Can freedom and the State coexist?

The premise for this thread is simple.

I'd like to see those who defend the existence of a State propose a form of government that would make it impossible for Moral Guardians to criminalize the targets of their hatred.

Such a government will be deemed to pass the test if there is no conceivable way to ever enact something like gun control, drug prohibition, warrantless searches, communications monitoring or censorship, copyright enforcement, bans on any kind of consensual sexual activity, restrictions on any sort of speech (and any form of expression is speech), restrictions on freedom of movement (like regulating migration), prohibitions on abortion or euthanasia, the need for permits and licenses... or any other item in the longish list of authoritarian bullshit people are forced to deal with/tolerate/submit to in a day-to-day basis.

I think (and it might not be far-fetched) that the only way to reliably get rid of all that is to abolish government. As long as there is government, all sorts of Moral Guardians will make their crusades and spineless politicians will pander to them. So I'd say that only by destroying the very concept of the law will people be able to live freely without all sorts of busybodies and government-approved thugs telling them what to do.

Still, I'm willing to play along with y'all and help with devising all sorts of schemes and checks and balances so the hypothetical forms of government proposed would indeed protect freedom. Anyone up for the challenge?

edited 8th Jun '11 2:57:09 PM by SavageHeathen

No easily conceivable way?

I think your standards are a problem.

OK, fine. Let's lower the standards to no practical/feasible way.

Yes, I think they can. Without certain rules and regulations, it'd naturally fall into a more feudalistic system, where the richest/strongest control the rest of the population.

Yes. Now excuse me as I continue to live in the United States perfectly okay and talk to my similarly non-oppressed buddies from Germany and Japan respectively.

If those issues are phased away, there would probably be no purpose for the government, which is something I wouldn't like. Face it, laws and the government are necessary - an anarchistic community larger than the size of a municipality, or using omnicidal tactics to achieve their anarchistic ideals, would not work at all.

I think that it's very hard to combine freedom and security. This is a problem inherent in the two concepts. Generally, a state brings security but takes some freedom. Having more freedom often means being less secure and vice-versa.

Sure you can find an acceptable middleground but no, complete freedom cannot coexist with a state.

Complete freedom is as dangerous as complete lack of freedom.

@Milos: I didn't understand your post. What do you mean?

I suspect it is impossible to design a constitution for a state that would prevent it ever being used for harm.

However, a lack of government is a power vacuum, and sooner or later people would fill it and form a de facto government — which would be just as abusive if not more. That all government systems can be abused doesn't mean anarchy is better.

This is a trick situation. The lack of a state wouldn't protect these things, either.

Total Catch22 situation, huh?

@Heathen: I agree that many laws are unnecessary, but some of the ones you mentioned are paramount, and if those were abolished, there would be no need for a government. Even if it still existed, the system would practically be anarchistic, and I'm very sceptical of anarchy.

I'd say so. You're asking us to produce a model of government which would fit your qualifications, without producing a model of anarchism which would do the same. Anarchism, as you've suggested it, wouldn't mean total chaos, but power and responsibility held equally amongst all citizens. On that note, I agree with you wholeheartedly, but it won't work unless there's a way to eliminate human weakness as a whole. Misconceptions, ignorance, fear, prudishness, ego and selfishness would send that model toppling like a house of cards—just like every other political model I've seen.

The main area where we disagree seems to be your trust in human ability to sort out its own weaknesses—which I do not agree with at all. From my experience, the only way humans force themselves to wake up is if something comes along and forces them to.

People are always talking about the supposed inherent conflict between security and freedom. What about the ways in which security promotes freedom? The security afforded me by having government-controlled police to keep the streets (relatively) clear of human predators provides me the freedom to travel around town at my leisure. I don't have to barricade myself in my home or carry unwieldy weapons for self-defense. I have more options because of the State.

Sure why not? The state situation as it is is far better than it was thousands of years ago.

Basically, anarchy would be what we had before states and rule of law. People murdering each other over slights, whole communities torched to the ground because one group didn't like another and it was all based on Might Makes Right. You had disproportionate retribution and you had no system of accountability.

With a state, you trade some freedoms to gain guaranteed protection of other freedoms.

So what's the pressing issues I find with our current state solution?

• Demagoguery (which includes pandering to moral guardians)
• Lack of informed voting
• Inefficient bureaucracy
• Imbalance of power between individuals in terms of political/civil power

I don't think you need to do anything drastic. You just slowly build on top of what we had before so that you are trading away less freedoms to gain better guarantees on a greater set on the rest of your freedoms.

More easily accessible information would make people vote in more informed ways. Automatic voter registration increases the potential voting pool. Mixing/matching bureaucratic systems and solutions across the world, alongside pilot programs, slowly make government more efficient. I mean in Canada, people get angry over 10 million dollars misspent in a trillion dollar economy.

Banning corporate donations and putting a hard cap on election spending, individual donations and in fact making it more tax/vote-based funding decreases the imbalance in political power in a country. Banning organised political advertisement by anybody but by political parties creates a more fair media atmosphere.

I am of the opinion that the power and authority of the State should be optimized and exercised only to the extent that is required to keep things civilized. History has shown us what happens when you try to make society too civilized, or do too good a job of eliminating undesirable elements. It also shows the tragic fallacy in the belief that the destruction of democratic institutions will cause better ones to arise in their place.

