We Never Know
No Slack
Nice dodge but since you think a child should make their own choice for their medical/health... don't you think they should be able to make their own choice on smaller things like their bedtime/curfew?
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Most free states run by Republicans. Least free states run by Democrats.
- Thread starter Twilight Hue
- Start date
Nice dodge but since you think a child should make their own choice for their medical/health... don't you think they should be able to make their own choice on smaller things like their bedtime/curfew?
I think that people should decide the course of their life for themselves.
The question of how much risk a person should tolerate of death or disability from a widespread disease impacts the course of a person's life.
The question of what exact time they should be home when they're 14 does not, except in very extreme cases.
Yerda
Veteran Member
The point of the Cato institute is to publish billionaire propaganda. These are the same people who'll tell you that the planet heating to dangerous levels is actually a good thing. Or that guarantees of good housing or healthcare for all are tyranny.
Are you more free if you can legally **** in the fountain or if you have clean water?
Am I more economically free if I have the right to drive wages to subsistence level or if I have a legal guarantee that wages can never go below a floor value?
The conception of freedom that most rightwingers and especially libertarians work from is freedom for the owners and coercion for the rest of us.
Are you more free if you can legally **** in the fountain or if you have clean water?
Am I more economically free if I have the right to drive wages to subsistence level or if I have a legal guarantee that wages can never go below a floor value?
The conception of freedom that most rightwingers and especially libertarians work from is freedom for the owners and coercion for the rest of us.
Some "billionaire propaganda" I like....
- Fighting civil forfeiture abuse by cops.
- Fighting for the right to trial by jury.
- Fighting USA playing policeman to the world.
- Defending free speech.
- Making police accountable for wrongdoing.
The list could continue.
Sure, those are crazy libertarian ideas.
But do you disagree with these efforts?
(FWIW, I don't agree with them on everything.)
Kooky
Freedom from Sanity
That's why I prefer to call right-wing "libertarians" by the moniker "propertarians":
In a conflict between liberty and property, they will inevitably choose the latter over the former.
You're a "propertarian" too.
The difference is that you want government to own/control it all.
The conflict with liberty is apparent where tried, eg, USSR, PRC.
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Yerda
Veteran Member
Those are good, agreed.
Kooky
Freedom from Sanity
Property & territory are always controlled by some entity.
The only variation is who does it.
(Read the following as Cole Porter might.)
Bird do it.
Bees do it.
Even Marxists with degrees do it.
On the flipside, we have examples like oppressive company towns and Somalia under the warlords showing that a lack of government regulation also results in a conflict with liberty.
Somalia is a terrible place.
It's another example why I prefer capitalism
in a constitutional democracy. Reasonable
regulation & the rule of law are useful.
But even Somalia is filled with propertarians
like Kooky. Warlords are effectively government.
... to a degree.
Employers are effectively government, to a degree.
Landlords are effectively government, to a degree.
The company that runs the mall is effectively government, to a degree.
Your local utility companies are effectively government, to a degree.
All of them are potential threats to liberty. None of them have the checks on abuses that an actual government has.
You - a mere customer, not a shareholder - don't have an opportunity every four years to vote your power company's board out and get a new one if you don't like how they operate.
You have quite a sense of humor.
(I hope that's what it is.)
Friend of Mara
Active Member
"Financial Freedom" and "Personal Freedom" are very different and having them lumped into the same category seems a little disingenuous. The same place you have little to no regulation on the pharmaceutical companies is the same place where you can spend your life in prison for possession of drugs for personal use. Texas is 21 overall but 49th in personal freedoms. Tennessee is 4th overall 2nd in financial and 39th in personal.
In all 50 states we need more personal freedoms.
Kooky
Freedom from Sanity
Feel free to address the topic I actually responded to at any time.
amorphous_constellation
Well-Known Member
I think the more useful debate route on that one is to talk about it in terms of 'control.' There is no way that every member of a public body can be in control, with total equity regarding that power, of everything a society might do. To which a socialist might say, 'that's not what I meant either.' Then, I can't really be sure they meant anything
Libertarians also want to argue that they can get maximal freedom, to 'freely control.' But it kind of comes down to sort of the same problem, really the exact same problem the socialists have.
Control is a continuum, with ownership at the higher end.
Remember that "maximal" doesn't mean total.
There is always regulation. Libertarians want the
balance to lean more in the direction of liberty.
Property, ie, assets, are limited resources. They'll
always have some entity in control that rises to the
level of ownership. Whether it's private parties,
government, warlords, etc, all assets will be controlled
by someone, lest chaotic fights for control waste them.
amorphous_constellation
Well-Known Member
'Liberty' is one of those terms that has been refabricated in various ways, so most philosophies or ideologies want a stake in it, and to make it do something role-like.
Liberty is set in balance with protection.
What in your view, is the role of public property, and where should that exist? And in public property, do you agree that the citizen does sometimes gain various freedoms he will not have in private property?
I might say that state property is separate from other 'freer' public property, in some ways. I observe that in some towns, there might be a little five by ten square foot area designated as a park, and on that park area, you cannot trespass after a certain time at night. But at the same time, hundreds of people might walk on the adjacent sidewalk for the rest of the night
Public property is useful for assets widely used with
some complexities awkward for private ownership,
eg, roads, airwaves.
amorphous_constellation
Well-Known Member
I read about something recently that is called 'odyssean self-control.' Does it occur to you as an atheist, and I assume you are then a materialist, that science has already figured out certain optimizations of motivation, and hence, perhaps what one often 'thinks' is then situated more on the side of faith? Can you decide the 'course of your life,' if the path toward 'living better' is covered in 'brambles,' where the path toward 'living worse' is free and clear? And importantly, you are consciously unaware of which path is 'better,' and which is 'worse?'