Do you view taxation as theft?

[Berzerker]

i'd like to know why "property" is immoral and how the anarchist has a superior moral claim to do with it as he pleases

 

[Traitorfish]

According to the definition of Hobbesian, that does not resemble what I've been saying to you except in the most round about and distant fashion. I figure you're just trolling me.

According to what definition of "Hobbesian"? That crappy, literal-minded dictionary quote you pulled out earlier? Talk about irrational attachments to arbitrary authority...

My point was, your philosophical anthropology and the theory of state you derive from it are essentially those developed by Thomas Hobbes, which is true. Your political prescriptions might differ, but that isn't what we're talking about. If you have some genuine objections to this characterisation, go ahead, but simply accusing me of trolling because reasons isn't going to cut it.

i'd like to know why "property" is immoral...

Property is a form of authority. Anarchists view authority as a bad thing. Therefore, property is a bad thing.

...and how the anarchist has a superior moral claim to do with it as he pleases

I'm not familiar with what you're referring to.

 

[Mise]

I don't think that the functions of the state can be accurately described as simply placing "limits" on behaviour without spuriously naturalising a whole host of social practices, such as private property, wage-labour, and indeed the state itself, which those "limits" serve to sustain. If the state was merely there to stop me knifing people to death, that would be one thing, but more commonly I find it obliging me to pay rent for a house that I already inhabit, preventing me from watching films or listening to music without paying tribute to an semi-arbitrary third party, defending the property-relations that leave me economically dependent on my employers and their managerial structures, and generally making me do a whole bunch of tedious, exploitative crap that serves to benefit a small minority of the population at the expense of the rest of us. If that isn't "control", then what is it?

Well in that case it sounds like your beef is with the existence of property rights rather than the legitimacy of the state. Is the state, in your view, illegitimate if it defends property rights? (Also, I think it's fairly easy for me to characterise "an obligation to pay rent" as "a limit on an individual's freedom to deprive someone else of the use of a house he played no part in building.")

That might function at the level of the state, but what about at the level of the individual? There is one government, and one Traitorfish; if Traitorfish rejects that government, then the government-as-it-pertains-to-Traitorfish would appear to illegitimate, wouldn't it? It shouldn't matter if everybody else views it as legitimate, any more than international recognition should make it legitimate.

:shrug: I am evidently not smart enough to see the problem, let alone resolve it, so I'll just bite the bullet and assume that this criticism is valid.

What you be appear to be arguing here is that political legitimacy is a convenient fiction. If that's the case, then how can it be used as the basis for claiming moral obligation to the state? And if it can't, then is it anything more than a pleasant but ultimately naive narrative?

I'm arguing that even if a non-unanimous, implicit conception of legitimacy has problems, the problems it has are much less offensive to liberty than the problems of a unanimous, explicit conception. For a start, as WH said, non-unanimous, implicit legitimacy allows the state to do a whole host of good. Add in legitimacy based on constitutional adherence and it allows prevents the state from doing a whole host of bad, too. Whatever problems arise philosophically get dwarfed by the overwhelming good that the modern liberal democratic state does. If you're arguing something like "private property is bad, the state defends private property, therefore the state is bad", then at least you're having an argument on these terms now: it's a toss up of whether the good outweighs the bad. I believe it does; and I believe, under the alternative, stateless society, the bad massively outweighs the good.

 

[Winston Hughes]

I'm sorry, you said we're not getting into specifics. You can't use specific acts of government to credit them.

In the same way that specific examples of doctors causing harm do not discredit the entire field of medicine, so specific examples of governments causing harm do not discredit the very notion of the state. As I said in the post you're replying to, the problem isn't in referring to specifics, but in making out that the mere presence of negative examples renders irrelevant all of the positive ones.

To put it another way, you're saying that the state is inherently evil, and thus is always illegitimate. I'm saying that the state is neither inherently evil nor inherently good, but has the capacity to do good on a scale which is otherwise impossible, and thus can be (and often is) legitimate. In this context, negative examples do nothing for your argument unless you can show them to be necessary and inevitable features of the state. By contrast, my examples need only show that the state can do good things on a scale which would otherwise be impossible, and that there are realistic prospects of getting states to do those kinds of things.

