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Thursday, July 1, 2010

Contra-Libertarians:

Libertarianism is a cure that's worse than the disease.  Switching from liberalism to libertarianism, even an hbd-aware, immigration-restrictionist libertarianism, is like swallowing the spider to kill the fly.

It appears that the majority of opposition to liberalism falls within the libertarian camp.  The other locus of resistance could be religious people, but they are not thoughtful enough to really bother making arguments in the public sphere.  Religion is on the wane and has no serious impact on public policy decisions.  Therefore the world is currently divided between libertarians and liberals.  Libertarians only receive 1% of the vote in American elections and have no power anywhere.  But this masks a much larger population of libertarians who exist both in the democratic and republican parties.  Polls have shown Ron Paul competing evenly in a presidential election against Obama.

This is very frustrating.  Our country needs to move towards an hbd-aware, immigration-restrictionist socialism.  In short, we need to become national socialists.  International socialism is flawed because it leaves out critical aspects of reality.

A)  People aren't equal.  Because they aren't equal, they aren't equally worthy of our funding, love, or care.  Africans might suffer a lot, but they still don't deserve a dime from the outside world, because they have little to no objective value worth preserving.  Even if we wanted to take care of Africans, they would just continue reproducing at six children a woman until it overwhelmed our ability to fund their inadequacies.  Extending socialism to inferior groups is like throwing money down a black hole.  Not only does the money never come back out, but its only effect is to increase the size and destructive sucking power of the black hole in the future.

B)  People like people like themselves.  When people share the same customs, history, language, religion, values, looks, IQ, education, etc, they care much more for each other.  Romantic love, familial love, and love of country are all based on similitude.  The only way to get people to open their hearts to altruistic ideals like socialism is to surround them with objects they are prone to love and care for.  This isn't 'unfortunate' or 'wrong' of people either.  People can quickly realize they aren't just themselves, but are part of a larger whole which represents everything true of their essence in many different persons.  This is both genetically true (there are millions of copies of the genes in your body within your ethnic group, but none outside of it, and only one inside your body), and culturally true (There are millions of people who feel and act the same way you do, that contain the same treasured experiences and visions you define your own identity with, who will continue indefinitely into the future after you die, but you, or even your children, can only form a few people who have no permanent continuity.)  As such, supporting everyone like themselves is just an enlightened selfishness.  People do not abnegate themselves by sacrificing for the genetic and cultural ur-self.  They do abnegate themselves when forced to support genes and cultures wholly unlike their own, even hostile and destructive to their own.  Self-preservation is an inherent right.  International Socialism completely neglects this.

Liberalism as practiced today has these two gaping flaws.  It requires everyone be equal when they aren't, and it requires we care for everyone equally when we don't, can't, and shouldn't.  Libertarians propose a solution to liberalism, they offer us a way to shred these liberal abuses to pieces -- Meritocracy will replace equality, individual selfishness will replace helping and caring for others.  But these are radical, destructive policies that would leave the vast majority of mankind miserable or dead.  There are easier ways to solve both of these issues -- nationalist ways.

National socialism could say, everyone is equal, within our borders.  It could then slam down the borders, or create new borders that only include the desired group, and thus get rid of the problem of human biodiversity.

National socialism could say, all for one, one for all, within our borders.  Because there really would be no distinction between the self and the group.  The individual could love the group, and the group could love the individual.  People would have natural, deep, willing desires to help and support their fellow man.  Taxes would not create protests or riots, but would be seen as wonderful opportunities to give back to the community.  Women wouldn't mind giving birth and raising children, men wouldn't mind dying for their country, poor people wouldn't mind their poverty, rich people wouldn't mind higher taxes, and everyone would be willing to do their part for the whole.  Because they would consider their contribution to the whole to be their greatest pride and the meaning to their lives.  They would love the whole, and thus be content with their place in it.  Not via brainwashing.  Not via threats and imprisonment.  But due to the deep, natural, abiding love people have for people like themselves, and their gratitude towards the love shown by others towards them.  It's a virtuous cycle.  It's hard to resent a country, or demand the right to be selfish and disruptive, when no one has ever hurt you, and everything has been provided for your happiness as just your birthright.  Instead of resentment and rebellion, we could expect citizens of such a country to have a great deal of pride (self-worth) honor (respect for others) compassion (concern for their well-being) and emulation (an ancient virtue, which basically means striving for the approval of those you approve of).

