Why libertarianism isn't conservatism

Don't forget kids: the tenet of self ownership. The reason some Christians do not believe in it is because the believe in slavery.

You either believe you own your body, or you believe others can own your body. If you believe others can own your body, you believe in slavery.

It's pretty black and white.

No wonder Jesus is so revered here. He believed in slavery. He even said so himself (see the video of Bill Maher I posted earlier).

I have no doubt though that Jesus was a living man and a historical figure, but he was no "son of god". If he was the son of an all knowing diety, he'd have understood the evils of slavery, even 2000 year ago.

This is just a small example of why things do not add up. Self ownership as a principal guide in your life will lead to the non-aggression principal. If one follows that, you will always have the moral high ground.

 

So conservatives are just progressives of a different religion. I prefer the libertarian moniker then.

 

Some say so, but no proof.

 

It is argued God gave the 10 commandments to illustrate that people cannot obey even 10 rules and will always sin, hence they will always be in need of a savior. Its true of course, because everyone is a sinner and cannot live through their lives without violating the 10 commandments.

 

As I said, the candidates running against him shared the same view, so why would libertarians support him for that reason

The exact opposite is true. Obviously you don't know the first thing about libertarian views on immigration and government meddling in trade (or anything else). They are for open borders aka free movement of people and goods. This is why many conservatives do not agree with libertarian views. Other reasons are their support for legalizing drugs, gay marriage, abortion etc

Libertarian party view on immigration (they want literally open borders):
"We welcome immigrants who come seeking a better life. The vast majority of immigrants are very peaceful and highly productive.

Indeed, the United States is a country of immigrants, of all backgrounds and walks of life…some families have just been here for more generations than others. Newcomers bring great vitality to our society.

A truly free market requires the free movement of people, not just products and ideas.

Whether they are from India or Mexico, whether they have advanced degrees or very little education, immigrants have one great thing in common: they bravely left their familiar surroundings in search of a better life. Many are fleeing extreme poverty and violence and are searching for a free and safe place to try to build their lives. We respect and admire their courage and are proud that they see the United States as a place of freedom, stability, and prosperity.
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Libertarians do not support classifying undocumented immigrants as criminals."

 

Some libertarians are conservative. Some are liberal. All are freedom loving.

Most everyone would agree with that. Immigration is a good thing. It is ILLEGAL immigration that is a bad thing. Even libertarians support having laws to govern society and to prevent the kind of chaos caused by illegal immigration. Well at least that is true of conservative libertarians.
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[/quote]Libertarians do not support classifying undocumented immigrants as criminals."[/QUOTE]

As I said above some are conservative and some are liberal. Putting people in a political party box is usually wrong. I'll bet you don't agree with all of the democrat party platform. Am I right?

 

Yes, that is true.

I quoted the official Libertarians party view on immigration, and I added most conservatives disagree with that particular view. The libertarian party officially supports open borders aka free movement of goods and people, and that undocumented aliens should not be considered criminals.

"Libertarians do not support classifying undocumented immigrants as criminals."

Of course I don't agree with them. I am not a democrat so why would I support all their views? I lean conservative / libertarian on most political issues. Its the populist republicanism that turns me off. IMO republicans made a mistake when they walked away from conservatism.

 

Libertarianism is about personal freedom vs. authoritarian power. It is about individualism. It is about having no more government than is necessary to contain chaos and protect freedom. It is about people letting others do what they wish so long as what they wish doesn't hurt anybody else. It isn't about a political party. I'm not a member of any party but I consider what I just wrote as the best approach for a society. Most, not all, libertarians feel the same way.

You don't write like a conservative. You don't say things that most conservatives would embrace. Let's call you a moderate liberal. I, on the other hand, am a right wing nutjob so you look quite left of me .

 

Premise error. To allow someone the ability to choose to act immorally or sinfully is not the same as promoting that behavior. Otherwise you would have to then accuse God and Jesus as promoting immoral and sinful behavior. After all T/they are all about people choosing to follow T/their teachings, not forcing them to obey them. Freedom and liberty would be the exact vehicle by which that choice is allowed.

