[SP] SP are libraterians? What are your politic views?

[LEGERdeMAIN]

I would have to agree that #1 is a stereotype. It also seems that you're equating libertarians with the Libertarian Party, which is, IN FACT, a group of wife-beating, God-ferrrin', predominately "country" white males. This is the Libertarian Party stereotype for a reason, unfortunately( "god" bless wikipedia):

Libertarianism is a term adopted by a broad spectrum[1] of political philosophies which advocate the maximization of individual liberty[2] and the minimization or even abolition of the state.


a BROAD spectrum of political philosophies. Not the Pop-Political Party which happens to have a socially liberal and dogmatic free-market economic "philosophy".

I would also agree that this doesn't have much to do with the topic, especially considering I have no idea what my type is.

 

[Thalassa]

Libertarianism isn't irrational because the world was chaotic 200 years ago. That statement is illogical.

Do you not see the connection between there being social programs and the world being comparatively more civilized? No? I invite you to look back on the state of cities even one hundred years ago. Without mandatory public education illiteracy will sky rocket. Without government social programs the social issues will still be there, and they will be much more in your face. Everything you dislike it not going to go away because the government gets smaller.

The quality of my life would not be complicated in a bad way with a smaller government. Community-based solutions are ALWAYS better than Federal or State government solutions.

Always? O rly? You're right. Community-based solutions are ALWAYS better than Federal or State government solutions.The Ku Klux Klan and town lynchings are far superior to the government stepping in and mandating civil rights.

The difference is that Federal and State governments will spend more than they have while community-based organizations and individuals cannot. You know what would really improve quality of life for the poor and soon to be poor? If they didn't spend the little money they had on cigarettes, pot and expensive, barely nutritive foods. I can't feel sorry for a 400 pound woman with three kids by three fathers who spends all of her hard earned welfare and child support on frozen pizza and doritos. America has the fattest poor and I'm supposed to feel sorry for them?

You seem to be unaware of the fact that this behavior is caused by poor education which will only increase with lack of funding to schools and by taking away mandantory public education. Also, many of these negative cultural phenomena you complain about are actually the products of unrestrained capitalism and have nothing to do with government.

Oh, and cable, that's BS. If you're working 30 hours a week at some fast food restaurant, DON'T GET CABLE and the most expensive cell phone and a laptop and other things you don't need and can't afford.

Again, capitalist society by-products, not by-products of the government. What don't you get?

very true, which is why I support community-based, grassroots programs to assist people who truly do need help. Government is too big and inefficient to properly care for people in need.

There is some truth to this, but history proves over and over again that private charities can help certain individuals but don't solve much of anything in terms of more complex social problems.

I'm a great judge of what is rational. Rational is easy, Logical is a bit harder and if I have the urge to insert bizarre, nonsensical sentences into a post, I will.

The wisest man is he who understands how little he actually knows.

 

[LEGERdeMAIN]

Without mandatory public education illiteracy will sky rocket. Everything you dislike it not going to go away because the government gets smaller.

Social programs are good, and even necessary, for SOME people. The people who really do need help(the mentally retarded, the elderly, orphans) should get help. Everything else should be handled at a local level. I don't think that social problems are going to disappear with smaller government, but they won't disappear with more government, either. My problem with a large government is that they subsidize every exploitative industry at the expense of the public good. If they stopped spending so much to keep bad companies afloat, cut the defense budget and decriminalized homosexual marriage I would be more than happy to sit on the sidelines and let them help those in need and I wouldn't even care if they threw a few more buckets of ice cream at the overweight, undeserving fake poor.

Public education? It's not that good. When I was in high school, we had a yearly writing and reading comprehension exam. I was one of the five percent who passed with "proficiency". Ninety-five percent of a seniors with a deficiency in understanding and using their own language is disgusting for a so-called super power. This isn't an exception in the US, it's the rule.

Always? O rly? You're right. Community-based solutions are ALWAYS better than Federal or State government solutions.The Ku Klux Klan and town lynchings are far superior to the government stepping in and mandating civil rights.

The KKK and public lynchings? Um...the key word was solutions, not ignorant, racist mobs.

You seem to be unaware of the fact that this behavior is caused by poor education which will only increase with lack of funding to schools and by taking away mandantory public education. Also, many of these negative cultural phenomena you complain about are actually the products of unrestrained capitalism and have nothing to do with government.

Unrestrained capitalism? We haven't had unrestrained capitalism for a hundred years. We have government-subsidized capitalism.

BTW, I'm not a capitalist.

