PoAC: Where Libertarians Go Wrong
Sep. 28th, 2005 04:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
velvetpageI had a (thankfully brief) discussion with a libertarian yesterday in another journal. It got me thinking.
As far as I can figure out, libertarians believe that people should take responsibility for their own lives and their own choices. All people have the opportunity to make choices, good or bad, that will affect their lives, and those who make good choices will be rewarded in the long run with good results. Those who make bad or indifferent choices will be similarly rewarded with bad or indifferent results. They believe that the government should not be in the business of helping people to make bad choices by keeping the nasty consequences at bay; these consequences are the natural result of their choices and are to be learned from. Government should be as small as possible, because big government is usually engaged in supporting in some way those who refuse to support themselves or who have made bad choices resulting in their own lack of support. Intelligence and industry should be enough to see that anyone who wants to succeed, can - but if they don't, it's a result of a lack of one or the other and that should not be encouraged.
I believe in the concept of self-determination. I couldn't be a teacher if I didn't. I believe that people have the chance throughout their lives to make choices that will positively or negatively affect their state of being, and that people should strive to make choices with the future in mind. I also believe in living up to one's responsibilities. Most of the ills in society can be traced back to someone who didn't fulfill their responsibilities. Life would be better for everyone if more people attempted to meet their responsibilities.
Now, the libertarian yesterday made some comparisons about possible good and bad choices that could affect someone's long-term stability. One could spend thousands every year flying to furry conventions all over the place, or one could save and invest that money. One could spend one's time jerking off to furry porn, or one could be industrious, get a good job, work hard at it, and earn more in the process. There were one or two other examples, but one thing struck me about all of them: they had an assumption of middle-class about them. They all assumed that basic bodily needs of food, shelter, and clothing were met. They assumed a minimum level of education required to get that better job, or access to the improved education necessary. They assumed health, or at least access to enough health care to function well on a regular basis.
For me, the assumptions were valid, though the examples used were a bit off-target. I am decidedly middle-class, and always have been. There have been only a few times in my life when my parents weren't sure where the next meal was coming from; I've never lived more than a few weeks like that as an adult. I have a university education which, while expensive, was clearly not out of my reach financially or otherwise. I am in basic good health, with access to the medical care I require. It makes perfect sense that I should be reaping what I sow. I am. I have a good life.
But what about if the assumptions were not valid?
I have students in my class who regularly find themselves struggling for basic needs. I have a student who is effectively the mother to her two younger siblings. She makes their school lunches, ensures that the lunches get into their bags, checks their homework, makes at least some of the dinners in the evening. She often misses breakfast herself while seeing to the little ones. Where is Mom? In bed, mostly. This little girl - she's turning nine next week - comes close to falling asleep in class several times a week. She's undernourished, and she's behind in reading and math. The libertarian model has this child starving on the streets because of her mother's bad choices and lack of responsibility. It has her homeless and uneducated. In short, it has her repeating the cycle begun by her mother, because she doesn't know any better. In seven years, she'll get the chance to decide if she wants to remain in school or not; effectively, she could make that decision earlier than that simply by not showing up. Higher education? Where would the money come from? Who would look after the younger siblings while she got it? Will she have enough basic education to allow her to get into a college program, if we can't help her read better?
Her choices are limited, not by her own previous bad choices, but by her mother's bad choices. She herself is taking on more than any child should be expected to do. She has more responsibility than many people twice or three times her age. Yet she is the one who will suffer here.
Let's take an even more telling example. My first year teaching, I had a student named Matt. He was a really nice kid, in a boisterous, speak-his-mind kind of way. He was popular, and he was smart. He was also seriously learning disabled. He couldn't spell any word longer than three letters; he got some of those wrong. Spell-checkers were no use to him because he couldn't recognize the right word if it was in the list, and if he got the first few letters wrong the right word wouldn't even be there. I remember his face when I gave him an A for his performance in the class debate. I had placed him in a group full of strong students who did the research and discussed their findings, helping Matt to refine his arguments and writing things down for him so that the whole group could understand. Matt never once looked at his notes; they wouldn't have done him any good. He spoke from his memory and from what he believed, and it rocked the entire class.
Matt was convinced that he was stupid. Nothing I could say or do would convince him otherwise. He couldn't read, therefore he was stupid. He figured he'd probably end up living on the reserve (he was Native) for the rest of his life, unable to work because who would hire a stupid guy like him?
