jrodefeld

Very good points. The thing that has bothered me the most about Stef's commentary is how one-sided it is. He evidently has time to comb through Philando's background and criticize him for smoking marijuana and insinuate that this makes him un-fit to be around children yet he doesn't have time to do a commentary addressing the points you raised? If a civilian was involved in a shooting like this, they would be arrested and charged with murder. They would have a high burden of proof to prove that they were acting in self-defense. For police officers, they are typically given a paid leave-of-absence while they conduct an internal investigation. Almost without exception, the officer involved in the shooting is exonerated. It is important to remember that law officers in the United States constitute one of the most powerful unions and they have tremendous political influence and power. I never said the police were racial profiling. I never said they were racist. Do you really think that if a civilian shot somebody that the excuse of "they were reaching for something" would be sufficient to exonerate them of murder? Are you claiming there is not a double standard in how police who use lethal force are treated under the law versus how civilians are treated? According to libertarian theory, we all have the equal right to self-ownership and self defense. We can delegate rights we already have to agencies who can act on our behalf. That means we are free to voluntarily delegate our individual right to self defense to a defense agency who are permitted to provide for the common defense in a specific geographical territory. Of course, in a libertarian society the defense agency would be voluntarily funded rather than through coercive taxation. The police, whether private or not, have the right to act in the exact manner an individual civilian can act. The law should treat everybody equally. Philando was allegedly reaching for his wallet at the request of the police officer. We cannot know this for sure, but we can reliably assume that the policeman would ask to see his drivers license and insurance. We have no evidence that Philando was NOT complying with police requests. We also have to consider the credible possibility that the police officer was given conflicting and contradictory directions. Even if Philando was not following directions, that doesn't give the policeman the right to lethally shoot him five times. The officer would have to credibly believe that his life was in danger and his actions were in self defense. From everything I have read on Philando Castile, his criminal history did NOT include violent crime. That should be a very important distinction. Having several dozen traffic citations and a DUI on your record does not credibly indicate you would pull a gun on somebody or rob a store.

I think it is incredibly irresponsible to speculate that Philando was the robber without far more evidence. The amount of evidence that we currently have to support such an accusation is pretty much zero, apart from the fact that Philando looks kind of like the suspect according to the police who pulled him over. Newport cigarettes are so popular in the black community that it has become a punch-line for comedians, so the fact that the woman smokes them is not much to base a serious accusation on. If evidence comes out that Philando was indeed the robber and his girlfriend was an accomplice, then I will certainly change my opinion about this entire event. That would be a momentous revelation. It would not automatically excuse the actual shooting, but it would paint the entire situation in a different light. If you watch the video and listen to the cop, you can clearly hear that the policeman sounds rather unhinged. He seems incapable of dealing with a stressful situation. The tone of his voice seems to lend credibility to the notion that he overreacted. Police training should prepare police to deal with tense situations with a cool head. What I believe happened was that the policeman either saw the gun on Philando's hip, or heard him or the woman say he had a gun, and overreacted and shot Philando five times. Yes the policeman thought that Philando was the robbery suspect so he might have been extra nervous, but that doesn't automatically excuse an improper use of lethal force. I believe the tone of the policeman's voice as heard on the cell phone video backs up this speculation. But let's also look at motive. Even if Philando was indeed the robbery suspect, what possible incentive would he have to pull a gun on a police officer who just pulled him over for a supposed "broken taillight"? Doing so would almost certainly be a death sentence. Meanwhile, the penalty for the type of shoplifting he MAY have engaged in would be far less harsh. Furthermore, Philando did not have a history of violent crime as far as I am aware. His past legal history involved a lot of minor traffic citations. He got cited for driving without a license, with suspended insurance, for a broken light, for speeding and things of that nature. The worst of his offenses I believe was a DUI. Unless I have missed something, there is nothing in his past that would indicate he was the type of person to rob a store or pull a gun on somebody. The reason I care about this is not because of the importance of this particular case, but because I feel strongly about how libertarians should address police misconduct and the black community in general. We have to go where the facts lead us and there is every reason to not automatically give the benefit of the doubt to the police. I'm hearing a lot of accusations without much supporting evidence, specifically the claim that Philando Castile and Diamond Reynolds were involved in the robbery. The only "evidence" given to support this is that Philando looked kind of like the suspect according to police and Diamond smoked Newports. I'll write a separate reply to address the racial I.Q. difference issue and what my disagreements with Stefan are about this issue, but I do think the broadly collectivist view of blacks having lower I.Q.'s, being more violent inherently, and similar statements causes some to not look at these situations objectively. These are just my opinions and I am happy to be corrected where I am wrong.

