a statist could literally be anyone who isn't a libertarian.
The thing is, you're not really targeting anyone with that.
You're just targeting non-libertarians at large.
I mean, you could be talking communists, fascists, conservatives, liberals.
You could literally just say, hey, non-libertarians, when you say, hey, statists.
I find it really bizarre that a movement that is so deeply individualist would collectivize literally everyone else as well.
That is just a bizarre thing for me to see.
And I don't really know how to answer.
I mean, hey, state- am I statist?
I mean, do I think government should exist?
Well, yes, I think government should exist.
Am I in favour of government?
Well, not really.
To me, government seems to be a necessary evil to enforce the social contract.
And I understand that in America, it does appear that that has broken down.
The government does not seem to be responsive to the people it's meant to be representing, and therefore they're not holding up their side of the bargain, and so I'm not surprised that an anti-government movement would occur.
But I'm very firmly in the position that if you want to have a society, it's going to have to be governed, and therefore you are going to require a social contract.
Because, and this is something I think a lot of libertarians overlook, is that the social contract isn't just between you and the government.
The social contract is also between me and you.
If a kid couldn't afford lunch because the school bullies kept taking a percentage of his allowance, you wouldn't blame the kid's parents for not giving him enough.
So why is it that when people struggle financially, you blame the employer who provides them with money and not the government which is taxing them?
Because the government isn't a bully and the employer isn't the parent of the employees.
The employer will pay the employees the minimum amount they can get away with to ensure the maximizing of their own profits.
And the government has an obligation to the people that they tax.
They aren't simply taking their money for the fun of it so they can spend it as they want, or at least in a regular society.
I realize that in the United States there may well be cases or maybe the rule that this isn't being upheld, but this is not in a regular healthy liberal democracy an apt metaphor.
For fans of democracy, I would ask, is it okay to forcibly rob, control, or otherwise victimize somebody as long as the majority approves of it?
Of course not.
This would be something called the tyranny of the majority.
And the very reason we have rights is to prevent this.
We all know that every economic system has market failures.
Capitalism, socialism, communism, whatever.
But my question is, why do you feel morally justified in forcing other people to subsidize these failures?
Why should I be forced to subsidize failed electric car companies like Fisker or failed government initiatives like Obamacare?
Shouldn't I have the right to decide what risk I want to take with my own money?
Well, once you've been taxed, it's not your money anymore.
But I do agree that the government shouldn't be subsidizing private companies.
Let them fail on their own if they are going to fail.
How come you want to ban things that you don't like?
As long as they're not hurting other people, what's the big deal?
This is a perfect example of why the word statist is almost worthless.
I don't want to ban anything that isn't actively causing harm to people against their will.
For example, you know, child pornography, sex trafficking, anything like that.
That's fine to ban.
I'm sure libertarians would also agree these things should be banned because, as Julie just said, these things are causing trouble.
And if it's not causing trouble, why would you want to ban it?
I agree.
I totally agree.
And I think a government should exist.
I suppose by definition I would be a statist.
But like I've just said, I don't want to ban any of these things.
I think if something's not causing any trouble, then you shouldn't ban it.
There's no moral grounds to ban it.
There's no justification.
So why would you do it?
But Julie's talking to me as if I want this sort of thing, which I don't.
Her using the term statist has attributed motivations and desires to me that I simply don't hold, meaning that it's just inaccurate.
Status of the left, who are always talking about how government's going to help the poor and demarginalize marginalized groups.
I don't understand this.
From the ancient world through the Middle Ages all the way up to modern times, governments have largely conspired against the poor.
Okay, I take issue with the framing of this question and the generalization of it as well.
Governments don't conspire with each other.
They're in direct opposition with each other.
And they certainly don't conspire against the poor.
If anyone conspires in a government, it's various factions of aristocrats against each other.
They generally don't care about the poor, because the poor aren't generally a threat to their power, because as you will go and say, governments are mostly made up of rich people, and they find themselves in competition with one another.
The poor are incidental in these cases usually.
And unfortunately, they do get exploited.
I'm thinking in particular a century ago with eugenics programs and segregation programs and zoning programs with business regulation and union rules.
Everything was designed to exclude, marginalize, and impoverish groups that didn't have power.
Governments are always controlled by rich people.