 

[Thalassa]

Social programs are good, and even necessary, for SOME people. The people who really do need help(the mentally retarded, the elderly, orphans) should get help. Everything else should be handled at a local level. I don't think that social problems are going to disappear with smaller government, but they won't disappear with more government, either. My problem with a large government is that they subsidize every exploitative industry at the expense of the public good. If they stopped spending so much to keep bad companies afloat, cut the defense budget and decriminalized homosexual marriage I would be more than happy to sit on the sidelines and let them help those in need and I wouldn't even care if they threw a few more buckets of ice cream at the overweight, undeserving fake poor.

You sound like a liberal. Most liberals don't want the government subsidizing exploitative industry at the expense of public good. In fact, that's a VERY Republican thing, specifically a REAGANOMICS Republican thing.

Public education? It's not that good. When I was in high school, we had a yearly writing and reading comprehension exam. I was one of the five percent who passed with "proficiency". Ninety-five percent of a seniors with a deficiency in understanding and using their own language is disgusting for a so-called super power. This isn't an exception in the US, it's the rule.

But you're wrong. In terms of public education the US is not the rule. Japan and Western European countries are the rule, they are far more socialist leaning than we, and their public schools are notably superior. So obviously the thing to do improve public schooling, not do away with it. Do you understand how illiterate and ignorant the general population was before mandatory public schooling and financial aid for college and the GI Bill?

I take it history isn't your favorite subject.

KKK and public lynchings? Um...the key word was solutions, not ignorant, racist mobs.

People become ignorant mobs without education. Libertarianism endorses a less educated public who makes "community based" decisions and "solutions."

You bet your sweet bippy that plenty of Southerners thought of these things as "solutions" to what they selfishly considered a threat to their selfish economic well being. Ah...sounds kind of like what you're talking about, eh? Small, community based "solutions"!

P.S. One of the only reasons that you're enlightened enough to understand that those people were ignorant racist mobs are the result of government programs you take for granted like the public school system and public libraries and the Civil Rights Act.

Unrestrained capitalism? We haven't had unrestrained capitalism for a hundred years. We have government-subsidized capitalism.

BTW, I'm not a capitalist.

A libertarian who isn't a capitalist? Then you're not a "libertarian" in the present-day sense. You're an old fashioned libertarian socialist i.e. "anarchist."

 

[Thalassa]

1. First off, I can't pass up an opportunity to tweak the Libbies... Libertarianism is a silly little philosophy that should've died off long ago. It's nothing more than a collection of gun nut militia types finding common ground with conservative "intellectuals," conspiracy theorists, Social Darwinists, gold-standard endorsing economics professors, college freshman who want drugs legalized and their upperclass counterparts who want the Fed investigated and ended. Throw in a few aging hippies who still don't trust "the man" or the "power structure" and you've got quite the souffle of crazy.

I love this paragraph. I just want to hold it and pet it.

Weird thing is, I have yet to meet a libertarian who isn't fairly certain that they're smarter and better informed than the average bear.

Of course, because if they acknowledged that they might be average, vulnerable, weak, and human then they'd also have to acknowledge that libertarianism wouldn't necessarily work for them as an individual. Libertarianism is platform based upon Social Darwinism, where these people suffer from the delusion that bad things will never happen to them. What's that like? Must be fun to come from such a life of ease and privelege that one can delude oneself into believing that bad things only happen to lazy, stupid people who deserve it. What do libertarians do when they lose their job or get into a freak accident and lose their good arm? It's a question I love to ponder. I love to ask libertarians without health insurance what they'd do if they ever got cancer.

Of course, they're also fairly certain that American history ended in 1789 and that everything since has been a bastardization of American values, so there's apparently no correlation between their certainty and reality.

Yes. It's super-strange. They consider themselves to be history buffs but refuse to acknowledge anything that's happened in the 200 or so years since the Revolutionary War.

But to finally be on topic, no, I don't think SPs are more likely to be libertarians. I think they're actually more likely to be anarchists, half-hearted liberal or moderates, or people who simply don't participate in poltical affairs.

 

[Thalassa]

My major was in Business Economics and many of my classes showed videos of John Stossel from ABC covering issues about the business world. So naturally I became a libertarian.

Is this a joke? It's really funny. Like, put it in a movie, witty one-liner, deadpan funny.

I really hope you're kidding.

 

[Ruthie]

It also seems that you're equating libertarians with the Libertarian Party, which is, IN FACT, a group of wife-beating, God-ferrrin', predominately "country" white males.

??? What of what I wrote leads you to believe THAT is how I see libertarians? "God-ferrin'?" predominantly "country?" "wife-beating?" When I think of libertarianism, I think of ivory tower pseudo-intellectuals who read Nietzche and Ayn Rand (both radical Atheists, so there goes your "God-ferrin'" stereotype).