Where is Matt supposed to start making good choices? Higher education is, if not beyond his reach, certainly at the very limit of it. It's not easy getting the kind of accommodations he'd need at college or university, especially considering the amount of work it would take to get him there. Even a basic grade-eight reading level was probably outside of his grasp, because of a condition he was born with. Employment will always be a difficult thing for him. Valuing himself enough to make good choices was a problem when he was twelve; how much moreso when he's now eighteen?
It's all well and good to say he should pull up his socks and work to better himself. He's got a lot further to go than your average middle-class kid to get there. No one's choices are really to blame for this; just biology.
The reason I could never be a libertarian is because I believe it is in society's best interests to help people make the best choices they can - the choices that will be best, not only for them, but for their families and for society as well. I am prepared to subsidize housing for the poor if it means the parents work one job instead of two or three. I am prepared to subsidize higher education (though I'd like to look at how that's done) if it means kids who have no money can still get the best education their intelligence will allow for. I am prepared to permit a government program to provide a year-long maternity leave to working moms, so that they can breastfeed and spend time bonding with their children and recover fully from childbirth, without undue financial hardship. I am prepared to provide cheap daycare in the hope that more children will be school-ready when they get to kindergarten. All of these are things that a libertarian would say people should provide for themselves and their children, or that perhaps should be subsidized by charitable organizations rather than the public.
I am not prepared to let children slip through mile-wide cracks caused by their parents' bad choices. I am not prepared to punish the children for the sins of their parents. I'm not prepared to let people die for want of simple medicines that are widely available, but too expensive.
And, most important to yesterday's discussion, I'm not prepared to let people die in contaminated floodwaters because they didn't have the foresight to own a car.
As far as I can figure out, libertarians believe that people should take responsibility for their own lives and their own choices. All people have the opportunity to make choices, good or bad, that will affect their lives, and those who make good choices will be rewarded in the long run with good results. Those who make bad or indifferent choices will be similarly rewarded with bad or indifferent results. They believe that the government should not be in the business of helping people to make bad choices by keeping the nasty consequences at bay; these consequences are the natural result of their choices and are to be learned from. Government should be as small as possible, because big government is usually engaged in supporting in some way those who refuse to support themselves or who have made bad choices resulting in their own lack of support. Intelligence and industry should be enough to see that anyone who wants to succeed, can - but if they don't, it's a result of a lack of one or the other and that should not be encouraged.
I believe in the concept of self-determination. I couldn't be a teacher if I didn't. I believe that people have the chance throughout their lives to make choices that will positively or negatively affect their state of being, and that people should strive to make choices with the future in mind. I also believe in living up to one's responsibilities. Most of the ills in society can be traced back to someone who didn't fulfill their responsibilities. Life would be better for everyone if more people attempted to meet their responsibilities.
Now, the libertarian yesterday made some comparisons about possible good and bad choices that could affect someone's long-term stability. One could spend thousands every year flying to furry conventions all over the place, or one could save and invest that money. One could spend one's time jerking off to furry porn, or one could be industrious, get a good job, work hard at it, and earn more in the process. There were one or two other examples, but one thing struck me about all of them: they had an assumption of middle-class about them. They all assumed that basic bodily needs of food, shelter, and clothing were met. They assumed a minimum level of education required to get that better job, or access to the improved education necessary. They assumed health, or at least access to enough health care to function well on a regular basis.
For me, the assumptions were valid, though the examples used were a bit off-target. I am decidedly middle-class, and always have been. There have been only a few times in my life when my parents weren't sure where the next meal was coming from; I've never lived more than a few weeks like that as an adult. I have a university education which, while expensive, was clearly not out of my reach financially or otherwise. I am in basic good health, with access to the medical care I require. It makes perfect sense that I should be reaping what I sow. I am. I have a good life.
But what about if the assumptions were not valid?
I have students in my class who regularly find themselves struggling for basic needs. I have a student who is effectively the mother to her two younger siblings. She makes their school lunches, ensures that the lunches get into their bags, checks their homework, makes at least some of the dinners in the evening. She often misses breakfast herself while seeing to the little ones. Where is Mom? In bed, mostly. This little girl - she's turning nine next week - comes close to falling asleep in class several times a week. She's undernourished, and she's behind in reading and math. The libertarian model has this child starving on the streets because of her mother's bad choices and lack of responsibility. It has her homeless and uneducated. In short, it has her repeating the cycle begun by her mother, because she doesn't know any better. In seven years, she'll get the chance to decide if she wants to remain in school or not; effectively, she could make that decision earlier than that simply by not showing up. Higher education? Where would the money come from? Who would look after the younger siblings while she got it? Will she have enough basic education to allow her to get into a college program, if we can't help her read better?
