Libertarianism as the Handmaiden to Socialism

S'task

Renegade Philosopher
Administrator
Staff Member
Founder
Believing that the family is the basic unit society is built around =/= collectivism. To claim otherwise is to claim that ever prior society in history is somehow collectivist, which is nonsensical.

Collectivism as an idea didn't really appear until the 19th century, maybe late 18th century. It is specifically structured around the idea of people as subordinate to the society as a whole. Prior to then, that was not generally the relationship, people were not subordinate to society, but subordinate to other people. IE, in feudalism, you had a chain of individual relationships that defined the structure of a society. Yes there were classes of people, but as a class peasants were not subject to kings, no, they were individually subject to their local lord, who was subject to their superior noble and upwards via individual relationships to the king.

Within the English system you saw such ideas quite regularly, there was considerable jurisprudence on what the rights of individuals (as defined as Englishmen) were, such as the right to keep and bear arms, rights to petition, etc. The idea of individual rights were much older than the United States; however, even within this system you had an understanding of social organization that was based on family units. "Clans", after all, are just extended families, and those extended families tended to be what made up day to day society for most of human history around the entire world.

Recognizing that families are the building block of society seems to be a fair thing to do, even while recognizing that individual rights are also a thing. They're not incompatible, and having a government oriented towards supporting families and favoring their creation seems like a generally good idea to me.
 
Believing that the family is the basic unit society is built around =/= collectivism. To claim otherwise is to claim that ever prior society in history is somehow collectivist, which is nonsensical.

Collectivism as an idea didn't really appear until the 19th century, maybe late 18th century. It is specifically structured around the idea of people as subordinate to the society as a whole. Prior to then, that was not generally the relationship, people were not subordinate to society, but subordinate to other people. IE, in feudalism, you had a chain of individual relationships that defined the structure of a society. Yes there were classes of people, but as a class peasants were not subject to kings, no, they were individually subject to their local lord, who was subject to their superior noble and upwards via individual relationships to the king.

Within the English system you saw such ideas quite regularly, there was considerable jurisprudence on what the rights of individuals (as defined as Englishmen) were, such as the right to keep and bear arms, rights to petition, etc. The idea of individual rights were much older than the United States; however, even within this system you had an understanding of social organization that was based on family units. "Clans", after all, are just extended families, and those extended families tended to be what made up day to day society for most of human history around the entire world.

Recognizing that families are the building block of society seems to be a fair thing to do, even while recognizing that individual rights are also a thing. They're not incompatible, and having a government oriented towards supporting families and favoring their creation seems like a generally good idea to me.

thing is what do you do in the case that any one of these systems decide to become hostile toward you. Just accept that "them's the breaks?" people need to be reminded they are mortal and WILL bleed if they get too arrogant and start to think they somehow can't bleed. too many times that ball gets dropped. I get the feeling Marie Antontte would have not been so careless had she known that her lack of awareness was going to get her a one-way ticket to head chop city, likewise I doubt hitler would have been so quick to commit the holocaust if he knew for a fact it was a vain action that would lead to suicide.
 

Captain X

Well-known member
Osaul
I can't help but think the real reason people try to legislate their religious morality and force others to conform to it is because they themselves cannot resist temptation and must have the government do it for them.
 

DocSolarisReich

Esoteric Spaceman
Believing that the family is the basic unit society is built around =/= collectivism. To claim otherwise is to claim that ever prior society in history is somehow collectivist, which is nonsensical.

And this is exactly why Lolbertarianism is the handmaiden to Socialism. Both treat the 'individual' as not only a real thing, but the only real thing. Libertarianism sees an atomic gas of individual economic units engaged in market relationship as with strangers. Socialism sees a solid block of ice composed of atomic individuals engaged in collective mass economic relationship with the whole.

Of course neither is true. The 'Individual' exists as a member of a family, a clan, a profession, a class, an ethnicity, a language, a culture, a nation, a religion, a tradition. The 'individual' has nothing that is his own, everything is received from those who have gone before; his flesh, his mind, his words, his soul.

This reveals all the 'state of nature' just so stories of the so called 'enlightenment' sophistry whereby 'society' emerges as a compact between 'individuals' as sick jokes.
 

