Big FREEDOM! Stuff > The Philosophy of Freedom/Libertarianism/Doctrine of free will
Is the state truly necessary?
Magnaniman:
Okay, here's my ideal vision of the world.
I currently live in the woods of Southern Indiana. I would continue to do much of what I already do: gardening, hunting, futzing around on the internet, playing music, etc. However, without rulers, I would also grow marijuana and not pay a bunch of protection money. I'd say the quickest possible police response time, if I were attacked out here, is probably 45 minutes, but I would guess that it is realistically more than an hour. So, when it comes to actual protection, I'm on my own already and I feel that I am adequately prepared for anything short of a rocket attack.
So, yes, my vision is only for me. That's what freedom is. It's about making your own decisions and enacting your own vision, including planning for contingencies in which someone wants to harm you. You say that is failing to address concerns, but here's the deal: Laws don't address those concerns, either. They don't prevent those thing from occurring. Murder, rape, and theft all happen even with laws prohibiting them.
No one is denying that those things happen. The NAP is not a preventative measure and no one is claiming that it is. It's an assertion that people should learn how to take care of themselves and work with their neighbors to take care of their communities. That *IS*, 100%, addressing any sort of concern about how people should deal with murder, rape, and theft. The only thing it lacks is a giant monolith of power, which, apparently, is the only answer that people are willing to hear.
badfish:
--- Quote from: Magnaniman on July 31, 2016, 12:25:21 PM ---Okay, here's my ideal vision of the world.
I currently live in the woods of Southern Indiana. I would continue to do much of what I already do: gardening, hunting, futzing around on the internet, playing music, etc. However, without rulers, I would also grow marijuana and not pay a bunch of protection money. I'd say the quickest possible police response time, if I were attacked out here, is probably 45 minutes, but I would guess that it is realistically more than an hour. So, when it comes to actual protection, I'm on my own already and I feel that I am adequately prepared for anything short of a rocket attack.
So, yes, my vision is only for me. That's what freedom is. It's about making your own decisions and enacting your own vision, including planning for contingencies in which someone wants to harm you. You say that is failing to address concerns, but here's the deal: Laws don't address those concerns, either. They don't prevent those thing from occurring. Murder, rape, and theft all happen even with laws prohibiting them.
No one is denying that those things happen. The NAP is not a preventative measure and no one is claiming that it is. It's an assertion that people should learn how to take care of themselves and work with their neighbors to take care of their communities. That *IS*, 100%, addressing any sort of concern about how people should deal with murder, rape, and theft. The only thing it lacks is a giant monolith of power, which, apparently, is the only answer that people are willing to hear.
--- End quote ---
Let's remember that we are talking about the entire country here, so for advocation to be successful we have to address the concerns of the population. You could argue that an individual state could secede, but let's be realistic. If an individual state seceded and abolished government completely the border would be shut down and free trade would not be allowed as the US would never acknowledge a state without government. I hope you are all smart enough to know the implications of that. Anyway, back to the subject, I know anarchy would be best for myself as well. I know that I can protect myself. I do not know that everybody else can. It's not even just about protection though. It's about justice. When protection fails people will always demand justice, and most would argue that justice offers protection in the sense that it can make people think twice before committing a crime.
Let's just imagine for a moment some of the problems that may come up in a voluntary society. Since you want to go with the argument of NAP is the assertion that people should learn how to take care of themselves then I will come up with scenarios to where that may fail. Let's start with children. Should they be able to protect themselves without the help of anybody else? Your answer to that might be, "No, their parents should protect them." OK, but who will protect children from their parents? Who will stop a father from raping his 10 year old little girl? Who will stop a father from beating his 8 year old boy inches from death in a drunken rage? I suppose the answer is nobody. Nobody would have rights so nobody would be able to take children away from abusive parents. Now you may argue that these things still take place today even with our laws that prohibit them. This is true, however the laws also help get children away from abusive parents. It may be after the fact, however in doing so you cannot argue the fact that at the very least the child that you saved will no longer have to endure the physical and emotional torture of their abusive parent.
I'm only asking people to be realistic. Until we can come up with ways to answer this type of question then we will never get the support of the public. I would much rather have the NAP group start talking about these problems now so we can get past this hurdle. It needs to be done before you will garner the support of anybody other than a single male who is comfortable with protecting himself. Please come to the realization that there are people who can't protect themselves. Please realize that there is more at stake here than a house in the woods of Southern Indiana. We can make things better if we work together to come up with the best possible solution to the every day problems of people in America. If we have logical arguments we can start getting more support and growing the movement. If we don't do it now then the progressive movement will take over, and we will be stuck with bigger government. Sometimes you have to compromise to get things done.
Magnaniman:
That's absurd. If one of my neighbors was raping his 10-year-old daughter, *I* would do something about it, probably with the support of the rest of my neighbors.
You're creating several straw men here. First, not having rulers does not mean, in any way, that people will just stand by idly while other people are being hurt.
Second, anarchy does not mean that people don't help each other. It simply means that it occurs voluntarily. It seems pretty clear to me that the vast majority of people recognize that it's important to help other people. That being the case, why is it important to be forced into doing so when people would do it consentually?
You're having trouble getting past the idea that collective efforts can succeed without the use of force. Every outcome that you desire for people in need can be achieved without pointing guns at people to do it. You're insisting that all of these problems must be solved with institutionalized violence, when, in fact, that is not true. I know that it's scary and time-consuming to take care of yourself, but divesting yourself from your own well-being and trusting it to others is not effective; it's simply a false feeling of security.
I don't know how many ways I have to say it, but there is not a single best solution to any problem. It depends upon the values of the people involved, what the problem is, what resources are available at the time, etc. I'm not going to pretend that I know all of the best solutions for other peoples' problems so that they feel comfortable. Learning to solve your own problems by working with your own community is not something that can be sugar-coated for people that have been raised to believe that it is the responsibility of other people to take care of them.
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