That's just the way it works.
Why do you think a government is the right means to help?
I find it interesting that this chap has to use examples from a hundred years ago to justify asking this question.
Government is also the only method by which the poor have any control over the rich or the way to ensure their own rights.
They're too poor to do anything else.
So it literally is the only method that the poor have to protect themselves from the rich.
Even if the rich control the government, that doesn't mean that they're despots.
They don't just have free reign to do whatever it is they want.
And the poor, as Brexit and Trump are demonstrating, can and do make themselves heard.
It's just for a very long time they haven't needed to because the situation hasn't been that bad.
However, it is that bad now and, well, the governments are going to have to start listening.
Unless, of course, you think that they should be rioting in the streets, which I think is a negative for everyone.
I don't see who benefits from riots.
I think that a responsible government that upholds the social contract rather than abuses it is a good idea.
And I think that's probably where we'll end up after a few revolutions.
Makes no sense to me.
So I punched this coming face in.
I said, how do you like those marks?
Oh, we're recording.
does my hair look okay how can you claim on one hand to be anti-guns yet on the other hand you want the state to take guns away at gunpoint Another failure for the term statist, I'm afraid, because I'm not really anti-gun, but then I'm not really pro-gun either.
So it's a bit by the by.
But yes, the state has to have a monopoly on force to be able to enforce its laws.
If there were other power-wielding entities within a state that were refusing, for example, to obey the laws that were agreed upon by our democratically elected leaders, then we could find ourselves in a position where I'm having my rights violated and you are violating a law, and the government does not have the power to enforce the law over you.
This is obviously an unacceptable position.
I'm sure you'd agree for me and for you, because I would be able to do the same thing for you.
Basically, you want to regress us back to a state of brute savagery, where you would end up with basically northern Mexico.
It's not a good idea.
It just ends in bloodshed and savagery and is entirely not conductive to a peaceful life, which is, I'm sure, what libertarians ultimately are desiring to lead.
It seems to be that there are many American libertarians who think that being able to own a gun is them challenging the government's monopoly on force.
It's not.
It's them being able to form a well-regulated militia to ensure the government doesn't turn into a despotic tyranny.
It's not the same thing.
Government has slaughtered 250 million of its own people in acts of democide.
How can you trust such a beast to rule over you?
And as some of you argue for, to be disarmed to.
Governments are not monolithic entities, and the concept of government is neither a monolithic entity nor something you can just point to and say, government did this.
This is basically the most absurd question I've ever heard.
The thing is, it does come from a position that isn't entirely illegitimate, though.
Yes, government is, like the previous question, demonstrated the monopoly on force, and so, yes, it needs to be checked and justified at all turns.
I mean, there should never be a situation where we simply give people in the government the benefit of the doubt.
They should always be questioned, always be critiqued.
But you can't sit there and simply say, well, government's the problem.
Let's get rid of it.
Which I'm guessing someone called Anarchy Ball is going to be advocating for.
Why is it that no matter how much money the government takes from its citizens, it's always broke?
Okay, I'm not going to lie.
The tone that people are asking these questions in is making it hard not to become confrontational in return.
And I'm really trying not to.
For example, I just recorded a thing where I was like, literally, look, I get told by libertarians all the time that I don't understand economics.
So a libertarian asking me a question about economics is bizarre, given how well they understand economics.
But I'm really trying not to do that.
But the thing is, you guys don't even know who you're talking to.
And you're acting in this really condescending way.
Not very productive.
But yeah, what good would it be if a government just piled up its citizens' money and didn't use it?
If keeping 100% of someone else's income is slavery, then at what percentage is it no longer slavery?
Keeping 100% of a person's income is not slavery.
It's not far off, and it's not very fair, and it's undoubtedly going to absolutely cripple that person and make them utterly dependent on the government.
But that's not slavery.
Can a bunch of people who don't have the right to do a certain thing grant to somebody else the right to do it?
And if not, how did Congress acquire the right to do things that you and I don't have the right to do?
The answer is yes, they can.
We do this all the time.
This is what every government is predicated on, and fundamentally, this is what the social contract is.
The agreement that we will all live by a certain selection of laws.
For example, I'm not allowed to hold you against your will.
However, if you violate certain laws, for example, if you would hold me against my will, then the government would be completely entitled.