S'task

Renegade Philosopher
Administrator
Staff Member
Founder
Of course neither is true. The 'Individual' exists as a member of a family, a clan, a profession, a class, an ethnicity, a language, a culture, a nation, a religion, a tradition. The 'individual' has nothing that is his own, everything is received from those who have gone before; his flesh, his mind, his words, his soul.
. . .

This is just as patently ridiculous a claim. People have many things that are independent of their native culture, not the least of which is their soul, unless, I guess, you believe in reincarnation, but since that's not actually a thing in the western religions that underpin western philosophy, it doesn't really matter.

People are influenced by their cultures, but still make decisions separate from them, they have free will to make decisions. Humans are not simply biological robots, utterly interchangeable. Three people growing up in identical circumstances will still end up quite different in their personalities, their skills, and their hopes and dreams. You see this with identical twins, siblings close in age, and pretty much everything else. Speaking as a father of two, children have personalities almost immediately out of the womb, before anything but genetics have had a major influence on them.

To say that humans are not individuals is as ridiculous a claim as saying the individual is all that matters. Further, even when part of all those things you list, people still engage in things on an individual basis. A company is not hiring a family or clan, they hire and individual. Even when shopping for a family, a person purchases things as an individual transaction, not as part of a unit. Contracts, which are quite old considering that the BIBLE makes references to such things, have always been able to be entered into by individuals.
 

StormEagle

Well-known member
Believing that the family is the basic unit society is built around =/= collectivism. To claim otherwise is to claim that ever prior society in history is somehow collectivist, which is nonsensical.

Collectivism as an idea didn't really appear until the 19th century, maybe late 18th century. It is specifically structured around the idea of people as subordinate to the society as a whole. Prior to then, that was not generally the relationship, people were not subordinate to society, but subordinate to other people. IE, in feudalism, you had a chain of individual relationships that defined the structure of a society. Yes there were classes of people, but as a class peasants were not subject to kings, no, they were individually subject to their local lord, who was subject to their superior noble and upwards via individual relationships to the king.

Within the English system you saw such ideas quite regularly, there was considerable jurisprudence on what the rights of individuals (as defined as Englishmen) were, such as the right to keep and bear arms, rights to petition, etc. The idea of individual rights were much older than the United States; however, even within this system you had an understanding of social organization that was based on family units. "Clans", after all, are just extended families, and those extended families tended to be what made up day to day society for most of human history around the entire world.

Recognizing that families are the building block of society seems to be a fair thing to do, even while recognizing that individual rights are also a thing. They're not incompatible, and having a government oriented towards supporting families and favoring their creation seems like a generally good idea to me.

It could be, and I believe it has been, argued that many of the early Bronze Age civilizations were broadly collectivist in nature. Egypt being the prime example of the early palace economies of the ancient Mediterranean civilizations.

Communism and socialism could actually be viewed as some form of twisted palace economy, with the palace and king in this case being the state/party itself.

If one accepts the argument, than collectivism as an idea has basically been around as long as human civilization itself.
 

S'task

Renegade Philosopher
Administrator
Staff Member
Founder
It could be, and I believe it has been, argued that many of the early Bronze Age civilizations were broadly collectivist in nature. Egypt being the prime example of the early palace economies of the ancient Mediterranean civilizations.

Communism and socialism could actually be viewed as some form of twisted palace economy, with the palace and king in this case being the state/party itself.

If one accepts the argument, than collectivism as an idea has basically been around as long as human civilization itself.
Collectivism requires more than just having a centralized command economy. Look at Bronze Age legal codes that we have from those same palace economies, those are most certainly not written with collectivist philosophy or understanding of society in mind, rather, they are built around individual crime and punishment. One could make an argument that there ARE some philosophies that are collectivist going back that far, for instance Confucianism and Legalism within Chinese philosophy both have strong collectivist understandings of society built into them, but those have had little to no influence on western thought in regards to the present conversation.
 
And this is exactly why Lolbertarianism is the handmaiden to Socialism. Both treat the 'individual' as not only a real thing, but the only real thing. Libertarianism sees an atomic gas of individual economic units engaged in market relationship as with strangers. Socialism sees a solid block of ice composed of atomic individuals engaged in collective mass economic relationship with the whole.

