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Fair enough. My question was not "Is he violating the NAP?" so why is it relevant to say that? Why is there a seeming compulsion to answer questions I'm explicitly not asking? This is becoming more interesting to me than the original question.

I changed the focus almost at the very beginning of the thread and said that I wished I could change the title of it. This wasn't some abrupt shift in recent posts. Interesting that again, even though someone can finally answer the question with a yes, it is seemingly imperative to combine it with an anti-government commentary, despite me specifically asking to stay focused on the individual and not government as a whole. For a bunch of individualists, y'all sure are hard to keep focused on the individual. Yes, but you've also been extremely selective in your choice of example. There are countless types of examples of restraint of power, but you go out of your way to choose one - and only one - that you can make out to sound absurd while carefully not mentioning the others. On top of that, to be quite honest, I bet cutting that event from 10 minutes to 5 minutes would be very welcomed by the victim, whose view is what really matters. As for "it is ok if it exists" I'm not even sure what that's in response to. All I asked is "Can Bob restrain his exercise of power?" I didn't ask "Are you happy that Bob's government job exists?" In fact, I went out of my way to make clear that was not what I was asking. But it seems people are very anxious to answer a question I went out of my way not to ask, which I find really confusing.

This is a good point and something that I think people on all sides of this issue should be able to agree on - reducing waste. Whether you believe the free market is the way to go or are a Venus Project fan, you can't think that there is any morality or sense in wasting resources at the very same time people are in need of them. Perhaps a Waste Reduction project could be a good anarcho-capitalist/Zeitgeister reconciliation point

Correct me if I'm wrong. But did you just basically say that there could be less rape, less theft, less assault, less killing and less threats but that discussion of such a thing is unimportant? I'm really trying to understand if that's what you just said. Are you basically saying that unless we can reduce these things to 0, the reductions are unimportant?

The question was not "Can Bob, as a government employee, never be involved in the use of force?" The question was "Can Bob use restraint in the exercise of his power?" You seem to have changed the second question into the first. The definition of restraint is exercising less power than one could use if they chose to.

Thank you for actually answering the question that, yes, he can restrain power in his job...even though you then used it as a foundation to go on another general anti-government commentary, despite me asking over and over not to answer about government in general, just about Bob as an individual It's interesting that anarcho-capitalists are all about the individual and the power of the individual to make bottom-up change. Yet, here I keep trying to focus on this individual, Bob, and even in the few cases where anyone will even answer my question about him, it's followed with mostly focus on the larger structure. Apparently, Bob can restrain his power, but the structure as a whole is violent so his individual choice isn't even worth focusing on. And it seems like nobody can just say that, yes, he can restrain his power, without then going on to add a litany of commentary about how bad government in general is, even though I keep pointing out that is not what I'm asking about here. I'm starting to find that as interesting as the question itself. Is there something about admitting that Bob can restrain his power even in a government role that requires it be followed with explanation of how bad government as a whole is?

I notice you did not mention Bob, even though my question is specifically about Bob. So you are simply not responding to what I'm asking. Here is the question again. Would you be so kind as to answer this question instead? "Bob has kids. He has great power over those children. But he can restrain his use of that power. I don't think any of us disagree and, in fact, his ability to restrain his use of power over his children is the basis of Stefan's hope for the future. In addition to being a parent, Bob works a government job. He has certain power in that job because of its position. Can Bob not restrain how he uses his power in that role or can he? Please, do not answer in terms of the nature or definition of government as a whole. The question, yet again, is not about government as a whole. It is about Bob and how he can act in each of these two roles.'

Thanks. So any thoughts about Bob? (I should have named this thread "What about Bob?")

Well I'm glad it's humorous, since that will have to make up for it not being true

I could reply to this, but it would only feed into the tangent since that is a separate discussion from what I'm interested in here. "Can a government rule by consent, rather than coercion?" is an interesting topic, but not the one I'm curious about here. Now, do you have any comment on my question about Bob and his dual roles? That is the question I'm curious about here.

I said a government would not violate the NAP if it only served those who support it and let others opt out. How would it fund itself? From those who support it. "Governments as we know them" is not relevant here. As I've pointed out repeatedly, if "as we know them" counts there, then anarchists will have to stop saying we can have no government because that is not how societies work "as we know them." This is a discussion of what could be, not what is "as we know it" now. Beyond this I'm going to say this is a distraction. The question of whether a government as a whole could be non-abusive is for a separate thread and not relevant to this one. Since this is an anarchist forum where people have strong anti-government feelings, it seems like people will sometimes take any topic and use it as an inlet to just start giving anti-government commentary. But, this thread is not about whether government as an entire entity is good or bad. It is about an individual, Bob, and his dual roles as parent and government worker, and whether he can show restraint in both or only in one. (See the post right above yours where I talk about Bob.)