Edit: I should add that they also have the capacity to do evil on a scale which is otherwise impossible. The point is that states are exceptionally powerful tools, which can be driven to good ends or ill. The aim, for anyone who wishes to help make a better world (or at least to prevent it from going to hell), must be to drive states to the good ends and away from the ill. If people believe it is possible, and are prepared to work to that end, states can be made better and more legitimate. But they can only get worse if people are encouraged to think of them as inherently illegitimate, and to regard disengagement as a morally righteous decision.

Let's assume, for purposes of argument, that there are no coherent alternatives to the capitalist state available. That's a discussion that I think takes us away from the central question here of how we should as individuals relate to the state, so we'll suspend it in your favour for at least the time being.

Does that mean that we are morally obliged to cooperate with the state? Does it even mean that it is moral to cooperate with the state?

I've been arguing that the first is incorrect, that nobody has any authority beyond that lent to them by informed and uncoerced consent, and so that nobody is morally obliged to accept the commands of anybody else.

Park has been taking the further step of arguing the second is false, that we in fact have a moral obligation not to cooperate with the state, because the state is an inherently violent and immoral actor.

What would you say to counter these criticisms, even assuming, as I said, that the state was the only feasible mode of political organisation?

The state has an unmatched capacity to suppress and prevent violence between individuals and groups, and to do so without needing to deploy massive violence of its own. Very often, its sheer power is enough to prevent people from even considering the use of violence, when otherwise it might seem an attractive option. Though there have been social forms in which violence was even less prevalent than it is in most modern states, those were only sustainable in places where the population density was extremely low and travel was very difficult, with the result that people rarely (if ever) came into contact with people to whom they did not share close personal ties or group affiliation. As compared to alternative social forms which might operate where people frequently come into contact with strangers and out-groups, the modern state offers a far superior prospect of keeping violence at a minimum.

As for the state being immoral, I'd simply say that depends on which state you're talking about and when. Looking at the Scandanavian model, I think they've achieved what are probably the most moral social arrangements in history (for a large scale society, at least), and they've done it by allowing the state a pretty extensive range of powers. What I absolutely will not accept is the idea that we can judge the morality of a social arrangement on the basis of an extremely narrow set of criteria relating to personal consent.

(As always, I must add that the state is neither good nor bad by default, and can itself be very violent indeed. But, again, that is an argument for engagement, not disengagement.)

As for personal ethics, I would say that the mere existence of a state does not oblige you to cooperate with it. But nor do your personal objections to the very notion of authority absolve you of such an obligation. As always, with moral questions, it is a matter of weighing and balancing. Blind obedience and blind disobedience are equally irresponsible positions.

Well, as Park said, that's quite an alt-history to sustain.

On the contrary, history bears this out time and again. When states collapse, or are too weak to maintain control, massive violence ensues, which continues until a new state is formed or the existing state reasserts its control. And where the reach of state power is limited, the level of violence (relative to wealth, population density and group diversity) is pretty reliably higher than in those places where the state is present to keep the peace.

The Provisional IRA hasn't committed any violent acts in fifteen years; would we thus conclude that it is a "peaceful" organisation?

PIRA was only ever half of the organisation, and so long as it refrains from violence, then I would regard the whole as a reasonably peaceful group. What is absolutely undeniable is that it is now a far more peaceful organisation than once it was. And this is the key point: states, like other organisations, can be better and worse. Once upon a time, I would have regarded the whole PIRA/Sinn Fein movement as an illegitimate attempt to drive political change through morally indefensible actions. Now, on the other hand, and so long as they refrain from use of guns and bombs, I am quite comfortable regarding them as just another, legitimate political group.

It seems to me that any attempt to decide whether an organisation is violent or not has to address the fundamental functions of that organisation, and not simply how often engages in direct, visible violence.

Such an attempt can address those functions, but they are pretty insignificant compared to the actual use of violence.

