Why are you a libertarian?

[John Dule]

Because I love humans and I have boundless faith in our ability and potential.

[John Dule]

because government is the worst invention in mankind history

Without government, life would be brutish and short.

You're improving.

[John Dule]

I’m not

Thanks for clarifying that. A lot of us weren't sure.

[John Dule]

Because I love humans and I have boundless faith in our ability and potential.

...And government must guide us in striving to reach that full potential. Left unchecked I'm sure Americans' life expectancy would fall massively - business would abuse the environment even more than they do now, gun violence would somehow increase even more, and COVID19 would have spread much more than it already has.

You know, I can't even say anything to this post, really, aside from this: It's impossible to have 'boundless faith in our ability and potential' after seeing the way people have behaved over the last few years. Poetry aside, we as a whole are pretty unhinged (at least in the US but probably the rest of the world, too), let's face it. We're like children fighting each other and if the government/adult wasn't there to stop us, we'd have killed each other by now between COVID19, gun violence, and the rich taking advantage of a lack of strong government to completely ruin whatever's left of the environment.

And if you think we have any problems right now, just imagine what'd happen if the government didn't get involved - because yeah, sometimes the government can be counterintuitive, but on the whole, it's done massively more good than harm. No one can appreciate it until it's gone and we see what a country without government would become.

Libertarianism, at face value, sounds really nice. In a vacuum, it would be a great philosophy. Unfortunately, it just doesn't work, not in the sad world we live in.

Libertarianism isn't anarchism, so you're not arguing against anything I believe. Actually, I think you'd make a nice fellow Hobbesian libertarian since you're fed up with the GOP, right-leaning, and semi-pro-government.

[John Dule]

Fair enough, and I did kind of jump to an extreme there, but the point still is that more limited government will likely lead to more harm than good, and the actual theory that people are good and will flourish and let others flourish if the government doesn't interfere - which does appear to be the philosophy libertarians including yourself advocate - is deeply flawed. Between post-election hysteria, COVID19/vaccine lies, and the gun obsession, among other things, believe me, if government were to reduce the frequency with which it interferes in people's lives, it wouldn't help. The key is, I think, in part to recognize which parts of government you can and should scale back, and which regulations should be left. Libertarians seem to think the less regulation the better - though of course, they are not anarchists since anarchists actually call for no regulation and no government - when the converse is probably more true. Weird analogy, but think of humans as children and the government as a parent.

Libertarians/children think the parents/government are overbearing and that the children/people would do just fine without parents 'nagging' them / government regulating them and their activities. And yes, sometimes parents/government can be a little too intrusive. But on the whole, they do massively more good than harm. Libertarians/the children agree that parents/the government shouldn't go (that's what anarchists want), but they think they'd do better if their parents/the government interfered less, which might appear to be true, but which usually isn't the case.  

Oh, the irony. Where do you think Covid conspiracies, election-rigging hysteria, and survivalist obsessions come from? These pathologies are the result of a government that has lost the trust of its people-- and deservedly so. No, I don't support these conspiracy theories. But at the same time, is it any wonder that people are reflexively suspicious of the government that brought us MK Ultra, the Pentagon Papers, Watergate, Iran-Contra, WMDs in Iraq, the Tuskeegee experiments, Buck v. Bell, Japanese internment, the USS Liberty, the USS Maine, the Vietnam War, and the Florida recount? The US government does blatantly unconstitutional, illegal, and unjust things on a weekly basis, and when people point this out, you argue that the government ought to have more power to constrain them. Talk about fighting fire with fire.

Americans hate being suckers, and if you naively expect government to "do the right thing," you often end up being a sucker. The public's solution to this situation has been to live in a constant state of suspicion of government that has existed since at least 1973. This paranoia cannot be fixed overnight, but mandating vaccines and masks is certainly not going to help.

So how do we restore faith in government, you ask? A simple first step would be to decrease its size. Our current bureaucratic state is so bloated with redundant agencies and regulations that even "experts" barely understand its structure. The ignorance and paranoia in the public you decry is the logical and rational response to a system that they have no hope of ever understanding. The average American has very little leisure time, and they cannot be expected to spend that time reading gargantuan omnibus spending bills, boning up on political platforms, assessing economic studies, or any of the other ridiculous wastes of time they'd need to undertake in order to "be informed." If you want engaged, reasonable voters, you need to create a system they can actually wrap their heads around-- and one that, at the very least, doesn't actively make their lives worse.

