It’s all fun and games until the bears show up
Comment on Tech moguls want to build a crypto paradise on a Native American reservation
FauxPseudo@lemmy.world 4 days ago
Look into the history of libertarians trying to set up paradises of like minded people to find out why this will fail. They start into the 19th century and just keep failing.
Sylvartas@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 days ago
GraniteM@lemmy.world 3 days ago
There are people who, disturbed by “big government” today and its tendency to curb the advantages they might gain if their competitiveness were allowed free flow, demand “less govern- ment.” Alas, there is no such thing as less government, merely changes in government. If the libertarians had their way, the distant bureaucracy would vanish and the local bully would be in charge. Personally, I prefer the distant bureaucracy, which may not find me, over the local bully, who certainly will. And all historical precedent shows a change to localism to be for the worse. —Isaac Asimov, Nice Guys Finish First, collected in The Sun Shines Bright, 1981
AcidicBasicGlitch@lemm.ee 4 days ago
I’m not surprised by more of this sovereign state nonsense, I’m just disgusted that they’re proposing building it on a reservation.
0x0@lemmy.zip 3 days ago
Casinos ring a bell…
Pudutr0n@feddit.cl 3 days ago
Err… I’m not trolling or taking any sides here but couldn’t that also be claimed about communism? And the vast majority of monarchies if you start your analysis then… And I guess if we look at the current day, one could argue contemporary democracy tends to devolve into fascism…
But, you know, It’s almost like the systems in use are irrelevant when there are generalized hostile war scenarios with huge foreign threats that might exterminate your nation state or make it implode through sabotage… And this seems to happen roughly every hundred years or so.
And after the horrors of war, the general population unifies to pick up what’s left and swear they will never let anything like this happen again. But then they have kids and grandkids that are like “oh, gramps you so silly”.
A basic notion of history and some critical thought shows us this has happened time and time again, the only significant contemporary difference being the existence of aerial and nuclear warfare.
Empires have life cycles, and they get old. Then they get corrupt and other empires start challenging them… And then you have a big big war, and then someone wins, and then people calm down for roughly 50 years… and on and on it goes.
rottingleaf@lemmy.world 4 days ago
Is that different for non-libertarian paradise-building attempts?
I swear, you guys just apparently decide nobody will ask the obvious questions, because libertarians are an allowed target.
FauxPseudo@lemmy.world 3 days ago
You didn’t understand the assignment. Before asking questions do the required reading. You may find your questions have already been answered.
ToastedRavioli@midwest.social 3 days ago
Pudutr0n@feddit.cl 3 days ago
I wrote a long reply to explore some ideas I’ve been entertaining recently. I guess I just wanted to straighten my own thoughts out, so please don’t take this as pontificating or “this is how it is for sure”. I just like thinking while typing. Feel free to not read.
I see your point and definitely agree with the conclusion:
Clearly, when it comes to certain kinds of problems, the response must be collective, supported by public effort
But umm… Sometimes the larger threat isn’t bears that randomly come over from the woods. Sometimes the people that were elected to protect you from bears and were supported by the public, even cheered and applauded… Idk, circumstances are important.
I also feel like lots of people focus a lot on the inherent flaws of different systems of political organization that they don’t adhere to, while turning a blind eye on their own.
**Libertarianism**
Yes, libertarianism is flawed and fails at a certain scale for both individuals and large populations as a whole in the presence of widespread distrust or relevant threats within or outside the population and will inevitably devolve into “anarchy” (which means warlords/cartels each with as much territory their ruthless leaders can secure and handle). Won’t disagree with you there.
**Capitalism**
What about good, old fashioned, standard American capitalist democracy? Well then it seems people get ruled by what results of the negotiation between corporations and political parties, who are largely controlled by the psychos who are ruthless enough to climb to the top of those systems… Ok so I guess this means getting ruled by psychos again. But at least people get to vote! At least people respect the law! right? Well… elections are basically a competition on what individuals and organizations are most effective at persuading or manipulating, and the law is the result of those competitions through time.