Conservatives are not necessarily religious. Most dictatorships are conservative and are not about any religious principles. Do again premise error since conservative is not automatically religious, or Christian.

 

I think for most individuals following the 10 would be rather easy -- Don't kill, steal, lie in court, shag neighbors wife .. how many of those have you broken ?

The hard one is "The Law"

 

Both of them are entitled to their beliefs, and since I would not make the mistake of taking your word for that I took the time to browse Kirk's "A Dispassionate Assessment of Libertarians" and it turns out his views are more complex and nuanced than you would have us believe, and that's because he recognizes, as any rational individual would, that libertarians are not some monolithic ideological entity. As it turns out, Kirk confessed that he approved of some libertarians in the U.S. and had favorable things to say about them, and went on to point out where he agrees with these various types of libertarians, particularly the ones who "are intellectual descendants of the old "classical liberals"; they make common cause with regular conservatives against the menace of democratic despotism and economic collectivism."

Personally, I agree with some aspects of Kirk's assessment and criticisms and I disagree with others, and I have no problem with that. There are some people who call themselves "libertarians" - ex., Larouchies - whom I consider cranks, but they're not alone in that respect.

BTW, it's Chesterton, not Chesterson (sic). You'll have to pardon my skepticism of the assessments of people who can't even spell his name correctly.

Much has been written about "Jefferson's Bible", which strikingly omits the Resurrection and the other supernatural events involving Jesus, and the author's intent, and as it turns out it was created and used solely for his own benefit. As you should know, his collection of excerpts from the Gospels - hardly what I would call a Bible in the sense that we call the King James Bible a Bible, for good reason - was never published during his lifetime and Jefferson made a point of keeping it secret. Gee, I wonder why...

"Libertarian doctrine"?

Yes, we're all aware that God is mentioned in the DOI and not only have I pointed that out I've pointed out that the concept of one of the elements in the Preamble - "all men are created equal" - can be traced back to Jesus. Again, Jefferson didn't come up with that concept and neither did any of the Founders.

Finally, you are correct that some libertarians speak out against God, just as Christian Libertarians don't, so not all libertarians are atheists.

I don't know where Jefferson would fit today, and you can't determine that for certain yourself.. He was a man of his time, not the 21st Century.

As everyone can see, you're not even remotely interested in truth. All you're interested in is throwing stones like the people Jesus chastised in the Gospels. Not only do you have a lot to learn about libertarianism and libertarians, you have a lot to learn about Christianity and what it means and takes to be a Christian.

Of course, Libertarians and libertarians aren't necessarily the same thing - I had to remind you of that myself. As for your prattle about Satan and destroying lives I do enjoy the spectacle of an irrational outburst.

There is debate over who and/or what created the universe, so that hasn't been established, and I find your claim that God created civil government laughable. Civil government is a human invention, and even religious authorities agree that people created it after the Fall to curb Man's imperfections.

Secondly, as I pointed out earlier, Medieval civil and canon lawyers, rights theorists and the Franciscan monk who developed the first natural rights doctrine, William of Ockham, established the existence of our inherent natural rights from several foundations/sources, amongst them and variously - either singularly or in some sort of combination - God, Nature, Reason and Law.

Well, I don't consider that the core tenet of libertarian ideology, as if there was a single libertarian ideology. That's one of the things about libertarians - they have a hard time agreeing on everything, and they're not alone in that respect.

 

You make some good points - and present some good info. Think the crux of this one is - and what the one you are responding to is missing .. is that one can be a Christian - but also be for separation of Church and State. Jesus was also for such a separation "Give to Ceasar what is Ceasars" .. but more to the point - "The rule that sums up the Law and the Prophets" - If you don't want others forcing person al religious belief on you - then don't do this to others.

While "God" is mentioned in the DOI - in was as a negative proscription not a positive one.

First off - the term used was "Creator" a term deliberately chosen not to invoke the Christian God. So even if one claims "God gave us these rights" .. it is not the Christian God..