It's not relevant to my arguments, but it may be of some interest to people reading if they want to put what I am saying in a proper context. Rational or not, people tend to react to arguments differently if they are coming from a leftist, a conservative or a libertarian. I just wanted to provide full disclosure up front as to which camp I am in. You said my post demonstrated a "lack of integrity", but your responses don't really back up that claim. You said: I agree that "troubling" is the wrong word here. What I meant is that I have some questions/arguments related to that topic, but first I'd like to discuss police shootings and what I think the libertarian response should be. There is no reason you had to respond to this throwaway line and it certainly is not an example of "lack of integrity". I wasn't telling anyone their experience. I am aware that I tend to write lengthy posts on forums, so I was just expressing that I am cognizant of my habits and I'll try not to turn off others by doing that. And like I said above, it is not relevant to any of my arguments. For people who haven't seen me post here before, I just wanted to avoid having people think that I might be a leftist troll just trying to stir things up. The only reason me mentioning that I am an anarchist could be an example of a "lack of integrity" would be if you genuinely thought I did it as a conscious attempt at manipulating you. I've known libertarians for a long time and the idea that a libertarian will be predisposed to accepting your argument simply because you label yourself a libertarian is absurd. Libertarians argue among ourselves with more passion usually than we do with leftists and conservatives. An argument from authority is only a fallacy if I claimed that we must believe what Higgs said because of who he is, rather than judge the argument on it's merits. I happen to agree with Higgs but I'm not asking you to agree with anything I have said simply because Higgs has said similar things. If this quote is not permitted in an argument, then ANY quote would also be illegitimate. I don't agree that those two sentences constitute "poisoning the well". Wikipedia defines "poisoning the well" this way: In the first place, I explicitly stated that much of his criticism directed at the black community is valid, or possibly valid. The entire thrust of my critique is that Stefan seems to have been avoiding criticizing the actions of police in all of his recent videos when, from my perspective, there are MANY things about how the police responded to both Alton Sterling and Philando Castille that are worthy of criticism from a libertarian perspective. Yet instead of doing this, Stefan and Charles Johnson were criticizing Castille for "having weed in his car". It was even insinuated that because Castille liked to smoke weed, he was possibly a danger to children and was thus unsuited to his job at the School cafeteria. Not only is such a criticism straight out of a 1930s "Reefer Madness"-esque propagana film, but the time dedicated to irrelevances about Philando's life could be dedicated to criticizing the police response. I grant that Stefan has criticized police in the past and he may have had something to say in this situation but I just missed it. Stef puts out many hours of content each week so I may have missed something. But I've consistently watched nearly all of the videos released in the wake of these two shootings so I do think I've got a pretty fair idea of what Stefan's views are in this matter. Like I said in a previous post, the officers judged Castille to possibly be a robbery suspect based he had a "wide-set nose". Leaving aside the trouble of getting an accurate idea of someones appearance when they are sitting in a moving vehicle, the police chose to pull over Castille knowing there was a woman and a small child in the car. If you think you are possibly going to confront a robbery suspect, you know that the situation has the potential to escalate into something dangerous. You should not do such a thing if you know there is a small child in the vehicle. A better move would be for the police who noticed Castille to notify other police in the area of the sighting, inform them of the license plate number and have the car monitored from a distance. When Castille parked and got out of his car, officers could get a better look at him to see if he truly matched the description of the robbery suspect. They could approach him for questioning when the little girl was safely out of the picture. I may be missing something, but this seems like a fairly good critique of what transpired. I can't see any way to excuse the shooting based on what we know. If you didn't want to respond to any of this, no problem. But you did respond and you accused me of having a "lack of integrity". Instead of responding to any of my arguments, you seem to be nitpicking at a few innocuous comments I made at the beginning as a way of avoiding any of the arguments I made after the first couple paragraphs.

Could you elaborate? I may have misspoken or phrased certain things incorrectly, but I don't know why you would assume I have a lack of integrity based on anything I wrote. I didn't intend to come across that way. I stated quite clearly that I am a libertarian anarchist, like Stefan. I have biases, like anyone else, but I try to temper those by looking at the facts. I agree it was a poor choice of words. But if you had kept reading you would have noticed that I did offer some actual arguments. What I intended by this phrase was that I had been thinking about the topic of race and I.Q. for a while since Stef had been placing so much emphasis on it and I do have some actual arguments and disagreements on the topic, but I'll hold off on addressing it because I first want to talk about Alton Sterling, Philando Castile, and police shootings in general. I didn't think it made sense to focus on both topics in the opening thread, so I punted on the latter and focused on the former.

Having a gun on you is not an act of aggression or a reason to shot. Apparently we don't yet know whether he had a concealed carry permit. He did not have one in the district that he lived but he may have gotten one in another county. But I'd argue that this is irrelevant to a libertarian. The act of having a gun and carrying it with you doesn't violate the NAP and since when are libertarians so concerned about whether someone has a government permit to exercise a natural right? You say he was a "suspect in a robbery", but that was based on the flimsiest of evidence. Police caught a glimpse of him driving in his car and thought he matched the robbery suspect because of his "wide-set nose". Now, the police had the discretion to approach this situation many different ways. If they were close enough to accurately match Philando's face to the robbery suspect, they were probably close enough to notice the four year old girl in the back seat. They could have easily just jotted down the license plate number and approached Philando when he wasn't in the company of a small child. They could have followed at a distance until Philando got to his destination and approached him in a different way for questioning. But the police chose to pull over a person they suspected might have been involved in a robbery knowing full well that, were he the suspect they were looking for, the situation had the potential to be dangerous. And they chose to initiate a potential dangerous encounter with a four year old child in the car. Diamond Reynolds stated that Philando was reaching for his wallet to show officers his identification. Stefan and others have demonstrated that Reynolds might not be the most reliable witness. That may well be true, but there is no indication as of yet that Philando was reaching for his gun and he'd have very little incentive to do so. Stef is always speaking up for children but why weren't the officers more concerned for the welfare of the little girl who was in the car? What sort of permanent psychological damage do you think she suffered from seeing a man, a father-figure, shot and killed in front of her? Maybe evidence will come out that shows conclusively that Philando was actually reaching for his gun to shoot the officer. But as someone who has experienced bad encounters with police, it can be a stressful situation even if you have done nothing wrong. It is not hard to imagine that the officer would be asking for license and registration while alternately demanding the you keep your hands where they can see them. In a stressful situation, you make a wrong move, "reach for your waistband" as police say, the officer feels threatened and he shoots you. I cannot seem to find any justification for this shooting based on all the evidence that has been released thus far. I would agree that police shooting and killing civilians wrongly is uncommon. But police altercations with citizens, arresting people for non-violent crimes, SWAT raids and things of that nature are much more common. So when people get upset about a police killing, it must be viewed in a larger context of strained relationships between police and civilians based on non-lethal encounters with police. To be clear, I'm not defending Black Lives Matter. However, I understand why a normal person who feels frustrated with police would superficially support BLM because, on the surface at least, they are calling for police accountability. In reality, they are more obsessed with inflaming racial tensions, disrupting peaceful events and things of that nature. I haven't seen a single policy proposal from Black Lives Matter that would do a damn thing to increase police accountability. So don't mistake what I am saying.

