AnonLLF's Announcements

Just anarchist? or Just left lib?

AnonLLF — Sat, 05 Feb 2011 19:51:36 GMT

Considering giving up libertarianism as a umbrella term for my views.

Disappointed dissenter

AnonLLF — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 22:38:13 GMT

More and more losing belief in this forum.

AWOL!

AnonLLF — Wed, 10 Nov 2010 17:45:48 GMT

Taking a break from politics for a while.

Criticism of Libertarian Factions.

AnonLLF — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 21:20:07 GMT

A Critical Look at Paleo-Libertarianism and Left-Libertarianism.

Left -Libertarianism.

It feels strange to criticize a movement I've just joined but I feel I must. I do so with no disrespect to anyone.

Left-Libs.

Authority/hierarchy:Many are critical of authority and hierarchy per se as immoral.This seems to make no sense.They claim parents are immoral or that bosses are immoral because they represent a position of superiority over another person.They conflate all of this in with statism and it seems the reason they oppose the state is more anti-authoritarianism not anti-statism.Consistent opposition to authority means opposition to bosses,contracts,property etc.I don't really understand it.They seem to be vague and try to infer there is something involuntary about hierarchy and that because it can be horrible that it must be.I don't buy any of this.I agree with them that we should not be uncritical of authority.We should not assume something an authority does is right merely because of their position('positional authority').We should think an authority is legitimate because they are acting morally and being a role model.
Mutualism: I don't think that mutualism need be a philosophy of thieves.It could exist in anarchy with a community of all mutualists but should mutualists try to appriopriate other non mutualist individuals property I consider that to be theft and trespass.
Georgism: I do not see how Georgism is left-libertarian or libertarian at all because it advocates a Land Value Tax.
Believe that right to liberty precedes right to property assuming they are not the same based on false examples such like that ownership of a home implies that when you invite someone in you have the right to rape them.This is false.Self ownership always exists even on others property.No one has the right to rape or murder you on their property.This is as valid in anarchy as it is now.
Some individuals hatred of non left-libertarians and the Mises crowd especially Lew Rockwell,Hoppe and Walter Block.Some of these criticism's may be valid.But there hatred is extreme and personally motivated.
Downplaying of the evils of unions historically.
Downplaying of evil of the welfare state and how marginalized benefit (in some limited sense) from state privileges such as affirmative action,child benefit etc.
wage labour: often they oppose wage labour per se.Again I think this is somewhat residual leftism from the marxists.
At times they are too favourable or uncritical of the statist left.
Thick Libertarianism: They are too stuck on the idea that cultural values are required to be libertarian which I disagree with and then take these to be leftist cultural values and so seem to imply cultural conservatives cannot be libertarian.They seem to imply racists cannot be libertarian.
Authoritarianism: They often claim that being in favour of authority WILL lead to statism instead of a much more moderate position that I take that being UNCRITICAL of authority could lead to statism depending on how a pro-authority they are.
Can tend to be too critical of family.Sometimes to the point of outright opposition to it.
Tends to ignore masculist issues.
Radical Feminism:I don't understand there support for Radical Feminism.I reject it.Not that I'm not feminist but I do not take it to the extreme.I still think any Radical Feminism tends to be anti-male,anti-hetrosexual and hate motivated.I can't sign on to it's anti-porn anti-prostitution stance.I'm a sex positive Feminist.
Cultural Values:They seem to suggest that one must either be culturally leftist e.g. radical feminist etc or culturally conservative as if there is no mean.I believe there is-cultural liberalism which takes a moderate balanced approach between these two extremes and that is where I lie.
Have vaguely defined left-libertarianism.
Anti-religiosity among some.
Those who pretty much do embrace left-libertarianism as meaning moral libertinism.

Paleo-Libertarians.

Often Don't recognise or pay enough attention to sexism,racism and cultural ways in which the individual can be mistreated.
Tends to ignore or downplay the evils that sometimes occur in family.
Tend to ignore or support smacking and spanking - a position I believe is un-libertarian.
Ignore left-libertarian valid arguments.
Can be at times too quick to think the corporation is legitimate or moral and can be too pro-boss at times as if they can do no wrong,ignoring or downplaying evil examples.
Sometimes anti-immigrant.
Tend to claim to be thin libertarians but proclaim thick values from a culturally conservative stance.
Too prone to being close to or supportive of the statist right,constitutionalists ,political parties.
At times too willing to support pseudoscience.
Tendency to be reformist or pro-voting and sometimes in ignorance of anti-voting arguments-making them the 'libertarian right' konkin spoke of.