**Communism**
But now let’s think about communism. How’s that turned out historically? Seems to me like people stop accumulating private property and start accumulating political influence to improve their position within a state that attempts to control or at the very least regulate everything to impose equal distribution of different resources, except… you know… for the people that have influence. This has happened time and time again. Seems devolve into authoritarianism really fast because people get desperate about trying to get to the top of that ladder of influence that decides who gets what. (trust me on this one, I live in south america). And when you have authoritarianism you have literally every psychopath in the country doing everything they can to have access to the absolute power its leadership entails. So… ruled by psychos.
**Socialism**
Ok, ok, but maybe communism was too extreme. How about socialism? That works, right? I mean, sure! It works under the following conditions: Your country has so much wealth it can afford to secure services to the less fortunate (as defined culturally), the struggle for power between people that want large powerful governments and those who want large powerful corporations is relatively balanced and carried out in good faith (or else unstable system), and both your private sector stays competent enough to keep the country rich and your government stays sharp enough to promote adequate legislation in order for corporations to not wreak havoc… So wait… Doesn’t this mean that this is just like American Capitalism or Communism, where this happens but in an earlier stage of its life cycle, before it devolves into “corporations win” or “the state wins”? Because the population is still able to identify charlatans and the culture is cohesive so people don’t consider their political rivals to be sworn enemies yet?
Final thoughts.
Given enough time, whatever system a country uses or constitution it adheres to, the psychos will rise to different positions of power, they’ll fight each other for a bit and then one team will win, turning the lives of everyone who isn’t in their team a living hell. Then, given enough time, the oppressed seize a victory and then change stuff up, for the better or the worse and on and on it goes until an idea/creation myth powerful enough to unite a fractured society comes and money can be made and things can be built again with idealism and unity… But nothing lasts forever. That’s just how it works. There are no good systems. Elections are as useless as royalty or theocracy. It’s not about systems, it’s about where in the life cycle of the society/empire you randomly got born into. All we can really do is adapt. If you made it this far, I’m impressed. Thanks for reading! Appreciate you hearing out my thoughts and would love to hear your opinion.
rottingleaf@lemmy.world 3 days ago
Governance is actually important. Whoda thunk?
Some day you’ll read Tao Te Ching and maybe stop thinking in absolutes.
Where I live libertarians are the most adequate part of the social fabric suppressed by that governance. Trots are the second.
In any case, you can have a thought experiment of the same town the same size with a group of people assuming governance and telling others what to do. They can collect taxes and tell they are using them as well as they can. The bear problem will probably be smaller, albeit sometimes someone complaining will accidentally meet a bear, the drowning in trash one - I dunno, probably the trash will move to the places furthest from where that group lives, but won’t be really disposed of, because - why? No incentive.
I’ve become a libertarian after watching one enthusiastic teacher organize some sort of discussion clubs. Everyone in favor of more governance eventually shifted to authoritarianism, when talking long enough, because when you are thinking as if you were the government, you just won’t understand why you shouldn’t surrender power and then why you should answer to anyone. Less governance - OK, I was alone in that, but the best (in their opinion) argument the others found was “so how do you host olympics in a libertarian land, or build a centrally planned new city? checkmate”, and of course there’s nothing I can answer to that because I don’t think a society needs global projects or flag days.
Archer@lemmy.world 3 days ago
So they’re just not living free in the correct way, got it
Broadfern@lemmy.world 4 days ago
When everyone is out for themselves, the very basics of civilization collapses.
Empathy and pro social behavior are key to our survival and evolution as a species. Oligarchs and unbridled greed are a violation and exploitation of the social contract and bottleneck progress and healthy societal functioning.
The Bioshock games weren’t just spun up out of nowhere.