[John Dule]

You are perfectly right in some of what you say. We do need a less complicated government, and a more transparent one. What I think I should question is that all Americans are good people, or that they'd go very far if left unattended. Yes, assuming that the government is always or even nearly always right is naive. Assuming that everything would go perfectly fine, and people would all have good intentions, if the government was scaled back, is naive. But so is the idea that people would do very well, unattended, if government was scaled back. A lot of people are crazy. They don't want to take the vaccine, for one thing. And yes, that's partly out of somewhat justified government distrust, but there are and will be crazies, who are thanks to Trump louder and emboldened. They won't take the vaccine. I don't think people have a high potential when a lot of them refuse to take a life-saving vaccine and wouldn't mind putting others at risk. So we definitely need the government to stop them from harming others - one of the government's key duties ("life, liberty, and the pursuit of happines"). I agree, however, that we need more oppenness from government, transparency, and a less complex system, with a smaller government in some ways.

The libertarian position does not require the assumption that humans are "inherently good" (a phrase that I've always thought was meaningless). It only requires the belief that people, when provided with the proper incentives, will maximize their own utility in a way that improves the well-being of others at the same time. Obviously the state of nature is a nightmare world in which brute force reigns supreme. But even the most minimal incentives (economic opportunity and social mobility) and disincentives (punishment for murder, theft, etc) can redirect human passions towards productive ends. No serious libertarian thinker wants to leave people "unattended." That is the position of certain fringe movements which-- although they are ideological cousins of libertarianism-- are not representative of it. The idea is that government simply facilitates a space in which individuals can create, bargain, exchange, and invest while remaining secure in the knowledge that the fruits of their labor will be protected by law.

The vaccine is an interesting example of how authoritarian policies damage a government's credibility. Yes, everyone would be better off if they were vaccinated. How, then, does a more involved state accomplish this goal? I'm legitimately asking, because I have no idea. It's become apparent in the past year that many people have no intention of ever getting vaccinated, and unless they are physically dragged from their homes by force, they never will. Is this something you support?

[John Dule]

This is where you lose me. We live in a country where a solid amount of the population will refuse to get vaccinated or wear masks even when it's been proven to save lives, and who are putting others at risk.

I was referring to market exchange with that comment.

When it comes to vaccinations, it kind of illustrates my point that while a lot of the time a libertarian, smaller government is the best type of government, in some cases, the best governance is authoritarianism. I don't think there's a question we need herd immunity, and that's probably not happening when a large percentage remains unvaccinated. I have no problems whatsoever if far-right MAGAns want to die to 'own the libs', but I do have a big problem when they endanger other, saner people in doing so, and that's why, one way or another, we need herd immunity so that they can't do that. How do we do this, you ask? Well, we can start by doing what Biden and the Democrats are doing: force businesses to require employees to be vaccinated. Nationwide. Force it for any travel, domestic or international (in all honesty this one may already be a requirement, I don't know). Basically, in theory leave the option of being unvaccinated, but make it so challenging that a lot who are at all interested in livelihood will just take the vaccine. By then we should have reached a high enough number that the remaining, completely stubborn MAGAns' refusal to vaccinate won't matter. And if we don't? Then yes, at that point, I do think it would absolutely be the right course of the government to go ahead and physically force all unvaccinateds to vaccinate - by any means necessary. Sure, it sounds brutish - it is brutish an very authoritarian, and believe me, it's something that should be used only as a last resort - but if it proves necessary, then it should absolutely be used.

I get the feeling that you're a bit of a utilitarian (as am I), but I would invite you to look at some of the discussion of utilitarianism in the thread on the R&P board. It's all well and good to say "the ends justify the means," but what you do not seem to understand is that the means affect the ends. If a government pursues one desirable goal at the expense of all other values, it will lose its credibility in the eyes of its citizens. The resulting insecurity and fear will create a much more inefficient and unstable system than doing nothing would have.

What you're describing is a perfect example of this-- a situation in which the cure is worse the illness. You believe that getting everyone vaccinated is the right thing to do, as do I. But it is obvious that this goal should not be pursued at the expense of all else. The mistrust of government created by this kind of unaccountable persecution would rival the paranoia resulting from any of the aforementioned scandals. The potential for political violence and violence against medical professionals cannot be overstated. The resources that would have to be devoted to the effort you describe are considerable. The law of diminishing returns applies to vaccinations, so trying to achieve a 100% vaccination rate is simply pointless.

It did not have to be this way. Sadly, the American people don't respond well to words like "mandate"-- especially if those mandates are not followed by those in power. At some point, there may have been a "libertarian" solution to this problem that respected individual bodily autonomy and rights while still making the public aware of the risks. That time has now passed.