An-caps.

Ignore other forms of anarchism or suggest they wouldn't exist in anarchy or are inherently statist.
too often conflation of Socialism with Statism.
Knee Jerk dismissal of leftist concepts like bargaining power- critising statist left arguments about it but not dealing with left-libertarian ones.
General ignorance/denial of left-libertarian elements and arguments.
Knee Jerk anti-environmentalism if not politically then philosophically.
Knee Jerk anti-feminism culturally or politically
Straw man attacks on left-lib position on corporations/limited liability.
Straw man attacks on left-lib positions conflating them all with libertines or statist egalitarian cultural liberals/leftists- a mistake Rothbard was guilty of too.
What Kevin Carson calls 'Vulgar Libertarianism' e.g. defending Walmart as pro-market or an example of a positive business when it is corporatist.
Ignoring/downplaying ways in which the poor workers etc have been harmed directly or indirectly by the state-basically ignoring left libertarian claims.
misunderstanding of thick libertarianism.
Too quick to embrace "Capitalism" while too quick to reject "socialism".
Somewhat unwilling to look beyond the libertarian circle to the broader anarchist tradition.
too willing to embrace knee jerk contrarian/pseudoscience positions

Among all libertarians

I am critical of

those who are unwilling to work beyond their brand of libertarianism
moderatism
fear of "not supporting the troops"
those who approach libertarianism from philosophical esp ethical and/or epistemological nihilism ,skepticism,relativism and believe these are more solid foundations than any other.
Libertarianism as a fashion statement.
Those who think libertarianism is whatever you want it to be.

On Left Rothbardianism/Left Libertarianism

AnonLLF — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 21:18:28 GMT

I'm Left Rothbardian and Left-Libertarian.

Recently I'm been reading and debating Left-Libertarianism.I've come to accept a form of it based on what I see in it that is consistent ,true and rational.

How I define Left-Libertarianism.

It is a philosophy which takes a libertarian view of the causes and solutions to issues which are traditionally leftwing issues such as bargaining power,unions,discrimination etc.

This definition includes in it some other definitions such as:-

"Socialist ends by market means" (Gary Chartier's definition)

emphasis on leftist aspects of libertarianism.

I do not think it requires culturally leftist values but at very least culturally liberal values.I'm unsure whether you could be culturally conservative and left-libertarian.

What I see as Left-Libertarianism's Essential features.

Emphasis on concern for poor,women,homosexuals,black people,disabled,indigneous peoples and other minorities traditionally associated with the left.
Understanding that voluntary Socialism is possible.
Understanding that the status quo is not Capitalism but corporatism.
use of Capitalism as synonymous with the freed market which never exists nor has done in history-which is a common error made by other libertarians.
In light of the fact that we do not have a freed market,review of issues which left have claimed to exist which have traditionally been dismissed in sociology and economics because it is said they do not or would not exist in a free market.
Awareness that even the industrial revolution was wrapped up with statism and involved horrible conditions such as leftists have traditionally claimed.
support for private property owned by individuals and by groups.
belief in what charles johnson calls 'strategic thickness'- belief that certain values help lead to a free society and help maintain it.They cannot help someone become a libertarian and lead to anarchy in of themselves but with other principles can help and are not required by libertarianism.
Willingness to work with the left especially the anti-authoritarian/anti statist left.
Emphasis on the evil of land theft/land monopoly.
Recognising that biggest benefactor of state privilege is the rich,
acceptance that the current distrubtion of wealth and land is largely due to the state/state privilege,
strict opposition to corporatism,acceptance that some values can aid in leading to a free society and help maintain it though are not require to be a libertarian.
tolerance of multiple anarchist schemes of organization,
support for some form of workplace Democracy,Industrial Democracy,Workers' self-management,
support for voluntary 'fair trade' ,
Tolerance of Co-operatives.
understanding that Socialism can be voluntary.
tolerance of mutualism,
emphasis on the poor, women and other minorities,
understanding state limits bargaining power by limiting possible job possibilities.

the state makes people poor and maintains it.

