Says DraniX:
Utopian fantasies fuck up the entire world.
Correct. Fantasies, by their nature, are prone to doing that. If one is to adopt or create a philosophy of living, then it certainly helps to have your ideas grounded in reality.
To specify, communists thought that they too had a pretty solid idea of how to create a utopia, specifically of the socialist persuasion. And it seemed solid in theory, at least to them. But I'll bet you not one of them could cite a real-world example of its success.
You need to speak with more Commies. Once you separate the water-headed teenage wanna-be rebels from those who've actually done their homework and can tell Proudhon from Bakunin, they're likely to fall into two categories:
- There are many real-world examples of small gift economies (insert various local examples) as well as the prominent case of the anarchist communes in post-civil-war Spain before WWII
- You are correct, because those damn dirty capitalists and authoritarian socialists keep mucking things up!
But that isn't the real point, here.
Such is the case with libertarians. Prove me wrong.
Prepare to be bored.
Libertarians cover a broad spectrum of belief and while some generalized things can be said about them, the moment you get into specifics everything gets complicated. There are Christian libertarians, anarcho-capitalists, sick-of-the-corrupt-GOP conservatives, independents who waffle between the two big parties, conspiracy nuts, Democrats who'll vote Libertarian just to mess with the Republicans, hardcore Libertarian Party members, people who just want the police to let them get stoned, people who just want to own a full-auto AK-47, and serious political scholars who argue for strictly limited minarchism.
Ask that room of "libertarians" for real-world examples of libertarianism in action and I wouldn't be surprised if you received 10 different answers. You'd hear about the first hundred years of the American Republic, ancient Iceland, various Protestant sects, Somalia, the Vatican, Antarctica, Switzerland, the theoretical moral line between one legitimate property owner and another, the Better Business Bureau, the Internet, and on and on. Would any of them be correct?
That gawd-awful mashup of ideologies and preferences is one reason why I'm not comfortable with calling myself "libertarian" even though it's the one term that most easily conveys my basic thoughts to the average person. It's why I self-identify as an anarcho-capitalist or free market anarchist. At least those terms narrow down the discussion.
Do I have any real-world examples of historical free market anarchism? No.
There are like-minded folks who believe there was a period in Iceland's past where something relatively close to our ideal was reached. I haven't researched it and am open to thinking either way. Others like to argue that any action that is not taken under the direct influence or duress of the state is essentially voluntary and free-market; I disagree.
However, despite not having any examples to which I can point, I don't think that in any way undermines the desirability of my ideal. Rather, it just reinforces just how long governments (specifically, the philosophies of political aggression that give rise to them) have been attached to our necks.
The lack of evidence can also be explained in other ways. The very idea of functional stateless societies is relatively new to human thought. The idea of radical free market capitalism is even more recent. It shouldn't be surprising to see few if any records of intentionally anarchist communities, let alone anarchist communities that explicitly enact a pro-private property and pro-free trade charter. There is intense antagonism between the majority of anarchists today (who stem from communistic/socialistic roots) and the majority of radical laissez-faire libertarians (who stem from individualistic/egoistic roots). We're talking about fractions of a fraction of a splinter ideology arguing definitions until throats are weary and fingers are worn.
Toss in the simple fact that just about all dry ground on this planet (and all of the pleasant, arable land) is currently under control of some state somewhere and add to it the quite obvious hatred establishment politicians and nationalists feel towards secession movements and what do you get?
Nothing of any substantial value worth using as an example to support my politics. Boo-hoo.
What is important is understanding this: I don't argue for a utopia. Murray Rothbard, David Friedman, Walter Block, and others don't believe everyone is an angel and will magically stop raping, robbing, and assaulting others if the state is abolished in a defined geographic area. We are aware, far more so than most people, of human nature and the temptations in front of us to cut corners when faced with the irreducible reality that life is a choice. One can either be productive and self-sufficient, or one can be a parasite to varying degrees. The single biggest reason why things are fucked up today is because too many people choose parasitism over production and that parasitism exists primarily in the form of the state.
A private court system in a society that recognizes aggression (the initiation of physical force) as the principle crime is not going to be crime-free. It is not necessarily going to be graffiti-free, obnoxious-loser-free, abortion-free, sleaze-free, idiot-free, pollution-free, or hatred-free.
But it will be substantially more free than anything else out there. And that's what counts.
I gotta tell ya, the "you silly utopian!" rejoinder is one of the more dumb responses I get to this stuff.