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Move if you don't like it

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brian0918

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I'm sure you've encountered this before. You're complaining that the government takes money from you at gunpoint simply for your need to survive, and you get the "move if you don't like it" rebuttal. How do you respond to something like that?

Here's one such example I got recently:

Gunpoint.

Right.

Do you vote? if you do, you have opted-in to the system where a plurality of voters pick representatives who determine government policy.

Or you don't vote, because you feel that the system is a terrible, violent, mess that oppresses you. You have freedom of movement, so you should travel to a place where such awful things as apportioning a piece of your money for joint efforts doesn't happen.

I suggest you move to Sealand.

While, you're here, though (wherever it is you live), please refrain from looting the stores and raping small children. Those nasty, gun-toting police might hold you.

At gunpoint.

:dough:

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Isn't this situation roughly analogous:

Gangs start roaming around your neighborhood, stealing from you and vandalizing your property. You call the police and describe the situation. The police say, "move if you don't like it."

The difference is that the public has voted for politicians who have imposed taxes on the public. So, they're basically saying that because it was voted for means that you must accept it or move.

Edited by brian0918
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How do you respond to something like that?
By explaining that individual rights are the fundamental moral principle when men deal with one another, majority rule is not. The majority may not --morally -- trample the rights of the minority. The individual is the smallest minority. Democracy, to the extent it is good, is only good to the extent it protects individual rights. It is secondary, not primary.
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Antagonist to brian0918: "Do you vote? if you do, you have opted-in to the system where a plurality of voters pick representatives who determine government policy.

Uh, no. The plurality of voters can't take away my right to free speech, or freedom of association, so that is not the system. Some things are sacred, why? The system also allows for this list of sacred things to be added to, why.

"Move if you don't like it" is used by people who want to shut you up.

Voting does not imply your agreement with anything, and nor is it required that you agree with everything that the public today has a say in, to participate.

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Uh, no. The plurality of voters can't take away my right to free speech, or freedom of association, so that is not the system. Some things are sacred, why? The system also allows for this list of sacred things to be added to, why.

"Move if you don't like it" is used by people who want to shut you up.

Voting does not imply your agreement with anything, and nor is it required that you agree with everything that the public today has a say in, to participate.

Thanks for the replies. It reminds me of the folks who say "if you don't vote, you can't complain". I guess I'm just trying to reconcile the fact that I am paying taxes with the fact that I shouldn't have to but can't do anything about it other than move.

Edited by brian0918
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I'm sure you've encountered this before. You're complaining that the government takes money from you at gunpoint simply for your need to survive, and you get the "move if you don't like it" rebuttal. How do you respond to something like that?

The appropriate answer is that switching countries is not like switching television channels. I cannot just pick up my house with its real estate and plop it down on some other part of the planet.

Turn the command around: if you do not like my standards of how a government is to treat me, withdraw your sovereignty from my property.

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Turn the command around: if you do not like my standards of how a government is to treat me, withdraw your sovereignty from my property.

So how do you reconcile the fact that nobody here actually makes such a command? Are you all simply not living by your principles, or are you trying to seek a peaceful solution?

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Gunpoint.

Right.

Do you vote? if you do, you have opted-in to the system where a plurality of voters pick representatives who determine government policy.

Rights violations are never moral and never justified.

Ask him the three men on an island question,and personalize it. If he is one of three men on an island, and two of them voted to beat him up and take his stuff, is that okay? Is it moral?

Or you don't vote, because you feel that the system is a terrible, violent, mess that oppresses you. You have freedom of movement, so you should travel to a place where such awful things as apportioning a piece of your money for joint efforts doesn't happen.

When your wealth and freedom are being taken, that's not a mere "feeling" of oppression it is in fact out right oppression. Anyone who is indifferent to oppression clearly does not value human life and does not value his neighbors and their freedoms.

I suggest you move to Sealand.

While, you're here, though (wherever it is you live), please refrain from looting the stores and raping small children. Those nasty, gun-toting police might hold you.

Now he's equivocating, clearly because he realizes there is something highly immoral about his position. It is he who is proposing "looting stores" in a big way, and maybe even "raping small children" (see Castro's regime), and he's not honest enough to admit it. It's flat out evasion. It's you, I assume, who are proposing that man's rights be observed.

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Thanks for the replies. It reminds me of the folks who say "if you don't vote, you can't complain".

One reply to that is that you vote to keep worse looters out of office.

I guess I'm just trying to reconcile the fact that I am paying taxes with the fact that I shouldn't have to but can't do anything about it other than move.

Where would you move to?

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It reminds me of the folks who say "if you don't vote, you can't complain".

The attitude of "if you do not vote then you cannot complain" is a prime example of a package deal. Just because one refuses to vote for the morally disgusting Democratic nominee or the morally disgusting Republican nominee does not mean that one should be forced to relinquish his claim to have an opinion on how things ought to be. This attitude is absurd.

The problem is and always will be the 16th amendment. Until that gets repealed, we unfortunately are victims to the whims of whatever politicians get elected in this country.

I definitely disagree with this. The problem, fundamentally speaking, is one of philosophy and not one of law. So long as individuals accept the morality of altruism, that is, the idea that we should sacrifice greater values for lesser ones means that individuals will accept terrible political philosophies such as Socialism, which leads to coercive taxation for illegitimate functions of government.

Being forced through mandatory taxation to fund legitimate functions of government, such as the court system, police forces and national defense is not nearly as bad as being subject to mandatory taxation to fund illegitimate functions of government, such as public schools or universal health insurance. In terms of political activism today, and this is my opinion, I recommend not campaigning to abolish taxation as such but towards abolishing socialized medicine or socialized education.

