Something called Stephen Metcalf has pumped out a badly written and even more poorly informed anti-libertarian screed over at Slate, and rather than swat it down as so many already quite ably have, I want to pose another question:
Why are they so afraid of us?
At the risk of ruining the party, Ron Paul and Gary Johnson aren't going to get elected. Whoever the Libertarian Party nominates isn't going to get elected either. We have one congressman, one senator, no viable presidental prospects and constitute a tiny minority of the population. We control no major media outlets, hold no governorships, run no state legislatures- not even a city council has fallen under the dreaded libertarian yoke. We are a boisterous bunch, to be sure, but we are hardly a meaningful threat to anyone. Yet, unlike any other tiny political fringe group, we are the bogeymen. We are the stuff of nightmares. We are denounced at length, slandered, purposely misrepresented and furiously attacked at every turn.
Obviously, we're scaring them.
What I don't understand is, why? It can't be our concrete political objectives. We're anti-war, opposed to the whole military-industrial complex, want to stop government intrusions on civil liberties, etc., etc. We're practically left liberals ourselves, if you leave our economics out of it. And even on that, surely a rational leftist could figure out that the odds of us getting our way on economic issues is pretty slim and thus decide we'll make useful allies on other fronts. But they don't. They recoil with horror whenever faced with us.
I think it's because we're right, and it scares them.
The traditional left and right have a towering superstructure of airy nonsense about social contracts and scales of values and so forth that they use to apply a light patina of philosophical justification to their schemes. And what frightens them so badly about the libertarian argument is that it burns through that patina with one simple question:
What business is it of yours what I do?
What business is it of yours what I eat, what I drink, what I smoke, inject or inhale? What business is it of yours where I move, what I sell, what I buy, what I charge, who I love, what I watch? Where do you get off trying to tell me what to do?
They don't have an answer. Confront them and you'll get a lot of handwaving about social order and obligations and so forth. Ask them why taxation isn't stealing and they'll get very defensive, angry, even mocking, but here's the crucial point- they won't give you a real answer. A brighter one might give you some fairy story about a social contract no one has ever read, signed, or even seen, but you can never get a reality-based distinction between the government and the mafia. Because there isn't one.
Their entire towering philosophical edifice is what I referred to in an earlier post as a social reality, and the problem with social realities is that they can be destroyed through simple disbelief. What scares them about confronting this truth is that it reveals their beliefs are rooted in simple violence. If you choose not to believe that the armed men in silly outfits are actually specially empowered agents of a higher good, those same men will come and force your compliance. If you realize you never signed any social contract and want to keep using incandescent light bulbs, they will forcibly stop you. If you prefer to smoke the leaves of a plant rather than drink fermented grape juice, they will break down your door, kill your dog and drag you off to prison.
Conservatives aren't bothered by this; conservatives are typically comfortable with violence and often actually enjoy it. But the left, well, they're the good decent ones, the sensitive ones, the caring ones, the ones who know better and want to make it all better for us all. So when we expose them for what they are- violent thugs out to impose their will by force- they panic. They howl, they rage, they spew all manner of bile.
They hate us because we hold up a mirror and show them what they really are. They cannot stand the image, and they lash out, in fear and rage. They hate us because they're afraid of us, and they're afraid of us because they're afraid we're right.
1 comment:
You absolutely nailed the sentiment in most of the country with this one. It's so funny to hear people talk about voting or politicians in general as, "picking the less of the two evils", but it's so true. What I don't understand is why the American public doesn't demand more choices at the polls. The two party system in this country is ridiculous. If there was one thing that you could say is destroying the nation it would be the current political structure. Out of all the brilliant people and leaders we have in this country it only comes down to two people in the end. It's a horrible system that is archaic and is in need of a serious wake up call. I hate to say it, but I've voted for a democrat in the last three elections. Not because I agreed with all of their policies, or that I thought they were the best man for the job. I voted for them because I didn't want to waste my vote. I wouldn't identify myself as a democrat, but rather a victim of the system. I, like many americans at this point,
just want to be left alone and live my life. I don't want to worry about my freedoms being infringed upon by the government; which is something that both democrats and republicans do, and won't give up. Where's an extremely rich, charasmatic, good looking, forty year old third party candidate when you need one?
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