It isn't necessary for national socialists to have high taxes and government spending.  In fact, it could have low taxes and low spending.  What it requires is a spirit of altruistic love for the whole, and for that spirit to be reflected in the taxes and spending.  A citizens' dividend, laws regulating morality, high environmental standards, a complete crackdown on crime, a pro-natal culture, cultural education that gives all children a taste of classical art, music, literature, and history, and emphasizes our ancestor's goodness and greatness, there are thousands of ways national socialism could legislate societal boons that don't cost as much as the current liberal regime.  What is terrifying about libertarians isn't their desire for lower taxes and spending.  It is their principled opposition to any law, any funding, any taxes, any education, that would value the whole more than the individual.  This would make any law that could help people impossible to pass, any system that contributed to the greater welfare inoperable.  Basically, it would strand everyone without the power of government to help weave together a society.  The predictable result of libertarian principles is anarchy, a war of all against all.  This isn't because they directly propose such a system, but the natural logic of their moral principles always rushes headlong towards this objective, and no amount of temporizing can stop libertarian societies from eventually ending up where their inner logic leads.

Libertarians insist that if we just cut all taxes, spending, and regulation down to a bare minimum, let everyone do whatever they pleased (fornicate, sodomize, inhale, inject, etc), and let evolution take its course, we would quickly create so much wealth that the trickle-down theory would lift all boats.  How exactly wealth would trickle down from the competent to the incompetent is left unclear.  We are just promised vague economic rules that would magically make this work.  They have no historical examples of this ever occurring, but that's nothing to fear, because we are assured that a priori logic has conclusively proven it will happen if it ever is attempted.  Their reason is as powerful as revelation or prophecy on how exactly things will turn out, and things will turn out grandly.  Aside from everyone being rich, they feel everyone would be happier if they achieved everything themselves and were able to pursue their own interests without any outside interference.  But is this really reasonable?  Does happiness come from self-reliance and being left alone?  Maybe for some small sub-sect of genetically determined personalities.  But the vast majority of happiness is due to relationships.  It is precisely from helping people and being helped by others that we find the most meaningful portions of our lives.  Understanding others, and being understood by others, are wonderful moments.  Being consoled or taken care of when struck by misfortune or weakness is welcome, just as people find meaning and happiness consoling or supporting others struck down by misfortune and weakness.  This is human.  The benefits of society are almost the total value of life.  Nor is this just theoretical.  It's well known that married couples are happier than singles, and that among singles, those who at least live with pets (who are, economically, mere 'parasites') are emotionally healthier than those without.  In jails, solitary confinement is the worst punishment available for those who misbehave.

There's no real evidence that everyone would become wealthy under a libertarian system.  But let's just grant this to them.  If it comes at the cost of dissolving all societal bonds, giving people complete freedom to degrade themselves, and reducing all meaning and purpose to short-sighted self-satisfaction, have we really gained?  What do libertarians know of love?

We simply cannot afford to grant the moral principles underlying libertarianism:

A) I don't owe anyone anything.
B) No one owes me anything.
C) I don't answer to anyone.
D) I can't judge anyone else.
E) No one else's well-being matters.
F) My well-being doesn't matter to anyone.

Just as A, C, and E would lead to psychopaths ready to trample over anyone for their own personal gain, B, D, and F leads to suicidal depression ready to surrender anything to those ready to abuse them.  Combining both sets of principle together doesn't cancel out the horrible negativity of either side, it just adds both vices together.

Wouldn't a society based on opposing moral principles be so much more appealing?  Doesn't it sound safer and nicer on the other side of the fence?

A) I owe many things to others, they should expect me to treat them according to their due.
B) Others owe many things to me, I should insist they treat me according to my due.
C) I should obey the law and conform to the morals and values of my society, whether legislated or not.  I should not be a public nuisance or menace to others.
D) I don't have to tolerate other people disobeying the law or refusing to conform to the morals and values of my society.  I don't have to watch helplessly as public nuisances and menaces undermine and tear down the society I love and support, even to the extent of corrupting my own children.
E) I care deeply for the well-being of everyone, in concentric circles starting with self, family, neighborhood, nation, race, humanity, and ultimately life itself.  My love for them isn't based on any reciprocal rewards I expect from them, or any merit they accumulated through good deeds, but is given freely as their birthright.
F) I can depend on the love and support of others, starting with my family, then my neighborhood, nation, race, humanity, and finally all living things.  They have feelings of good will towards my aspirations and needs, whether I deserve it or not.  It was earned upon birth.

