So, what's wrong with Libertarianism?

Your logic is correct, yet I still disagree with your conclusion because I believe premise 1 is incorrect.

You see, it's not so hard...

 

You don't believe I posted that?

 

Your claim that labour mobility in the 19th century was generally lower than it was today is empirically false. As far as anyone can tell, you're basing that on an attempt to somehow infer labour mobility from wage-levels, or in other words, making stuff up.

 

Just because some people make that a definition does not mean that it is true.

 

It depends whether you're talking about a [free][market] or a [free market]. The former is a compound known comprising the words "free" and "market", so its definition is constrained by the definitions of these terms. The latter is a completely independent noun which only possesses the superficial form of a compound noun, so can mean whatever you want. Perhaps it has something to do with economic regulations, but perhaps it refers to an overweight cat, or the smell of frying onions. Who can say?

 

Whichever it's supposed to mean, it doesn't change the fact that the majority of the actors in the market are being coerced by those who happen to have more power than they do. The coercion does not go away just because it's not the government doing it.

 

I pointed out that Marxism et al were also intellectualizations not as any 'defence', but because I figured some US right-wingers reading this would take it as an ideological slur against their Malboro-man fantasy, and thus I also 'attacked' their big evil ideology. Not a slur. Libertarianism and Marxism are both intellectual jokes, but they are interesting and important historically and politically. People doing intellectual history always seem to think 'big ideas' matter, but in truth most human behaviour is governed by forces unknown to the conscious brain. If you want to understand how they work and why they matter, reading them in depth and arguing with them is pretty inefficient way of going about it. You can better understand these ideas by asking 'who do they serve', 'who benefits' and 'who loses', 'who publicly advocates them', 'who pays for their promotion', and so on. It matters a litte, but not very much, what one random academic or 'thinker' with temporary social power says in one place, another somewhere else, any ideology to be effective politically has have a simple form people without brains, time or resources can engage with. That's the only bit that really matters.

 

I'm willing to pitch in to send the libertarians to Somalia. They will be more than happy to move to a place that conforms perfectly to their ideology.

 

Isn't a term Free Market a compound to begin with? Under all circumstances? Pretty much every country in history - including the USSR - had some form of a market economy, but a free market economy is much more narrow term, and depending on your definition, may have never been achieved.

 

I would have thought the mention of tubby cats made it fairly clear I was being ironic?

 

Only for that sentence friend.

 

I don't see your irony. We see the irony of the compound word [free market] when (or if, depending) it is something of unfreedom.

 

Okay, well, the point was that many advocates of "free market" use it the term as an ideological shibboleth without real semantic content, and by treating this with exaggerated tolerance, I was commenting that it is in fact a load of old bollocks. See?

 

Oh, well yeah you made that super clear just by sentence 1. I interpreted the irony as belonging to those who use it unironically, with you playfully demonstrating that.

 

Oh. I guess? I'm not actual sure that works, exactly.

 

We experience the irony in the observation? Or something?

 

...Maybe? Ugh, where's a literature student when you need one...

 

let's just start over. Kaiserguard is agreeing with you, anyway. I think he just slightly missed the point.

 

Libertarianism =/= Anarchy.

 

Somalia =/= Anarchy, either. Non-identities all round!