“Truth? You can't handle the truth!”

[Modern Panther]

The gist of your argument seems to be that there's no need for anti discrimination laws because there's no way that people would buy from a company that treats others badly.
That is obviously not true. 

You've also confused the ability to pay for something with being discriminated against, to justify another of your ridiculous examples.  There's a clear difference between "I won't sell you a product at a reduced price" and " I refuse to sell you a service you require because you're a Jew".

[Frank]

that shopkeeper risks alienating a large proportion of the customer base, and diminished profits, through (discriminating against others). If somebody wants to do that, just let them - then stand back and watch their business fail

That's the Whig interpretation of history, Sharky.

This is David Maxwell Fyfe (1900-1967). He was an MP from 1935-1962, serving as Attorney General and Home Secretary. An opinion poll of the general public named him third favourite to succeed Churchill.

As Home Secretary, he described homosexuality in men as a plague he intended to rid England of, and he opposed the bill which eventually led to the decriminalising (not legalisation) of gay sex for those over the age of 21, in 1967.

His views were not those of an unpopular minority. Sometimes it takes a law to stop people being cunts:

[TordelBack]

I'm at the tram stop this evening, scrawny lad in filthy tracky turns to two girls standing beside me and addresses the white girl of the pair in the drawn-out slurred pitch of the Dublin drunk/junkie:  "do you know you have the most beautiful blue eyes".  "Yep, that's why I married her" says the black girl of the pair (and convincingly said, rather than a cunning defence).  Scobie says, still in the mangled tones of the fellow you don't by choice sit beside on a park bench: "I'm really sorry, I didn't know she was your wife, didn't mean anything by it". "No problem" say the two girls together.

This exchange brought to you by near-universal acceptance of equal rights which comes with legislation to back it up. Absolutely inconceivable in my youth that a mixed-race gay couple would be treated with respect by the average edgy drunk - I would have expected a fouk-mouthed retort on at least two grounds.  No-one is policing this lad's speech directly, but he knows, we all know, that this is the society we live in , the society we want to live in. These laws, these policies, we want them. They encourage us to be better.

[I, Cosh]

A typically interesting and eloquent response TB.

Anecdotally, friends point to the complete absence of gay (or similar) as an insult used by teenage boys.

Question for Sharky: can you think of one negative outcome (within the existing legal framework as conceived by the sheeple you pity) of equality legislation?

[Hawkmumbler]

TB I have no idea who you are, what you look like or what your real name is but I will one day find you and hug you! A beautiful example of how it should work and is becoming progressively common.

DDD, i'm sorry your visit to Canal Street was so misfortunate, i've always found it to be my kind of a night out and my straight friends have always been made welcome.

[The Legendary Shark]

The gist of your argument seems to be that there's no need for anti discrimination laws because there's no way that people would buy from a company that treats others badly.
That is obviously not true. 

You've also confused the ability to pay for something with being discriminated against, to justify another of your ridiculous examples.  There's a clear difference between "I won't sell you a product at a reduced price" and " I refuse to sell you a service you require because you're a Jew".

You have misunderstood. The anti-discrimination "laws" would be written into libertarian trade agreements (in my example) and upheld by the signatories. You also seem to be imagining how a libertarian company would operate if it suddenly came into being now, in the current non-libertarian environment. As I said at the start of my post, my answer comes from a hypothetical time when a country is, or is on its way to being, a libertarian society. A libertarian society cannot come into being overnight or through some kind of armed uprising or general coup. It's nowhere near as simple as just slotting a libertarian leader into Number 10 and then getting on with your life. It's the opposite of that. It begins and ends at grass roots level, firstly with learning about libertarianism from such writers as Spooner, von Mises and Rothbard (among others), and then figuring out one thing at a time. It's a case of chipping away at what is, bit by bit, and not simply chopping its head off and sewing on a new one. And I'm sorry you found my response "ridiculous" - I couldn't think of anything as in-depth and complicated as "...because that's how the world works."

Butch - thanks for the links. I'll read them later as I'm about to go to work.

Tordels, legislation may have played a part in cementing modern attitudes but it is not the source of them. It's not like legislators said, "hey, i know, let's make people equal," because they didn't - they simply took modern attitudes and desires at second or third hand and then codified them. It doesn't take legislation to do this. Furthermore, legislation is a small part - there's also the massive influence of television, film, radio, newspapers, books, general social attitudes, cases at law, etc.

