Why I Hate Libertarianism: Part XXIV
I'm a mild mannered man. OK, that could be an exaggeration. Let's compromise on a "nonviolent person." One thing that has long reduced me to incoherent fury is libertarianism. I remember being outraged by it in high school and college.
So let me try to be slightly more coherent. I've thought about it a lot, and I think I can finally clearly identify the part I object to.
Man is a social animal. Not quite as eusocial as an ant or honeybee, but obligately social nonetheless. The essence of any society is the principle that we are all in this together, and libertarians reject this explicitly. So, for me, libertarianism is both antisocial and anti-human.
The other part of my anger is watching how libertarianism works in practice. The US is perhaps the most libertarian society in the advanced world and the result has been a system in which the wealthiest and their corporations loot and pillage the general populace with the support of the government. Of course this is not how libertarianism is supposed to work in theory, where the government just enforces order and property rights, but Communism wasn't supposed to be the oppression of the masses for the benefit of a corrupt party elite either, that was just the way it worked out in practice.
About property rights. The government and its legislatures and courts define and enforce property rights, and throughout history that has been used to support a wealthy elite that exploits and victimizes everyone else. This has resulted in a system in which giant corporations like Disney can still hold copyright for works of authors even after their authors and their children are long dead, and pharmaceutical companies can charge enormous prices for drugs developed with taxpayer money.
Fuck libertarianism.
So let me try to be slightly more coherent. I've thought about it a lot, and I think I can finally clearly identify the part I object to.
Man is a social animal. Not quite as eusocial as an ant or honeybee, but obligately social nonetheless. The essence of any society is the principle that we are all in this together, and libertarians reject this explicitly. So, for me, libertarianism is both antisocial and anti-human.
The other part of my anger is watching how libertarianism works in practice. The US is perhaps the most libertarian society in the advanced world and the result has been a system in which the wealthiest and their corporations loot and pillage the general populace with the support of the government. Of course this is not how libertarianism is supposed to work in theory, where the government just enforces order and property rights, but Communism wasn't supposed to be the oppression of the masses for the benefit of a corrupt party elite either, that was just the way it worked out in practice.
About property rights. The government and its legislatures and courts define and enforce property rights, and throughout history that has been used to support a wealthy elite that exploits and victimizes everyone else. This has resulted in a system in which giant corporations like Disney can still hold copyright for works of authors even after their authors and their children are long dead, and pharmaceutical companies can charge enormous prices for drugs developed with taxpayer money.
Fuck libertarianism.
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