Theme: Predation

OBJECTIVISM, LIKE LIBERTARIANISM, IS MERELY MARXISM FOR THE MIDDLE CLASS: PARASITISM UPON THE COMMONS.

All, ( h/t: Reece Edward Haynes )

Um. I will crush a lot of egos and expose a lot of malinvestments if I say that objectivism provides us with moral justification to be skeptical of demands for contributions to the commons. Particularly “positive demands” in payment for “positive freedoms.” In other words “violations of reciprocity, masquerading as demands for reciprocity, by casting preferences or goods as necessities. (You might have to read that a few times before it sinks in.)

But just like the NAP is a half truth, Objectivism is a half truth. Meaning, how do we demarcate the between productive reciprocity (trades), free riding, parasitism, and theft?

You see, this is why there are no advanced literatures on Libertarianism, and why libertarianism was intellectually abandoned.

You can’t control what others will retaliate against you for (the definition of property), and you can’t control when you are free riding on the investments of the commons by others (except to leave the area).

So it is one thing to say ‘I wish control over my life’ and another to say ‘Here are the limits to the control I have over my life’. Those limits are products of human nature (retaliation against investments in obtaining an interest) or products of consequence (I can no longer remain in this polity without benefitting from the construction of said commons.)

Crusoe’s Island is, like all of marxism, an elaborate deception. And like the border-regions where states have little influence, or like the ghetto that obtains permission to use its own customary laws internally, Crusoe’s island is surrounded by water that serves as the walls around the ghetto or the borders of neighboring states. Instead, the problem of ethics is not one of choice, but that given an territory normally distributed with other people, how do I cooperate with others so that I have the maximum choice possible given that humans are super-predators, and will only cooperate if it is more beneficial than killing you or enslaving you and taking your things. The answer is total non-parasitism. Not just the parasitism I choose to avoid. But total non parasitism, even if my parasitism is created by my benefit by externality.

The question is not one of preferential philosophy. It is not one of optimum ethics. It is not something that requires belief. And it isn’t the product of rationalization. It’s a very simple empirical question: what will people not retaliate against me for? What commons do I need to pay for to not force these people to retaliate against me for not paying? How can I create enough economic and social incentives to create an alternative polity if this one is unsuitable? Am I better off in this commons or another?

Libertarianism was a failed experiment in converting the cult of jewish separatism evolved among pastoral people who never developed the ability to hold territory and the required ethical code of land holders: either a professional warrior caste and the tax structure to fund them, or a universal militia that is self funded and risks personal life and property.

Just as marxism was a failed experiment in universalizing ingroup equalitarianism, so was Libertarianism. In other words, marxism consists of justifying parasitism upon direct production, and libertarianism consists of justifying parasitism upon the commons – which is, as much as private property, the unique feature of western civilization: we produce high trust as our most valuable common. And that trust is created not only by prohibition on the parasitism upon private production, but by the parasitism upon commons production. So libertarianism is just a middle class application of marxism.

Objectivism ( skepticism ) as a means of questioning (in the Nietzschean sense) whether moral demands were created in pursuit of positive freedom (parasitism), or demands for dysgenic reproduction (parasitism), or demands for institutionalize rents (parasitism), or malinvestments in a commons that would not produce returns only produce additional rents for some sector (parasitism) – it’s a purely empirical question.

But like all (“bullshit”) claims that operating by general rules (deontological ethics / rule ethics / black and white decisions so to speak) obviates you from performing the work of investigating whether you are the victim of free riding, rather than a free rider. And I have never, ever, seen any such ethical claim that was other than an attempt to justify free riding under the pretense of moral principle.

Never.