But Regardless - take the case of abortion. You can't use the DOI to support law prohibiting abortion .. as the invocation of God is there to state what Gov't can NOT do. This relates to what is the legitimate authority of Gov't .. and what is not. - and this is in the "What is NOT" category.

The appeal to God is to put Essential liberty "ABOVE" the legitimate authority of Gov't .. remember the song "Can't touch this" think was Hammer.

Most folks do not know what essential liberty is .. and so will say dumb things like .. "what about murder" Murder is not an essential liberty .. there is a difference between what one does to others .. and what one does to themself.

The legit authority of Gov't is protection from harm - as stated by Tom .. . The Gov't has no legit authority "OF ITS OWN VOLITION" to make any law messing with essential liberty.

If it wants to make such law it must appeal for a change to the social contact - construct by which we the people give "Consent" to the power grab. This consent must be overwhelming .. at least 2/3rds majority or 75% .. but NOT - 50+1 or "Simple Majority Mandate"

Both classical liberalism and republicanism refers to 50+1/ SSM "Tyranny of the Majority" -- not how our system is supposed to run.. not a Constitutional Republic.

So you can make law messing with essential liberty .. Pot for example -- but you are supposed to have 67% public consent minimum for such a law to be legitimate.

Obviously - Pot law is ridiculously illegitimate .. as is abortion law .. lacking the necessary consent.

These safeguards have been removed of course -- but this is how our system is supposed to limit the power of Gov't .

 

You learned well grasshopper (finally, someone that embraces the Libertarian Party definition of libetarianism:

"As Libertarians, we seek a world of liberty: a world in which all individuals are sovereign over their own lives and are not forced to sacrifice their values for the benefit of others...Consequently, we defend each person’s right to engage in any activity that is peaceful and honest, and welcome the diversity that freedom brings. The world we seek to build is one where individuals are free to follow their own dreams in their own ways, without interference from government or any authoritarian power."
Platform | Libertarian Party (lp.org)

Of course "without interference from... any authoritarian power amounts to "Sky Fairy, you can't tell me what to do!", hence the reason God isn't mentioned in any libertarian doctrine and is openly abhorred by libertarians.

Free from the bondage of sin through Jesus Christ (I keep telling God haters to quit throwing darts at the Bible and to read it for it's true meaning).

i.e. "It's MY body and I can do with it as I please! The hell with everyone else!" Hence the reason libertarianism is the most selfish ideology and destructive behavior known to man:

Yes, it is black and white that libertarianism goes against Judeo-Christian doctrine of loving God (and His institutions) with all of your heart, soul and mind, and to love your neighbor as you love yourself.

Jesus warned libertarians in Matthew 18:6 what will happen to them if they lead others into sin:

Hey libertarians, have you been fitted for your millstone yet?

Ted here definitely falls under tenet #2 of the 3 tenets of atheism. Too bad that he doesn't share where that HATRED of God comes from (I've heard his story hundreds of times and know exactly why he HATES God with a passion).

If you think that drug addiction, sexual perversion and sexual immorality have contributed to society, then libertarianism is for you, as you can not only believe in having a HATRED for your fellow man, you can see that HATRED in action through legislation.


Homosexual man dying from AIDS. As any libertarian will tell you: "There will be victims on the road to liberty and freedom".

 

I hear that con from libertarians frequently, yet they go silent when I point out that the legalization of marijuana has lead to "promoting" marijuana shops


The legalization of pornography has lead to widespread use of pornographic websites and book/video stores, and that the legalization of homosexuality has lead to things like homosexual so-called 'marriage' and other things that wouldn't have happened if homosexuality were not legal.

"All law commands human action; it seeks either to restrain or to urge particular actions. It necessarily says either "Thou shalt" or "Thou shalt not," and it backs these commands to action or restraint with coercion, with sanctions enforced by the power of the sword. The sword and the word are united in law. And because the word commands action by men, the word of law is necessarily a morel teaching, a teaching which seeks to guide the ruled along a particular way of action, of life"
CIVIL GOVERNMENT: THE NEGLECTED MINISTRY, by Archie P. Jones (vftonline.org)

God gave man free will, but nowhere will you see in Holy Scripture Him telling man to use it against His Word. In fact, because of that free will that God gave to mankind, He created the 3 institutions for the governance of man (as seen in the above link) : the family, civil government and the Church, to keep that sinful behavior that comes with free will in check.