[John Dule]

To your third paragraph - absolutely I agree. And honestly, it sounds kind of cliche, but it's because of how politicized it is. I mean when the influenza vaccine came out you didn't see one party attack and a solid proportion of Americans question its effectiveness and instead resort to bleach.

To your second - yes, it'd be expensive, but first of all, I'm obviously not talking about a 100% vaccination rate. Herd immunity would require a vast majority, but not necessarily everyone, to get vaccinated. If there was a way we could get, say, 90% of Americans vaccinated without force, I'd definitely take it, because then the need to vaccine the others (10%) wouldn't even matter much and forced vaccinations wouldn't matter. The trouble is that enough Americans are diehard objects to the vaccine that if we let them remain unvaccinated and stopped just short of force, I don't think we'd necessarily meet the mark (whatever it may be - 75%, 80%, 90%, whatever) for herd immunity. So forced vaccinations would, in fact, be necessary. I do take strong objection to this point of yours - "The potential for political violence and violence against medical professionals cannot be overstated." I absolutely don't think the American government shouldn't force vaccinations because they fear a bunch of far-rightists would threaten others. They cannot be indimidated - firstly on a moral ground and secondly, it's the U.S.! Whatever danger the MAGAns may pose can easily be alleviated by the FBI keeping close tabs on them, or sending the trusted doctors like Fauci to safe place, or giving them extra security detail, or whatever the FBI / government would consider appropriate. I do also want to say that with regards to forced vaccinations, there may be other solutions. I suppose the same way leper communities exist, we could have a 'COVID community' where all those who don't want the vaccine are forcibly sent to reside for the rest of their lives - maybe somewhere in a rural part of the TX panhandle, or the OK panhandle, or some other extremely sparse area (like rural AK).

Don't take this the wrong way, but it sounds like the vaccine is no longer a matter of public policy for you, and has instead become an issue of morality. Ignoring whether that's a fair way to view the situation, I would submit to you that it simply doesn't make any sense from a policy standpoint. Herd immunity can be obtained somewhere between a 70 and 90% vaccination rate. Right now, 76% of the country has gotten at least one dose of the vaccine. We are well on target to achieve herd immunity, and even if the virus mutates in the unvaccinated population and causes another outbreak, those later strains will be too weak to kill anyone but the fattest, oldest, most unhealthy people in the country. Simply put, it is a waste of time and resources to continue these draconian policies just to maybe save the lives of that small demographic. Forced vaccinations will help no one, and will only serve to accelerate the breakdown of trust between citizen and state in this country.

[John Dule]

Fair enough. To be 100% on honest with you, I did assume less than 76% had at least one vaccine dose, and more importantly I thought herd immunity would require something like 80% vaccinatio rates, not 70%. Then in all honesty, I don't think we would really require physical vaccine mandates. What I still stand by, however, is that if it were in fact necessary to obtain herd immunity - if, hypothetically, we needed 80% vaccinated and we only had, say, 70% vaccinated and the other 30% refusing to get the vaccine no mater what - I would say that it would have to happen. Fortunately, as things actually stand, I don't think it'll actually be required. So yes, in this case, fortunately, the extreme authoritarianism I think the government might have otherwise had to resort to can be avoided. But I think as a philosophy, my problem with libertarianism is that while on certain things, yes, we could do with a smaller, less interfering government, we need a totally authoritarian and forceful government in others (and I'd say the pandemic is an example where the latter attitude is approprate, except thankfully, the number of insane MAGAtards is low enough that we don't need it).

The thing is, you don't get to choose to have an authoritarian government for just the small number of occasions in which you really need it. In theory, yes, it would be great to have a government that adjusts its approach (and size) to respond to the situation at hand. But getting the state to "shrink back down" post-crisis is rarely possible. Thus, when you grant the government a new power, you should operate off of the assumption that it will retain that power indefinitely. Once you assume that, ask yourself this: Would you feel secure knowing this power was in the hands of your enemies rather than your friends? Is this a power you would entrust not only to the leaders of the present, but to those of the future as well? Are there safeguards in place to prevent an unscrupulous person from using this power for his own gain? Once you start asking these questions, you'll be surprised at how often you answer "no."

I am not an ideological libertarian. I am a utilitarian who happens to believe that libertarianism maximizes utility. Thus, I have no particular loyalty to libertarian thought in-itself, and I'll be the first to admit that libertarian systems often fail to meet certain challenges. But politics is not a project of perfection. There is no system that works 100% of the time-- our goal should simply be to find the system that works better than the rest.