Cosh, I neither like nor use the term "sheeple" - I think it's derogatory and insulting and does nothing to get my point of view across. All terms like that do is put people's backs up. That term is just one step up from calling people idiots, and people are not idiots. I have great faith in people. If I didn't, how could I be libertarian? In answer to your question - no, not off the top of my head. I'll have a think about it and get back to you as I have to get off to work now.

[JayzusB.Christ]

I'm at the tram stop this evening, scrawny lad in filthy tracky turns to two girls standing beside me and addresses the white girl of the pair in the drawn-out slurred pitch of the Dublin drunk/junkie:  "do you know you have the most beautiful blue eyes".  "Yep, that's why I married her" says the black girl of the pair (and convincingly said, rather than a cunning defence).  Scobie says, still in the mangled tones of the fellow you don't by choice sit beside on a park bench: "I'm really sorry, I didn't know she was your wife, didn't mean anything by it". "No problem" say the two girls together.

This exchange brought to you by near-universal acceptance of equal rights which comes with legislation to back it up. Absolutely inconceivable in my youth that a mixed-race gay couple would be treated with respect by the average edgy drunk - I would have expected a fouk-mouthed retort on at least two grounds.  No-one is policing this lad's speech directly, but he knows, we all know, that this is the society we live in , the society we want to live in. These laws, these policies, we want them. They encourage us to be better.

Ha! Brilliant. This is not the Ireland I grew up in, thank fuck.

[Modern Panther]

The anti-discrimination "laws" would be written into libertarian trade agreements (in my example) and upheld by the signatories.

Written agreements which everyone agrees to abide by, but which are definitely not laws.  When the companies which provide you with fuel break these agreements, you'll just go to another company? Except, there's nothing to prevent every company from breaking the agreement, allowing them to make more of a profit and leaving you with no choice.

my answer comes from a hypothetical time when a country is, or is on its way to being, a libertarian society.

"Utopian society will be utopian" isn't an answer to anything.  "I imagine a time when crime doesn't exist, so there's no need for a police force" is not a reason to do away with a police force. "I imagine a time when everyone will treat everyone with respect regardless of race, gender, or religion, so there's no need for laws to enforce that" is not a reason to do away with anti discrimination laws.

And I'm sorry you found my response "ridiculous" - I couldn't think of anything as in-depth and complicated as "...because that's how the world works."

Do you honestly think that companies which act badly don't run at a profit?

legislation may have played a part in cementing modern attitudes but it is not the source of them.

No legislation is not the source, but that doesn't mean it is not necessary.  As a society, we can only move at the pace the slowest members are willing to move at.  When slavery was abolished, plenty of people would have been quite happy to keep slaves. (Yes I know, in a libertarian world everyone is just nice to each other) anti pollution laws are made despite plenty of organization s and individuals being willing to pollute.  Equal pay laws are required because many companies were perfectly willing to treat women worse.  There is no reason to think that these things would have just developed had they not been enforced by legislation.

[Frank]

legislation may have played a part in cementing modern attitudes but it is not the source of them ... they simply took modern attitudes and desires at second or third hand and then codified them.

70% of baby boomers still thought homosexuality was wrong in 1993. Their elders, who made up the majority of the voting public when homosexuality was decriminalised in 1967, disapproved even more strongly. There were no votes to be won by decriminalising homosexuality:

There was no political impetus to legislate on this matter, but it was considered that criminal law should not penalise homosexual men, already the object of ridicule and derision. The comments of Roy Jenkins, Home Secretary at the time, captured the government's attitude: "those who suffer from this disability carry a great weight of shame all their lives" (quoted during parliamentary debate by The Times on 4 July 1967).

Lord Arran attempted to minimise criticism with the following qualification to this historic milestone: "I ask (homosexuals) to show their thanks by comporting themselves quietly and with dignity ... any form of ostentatious behaviour or public flaunting, now or in the future, would be utterly distasteful ... (and) make the sponsors of this bill regret what they had done" (quoted during Royal Assent of the bill by The Times newspaper on 28 July 1967)

As the links above demonstrate, public hostility to homosexual men remained strong amongst boomers and their elders in the years following decriminalisation, but not among those who grew up after the passing of the 1967 legislation [1], in a world where being gay didn't make you the same kind of criminal as a rapist or child molester.