 

Oh those Christian slavers, following the word of god:

"Slaves, be obedient to your human masters with fear and trembling, in sincerity of heart, as to Christ"
Ephesians 6:5-8

Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything; and do it, not only when their eye is on you and to curry their favor, but with sincerity of heart and reverence for the Lord. 23 Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, 24 since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving.
Colossians 3:22-24

1 All who are under the yoke of slavery should consider their masters worthy of full respect, so that God’s name and our teaching may not be slandered. 2 Those who have believing masters should not show them disrespect just because they are fellow believers. Instead, they should serve them even better because their masters are dear to them as fellow believers and are devoted to the welfare of their slaves.
1 Timothy 6:1-2

9 Teach slaves to be subject to their masters in everything, to try to please them, not to talk back to them, 10 and not to steal from them, but to show that they can be fully trusted, so that in every way they will make the teaching about God our Savior attractive.
Titus 2:9-10.

 

The question before us is this: Does Libertarianism exist?

Let us address this question from a phenomenological perspective, taking as a starting point the following sentence from Martin Heidegger's Being and Time: "The nothing nothings" (or "Nothingness nihilates"). That sentence is an extremely apt description of Libertarianism promoting itself. It isn't there, and it's not saying anything or, to put it differently, it is nothing and it's saying nothing. Libertarianism is a kind of hole or vacuum. Let us consider Libertarianism provisionally as a section of unoccupied space and time (later we will have to refine this account).

A Libertarian might reply that while "of course" Libertarianism is something or perhaps even some thing, the problem is its ideology. It tries to stay safe by sticking to pure cant and revealing as little as possible of itself.

Paradoxically, however, the fact that it will not or cannot reveal itself in public is precisely its most authentic revelation of itself. As Libertarians speak from concealment, Libertarians are nothinging or nihilating: their self is the self that creates or clears the absence that they present, and the presentation from which they are absent. Libertarianism is nothingness, the source of the nullity it embodies in public space. The nothing nothings; but more, only the nothing nothings. Nothing cannot derive from something, as if by a slow decay. Rather, the abyss lurks at the heart of each thing as a possibility. In human beings the abyss lurks as a choice, but to choose nothing (what Sartre called "bad faith") is to choose the unreality at the heart of oneself, to annihilate oneself or tumble into perfect falsehood, or rather perfect negation of truth, as the essence of oneself.

Libertarianism tumbled into this infinite pit long ago and now calls upon all of us to do likewise, to annihilate ourselves entirely, to take up and become sheer empty space and time. Nothingness now beckons us from our televisions to vote for it, to endorse it, to choose it to represent us; that is, it urges and cajoles us to become sheer void.

It would not be inaccurate to think of Libertarianism as a nihilist in the Nietzschean sense, as something who by withdrawing in fear from reality seeks an annihilation of all that is into the nothingness it itself has chosen. Augustine famously proposed that evil is the absence of good. In beckoning us toward nothingness, Libertarianism calls us to evil. But it calls us not only to the absence of everything but also to the absence of nothing, and thus to the absence even of evil itself. Hence Libertarianism is no more evil than it is good, which is perhaps what people sense when it occurs to them that Libertarianism means no harm, or even that it is not a deeply evil thing. One finds oneself wishing beyond hope that Libertarianism were evil. Even that much nothing would be something.

But Libertarianism, in being the very principle of emptiness itself, cannot be evil, for it is also what annihilates even nothingness, what annihilates good but also the absence of good. Libertarianism is the infinite series of annihilations by which the universe devours itself, devours its own devouring of itself, and then devours even that. Libertarianism is the devourer of dimensions, the devourer even of time and of the possibility of time.