Of course neither is true. The 'Individual' exists as a member of a family, a clan, a profession, a class, an ethnicity, a language, a culture, a nation, a religion, a tradition. The 'individual' has nothing that is his own, everything is received from those who have gone before; his flesh, his mind, his words, his soul.

This reveals all the 'state of nature' just so stories of the so called 'enlightenment' sophistry whereby 'society' emerges as a compact between 'individuals' as sick jokes.

You know you talk big about how ""your very soul is all a sum of what has come before but it is amazing how suddenly the individual becomes very important in one's last dying moments as they cling to their last moments of life especially if that life is being taken by another person. It's Amazing how mobs act like they really are something and then scatterer like roaches when met with actual force especially if said force manages to aim for the head and take out the guy that is the only person holding the thing together. It's almost as if a lot of collectivist movements are less about the collective and more about serving the needs of a charismatic leader who will use and throw away people as he sees fit.
 

Lord Sovereign

Well-known member
Look at Bronze Age legal codes that we have from those same palace economies, those are most certainly not written with collectivist philosophy or understanding of society in mind, rather, they are built around individual crime and punishment.

Hence why those systems flourished for thousands of years. God damn, when in terms of human happiness and justice the Bronze Age has got it beaten outright, you know Communism is shit.

This also adds credence to the argument of "you can have a flourishing civilisation without going overboard with collectivism." I think the Neo-reactionaries need to understand that just because the left do it (to the absolute detriment of our countries) doesn't mean they should too.
 

ShieldWife

Marchioness
I follow Academic Agent and actually watched these videos before I saw a thread about them.

I think that the makes some good points. I would agree that there is a problem with liberalism/libertarianism in that it too often has the same goals as the left does. I don't think that this is always and necessarily true, in in practice it has been the case that liberalism has far too often upheld material gain or individual pleasures as goals. This doesn't have to be the case, a person can be a conservative and value traditional, family, morals, community, nation, identity, culture, land, religion, etc. without wanting (or thinking that it's effective) for the government to enforce these things.

We can say that divorce is wrong and destructive without wanting to outlaw divorce, for example.

In fact, at this point where the left holds all the cards and has all of the institutional power in society, any talk of illiberal laws or policies is as fanciful as discussion of what superpowers we want to have. The Benedict Option, or something like it, is what we have left to us. In some theoretical future where paleo-cons have the power, then it may be useful to discuss such things.

I'm really not sure if such values which lie at the foundations of a functional civilization can be enforced at the barrel of a gun. I think that this sort of character has to arise from the bottom of society upwards.
 
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I follow Academic Agent and actually watched these videos before I saw a thread about them.

I think that the makes some good points. I would agree that there is a problem with liberalism/libertarianism in that it too often has the same goals as the left does. I don't think that this is always and necessarily true, in in practice it has been the case that liberalism has far too often upheld material gain or individual pleasures as goals. This doesn't have to be the case, a person can be a conservative and value traditional, family, morals, community, nation, identity, culture, land, religion, etc. without wanting (or thinking that it's effective) for the government to enforce these things.

We can say that divorce is wrong and destructive without wanting to outlaw divorce, for example.

In fact, at this point where the left holds all the cards and has all of the institutional power in society, any talk of illiberal laws or policies is as fanciful as discussion of what superpowers we want to have. The Benedict Option, or something like it, is what we have left to us. In some theoretical future where paleo-cons have the power, then it may be useful to discuss such things.

I'm really not sure if such values which lie at the foundations of a functional civilization can be enforced at the barrel of a gun. I think that this sort of character has to arise from the bottom of society upwards.

I'm sorry I laugh at paleo-cons, talking about the evils of modernity on the internet....using a phone or a computer....made from a factory....that uses freaking electricity. I take it about as seriously as the left who talks about raging against the machines on their Iphone 12s while wearing their gutchi bags and Abacrombi shirts.it's like saying promiscuity is bad while going to a stripper club.
 

LindyAF

Well-known member
I'm sorry I laugh at paleo-cons, talking about the evils of modernity on the internet....using a phone or a computer....made from a factory....that uses freaking electricity. I take it about as seriously as the left who talks about raging against the machines on their Iphone 12s while wearing their gutchi bags and Abacrombi shirts.it's like saying promiscuity is bad while going to a stripper club.

