Are you a Real Libertarian, or a ROYAL Libertarian?

http://geolib.com/essays/sullivan.dan/royallib.html

by eevilspock • 13 years ago

35 68 13 years ago

eevilspock4• 13 years ago

This is directed at that seemingly large portion of HN users that lean libertarian.

eire1130• 13 years ago

I've met Dan. Cool dude. He wrote that article a while back though. He's a geoliberatian (geo is for george, as in Georgist)

ericcope• 13 years ago

the geo clarification makes a huge difference in the article. An article about land ownership and "geo"libertarianism requires a definition! I was totally lost without that...

krisdol2• 13 years ago

Does anyone know of a community of tech professionals (such as hackernews) that isn't full of these libertarian types? Maybe one populated by driven to solve problems facing communities and the under-privileged?

I like a lot of the technical topics here, but I find the socio-political views I encounter largely limited to only one narrow perspective (with which I almost always disagree).

dublinben• 13 years ago

In my experience, the free software movement is much more populated with socialists and other left-leaning individuals than the general technology community.

ptaffs• 13 years ago

i'm often confused by the FOSS and VC mix here. I agree generally FOSS are left leaning, and would suspect VC are more right?

Glyptodon• 13 years ago

FOSS is an appropriation of excessive intellectual property laws to create a productive form of Libertarianism-lite (which strangely appears to somehow be 'socialist' to most because somehow many people have been tricked into thinking socialism has to do with things being 'free' rather than things being regulated and rationed by the state or something).

Stronico3• 13 years ago

If you're interested in technology for technology's sake, then that will probably crowd out any interest in either communities or the plight of the less fortunate. Both technology and libertarianism tend to draw from the high side of the autistic spectrum.

Iftheshoefits• 13 years ago

Both technology and libertarianism tend to draw from the high side of the autistic spectrum

Do you have a source for this claim? It seems quite extraordinary. Anecdotally, everybody I've ever met in technology who has claimed to be on "the high side of the autistic spectrum" has in reality merely been an average-intellect asshole who: a) thinks he's much smarter than he is, and assumes his inability to "get along" is because others are jealous of his abilities or just don't understand what it's like to be "on the spectrum"; b) is looking for excuses for his own boorish behavior.

mpyne8• 13 years ago

As a father of a child with autism myself, I'd hesitate to leave the prevalence of libertarian and anti-authoritarian tendencies in tech to such a simple explanation... but I'll admit there are parallels.

The "theory of mind" is a known challenge (not an impossibility) with those with autism [1]. This is basically the degree of awareness a person has on the fact that other persons have their own thoughts, prejudices, levels of knowledge, etc. Essentially the idea, can you put yourself in the mind or worldview of someone else?

With the types of libertarianism followed in the U.S. there is simply no need to care what other people think: The idea is that the rules are simple and easy to follow, and as long as they're rigidly applied anything that happens must be fair.

When you combine the difficulty of understanding why other people feel the way they do, with the very real awareness of how intelligent and knowledgeable our prototypical tech libertarian is, it starts to make sense why they believe that the outcome of these rules are fair. They are able to motivate to work, they are able to produce good work (at least, in their opinion), they follow the rules that respect others' things; why can't you?

When you scale that up to the idea that a society of people all trying their best to do good work and live by the rules must obtain the ideal outcome, the appeal is more understandable, if not actually obvious. Why should the government tell a person how to live or what to do, when that person obviously knows best what's good for them, especially when government in general has long historical examples of failure. Even if you point out successes of regulation, the rejoinder is simply that such successes could be replicated with the simple set of rules, if people would only follow them. And either way, how difficult could it be to make rules that are good at an individual level also be good at a national level?

The problem with the failure to understand the theory of mind is probably most pronounced with that last question... a difference in scale has always been a difference in kind, but how can you perceive that what's best for society is not always what's best for one person, when you can hardly understand that other individual people are not mirror images of oneself, let alone understanding societies at a macro level?

