But you can just leave?

[robmcmullan]

Hi everyone, 

 

  What do you all think are the best arguments against the 'you can just leave if you don't consent to be governed' line from statists. 

I have to admit when I hear it from people, I get so angry that I lose my ability to think of a clear and concise rebuttal. All that pops into my head is an image of a school yard bully beating up a kid, and instead of anyone caring at all about the immorality of the kid being bullied… everyone simply shrugs their shoulders and says that the bullied kid could always move schools, so who cares. 

Anyway, I would like to hear your ideas on how to rebut this 'you can just leave the country' arugement so that it can give some clarity to my own thinking and so that I might be able to throw some good arguments back in the face of the next person that says it to me. 

Cheers!

Rob

[Anuojat]

Well if you search for "love it or leave it' from Stefans podcasts and videos on youtube youll pretty much find i think very good counter arguements.

 

 

As for addions to that which he has already said i agree with, theres ofcourse the fact that you CANNOT leave in many cases because the state economically bars you from leaving and forces other hurdles on to you if you decide to do so.

 

Also to say that you MUST love it or leave implies that the sate OWNS everything and that the voters and politicians (whom randomly fluctuate in numbers and persons) also own everything because people vote for those in power. So the "arguement" fails on that fron entirely.

 

The assumption is that the people in the government have any rationally justified authority in the first place, which they dont.

The people saying these words to you are just bylluing you to shut up and obey the rules which THEY prefer and are automatically rejecting your principles and preferances AND not only that but ignoring the fact that you arent imposing anyhting on them but they are on you.

 

The "againts me" arguement comes to mind in such an instance. Though its very volite remember that.

[Troubador]

Well I think the simple response is that there isn't a society founded upon anarcho-capitalist principles to go to. Plus I think most if not all land masses on the globe are claimed by some nation or another, so unless you can invent interstellar travel in your backyard going anywhere is a bit of a non starter.

 

FYI I'm not entirely sold on the abolition of the state myself, but more power to you if that's what you believe, you can only really seek to change the system you find yourself in at this point. Which is fair enough.

[Romulox]

The classic rebuttal is that if the mafia rolls into their neighborhood and demands "protection" money, they should have no problem, since they can just move if they don't want to pay. 

 

Instead of leaving your trash in your yard for the garbage man to pick up, just dump your trash in their front yard and see how they respond.  When they demand that you clean it up, tell them that they can just move if they don't like it.   

 

I really like the schoolyard bully scenario though; first time I heard that one.  I'll be using that one in the future as it has an emotional component that the other rebuttals are lacking. 

[dayna j.]

You can't just leave, because there is nowhere to go.  Virtually all inhabitable pieces of land are occupied/claimed by a government. The only alternative is to leave one country to go to another.  There is no choice for the non-statist.

[Magnetic Synthesizer]

You can't just leave, because there is nowhere to go.  Virtually all inhabitable pieces of land are occupied/claimed by a government. The only alternative is to leave one country to go to another.  There is no choice for the non-statist.

Hiddden auto-sufficient biosphere with life-support for humans in a mountain or in a military class submarine.

If I had that option and to leave with highly skilled and nice people, I'd be gone before anything. I would be so happy!

[thebeardslastcall]

"No, I'm good where I am and am not giving away my property to thugs because they threatened me. If you don't like my "non-compliance" you can go somewhere else and try to rule someone dumber and more docile."

 

It's like if the robber gave you a call ahead of time "I'll be there at 5 PM to rob you, you don't have to be home if you don't want to, you can go out for the night and leave me to it, but if you stay and leave your jewelry you have only yourself to blame!"

You can't just leave it without taking a hit if it's even possible. It's a totally bogus argument that encourages people to yield to thievery and tries to force you into their deluded social contract simply because you didn't move away from a bully. People that make that argument are bastards, they're enemies of freedom. Whether or not there is somewhere to go is irrelevant and if there was a better place to be (moving costs considered) then you'd have left already.

[NotDarkYet]

If the Earth was split into 2 massive states (hemisphere A "Communist State", and hemisphere B "Fascist State"), would you be "free to choose"?

