this post was submitted on 28 May 2024
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No, I'm a libertarian who was for gay marriage long before it actually became reality
That's great but I don't believe that changes my overarching point.
Interestingly by the core tenents of Libertarianism, segregation to colored bathrooms would still be alive and well, since private property and individual freedom reign supreme. There'd be a similar recognition or lack thereof for things like same-sex marriage or Trans rights.
Taken to its logical conclusion, such a libertarian utopia would be a hodgepodge of private properties with arbitrary and often draconian local laws dictated by landlords. In effect it would probably devolve into something of a feudal system.
Can't simultaneously have a small toothless government and at the same time one with enough authority to ensure equal rights and counteract discrimination. There's a reason the biggest proponents of Individual Freedom and states rights tend to be the most backwards, socially.
I don't personally believe in segregating bathrooms by gender either. Just go into your stall and do your business. If you want to stand up to pee, that can be in a different compartment
But if a business wanted segregated bathrooms for different races, they would get protested so hard they would go out of business. This would be a good outcome since the racist business owner would be ruined.
The problem is it doesn't matter if you don't personally believe that. What matters is that a vast swath of the dipshit Southern Confederate culture does, and it would be entirely unenforceable to suggest otherwise under such a Libertarian system where private property reigns supreme.
If that was the case, then the Civil Rights Act or Emancipation Proclamation wouldn't have been necessary in the first place. Unfortunately you'd find vast swaths of geographical cesspools where people too unfortunate to be born in that area would be subject to great discrimination.
Emancipation Proclamation is actually a human rights issue. What is the the thing that all libertarians believe? It's that other people should not meddle in your life. Slavery is the most egregious violation of this short of killing you.
The Civil Rights Act was necessary at the time, but would not be necessary now. Not because there are no bigots, but because the public opinion is against them. Notice the difference: if someone doesn't hire you because their race makes them uncomfortable, it's affects you the same as any other rejection. It doesn't force you to do anything.
By the way, people still get rejected based on race all the time, it's just more hidden so it's not like the law solves the entire issue. The question of the matter is whether we should encourage the dumb racists to express that opinion on public. I would certainly want to know so that I don't accidentally patronize their establishments
Again, your belief is not what matters; what matters is how you enforce aforementioned human rights issues with a toothless government where private property ownership reigns supreme. This is the key hole in your argument you've yet to address.
Says who — you? Considering how rampant discrimination and racism still is, I beg to differ. If someone refuses to hire you because YOUR race makes them uncomfortable, that remains utterly unenforceable under a utopic Libertarian society. The key point being: We wouldn't have ever passed a Civil Rights Act under such a Libertarian society in the first place. And so when another issue comes along just as slavery, segregation, same-sex marriage, trans rights, bathrooms and so forth... Where will Libertarians be? Curiously absent in the fight to enforce aforementioned civil rights. Why? Because the government they believe in literally makes said government toothless against enforcing such laws in the first place. So while you may or may not choose to believe in "socially liberal" things, you've constructed a society that doesn't promote said socially liberal things. To that end, we'd probably still have the Confederacy with slavery.
Of course it doesn't resolve the issue; that's like saying "outlawing murder doesn't stop murder," — no shit, but it sure as fuck reduces it.
Yeah that's no working so hot, considering the damage MAGA has caused out in the open. I'd rather make it harder than easier, if that's truly what you're trying to suggest here.
The government should not be toothless in human rights issues, it should be the fiercest defender of liberty.
In terms of discrimination, it wouldn't be very different if protestors spread awareness about shitty businesses. You're right that Civil Rights Act can't be passed in a libertarian society. But that just means there were not enough social systems in place to shame bigots and shut down their businesses.
A libertarian society has to have replacements for the functions of government. For example, if we want to privatize welfare programs, the charity organizations must have enough funding privately to cover all the functions government transfers do. So you can't just insert a libertarian society into the past and claim it wouldn't work. Because it wouldn't, and it won't work if we switched to it now.
But let's say we started deregulating businesses in key areas like manufacturing. You still need environmental protections (because pollution is meddling in other people's lives), but we basically forgot how to build things in this country. In the event of a war with China over Taiwan, we would get outproduced eventually as they switch their factories from exporting goods to making things for the military.