One can see this most clearly when one listens to Libertarians, which is a complete waste of time. It's not just that in listening to Libertarians time is disposed of nonproductively, that time is lobbed into the universal garbage pail along with the cosmological coffee grounds and orange peels. As Libertarians speak, time is wasted as a disease wastes the human body; time slowly collapses in on itself like the body of a consumptive: time withers, time decays, time atrophies as all things cease to be, even the very ceasing-to-be itself of things. So Libertarianism makes not only everything impossible, it makes nothing itself impossible too, for nothingness must be the annihilation of itself as well as of everything. Libertarianism is the universe feeding on itself and then feeding on its own excrement and then feeding on its own feeding maw, until it collapses into itself like a black-hole that consists of a single infinitesimal point. And then Libertarianism is the annihilation of that infinitesimal point itself, and the annihilation of that annihilation.

To vote for Libertarians, then, is to endorse and to become the negation or abnegation of all truth and all reality; it is to take up a position as the destroyer not only of oneself, and not only of American political discourse, but of the entire fabric of the universe. Thus any election poses itself as a question: Will we trip over Libertarianism's abysmal foot into the infinite void, falling eternally into dimensionless nonbeing? For when all space is unoccupied, then space itself collapses, and not only does nothing exist any longer, there is no place where anything could come to exist; the collapse of space is the collapse of all the dimensions and modalities of being; it is the destruction not only of actuality but of possibility.

Consequently, a vote for Libertarians is a vote not only against the universe in which we happen to find ourselves; it is a vote against the very possibility of any universe, of even a single merely possible lepton. A vote for Libertarians is a vote for the complete annihilation of all possible worlds.

Thus there is more at stake in elections than tax policy and other banal and trivially mundane things; as you enter the polling booth you face the question of whether you yourself will cease to exist.

 

If I might add a few comments of my own:

First of all, I don't know what you mean by Jesus "believing in" slavery, which appears to imply some sort of endorsement or approval, and I think he understood the evils of slavery, not only in physical terms but in relation to human dignity. Furthermore, and this is difficult for most of us to grasp from our own perspective 2000 years removed from the Ancient World and the attitudes and assumptions of the people who lived in it, that Jesus' message that all men were equal in the eyes of God was both a revolutionary and dangerous idea during a time when natural inequality was accepted as not only fact but part of the social order. The Ancient Greeks, for example, believed that slaves and their inferiority were all part of the order of the cosmos. If you were a slave, you were meant to be a slave. If you were inferior, you were meant to be inferior. The idea that all men are equal in the eyes of God is totally antithetical to the Classical assumption of natural inequality.

Thus, it should come as no surprise that a thousand years later, Medieval Christian theologians and jurists asserted that people did own their own bodies - that they had a right to life and the rights to defend and preserve it. Some, most notably Henry of Ghent, a member of the esteemed Faculty of Theology at the University of Paris in the late 13th Century, argued that this gave a starving man the right to steal food - in spite of the 8th Commandment - to save his own life (a position adopted by the Church), and that criminals who were under sentence of death had a right to their lives and their self-preservation, thus they were in their own rights to escape execution (a more controversial position that was argued even up to Locke's time). From those fundamental rights to Life and self-ownership extended other rights, most notably the right to due process, which was an extension of the right to self-defense from which our right to bear arms evolved.

The reason I bring this last point up is because the Christians who don't believe in the principle or tenet of self-ownership are out of step with their own religious beliefs and institutions. To reinforce the point, consider the First Commandment - Thou shall not kill. Implicit in that commandment is our right to life and self-ownership, and that no one has the right to take that away.

The people who call themselves Christians while rejecting the right to self-ownership would do well, in my opinion, to pause and reflect on their conflicts and contradictions.

 

LOL

To be fair, some conservatives...

 

Thanks, and obviously you are correct, and there was a time when the Church actually sought that separation in order to maintain its independence from the more powerful secular rulers of the Early Middle Ages. Later, after the papacy sought to impose its power over those rulers, the aforementioned Franciscan, William of Ockham, pointed to those early Medieval popes and their decrees when he argued in favor of the separation of Church and State and their "distinct powers" in the early 14th Century. Ockham would take his argument in the Dialogus de potestate papae et imperatoris (Dialogue on the Power on the Pope and the Emperor) a step further when he asserted "the emperor has his power from the people” and "does not have power which is dangerous to the common good" - themes we find later in the works of John Locke, et al.

