Why I Am A Libertarian and Not A Conservative

Unfortunately many of the people I interact with in Scotland in my daily life are unfamiliar with the philosophy of libertarianism. So when having political discussions with people I begin to put forward my views I am very often branded “conservative” or sometimes bizarrely even “neoconservative” (which considering the libertarian anti-war stance makes absolutely no sense). Now, to anyone who understands libertarianism these conservative labels are not accurate and I would like to point out why (in my own view) this is.

Before we go on I should point out that the reason why I have called this article “Why I'm a Libertarian and Not A Conservative” opposed to “Why I'm a Libertarian and Not A Liberal” is that (if we leave aside the fact that the word liberalism has been twisted so many times over the years to mean different things and use it as it is currently understood in the mainstream vernacular) frankly in many parts of the People's Republic of Scotland “conservative” is a rather dirty word (especially in Glasgow). So if I talk to someone and mention that I'm anti-war, pro drug decriminalization, for limiting government spending and free markets many people seem to filter out the parts they would call “liberal” and jump on the ones they would call “conservative”. Because to them being a conservative is just downright bad. But this aside, let's continue.
 

Like most ideologies what we call conservative in the mainstream and what being a true conservative is are radically different things. In my opinion no true conservative would call David Cameron and his band of followers conservative. So what do I mean when I talk about conservatism?
 

I'm usually accused of being a conservative when I mention my economic preferences for (ideally no government whatsoever) but realistically a very small one, which would entail massive cuts in public spending (which is associated with conservatism in the minds of many). So I would abolish (or radically slash) welfare, the NHS and even privatise public roads. Now my preferences are actually more radical than most conservatives because I believe having a truly free market minus a state. But you can see that there are similarities between libertarians and conservatives when it comes to free markets and small government. But when it comes to social policy things start to look very different.

To me conservatism is really about either retaining traditional social norms and values (as we have them in this country) or going back further to previous norms and values. Why I do not identify with this school of thought is because to me it seems like imposing your own morality on everyone else. Before I go further it should be mentioned that most conservatives feel this way because they genuinely believe this line of thought keeps social order and is generally good for society. But my problem is that (like most libertarians) I don't want to impose my values on anyone else. Many conservatives in the UK are against things like gay marriage, drugs decriminalization and legalizing prostitution. But - coming at this from a libertarian perspective - I personally don't care what consenting adults do as long as it doesn't hurt anyone. I also don't think that these things destroy the “social fabric” that many are so obsessed with preserving (for more in depth on why see my articles “The Gay Marriage Distraction” and “Legalize All Drugs!”). To libertarians, wasting tax payers money prosecuting victimless crimes like smoking a joint or visiting a hooker is madness. I simply want to leave people alone who are not hurting anyone and I want people to leave me alone as long as I'm not hurting anyone. It really is that simple.
 

In a recent interview Caity and I did on the Greening Out Podcast with Dr Sean Gabb, director of the Libertarian Alliance UK he explained that in the past in libertarians in the UK allied themselves with the Conservative Party (something they do not do now). So that may be one reason for some people's confusion of the terms. But I think another is simply that libertarian ideas are not widely discussed in the mainstream in the UK so as soon as someone who leans left, shall we say, hears about cuts in government they think “AHH CONSERVATIVES!” In the same way when a conservative hears about gay marriage and drugs etc and being anti-war then the reaction is “Bloody liberals! You want to destroy our society.” Many people simply attribute different policies to where they fit in to their left-right political mind box.
 

The way I understand and espouse libertarianism is that it takes good ideas, some we attribute to the right wingers (free markets and slashing government spending) and some the left (drugs decriminalization and being anti-war) and moulds them into a coherent philosophy which is all it's own. It is my own personal view that if we can spread libertarian ideas as widely as possible then we can begin to dispense with this left-right tribal rubbish and actually talk about what will increase freedom for all.

 

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Most Scots Aren't Ready For Independence

As an anarchist I am often accused of being too optimistic when sitting with someone and explaining how people can be trusted to take care of their own affairs without having to have a government do it for them. But what I've seen and heard during this independence referendum campaign deeply worries me and shows me that to put it bluntly most people in Scotland are simply not ready for independence.

So what do I mean by that? Well from the SNP to the Radical Independence Campaign (RIC) all I see is socialist ideas being put forward by most on the yes side. Like the SNP talking about re-nationalising Royal Mail in Scotland, something that simply would not work when you take into account the thousands of employees who now own shares and also keeping the universal service would be a major challenge.