[1] The eighties led me to understand that trainers bought (by your mum) from the market were gay and that Julian Clary and Jimmy Somerville were gay. As such, gayness was to be avoided in oneself, but might be tolerated and even prove entertaining in others. Progress of sorts

[The Legendary Shark]

Written agreements which everyone agrees to abide by, but which are definitely not laws.  When the companies which provide you with fuel break these agreements, you'll just go to another company? Except, there's nothing to prevent every company from breaking the agreement, allowing them to make more of a profit and leaving you with no choice.

According to the Oxford Dictionary, law is the, "... system of rules which a particular country or community recognizes as regulating the actions of its members and which it may enforce by the imposition of penalties." So, basically, a law is something which people agree to abide by. Things like the rules contained in the agreements I was talking about. And once more you bring up a foolish example, set in this current system, totally failing to recognise that, in this current system, fuel companies lobby and bribe and bully "governments" for concessions and protection - centralising their wrong-doing through one easily manageable group of greedbags. "Oh, did we spill some black shit all over your beach? Sorry - here's a couple of million, now f*ck off and leave us alone. And if you don't leave us alone, we might have to reduce or even stop trading - and if we do that, oh my! What a mess you'll be in!" So they're left alone.

In a libertarian society, what the fuel companies do would be up to you and your community. The Esso on the roundabout ripping people off? Boot it out and get a better firm in, or create a new one - one that isn't banned from trading by protectionist "government" tariffs, license fees and regulations. make sure the new company's a good one yourself, by hiring your own private fuel experts to check its business practices and premises out. Esso's soon going to realise that it's in the free market, now, not some protected cloud-cuckoo land where it can do as it pleases. It's going to learn, and fast, that in a true free market economy the consumer is In Charge, not some easily bought-off gang of freebooters in expensive suits. If it doesn't learn, it'll go the way of the dodo and there'll be plenty of good business types waiting in the wings to take over.

The way to make businesses follow the rules is to hit them in their pockets. You find a good business, you'll fill its pockets with gold and it'll cherish your custom forever. That's basic economics.

"Utopian society will be utopian" isn't an answer to anything.  "I imagine a time when crime doesn't exist, so there's no need for a police force" is not a reason to do away with a police force. "I imagine a time when everyone will treat everyone with respect regardless of race, gender, or religion, so there's no need for laws to enforce that" is not a reason to do away with anti discrimination laws.

Fantastic example of a straw-man argument, there. I never mentioned Utopia. There's no such thing as Utopia. A Utopia, being perfect, would be a place where there is nothing left to improve, nothing left to solve, nothing left to strive for; nothing left to do. Deadworld. Any society, be it libertarian, fascist, democratic, republican or the peculiar land you seem to inhabit, are all works in progress. Society is a process, not a goal.

No legislation is not the source, but that doesn't mean it is not necessary.  As a society, we can only move at the pace the slowest members are willing to move at.  When slavery was abolished, plenty of people would have been quite happy to keep slaves. (Yes I know, in a libertarian world everyone is just nice to each other) anti pollution laws are made despite plenty of organization s and individuals being willing to pollute.  Equal pay laws are required because many companies were perfectly willing to treat women worse.  There is no reason to think that these things would have just developed had they not been enforced by legislation.

Yet another straw-man - "...in a libertarian world everyone is just nice to each other." What a crock. Human beings are human beings. There will always be disagreements and arguments, no matter the society. It doesn't matter where the rules are written if nobody follows them. How many times have I seen people chucking rubbish out of car windows up the motorway, dumping old mattresses down country lanes, double-parked, pissed-up and fighting in pub car parks, showing their tits and arses through mini-bus windows, pissing in the gutter, not wearing seat belts, stealing saplings from public parks or the borders of farmers' fields, short-changing their customers, smacking their kids, swearing at check-out staff, running red lights, not picking up after their dogs, playing their radios too loud, picking wild flowers, stealing supermarket trolleys and dumping them in canals, spraying graffiti on walls, pinching stationary from work, fiddling the gas meter? The list of things legislated against is virtually endless, and this is just the low-level stuff! There's no reason to think legislation had no effect at all but I don't think its effect is as great as you would like to believe. As I said before, television, films, newspapers, books, radio, social attitudes, schooling and plain old leading by example have a far greater influence. Here's an example; a friend and I went for a walk along the local sea-wall not long ago. She said to me, "Gee, look at all that plastic crap washed up." So we got a couple of washed-up buckets and started collecting a bit on our way back. And as we went, what did we see? Lo and behold, a couple of other people (but by no means all, admittedly) were following suit. Legislation didn't tell us to do that, we just did it. A handful of people voluntarily doing a small amount to make a tiny bit of the world slightly better. Pass legislation ordering people to clear up the coastline if they want to walk there and very few people will bother. Show some celebrity doing it voluntarily on TV and you'll get thousands joining in - but still not everybody. Most of us would much rather be inspired to do something than ordered to do the same thing.