Her choices are limited, not by her own previous bad choices, but by her mother's bad choices. She herself is taking on more than any child should be expected to do. She has more responsibility than many people twice or three times her age. Yet she is the one who will suffer here.
Let's take an even more telling example. My first year teaching, I had a student named Matt. He was a really nice kid, in a boisterous, speak-his-mind kind of way. He was popular, and he was smart. He was also seriously learning disabled. He couldn't spell any word longer than three letters; he got some of those wrong. Spell-checkers were no use to him because he couldn't recognize the right word if it was in the list, and if he got the first few letters wrong the right word wouldn't even be there. I remember his face when I gave him an A for his performance in the class debate. I had placed him in a group full of strong students who did the research and discussed their findings, helping Matt to refine his arguments and writing things down for him so that the whole group could understand. Matt never once looked at his notes; they wouldn't have done him any good. He spoke from his memory and from what he believed, and it rocked the entire class.
Matt was convinced that he was stupid. Nothing I could say or do would convince him otherwise. He couldn't read, therefore he was stupid. He figured he'd probably end up living on the reserve (he was Native) for the rest of his life, unable to work because who would hire a stupid guy like him?
Where is Matt supposed to start making good choices? Higher education is, if not beyond his reach, certainly at the very limit of it. It's not easy getting the kind of accommodations he'd need at college or university, especially considering the amount of work it would take to get him there. Even a basic grade-eight reading level was probably outside of his grasp, because of a condition he was born with. Employment will always be a difficult thing for him. Valuing himself enough to make good choices was a problem when he was twelve; how much moreso when he's now eighteen?
It's all well and good to say he should pull up his socks and work to better himself. He's got a lot further to go than your average middle-class kid to get there. No one's choices are really to blame for this; just biology.
The reason I could never be a libertarian is because I believe it is in society's best interests to help people make the best choices they can - the choices that will be best, not only for them, but for their families and for society as well. I am prepared to subsidize housing for the poor if it means the parents work one job instead of two or three. I am prepared to subsidize higher education (though I'd like to look at how that's done) if it means kids who have no money can still get the best education their intelligence will allow for. I am prepared to permit a government program to provide a year-long maternity leave to working moms, so that they can breastfeed and spend time bonding with their children and recover fully from childbirth, without undue financial hardship. I am prepared to provide cheap daycare in the hope that more children will be school-ready when they get to kindergarten. All of these are things that a libertarian would say people should provide for themselves and their children, or that perhaps should be subsidized by charitable organizations rather than the public.
I am not prepared to let children slip through mile-wide cracks caused by their parents' bad choices. I am not prepared to punish the children for the sins of their parents. I'm not prepared to let people die for want of simple medicines that are widely available, but too expensive.
And, most important to yesterday's discussion, I'm not prepared to let people die in contaminated floodwaters because they didn't have the foresight to own a car.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 09:40 pm (UTC)In fact, I'd say that based on my understanding of the non-extremist libertarian party line, that your politics are very libertarian. That is, my impression is that you are socially progressive, but otherwise conservative (by Canadian standards). Of course, that means that US libertarians will probably seem way too conservative to you. But you might find that Canadian libertarians are quite agreeable. Unless I'm way off my mark about their politics.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 09:51 pm (UTC)Here's what they say:
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 09:59 pm (UTC)Heck, the Klu Klux Klan describes themselves as an advocacy group dedicated to preserving racial diversity. (Not that I equate Libertarianism with racism.)
Anyway, the article talks about the various strains of Libertarianism.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 10:33 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 09:42 pm (UTC)I find the rigidly dogmatic interpretation of libertarianism, by those who purport to be libertarians and thus all about individual liberty, to be quite frustrating. I cannot help but wonder if you feel a similar frustration when faced with people using the term "intelligent design" to signify a dogmatic and rigid adherence to a strictly literal biblical interpretation of the beginning of things.
I consider myself quite libertarian, but not in the way the most vocal libertarians seem to be. I think your writing above laid out my personal issues with libertarianism, at least as it's now being interpreted, very clearly. Thank you.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 09:56 pm (UTC)I once asked on a libertarian community what kind of volunteer work/charity work they did.