Emphasis on moral concern for the poor.

Critical of authority being taken uncritically.

Emphasis on anti-privilege nature of libertarianism.

Emphasis on voluntary redistributive nature of libertarianism.

State privileges and regulation limits job possibilities making sweat shop jobs more likely.Thus taking a job does not demonstrate by action,that someone prefers X job to all others but merely that they prefer X job to all legal (and affordable) possible alternatives.The alternatives are limited both by wealth considerations and what is legal/illegal.

Emphasis on Mutual aid aka friendly societies,

Rejection of Georgism even as a form of libertarianism.

Opposition to current 'Globalization' as corporatism while support of Globalization when it refers to international free trade in a free market.

I side with BrainPolice when he writes: "As to "class conciousness", it reeks of crack-pot hard determinism to imply that someone inherently has a particular ideology or personality simply because they were born into a particular economic class (or race, nation, gender; you name it). I don't think I have any special reason to feel solidarity exclusively with "the proletariet" ,when he says "I see no reason to normatively favor any particular economic class over another (except when one considers the degree to which certain classes are legally privileged, but it still would not be accurate or make sense to uniformly condemn "the rich" as an absolute, as if they are anti-labor scrooges by default, irrespective of their traits and actions as individuals" and "I don't just reject Marx's class theory, I reject Marxism in general as an ideology (although I do not think that Marx was wrong about everything and there's a degree to which I concur with Marx in light of the historical context, I.E. society was just getting out of feudalism and monarchy). I reject Marxism in the same sense that Bakunin did, I.E. the "dictatorship of the proletarient" is an obvious recipe for authoritarianism".

I am still anti-marxist.Though I think he did say some interesting and valuable things.

I reject any version of the Labour Theory of Value.

I reject Mutualism as potentially leading to Theft.However I am tolerant of it existing in a free society.

I still maintain Property rights are absolute.

How I define Left-Rothbardianism.

I like Brainpolice's definition

"At this point I'd call left-Rothbardianism an interpretation of Rothbard by some of his appriciators, an interpretation that focuses on select texts of his (mostly from the late 60's and early 70's) that are left-friendly or were part of his prior attempt to form an alliance with the New Left, which has taken on a life of its own that I'm not sure has much to do with Rothbard himself.

Granting that it does have to do with Rothbard, it can ideologically be distinguished from Rothbard's paleo phase and the kind of "Rothbardianism" dominantly promoted at the Mises Institute because of a tendency to reach certain more socialist-compatible conclusions from the same basic framework or group of ideas."

as well as another commenters addition, "The only thing I'd add is that left-Rothbardian tends to be used to describe ancaps who recognize and are critical of the way in which actually-existing-capitalism is supported and driven by state-granted privilege, while still supporting an idealized capitalism. This distinguishes them from the free-market anti-capitalist strains of left-libertarianism".

Attributes of Left-Rothbardianism.

Takes inspiration from Rothbard's left leaning days.
Rejection of more extreme left-libertarian position such as Mutualism.
Pro-private property.
Support for natural rights/natural law.
Tolerance for 'participatory democracy' and emphasis on this aspect of the freed market.
concern for minorities.
support and/or tolerance for the best within the New Left.

Vulgar Libertarianism and Vulgar Liberalism

AnonLLF — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 21:17:22 GMT

Vulgar Libertarianism and Vulgar Liberalism.

"Kevin Carson has coined the term “vulgar libertarianism” for the tendency to treat the case for the free market as though it justified various unlovely features of actually existing corporatist society. (I find it preferable to talk of vulgar libertarianism rather than of vulgar libertarians, because very few libertarians are consistently vulgar; vulgar libertarianism is a tendency that can show up to varying degrees in thinkers who have many strong anti-corporatist tendencies also.) Likewise, “vulgar liberalism” is Carson’s term for the corresponding tendency to treat the undesirability of those features of actually existing corporatist society as though they constituted an objection to the free market. Both tendencies conflate free markets with corporatism, but draw opposite morals; as Murray Rothbard notes, “Both left and right have been persistently misled by the notion that intervention by the government is ipso facto leftish and antibusiness"

(From Roderick Long,Corporations versus the Market; or, Whip Conflation Now)

Vulgar Libertarianism and Vulgar Liberalism

AnonLLF — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 21:17:22 GMT

Vulgar Libertarianism and Vulgar Liberalism.