I understand that perspective. But this brings up a another issue that is bothering me. What does Stef expect these people to do? Like it or not, nearly everyone who chooses to vote in November will be voting for either Trump or Hillary. Getting massive numbers of people to become either principled non-voters or vote libertarian is probably more unlikely than achieving some form of police union reform and accountability. I'll agree that both are extremely unlikely in the short run. But in a recent video, Stefan seems to be urging Bernie supporters to vote for Trump. Surely they shouldn't be voting for Hillary, but Trump? I never understood libertarians who support Trump. Not that Stef is offering a full-throated endorsement, but even the implication that Trump will be much better in office seems unknowable. Trump already chose a neo-con VP in Mike Pence and I'm quite sure once in office he'll start "making deals" with all the same Republican think-tank outfits that were influencing the Bush White House. I think it's sad that most of these Black Lives Matter people, and those shouting for police accountability, will end up voting for Hillary in November. But there is an opportunity to channel this anger into channeled efforts to achieve a greater degree of police accountability. I agree 100%. Replacing State police with free market security solutions is the best thing we could do. If communities, of whatever race, were able to freely contract with competing private police and security companies for mutual defense of their neighborhoods, the relationship between police and the community would improve dramatically. Security agencies would have an incentive to provide good services and refrain from abusing their customers, since they rely on freely-made payments and not coercively collected taxes. Short of this, I think there are plenty of steps that could be taken within the current system. Maybe an independent adjudication agency from another county or State could step in whenever there is a police shooting or controversy about improper policing behavior? Therefore, there might be less instances of police covering for their buddies, destroying evidence and so forth. Just an idea off the top of my head.

I just watched Stefan's recent interview with Charles C. Johnson and I've got quite a few disagreements with him about the recent police shootings and I'd like to share my perspective here. I've also found some of Stefan's "race realism" and racial I.Q. difference emphasis rather troubling for a while now and I'll get into some of that in a minute. I don't want to bore by being too verbose, but I want to express my thoughts clearly for myself as much as for you. First, I want to say a few words about police in general. Like Stef, I am an anarchist libertarian. What this means to me is that I oppose the State in it's entirety. As such, I must completely oppose the existence of a State-monopolized police force. I oppose aggression and who is assigned to carry out the aggression in the name of enforcing the State's edicts? The police, of course. I agree with Robert Higgs that there are no good cops. Higgs said: "The whole Good Cop / Bad Cop question can be disposed of much more decisively. We need not enumerate what proportion of cops appears to be good or listen to someone's anecdote about his uncle Charlie, an allegedly good cop. We need only consider the following: (1) A cop's job is to enforce the laws, all of them; (2) Many of the laws are manifestly unjust, and some are even cruel and wicked; (3) Therefore every cop has to agree to act as an enforcer for laws that are manifestly unjust or even cruel and wicked. There are no good cops." In the current discussion vis a vis police shootings, Stefan seems to repeatedly show deference towards the police while offering blistering criticism directed towards the black community. As valid as much of this criticism may be, it doesn't strike me as being particularly libertarian in that the poor black community poses far less of a threat to our liberties than do agents of the State. The videos Stefan usually posts following the shooting of a black man often consist largely of a recitation of the black man's previous transgressions, legal history and bad behavior. This talk strikes me as largely irrelevant. There is a time and a place to offer pointed criticism towards the black community, but in the aftermath of a police officer shooting and killing a man, the primarily thing to consider is whether or not the police had justifiable cause to kill the man. Whether, for example, Philando liked to smoke marijuana or whether he had a bunch of minor traffic violations in years prior are simply irrelevant to the question of whether or not he deserved to be killed. The only reasoning I could muster as to why this would be relevant would be that Stefan is attempting to excuse racial profiling by saying that blacks commit more crime per capita than other races. But this too is a specious argument, since police are responding to each unique situation and should be held responsible for their actions. Libertarians like to criticize the teacher's unions for being terribly corrupt and doing a great deal of damage to our children in that their jobs are artificially protected by the State. And they are completely right about that. It is basically impossible to fire a bad teacher in many cases. But why does Stefan not spend more time focusing on the equally pernicious (if not more so) police lobby? Vice wrote an article not long ago about it, and many libertarian writers have pointed out many of the same things: http://www.vice.com/read/the-pernicious-power-of-police-unions Why does Stefan seem to imply that prosecutorial verdicts involving police officers will be impartial when we have so much evidence to the contrary? The actions of police officers are clearly judged by a completely different moral standard than average citizens. Isn't Stefan always preaching about the irrationality of opposing moral categories? There is no reason to judge police conduct by any different standard than we would judge the actions of anyone else. I understand the problems with Black Lives Matter and the Progressive movement seizing upon shootings like these to inflame racial tensions and win support for their latest Statist programs. I don't care about them because there is a principled libertarian reason to be opposed to police shooting and abuse. There is a principled libertarian reason to call for much more police accountability, to break up the power of the police unions, get rid of or scale back the so-called "sovereign immunity" and show some empathy for many communities that are starting to see heavily armored, militarized police units as almost like an occupying force rather than a defender of their rights and property. My favorite blog on this subject is Will Grigg's Pro Libertate: http://freedominourtime.blogspot.com/ I'm also partial to Scott Horton and his commentary both on Antiwar.com and on his show, the Scott Horton Show. I've tried to look at the facts that we have available thus far regarding the Alton Sterling and Philando Castile shootings. While the facts are still coming in and we don't know everything yet, the Alton Sterling incident looks extremely questionable and the Philando Castile shooting looks totally unjustified. I'm just mystified why Stefan can't muster a few minutes to criticize the police. Yes, the left and particularly Black Lives Matter have distorted things for their own political benefit and correcting the record is not un-called for. But proper context should be established. Due in particular to the war on drugs, many communities have been subject to police harassment and violence for activities that should not be crimes. Anti-police sentiment is healthy, in my opinion. We just need to convince people that it is the State itself that they should oppose, not just one narrow sub-category of State aggression. Stefan and Charles Johnson implied that Philando Castile MAY have been the robbery suspect they were looking for and/or that his girlfriend (or whatever their relationship really is) might have participated in the robbery. Both claims seem incredibly irresponsible without much more concrete evidence of either assertion. I agree with Walter Block in that libertarianism is neither left nor right, but I am concerned about Stefan perhaps shifting his views right-ward, where he is preoccupied with opposing the Left, Black Lives Matter, and the media instead of offering a principled anarchist libertarian perspective on events, un-clouded by the petty political considerations of the present. I intend to raise some points about Stefan's resent obsession with I.Q. particularly with regard to blacks, but I think I've written enough for a first post. I'll elaborate on that a bit latter. For the record, I remain a fan of Stefan's with regards to most things he puts out and even when I disagree I find him frequently intellectually stimulating. I just didn't want anyone to get the impression that I had some personal animosity towards Stefan because I disagree with him on some of his recent views.