Come on, Panther, you can't think that this modern fuck-witted society is the best we can do, surely? Like I said earlier, society is a process and we have to keep moving it along. We can't just keep on doing the same things over and over, hoping that the next time there's a popularity contest election the person who gets in will steal less of our money, stop threatening us so much, destroy fewer of our services, pander to half the special interest lobbyists, listen to more sensible advisors, not get us into any more wars, etc. But, oh shit, look - it's all happening again. Damn it. Well, maybe next time. Or the time after that. Or the time after that? Because if we keep on down this road, with those self-appointed godheads in Westminster making things one degree worse every day, sooner or later we're going to vote in a Hitler or a Stalin, and then what? Our system's already thrown up a BNP and a UKIP so don't say it could never happen. Concentrate the power of society all in one place like that and the danger is great - and more imminent the worse things get and the more disaffected people feel.

Is libertarianism the answer? I think it might be but, of course, I can't be sure. I think it's got a lot going for it. You disagree, that's fine. That's great! But we have to think of something to work towards beyond more of the same - because that more of the same is causing a lot of misery and getting a lot of people killed. We need to think about how to move the process on.

[Modern Panther]

You've managed to completely ignore the issue.

Yes, I think we can do better.  No, I don't think we'll get there through unregulated capitalism.

"Throwing out" the local petrol station sounds like a great idea, but history shows us that people don't behave this way.  People make the financial decisions which are best in the short term for them. People, on the whole, care little about the environment they can't see or the rights of minority groups that they are not confronted with.  There are plenty of facts and sources in the last few posts which show this.

You've said yourself that people will continue to behave poorly, yet you think that having a powerless minority who are willing to pick up litter and point out bad behaviour is a solution.

And I appreciate that your not talking about an actual utopia.  My point was that saying "a functioning libertarian society will be a functioning libertarian society" is not a blueprint for a libertarian society, nor is it any reason to believe that people would be better of without the legislation that protects them from abuse.  You want to change things, but you've said in the past that you are unwilling and unable to put forward any solution as to how society should actually reach this point, because we should all just get there. 

If you're unhappy with government, if you're unhappy with legislation then there is a whole system in place to change things.  It might be hard, but as noted above even the most unpleasant but popular rules can be changed.  In a libertarian society, the only thing that changes things is having enough money to compete with a monopoly.

But your not going to accept this, because you begin and end with the premise that government is either bad or simply non existent.

[The Legendary Shark]

History shows us these very things have happened, hence the still used expressions "tarred and feathered" and "run out of town on a rail." People who scammed, harmed or insulted the community were humiliated and banished. Whilst I am not advocating such treatment, one has to admit that tarring and feathering highly-polished pseudo-humanoid Cameron and dumping him in a remote field somewhere does have some appeal. In any case, it's better than lynching.

Yes, people will make financial decisions that benefit them. They do that now. They have done it throughout history. They will continue to do it. The trick is to make the benefits less toxic to wider society. Unfettered capitalism does not mean a free-for-all or survival of the fittest. Libertarianism is the champion of enlightened self-interest. The system we have now is the champion of unenlightened greed.

As an example, take the logging industry. A "government" sells logging rights to vast swathes of the Amazon, for example. The logging companies then have the incentive to cut down as many trees as they can before somebody else gets to them. If sections of the forest were sold to the companies instead, however, their priorities change. It then becomes more economically viable to cut and re-plant in order to maintain a sustainable income from the land they now own. Ownership is the key to enlightened self-interest.

People will continue to act poorly so long as conditions permit, and even encourage, such behaviour. "Government" is the biggest enabler of bad behaviour and one of the primary, if not the primary, culprit. It does things you and I would never dream of doing. Picking up litter is one tiny example (as I said) and not, as you claim, an entire manifesto upon which to lay the foundation of a better society.