All the same, this is all just a bunch of supposition. I am sure there are better explanations (though I should hope that it's not considered surprising that one's ability for empathy, sympathy and theory of mind may play a role in one's natural political tendencies).

[1] http://www.autism.com/index.php/understanding_theoryofmind

chamblin• 13 years ago

I wish it were possible to have a tech community that politics didn't eventually dominate.

patrickmay• 13 years ago

I wish it were possible to have a <s>tech</s> community that politics didn't eventually dominate.

snowwrestler• 13 years ago

I think any web forum that grows significantly (not just tech) will tend toward politics, because to talk politics, all you need is an opinion, and everyone's got one of those.

To talk about technical topics, you need some experience and expertise, and those are a lot harder to come by. So the percentage of those folks declines as the overall audience grows.

didgeoridoo• 13 years ago

Correct me if I'm misunderstanding, but is your comment intended to imply that libertarianism is associated with being unconcerned with the "problems facing communities and the under-privileged"? Might libertarians merely believe that there are better, fairer, more efficient ways to solve these problems than the application of government?

poolpool• 13 years ago

No one is disputing that people believe that. People dispute that its in any way true in many cases.

krisdol2• 13 years ago

You're right, I should not have worded my comment in such a way because I did not want to start an argument around that particular topic.

To better phrase it: I feel that the problems being solved with software on this community, while valuable, are typically addressed at other geeks, upper-middle class consumers, entrepreneurs, and the startup community.

I think we can agree that nearly no discussions on this site center around using our technical expertise at solving the problems facing those who are impoverished, ill, unemployed, discriminated-against, and/or facing extreme difficulty accessing the sort of quality of life many of us enjoy. Much of the solutions here have either low relevance or high barriers of entry (be it cost, technology, or educational background) for that population.

I'm seeking a community, be it a hackerspace, online community, conference, or similar that focuses on solutions that are driven more by social impact than profit.

While I disagree with libertarians on many issues, I did not mean to say that they do not consider these problems. I apologize

iterationx4• 13 years ago

Not seeing your Statist views reflected in the comments section?

No worries, try CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, NPR.

bluthru2• 13 years ago

You think large for-profit corporate news organizations demonstrate "statist" views? Ha!

(NPR is one of the more accurate news organizations in the US for a reason, though.)

dkuntz2• 13 years ago

The problem I see is that most people don't really look beyond the current political parties in their immediate vicinity (IE: those campaigning near them presently). This leads to people really only seeing the American Libertarian movement as an individualist group.

spindritf• 13 years ago

We have a "something privilege" article here probably every day. Women in tech every other.

There was an actual "programmer privilege" submission. Twice.

drcode• 13 years ago

Try http://www.reddit.com/r/marxism

logfromblammo• 13 years ago

Depends on what you mean by "these libertarian types". There are more philosophies on Earth, Horatio, than are things in your dreams... er... can't be fooled again.

The article is by a geoist, or Georgist. Those people are no more true libertarians than they are true Scotsmen. Or at least that's how it is according to the libertarians that do not agree with their principles.

If you're looking for social justice and community-based governance, you would be better served by hanging out with an-soc (or socialist anarchist) proponents, and then the an-caps (capitalist anarchists) will mock you for your beliefs.

If libertarianism seems like a narrow perspective to you, you might want to examine it from a different angle. Freed from the bonds of actually having to agree with anyone to accomplish something, libertarians can and will believe in almost anything that sounds even remotely plausible, then defend that well past the Godwinning of the thread. The end of a libertarian thread is actually when Somalia comes up, not Hitler.

In any case, the ability to argue endlessly over an irrelevant topic and always be correct, regardless of any findings of fact is strangely attractive to people with an engineering temperament. You see, the more government looks like a problem, the more tempting it is to try to solve it. And with more solutions proposed, the more tempting it is to argue over them.

And how many times have you heard a naive younger developer say, "Wouldn't it be easier to scrap the enormous messy kludge we have and start over from scratch?"