Edited by DarkWaters
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So how do you reconcile the fact that nobody here actually makes such a command?

Perhaps they have and we don't know about it.

Are you all simply not living by your principles, or are you trying to seek a peaceful solution?

My ethical principle is not to initiate force. And I can't think of a more peaceful thing to do than that.

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Would it be possible to form an Objectivist-based country? Has anyone seriously contemplated taking the steps in order to achieve it? It seems to make sense in that if one is to live in a truly rights-respecting environment, that environment must be created, rather than go through the arduous, and very likely futile, process of political reform and education to make it feasible where one lives.

And if such a country was created, would Objectivists move there? Or does love of America, UK, Australia, etc mean it is better to stay to reform the homeland?

MM

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Would it be possible to form an Objectivist-based country? Has anyone seriously contemplated taking the steps in order to achieve it? It seems to make sense in that if one is to live in a truly rights-respecting environment, that environment must be created, rather than go through the arduous, and very likely futile, process of political reform and education to make it feasible where one lives.

I think this is impracticable at the moment, what's more the idea of a country comprised of people who respect each others rights would have to come long before an Objectivist-based country.

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Gunpoint.

Right.

Do you vote? if you do, you have opted-in to the system where a plurality of voters pick representatives who determine government policy.

Or you don't vote, because you feel that the system is a terrible, violent, mess that oppresses you. You have freedom of movement, so you should travel to a place where such awful things as apportioning a piece of your money for joint efforts doesn't happen.

I suggest you move to Sealand.

While, you're here, though (wherever it is you live), please refrain from looting the stores and raping small children. Those nasty, gun-toting police might hold you.

At gunpoint.

Wether men vote for it or not can't sanction the act of theft. If men vote for people to initiate force upon their behave then that is their own fault but still does not make such a situation desirable or virtuous. Contrary to what most people beleive, there is an objective morality that exsits seperatly from mens petty feelings at the spur of the moment. It doesn't matter how many people want exitence to not exist, it does, it has, and it will. A is A regardless of what you or any random majority beleives.

"The object in life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane."- Marcus Aurelius

Edited by Miles White
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There was another thread discussing something similar. Here is my post regarding your queston.

If somebody initiates the use of physical force against you, whether or not such a thing is protected by law, he is immoral. And any such law is indeed invalid.

If somebody wishes to initiate the use of physical force against you, he needs your agreement.

If a land owner decides that whoever wishes to enter his lawn has to be shot in the leg, he is not entitled to shoot, unless an agreement was reached first with the one who wishes to enter, and is willing to pay the price.

A government does NOT own the land, and therefor they have no business dictating laws that will dictate the behavior of anyone living on that land, apart from doing what they're paid for, which is to protect individual rights (of those with whom they have an agreement to do so).

If I am born into an Islamic society, they most certainly DO NOT have the right to beat me to death if I decide to walk in the street without a veil.

Edited by ifatart
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There is no point in responding to such nonsense.

Someone who responds in such a manner is not looking for rational discourse, and not giving you any actual advice. They are merely saying that their value-system is such that they do not want to hear any criticisms at all about their country, culture or government.

The proper response is a punch in the mouth or, if you don't fancy an assault conviction on your record, to simply ignore the person.

Edit: As an aside, another warning sign that he's not someone worth talking with is that he can't distinguish between something being illegal because its wrong (ie theft) and something just being illegal because a lot of people say so (ie not paying your taxes.)

Social metaphysics, anyone?

Edited by sanjavalen
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I received this hilariously absurd response upon asking if they deny that we have fundamental rights:

No, I don't deny that we have those rights. Do you deny that we have corresponding obligations to the society at large that ensures those rights as best as it is able, which ironically necessitates to some degree the curtailment of said rights?

You don't like paying taxes, fine, find some place with a social contract that either allows you to freeload or doesn't provide any services. You won't find one in any functional society. Go figure.

Justice holds a balance for a reason, and it's not just because the ancient Greeks hadn't invented the digital scale yet.

I've already obliterated their arguments in a reply of my own, but thought you'd get a kick out of it.

Edited by brian0918
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He isn't worth arguing with. The difference is a philosophical one - mainly, he believes that you have the moral obligation to help your neighbor. Moreover, his use of the word "contract" implies that he believes in some form of social contract theory, which if I am not mistaken, has always stood for the subordination of individual rights to the will of the majority, at least in the popular Rosseau formulation (which seems to be what he is arguing for).

As a side note, I had never heard of this nation of Sealand until now. I did some reading on it on Wikipedia and find the whole thing quite comical to say the least.

Edited by adrock3215
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He isn't worth arguing with. The difference is a philosophical one - mainly, he believes that you have the moral obligation to help your neighbor. Moreover, his use of the word "contract" implies that he believes in some form of social contract theory, which if I am not mistaken, has always stood for the subordination of individual rights to the will of the majority, at least in the popular Rosseau formulation (which seems to be what he is arguing for).

So given a fundamental moral disagreement of this kind, is it proper form simply to not bother? Can the disagreement be resolved, and if so, how? How does one argue against another's assumed set of rights, moral codes, etc. Is it possible to show their assumption is incorrect, or can one only say that such assumptions are not favorable in some way?

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Ultimately, when confronted with this sort of confrontation (isn't redundancy redundant?) I just refer to Galt's Speech when he says, "I do not grant the terms of reason to men who propose to deprive me of reason. I do not enter discussions with neighbors who think they can forbid me to think."

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