 

Choosing isn't necessarily = to freedom.  

 

The point is moot anyway, because no organization has the right to impose debts on the unborn.

[Nathan Metric]

The argument is circular reasoning. The love it or leave it argument doesn't actually explain where the government's authority comes from. It just assumes the government has authority.

 

The argument also assumes that one can change the system by leaving it. Nonsense. The only way to fix society is to participate in society.

[robmcmullan]

I actually had another thought on this one, which might be an interesting rebuttal to anyone who makes this point in the USA. 

The US was actually meant to be a libertarian society of the least government and the most freedom possible… but it has grown into the monstrosity that it is today. Maybe next time anyone tells me that you can just leave, I will say that people did leave. They already travelled to the other side of the earth to be more free… and you busy body assholes still followed!

[A4E]

Great posts! I would like to add some fun, but perhaps unwieldy suggestions:

 

Start carefully and slowly grasping at anything valuable that the person has, like some money in his wallet, and when the person objects or tries to stop you, just say "Well, if you don't like people trying to take things from you here, you can just move to somewhere else." (slowly and carefully so not to be too threatening)

 

Unzip and start peeing on the persons shoes, and if the person objects or complains, just say "Well, if you don't like getting peed on, you can just relocate."

 

Start singing some really crappy pop song, and really badly on purpose. If the person gets annoyed be sure to tell him "Oh, it seems that you are annoyed at the sounds in this area... You can always move away, you know."

 

Start ordering him around and threatening him with fines or confinement if he does not obey you, and let him occasionally know that if he does not like the situation, that he can move to another town or whatever.

 

Start acting drunk or any other way that you know the person will find very embarrassing and/or awkward. If he questions you, then say "If you don't like what is going on here, you are free to leave."

 

 

If the person walks away saying that you are crazy or something, then if you want to make the point more clear, you could follow him and do the same thing again in whatever location he stopped at. Not in between though, since he is 'moving'.

 

If he however does anything else than move away, then you can respectfully point out that it seems he is choosing another approach than what he was advising you to have, which makes him a hypocrite.

[Snafui]

"Make me."

 

The idea that they would have to confront you personally in order for you to leave would cause them to reconsider their perception of reality.

[LibertarianSocialist]

I hate the argument that one can 'just leave', mind you I get it a lot from ancaps regarding employment. To be fair there is a large difference in scale. At what scale it becomes unacceptable to you guys?

[Mister Mister]

I hate the argument that one can 'just leave', mind you I get it a lot from ancaps regarding employment. To be fair there is a large difference in scale. At what scale it becomes unacceptable to you guys?

 

I'm not sure I understand.  If you are in a relationship with an employer that is not valuable or satisfying, you can dissociate from that relationship.  If you are in a relationship with a government that is not valuable or satisfying, you cannot legally dissociate from that organization.  That's the problem.  It all fits within the principle of voluntary association.  It's the difference between saying "if I leave my girlfriend she will burn my house down", and "if I leave my girlfriend I cant have sex with her", so I can't leave her.  Those are completely different scenarios.  One is violent retribution, the other is the withdrawal of resources.

[LibertarianSocialist]

I'm not sure I understand.  If you are in a relationship with an employer that is not valuable or satisfying, you can dissociate from that relationship.  If you are in a relationship with a government that is not valuable or satisfying, you cannot legally dissociate from that organization.  That's the problem.  It all fits within the principle of voluntary association.

Here is my thinking: the state is a monopoly over a given area with legal right to the use of violence. This is also the definition of private property. The difference is scale. I can leave a country, it is just hard to do, and I may not get accepted into another. Leaving a job may also be quite hard, I may desperately need the income, it may be one of few in the area, perhaps I have dependants or a support network there, I may not get accepted elsewhere.

 

You see, the barriers are the same, the latter just smaller and more localized. So where is the line drawn?

[Mister Mister]

sorry, you're changing the conversation.  you made a point - what's the difference between choosing to revoke citizenship and leave a country, and choosing to quit employment with a particular job.  I made a rebuttal.  It's the difference between forced association and voluntary dissociation.  your following post is as if I didn't respond at all

But to the point you just made, Stef just did a call-in show, #3060 where he dealt with this question, on the second caller.  I'd like to know what you think of it.