One of the big fear tactics is telling people that the Tories in England are trying to privatise the NHS and the only way to keep it in Scotland is to vote yes. Now, I have explained in many other articles why the NHS should be privatised anyway. But this is not about that, this is about how socialistic policies in the UK have infantilized large amounts of the population. That's what state socialism (and socialistic policies) do.

It's like this, followers of the Abrahamic religions feel comfort in having a god that is interested in them, loves them and deeply cares about what's going on in their lives like a benevolent father who never abandons them and is always around. To remove that from the very deeply religious is to invoke fear of being alone in the cosmos and it removes the hope that there is someone you can ask to help you out in hard times and will provide a paradise (although in some Christian conceptions a strange one that's like one eternal family gathering – I'll take hell over that thank you very much) after death.

People feel the same way about the state (whether they admit it or not). The revulsion in peoples faces when you talk seriously and intelligently about removing the state altogether is due to the fact that they are afraid to have to fend for themselves without daddy government around to do that for them. By having a national health service, welfare, state pensions and all the rest of it people feel more comfortable because they don't have to worry about that stuff. They're not bothered about the fact that none of this is actually free if you are forced to pay taxes. Or by the fact that we have to put up with inferior services from state-run institutions (I have gone into depth on this in other articles).

As the state grows so does the rise of adult infants. If there was no welfare or NHS many people might think seriously before having children, they would realise that they need to work harder or get a job in the first place. That their resources must be channelled into providing the best life for their child. But when daddy government is around then people feel freer to be irresponsible because they just think fuck it, the government will pay for it. The same goes for people who don't save for their retirement for the same reasons. Do they ever think about the fact that the government steals the money from hard working responsible people to pay for that​ It is a disgrace that so many people are dependent on the state in Scotland. Now before you think, it's the fault of big business creating inequality or some other scapegoat just remember that big business couldn't exist without having politicians in their pockets and it is irrelevant which politician you put in office because everyone has their price and we know people get into politics to get paid – in a big way.
 

So how does this all tie in? Government is the most dangerous superstition (as Larken Rose put it) that we have. All this independence chat is is about bringing some form of Tartan Socialism to Scotland within the already existing power structures (the EU and the Bank of England). Until we have a major paradigm shift in Scotland and people wake up to what is really holding them back then all this independence stuff is frankly a waste of time. I would be the first to enthusiastically support a free Scotland with a minimal state to begin with and I would be out campaigning every day if that was on offer but all I hear from pro-independence people is talk of growing the state even larger if 'independence' is achieved. Let me tell you until the people wake up to the reality of government we're just re-arranging the deckchairs on the Titanic.

 

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SNP Propaganda Piece Decoded

I recently struggled through a short SNP propaganda video lately which, I have to say was one of the worst attempts at propaganda I have ever seen in my life. But it is full of what passes for debate in modern politics and it is this fallacy that will win the independence referendum and that is the logical fallacy known as the “Appeal To Emotion”.

The definition of this fallacy from Wikipedia is: “Appeal to emotion or argumentum ad passiones is a logical fallacy which uses the manipulation of the recipient's emotions, rather than valid logic, to win an argument. The appeal to emotion fallacy uses emotions as the basis of an argument's position without factual evidence that logically supports the major ideas endorsed by the elicitor of the argument. Also, this kind of thinking may be evident in one who lets emotions and/or other subjective considerations influence one's reasoning process.” These fallacies are nothing new in politics of course, pretty much every word out of a politicans mouth is an appeal to emotion, tradition, authority etc.
 

The video I watched is about Kirtsy who is so intelligent that she is mulling over Scottish independence as a foetus. And she has some questions which I'd like to answer for her.
 

Will it be a Scotland that is fairer and more prosperous? A Scotland where I can reach my full potential? Crystal ball anyone? I always worry when the word 'fair' comes up in political discussion in Scotland because it's usually used in a socialistic fashion. For example people may think that it's fair to steal money in the form of taxes from hard-working people to give to people who choose to do nothing with their lives. Is it fair to give said money to people just for having children? What about the word 'prosperous' by that are the SNP talking about the oil fairy again? We would be more prosperous if the SNP dropped the idea to keep the pound and we could finally escape from the control of central banking which creates money out of thin air and causes inflation.
 