Where the anarchists in question actually practising anarchism? Sounds to me like they were just scrapping with cops, and that's not something unique to anarchists, nor can I see any particular reason why it should become anarchism-in-practice just because an anarchist is doing it. (If I make a cup of tea, is that anarchism-in-practice because it's me doing it?)

Many of these guy were (and, afaik, some still are) living in various communes, most in squats and a few in a couple of collective 'subsistence' farming communities. At least one of the latter was funded by selling drugs, and apparently ended with the police being called to break up a violent confrontation over how to divide up the spoils. For all that, though, they were quite serious about their anarchism, and would talk at great length about their beliefs to anybody who was prepared to listen.

To me, the really sad thing about it was that most of them genuinely wanted to improve the world, but, thanks to all their anarchist readings, had got themselves into this mindset that it was pointless to even attempt working within the system (despite none of them ever having given it a try). The missed opportunities seem especially acute when I contrast these guys with the many people I know who have made an effort to improve the world in various small, but significant ways, and have actually succeeded in doing so.

New social forms emerge from practice, not talking. The practice of anarchist social forms means overturning the state and property, both of which are protected by law. Anarchism-as-practice, then, is face with violent suppression, and it's a bit ridiculous for someone supporting and cooperating with this suppression to ridicule anarchists for not doing enough.

Well, that's just tough. Anarchists are free to try and convince people to go along with their ideas, but so long as they reserve the right to use violence, and to attempt to overthrow 'the system' without gaining the support of the population at large, most of the rest of us are going to remain pretty relaxed about the state suppressing their activities.

(The same is true of all political extremists, btw, be they left, right, or other. If you refuse to play by the rules of peaceful politics, that's your choice. Just don't expect sympathy when you get treated like anybody else who insists on openly breaking the law.)

 

[Souron]

Why not? If there is no process in place to establish the consent of the governed, how can we know that it exists? All you have is the dubiously Stalinist logic of "you're here, therefore total consent is assumed".

We can know consent exists, because consent is a no-brainer. A baby needs the government it is born into. And after that, it's obligated to work within the system to change it.

Should I feel bound to represent the claim of Nazi prison camp guards to the gold teeth of murdered Jews? An extreme example, I admit, but hopefully it makes the point with minimum ambiguity.

You don't have the right to take Nazi gold. It might not be legitimately theirs, but it's certainly not yours.

I mean in specific regards to the matter of territorial sovereignty. You claim that the population of Ireland is beholden to the larger population of Ireland-&-Britain, and that it would be illegitimate for the Irish minority to unilaterally overried the. The only explanation you seem to offer is this,

Which as far as I can see isn't anything more than an appeal to the arbitrary authority of tradition. I mean, if that's the logic we're going by, then Britain never had any right in Ireland in the first place, because the whole thing is rightfully the property of the various clans and their chieftains.

No, it's an appeal to the fact that they were consenting British citizens before they decided to secede.

 

[Souron]

Well, the state seem to believe me beating up pedestrians and taking their wallets is not a legitimate means of acquisition, which seems in contrast to your ideas that almost all means of acquisition should be respected, and that exercise of ownership amounts to ownership.

Punishment of crime is based on harm; criminal cases are essentially claims that a certain act harms society, and everybody in it. How do long ago ill acquired lands harm you, a citizen of the state that now develops and safe guards that land?

Even if the land is immorally acquired, you have no right to it yourself.

Why? Their will can be assumed remember? So as long as a party represents someone best interest, why can't their vote for that party be assumed?

I mean you're venturing into legitimate fascist argumentation with this "social contract is something you can be assumed to enter into, therefor anything that represents the General Will represents your will, regardless of whether or not you believe that" argumentation here, so what, other then your repeated insistence that it is necessary, necessitates actual elections to represent the governed?

Although a child's consent to be a part of society can be assumed, the intent and competence of the government cannot be assumed, and must be ensured. I don't see this as a contradiction.

Yes, and if it was my obligation to live an immoral life in exchange for that, I'd prefer they hadn't.

You can hardly be held accountable for what the state does until you can vote.

 

[Princeps]

I might be willing to concede that taxes are theft only if the government is not democratic, i.e. not representative or responsive to the people. But even then you run into the problem that in a non-democratic regime, property rights are also not legitimate.