I have offered no blueprint because no blueprints exist. I have offered only suggestions and indicated possible directions and possible solutions. Without writing a novel, I could not possibly hope to present every conceivable answer to every conceivable question, nor every conceivable solution to every conceivable problem. Nobody could. There are, however, a great many solutions out there which have been written about over the centuries by far more intelligent and learned people than I could ever hope to be. It's not like there's absolutely nothing to use as foundations. There's tons of stuff.

And you're absolutely right. I've said, many times, that I can't tell you how to get from here to there. There are various reasons for this, chief among them being that I don't know which "there" you want to get to. I don't know what's best for you, your family or your community. I don't know what you can and can't do, what you're willing or unwilling to do, what you have got or not got to offer. Those are questions for you and you alone to answer - it's not up to me, or anybody, to map out your future for you.

I've said this before as well, but the only revolution that's worth a damn is a revolution of the mind, a revolution of attitude. And that I might be able to help with. After that, it's up to you.

The system you speak of has one function and one function only - to preserve itself. It is a system of coercion and monopoly. It manufactures nothing, it produces nothing. Its only source of income is through theft at gunpoint. Its only power is that which you give it - which power you give, again, at gunpoint. It is little more than a cult with its own version of the Spanish Inquisition to deal with dissenters.

At least in a libertarian society you have the chance to compete with a monopoly. Currently, there's no chance because, if you try, you will be stifled by the legislation you love so dearly, by tariffs and licensing, through taxes and red tape. If you try to cut through all that, the state's enforcers will shut you down, lock you down and take you down with batons and handcuffs. Under these protections, monopolies have no need to be sensitive to customers' needs, mindful of the environment, efficient or even profitable for any shortfalls will be offset by corporate welfare, paid for with the money stolen from you. This system is not fair, not honourable and, perhaps worst of all, not sustainable.

Your last statement is correct. Unless you can convince me that coercion, theft, kidnapping, slavery and murder are good, then yes, I believe government is bad. And unless you can show me an actual thing, an entity which exists in and of itself, and is not just a bunch of people in a building assuming rights you and I don't have in order to keep themselves and their systems in place, I will continue to claim that "government" is as real as magic pixie dust.

[Modern Panther]

Are government regulations the only thing that stop you from running your own oil company, or is the power to do such things held only by the richest? If we remove the government regulations which cut pollution and fix workers rights, would you be able to challenge the position of the wealthiest?

No...well, maybe you would in the libertarian world where everyone is "enlightened", but that is a utopia.

There's a reason why libertarianism is popular with the most powerful and wealthy.  It cements their position, because it removes the democratic system which can challenge their authority.  It raises self interest and self importance from vice to virtue.  Under the pretence of individual freedom it gives us a system where everything is permissible if you can afford it. 

We have laws to protect minority groups and the disenfranchised not because of some government scam of self interest, but because people fought for them, died for them.  People struggled with unfair, and unregulated, systems for centuries.  The idea that they are no longer required, or unfair...who does that benefit? 

[TordelBack]

Enacting legislation is leading by example, just at the regional level.  It's society saying to itself  'this is how we behave now'. Your list of horrid modern goings-on is accurate, but in most cases represents a distinct improvement on what was going on only a century ago.

I completely agree with the idea that individuals leading by example is a massively powerful force, your beach cleanup is an excellent case (I regularly participate in two beach cleanup groups, as well as doing it with just the kids - we always bring more bags than we think we can use, and we always end up with too few because passers-by join in). But note that it takes place against a background of pollution legislation, and general attitudes (including your own), that almost certainly make the task easier. And if you could vote for legislation that would further improve the situation, why not do both?

[Eric Plumrose]

I agree with the majority of what you say here. I, personally, do not find racism, willful ignorance or bigotry to be endearing qualities in anyone. However, just because I think this, I have no right to force others to think the same thing. If I did have the right to force people not to be bigoted then the equal and opposite right for others to force me to be bigoted must also exist. Much as I would detest seeing such clubs, I would not assume the right to ban them. It's better to educate than subjugate.

To clarify, I was responding to your assertion that such clubs aren't harmful to others. Perhaps not directly, though being hives (wretched, natch) of scum and villainy they aren't conducive either to someone's 'education' for living in a world of all stripes.