I don't post much here, but I'd like to start by responding to this. I frankly don't understand how some libertarians could support Donald Trump. I am an anarchist, but I don't oppose voting or participating in the political process at all. I voted for Ron Paul in 2008 and 2012 and supported Gary Johnson in the general, even though I don't agree with either man completely. But Trump? He is not remotely libertarian. I understand that the media and the political establishment hates him and are working to sabotage his candidacy but I don't think that is sufficient to support someone. How often in human history have revolutions resulted in greater human liberty instead of less? Simply because someone is trying to overturn the established order does not mean that their victory will mean progress towards a libertarian future. There are a few things Trump has said that are encouraging and, frankly, I hope he does as much damage to the Republican Party as possible. But I don't root for his ultimate election as president and I fear greatly for what he might do in such a position of authority. Walter Block has set up a group called "libertarians for trump" and his reasons for doing so amount to his belief that Trump is less militaristic in comparison to the other GOP candidates and since military policy is ultimately more important than domestic policy in terms of which allows the greatest expansion of State power, this justifies a libertarian effort to support Trump as the nominee of the Republican Party. I couldn't disagree more. In the first place, Trump's "ideology", if it can be called that at all, is so half-baked that I am not at all sure that his relatively anti-war rhetoric can be trusted. There is every reason to expect that, once elected or close to ultimate victory, he will make peace with the GOP establishment and military industrial complex and support policies that are very status quo. I think some libertarians are so enamored with the idea of the establishment taking a loss that they lose their critical faculties and project libertarian intent onto Donald Trump where none exists. Among the remaining viable candidates who actually have a prayer to win the general election (thus excluding the Libertarian Party and all third party candidates), there really is no telling which one would be objectively worse for liberty in the long run. To my mind, there is just as strong a case for a Sanders of Hillary victory as there is for Trump. Not to say that Sanders or Hillary are even remotely libertarian, only that they'd make such weak candidates that a strong opposition and general unpopularity could make them lame ducks for a large extent of their presidency as the Federal Government is mercifully mired in gridlock. On the other hand, with an overwhelming victory and a mandate, not to mention the personality of Trump which lends itself to executive power appropriation, a Trump victory could lead to greater loss of liberty and expansion of State power. Trump is an unknown in many ways, I grant that. But should libertarians spend ANY proactive effort to support his candidacy? I don't think so. Perhaps his candidacy would be good for liberty ultimately or maybe not. I just think there is a certain threshold that a political figure must reach in regards to their advocacy of pro-liberty positions to be worthy of a conscious libertarian's support. For me, an anarchist is a person who understands that aggression is not and cannot be justified. That the only completely moral system of human organization is one where a consistent moral standard is applied to all people. That does NOT mean that a libertarian who holds this view cannot participate in the political process. If we concede that at this particular moment in human evolution, the State is unfortunately supported by most people, then can we not work to limit it's harm? I think we certainly can and should. If and when a good libertarian candidate is available to us I think we should support those people. I wholeheartedly supported Ron Paul even though he is not an anarchist because I believed that this collective show of support by libertarians would do more to advance the cause of human liberty than all the internet blogging and ghettoized self-reinforcing "philosophizing" on internet forums would ever do. I am quite sure that history has borne out this truth. But IF we choose to use politics as a means towards promoting liberty, we ought to be VERY careful and selective in who we choose to support. Trump's candidacy makes this election season far more entertaining and unpredictable than most, if nothing else. We ought to be using this opportunity to educate our fellow citizens about liberty and supporting Trump surely does not do this.