 

[Berzerker]

Property is a form of authority. Anarchists view authority as a bad thing. Therefore, property is a bad thing.

I'm not familiar with what you're referring to.

property represents the time and labor of the owner...why does the anarchist have a superior moral claim to it? by what "authority" does the anarchist walk in and live rent free?

 

[MagisterCultuum]

The improvements made by human labor represent the time and labor of the owner, but the Land itself is a scarce natural resource that is monopolized by (the threat of) force. When land has a positive economic rent, then the rentiers are aggressing by demanding rent and not redistributing it to the community.

 

[Berzerker]

land is not a scarce resource, but yeah, i get to monopolize my time and labor and i get to use force to defend them and what they represent.

why does the anarchist have a superior moral claim to my time and labor? the "community" didn't spend years working to buy that land, i did.

 

[Mise]

FWIW, I think the biggest problem with implied consent is that it really is very difficult to revoke. The weakest argument for consent is the idea that you can simply leave the country if you think the government is illegitimate. Tell that to the millions of people who have literally died at the hands of authoritarian regimes, and the billions more who have mysteriously stayed in their own countries, despite being ruled by illegitimate governments. If we step outside of Traitorfish's anarchist world where property rights are literally worse than Hitler, and step instead into Saudi Arabia, China or the former Soviet Union, it's difficult to claim that you consent to your government by virtue of being born there, or by staying there after you turn 18.

 

[Winston Hughes]

FWIW, I think the biggest problem with implied consent is that it really is very difficult to revoke. The weakest argument for consent is the idea that you can simply leave the country if you think the government is illegitimate. Tell that to the millions of people who have literally died at the hands of authoritarian regimes, and the billions more who have mysteriously stayed in their own countries, despite being ruled by illegitimate governments. If we step outside of Traitorfish's anarchist world where property rights are literally worse than Hitler, and step instead into Saudi Arabia, China or the former Soviet Union, it's difficult to claim that you consent to your government by virtue of being born there, or by staying there after you turn 18.

Indeed, and this reinforces my point that we should be talking about states being more or less legitimate, rather than treating it as a binary question.

Also, whilst consent is a relevant factor, it is far from being the only significant one, especially when we consider that universal consent is an impossible criterion to meet. Even if you somehow managed to get the agreement of all citizens who were able to consent, the arrangement will still have great influence over the lives of others (inc. those without the capacity for informed consent, citizens of other countries, sentient animals).

If we take the concept of legitimacy beyond simply "what the law says", and treat it as a moral notion, then we are obliged to consider a far broader picture than implied by the focus on the rather narrow question of consent.

 

[ParkCungHee]

Let me try again: Your philosophy prevents me from protecting myself from murders. How is it moral?

How is murdering people in retaliation moral?

 

[ParkCungHee]

property represents the time and labor of the owner...why does the anarchist have a superior moral claim to it? by what "authority" does the anarchist walk in and live rent free?

He doesn't. But the very fact that you're discussing "moral claims" suggests you're pretty uncomfortable with property rights as is, which ascribe legitimacy only to those who have secured property rights, especially since you've got the labor theory of value going in this post.

 

[Cutlass]

How is murdering people in retaliation moral?

It takes the right of aggression out of the hands of those who do it only for their personal gain.

 

[Core Imposter]

You'd get different poll results if you actually polled taxpayers and not a bunch of life slackers lurking in the basement of their parents house.

 

[Mise]

I pay my own mortgage, thanks.

 

[ParkCungHee]

It takes the right of aggression out of the hands of those who do it only for their personal gain.

What is the "right of aggression" and why is it so important to have?
If people have a right to aggression, why is it bad to use it for personal gain?

 

[Borachio]

You'd get different poll results if you actually polled taxpayers and not a bunch of life slackers lurking in the basement of their parents house.

I paid off my own mortgage, thanks.

 

[Cutlass]

What is the "right of aggression" and why is it so important to have?
If people have a right to aggression, why is it bad to use it for personal gain?

Now you're just being silly. And you're not making your point.