Attempting to answer my questions in this thread by claiming that government is inherently abusive is to not answer my question at all. The nature of government is not relevant to what I'm asking (how many times can I repeat this?) It seemed relevant when I first started the thread, hence the misleading title of the thread (which I would now change if I could). As I realized within the first couple posts after starting the thread, this question is about an individual person. I even pointed out earlier in another post that we could call the person Bob. The question is not about government or its definition. The question is about Bob. Bob has kids. He has great power over those children. But he can restrain his use of that power. I don't think any of us disagree and, in fact, his ability to restrain his use of power over his children is the basis of Stefan's hope for the future. In addition to being a parent, Bob works a government job. He has certain power in that job because of its position. Can Bob not restrain how he uses his power in that role or can he? Please, do not answer in terms of the nature or definition of government as a whole. The question, yet again, is not about government as a whole. It is about Bob and how he can act in each of these two roles.

Very convenient of you to ignore an entire paragraph where I said that if you are having emotions that you need to talk about to start a thread and we can focus on them there. Also convenient that you ignore my many specific examples of you misquoting me and make no apology for it. Now I'm abusive because I dare to offer alternative approaches that can bear fruit and have born fruit in discussions I've had? I think it is you who has been abusive in this thread making false accusations and projecting your emotions onto me. You started a thread suggesting a way to help people open up to mind change. Apparently pointing out that this is not the only way to do it and that it is a way that sometimes doesn't work, is something unacceptable to you. However, that is my experience and I've offered some alternatives.

I don't really see the point. I'm not questioning the legitimacy of the power or how the power came about. I'm simply pointing out that, once in a position of power, people can exercise restraint.

I think the reason lies in your use of quotes around criminally, which shouldn't be there. What Nixon did was, in fact, illegal. It was against US law. The eavesdropping on allies, as far as I know, is legal. I may be wrong and correct me if I am. Also, looking at the Articles of Impeachment on Nixon there is a lot more in there than just any involvement in the break-in. In fact, it looks like what he did in service of the cover-up, including paying people off to stay silent, was considered even more serious, perhaps. Major obstruction of justice case.

I think there is a huge false dichotomy going on here. The choices aren't "empathize" or "be mean and harsh." Empathizing, as an actual strategy, means to me where what you do, in response to what someone is saying, is to focus on their emotions and make those emotions the topic of conversation. Sometimes that is a great strategy that can open the person up to many other things. But sometimes, focusing on their emotions is a distraction from other things that might be more relevant or of interest even to them. And sometimes they don't even want their own emotions to become the topic. That doesn't mean the only other choice is to attack them. There are many other choices. For example: 1) Stick to the logical arguments, but keep a friendly or at least neutral tone. 2) Tell a story about someone you know that sheds light on the topic so they might see it in a new light 3) Arrange an experience, where you go with them to an event or a place where they will gain a new perspective 4) Do a thought experiment - like what happens with Scrooge - where you consider where certain lines of thinking and acting lead I could go on and on. None of these choices involve empathizing, per se, as your activity of choice. But they are all very respectful and I can think of situations where everyone of these has led to someone changing their mind, even in cases where empathizing with them directly would probably not have. Once again, it just depends on the person, what they value, their epistemology, how comfortable they even are with their feelings being the focus (some people will actually shut down, not become more open, if you focus directly on their feelings and prefer things discussed more indirectly).