I agree with that. All States are funded by violations of private property rights so how can they logically be seen as defenders of private property rights? However I am more interested in why an anarchist society won't produce voluntarily funded institutions that violate private property rights and the non aggression principle? I don't need to prove that it is impossible but I think that to convince people of our position we need to have a good explanation of why this is less likely and that law that emerges on the market will conform to the non aggression principle. It is one thing to go on and on about how aggression is immoral yet just say "law that emerges on the market may or may not conform to ethics, I just don't know." I am already convinced of the anarchist position for other reasons, I am justly playing the devils advocate to improve my responses to challenges by Statists.

Hello everyone, Like many I have abandoned minarchism and embraced anarchism as the only justifiable and ethical system of social organization. However, when it comes to private law and the enforcement of that law I have some questions. I feel like I am fairly well read on libertarian topics but I have been challenged in debates on a few points and I'm not sure of the best way to respond. In short, libertarians accept self ownership and private property rights as we all know. Our understanding of ethics means that in accordance with this view of private property, we view the act of aggression against person or property to be immoral and in a libertarian society such acts of invasion and violence should be illegal. That makes sense rationally. But in an anarchist society without a single arbiter and standard of law and order, who is to say that all voluntarily funded arbitrators, defense agencies and private laws that emerge will conform to the non aggression principle and defense of private property rights? For example, suppose a community is very heavily religious and they believe strongly enough that drug use is immoral and that they should be permitted to use force to stop people from using drugs on their own property. While it certainly seems less likely that people would want to voluntarily pay to have private police forces go after non-violent "criminals" than under a State controlled system, it is not impossible and one could imagine numerous cases whereby a committed and fundamentalist culture could voluntarily pay private contractors to violate the property rights of a minority, even in the absence of a State. Is there any reason why something like this wouldn't happen? How do we know that private law that emerges on the market will conform to libertarian ethics and the defense of private property and the non aggression principle? While it may well be true that such a thing is MORE likely to happen in a State run society, I could see many people shying away from anarchism if they believe there is a good likelihood of private agencies adopting norms and laws that violate private property even if such agencies are funded voluntarily. I could see a libertarian saying "see, this is why we need a central agency to administer libertarian law, to protect private property rights and the non aggression principle but nothing else". What is your response to this?

I kind of thought it was an old post but it certainly seemed to apply to what I was saying so I just responded as if it was directed towards me. Anyway, does Stef post on these forums at all? It would be cool if he would get involved with some of the discussions on these boards, but I'm sure he's a pretty busy guy and probably doesn't have the time for that sort of thing.

I don't necessarily expect Chomsky to agree to a formal debate, nor do I think it would be right for Stefan to be combative and hostile. Personally I just wish that they would have spent a little time, even just 20% of the time, having a friendly discussion about their disagreements. It wasn't really this one that bothered me. To the contrary I agreed with every single thing Noam said in this interview. But I recall in the last interview at the end, Chomsky went on about how American libertarians are confused and how European "libertarians" hold to the true tradition of libertarianism by being socialist or something to that effect. Stefan didn't challenge him on this either. I frequently listen to Tom Woods' podcast and he always asks tough questions of his guests to make them defend their beliefs. Stefan has certainly done this before. Anyway, this is not a big gripe I have, more like a quibble. I really would like to see Stefan have more challenging discussions with the real intellectual heavyweights of the left. Not necessarily formal debates, just challenging interviews and exchanges of opinions. I appreciate this response. Personally I don't think I accused anyone of lacking integrity. In fact I fully suspected that you had very good reasons for limiting the scope of the discussion and I did find his comments very strong and I agreed with all of them. I wonder if Mr Chomsky would agree to an interview in the future where you can compare and contrast his anarcho syndicalist or libertarian socialist views with those of a private property anarchist or anarcho capitalist? I certainly haven't listened to all your podcasts, but this does seem to be one area of discussion that seems undeveloped. Of course, it doesn't have to be Chomsky who discusses this subject but I'd love to hear more about it regardless.

I'm a longtime listener of the podcasts and a longer time libertarian. I usually enjoy what Stefan has to say though I disagree at times. I am a little perplexed though about today's interview with Noam Chomsky. I was similarly confused about the last time Chomsky was on with Stefan, in that the topics discussed were exclusively ones where Noam and Stefan agreed. While there is definitely plenty in Chomsky's work that is admirable and more than enough common ground between market anarchists and left anarchists or anarcho syndicalists, there remains huge disagreements over economics, over property rights and a whole host of very important issues. I am disappointed that Stefan did not use the time to push back a little on the economic illiteracy that Chomsky usually displays. Here is a sampling of what I mean from Tom Woods' page: http://tomwoods.com/blog/chomsky-the-anarchist/ I'd really like to see Stefan go into a real, substantive debate with an opponent of Chomsky's stature rather than lightweights like Sam Seder and Peter Joseph. I've actually never seen Chomsky challenged on his views on libertarianism or his economic views from an Austrian or anarcho capitalist perspective. I just thought it was a lost opportunity in some ways.