In fact, it would be mandatory for the government to then hold you against your will as not only the justice that I would deserve to see you being punished for the crime you've committed against me, but as a disincentive to other people from committing that same crime against other people.
Fundamentally, it's all about preserving your own rights.
These people aren't just locking people up or shooting people or whatever, willy-nilly.
There is a great deal of structure behind what you've asked.
Why are you comfortable spending borrowed money knowing your children will have to pay it off down the line?
You're increasing their eventual taxes before they can even vote.
Isn't that the definition of taxation without representation?
Again, another failure for the term statist.
I'm not in favor of that.
I doubt very many people are in favor of that.
Maybe the people who are running the Federal Reserve.
If people are so greedy and selfish that we need governments to steal from the rich and give to the poor and needy, then why do over 1.5 million charities exist globally, with 373 billion dollars being raised in 2015 alone?
Governments don't steal from the rich to give to the poor.
And that's not including the Clinton Foundation's money laundering operation.
Alleged money laundering operation.
Yes, alleged.
You do realize that making something illegal won't make it go away.
Guns, drugs, the black market will provide.
Because a law is the only way you're going to see any justice.
If someone breaks a law and violates your rights, and they are then arrested, tried, and found guilty, then whatever recourse is due you will be given you, and whatever punishment that is due for the person who broke that law will be given to them.
This acts as a massive disincentive to people who would otherwise break this law and violate your rights, but decide they won't because they have something to lose, as in their freedom, their property, maybe even their life.
That in itself prevents untold numbers of crimes.
Here's some of the money government wasted.
The government spent $1.4 million on an app that just simply points left and right for the TSA.
The government.
That should have been done for way cheaper.
Oh, that's not crazy enough for you?
How about this?
The government wasted $1.4 trillion on a jet that doesn't even work.
That's enough to buy every homeless person in the United States a mansion.
Yeah, and I'm sure you're entirely in favor of this, but I love this guy's backdrop.
Look at this.
This is my favourite thing.
Stacks of gold and money and guns in one corner.
A beautiful vista.
A burning fireplace.
Just it's the most palatial mansion ever.
Just like what he's suggesting the poor people should be bought, I imagine.
This strikes me as the ultimate libertarian fantasy.
The one-man island.
You don't have enough guns to prevent people from taking these away from you.
You simply don't.
If the government was abolished and you lived in a state of anarchy, you would lose all of this very quickly to a very well-organized gang of very dangerous people who would come and take it.
And yeah, you'd kill a few probably, and maybe they'd maybe they'd think twice and maybe it'd take a while for it to end up happening, but it would happen because you have to sleep sometime.
A $600,000 home.
Oh, that's not crazy enough for you.
The government lost $6 trillion.
Knowing all of this, do you still think the government could spend your money more wisely than you can?
No, not really.
And I'm sure that government is practically the worst way of doing anything except for certain features that can't be done practically in any other way.
For example, military.
The last thing you want are privately funded armies.
Just the very last thing.
Armies that are literally fighting for nothing but pay are the worst armies imaginable.
Not only from a technical standpoint of military efficiency, but also from the position of the people who have to live with these armies occupying them.
Just read Machiavelli.
Medieval Italy was rife with mercenary armies, and he disdained them more than anything, with good reason.
These people don't fight for ideals, they don't fight with any morals, they don't operate or obey any kind of laws, and they barely even obey the person paying them.
They are the worst, and that is something that cannot be done to any degree of efficiency or even any kind of good sense without a government.
How can you rationalize basic philosophical concepts such as non-aggression principle as being quote-unquote too difficult for society to be educated on and abide by, yet believe that hundreds of thousands of pages of federal and state regulations, clauses, case files, and amendments are somehow easier?
Personally, I don't subscribe to the non-aggression principle.
I think that if I can see someone preparing to do violence against me, then I am perfectly within my rights to do violence to them first.
But secondly, the average person doesn't need to know any of these things because they generally aren't affected by all of these things.
Most of these things are industry-specific, and there are professionals whose entire careers are dealt with dealing with these regulations.
For example, I have a friend who works in the pharmaceutical industry, and his entire job is just regulation.
He has to quality check all of this stuff, and so he has to know these regulations.