[A4E]

Here is my thinking: the state is a monopoly over a given area with legal right to the use of violence. This is also the definition of private property. The difference is scale. I can leave a country, it is just hard to do, and I may not get accepted into another. Leaving a job may also be quite hard, I may desperately need the income, it may be one of few in the area, perhaps I have dependants or a support network there, I may not get accepted elsewhere.

 

You see, the barriers are the same, the latter just smaller and more localized. So where is the line drawn?

 

Is it okay if I go to your neighborhood, set up a local food distribution, and:

 

-Require everyone in your neighborhood to give the food distribution 50% of their net income

 

-Hand out food for everyone, because my food distribution is good and wants the best for everyone. Also who would distribute food without food distributions? This is why we need food distributions!

 

-Give my food distribution the 'legal' right to any kind of violence against anyone who oppose it in the neighborhood.

 

-Give my food distribution the 'legal' right to change any rules, and make new ones, and get rid of any others as it sees fit. And ignorance of the law is no excuse.

 

-Make it hard to leave the area.

 

-Let everyone in the neighborhood vote for what family is going to manage the food distribution, and get paid to do it, out of the 2-4 families that my food distribution lets you vote on.

 

 

Is this okay?

[Mister Mister]

sorry, you're changing the conversation.  you made a point - what's the difference between choosing to revoke citizenship and leave a country, and choosing to quit employment with a particular job.  I made a rebuttal.  It's the difference between forced association and voluntary dissociation.  your following post is as if I didn't respond at all

But to the point you just made, Stef just did a call-in show, #3060 where he dealt with this question, on the second caller.  I'd like to know what you think of it.  Starts at 48:00

 

[LibertarianSocialist]

sorry, you're changing the conversation.  you made a point - what's the difference between choosing to revoke citizenship and leave a country, and choosing to quit employment with a particular job.  I made a rebuttal.  It's the difference between forced association and voluntary dissociation.  your following post is as if I didn't respond at all

But to the point you just made, Stef just did a call-in show, #3060 where he dealt with this question, on the second caller.  I'd like to know what you think of it.

I couldn't find the part where Stef talks about this. But I did listen to half an hour of the idea of forced multiculturalism.

 

You have as much right to dissociate from a state as a corporation. It's is scale that makes the former harder.

The state has a monopoly over a given area and the legal right to force. In most cases, it cannot obligate you to stay, but it needn't accommodate you on its land. It may withhold all the services and infrastructure it wishes. The same is true for the employer. What of the man who lives in the company town? In the company town the man finds all the analogs of state despotism, and if he is bound by debt he cannot leave any more than the man under the state.

 

So it is rather a question of scale, and of legitimacy.

[LibertarianSocialist]

Is it okay if I go to your neighborhood, set up a local food distribution, and:

 

-Require everyone in your neighborhood to give the food distribution 50% of their net income

 

-Hand out food for everyone, because my food distribution is good and wants the best for everyone. Also who would distribute food without food distributions? This is why we need food distributions!

 

-Give my food distribution the 'legal' right to any kind of violence against anyone who oppose it in the neighborhood.

 

-Give my food distribution the 'legal' right to change any rules, and make new ones, and get rid of any others as it sees fit. And ignorance of the law is no excuse.

 

-Make it hard to leave the area.

 

-Let everyone in the neighborhood vote for what family is going to manage the food distribution, and get paid to do it, out of the 2-4 families that my food distribution lets you vote on.

 

 

Is this okay?

It is about as okay as the paternalism of the company towns during the gilded age, or the 'charity' of feudal owner or church during the middle ages. I am not arguing in favour of the state.

[AncapFTW]

I couldn't find the part where Stef talks about this. But I did listen to half an hour of the idea of forced multiculturalism.

 

You have as much right to dissociate from a state as a corporation. It's is scale that makes the former harder.