The MAGA idiots being out in the open is great, now they are bitching about being discriminated for being conservative. But that's how a libertarian society would deal with intolerant people - by not tolerating them.
So the functions of the government like security and protection of liberty is just as important to libertarians. We're just not so eager to reduce liberty to hopefully force a good outcome.
What happens when the bigots run amok? What happens when they run the local town, the state, the country? What happens when, say, the average individual is a total piece of shit? In our country the idea is to put our best minds forward. We fought a damn civil war for crying out loud; it wasn't like the North could just boycott plantations in the south and that would've resolved the issue of slavery. It wasn't like vast swaths of the country who actually evolved beyond segregation could boycott southern states like Alabama and prevent discrimination both at state level (schools such as in Brown v. Board of Education), or stop going to bars that were well-received locally. Such segregated establishments of the deep south were surely thriving. Such civil rights laws are used to provide a gateway of Protections and Change not just for issues that have been resolved but for future issues that violate the spirit of said laws.
My concern remains to be the contradictory argument that government should be small but yet large enough to enforce interpersonal conflicts and civil rights issues. If we open up the door to that, then you are probably getting closer to what the average Democrat is today. There really isn't a difference between sending your tax-dollars to a Democratic institution versus a charity; in fact the former can be stronger because they have the capacity to create and enforce laws, whereas charities can only really address symptoms as opposed to root causes. Moreover we must understand that there have been largely needless middle-men and our convoluted private health insurance system is chief among them as to why making a profit off of healthcare is both morally wrong and inefficient. So while I'm not opposed to having a regulated market system of trade and enterprise, there should certainly be industries off-limits and considered a public service -- hence why I'm more closely aligned with Social Democracies.
You're spot-on regarding manufacturing -- both in terms of addressing negative market externalities like pollution, as well as how much we've pivoted to building elsewhere. Though at the same time I don't think many Americans particularly want to do the kind of work China and Taiwan do; or at least not accept the price we'd have to pay upfront for it either. I remember my conservative Economics professor touting this as "comparative advantage," but really, let's call it what it really is: human rights exploitation.
Whether MAGA is being called out -- they still win elections and still sow terrible consequences for people across the country; their results have taken away rights from women, taken away rights from voters in axing the VRA. They are still a threat despite being out in the open because that's the nature of ignorant populism built on fearmongering and lies. In a perfect world they'd be shunned and explained why they're wrong, but that's not how rhetoric works -- especially when the largest megaphones are held by the conservatives. And due to the Electoral College, MAGA can still easily win despite never once attaining the popular vote of the country. So clearly more must be done beyond just calling them out; action must be taken for a group who knows no shame and a group who props itself up and enables their businesses to continue operating.
Well, you can't run a libertarian country, that's an oxymoron. A libertarian government only protects you from foreign and domestic threats. Segregation would not be possible to enforce because it's against the freedom of association. Besides, a libertarian government wouldn't have like laws allowing you to implement it because it would be extremely limited.
Basically, an ideal libertarian government just has people executing their roles and it can only be run poorly. When you start making racist laws, it wouldn't be a libertarian government anymore, so ideally there would be checks in place against that.
But what would happen if the current government would be run by bigots? They would just repeal the Civil Rights Act. It can't stop them since they run the country. Then they can pass segregation laws.
And yes, we fought the Civil War against slavery, which is the libertarian view of society and enforcing individual rights. Again, a libertarian government would fight the same war because it's still a government, and it still protects rights of citizens. We're not anarchists.
Brown vs. Board of Education would also happen, since a libertarian government still has courts that rule on things.
I don't understand why Americans won't do the work the Taiwanese do. It's one of the richest Asian countries, about as rich as Japan per capita. Not as rich as the US, but what kind of work do you think they do? Their major industry is semiconductors, they are making the iPhone chips and more. Americans also do this work, because TSMC has fabs in America.
We should get rid of the electoral college. While we're at it, make Congress get the percentage of third parties that got in the election. If Greens or whatever party get 1% of the total vote, they should get 1% of seats in Congress