There were people who gave blood, or gave a little to charity. One person maybe mentioned volunteering as a tutor, but that was about it. I do know one woman who is very vocal about her libertarian path and she makes a point of making volunteer work a big part of her life. THAT I could deal with, if I saw a lot of the hard core libertarians at least volunteering to help the les fortunate. But I am not seeing that.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 10:28 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-29 12:29 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-29 03:02 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-29 11:46 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 09:49 pm (UTC)Dumbass.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-29 11:48 am (UTC)I might agree with some Libertarian ideas in normal circumstances, but the idea of letting the poor fend for themselves in the middle of a huge disaster - that's not just conservative, it's immoral.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 09:55 pm (UTC)There are basically four big bones I have to pick with these guys;
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 10:03 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 10:29 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 10:19 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 10:37 pm (UTC)I am (or at least, i strive to be) an advocate for good parenting. I have a pretty good idea what it takes to be a good parent, and what it takes to raise good kids who will have a good work ethic and will contribute to society over the long-term. I rejoice to see parents who are raising good kids. Again, the world would be a nicer place if everyone strove to raise good kids.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 11:56 pm (UTC)I so want to go over there and take their kids for a couple of hours so they can go get parenting courses.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-29 11:51 am (UTC)Of course, it would be condescending - but it would also be designed to HELP THEIR KIDS, and them, have a nice family life.
I've come across some families where I'd like to see that happen. I've also seen suggestions that school boards should be offering parenting courses for free to members of the community, in school buildings. I think it's a great idea if we can find the money.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-29 05:23 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-29 09:56 pm (UTC)It seems to me there's never been a president who was not rich - most were rich from birth, even. That in itself highlights a problem with the system.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-10-03 06:48 pm (UTC)The U.S. really needs to remove all real power from the presidents office and give that power to a prime minister who's not directly elected. Maybe then they'll get someone whose core competency isn't looking good in public.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 10:42 pm (UTC)Found tanked out of their brains in Leicester Sq perhaps but not living in a cardboard box.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-28 11:00 pm (UTC)I think it's the responsibility primarily of charitable organizations to provide for the ones who slip through the cracks rather than the government, though of course, since charitable organizations are all too often overstretched as it is, the government is inevitably obliged to step in. The problem with government is that once it steps in, it does so with jackboots and takes over like a bossy older sibling, elbowing the "ineffective" charitable organizations out of the way more often than not.
Government should not be any bigger than absolutely, positively necessary. The problem is that the bigger government gets, the bigger it wants to get. It starts regulating, one way or another, small things that it has no business poking its nose into, and is inevitably corrupted entirely too easily, with the corruption becoming easier as the government becomes bigger and has more regulations that people don't want to go to the trouble of obeying, and thus encourage officials responsible for enforcing those regulations to look the other way by whatever means lie at hand.
Governmental nature is human nature magnified to the extremes of recognition. - usually on the negative end of the spectrum. When the government has programs that encourage people to make the best choices they can, it starts feeling its oats and pokes its nose into the lives of people that are making decent choices but the wrong ones according to the government.
People in urban ares often do not have cars because in normal urban circumstances, the foresight shows parking problems, pollution problems, etc. No single person can plan for every contingency, especially more-than-likely one-time contingencies such as the situation in New Orleans. Unfortunately, the government, whose job it is to plan for extreme contingencies, was distracted by poking its nose where it only marginally belonged at best, or had been corrupted to the point where it was too lazy to actually put the plans into practice on one level or another, or some combination of that and other factors. Thus, buses weren't available to take people out, even though the plan stated that they would be.
Now, for Rita, planning was much better, mainly because the example of what could go wrong was so blatantly before them. There were buses available to take people who didn't have other means of transportation out of the area. Those who chose to stay do deserve the consequences of their actions. Unfortunately, there were probably children whose parents chose to stay and keep their children with them. Those children had to live with the consequences of their parents' choices. It's highly unfortunate that that happens, but unless we want to take all children away from all parents and do what society's consensus says is best for them, it's going to keep happening.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-29 12:08 am (UTC)Like many of them, I was extremely lucky. My parents were involved in my schooling and my father is still involved in my life, helping, advising, and protecting me. I'm healthy. I had a reasonably stable childhood, and it was possible, when I couldn't handle college because of my ADD and other issues for me to see a specialist and get a couple of very expensive prescriptions to make focusing and remaining emotionally balanced possible. Unlike them, I can see that if I'd been without even ONE of these things, I would not have made all the "good choices" that I made. And what about, for example, people whose houses and livelihoods are destroyed by Katrina or Rita? Could they have "chosen" not to be hit by a hurricane? (Yes, they could have lived elsewhere, and risked tornadoes, or earthquakes, or blizzards, or typhoons, or simple house fires.)
So I'm not inherently better or more deserving of a good outcome than many of these people, and thus the inequality strikes me. And the complete lack of empathy and understanding of someone who cannot see that their good outcomes do not make them special except in the sense that they're especialy lucky boggles my mind.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-29 11:54 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-29 06:00 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-29 12:29 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-29 04:00 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-29 06:35 am (UTC)I'm probably going to get jumped for this, but I am essentially a libertarian.