I think I specified about three times that this was not the point of the thread to compare legitimacy of government vs. legitimacy of parents or whether government and parents are the same thing. It is not relevant that parents and government in general have differences. The question is about the capacity of a person - sometimes even the same person - to show restraint in one setting and supposedly not in the other. Stefan is a big fan of a sort of symmetry. How you view the government is a reflection of how you view parents and so on. So why isn't it a symmetry that the same person who at home, with children , wisely uses his power with restraint then goes to his government job and acts with restraint there too? A better way to think of this is: Can't Bob, who has learned to restrain his use of power over his children also learn to restrain his use of power when he goes to his public sector job? Stefan seems to be saying that he can learn to restrain his power at home with his kids, but there is no way he can learn the same restraint in his government job. I hope I don't have to clarify this another time. The question is about this person in his dual roles, not about parents vs. government in general. When I titled this thread and made my first post, I hadn't fully thought through things. After about one or two posts, I realized I hadn't quite named things precisely and this thread has paid the price ever since. No matter how many times I try to clarify, it seems like people continue to respond as if the original title of the thread is what I really meant to ask. I keep posting with my newly refocused framing of things, but people continue to respond as if the question is the way it is in the thread title. I don't think your analogy does your argument any favor. Of course an armed robber can use more or less restraint. That's why some of them end up killing their victim and some of them go as far as changing their mind and letting their victim go. But different people within governments do exercise different levels of restraint of power. That's why, at least in some cases, taxes go up and down. Some people in government want more restraint and lower taxes, some want less restraint and higher taxes. And some governments have larger or smaller militaries, even accounting for what they could afford, because some people in some governments prefer to restrain military power and some prefer to expand it. As far as the Amish, look at this, which explains about the Amish: "They are not required to pay into any tax system that is against their beliefs and correspondingly do not receive the benefits of these programs. The Amish believe in taking care of their own, and most are against insurance policies. They don't believe in Social Security because it is a form of insurance; thus, they are not required to pay into the program. Individuals within the Amish community are exempt from paying into Medicare as well. Like Social Security, Medicare is interpreted as a form of insurance. Due to Biblical interpretation, the Amish believe in living apart from the outside world. Amish religious beliefs and practices are protected by U.S. laws, which include exemption from certain government programs and military duty." These all look like examples of restraint on the part of our government toward the Amish. It seems like all that it would take for a government not to violate NAP is that it exist to serve those who want it and those who don't want it be able to opt out. If a system worked that way, I'd say it could still be called a government. So I don't think violating the NAP is inherent in the word government. The NAP violations come when a government goes beyond serving those who support it to refusing to let those who don't opt out. You may be right that no examples of such a government exist today. But as I pointed out, that's not any more relevant than anarchists think it is when someone says there is no example of a large-scale working anarchist society today either. Not existing currently does not mean impossible. As for the other side, I bet you'd be hard-pressed to seriously find any parent that hasn't violated the NAP. Even the best-intentioned parent probably, at times, has to use some amount of force to get their kids to brush their teeth or go to the doctor - things that we all agree are truly in the child's best interest. I'm pretty sure even Stefan says he has done that as a last resort at times.

I have a hard time following your train of thought. I didn't say anything about the role or non-role of states. I was talking about social structures with certain levels of population-density. I don't see the relevance of state or no state to what I was saying. It's as if you've come into a discussion of one topic and, out of the blue, started promoting anarchism when that wasn't even the topic. The topic, as far I understood it, was whether a group of people needing resources they couldn't get affordably on the market would be a cause for violence. I believe yes it would be. If you are saying "yes it would be because the state would make it so" then I guess you agree, though you may have your own reasons for that. For probably the fourth or fifth (and definitely last) time I will repeat - nobody has to commandeer 100% of any resource. All that has to happen is a group needs something and can't find a seller at a price they're able to pay. Maybe there are 5 groups with that resource and none want to sell it. Maybe there are 10 groups with it, but they are already selling it to someone else and there isn't enough left. Maybe some are selling to others, some want to keep it themselves, and some are selling at too high a price. There is a finite amount of each resource and sometimes demand outweighs supply. Do you believe there are infinite resources and there can never be a shortage where any group can't find what they need? I can't understand your confusion about this. You basically seem to be arguing that demand never outstrips supply, driving a price too high for some to reach. If you want examples of violence driven by resource shortages, just google terms like "wars over resources" or "resource shortages and violence" and you'll find literally millions of results. Like I said, this writer is putting forth this view as part of an argument against civilization (the growth of cities, which certainly goes along with the growth of powerful states). So he is certainly no fan of states either. But I think you may have things backward. States arose out of the accumulation of resources in concentration, not the other way around. It was the rise of consolidation of resources, leading to the development of storage and protection of these accumulations, that led to states. It's not like states came about first, then decided to accumulate resources and build up higher density populations. It couldn't have even worked in that order.

So basically the idea is that the closeness and love a parent has for the child is what can help them restrain their potential abuses of power, but a social leader does not have enough of that closeness and love for those in his society to similarly restrain him or her? Yeah, I don't know if that's what Stefan would say is the reason for the difference. But at least it's an explanation that could make sense. Thank you.