And these regulations are there for a purpose.
The average person doesn't know anything about this, and they don't need to.
Is it illegal for me to import my hedgehogs to a multitude of places?
I can't say I know anything about the laws governing the importing of hedgehogs to various countries, but I imagine it's got something to do with various diseases and invasive populations of animals.
But it's totally legal to import thousands upon thousands of fighting-age economic migrants.
These economic migrants are not being imported.
They are being allowed in.
And I'm obviously against this as well, so I guess there's another failure of the term statist.
If it's wrong for you to do a certain thing, can you, by voting, make it right for someone else to do the exact same thing?
I think I've answered this question three times now.
But yes, that's exactly how the social contract works.
It is the method by which we determine legitimate political authority and the properties of that authority.
So yes, yes, you can.
If the competitive market ingenuity of capitalism can deliver us things like iPhones, 3D printers, and private spaceships, why should services as important as justice, roads, and defense be monopolized by the state?
Because these services are necessary for everyone in society, not simply people who can afford them.
I swear to God, I'm not trying to be a dick about this, but can you imagine a society where justice was predicated on wealth?
Just honestly, come on.
And military, again, just right-wing statists.
When you're opposing gun laws, you argue the government shouldn't be so powerful that it can disarm the populace.
So why when it comes to drug laws, do you argue the government should be so powerful that it can tell people what they can put into their own bodies?
The fact that you needed to distinguish between right-wing statists and other statists just again goes to show the failure of the term statist.
And as I'm not a right-wing statist, I can't really answer this because I'm not in favour of drug laws in general.
I don't think that drugs should be criminalized, and I don't see the point of them.
They don't work.
Prohibition on drugs has never worked.
So I can't answer this one, I'm afraid.
Now, to status of the right, claim you're opposed to socialism and don't see government as the answer, and yet invariably you're celebrating the cops, the first responders, and the fire departments, and the jails, war, all big public sector programs.
It's a kind of the socialism that you love.
Why do you think that that's going to work better than the private sector?
Honestly, I'm baffled that I have to answer this question.
Private police forces, military, laws, and prisons are all very bad things, especially if all combined together.
I mean, especially if this is predicated on wealth as well.
The rich people are controlling private police forces, militaries, and writing private laws that then other people have to abide by.
I mean, who's going to make them abide by their own laws?
We have enough problems with that, as in the state itself, by in the example of Hillary Clinton, making the FBI prosecute her for the things she has tangibly done wrong.
In a system where literally everyone has to abide by the same laws, we're having a problem making everyone abide by the same laws because of certain factors and privileges that some of them have.
And you think that's going to be less of a problem in a system that would specifically incentivize it?
If people are innately good, what is the need for government?
And if people are innately evil, what is to stop them using government to cause evil to one another?
And would it not be better that their influence be limited to that which they can achieve voluntarily, rather than to give them the added benefit of legitimized force?
Some people are innately good.
Some people are not innately good.
Some people are good but do some bad things.
Some people are bad but do some good things.
The point is that you can't plan only for the best case scenario, and you absolutely have to plan for the worst case scenario.
The worst case scenario is that you live near people who are not good, and the best way to incentivize anyone to do anything is to play on their own self-interest.
For example, if you rob me, you will not only go to jail, but your future career prospects will also be harmed by your criminal record that an employer will see.
That will prevent you, in most cases, from being robbed by people who otherwise might not have a moral compunction in robbing you.
A major question that I have for proponents of state economic regulations in particular is how exactly can you sleep at night knowing the economic destruction that you've created?
The effect of government regulations on output has been calculated to have an accumulated reduction cost on the American GDP of nearly $40 trillion just since 1949.
In other words, absent of any federal economic regulations after World War II, we could have tripled our GDP.
Every citizen could have an average income of $333,000 instead of $53,000, a $277,000 increase in the average income.
This doesn't even factor in the cost of compliance, rent-seeking, and state-level regulations.
We could have had so much more prosperity and so much less poverty without state regulations on our economy.
So how can you look your opponents in the eye and claim that your regulations are somehow for the common man?
Well, aside from the fact that this seems like an absurdly utopian fantasy, and again, I remind you, I'm not an economist.
I'm going to suggest that perhaps the regulations you're referring to are not applied to the common man.
