[blacktrance]

I've been wondering whether I should call myself a libertarian or not. Maybe another label would be more indicative. Some positions:

- The government should be completely secular. That said, things like "In God We Trust" on the currency aren't that big of a deal (I'd like it removed, but it's a very low priority) - the problem is when actual laws are based on religion.

- Religion isn't only bad when it influences politics - it (and spirituality in general) are bad because they are incorrect and impede consistent rational thinking. Religion is especially bad when it's involved in politics, but it's bad by itself too.

- Abortion should be legal at all stages of pregnancy, and should probably be subsidized.

- Ideally, the government would only be involved in marriage to the extent that marriage is a contract between consenting parties - there should be no tax benefits or penalties for married couples. Any consenting adults should be free to make these contracts with anybody else - so same-sex, polygamous, and consanguineous marriage should be legal. As a second-best alternative, as long as the government is involved in marriage, same-sex marriage should be treated the same as heterosexual marriage.

- The national security state should be dismantled. Repeal the Patriot Act, end domestic NSA espionage, abolish the TSA.

- End the War on Drugs, and legalize all drugs. While I'm personally opposed to their use, I'm against using force to prevent their use, too.

- Prostitution should be legal.

- Human cloning, genetic enhancement, and such should all be legal as long as the cloned/enhanced individual (if they're developed to the point of being a human) is no worse off for it.

- GMOs should be legal and unlabeled.

- I'm against things like affirmative action and non-discrimination laws in business. People should be free to hire and fire whomever they want, as long as there's no breach of contract in doing so. Racism and sexism are bad, but alone (when not coupled with rights violations) don't justify the use of force against racists and sexists.

- Feminism is a good social movement, though I'm against some common feminist political goals. Ideally, normative gender roles would be abolished altogether.

- There should be parental licensing. Parents should be required to pass a test on basic parenting skills and have a certain level of income before they would be allowed to have a child.

- There should be no immigration laws - there should be as few barriers to moving from Mexico to the US as there are to moving from New York to Texas. However, open borders doesn't mean open citizenship - immigrants should not be allowed to collect from the welfare state (if there is one) or to vote, unless they obtain citizenship.

- All taxes should be replaced by a sales tax. Its regressiveness should be countered by a tax rebate.

- Anthropogenic global warming is real, and should be countered by a green tax shift - a general tax cut paired with an increase in the gasoline tax.

- There should be no barriers to international trade.

- The minimum wage should be abolished.

- The welfare state should be abolished. As a second-best alternative, the current welfare state should be abolished and replaced with a basic income.

- Health care reform: Repeal the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), abolish the employee tax break for offering health insurance, abolish Medicare and Medicaid, simplify contracts between insurers and insurance buyers, and strongly enforce them (to prevent insurance companies from unexpectedly dropping clients when they get sick).

- The FDA should not be able to ban medicine, only to require medicine that has not been approved to be labeled as "Not Approved". Similarly, anyone should be allowed to practice medicine, but those who aren't qualified doctors should be required to label themselves as such.

- Unlike most libertarians, I don't want to abolish the Federal Reserve, and don't support the gold standard. The Federal Reserve should, however, be bound by a rule: it should target nominal GDP.

- Eminent domain should be abolished.

- The government shouldn't have bailed out the banks or the car manufacturers. Instead, it should have investigated the banks for fraud.

- Right-to-work laws should be abolished.

- Historically, the government and big business have been close friends. Much of what has been or is currently called "free market" is actually corporatism. Big business lobbies for protection against smaller competitors, a favorable foreign policy, etc.

- The military should be significantly reduced in size, and only used for defensive wars, not for imperialism or "humanitarian interventions".

- Patriotism/nationalism are evil. The government is nothing more than a service provider, and one's "nation" is mostly comprised of strangers, so it makes no more sense to be loyal or deferential to one's government or nation than it does to be deferential to one's plumber or a random guy down the street.

