Intro to libertarian philosophy animation

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Dump or don't dump...I don't care. If you choose to dump, then you can do so, but you do not have the right to choose to dump your sewage such that it enters my property, unless I say it is okay. As to the means of keeping your sewage out of my section of creek, I could care less, so long as it gets done. Getting it inspected or it costing $10,000 is not my concern, nor is it an impinging of your rights. In fact, it is simply the cost of exercising those rights responsibly. No one ever said freedom was free.

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My point is that this is actually an incredibly restrictive philosophy. If you want to guarantee that no one is ever affected negatively by anyone else's actions, that necessitates an enormous and intrusive government for enforcement. Your utopia of liberty actually turns into a very restrictive society where no one can do anything.

Your rights are being impinged right now. You're being forced to breathe contaminants in the air. According to your philosophy, this invasion of your rights must be remedied by forcing everyone else to cease driving cars. After all, they're emitting carcinogens which you can't avoid breathing. Would you say that the inconvenience of everyone having to ride bicycles or walk isn't your concern, nor is it an impinging of their rights?

In fact, we'll have to shut down all the power plants and oil refineries, too. Among other things, they're causing global warming. That's causing sea ice to recede in the north, which is destroying Inuit/Eskimo hunting grounds. Their livelihood is being destroyed as a consequence of someone else's action. Clearly their rights are being violated, which must be avoided at all costs, correct?

I agree with you about gay marriage, etc. It's just that in the real world, people have overlapping and conflicting rights, and it's naive to simply say, "Everyone has rights and they should always be respected."

[coffeecrazy1]

Okay...fair point. As disgusting as bestiality is, you make a convincing argument for its legality. I stand corrected.

[coffeecrazy1]

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Dump or don't dump...I don't care. If you choose to dump, then you can do so, but you do not have the right to choose to dump your sewage such that it enters my property, unless I say it is okay. As to the means of keeping your sewage out of my section of creek, I could care less, so long as it gets done. Getting it inspected or it costing $10,000 is not my concern, nor is it an impinging of your rights. In fact, it is simply the cost of exercising those rights responsibly. No one ever said freedom was free.

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My point is that this is actually an incredibly restrictive philosophy. If you want to guarantee that no one is ever affected negatively by anyone else's actions, that necessitates an enormous and intrusive government for enforcement. Your utopia of liberty actually turns into a very restrictive society where no one can do anything.

Your rights are being impinged right now. You're being forced to breathe contaminants in the air. According to your philosophy, this invasion of your rights must be remedied by forcing everyone else to cease driving cars. After all, they're emitting carcinogens which you can't avoid breathing. Would you say that the inconvenience of everyone having to ride bicycles or walk isn't your concern, nor is it an impinging of their rights?

In fact, we'll have to shut down all the power plants and oil refineries, too. Among other things, they're causing global warming. That's causing sea ice to recede in the north, which is destroying Inuit/Eskimo hunting grounds. Their livelihood is being destroyed as a consequence of someone else's action. Clearly their rights are being violated, which must be avoided at all costs, correct?

I agree with you about gay marriage, etc. It's just that in the real world, people have overlapping and conflicting rights, and it's naive to simply say, "Everyone has rights and they should always be respected."

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So, you are arguing that making everything public and abolishing property rights makes things less restrictive? Hmm...I thought that's what the Soviet Union did.

What you are overlooking is my right to consent. You never asked me if it was okay for you to dump your stuff in my creek...you just wanted to know if you could do it, regardless of my feelings. I have gotten so much farther with people simply by asking. Maybe it would be better to dump sewage in the creek...but you never asked me.

What I am defending is my right to say no, if I so choose. Most people give their consent to things like pollution because of the upside of pollution...which is the product of all those factories. Almost everyone seems to not have a problem with breathing a few fumes in exchange for electricity, hot water, and the ability to drive around in a car...myself included. So...I am consenting to the necessary evils of modern convenience.

However, I am not enjoined from running off and joining a commune in the middle of the woods. As strange as they are, no one faults the Amish for sticking to their beliefs.

As to your global warming/melting of ice caps argument, I would say that any statement that invokes chaos theory as part of its proof is in trouble. Global warming is not a proven fact...it is still being debated as to its harmfulness, or whether it actually exists as a result of our actions, or simply as the result of the Earth oscillating through its own geologic and atmospheric cycles. And...how come we haven't heard about the epidemic of starving Eskimos and Inuits yet?

No, it is not naive to say that...it is American, and it is the best part about our country to say so. The cynicism in this country is overwhelming and suffocating. The thing that drives most mainstream individuals from both sides of the political divide up the wall about libertarians is our overriding optimism about people and their capacity for goodness. Believing that "the real world" can never change is the exact reason why it never does.

Libertarianism is inherently romantic. The majority opinion now is that of cynics, with little to no faith in the divinity or ascendancy of mankind.

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Um...not sure where you got that, but no...far from it. Is this going to say that animals can't consent to being slaughtered, therefore should not be?

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Yes, that's where I'm going with this. It's hypocritical to say that it's okay to kill animals for food without their consent, while it's not okay to have to sex with them without their consent. It seems very arbitrary, and, as a libertarian myself, I don't like arbitrary things.