The state has a monopoly over a given area and the legal right to force. In most cases, it cannot obligate you to stay, but it needn't accommodate you on its land. It may withhold all the services and infrastructure it wishes. The same is true for the employer. What of the man who lives in the company town? In the company town the man finds all the analogs of state despotism, and if he is bound by debt he cannot leave any more than the man under the state.

 

So it is rather a question of scale, and of legitimacy.

So your argument is based on company towns which were essentially monopolies on providing products and services in a given area.  They were pretty much tiny countries.

 

How does that have anything to do with an actually person in modern society in which there are dozens, hundreds, or thousands of potential places for them to work and also that many places to exchange their money for goods and services?

[LibertarianSocialist]

So your argument is based on company towns which were essentially monopolies on providing products and services in a given area.  They were pretty much tiny countries.

 

How does that have anything to do with an actually person in modern society in which there are dozens, hundreds, or thousands of potential places for them to work and also that many places to exchange their money for goods and services?

You mean the same society where one can move to another country in a half day on a coach fare?

 

There is hardly a lack of monopoly in our current society. True, I may have the option of worker for a dozen or so employers, but my relations are always the same. I must work for HIM. I may have the option to choose my master, but I cannot choose to have no master without suffering unduly as a result. The monopoly of one may not exist, but the class monopoly is all pervasive.

 

Would you say it just if governments were broken up by region, if only to be administered as tyrannically? Pick your flavour of despotism!

[AncapFTW]

You mean the same society where one can move to another country in a half day on a coach fare?

 

There is hardly a lack of monopoly in our current society. True, I may have the option of worker for a dozen or so employers, but my relations are always the same. I must work for HIM. I may have the option to choose my master, but I cannot choose to have no master without suffering unduly as a result. The monopoly of one may not exist, but the class monopoly is all pervasive.

 

Would you say it just if governments were broken up by region, if only to be administered as tyrannically? Pick your flavour of despotism!

So what's keeping you from starting your own business?  Do you not have your own idea?  Will the bank not approve your loan?  Could you not get investors?  You certainly seem to have an interesting idea for a business model.  Surely there are plenty of people who would be willing to start a coop with you.

 

I even had my own idea for a co-op, a farm where anyone could come by and work for a cut of the produce, or trade their work for prepared food, a bed to sleep in, certain basic goods, etc.  Basically, it would be a place where the homeless and poor could come to earn what they needed to live.  I don't think that idea would work for you because you would actually have overhead, such as land costs, fertilizer costs, the work people did getting the goods people trade for, etc.  Maybe if you could get enough donations you could cover your overhead and pay everyone exactly what their labor resulted in, but it would take quite a bit of donations.

 

If you don't want to work for someone else, start your own business.  Don't scream that it's the company's fault that you can't earn a living.  If you can't earn a living working for them, or are unhappy with work conditions, then do something about it.  They aren't you "master" any more than anyone you do business with is your slave.

[Magenta]

[LibertarianSocialist]

So what's keeping you from starting your own business?  Do you not have your own idea?  Will the bank not approve your loan?  Could you not get investors?  You certainly seem to have an interesting idea for a business model.  Surely there are plenty of people who would be willing to start a coop with you.

 

I even had my own idea for a co-op, a farm where anyone could come by and work for a cut of the produce, or trade their work for prepared food, a bed to sleep in, certain basic goods, etc.  Basically, it would be a place where the homeless and poor could come to earn what they needed to live.  I don't think that idea would work for you because you would actually have overhead, such as land costs, fertilizer costs, the work people did getting the goods people trade for, etc.  Maybe if you could get enough donations you could cover your overhead and pay everyone exactly what their labor resulted in, but it would take quite a bit of donations.

 

If you don't want to work for someone else, start your own business.  Don't scream that it's the company's fault that you can't earn a living.  If you can't earn a living working for them, or are unhappy with work conditions, then do something about it.  They aren't you "master" any more than anyone you do business with is your slave.

Actually I am currently doing all those things. Right now I am homesteading, trying to acquire such skills. I am learning all I can about farming, construction, power generation, engineering etc. all those things necessary to start a commune.

Personally I am happy labouring in the community, but I would prefer to produce goods for exchange.