They are applied to massive corporations, hugely wealthy individuals, and various industries to prevent them from being predatory on the common man.
Left-wing statists, when you're opposing drug laws, especially weed, you argue the government shouldn't be so powerful that it can tell people what they can and can't put into their own bodies.
So why when it comes to gun laws, do you think the government should be so powerful that it can have a complete monopoly over effective force?
Because a person getting high isn't the same thing as a person having a gun.
One thing does not have the potential to kill me and the other thing does.
Here are the things you can't do without government permission.
Build a house.
Because there are cowboy builders who will build houses that are not safe and sell them to people telling them that they are.
Drive a car.
Because cars are very large and dangerous objects and a certain level of proficiency driving one is required to minimize the chances of someone being run over.
Own a gun.
Because there are lunatics out there who will shoot people if given access to a gun and preventing their access to a gun is the only thing preventing them from shooting people.
Go fishing.
I imagine this is something to do with sustainable levels of fish in local lakes and rivers.
I have no idea, but I imagine there is actually a good reason for it.
Collect rainwater.
I heard about this.
This was a case where the federal government of the United States punished some people for collecting rainwater on their own property.
Absurd.
Hunt.
I imagine this is to prevent the extinction of animals in various locations from overhunting.
Cross the road.
Oh yeah, Americans have jaywalking laws, don't they?
Yeah, that's silly.
Get married.
Well, a marriage is a legal contract that creates a single economic unit, so I imagine the government probably would need to be involved with that.
Leave the country.
I refer you to Lauren Southern complaining about economic migrants.
If you want to know who is coming into or going out of your country, the government will need to be involved.
Start a business.
Yes, because some businesses have harmful consequences if they are not well regulated and managed.
And you cannot simply rely on a person's goodwill to well regulate and manage their business, especially if they are the sort of person who simply doesn't care.
Fly on a commercial plane.
Alawak Bar, my dude.
Take drugs.
What kind of drugs?
Are we talking pharmaceuticals?
Because pharmaceutical regulations prevent thousands and thousands and thousands of deaths every year.
These are a good thing.
Work.
You don't need government permission to work.
You may need to pay the government money from the money you earn from your work, or you may, as an employer, need to follow certain rules and regulations on who you employ and how you employ them.
But you actually do not need government permission to work, unless there's something that I'm missing, but then you didn't specify.
So let's carry on.
It's actually hard to think of something that doesn't require government permission.
Pissing, wanking, shitting, talking to someone, having friends, having relationships, owning anything.
I mean, literally almost everything you do doesn't require government permission.
You've just specified things that have an effect on other people, and so really should have some sort of rules or regulations governing them.
Knowing this, how can you say you're free?
Well, we do not know this, and the definition of freedom is predicated on not only my ability to do things, but also my freedom from your ability to do things to me.
If being a democratically elected constitutional republic creates legitimate political authority, does that mean that all the things that were done by the democratically elected constitutional republics of the Soviet Union, Nazi Germany, and North Korea, all those things were legitimate and justified?
This would take a long time to unpack, so I will sum it up by saying you're comparing apples to oranges.
The United States government is not the same or comparable to a totalitarian authoritarian state.
If you're a proud, government-loving liberal who champions personal choice, could you please explain why I can't choose to not fund the murder of innocent children abroad?
You can.
You do it at the ballot box.
When you vote for someone who says I am not going to conduct drone strikes on Pakistani villages or something like that.
If you have a government that does do that, you should be petitioning them along with all of your other libertarian friends.
But instead, you're making this video.
If you've ever said there ought to be a law, or if you believe the government is the best solution to most of life's problems, I have one question for you.
Are you prepared to kill?
Every law, no matter how big or small it appears to be, is backed by violent force, and in many cases, death.
Oh my god, just the hyperbole.
Come on, guys.
You're really making it hard not to mock.
Yes, if for some reason there was a situation where I would want the government to step in and use force, then they are doing that on my behalf, so I don't have to do that.
If somehow you threatened me to the point where someone has to use force to prevent you from hurting other people, then yes, I would kill you myself because it would be self-preservation.
Thankfully, I don't have to.
There are police who do that.
I don't want to have to kill you.
And I don't see why you'd be so fucking stupid as to commit some sort of crime that would require you to be shot or killed in the first place.