- The justice system should be based on two principles: most importantly restitution to the victim, and secondarily, deterrence.


Political compass results:
Economic Left/Right: 3.25
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.44

[emmitt]

Yeah, you should call yourself a libertarian. If you want to be more precise, you could call yourself a minarchist even though most minarchists don't seem to be too fond of subsidies.

Abortion [...] should probably be subsidized.

But minarchism is still the best label I can think of.

[blacktrance]

How many libertarians do you see supporting a carbon tax, or parental licensing?

[emmitt]

You're miles away from any other ideology. Libertarianism is the best thing you've got. You can't have a new label for every possibly modification. Only hardcore ideologues agree with the foundations of their favorite ideology 100% of the time.

And yes, some libertarians, namely geolibertarians, might support a carbon tax.

Maybe you should interact with more libertarians. They might be able to explain to you why your modifications of libertarianism probably don't make much sense.

[Typhoon]

Or perhaps interact more with non-libertarian groups who's views converge with your own so they can tell you why the rest of your libertarian views don't make sense. Since you seem to be cautious of the libertarian label.

[mikema63]

Your closer to libertarian but many of your views are philosophically inconsistent.

You should ask around and study the logical structure of several ideologies to create a consistent ideological view before deciding on a label.

[blacktrance]

I have consistent philosophical beliefs behind this quasi-libertarianism, namely contractarianism in the tradition of Hobbes.

[mikema63]

The problem is that by granting subsidies you begin a process of warping economic outcomes, provide something for business to lobby towards, and provide precedence for such subsidies. Thus such infiltration into the economy will grow and what you term corporatism would return. One point thus contradicts another.

Another would be your licensing for parents, such an intervention in the social makeup by government will give it enormous power to influence people and will naturally cause the government to change and morph away from many of your other stated goals.

[Social_Critic]

I forgot if you mentioned gun control. I'd like to go shopping carrying a small caliber automatic with poisoned bullets. And for more serious business I want to own a small nuke.

[Rich]

Anarcho-Capitalism is a fantasy, but its a fantasy with a purpose. It satisfies a deep psychological need fir its proponents. Anarcho-Capatalism is also relatively safe for its proponents because there is exactly zero chance of it ever being enacted and its proponents having to suffer the effects of its lunacy. You see the problem is as soon as you allow government coercion for anything, you're done for. Once you've accepted the principle that coercion can be used in one instance then the principle can be used to argue for government coercion in other areas.

[Voluntarism]

I forgot if you mentioned gun control. I'd like to go shopping carrying a small caliber automatic with poisoned bullets. And for more serious business I want to own a small nuke.

I'm not sure whether you are just being sarcastic to provoke a response or if you are actually anti-Libertarian, but I'll bite.

Depending on what you were doing, these actions could be legitimately denied under Libertarianism. Yes Libertarians are pro-gun choice, but they are definitely against the initiation of a threat of violence against others. Walking around an empty area waving around a gun is completely legitimate. Doing the same in a crowded elevator is initiating a credible threat of violence against others (your true intentions are unknowable by the strangers and hence they would naturally feel threatened even if there was 0% chance that you would actually commit harm).

[blacktrance]

By the way, what happened to the PoFo test? Is there any way to access it?

[mikema63]

The creator is gone and it's in limbo being rebuilt on a voluntary basis, which means it's gone.

[Social_Critic]

I'm not sure whether you are just being sarcastic to provoke a response or if you are actually anti-Libertarian, but I'll bite

I guess the intent was to point out there ought to be limits of some sort. To be honest I'm not sure where they ought to be set. Nowadays I live in Europe in a country with an extremely low crime rate, with very strict gun control measures. It's a very relaxing lifestyle if you happen to be large and have very long arms. I have no problem at all walking at night at 3 am anywhere. That's not exactly the way it was when I lived in other countries. Anyway, I guess it has its pluses and minuses.