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Friday, September 04, 2009
Anarchism & Education
In February 2007 I published a small magazine of current affairs opinion pieces, mostly for the experience as well as getting my ideas out to those I could reach. Although I forget the number now, I would estimate about 50 copies were made. Most of those copies were given to family, friends, and the Civitas conference that happened to be in Halifax in May 2007.
I have published a couple articles from this magazine and the LPC newsletter already, but here are a couple scans I thought were still at least decent. The rest is unfortunately anti-conservative at times, but hey, you have to start somewhere! It must be said that the second article is not written by me, however I agree with the overall message that the whole public school system is so rigid that creativity, intellect, and intelligence is no longer rewarded. Sometimes, it’s even punishable behavior. Hooray for progressivism!
The first article is essentially a rant about the comparison of anarchism and libertarianism. Someday I will write about the fact that anarchism is essentially more left-wing than even communism, but in the meantime I would love to hear hear my fellow conservatives’ opinion on both of these (old) articles.
[Cross-posted at The Right Coast]
Posted by Dane Richard on September 4, 2009 in Libertarianism | Permalink
Comments
Dane,
The difference between anarchists and libertarians is anarchists can honestly claim that they believe that taxation is theft while libertarians cannot. Anyone who calls himself a libertarian and says "taxation is theft" is lying. This is simply because if there is a difference between anarchism and libertarianism, it is that libertarians, unlike anarchists, believe that the state, however small, is justified. Those limited activities that the state is needed to perform cost money, and so coercive taxation to pay for them is justified. While they might be able to say that excessive taxation is theft, they cannot make the more general claim. That claim is reserved for anarchists only.
"Someday I will write about the fact that anarchism is essentially more left-wing than even communism...."
The term 'left-wing' has no fixed meaning. It means whatever the person using it wants it to mean. But if there is one thing that seems most common about how the term is used, it is used to indicate the belief that governments running or regulating things is good, if not outright necessary. So if you think that people who believe no government is justifiable are 'left-wing', you have a rather peculiar idea of what the term means, and one that bears little relation to how it is used in most political discussions.
Posted by: Fact Check | 2009-09-04 3:45:13 PM
FC: I believe libertarians (intelligent ones at least) will argue that income tax is theft, as it is coercive. Sales tax is not coercive and libertarians, if they follow their ideology to the book, should accept that a libertarian government would still need sales tax, if not income tax. They may not like sales tax, because it's still taxation, but that's not the issue.
I suppose I should have used the term "collectivist" instead of "left-wing", but I generally refer to "the left" as a general mentality. It's a tough mentality to put into words but it's something conservatives seem to collectively understand without even talking of it. Maybe I'm the only one?
Posted by: Dane Richard | 2009-09-04 4:00:02 PM
Dane,
"Sales tax is not coercive...."
Of course it is! If you own something, you want to sell it to me, and I want to buy it, the only reason that I would give any money to the government is if they forced me to do it as a condition of our exchange. I have no choice about whether or not to pay it. That's coercion.
In fact, there really is no difference between income for work and selling property. In the employment case, person A gives person B something person B wants (labour) and in return person B gives person A something person A wants ($). It is a free exchange they can make that is none of the governemnt's business to interfere with or tax. But the exchange of property in a sale is the same thing - person A gives person B something he wants (property) and in return person B gives person A something he wants ($). So if taxing one is theft, they both must be theft. If one is not theft, then both must not be theft.
Taxing consumption might be a way of raising money that has less negative impact on the exonomy generally than income tax, but that does not make it any less theft. They stand or fall together. So a libertarian cannot give a pass to sales taxes without also giving a pass to income taxes. which is my point: libertarians lie when they say "taxation is theft", no matter what kind of tax they are talking about.
Posted by: Fact Check | 2009-09-04 6:06:22 PM
To tax everyone $x for common services is ok.
To tax income n% for common services is not ok, since some pay more that others.
To tax income progressively is even worse.
To tax me to pay you is pure theft.
Posted by: Johan i Kanada | 2009-09-05 6:44:40 AM
"Anyone who calls himself a libertarian and says "taxation is theft" is lying. "
A small government would not necessarily HAVE to be funded through a coersive tax system, perhaps user fees.
Posted by: Freedom Manitoba | 2009-09-05 9:08:51 AM
A small government would not necessarily HAVE to be funded through a coersive tax system, perhaps user fees.
Posted by: Freedom Manitoba | 2009-09-05 9:08:51 AM
There would be no need for taxes once a libertarian government has sold off all the roads, sidewalks, lakes, rivers, the military, etc.
Posted by: The Stig | 2009-09-05 9:24:05 AM
"Anyone who calls himself a libertarian and says "taxation is theft" is lying."
Wrong, FC. Calling taxation theft is the truth no matter who says it. Condoning theft under the libertarian label is inconsistent and contradictory. That's why limited government libertarianism is not pure but could possibly be a bridge to anarco-capitalism.
Posted by: John Chittick | 2009-09-05 9:59:02 AM
Scott,
"...perhaps user fees."
