a question about libertarianism in america.

[FriendorFoe]

are all libertarians crpto-facists? was libertarianism just fascisms way of re-estabilishing itself?

[spartan]

I am not a Libertarian but as far as i know Libertarianism does not have any connection to, nor anything to do with, Fascism.

Libertarians usually hold property rights above everything else and are often oppossed to state and Government intervention in non-criminal circumstances.

Indeed some Libertarians believe that there should be no Government, military and police force at all whilst some oppose, to a degree, taxation.

So as you can see Libertarianism can hardly be put into the same basket as Fascism which believes in a strong Government, backed by a loyal military, ruling every aspect of its citizens lives, via a police force, in the territory under their (The Fascists) control.

Here is a link that should help you understand Libertarianism a little better:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism

[Schrödinger's Cat]

Originally posted by [email protected] 08, 2007 03:21 pm
are all libertarians crpto-facists? was libertarianism just fascisms way of re-estabilishing itself?
Mainstream libertarians in America are capitalists who believe the government should only be involved in recognizing/enforcing property rights.

[jacobin1949]

The one good thing about Libertarians is they oppose imperialism, support free trade with China and the Third world and support open immigration

But generally the combine the worst of political conservatism with moral debuachery and decadence

[Invader Zim]

There are certain fringe groups within the libertarian school that certainly are attractive to fascists. Particularly the Randian nutters who have a philosophy of utter selfishness.

[mikelepore]

Seems to me most of the Libertarians are sincere but they are stumbling over a logic problem that makes them think that every lesser-evil choice is an entirely free choice. The structure of their thinking goes something like this: (1) You can't complain that the cost of renting an apartment is high because it's competely voluntary; that is, you could have bought a house; (1) You can't complain that the cost of buying a house is high because it's completely voluntary; that is, you could have rented an apartment. Then if you point out that the two statements are incompatable, because that reasoning offers a limited menu with two very similar items on it, then they reply by denying that the utility of the available choices affects the amount of freedom in the choosing process, "the world doesn't owe you a living", etc.

Now apply that pattern of logic failure to the exploitation of labor. Generally the Libertarians don't seem to deny that working class people have two-valued choices such as: accept employment and "consent" to the ratio of the capitalist share to the workers' share, or don't accept employment and starve; passively accept the employer's treatement of workers without complaint, and keep the job, or complain about it and and get fired. They don't deny hat much, but they view at as perfect freedom. If you don't like A then B is available, and if you don't like B then A is available. There are two items on the menu, and two is greater than one, so you are free. If you don't like either A or B, then "you are under the impression that the world owes you a living."

[Nosotros]

I think this discussion is kinda crazy.Libertarianism is about liberty/freedom not hierarchy or inequality.It's about democracy and destroying the the state and all heirarchy.

[bootleg42]

Originally posted by [email protected] 09, 2007 11:06 am
I think this discussion is kinda crazy.Libertarianism is about liberty/freedom not hierarchy or inequality.It's about democracy and destroying the the state and all heirarchy.
If you're talking about the original libertarianism then maybe but today's libertarianism (and the one that we're talking about in this thread) is the capitalist version. So this libertarianism that we're talking about is not about freedom and stuff like that.

[Jazzratt]

They are our enemies that is certain, they support unbridled freedom for the bourgeoisie and this is certainly not in working class interests but they are not, by any stretch of the imagination fascist. Not all our enemies are fascists in disguise some, like libertarians are misguided and believe they are acting for "freedom" and these are much more dangerous - everyone knows about fascism leading to horrendous results but with something as yet untested, like libertarianism, people do not have so many preconceptions which is a great boon to libertarian propaganda.

[Dimentio]

Libertarianism is based on the same class segments as original fascism.

[syndicat]

It's really necessary to disrtinguish right-wing and left-wing libertarianism. A "libertarianism" is presumably a political view that emphasizes liberty, or takes it as a fundamental value. One way of distinguishing the right and left libertarianisms is that right libertarians are concerned about the libery of bosses, owners of productive property, landlords, etc. The left libertarians are concerned about the liberty of the working class and of the oppressed in general.

Thus right libertarianism is really a fake libertarianism because it doesn't take liberty as fundamental, what it takes as fundamental is the property rights of the owning classes.

The use of the word "libertarian" to refer to the extreme laissez faire capitalist ideology is relatively recent, going back to about the 1960s. At that time anarchism in the U.S. had virtually disappeared, so the older use of "libertarian" to refer to Left libertarianism had fallen out of use. The ideology of right libertarianism is actually derived from the old, classical individualist form of liberalism of the 18th and 19th centuries. In the U.S. the word "liberal" changed its meaning by the '40s because of the emergence of a new form of liberalism in the U.S. in the early 1900s that emphasized the need of the government to reign in corporate excesses and protect consumer and worker liberties. This occurred through the emergence of the populist and "Progressive" movements about a century ago. Their ideology won over sections of the capitalist elite who feared growing strength of the Socialist Party in many cities in the U.S. before World War I, and the growth of the municipal ownership movement. The big companies that owned public utilties, for example, saw government regulation as a lesser evil compared to municipalization.

This new form of liberalism became especially dominant in the U.S. in the '30s with the rise of the New Deal, due to the fact that the collapse of the economy in the '30s discredited laissez faire.

so in the decades after World War 2, the advocates of the old pro-business laissez faire liberalism needed a new name for their ideology, and they appropriated "libertarian" for this purpose.

I think this ideology does tend to find more favor among small business and professional people because they can envision themselves running their own businesses and becoming wealthier that way, and are less able to influence government to benefit them than the big companies can.

in that sense i think it is correct, as one poster noted, that this ideology will tend to find favor with the same section of the population who historically formed the mass base for fascism.

also, one should have no illusions about the lack of commitment to authoritarianism among rightwing libertarians. some of their ideologists are even willing to say slavery would be warranted if it was "voluntary" i.e. if propertyless people were desperate enough to agree to it.

on the other hand, some people attracted to this ideology may be motivated by a sincere commitment to freedom, but just have an incomplete idea of it, and so one should be open to dialogue with them.