Certainly one of the most challenging and difficult social problems we face today is, how can the State maintain the necessary degree of control over society without becoming repressive, and how can it achieve this in the face of an increasingly impatient electorate who are beginning to regard legal and political solutions as too slow? The State sees the spectre looming ahead of terrorism and anarchy, and this increases the risk of its over-reaction and a reduction in our freedom.

One of the conclusions is that there are limits to which state should go in maintaining law and order. The State should not do the wrong thing for the right reason, even though it frequently does the right thing for the wrong reason.

As with everything else in life, it is a matter of groping for the right balance, and a certain amount of luck.

I defend the existence of the state as a necessary thing, or as you would see it as a Necessarily Evil. I believe that some standards and government thugs are necessary to keep people from raping, pillaging and killing with impunity. We need a strong frame work to keep the guts of society in. And looking back through history, Anarchy and Pure Communism have never ever worked, and probably never will. Freedom complete and total is a far away, rather stupid ideal, because with complete freedom comes complete license to do as you please. Consensual marriage and relation between close family would result in some poor, deformed creatures, and there are just some things that should not be shown. While some Moral Guardian types take this too far, standards should never be abolished.

Sacrifice freedom or security for one or the other, and you do not deserve either.

edited 8th Jun '11 3:24:53 PM by NickTheSwing

-buffs user name lovingly with a wet rag.-

What you reffered to in King Zeal's post was not really a Catch-22. Catch-22, at least until the authorities boil it down to "we have the power to do anything you can't stop us from doing" is a compulsion. A litteral Catch-22 is both compulsory and conservative, it prevents any change to the system by causing a victory condition to be true only when two mutually exclusive prior conditions can be fulfilled.

You have, however, presented a Catch-22 with your initial conditions. By essentially defining all actions performed by a state as unacceptable, and than asking us to design a state that can fit those conditions, you have indeed provided us with an unwinnable scenario. By the logic you laid forth, abolishing governments is the only possible option.

So yes, if you define taxes and fishing permits as toltalitarian impositions on a person's freedom that they are forced to submit to under the heels of a government hell-bent on controlling every aspect of our lives, an Anarchist revolution is indeed right around the corner.

Incidentally, if you print in greyscale instead of pure black and white, not only you will often get a more detailed picture with greater texture, but you'll be able to see that what you thought was purest white is somewhat tinged, and the darkest black has some hints of being less absolute than one may have suspected.

I didn't say taxes. I said sin taxes.

Of course if there'd be taxes in the presence of a government!

You're asking for a regulatory body that can't regulate.

I just lost three bucks to social security, which I likely won't see again. I tolerated it.

edited 8th Jun '11 3:53:11 PM by HungryJoe

@Savage Heathen:'Legum servi sumus ut liberi esse possimus~We are slaves of the law so that we may be able to be free.'

What I described wasn't a regulatory body that couldn't regulate: The restrictions listed would perfectly allow for a peacekeeping body that leaves people alone as long as nobody's rights are violated.

It might also raise revenue (as long as it's not done via sin taxes) and provide services. It might even arbitrate in disputes among people, if you're feeling particularly statist. Yes, that might include labor-management disputes, unless businesses are co-ops on the first place, and provide for enforcement of contracts.

They'd be fully able to punish actual crimes (that is, when somebody's rights are disregarded without their consent).

Let's lower the bar: The permits and licenses thing you might get dropped from the list of requirements (as long as they were only ever required for economic activity and were always shall-issue. Zero arbitrary treatment)

In short, except regulating private and consensual conduct in any way or infringing the natural rights of the people, they'd be able to do pretty much anything States do. If it is not even imaginable, it means that the State and personal liberty are by definition incompatible.

edited 8th Jun '11 4:12:22 PM by SavageHeathen

You want things that, while it's possible to have, are inefficient. Punishing crime while doing nothing to prevent it. Or hell, in the case of sin taxes, not punishing poor decisions and using that punishment to counteract them. With permits- doing nothing to stop people who shouldn't have certain things until after they have them. And so on.

EDIT: I submit to you that total personal liberty and LIFE ITSELF are incompatible. There will always be people that what power, no matter what, and if you get rid of the existing ones who're more or less benevolent, you allow the malevolent ones to take their place. If you have total, unrestricted free speech, freedom of assembly, and freedom to have guns, you allow me to start convincing people that they aren't safe, and that they should band together. Once we're together, we can go around taking what we want. You don't have the right to search us, so even if we have guns we can conceal them and shoot you and anyone else who disagrees. And so on.

SECOND EDIT: Also, from the OP- some of those regulations aren't moral government issues,. If you believe that life begins at conception, it's stopping murder, so to pro-lifers, by not regulating it, you've no right to keep people from going around murdering eachother. A bit strawmannish of me, but meh.

edited 8th Jun '11 4:18:53 PM by Wulf

Whaddayamean, nothing to prevent it?

That State could have patrols'n'stuff, there to thwart attempted rapes or robberies or kidnappings. It might even have sufficient social services so that there's no poverty, preventing most crime. It's not barred from funding addiction recovery and stuff, or even providing addicts with cheap drugs so they don't have to steal to get them. It might suppress barriers to entry and fiscally encourage unemployed workers to start co-ops, thereby reducing unemployment.

As for not taking things away from people until they try to screw others over? Yeah... As long as people don't attempt to violate the rights of other people, they should generally be left alone. Not leaving them alone might be practical, sure, but it's highly questionable.

edited 8th Jun '11 4:21:21 PM by SavageHeathen