 

Yeah it seems like he was really describing conservatives he was describing progressives.

Conservative in the political sense is about conserving the Constitution in the First Amendment specifically States that the state will make no laws forbidding the free exercise of any religion or make any laws respecting a religion.

So right off the ops evaluation is incorrect.

It's conservative to say people have the right to believe in whichever God they want or no God at all.

 

Yes. EG Progressives are conservative.

 

Thank you! I couldn't have described libertarianism any better myself. Thanks for showing how extreme libertarians are even on issues such as national borders; even the Democrats believe in some control of the border, thus making libertarians even more radical on border policies than the Democrats. Imagine what this country would be like with open borders: criminals of every sort (child molesters, mass murderers, drug king pins, etc. etc.) would be free to enter, even those with deadly diseases, diseases that Americans have never dealt with or have had vaccines to eradicate those diseases, etc. etc. etc.

I'm interested in your thoughts on how Americans would benefit from an open borders policy, as the criminal element entering the US and people with deadly diseases only skyrockets the size of government, as shown as it does with libertarian failed social policies. Tell me how 27 Mexicans living in a studio apartment and earning slave labor wages so that they can send most of their money back to Old Meh-He-Co benefits America, especially when there are no rules or regulations overseeing those laborers (no health and safety permit, etc. etc.etc.)

Boy, it's sure good to finally meet someone who isn't ashamed to admit that they're a libertarian!

 

I'd be curious on how you define "progressive"?

 

Yes .. and other Enlightenment thinkers - The French Revolution .. was a revolution against the Church as much as anything .. just is not a good combination .. as Islam has shown us .. Of the places I would rather not live vs China .. These nations make up the lot of them - meaning I would live in China before living in those places .. .. Saudi Arabia being one of the worst - and ring leader so guess they have to set an example of some kind..

and this is what I say to folks about the abortion debate .. these religious groups getting political - introducing law which violates the founding principle aka 2/3rds majority - based on religious belief .. same with Prohibition -- Pot - this is just not what the founders envisioned.. why the DOI was written .. document by which law and the constitution is supposed to be interpreted. . in conjunction with having a clue what a "Constitutional Republic" means = NO TYRANNY of the friggenmajority. by definition .. part of the definition of the word ..

Now we have "Utilitarianism" what will increase happiness for the collective - no mind to the individual .. gone from the calculation - an end run around one of the primary safeguards to both essential liberty and limitation to Gov't power. - an anathema to the founding priniple .is this justification for law.

Unfortunately - while Blue pioneered use of this dark energy - and by my account is better at it and uses it more - Red is eqallly guilty if not more of using this evil doctrine to enact authoritarian legislation - letting loose the police state we have witnessed - because of Pot .. Red.
add in making it our "Patriotic Duty" to trade liberty for security ... Obama jumping in both feet but chaning the name to the equally Orwellian doublespeak "Freedom Act"

and now we have extensive use of state sponsored propganda .. of the highest order .. including every public Relations firm on the planet (those who help Political types create propaganda) generating a narrative in a massive effort to manufacture consent. Wonder what Old Noam thinks of Covid Already know what Eddi Bernays thinks "Engineering Consent" George is appauled of course .. "I told you so" ... but these fkers then used it as a textbook

 

aCultureWarrior said: ↑
In order to establish my case, it first has to be shown what libertarianism is, which the platform of the Libertarian Party shows quite well:

"As Libertarians, we seek a world of liberty: a world in which all individuals are sovereign over their own lives and are not forced to sacrifice their values for the benefit of others...
Consequently, we defend each person’s right to engage in any activity that is peaceful and honest, and welcome the diversity that freedom brings. The world we seek to build is one where individuals are free to follow their own dreams in their own ways, without interference from government or any authoritarian power."
Platform | Libertarian Party (lp.org)

Let's just say if those 60 million unborn babies murdered in the womb in the name of "choice" here in the US in the past 48 years were able to speak to us from Heaven, they would say "Most definitely!".