However, and this is a fairly big however, it needs to be established that "libertarian" is a fairly expansive word and encompasses many different types of people, from apolitical nihilists to Randite Objectivists to classical libertarian socialists (ie anarchists) like myself.
The Libertarian you refer to is obviously of the American variety, and usually spelled with a capital "L" (as in the Libertarian Party) or possibly an outright Randite, like the one recently in
As I comment on a few things that you touched on here, please keep in mind that these are very different philosophies.
libertarian --> Anti-authority, anti-hierarchy
Libertarian --> As above, but usually associated with the Libertarian Party of the USA and explicitly pro-capitalist.
"...an assumption of middle-class about them"
I totally agree, and it's one reason why I give these people little credit. It's great for someone who has never worried about their next meal to extol the virtues of the market, but that means little to those who need bread *now*.
For any human being to ignore the effects that poverty and class has on other human beings is criminal, in my opinion. And Katrina was an excellent example of this, in so many ways.
And the same people that are so anti-government and yet care so much about markets and money seem to be oblivious to such basic questions as:
a)who defines property
b)who defends property rights
c)who makes the money
"The reason I could never be a libertarian is because I believe it is in society's best interests to help people make the best choices they can - the choices that will be best, not only for them, but for their families and for society as well."
What you are arguing against here is not so much libertarianism so much as pondering how society should be organized. It is perfectly reasonable for a society to organize itself without hierarchy or authority but still provide a support network for all members of society.
The problem I see with Libertarians is that, because they extol the virtues of capitalism, they tend to see everything, even human suffering, within the context of markets. This is not a feature of libertarianism in general but of capitalism specifically. None of the libertarians I associate with would sit idly by while people suffered.
At the same time as the person you were talking to may have wanted to sell life-preservers to drowning people, there were libertarian socialists setting up free clinics and schools for the survivors in New Orleans.
I see it as a question of solidarity... never charity. In fact, I hate the "c" word.
"I am prepared to permit a government program to provide a year-long maternity leave to working moms, so that they can breastfeed and spend time bonding with their children and recover fully from childbirth, without undue financial hardship."
Which is cool and all, but such a program could also be organized without a government and thus be consistent with libertarian principles. (Not without major restructuring of our society, of course).
"And, most important to yesterday's discussion, I'm not prepared to let people die in contaminated floodwaters because they didn't have the foresight to own a car."
Hear! Hear!
It's sad that these people are even given a voice for their disgusting beliefs, and I deeply resent that I am sometimes considered in the same category as them. And all because of a capital "L" :)
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-29 11:59 am (UTC)I have one question: if huge social change (of the sort that would allow government welfare programs to become non-government programs) were not in the offing, would you support the government version instead, for the most part?
If you do, then we're in near-total agreement on this one. :)
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-29 12:19 pm (UTC)"I have one question: if huge social change (of the sort that would allow government welfare programs to become non-government programs) were not in the offing, would you support the government version instead, for the most part?"
Well... to a point. I'm no revolutionary.
However, I don't see things changing without some kind of pressure on the state to concede its powers to us little folks. Sometimes, it needs to be encouraged. For me, it's ok that it take us a while to get there gradually, so long as we do get there eventually, and so long as there is actual progress and not just the illusion of it (which is often the case, IMO). Think evolution rather than revolution.
I don't know if that sufficiently answers your question, but I can expand, if not.
Keep in mind, I was not so much trying to engage you in any kind of debate about the merits of libertarianism (socialist or whatever). My intention was more to explain the difficulty in analyzing libertarians as a group, because they are simply way too diverse... most anarchists and "anarcho"-capitalists hate each other, for example.
I appreciate your way of thinking though. I think we are mostly in agreement about *that* kind of "libertarian" and I could add quite a bit to your criticism :)
(no subject)
Date: 2005-10-03 07:03 pm (UTC)Personally, I don't think it will happen in our lifetimes, and I doubt it will ever happen. The problem with libertarianism is they fall into the same trap as communism when they outline how to deal with social problems. Think about it a while and I think you will see that private charity will never be able to keep up with public need. As soon as one person decides to opt out of the charity, the system begins to collapse.
Of course, it doesn't help that I think a large number of libertarians are in it for the "don't take my money" aspect of libertarian philosophy. They're the libertarian capitalists mentioned above, and they will never provide one ounce of charity to their fellows until some grand misfortune befalls them and humbles their world outlook.
On the social side, I like the philosphy of liberty, though.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-10-03 07:40 pm (UTC)