10 Reasons Why Libertarianism is Bullshit

[Galraedia]

I have encountered some libertarian atheists, and a video of Penn Jillette talking about his version of libertarianism I screamed BULLSHIT!


1. It's impossible. Libertarianism is impossible except for survivalist nutters and hermits. Humans need a social structure because we're a social species. Trusting that humans can moderate their own behavior on their own is just a fantasy. If we were as sparsely distributed as wolf packs, we could get along in our small groups without intervention from a higher authority in theory.... but the matriarch or patriarch would be the higher authority so even that isn't strictly libertarian. Anyway, we're long past the point in evolution where we could manage our behavior without a formal structure. Michael Shermer theorizes the optimal size for a human community to manage without any oversight is about 150. Those days are gone.

2. It's naive. It assumes people are basically good. This is a nice thought, and a refreshing break from the Christian belief that all people are sinners who need to be saved, but it's just plain wrong. Just as we differ in our DNA we differ in our personalities. Some of us will go through life making very few decisions that negatively impact others, and some of us are sociopaths. At its best, government protects the truly good from the sociopaths. Without a government, we would be reduced to lynch mobs which can only avenge bad deeds, not prevent them. And we certainly wouldn't have something like the FBI, which can trace the path of a serial killer from one area to the next based on DNA evidence, etc. I think the people who believe that "survival of the fittest ergo libertarianism" probably assume they are the fittest themselves. They don't think that they would be the victims of a sociopath. Bernie Madoff counted on this kind of hubris to make his illegal millions.


3. It's cold-hearted. For example, regulations about safety in cars aren't needed because over time car companies would be forced to make safer cars or they'd go out of business. So the people who died in fires caused by exploding gas tanks in Ford Pintos, or in wrecks caused by the design of their Corvair were just collateral damage in the evolution of better cars. People who died because of unregulated businesses did nothing to deserve that fate, except perhaps not be able to afford better cars. And the pseudo-Darwinism of libertarianism really doesn't care what the strong do to the weak. Rich and powerful people are good and deserve to be rich and powerful. The poor and powerless deserve what they get.

Read more: http://ladyatheist.blogspot.com/2011/12/10-reason-why-libertarianism-is.html

[TalkingDog]

1. Requisite addendum to the (mis) use of the word Libertarian.

[jimlup]

2. Thanks

It is important to clarify this...

[Nye Bevan]

3. Surely the "legalize drugs" and "leave Government out of abortion" parts are good (nt)

[SunSeeker]

5. Both Ron and Rand Paul are rabidly anti-abortion, they're fine with women having no liberty. nt

[JoeyT]

8. The latter is less common than you think.

I'd say less than half the libertarians I've ever met were pro-choice. Probably way less than half. It's a banned topic on many libertarian blogs because it usually turns into a thousand post flame war with pro-choice being in the minority.

A guy that would lose his fucking mind if the government told him he had to let someone live in his house for a day is often fully prepared to happily argue that the government should force a woman to allow someone to live in her body for nine months.

Gay marriage isn't even a certainty, though "support" for it is more common than support for legalized abortion. Support is in scare quotes because they claim to support it, but will often gleefully vote for a politician that thinks GLBT people should face the death penalty if they promise them lower taxes.

[Nye Bevan]

10. According to the Libertarian Party Platform....

Recognizing that abortion is a sensitive issue and that people can hold good-faith views on all sides, we believe that government should be kept out of the matter, leaving the question to each person for their conscientious consideration.

http://www.lp.org/platform

I don't have much experience with Libertarians, but any self-proclaimed Libertarian who wants to ban abortion is quite obviously a hypocrite.

[JoeyT]

11. If I remember the argument correctly:

It's basically that the fetus is a human being and as such has as many rights as the woman, and that the woman entered into a contract with the fetus when she became pregnant, and she has no right to unilaterally terminate that contract. I'm trying to represent the argument in good faith, but I can't make it sound any less stupid than that, no matter how hard I try.

It's far more common among religious libertarians, much less common but not totally non-existent among non-religious ones.

[Hydra]

4. I like what another DUer said about Ayn Rand and her less than amazing worshippers

"Libertarianism is something you grow out of."

Even Rand wound up becoming a "taker&quot I would argue she always was) and grew out of it.

The Libertarian movement is a bunch of smug people who haven't had reality bop them on the head yet. It always comes if they live long enough, though...

[1StrongBlackMan]

6. Actually ...

2. It's naive. It assumes people are basically good.

I would see it's quite the opposite ... libertarianism assumes that people are equally ruthless and uncaring.

[grahamhgreen]

7. Agreed!

[JoeyT]

9. Agreed.

Selfishness is a virtue doesn't come close to assuming people are basically good. It's a "Fuck them before they fuck you!" mentality. Everything becomes a zero-sum game.

It often *claims* to assume people are basically good, for example when it can screech about how private charity will feed the poor (norillyguys it will!) so we shouldn't be paying taxes to feed hungry children, but that's just being, to borrow your description, ruthless and uncaring. They don't give a shit if hungry kids get fed, they just don't want to pay taxes. If you push them long enough you can usually get them to admit it.