Why would you do this?
Why would you be so obstreperous that you're like, you know what?
No, I'm just going to keep saying no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, until eventually I have to be killed to preserve the safety of other people.
What kind of moron would do this?
Come on!
Again, I'm trying not to mock, but listen to the questions you're asking.
You really want the same people who run the DMB to be in charge of your health care?
No, the people running the DMV will be running the DMV.
The people running the healthcare will be running the healthcare.
These are not the same people.
They are both bureaucrats, but they are not the same people.
They don't do the same job.
They don't have the same requirements, and they don't have the same qualifications.
This is the problem with looking at this as a monolith.
Government isn't just a monolith.
Why is it that you prefer anti-discrimination laws which force those who hate other races to hide that prejudice and make money off of those other races to a system where they could be open about said prejudice and lose money?
Because it's one thing being a racist, and it's another thing acting on your racism.
For example, if in the libertarian utopia I have decided to open a health clinic and I am the only health clinic in say 30 miles because I live in, I don't know, the Australian Outback, the American Midwest, something like that, and a black person comes in and he's been shot.
Who knows why?
And he's like, look, I need healthcare.
Luckily, I can pay.
I've got loads of money.
And you go, yeah, but I don't like niggers.
Then he has to die because of your bigotry.
Is that really the society you want to live in?
You guys often say that libertarians have too much faith in the goodness of people.
Why then do you, in the same breath, argue that I give up my right to bear arms and entrust my personal safety to police in gun-free zones?
That seems like pretty strong faith in human nature to me.
Well, again, a failure for the term statist, because I don't believe that.
But the police are not governed by a faith in human nature.
They are governed by a very specific and rigorous set of rules that if they violate, they are, at least hypothetically, punished for.
This is not based on goodwill.
It is, again, based on people acting in rational self-interest.
Status, since the war on drugs has been an absolute failure, what makes you think a war on guns would be any different?
I don't think there should be wars on anything.
And I don't agree that a war on guns would be a good idea either.
So, chalk another one up to the failure of statist.
Can you morally justify the federal government preventing a small territory from seceding from a larger country?
This is actually a very good question, and one that I don't agree can be justified, but is going to be justified by sovereign power.
I'm not going to go into it now because it would take a very long time to go through, and I'd have to go through a few things that I've recently read and pull out a few important and pertinent extracts.
But yeah, very good question.
And no, I think that it's not really justified.
I think that people should have the right to self-determination.
How is me writing down I'm in charge and then getting 20 friends to sign it any different from the drafting of the Constitution?
You don't have the power to enforce it.
That's the difference.
Don't get me wrong, there are all sorts of questions of legitimacy that would follow from all of this.
But fundamentally, it boils down to the fact that you can't enforce it.
If roads are so complicated and magical that they can only be built by governments, then why do they hire private companies to actually build the c, eh?
My finger roads!
More a question of cost-effectiveness, I'd imagine.
Paying a toll every time you go onto or leave a certain stretch of road is probably going to cost you more than if you pay a small amount upfront and be able to use every fucking road.
But not only that, I mean, of course the government is going to hire private companies to do it.
For a start, these companies do things other than build roads.
And why not?
Why would you be against private enterprise?
Why is every logical explanation we provide about how something will work just pure speculation, while any doomsday scenario you pull out of your ass about anarchism is absolute truth?
You're not going to like this.
You're not going to like this at all.
Your logical explanations are shit.
That's why.
I'm going to give it to you straight.
The logical explanations you propose are flawed.
Deeply, deeply flawed.
And the things that we're pointing out are the flaws in your logic.
That's why.
I know you're going to be upset.
I know you're going to be upset by that.
And I'm not trying to upset you.
I'm really not.
But you guys don't seem to listen.
I've had lots of conversations with libertarians and they never seem to understand why these things won't work.
Everything you say is utopian.
Absurdly utopian.
And would never actually pan out in reality.
And there's normally a historical precedent we can point to to prove the point.
To say, look, this is where this has been done, and it failed.
And what you're proposing is just going to leave out certain segments of the population and you're not accounting for them.
I mean, for example, in the perfect ANCAP society, what happens to the statists?