I have decisively shown that the problem of production has been solved.  Technology, without any help from libertarian economics, can give a high standard of living for any high IQ society that can maintain it.  The only way there could be too few resources for everyone is if we allow overpopulation -- something that wouldn't occur in the civilized world naturally if we stopped immigration, since people have already figured this out and drastically reduced their birth rates.  Under national socialism, which admits unlimited legislative power to enact the public good, we could always clamp down on recklessly reproducing couples who are creating more mouths than society can feed, we could also increase the average IQ to any desirable level through eugenics.  Therefore libertarians who talk about how their program as the surest way to increase wealth is meaningless.  There is enough wealth even without libertarianism.  The question then remains whether we should sacrifice all the principles listed above for the sake of this hypothetical additional wealth.  It seems to me such a violent deformation of all human morality and virtue for the sake of a few extra dollars is mercenary and obscene.  Those who keep advocating this must have some portion of their hearts missing, to not realize how mechanical and wooden they sound to the rest of the world.  The purpose of humanity isn't to get rich, or increase production, or abide by laws of economics.  It's truth, beauty, and love.  Why sacrifice true goods for the sake of false ones?  Spiritual goods for material ones?  What good is it to gain the whole world and lose your soul?

I'm not even debating between say, having enough material goods to stay fed and air-conditioned, at the price of losing human fellowship.  We're talking about having enough money for a pool in the backyard and a private jet, at the price of losing human fellowship.  You are sacrificing the most precious parts of man's spiritual existence for the sake of absolutely worthless trinkets that no one could possibly need.  And yet libertarians are so insistent on getting these last few bucks of materialistic gain, it becomes clear they set zero value to any spiritual goods whatsoever.  Liberalism is full of flaws, but at least it doesn't try to make humans into money-making machines.

What's missing in this world is cohesive families, cohesive communities, cohesive nations.  Poverty isn't the issue.  Atomization, loneliness, and unnecessary conflicts are the issue.  50% of marriages end in divorce.  Nearly 50% of children are born to single mothers.  When people do marry, it is only after several painful and unsuccessful relationships, and many years after their biologically intended courtship periods, which leads to several bad effects later down the road.  Even among couples who don't divorce, many live separately, and only live as one on paper.  People live in the same country, but are balkanized among endless different races, ethnic groups, historical memories, religions, philosophies, languages, etc, to the point that no one cares for or understands anyone else.  The country is just a line on the map, an economic arrangement for the sake of efficient distribution of trade goods.  Relationships are so difficult to form that we are reproducing at only one half the replacement rate.  Unemployment is stuck at 20%, and most other jobs are obvious busywork for the sake of keeping people employed and paid, rather than producing anything of worth.  Meanwhile, the rich have an ever growing, record share of the total wealth and income of the country, growing further and further apart from the common experience and reality of the lumpenproletariat.  Mental illness and drug use continues to expand among the younger generations, a quiet despair plagues their frenetic hedonism.  Libertarians have no solution to any of these problems.  They just keep harping on about how they will increase wealth, as though wealth is the problem in any civilized country.  They don't even recognize the problems facing countries today, and all of their programs would only exacerbate them.  So in order to solve a problem we don't have, they want to double all the problems we do have.  And this is the revolution that will sweep Washington and deliver us from the evil liberals?  Thanks but no thanks.

1 comment:

Lockeford said...

I don't disagree with wise use of government but I think that's a bit harsh on libertarians.

1. They have their defenders of more than just wealth creation. They also argue for a spiritual or vitalizing effect from more freedom. I'm not a libertarian so won't defend that much, but I don't see it as implausible that with fewer or no government buffers people would have to have more personal connections, and a more natural tendency to do so.

2. White people are feeling besieged and this is part of them finding their past and a way to speak up for their interests in a bit of a fumbling way. Classic liberalism is part of Anglo-Saxon tradition and embedded in much of the older ideals. It's part of the process of trying to find a third way through the mire of modern, gridlocked politics.

It's not quite what it seems on the surface. People are scrambling for a way to assert themselves. It's like the sunset effect: Libertarianism goes through a blaze of glory before it goes down.

Then something new arises.