Hello, In the last day or so there have been a lot of news reports about the fast food workers strike where workers are demanding an increase in their minimum pay to $15 an hour. I just saw a segment by Jon Stewart where he took a sympathetic view toward the cause of the striking workers. He made fun of business news hosts who were arguing against raising the minimum wage. But as a reader of Austrian economics, I understand that the minimum wage laws are counterproductive and lead to increased unemployment and less job opportunities for the less fortunate. Yet I want some better arguments to rebut people who argue that it is inhumane to not increase the minimum wage. For example, on this article http://mises.org/daily/2130 the author says the following: "Employers pay a wage no higher than the value of an additional hour's work. Raising minimum wages forces employers to dismiss low productivity workers." I understand this. Yet for most people, they will point to the tremendous profits of companies like McDonalds and say "Why couldn't McDonalds make only, say $10 Billion dollars in profits a year instead of $15 Billion and pay their workers a little more? They would still be tremendously profitable but their poor workers would be much better off." What is the best way to rebut this argument? Because this simplistic line of thinking is probably the way 90% of people think about minimum wage laws. Why should it be expected that a company like McDonalds should have to cut workers if they make so much money in profits? And if workers are truly paid the value of their productivity, then why would profits for the company be so much higher than their yearly payment to workers? I am asking these questions not because I believe any of these things, but because this is how most people think regarding minimum wage laws. I want your best responses regarding minimum wage laws and the fast food workers strike. Thanks for the help.

My question is very simple and is written in my topic. We all know that Obamacare is a catastrophe and State involvement in medical care leads only to rising prices and artificial scarcity of services. Yet most people won't accept a theoretical argument no matter how sound. Many people simply want to see a working system before they can accept a proposed economic system or method of delivering healthcare. The left cite Canada and Sweden as examples of actually existing single payer medical care systems. Are there any approximations of free market medical care delivery in any current nation? If not, in what area of the globe do you believe a person could get the best quality medical services? Which system is the best?

Hello everyone, I have basically come full on board with the anarchist (anarcho capitalist) ideology. For a while I was a minarchist not quite able to fully comprehend a state less society. But after reading Hans Hermann Hoppe and listening to Stefan Molyneux and a few others, I understand how security and private law can accomplish in a more moral and efficient manner what many libertarians consider the limited but important functions of government. I still think from a pragmatic perspective that it is much harder to convince people of the morality and worth of an anarchist society vs advocating for a minarchist government. Therefore, I am not opposed to political action to move the needle towards reducing the "tumor" as the expression goes, hoping that later on we can take the final step into a truly state less society. I am intrigued by a statement I keep hearing by Stefan, where he admits that corporations are an evil, but one that is artifically sanctioned by the government. He claims that in the absence of the State, there would be only people and not this artificial entity called the corporation. Now, as I'm sure your aware, one of the biggest motivators for people to defend the government is the idea that corporations need a "check" on their power by a group that ostensibly represents the interests of the average person. These same people feel that by eliminating government it will only empower corporations and the "rich" or privaleged class. Could some of you possibly elaborate on Stefan's claim that corporations wouldn't exist without a State? I am not sure what he means by this. Sure there would be no subsidies and special privaleges, but couldn't a "corporation" be created merely by voluntary contract? Maybe I am being tripped up on semantics, but for us to "win" this argument, I think it is imperitive that we can articulate that without a State, corporations or the "rich" will in fact NOT be more empowered or in a position of privalege. Not that "egalitarianism" would be a stated goal, but I always was of the belief that the free market trended towards egalitarianist outcomes because people could only become wealthy by satisfying the needs of others, therefore a wide gap between the very rich and the poor would not really exist. The moment a business man is not providing value for his customers, he will lose them, lose market share and a viable competitor will take his place. Thus, large income inequalities would not exist in a State less society. Do you see were I am going with this? Have you heard Stefan claim that corporations would not exist in a state less society? Can you elaborate on this statement and address the broader points I have raised here? I really appreciate it.