State Enforced Limited liability

AnonLLF — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 21:16:18 GMT

Brad Spangler on State Enforced Limited Liability.

Spangler: No, I would have no objection to a joint stock company formed on the freed market with no statist grant of limited tort liability. You might be confusing my position with someone else’s. I don’t know.

I will review my position on this matter below to make an accurate critique more convenient for you.

Tort liability limitation can’t be accomplished contractually. Said liability can be contractually distributed among contracting parties ahead of time prior to a tort being brought against them as a group (that’s what liability insurance does, after all). You can NOT, though, contractually limit the rights (such as the right to pursue compensation for tortious damages) of people who are NOT parties to your contracts. I could, for example, write contracts all day specifying what you supposedly owe me and it wouldn’t do me any good if you never sign them. You can’t contractually limit the right of others to pursue compensation for tortious damages because that right is not yours to bargain away.

The corporate form is illegitimate because it depends on state granted tort liability [limitation] that is itself illegitimate. We know this because even the state recognizes business forms that don’t possess limited tort liability. Owners in partnerships and sole proprietorships face FULL tort liability that corporate stockholders are shielded from BY DEFINITION.

You may be aware that your own state of Texas recognizes and charters joint stock companies without granting them limited liability. I have no objections to Texas JSCs. They’re seldom used precisely because the unjust state grant of privilege in a grant of limited tort liability is valuable

-From a debate with Stephan Kinsella posted on his(Brad's) blog.

Descriptions of Left-Libertarianism

AnonLLF — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 21:03:08 GMT

Some excellent descriptions of Left-Libertarianism.

From Leftlibertarian.org

•Jeremy Weiland

I don't claim to possess any extraordinarily superior spark of insight, but I do think many libertarians suffer from a failure of imagination when applying libertarian principles thoroughly to these issues. Corporations are creations of government privilege which are granted limited liability, preferred access to our leaders, and constitutional rights as if they were living, breathing human beings whose interests were no different than ours. The power differential they exploit is not "laissez faire" economics, but rather the result of State intervention in the otherwise voluntary, human-scale economy, resulting in artificially bloated organizational behemoths. We are certainly not becoming freer, and direct government manipulation, while ever present, is only dwarfed by big business's need for a rational, sanitized, intimidated customer base to dump junk on. Environmental problems go deeper than mere property rights issues and get down to the incentives and privileges afforded industry by the State. Poverty, suffering, and unfair labor practices here and around the world cannot be the result of a "free market" if what we have now is demonstrably not free. So why shouldn't we oppose them on the same grounds that we oppose other side-effects of central planning and top-down command? What are the alternatives to the institutions, practices, and concepts that have created these problems?

•Sheldon Richman

Left-libertarians share the leftists' concern for the vulnerable and wish not to be mistaken for rightists, but go one better by correctly identifying the source of the vulnerability -- corporatism -- and the solution: an unfettered competitive market void of any sort of privilege

•Gary Chartier

Left libertarianism represents a particularly radical development of generally acknowledged libertarian moral judgments and an elaboration of the implications of moral principles that can be seen to provide plausible grounds for rejecting statism. It can provide bases for challenging and means for reducing or ending exclusion, subordination, and deprivation that are authentically consistent with market anarchism. Thus, it can outline identifiably libertarian means to identifiably leftist ends, and it can persuasively redescribe those ends and means as both genuinely libertarian and genuinely leftist.

Relativism is sick

AnonLLF — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 23:50:04 GMT

I don't like the relativism swirling around in Libertarianism recently. Since when was Libertarianism infected with post modernism .cut out the paraite from the host.

Round Here

AnonLLF — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 00:04:16 GMT

Feels like my little town near where I live is becoming a police state. lots of police roaming around and cycling is banned on a wide street in a public place[:S].Even poor auld socialist Scotland never went that far.