The problem with this claim (although I don't expect you to understand it) is that it does not address the principle of whether taxation is theft. If having a minimal state is justified and funds are necessary to run that state, then the state has a legitimate claim to taking those funds if needed. Maybe there would be enough people who would just donate money out of the goodness of their hearts so no taxation is needed, but that is a practical solution to the funding problem that does not negate the claim that if no one donated money, coercively taking it from them would be justified. The same is true of user fees. People might be willing to pay user fees for services that would raise the money needed to run a government, but if no one was willing to do that, it would still be the case that having a government is justified and thus taking the needed money by coercion to fund it would be justified. The principle that justifying the existence of a state is to justify the coercive funding of it remains.
But if you are merely advocating a system whereby "government" services are only available to those who pay user fees (thus either they are paid for voluntarily or they are not needed, since the non-payer has no right to demad the servies), then you are actually an anarchist and not talking about "government" services at all, but simply ones that would be provided by voluntary associations.
Anarchists can believe that voluntary associations are a good thing. They can support, for example, the existence of insurance companies to help reduce risk for groups of people. If they believe that liberty is important, they can also believe that non-state, voluntary associations can legitimately enforce respect for liberties. Private security companies can replace police, for example. These might look like street gangs, but so long as they are only enforcing the respect for individual liberties, what they are doing is justified.
So if you think that something stronger than voluntary associations where the members pay for the activities with user fees is needed, then you are not an anarchist, but also must endorse in principle coercive taxation. If you think self-funding voluntary associations are enough, then you are an anarchist.
Stig,
"There would be no need for taxes once a libertarian government has sold off all the roads, sidewalks, lakes, rivers, the military, etc."
The problem with this is that using the funds from selling what is stolen property in the first place is to use what is the same as stolen money. If I steal your car and sell it, you would be right to say "that's my money" even though you never possessed that cash before. Similarly, unless you think the government ownership of property as it stands now is legitimate (which is to deny it is the result of theft), then you cannot so easily launder the proceeds that come from selling it. Either that money is stolen too, or the property they sold to get it was legitimately held.
Posted by: Fact Check | 2009-09-05 10:11:37 AM
Scott,
PS - You keep saying you won't respond to me further, but then respond again. Do your declarations apply only to particular threads, or are you just incapable of sticking to what you say. If the former, let me save you the trouble (and embarassment) of trying to respond to my comments here. You're still a dumbfuck. There. You can ignore me now.
Posted by: Fact Check | 2009-09-05 10:14:33 AM
"You keep saying you won't respond to me further, but then respond again."
You're right, I forgot that I was ignoring you.
"You're still a dumbfuck. There. You can ignore me now."
And I shall.
Posted by: Freedom Manitoba | 2009-09-05 10:22:53 AM
John Chittick,
Me: "Anyone who calls himself a libertarian and says "taxation is theft" is lying."
You: "Wrong, FC. Calling taxation theft is the truth no matter who says it."
Me: 'Lying' is saying something you believe to be false, even if it should turn out to be true. If we're playing tennis and I call your balls out all the time when I really believe that they are in, I am a liar. If you know I am calling things contrary to how I see them you would be right in thinking I am a liar even if you subsequently were to find out that all my calls were, in fact, correct. A lie and an error don't combine to erase the lie.
So when you say, "Condoning theft under the libertarian label is inconsistent and contradictory" we agree. I'm just trying to give libertarians some credit for being able to see that it is contradictory. But maybe they can't see it. It says little for their intelligence if they can't.
I've always thougth libertarians say "taxation is theft" even though they don't believe that because it makes a better rallying slogan than "excessive taxation is theft and we are taxed to much" does. Maybe I'm worng. Maybe they really have begun to believe their own bullshit (in the Harry Frankfurt sense of the word).
Posted by: Fact Check | 2009-09-05 10:29:50 AM
Anyway, about the article concerning education
Dane, I have to totally agree with the article. In my experience in high-school I could never grasp calculus and failed it twice. The second time I took it I actually dropped it. I had the same teacher, and when I asked him to explain it to me, his response was, "don't question it, just accept it.
In the same school, in Ontario, I wrote an essay for an English teacher and he slaughtered what I had written. The next book we were assigned was Heart of Darkness. I copied down everything he said in class and spewed it back to him in my essay. His comment was that it was brilliant.
Of course this nearly stopped reading. But out of curiosity, I started reading English Literature, classics of all kinds and philosophy. I discovered it is a lot easier to take something out of a book when someone doesn't tell you what its meaning is and your ideas are wrong.
This even goes on in university. I wrote an essay on Cyclodaic Pottery. I did not know my professor was an (expert) on the subject. His comment on the essay was: "Good essay. However, if you had read my book, you would have seen (author) was wrong when he said....
This kind of nonsense and the politics of teachers playing students off other teachers is why I did not continue in academia.
Apparently it is worse now, and if I had children,I would rather have them home schooled than sending them into the incompetant hands of the school boards to mould their brains into mush.
Posted by: Doug Gilchrist | 2009-09-08 3:49:33 AM
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