I'm sorry but from this response I'm guessing you didn't read the thread at all. I am not asking "Why is parental power legitimate and government power illegitimate?" I'm asking "Why does Stefan consider people in a position of power as parents capable of restraint in the exercise of that power, but people in a position of power as social leaders incapable of restraint in the exercise of that power?"

I'm not understanding. The children are not relevant to the double standard. This is all about the adults and their restraint capacities. Often the adults are even the exact same person - someone who has children and also may be a social leader simultaneously. Stefan says that as a parent this person can learn to exercise restraint, but as a social leader this very same person cannot.

It's helpful to think in terms of Internal Family Systems here. In a narcissist, there is a wounded insecure child part. It is painful to be in touch with that part. So protector parts designed to impress people take the reins. What makes for an extreme case like NPD is when those protector parts exercise very, very strong control over the system with little flexibility. The pain underneath is so severe that they will not let up at all in suppressing those child parts. A narcissist is a little further along on the split personality spectrum than the average person, who has a variety of parts but usually not so extremely polarized. The origins of the whole complex could be in anything that creates a feeling of deficiency in those child parts.

I'm happy with these definitions from the dictionary: Power - the possession of control or command over others; Restraint - the act of restraining, holding back, controlling, or checking. Restrain - to hold back from action; keep in check or under control; repress: to restrain one's temper. In other words, a person in a position to exert a high level of control over others willingly chooses to limit that exertion of control out of compassion or wisdom. In the case of a parent, Stefan adamantly insists this is possible. In the case of leaders of societies, he seems to say this is not possible. I think, again, this is a change of subject. This has nothing to do with whether governments or parents' power is legitimate, which is a whole separate question. This is just about the apparent double standard of saying that people can restrain their power in a parental role, but cannot restrain their power in leadership roles within society at large. I don't see why one would be the case and not the other. If a person can say "I am so much more powerful than this child, but I need to use that power wisely and for their best interest" why can't the same person, as mayor of a city or congressman or Senator or anything else say "I am so much more powerful than the people I represent, but I need to use that power wisely and for their best interest." Again, forget about whether it's legitimate for them to have that power in the first place. Once they do have that power, why this double standard?

Well first of all, I don't think your list of perspectives covers what I've been talking about. I'm putting forth Jensen's idea, not that market dependence is good or bad, which is a separate issue, but that extremely high-density social structures like cities, which require importation, lead to a problem when they are market-dependent for necessities. That doesn't mean market dependence is always good or bad. It just means that market dependence for necessities, in the context of very high population-density centers, often leads to a higher risk of conflict. It's not an argument against the market, but an argument against having society set up in cities (ie: civilization - a social system based on cities) For me the thread comes down to two questions: 1) Can a group of people end up needing something that nobody will trade them for at a price they can afford? - I think it's not only feasible, but has happened many times. If you think this can't happen, then there is nowhere further to go with the discussion. 2) If you think #1 can happen, then what do you think will be the result? - I think that regardless of morality, many, in the face of survival need, will use violence in that situation. Otherwise, they will perish. If you think #1 can happen, but that people in that position will not use violence, you are saying that people will sit passively and perish. In some cases, you're right, they will. They may feel so strongly about peace that they would rather perish than use violence. But I don't think that's the norm. My initial response to what you say your concern is here is this: Those in power, like most companies, don't like competition. They don't see your little piece of freedom as a threat in itself. But if you are able to go too far with it, then what happens if more and more people do it? So that kind of competition has to be quashed as a general policy. However, I'm not sure why you say you can't have a remote piece of land with your water. Why can't you? Aren't there people who have that right now? As you say, you might get taxed on it, but, unless they want to take that land for eminent domain or something, why do you feel you wouldn't be allowed to live that way?

Cities already are that size and were grown that way by getting resources from outside, often violently. Cities don't have to provide things the outside needs if they take the resources violently. It's almost as if you're having a completely different discussion than the one I'm having. Zero response about the US settlement and the violence to take resources the natives did not want to give freely. Zero response about the constant violations of indigenous peoples that still go on in order to take their resources when, according to you, those resources can easily be found in abundance elsewhere available for trade. I think OP's point was quite valid and worth consideration. At this point I don't think I have much more to say on this unless OP returns and responds to his thread.