The ethics of unilateral secession

[Cutlass]

Why do you Americans have such a huge problem with succession? Get over the Civil War; it was in the 19th century it isn't relevent now.
Also I'm a Satanist according to Cutlass?! that is brilliant

In TF's hypothetical I do not see any reason why the Republic of Montana cannot morally leave the Union, beyond petty nationalist unionists :S.
Take Scotland for example, in my ideal GB they would be a part of our nation - but if the people give a democratic mandate wanting independence, it's not my call to make and they should do as they please.

..and yeah i'm a proud statist MHHHHH enforcing my morality on others through the mechanisms of the state

We'll get over it when the traitors accept the fact that they lost, and deserved to lose. We are not the ones keeping the issue alive, they are.

And I wasn't referring to you on the other, but to those who pretend they are Christians while acting the opposite.

 

[Quackers]

Ahh ok I thought you were.

Can't you, for the sake of the discussion, pretend the Civil War never happened - ignore the ramblings of the "South gunna rattle again" people - and understand there is a good case for seccession? Or is it just hard to stomach?

 

[Traitorfish]

Treat the individual people as people and enforce the laws.

I'm afraid that's a bit nebulous. What concrete actions do you think the Federal Government should take in response to such a secession?

And you feel no obligation to pay them back for all that they did for you? If they were abusive, that would be fine. But if they supported you, and you won't reciprocate, then that just makes you a bad person.

Perhaps that is a case, but how do you draw a line between "you are a jerk" and "I'm going to shoot at you until you stop being a jerk"? Because that would seem to be what you're arguing for in declaring unilateral secession a criminal action.

And what does a tiny and isolated community really have as a comparison to what most other people have to live in? For ever Iceland there will be a Somalia.

As I said, I don't disagree that there are complexities that simply noting the Icelandic Commonwealth existed doesn't even begin to address, but all I'm saying is that it illustrates that there are not in the most fundamental principle no alternative to state-based forms of social organisation. Simply saying "ah, but it's different now!" is as lazy as if I held up the Icelandic Commonwealth as an example of how we could make statelessness work tomorrow. The state may have the weight of historical inertia on its side, but that does not suggest that we can default to it without question, any more than people living fifty years ago could simply default to Jim Crow or to New Dealism (to pick one from each side of the bad/good spectrum, ken ). I'm not saying that you have to become an anarchist- it may be that even the most critical analysis leads you back to where you started!- but that a robust politics should be able to absorb these criticism without having to resort to "tish and pshaw" dismissals.

 

[Dachs]

Can't you, for the sake of the discussion, pretend the Civil War never happened - ignore the ramblings of the "South gunna rattle again" people - and understand there is a good case for seccession? Or is it just hard to stomach?

This is a bit rich, coming from an English Briton. Ain't no secessionist movement in America as strong as the SNP or Plaid Cymru is in the UK.

 

[Crezth]

Why do you Americans have such a huge problem with succession? Get over the Civil War; it was in the 19th century it isn't relevent now.

I guess the defining conflict of a century doesn't have any persistent effects.

 

[Cutlass]

Ahh ok I thought you were.

Can't you, for the sake of the discussion, pretend the Civil War never happened - ignore the ramblings of the "South gunna rattle again" people - and understand there is a good case for seccession? Or is it just hard to stomach?

We've discussed that in a million other places. You have to make a case of it. And even then unilateral secession is not likely to be acceptable unless all other options for peaceful coexistence are off the table. Take Czechoslovakia as an example, a country can desolve peacefully when all sides mutually agree to it. But it takes that mutual agreement, it takes a legal process acceptable to both sides. Unilateral action is not the way to go about it.

I'm afraid that's a bit nebulous. What concrete actions do you think the Federal Government should take in response to such a secession?

What are the specific actions being taken? Why do I need to define a specific response when I don't know the specific circumstances?

Perhaps that is a case, but how do you draw a line between "you are a jerk" and "I'm going to shoot at you until you stop being a jerk"? Because that would seem to be what you're arguing for in declaring unilateral secession a criminal action.

As I said, I don't disagree that there are complexities that simply noting the Icelandic Commonwealth existed doesn't even begin to address, but all I'm saying is that it illustrates that there are not in the most fundamental principle no alternative to state-based forms of social organisation. Simply saying "ah, but it's different now!" is as lazy as if I held up the Icelandic Commonwealth as an example of how we could make statelessness work tomorrow. The state may have the weight of historical inertia on its side, but that does not suggest that we can default to it without question, any more than people living fifty years ago could simply default to Jim Crow or to New Dealism (to pick one from each side of the bad/good spectrum, ken ). I'm not saying that you have to become an anarchist- it may be that even the most critical analysis leads you back to where you started!- but that a robust politics should be able to absorb these criticism without having to resort to "tish and pshaw" dismissals.

I haven't seen a defense of a stateless society that seems at all reasonable to me in the modern world and large populations. Until I see that, the argument is just fiction to me. I can't take it seriously, because I can't imagine it. Old Iceland may not have had anything you recognize as a state, but they still had some way of protecting people from one another.

 

[Core Imposter]

Old Iceland may not have had anything you recognize as a state, but they still had some way of protecting people from one another.

Do you suppose they might have taught their men to be men and told them to stand their ground?

 

[Cutlass]

Do you suppose they might have taught their men to be men and told them to stand their ground?

How would that be relevant to anything?

 

[Traitorfish]

What are the specific actions being taken? Why do I need to define a specific response when I don't know the specific circumstances?

What further details do you need? I would have thought that I gave enough detail to work with, but I could spin some more if necessary.

Is it not the case that you think seceding territories should be forcibly brought back into the union?

I haven't seen a defense of a stateless society that seems at all reasonable to me in the modern world and large populations. Until I see that, the argument is just fiction to me. I can't take it seriously, because I can't imagine it. Old Iceland may not have had anything you recognize as a state, but they still had some way of protecting people from one another.

Well, like I said, I'm not asking you to become an anarchist, I'm just asking you to think critically about what you're actually advocating. It's not about taking two competing policy proposals and then slamming them together to see which one survives (I really don't know why everyone here always insists on defaulting to that), it's about developing a critical analysis of the existing organisation of things, of understanding what is actually "necessary" in society and why, rather than simply taking what we find ourselves with "necessary" because we can't think of an alternative. If you don't have that, then you're really just a conservative who likes welfare.

Do you suppose they might have taught their men to be men and told them to stand their ground?

Actually, that was kind of a problem for them. Nordic pride lead to rather too many scuffles, and scuffles in a world over-burned with big sharp axes meant that blood-feuds where the biggest threat to social stability that the Commonwealth faced. Probably would have been a better if they'd all been a bit wimpier.