Yet you participate in society, 🤔🤔🤔
 

StormEagle

Well-known member
I'm sorry I laugh at paleo-cons, talking about the evils of modernity on the internet....using a phone or a computer....made from a factory....that uses freaking electricity. I take it about as seriously as the left who talks about raging against the machines on their Iphone 12s while wearing their gutchi bags and Abacrombi shirts.it's like saying promiscuity is bad while going to a stripper club.

...What, exactly, do you think paleocons believe? Because I can tell you, they aren’t luddites raging against the invention of electricity or the internet.
 

ShieldWife

Marchioness
I'm sorry I laugh at paleo-cons, talking about the evils of modernity on the internet....using a phone or a computer....made from a factory....that uses freaking electricity. I take it about as seriously as the left who talks about raging against the machines on their Iphone 12s while wearing their gutchi bags and Abacrombi shirts.it's like saying promiscuity is bad while going to a stripper club.
Paleo-cons don't necessarily object to the internet, if they don't object then there is no inherent hypocrisy in using it. I know a lot of paleo-cons, and I read their books and follow their pundits as well, and very few oppose the very idea of the internet. People can also be okay with a glass of wine after dinner but oppose alcoholism. I think that you're straw-manning paleo-cons if you think we want to literally return to medieval technology.

Though, you know, even if someone does oppose technology, that doesn't mean that they are ridiculous or hypocrites for using it. Accusations of hypocrisy are one of the weakest and most empty arguments, it's not even addressing the opponent's points or saying they're wrong. Technology exists, it is used against people who oppose technology, saying that people who oppose some technology can't defend themselves with it is absurdly unfair.

What if two people, Guy A and Guy B agreed to a fight, and Guy A said it should be a fist fight. Then Guy B brings a sword. Does that make Guy A a hypocrite for picking up a sword himself? Must Guy A accept death because he would prefer to fight with fists but his enemy has a sword? Perhaps an anti-technology paleo-con (who are certainly a small minority) might prefer there to be no internet, not because the internet isn't a useful tool but because its widespread use has other damaging consequences. Just as Guy A would acknowledge that a sword is a more effective tool to fight an enemy, but a sword fight has more destructive consequences than a fist fight has.
 

DocSolarisReich

Esoteric Spaceman
I would agree that there is a problem with liberalism/libertarianism in that it too often has the same goals as the left does. I don't think that this is always and necessarily true, in in practice it has been the case that liberalism has far too often upheld material gain or individual pleasures as goals. This doesn't have to be the case, a person can be a conservative and value traditional, family, morals, community, nation, identity, culture, land, religion, etc.

A liberal can of course 'value' these things, but the very word 'value' gives the game away. A merchant negotiates values. A man pursues virtue. A liberal can place his 'value' on whatever he like, this is the essence of the liberal conception of 'freedom'. But this nominal observer imposed valuation has completely displaced the concept of virtue, a virtue that is objective and remains true whether or not the 'liberated' and 'enlightened' 'individual' extends an unprincipled exception based on aesthetic preference to artifacts of the dark ages of 'tyranny of the cousins'.
 

JagerIV

Well-known member
Okay, now you really sound like the identity politics crowd.

Are you talking about Hastour or Fried?

@Hastur of Carcosa everyone youve met who disagrees with the new deal and interventionalism wants to go back several thousand years?

Paleocon, at least in the American context, refers to the paleocon neocon split.

It's basically between conservatives who made peace with the new deal and embraced America as world policeman, and those who still reject the new deal and wish to follow a more isolationist policy.

I think you might be misusing the term. Could you respond with a little bit less hostility to the right in general? You comming across as an irrational leftist, and its undermining your ability to make a clear point.
 
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@Hastur of Carcosa everyone youve met who disagrees with the new deal and interventionalism wants to go back several thousand years?

Paleocon, at least in the American context, refers to the paleocon neocon split.

if that be the case then I stand corrected. Any reference I've see to paleocon refers to people who blamed most of our ills on the industrial revolution. I was left with the impression that it was a name for some kind of Luddite political party.
 

ParadiseLost

Well-known member
I think socialism and libertarianism can both be damaging to the extent that they promote the idea that government policy should be based in what is economically good, and not necessarily culturally or socially good. Maximizing average or national wealth isn't a good thing if it comes at a high cultural or social cost.
 

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