As for the Party itself being like that, I gave up two hours of my life (could it really only have been 2 hours? felt like weeks) watching C-Span cover the LP debates and convention. They were quite the collection of unlikable nutjobs who clearly couldn't go more than 5 minutes without quoting Cicero or casually calling "average" Americans stupid. That was a frightening group, and there wasn't a "God-ferrin', "wife-beating," redneck among them. I do agree with one of your points... I'd put money on them being overwhelmingly white.

This is the Libertarian Party stereotype for a reason, unfortunately( "god" bless wikipedia):

Libertarianism is a term adopted by a broad spectrum[1] of political philosophies which advocate the maximization of individual liberty[2] and the minimization or even abolition of the state.

a BROAD spectrum of political philosophies. Not the Pop-Political Party which happens to have a socially liberal and dogmatic free-market economic "philosophy".

Wow, thanks for the lesson on the difference between the LP and libertarianism as political philosophy. It's actually a really good demonstration of that "thinks they're smarter than the average bear" thing: if someone disagrees with libertarianism, they must not fully understand it. All enlightened, rational people will come around.

 

[Ruthie]

Is this a joke? It's really funny. Like, put it in a movie, witty one-liner, deadpan funny.

I really hope you're kidding.

Keep holding down the fort, Marmalade. This is fun.

 

[slant]

I don't affliate with a specific political point of view or party.

 

[Pristinegirl]

OMZ slant surprise surprise!!!
Didn't know I would find you here, I thought you hated ENFPs ;o

I don't affilate with a party but Freedom is important to me and I hate when socialism is taken to a riddiculous extent such as in Scandinavia or former USSR. =)

 

[LEGERdeMAIN]

Wow, thanks for the lesson on the difference between the LP and libertarianism as political philosophy. It's actually a really good demonstration of that "thinks they're smarter than the average bear" thing: if someone disagrees with libertarianism, they must not fully understand it. All enlightened, rational people will come around.

People tend to equate Libertarianism with the LP. It's like saying Republicanism and the Republican Party are the same thing. Common misconception. Not my fault and not my problem.

The LP is a very diverse party with plenty of little subgroups who vote Libertarian for different reasons....but....

The two most visible groups within the LP seem to be the white, southern Protestants who think the RP is too soft and the intellectuals who take Nietzsche and Stirner too seriously. The group I most often come into contact with is the former.

 

[slant]

Pristinegirl, I am everywhere, and everywhere is me.

 

[Ruthie]

libertarian = NT. "Rational," self-contained, inflexible in the face of reality.

 

[Thalassa]

... I'd put money on them being overwhelmingly white.

In my experience they're overwhelmingly white, upper-middle class, and male.

 

[LEGERdeMAIN]

In my experience they're overwhelmingly white, upper-middle class, and male.

Yes, overwhelmingly white just like the US. According to US Census Bureau estimates(circa 2008), 80% of Americans are white. Non-hispanic whites are 66%.

 

[Ruthie]

Yes, overwhelmingly white just like the US. According to US Census Bureau estimates(circa 2008), 80% of Americans are white. Non-hispanic whites are 66%.

Are you actually going to make the argument that libertarians are a representative cross-section of America? That 34% of Libbies are Hispanic or non-white?

 

[LEGERdeMAIN]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ruthie
... I'd put money on them being overwhelmingly white.

Then:

marmalade.sunrise
In my experience they're overwhelmingly white, upper-middle class, and male.

And then:

Originally Posted by MaybeLogic View Post
Yes, overwhelmingly white just like the US. According to US Census Bureau estimates(circa 2008), 80% of Americans are white. Non-hispanic whites are 66%.

What part don't you understand?

 

[BlackCat]

I was talking politics with a friend (ENTP) and he said that my beliefs sounded libertarian. I'm fiscally conservative and socially liberal, but neither to too much of an extreme.

 

[Ruthie]

What part don't you understand?

Um... how about the part where you use national demographic statistics to justify the argument that libertarians are "overwhelmingly white." I live in Maryland, a fairly diverse state that - like the country - is majority white. Some people live in Utah. That is also a majority white state. Guess using your logic, there's no difference between the demographic make-up of Maryland and Utah since both are, you know, majority white.

If you're going to be nitpicky though, how about this:

The Libertarian Party, or individuals who profess to hold a libertarian philosophy, are significantly less racially diverse than the nation as a whole.

Would you at least agree with that statement?

 

[LEGERdeMAIN]

I agree that the Libertarian Party is less diverse than the Democratic Party.

The problem in the last few pages of this thread is that your talking about the Political Parties and I'm talking about Political Philosophy.

Another problem is that you keep making assumptions about what I believe. You don't know what I believe. All you're doing is taking the popular LP stereotypes and applying it to a non-LP, libertarian individual.

I wasn't nitpicking. All I did was post an estimate by a GO showing that the majority of the population was white. You took that and assumed some more. That was the point of posting it.

Half of this thread should probably be it's own thread. Do you agree?