Pudutr0n@feddit.cl 3 days ago
Both empathy and the lack of it are required. Humans are pack hunters. We work best as teams. Someone has to lead those teams. Guess what traits tend to make for people better at securing and conserving power within groups, and keeping loyalty within their ranks? Yep, you guessed it! Psychopaths! :D
There are benevolent leaders, yes, that exists, but in a competition where anything goes, a psychopath which is difficult ton detect will have the advantage over someone with more empathy and robust moral limits.
There’s a reason why they’re roughly estimated to be around 10% of the population. Hierarchies need few leaders. The higher the ladder, the more vicious the psycho it gets, because they’ll have to be competent enough to defend themselves from the other psychos that want all their tasty tasty power.
The reason why all our leaders are psychopaths is this is the same reason why basketball players are all tall. If you don’t have that trait, you just don’t get the fucking job.
This used to depress me, but I chose to stop thinking about it. I don’t think there’s any fixing it.
WanderingThoughts@europe.pub 3 days ago
In a time of crisis. The biggest downside of these leaders is that they keep creating new crises to stay in power. There are cases of killing such a leader because of that.
And in a lot of leaders, their status was defined for how much they could give away and how generous they were, not how tough they were.
Then there is religion, that manages to encoded certain rules and pass them on to the next generations.
The world is a lot more than psychopaths.
Pudutr0n@feddit.cl 3 days ago
Agree 100% to every statement you made.
But umm… you realize that just by changing religion’s name it doesn’t stop being religion? Like, just because now instead of striving to go to heaven or achieve enlightenment or some other afterlife or any other form of supernatural transcendence, we now strive for a better society of tomorrow and understanding the universe… as long as people are willing to kill and die for their version of how to achieve their notion of paradise/transcendence/whatever is meaningful to them, and leaders are capable of using this conviction to build empires, there isn’t any meaningful difference?
You might argue we got rid of “magic”, but again… changing names… Statistical anomalies, higher curled up dimensions, superimposed states… Just because we have observed bizarre phenomena that has blown our minds and have the ability to predict some of it’s behavior does not mean the eradication of all the unknown is possible. And that’s all “magic” is and was. The unknown over which we have little control.
Yes, the world is a lot more than psychopaths, and yes, religion was and is fucked up, and there is enormous value to kindness and compassion which we should all strive for, but I’m sure we can agree psychos play a big role in leadership and people have a hard time seeing the stories of their time for what they are.
And, as a reminder, if someone has an advantage over others in the game of achieving power does not mean it’s wise to do as they do or that they are any more (or less) valuable than anyone else. They’re just good at a game. My comment was in no way a message of admiration, rather a declaration of resignation.
rottingleaf@lemmy.world 4 days ago
Libertarianism doesn’t deny empathy and “pro social behavior” (as an autistic person, I rarely see it toward myself, not being liked and not making right faces - apparently not deserving of it, but OK ; it’s already good if those “pro social” people don’t consider it normal to steal from you when they don’t like you), it actually relies on those more.
The issue is that it’s something that needs scale and consistency. You can’t just assemble a bunch of idealists and crooks and expect them to make a working mechanism.
I don’t think there were many more successful attempts by left anarchists.
Broadfern@lemmy.world 3 days ago
We probably have different understandings of the word “libertarian,” from what I’m reading.
I’m referring to the people who would also label themselves “anarcho-capitalists,” as the literal definition of libertarianism isn’t typically associated with the term. I put it in quotes since capitalism by design leads to and encourages hierarchy (private ownership etc etc). No, commerce/trade is not the same and is as about as old as written history itself.
I’m also autistic and have been ostracized for “wrong” behavior. When I say “pro social” I mean mutual aid, genuine compassion and actually treating other humans with respect for their immutable traits (beliefs like bigotry don’t count). I do not mean masking or “fitting in.” Unfortunately we do get unfairly judged and that’s bad. But - we also are generally capable of finding and forming our own groups.
Sovereign utopia building as a whole has its own set of issues, but that’s not what was specifically being addressed. Socialist policies in general improve the wellbeing of the respective societies they’re applied to, though.
rottingleaf@lemmy.world 3 days ago
I’m talking about ancaps as well.