I feel like I kind of threw this post together without thinking too much about it. You are all correct that a limited government, government owned roads and any taxes at all are violations of the non aggression principle. I also agree that if one takes libertarianism to its logical and consistent conclusion, one embraces voluntary anarchy. I think that is the case and I feel that any minarchist must contradict his own principles in embracing even a minimum government. But let me clarify why I have a hard time going "all the way" and becoming a complete anarchist. 1. The first one is practical. The one area that I feel compelled to critique Stefan is that he has the enviable position of being completely philosophic and theoretical and thus able to be as consistant and logical as is possible. But by the same token, I don't see that effort, without the more practical and realist libertarians who actually engage in politics a little bit and attempt to move things in our direction, being successful in any practical sense. I mean, in a vacuum and isolated from all practical concerns about how things work, we can devise what would be the ideal society for liberty. And if that is Stefan's role to play, that is great and I appreciate his effort. But he seems intolerant of libertarians who make any "compromises" of what he sees as the consistent moral defense of liberty, as his philosophic work dictates. He has criticized Ron Paul and those who worked in his presidential campaign as the whole effort being a waste of time because he thinks it is completely impossible to reform government, period, or get rid of it through the political process. Ultimately that is correct, and I understand the concept that even voting and participating lends a credibility to government, but without some efforts in that vein, like what Ron Paul has done, we will accomplish very little. If a person such as Ron Paul was to get elected and his only accomplishment was to stifle and veto and undermine the efforts of those who sought to use government to hurt people, that would be an accomplishment of sorts. Sometimes just throwing a wrench into the mechisms of tyrants is a small victory. And if that person were able to also articulate a philosophy that is 90% close to what Stefan believes, promoting Austrian economics, an end to imperialism and war and a respect for philosophy and liberty, then that would be a significant victory. If a couple million people became exposed to Stefan Molyneux and his work, that would be a huge victory even if the mechnisms of government haven't changed that much. My first concern is that if we haven't managed to keep any sort of limited government throughout all of human history, how can we practically achieve a society of no government whatsoever? How do we get from here to there? 2. Maybe I wasn't clear in my original OP, but it seems like a majority of people want some type of government. As you no doubt would agree, for whatever perverse reason, the propaganda that has convinced people of the necessity of the state is powerful and compelling to many as the same arguments have been put forth over and over again. So if we WERE able to achieve a voluntary anarchist society, how would we keep it that way? If a slim majority becomes convinced through propaganda that we need to establish a centralized State, even those who object will probably not be able to stop the force of a majority against the minority. Therefore, while a minarchist government WOULD be force and coercion, it would be a limited amount of evil. If we establish a voluntary anarchist society and an ignorant majority are later convinced of the necessity of a central government and it is established, it might grow larger and become more abusive of the peoples rights quicker. I just don't know how a principled minority of voluntarists could protect themselves against an ignorant majority if they are deceived into buying into the neccesity of the creation of a government. The only way I could see is to establish a minarchist State, and put as many restrictions to its growth as possible. It just seems that the majority will always be ignorant of philosophy and concepts like voluntarism and so forth. Maybe I don't understand. Could you tell me what methods would be in place to prevent or discourage the creation of a government in a voluntary anarchy society? The argument I hear from Stefan is that limited governments have always failed and governments grow regardless, that is why we have to get rid of government altogether. The idea is that to best limit government would be to eliminate government. I am just not convinced that will work because just as easily a new government could be established and grow as fast or faster than with no government. I don't know if I am explaining myself that well but I hope you get what I am getting at. 3. I am a little confuse about "dispute resolutions centers", or private law in an anarchist society. This seems to be a very difficult idea for people to grasp. How would they work? So each "center" would have a different set of laws? What if they contradict? What if one "resolution center" wants to outlaw drug use? Who would stop them from using force against me for the voluntary behavior of using a recreational drug? I think most people see that there can be horribly unjust laws, as we are well aware. There are moral and just laws, but people feel like the law should apply equally to us all. Perhaps the government has no moral authority to be the arbitor of the law, but if we have multiple "private" laws and different standards for justice, how can that lead to a just society? Wouldn't a rich person be able to pay off a "dispute center" and get unequal justice? Or merely be able to resolve a dispute at a DRC that is farther away that has a legal code that favors him? I really have a hard time understanding how this would work. And secondly, if these DRC's are completing for the justified use of force to punish criminals or make them pay damages to their victims, why wouldn't they seek to collude with one another and create one legal system and make it oppressive to some and beneficial to them and their friends. What about police? If there are competing private police, how would they dispense force against criminals? It would seem to be highly tempting for any private groups dispensing laws or police force to begin to collude and merge and eventually create a large enough collusion to eventually transition to being a de-facto government. The concentrated benefits of a centralized monopoly on force and law is so tempting. Sorry for asking so many questions. I would appreciate it if you could help to enlighten me on this subject.

I feel like I kind of threw this post together without thinking too much about it. You are all correct that a limited government, government owned roads and any taxes at all are violations of the non aggression principle. I also agree that if one takes libertarianism to its logical and consistent conclusion, one embraces voluntary anarchy. I think that is the case and I feel that any minarchist must contradict his own principles in embracing even a minimum government. But let me clarify why I have a hard time going "all the way" and becoming a complete anarchist. 1. The first one is practical. The one area that I feel compelled to critique Stefan is that he has the enviable position of being completely philosophic and theoretical and thus able to be as consistant and logical as is possible. But by the same token, I don't see that effort, without the more practical and realist libertarians who actually engage in politics a little bit and attempt to move things in our direction, being successful in any practical sense. I mean, in a vacuum and isolated from all practical concerns about how things work, we can devise what would be the ideal society for liberty. And if that is Stefan's role to play, that is great and I appreciate his effort. But he seems intolerant of libertarians who make any "compromises" of what he sees as the consistent moral defense of liberty, as his philosophic work dictates. He has criticized Ron Paul and those who worked in his presidential campaign as the whole effort being a waste of time because he thinks it is completely impossible to reform government, period, or get rid of it through the political process. Ultimately that is correct, and I understand the concept that even voting and participating lends a credibility to government, but without some efforts in that vein, like what Ron Paul has done, we will accomplish very little. If a person such as Ron Paul was to get elected and his only accomplishment was to stifle and veto and undermine the efforts of those who sought to use government to hurt people, that would be an accomplishment of sorts. Sometimes just throwing a wrench into the mechisms of tyrants is a small victory. And if that person were able to also articulate a philosophy that is 90% close to what Stefan believes, promoting Austrian economics, an end to imperialism and war and a respect for philosophy and liberty, then that would be a significant victory. If a couple million people became exposed to Stefan Molyneux and his work, that would be a huge victory even if the mechnisms of government haven't changed that much. My first concern is that if we haven't managed to keep any sort of limited government throughout all of human history, how can we practically achieve a society of no government whatsoever? How do we get from here to there? 2. Maybe I wasn't clear in my original OP, but it seems like a majority of people want some type of government. As you no doubt would agree, for whatever perverse reason, the propaganda that has convinced people of the necessity of the state is powerful and compelling to many as the same arguments have been put forth over and over again. So if we WERE able to achieve a voluntary anarchist society, how would we keep it that way? If a slim majority becomes convinced through propaganda that we need to establish a centralized State, even those who object will probably not be able to stop the force of a majority against the minority. Therefore, while a minarchist government WOULD be force and coercion, it would be a limited amount of evil. If we establish a voluntary anarchist society and an ignorant majority are later convinced of the necessity of a central government and it is established, it might grow larger and become more abusive of the peoples rights quicker. I just don't know how a principled minority of voluntarists could protect themselves against an ignorant majority if they are deceived into buying into the neccesity of the creation of a government. The only way I could see is to establish a minarchist State, and put as many restrictions to its growth as possible. It just seems that the majority will always be ignorant of philosophy and concepts like voluntarism and so forth. Maybe I don't understand. Could you tell me what methods would be in place to prevent or discourage the creation of a government in a voluntary anarchy society? The argument I hear from Stefan is that limited governments have always failed and governments grow regardless, that is why we have to get rid of government altogether. The idea is that to best limit government would be to eliminate government. I am just not convinced that will work because just as easily a new government could be established and grow as fast or faster than with no government. I don't know if I am explaining myself that well but I hope you get what I am getting at. 3. I am a little confuse about "dispute resolutions centers", or private law in an anarchist society. This seems to be a very difficult idea for people to grasp. How would they work? So each "center" would have a different set of laws? What if they contradict? What if one "resolution center" wants to outlaw drug use? Who would stop them from using force against me for the voluntary behavior of using a recreational drug? I think most people see that there can be horribly unjust laws, as we are well aware. There are moral and just laws, but people feel like the law should apply equally to us all. Perhaps the government has no moral authority to be the arbitor of the law, but if we have multiple "private" laws and different standards for justice, how can that lead to a just society? Wouldn't a rich person be able to pay off a "dispute center" and get unequal justice? Or merely be able to resolve a dispute at a DRC that is farther away that has a legal code that favors him? I really have a hard time understanding how this would work. And secondly, if these DRC's are completing for the justified use of force to punish criminals or make them pay damages to their victims, why wouldn't they seek to collude with one another and create one legal system and make it oppressive to some and beneficial to them and their friends. What about police? If there are competing private police, how would they dispense force against criminals? It would seem to be highly tempting for any private groups dispensing laws or police force to begin to collude and merge and eventually create a large enough collusion to eventually transition to being a de-facto government. The concentrated benefits of a centralized monopoly on force and law is so tempting. Sorry for asking so many questions. I would appreciate it if you could help to enlighten me on this subject.