So I don't think you will easily find such a community unless you go out of your way to create one yourself, and police it rigorously with a NO POLITICS rule.

naturalethic3• 13 years ago

Are you kidding? This place is 90% socialists.

angersock• 13 years ago

This view seems very much oriented at solving the problems of communities and the under-privileged: it explicitly identifies how you are bound to pay rent to the community when you use common resources.

The problem I think you may be having here is the conflation of "I don't want to be part of any community fuck-you-got-mine" with "I want to have control over how I give back to my community and what community I identify with".

_delirium6• 13 years ago

Depending on what you're looking for as an alternative, some hackerspaces (and the physical + online communities around them) are quite left-wing. That's especially the case in Europe, where many hackerspaces are physically located in "nonprofit social center" buildings that provide housing for mostly DIY/left-wing/anti-authoritarian groups. For example, there's Malmö's Forskningsavdelningen (http://forskningsavd.se/about/), which was formerly hosted in Udkanten, and is now hosted in Kontrapunkt.

danboarder• 13 years ago

For a combination of the two, I recommend the Bleeding Heart Libertarians website[1]. The two are not mutually exclusive. It's not a tech-focused site like HN, but does address the topics you mention - a focus on solving problems facing communities and the under- priviledged. 1. http://bleedingheartlibertarians.com

Crito2• 13 years ago

Focus less on what you call yourself, and more on what you think. Political labels are so dumb; what use are they? Do you proudly self-identify with a political label at dinner parties? On dates? While chatting with somebody on the bus? To your boss, or in an interview?

I sure as hell don't. I talk politics plenty, but I haven't said "I am a ..." since probably highschool.

If you are already talking politics, then just tell people what you think about relevant issues. It makes for a better conversation anyway.

netcan• 13 years ago

They're useful for the forming political parties, for example. I mean that in a general sense. A group of people identifying with political goals and trying to achieve them somehow, maybe by getting elected.

But I agree with your main point. Unless you have a good reason to accept a label, don't. It generally leads to poorer thinking.

Crito2• 13 years ago

My ultra-naive hope is that if more people ignored political labels, then we could naturally move away from toxic partisan politics.

lvh• 13 years ago

Isn't that exactly what the article does? I mean, sure, he starts out with a political label in the title, but then he makes an argument about something with substance: specifically, whether or not that land, too, is a good that should be protected by property rights.

john_b2• 13 years ago

libertarians (little "l") in general are pretty good about this due to their inherent dislike of being labeled, caricatured, and stereotyped. Having many libertarian subtypes helps too.

The downside is that, as others have pointed out, focusing on individual identity and personal beliefs hampers meaningful political organization since it requires a certain ideological smoothing and compromise.

_delirium6• 13 years ago

Background: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geolibertarianism

arethuza• 13 years ago

"When the state granted land titles to a fraction of the population, it gave that fraction devices with which to levy, and pocket, tolls on the fruits of the labor of others."

In a master stroke, when the Kings of Scots granted feudal titles to existing lords who controlled lands, who were inevitably potential rivals, they granted them feudal rights over different lands to those they actually occupied - ensuring long struggles between the lords that meant they wouldn't pose a threat to the kings.

zzzeek• 13 years ago

how do you define "land"? is it, "the limited resources of the Earth"? or what? because if the "resources of the earth" are common property, that might say a lot about say, what people put into the air, in the water, in the ground, etc.

john_b2• 13 years ago

There are libertarians who are very concerned with exactly these issues:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_libertarianism

transfire• 13 years ago

"One is replacing all taxes on productivity, that is, on land use, with taxes on the value of land itself. The other is the Lockean pre-monetary system. It would have to rely on a judicial mechanism, whereby you assert your claim to land by demonstrating that you are using the land. While the latter method does not provide any community funds (a mixed blessing, perhaps), it does subject your landhold to the discretion of that judicial mechanism."

Why should it be any business to the government what you are doing with your land (as long as it is not illegal)? I am not even sure the government should have the right to judge the value of any land.

I can understand Paine's argument. And for that I think it is not unreasonable that a light tax be assessed to land ownership. But today's property taxes are far too high.

Are you a Real Libertarian, or a ROYAL Libertarian?

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