If Hobbes is correct, then people are just naturally, in a state of nature, going to gang together and create a state because it provides them with certain benefits that not being a lone individual in the wilderness is going to provide.
What are you going to do with those people?
I mean, how are you even going to stop them from doing it?
I just, honestly, nothing about, especially anarcho-capitalism, but again, libertarianism as well, it's not going to pan out.
It's just not.
It's so idealistic that it's not going to work.
And I know, I know, angry, angry, angry libertarianism, my roads.
I'm sorry.
Sorry to say it, but it's just not going to work.
How highly do you think of yourself that you think it's your right to impose your views on people you've never met and tell them it's good for them?
Very.
This is my life.
It's the only one I have.
And like I was saying about the social contract, it's not just to protect me from the government, it's to protect me from you.
Listen to this ridiculousness.
We protect our president with guns, but our children with paper gun-free zone signs.
Well, what else are you going to protect your president with?
And you also protect your children with guns.
Congress has a 9% approval rating.
Government can't even balance a budget.
We are about to reach a $20 trillion debt.
Social Security and Medicare and other socialist policies are unsustainable.
The drug war kills more people than drugs itself.
How can you say government is effective?
God, that's a damning indictment of the Latvian government, isn't it?
Oh, wait, you're not talking about the Latvian government.
You're talking about the American government.
Well, I think that might be a bit of a special case, given that most countries don't have thriving libertarian movements, and America does.
There isn't just governments.
There are many governments, and yours is one of them, and honestly, appears to be one of the most corrupt and ineffective ones.
And yeah, you should do something about it.
But arguing for the abolition of government isn't the answer.
Frankly, it's never going to happen.
It's the most ludicrous pipe dream I've ever heard.
Again, I don't even...
I'm not even, like, anti-libertarian, you know, libertarians, there are so many people in this video that I genuinely like, you know, like Josh, Lauren, T, probably others that I know.
And I'm, you know, I consider myself to be at least on good terms with, if not outright friends with.
And yet, guys, it's never going to happen.
It's just a pipe dream.
It's never going to happen.
Now, to the status of the left and right, who are constantly against free trade and promoting protectionism and warlike foreign trade policies.
Why is it that you think trade between nation states is any different from trade between states in the US, between Vermont and New Hampshire and Georgia and Mississippi, which we understand is a good thing because it broadens the division of labor and makes everybody better off.
Why do you not see that that's also true internationally?
And why do you think a solution to this non-problem is to raise taxes on the American people?
Put simply, the hegemonic power of the federal government makes that the case.
And you are dealing not with competing states within a single framework, but multiple different frameworks in competition with each other.
The U.S. government can ensure that all of the states are playing by the same rules, whereas the U.S. government is incapable of ensuring that another state is playing by those very same rules.
This is one of the things that Donald Trump is always going on about with his trade deals with China or Mexico and how you're getting killed in trade.
If they want to play by different rules to undercut you or to screw you in some way, you have no recourse.
When an individual's moral conscience conflicts with the commands and rules of lawmakers and law enforcers, is an individual morally obligated to do what they believe to be wrong simply to obey the law?
Unfortunately, yes.
And it's just because it's your own self-interest not to break a law, even if you find that law immoral.
I know, it's terrible.
But the trick is to make sure that you have some form of control of your lawmakers.
And that requires you being an active and involved populist.
Again, honestly, this all does come down to the social contract.
I recommend reading Leviathan, Rousseau, and I'm About to Start Locke.
And there are a few others as well, but I think these are probably the key ones.
And already I can see why you guys are going wrong.
I doubt you've read these things, have you?
You keep saying I have to be moral by voting for a lesser evil this year.
Could you please explain how any kind of evil is ever moral?
I don't keep saying that, and sometimes it is.
For example, it's an evil to kill someone.
But if I see someone, ooh, I don't know, raping, abusing, and about to murder someone else, killing that person may well be the moral thing to do.
Indeed, it might be the only moral option.
Given my first question to right-wingers and my second to left-wingers, comparing drug rights, which half of you advocate, and gun rights, which the other half of you advocate, it seems to me that there are two possible compromises.
Either we go full authoritarian and none of you get what you want, or we go full libertarian and you can both have what you want.
Which sounds more appealing to you?
Or one person can get what they want and the other person doesn't get what they want, because the thing that one person wants doesn't harm other people, but the thing the other person wants does.