I eat meat btw. And as disgusting as bestiality is, I don't think I can tell someone else that they can't have sex with an animal when I'm eating an animal's flesh.

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There's a huge difference between beastiality and being carnivorous.

One type of animal eating the flesh of another is totally natural. However, sex between different types of animals, for the most part is unnatural.

Therefore, it's perfectly alright to be a meat-eating libertarian that shuns acts of beastiality.

[edthayer]

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One type of animal eating the flesh of another is totally natural. However, sex between different types of animals, for the most part is unnatural.

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Homosexuality is unnatural, but you're going to have a very hard time finding libertarians who are against gay rights.

Outlawing something because it is unnatural is irrational. Who decides? I could argue that most of modern civilization is unnatural.

EDIT: You can be a meat-eating libertarian who shuns bestiality. I fall into this category. However, I do not wish to impose my beliefs on this matter on others.

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So, you are arguing that making everything public and abolishing property rights makes things less restrictive? Hmm...I thought that's what the Soviet Union did.

[/ QUOTE ] No, I'm arguing that libertarianism is a naive and generally useless political philosophy.
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What I am defending is my right to say no, if I so choose. Most people give their consent to things like pollution because of the upside of pollution...which is the product of all those factories. Almost everyone seems to not have a problem with breathing a few fumes in exchange for electricity, hot water, and the ability to drive around in a car...myself included. So...I am consenting to the necessary evils of modern convenience.

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But the point of libertarianism is that you don't have to consent. If we are to respect everyone's rights fully, if one single person refuses that bargain, then everyone has to stop using cars.

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However, I am not enjoined from running off and joining a commune in the middle of the woods. As strange as they are, no one faults the Amish for sticking to their beliefs.

[/ QUOTE ] Why should they have to move? This is like me telling you to move your cabin if you don't like my sewage.
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As to your global warming/melting of ice caps argument, I would say that any statement that invokes chaos theory as part of its proof is in trouble. Global warming is not a proven fact...it is still being debated as to its harmfulness, or whether it actually exists as a result of our actions, or simply as the result of the Earth oscillating through its own geologic and atmospheric cycles. And...how come we haven't heard about the epidemic of starving Eskimos and Inuits yet?

[/ QUOTE ] [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] I thought you might be skeptical. Okay, I'll skip this whole debate and just say that there are any number of other examples. Lead smelting plants give lead poisoning to the surrounding community. Mines create toxic waste pits. Or take an example from Jared Diamond's book Collapse. Because of certain properties of Montana soil, if I irrigate land that is uphill from your farm, the excess water will seep down to the bedrock, pick up a lot of salt, and end up in your fields. After a decade or so, you'll get maybe half the yield you used to get. Should I be allowed to irrigate? All these may or may not be necessary evils for the modern economy, but the point is that under a strict libertarian ethic, they could not exist because of their harmful effects on their neighbors.

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The thing that drives most mainstream individuals from both sides of the political divide up the wall about libertarians is our overriding optimism about people and their capacity for goodness.

[/ QUOTE ] This isn't a question of inherent virtue or evil. It's just that it is logically impossible to guarantee everyone all their rights all the time.

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One type of animal eating the flesh of another is totally natural. However, sex between different types of animals, for the most part is unnatural.

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Homosexuality is unnatural, but you're going to have a very hard time finding libertarians who are against gay rights.

Outlawing something because it is unnatural is irrational. Who decides? I could argue that most of modern civilization is unnatural.

EDIT: You can be a meat-eating libertarian who shuns bestiality. I fall into this category. However, I do not wish to impose my beliefs on this matter on others.

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You know, turning new people on to the libertarian ideal is going to be pretty [censored] hard if we get labeled as approving of beastiality like you do.

Beastiality involves an abusive situation. Homosexuality between two consenting adults is not abusive. I see them as being totally different activities.

I suppose that since you eat meat, you approve of people torturing animals for entertainment eh?

[lehighguy]

It really depends on how we classify animals philisophically.

If they exist somewhere inbetween an inanimate object and a human being then perhaps they are afforded some but not all of the rights a human is afforded.

Same for an unborn fetus. Until the fundamental question of wether something is alive, dead, partial/potential live and what rights each of those states affords them it is impossible to take a posistion on the issue.

[edthayer]

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You know, turning new people on to the libertarian ideal is going to be pretty [censored] hard if we get labeled as approving of beastiality like you do.

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Not if we can clearly make the distinction between what is legal and what we approve of. I'm sure that as a libertarian, you know exactly what I'm talking about.

When I argue that I'm in favor of ending the drug war and making drugs legal, usually the next thing people say is something to the effect of: "So you think people should do drugs?" I then explain to them the difference between believing something should be legal versus believing whether you or I should be doing it.

I definitely do not support animal cruelty. They are ways to deal with someone who tortures animals without resorting to government intervention.

[edthayer]

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It really depends on how we classify animals philisophically.

If they exist somewhere inbetween an inanimate object and a human being then perhaps they are afforded some but not all of the rights a human is afforded.

Same for an unborn fetus. Until the fundamental question of wether something is alive, dead, partial/potential live and what rights each of those states affords them it is impossible to take a posistion on the issue.

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If I may ask, how do you classify animals philosopohically, and why?