Will it be a Scotland of opportunity, where free higher education is a right for all, and going to Uni depends on your ability, not your bank balance? Unpopularity alert – education like healthcare is not a right. I don't actually mind funding intelligent people from poorer backgrounds to get an excellent education but I would like to do it voluntarily and not have money stolen from me to do it. Also, what about parents, is saving for your kids college education (which would be easier with much lower or no taxes) such a bad thing? Another point to this is that University education for prosperity is a lie. There are many people with degrees who are out of work or in low paying jobs (believe me, I know a few) and at the same time we have very prosperous people like Richard Branson and Bill Gates with no degrees! With a wealth of information available at our fingertips higher education is becoming irrelevant in many fields, how about teaching entrepreneurship in schools? That would make us prosperous.
 

Will the land of my birth be a true nation that stands proudly alongside all other nations, with a voice and a vote to help build a better world? This is a classic meaningless sentence. What is a 'true nation' anyway, one that exists? What does a “voice and a vote to help build a better world” actually mean? A vote where? In the EU perhaps? With it's unelected president? This is just meaningless emotional garbage.
 

Will my Scotland be free of weapons of mass destruction and a country that can never be led by others into illegal wars? I would love nothing more than to say yes, yes and yes again. I have never agreed with the 'deterrent' argument for the UK having nuclear weapons, there is no circumstance under which we will fire them unless we decide with other countries to all have one huge earth-wide suicide. But with the SNP voting to stay in NATO it seems likely that they will exert pressure to keep the nukes if they think it's beneficial and just by being in NATO it is likely that we will be dragged into 'illegal wars' – guess what, pretty much all wars are illegal, mass murder isn't exactly a good thing. Another point is that NATO was set up as a defence against an attack from the Soviet Union – something that doesn't even exist any more.
 

Will I grow up in a Scotland where our wealth and natural resources are in Scotland’s hands, not squandered by Westminster governments we didn’t even vote for? Hmm, well did we not affect a hung parliament in Westminster when only one Tory MP was elected in Scotland? Let me tell you this is a post-Thatcher type of voting because the Tories used to pick up many MP's in Scotland before the Thatcher-era and the disastrous poll tax that left a very sour taste in Scottish mouths. Oil could be great revenue for Scotland but we would have to keep the EU's hands off it to profit.
 

Will my mum and dad be able to live their old age with dignity, in a Scotland that respects and cares for its pensioners? Ah yes, back to the appeals to emotion here. Why would you not want a private pension? They don't take as much as the tax man and you will have more in the end than you would with a state pension. Also, the SNP have talked about how much they would have to increase immigration in an independent Scotland to have enough young people working to pay for it. Now, I have no problem with immigrants all my grandparents were and my wife is one also. However, mass immigration can lead to major social tensions (as we are seeing right now in Glasgow) that can lead to major social unrest and a strain on these much praised 'services' that our tax money pays for.
 

Will my own kids be born into a society that is more equal and safer, a society that reflects the true values of Scotland? Again, more emotional chat and not much facts or policy. What are the “true values of Scotland” anyway? Friendliness? Sure, there's a lot of that. Sectarianism? There's just as much as that also. By “safer” do they mean increasing the already growing police state? If they want all this immigration and it causes social tension will that make us safer?
 

Will I raise my family in a Scotland where the decisions about our future are taken by the people who care most about Scotland, the people who live here? I hate to break it to you Kirsty because I've come to be quite fond of you but the elites in power don't give a shit about you and they never will. Governments are no better than organized crime, they are inherently violent. They steal your money through tax and if you object they send uniformed thugs to your door calling themselves police to kidnap you. If we accept that initiation of violence and stealing are wrong then we have to conclude that government is morally wrong.
 

Now, I have picked on the SNP in this but the Better Together mob are every bit as bad. I would love the people of Scotland to think critically instead of being led into emotional arguments either for a yes or no vote. If we don't see through the manipulation of the people through emotional arguments then we will never figure out what works economically. We have to get out of thinking in the sectarian box, that's the only way we can make sensible decisions about the future. Sorry Kirsty.