 

I wish that were true, but my reality is that those companies loom large over the land here. I see every day people buying produce from the stores, when we have good farmers here trying to get by. Timber from burnings warehouse while sawmills lay idle. Sure the services cost more, are less efficient, but it helps the local economy. I know without those chain stores looming large we would have a healthy and vibrant economy.

[AncapFTW]

Actually I am currently doing all those things. Right now I am homesteading, trying to acquire such skills. I am learning all I can about farming, construction, power generation, engineering etc. all those things necessary to start a commune.

Personally I am happy labouring in the community, but I would prefer to produce goods for exchange.

 

I wish that were true, but my reality is that those companies loom large over the land here. I see every day people buying produce from the stores, when we have good farmers here trying to get by. Timber from burnings warehouse while sawmills lay idle. Sure the services cost more, are less efficient, but it helps the local economy. I know without those chain stores looming large we would have a healthy and vibrant economy.

Wait, so without chain stores providing low-cost supplies for you to build things, you would have a stronger economy?

How does it help the economy if they pay more for what they are getting?  The money they spend doesn't disappear, it just goes to wherever the supplies they are buying comes from. Or do you prefer to keep the supply local, thereby limiting the variety of what they get and weakening the economy elsewhere?  Does the local economic good mean that people should have a lower standard of living?

[cab21]

I know without those chain stores looming large we would have a healthy and vibrant economy.

 

why is  this?

[Jot]

You can't just leave, because there is nowhere to go.  Virtually all inhabitable pieces of land are occupied/claimed by a government. The only alternative is to leave one country to go to another.  There is no choice for the non-statist.

In fact there are a couple of such places.

[Frosty]

Hi everyone, 

 

  What do you all think are the best arguments against the 'you can just leave if you don't consent to be governed' line from statists. 

 

Often when I hear short sound bite arguments about complex topics it's because something has been simplified and if that's the case then often simply repeating the argument back at them is sufficient, it's not a concise counter argument as such, but it's normally quite powerful to show them how their reasoning can be applied to arguments they disagree with.

 

So simply saying "well you can just move away yourself", hopefully is enough to spark a discussion about how neither is privileged to demand that of the other and it brings you back to even footing again and demonstrates the need for universality in morality. In fact it's a great opportunity to further explain how moral systems need to be universal otherwise they lead to contradictory positions, and that something more sophisticated is needed.

[LovePrevails]

this is pretty good

[Kurtis]

this is pretty good

 

 

 

That is very good

[Zach]

After studying contract law I've learned a lot regarding this. According to contract law you're contracted to the state VOLUNTARILY by your parents via your birth certificate. There's where you're enslaved, my Canadian birth certificate says "1982 Canadian Bank Note Company" and the red number on it is a trust number. From there you voluntarily APPLY(legal defintiion:beg) for a SIN number which is your voluntary contract to be taxed. What does everyone think of that?

[thebeardslastcall]

After studying contract law I've learned a lot regarding this. According to contract law you're contracted to the state VOLUNTARILY by your parents via your birth certificate. There's where you're enslaved, my Canadian birth certificate says "1982 Canadian Bank Note Company" and the red number on it is a trust number. From there you voluntarily APPLY(legal defintiion:beg) for a SIN number which is your voluntary contract to be taxed. What does everyone think of that?

What happens if they don't get a birth certificate or SIN number for the baby?

Also that's selling kids into slavery. The kid didn't agree to it and the kid is the individual with agency that is then going to be put under the control of this contract which they didn't agree to. Can I sell people I don't own into slavery and then call that legit? I don't think so.

[shirgall]

After studying contract law I've learned a lot regarding this. According to contract law you're contracted to the state VOLUNTARILY by your parents via your birth certificate. There's where you're enslaved, my Canadian birth certificate says "1982 Canadian Bank Note Company" and the red number on it is a trust number. From there you voluntarily APPLY(legal defintiion:beg) for a SIN number which is your voluntary contract to be taxed. What does everyone think of that?

 

Can your parents consent to your statutory rape?

[DCLugi]

I ask if the "love it or leave it" gang would hold their stance in a world government.