Friday, December 28, 2012

My Divorce from Libertarianism

Back in 2007, sometime in May, as a faithful neocon turned paleoconservative, I watched the South Carolina Republican Presidential Debate for the same reasons that anyone engages in anything political: to reaffirm my beliefs in a group orgy and mock those who disagree for their ignorance and cruel intentions. The plan met merely moderate success. One debater voiced an opinion which made me predictably furious. And eventually, this debater made me agree with that terrible opinion which I found so misguided in the past. For the next several years, I spent no small amount of time and money promoting Ron Paul and the Libertarian movement in general. And in the spirit of that unlikely conversion in 2007, I turned my back on the Libertarian movement in 2012.

Libertarianism can be rather effectively summarized by citing a few principles: the Non-aggression principle, private property, homesteading rights,. At its core, Libertarianism is simpler than many political philosophies because it essentially does not advocate anything. We often sum this up with the term "Negative rights" - that is - the right to be left alone. Libertarians spend a great deal of time delineating exactly when one possesses the right to be left alone, filling lexicons with names for these individual rights, imposing a total ordering on these rights, and complaining about even the most minute violation of these rights.

Although only Negative rights seem to be discussed by Libertarians, there exists a natural dual to these rights which is of equal importance to the cohesion of the theory as a whole. Without the complement, the philosophy survives from a deontological viewpoint but thoroughly fails as any sort of complete socio-cultural means of organization. The proper foundation for Libertarianism is that of Negative rights and Positive action. The latter often finds itself omitted from discussion since too many Libertarians are exactly what people accuse Libertarians of being: self-interested people with comfortable lives who find any social obligation to be a detriment to their happiness.

Negative rights are easy. They're fun for everyone. Positive action is hard and not so fun. Succinctly, Positive action replaces the political process with determined action by individuals. With our current system of organization, the public will recognize a problem which must be fixed. For the purposes of illustration let this problem be a cultural glorification of violence and incidents of spree-killing. Once the problem is noticed, various solutions are proposed: media coverage which focuses on the victims rather than mythological depictions of the perpetrator of shootings is needed, entertainment must be less violent as to stop a cultural desensitization to violence,  firearms are too prevalent and need to be reigned in, firearms are not prevalent enough, and so on. Finally, we come to the time when solutions must be implemented. Here the great perversion occurs where political and indirect action replace personal and direct action. At this point the government is lobbied and the call for the force of law begins. We demand that government make the media's coverage balanced. Bureaus and Boards must be erected stop violence in entertainment. Armed guards need to be posted at schools. Government needs to step away so that the force of dereliction itself can solve the issue.

People will clamor and scream for anyone else to do something to fix a problem. The political process itself atrophies the actions of individuals. The path of least resistance is encouraged. And this situation is completely ignored by most Libertarians and the movement in general. As they call for the government to abdicate power, they ignore the void which must be filled in the wake blind to the unfortunately obvious reality that mere negligence is insufficient to build a social unit. The great radical notion of Libertarianism is the notion of Positive action.  Individuals alone have the obligation and the means to bring about change. The moral duty to such action cannot be spread across the aggregate population of a geographical area. The moral duty to action is not fulfilled by mere group inclusion in a body nor in vocal and philosophical support. Libertarians having the largest exposure in their history had a chance to preach the path to change via acting rather than passively complaining about even the most trite issues. The opportunity was ignored.

Libertarianism as spread too often today offers no real solutions to a world in desperate need of them. It suggests them, but stasis cannot breed change. Negative rights exist as means of defense on one hand and on the other as an arbiter to ensure that the room for individuals to act towards improving the world exists. Negligence of the second function is easy. Statism and broken Libertarianism share a common appeal. They both suggest that all problems can be solved by others. An omnipotent government direction by an omniscient social consciousness in the case of the former, and simple addition by subtraction where a healthy society springs spontaneously from the rubble of a toppled government in the latter. Both are equally full of delusion. I, having no interest in a lazy delusion, no longer wish to count myself a member of either camp.

We spend far too much time forcing others to act and thinking of what others ought to do. Nobody ought to do anything except ourselves.

No comments:

Post a Comment