Hello everyone, I am a new member here. I have been a long time libertarian. I supported Ron Paul both in 2008 and in 2012 and have studied a considerable amount of Austrian economics (Mises, Rothbard and the whole lot). I also have a great deal of respect for Stefan and I have watched his youtube videos and interviews and always found him engaging and enlightening, My first post here concerns a question I have regarding the viability of true anarchism, i.e. no state whatsoever, private law and the outer edges of anarchist philosophy. I have heard Stefan claim that Minarchism or the desire to create a strictly limited government is a lost cause because, as history will show, a limited government and free market creates a tremendous amount of wealth and prosperity, thus creating the conditions for that government to grow and consume the wealth that was produced by the market. So the argument goes that we must get rid of government entirely to prevent that unending cycle whereby a productive free economy becomes devoured by an established government that breaks free or circumvents any limits imposed upon it initially. My problem with this is that there are always going to be people in society that do not want to behave in voluntary, peaceful ways with other individuals. The desire to create an organization with the monopolization on the use of force (which is essentially what government is) is so great that in the absense of any established government certain interests would collude to essentially create such a monopoly on force, and thus a "government", whether it is called that or not, will emerge regardless. And if wise and proactive libertarians have not thought ahead and established a highly minimal government, defined its legitimate functions with plenty of safeguards in restraining its growth, then the government that emerges out of conditions of anarchy will grow far faster because there are no explicit limits to prevent its growth. I agree that no written constitutions or methods have been sufficient to limit government over long periods of time. But, with effective safeguards and separation of powers, I believe we can limit government for a considerable length of time. In the United States, despite the atrocious violations of the rights of women, blacks and Native Americans, the restraints that were imposed on government in the form of the Constitution allowed a market economy that propelled the rise of the worlds largest middle class and the acceleration in the rise of living standards was terrific. And I believe that we could do far better in crafting a Constitution, improving the one we have and implementing additional safeguards that could effectively limit our government better than that which our founders gave to us. I also think that a minarchist government, stripped to its essential functions, could exist and not violate the non aggression principle. For example, the income tax is horrific and clearly immoral. It is clearly theft and coercion against peaceful individuals. But I would suggest that a strictly limited government should run on revenues collected by Americans engaging in purely voluntary activities. For example, importing certain products would come with a tax. But you can easily avoid that tax by not importing that product or buying it locally. Or you could have a government toll road, but you could choose to drive on a private road. Therefore, any American could easily avoid paying the government anything unless the convenience of doing whatever voluntary and unneccessary activity is worth the additional tax. This does not seem like tyranny. Furthermore, if government did not engage in any wealth redistribution but used all revenues to fund its bare essential functions, defense of the country, maintaining a court system and so forth, and all these functions benefitted each person equally, I don't think this violates the non aggression principle. Now, even if some of you are able to show that this is not the case, that the non aggression principle is being violated and some sort of inconsistency is being shown in my libertarian logic, I think that the reality is that in any society on the planet, at some point, a group of predators will organize to create a monopoly on the use of force, which will end up being a de facto government regardless. If we understand this to be inevitably true, then it would make sense to proactively establish the best kind of government that can possibly exist, with as many safeguards and limitations on the growth of its power as possible. What is the problem with this logic? Do any of the Molyneux disciplines have any good refutations to my points?