 

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http://www.snp.org/vision/better-scotland/independence

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-25910947

http://www.snp.org/blog/post/2014/may/what-yes-vote-means-immigration

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_emotion

 

To All Scotland's Left-Wingers – Government Is The Problem

As we know Scotland is a very left wing country ideologically and from these pro-independence leftist groups, bloggers, commenter’s, people who talk at me and the rest I hear a lot about fairness and how an independent Scotland would be fair if we just could get the right government in place to deal with Scotland's problems. What these well-intentioned folks fail to realise is that having a government in the first place is the problem and replacing a ruling elite with a new, bigger, tartan ruling elite won't make anything better in Scotland, it may even make it worse.

So if you've made it this far it's because you want to see where I'll take this madness next. Well let's start (as everything should and most things don't) from some philosophical principles. Most people accept that initiating violence against people for no reason is wrong. So far so good. Most people also accept that stealing is wrong. But when I take those principles to their logical conclusion then I lose most people for some reason.
 

Let's take taxation. If we want a bigger welfare state and more money poured into the NHS and childcare and whatever else is on your left-wing state shopping list it has to come from somewhere. A lot of these more radical leftist independence campaigners either don't mention higher taxation or think that the oil fairy will pay for everything. Well it will be higher taxes in Scotland and if we accepted the first two principles (that initiating violence and stealing are wrong) then taxation is inherently immoral. Why? Well because - just like the Mafia extorting a shopkeeper – money that I have earned is stolen from my wages by criminals calling themselves government. Now, what happens if you refuse to pay tax? Violence happens, first you are threatened violently then if you continue to resist men in costumes calling themselves police will kidnap you and lock you in a cage.

I hear you making the argument in the distance that tax pays for services. Look, every service that taxation pays for can be provided peacefully, voluntarily and without violence. Look at bin collections, my workplace (and many others) use private companies to remove their rubbish. If we had a free market without government then healthcare could be opened up and without regulations could provide varied coverage for all incomes. But what if the doctors were not very good? Well we have comparison websites right now I'm sure in a free healthcare market doctors would be rated so you could see which ones have the highest success rate in any area. Why do people get all teary-eyed about the NHS anyway? Have you been in an NHS hospital lately!? And what about all the scandals that have come out?
 

Providing services is like this, when one entity (government in our case) has a monopoly then there is no incentive to innovate or no competition to push standards up. People have to pay for it anyway so you can provide as poor of a service as you like. I have made the argument using a fictitious shoe company before and I'm sure you will understand that we enjoy immense choice in areas of our lives like shoes and cars and electronics, all of which companies are competing with each other to have the best product for the best price. If it's good enough for shoes then why is the free market not good enough for healthcare?
 

People are angry about wealth gaps also and I agree this is a big problem but it is also a problem that government has helped to create. Politicians are lobbied left, right and centre and it's government that gives perks to big corporations and introduces legislation to make it harder for smaller companies to compete with the bigger ones and they will do this all for massive donations from wealthy men. A 'corporation' as we understand it would not exist without government!

Now I know you're thinking about the poor and elderly and the ill. We have great charities all over the British isles that deal with these matters and others very well. People say to me “Who would take care of the poor.” and I say “I would, wouldn't you?” Then they agree and we wonder what we're arguing about! Without the burden of taxation I have no doubt that the people of Scotland would take care of each other, look at food-banks that are privately funded or even the SSPCA (which receives zero government money) or the National Trust (which is also privately funded). Look, if we can take care of cats, dogs and historic buildings with private donations I think that we could definitely take care of the poor, sick and elderly in our country. I have absolutely no doubt in my mind about the generosity of the Scottish people to get things done and take care of each other without violence.

This is obviously a breeze through some anarcho-capitalist thought but let's quickly tackle one more issue – law and order. Government is not required for justice in fact often it's an obstacle to justice. If a stateless society were to run on contractual and voluntary relations among people with (as Stephan Molyneux envisions) Dispute Resolution Organizations (DRO's) to enforce contracts and deal with violent crime then you can see how easily it could work. It is beyond the scope of this article to go into depth as to how crime would be dealt with in a stateless society so if you're sceptical then please read the work of Murray Rothbard and others (available at http://www.mises.org) and listen to Stephan Molyneux at http://www.freedomainradio.com they will describe the minute details for you better than I ever could.
 

Albert Einstein got it right when he said that insanity was doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. That's all we're doing by changing the government, we're just moving the pieces on the chess board but we are still all stuck on the board. The solution to problems created by government is not to change the government but to get rid of it all together and give freedom a try as Murray Rothbard points out, the worst that could happen is that we end up with another state, but at least humanity would have had a holiday for a while.

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