And given that answer that you gave, don't you think there are one or two other issues we could apply this reasoning to?
I think we should apply this reasoning to almost every issue.
If there's something that harms other people, then perhaps that should be restricted or at least heavily controlled.
If there's something that doesn't harm other people but only harms you, well, that's your choice, isn't it?
So I'm going to finish up with a bit of a waffle, I guess.
Like I said, of all the ideological groups on the internet, I find libertarians, and not just on the internet, but generally, I find them one of the least objectionable, because everything is predicated on a moral stance, to be the least harmful to one's fellow man as possible.
And I think that's very noble.
But I also think that their suggestions are misguided, and I don't think they're ever going to pan out.
And I don't think that they understand that not everyone in society is like them.
You'll notice that all of these people seem fairly upwardly mobile, intelligent, well-read, well-spoken, and many, many, many, many people are not.
And you will find certain people who are not as noble and well-intentioned will take advantage of the fears, insecurities, and desires of those people and use them against the libertarians.
So in many ways, it's for your own protection that we don't live in a libertarian society.
I know this all sounds quite esoteric, and I'm no expert on this, but I'm learning an awful lot.
And fundamentally, I do think it comes down to the legitimacy of government, which obviously libertarians think that there isn't any, because they are seeing their own government.
And overwhelmingly, these people are American, but there are occasionally the odd British libertarian there.
And there's every reason to think that the British government isn't being as responsive as it could be to British people's needs.
But the American government obviously isn't.
And I think that libertarianism is a reaction to that.
And finally, libertarians, you have to stop talking about statists.
I know, that sounds crazy, right?
That sounds like way out there, but statists are not a monolith.
You are not being specific when you talk about statists.
Therefore, you're not really using any useful terms when you do it.
Basically, you have made statists the other.
I mean, just look at the contempt that you guys have shown throughout this video.
Just the way you've spoken.
Like I was saying, I was having a real hard time not being a dick in this video.
I really was.
And just, you know, not mocking.
Because you guys have obvious contempt for those people that you think are statists.
You've otherised them completely.
And you don't even know who you're talking about.
You couldn't even tell me what status.
I mean, you guys had to then start delineating between types of statist.
And it's just like, and again, nobody identifies as a statist.
It's not something anyone's going to put their hand up to.
You know, so you're otherizing these people.
And honestly, it does come back to these cult behaviours that Diekman was saying about.
As soon as you start thinking of yourself as morally superior, then you start thinking of other people necessarily as inferior.
And you start becoming a cult.
You start finding yourself locked into these cult patterns of behavior, especially if you can place all of the blame on someone else.
And you can.
It's the government and the damn statists.
You've got to knock it out.
You've got to knock it off.
You've got to stop this.
This is becoming unhealthy.
And I'm genuinely, genuinely serious.
And I'm not trying to offend anyone.
I swear to you, I'm not trying to be a dick.
I'm not trying to condescend.
I'm genuinely worried about the people who I know who are libertarians.
Because I had this hangout with Aga T, and I saw him doing it.
saw him getting emotional about the government and status and I was just like dude you know this isn't this is not the right way to do it And like I said, I'm not trying to be a dick.
I'm genuinely trying to help.
You're going to find yourself locked into your sort of small ideological community like the SJWs with misogynists and Black Lives Matter with racists and all this sort of stuff.
You're statists to them.
When they think of the white supremacy, you're thinking of government.
When they're thinking of misogynists, you're thinking of statists.
That's exactly the same thing.
You don't, like, there is no such thing as, like, a self-identified misogynist.
There is no group of misogynists.
You've got to stop using the term statist.
You've got to stop using the government as a scapegoat for everything you think is wrong in society.
And I genuinely mean it.
And I'm not trying to lose friends, even though I'm sure I will do.
I genuinely hope that the people in this video who I have replied to, who I know and like, understand that I'm not doing this as a method to try and get at them.
I'm doing this genuinely, and I honestly mean this.
I'm doing this genuinely to try and help them understand why there aren't more libertarians.
Because like I said, I don't think their principles are bad.
I just think they're unpragmatic.
Anyway, sorry for the poor quality of this video.
Did the best I could.
And I look forward to the comment section afterwards.
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