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Wednesday 1 August 2012
It’s Hip! It’s Cool! It’s Libertarianism!

At a time in which our society has never been more interdependent in every possible way, libertarians think they’re John fucking Wayne looking out over his ranch with an Apache scalp in his belt, or John fucking Galt doing…whatever it is he does. (Collect vintage desk toys from the Sharper Image?)

Their whole ideology is like a big game of Dungeons & Dragons. It’s all make-believe, except for the chain-mail–they brought that from home. Elves, dwarves and fair maidens for capital. Even with the supposedly “good ones”—anti-war libertarians—we’re still talking about people who think Medicare’s going to lead to Stalinism.

So my advice is to call them out.

Ask them what their beef really is with the welfare state. First, they’ll talk about the deficit and say we just can’t afford entitlement programs. Well, that’s obviously a joke, so move on. Then they’ll say that it gives the government tyrannical power. Okay. Let me know when the Danes open a Guantánamo Bay in Greenland.

Here’s the real reason libertarians hate the idea. The welfare state is a check against servility towards the rich. A strong welfare state would give us the power to say Fuck You to our bosses—this is the power to say “I’m gonna work odd jobs for twenty hours a week while I work on my driftwood sculptures and play keyboards in my a chillwave band. And I’ll still be able to go to the doctor and make rent.”

Sounds like freedom to me.

45 notes

  1. dammit-daria reblogged this from sociolab
  2. awalt2069 reblogged this from azspot and added:
    I hate libertarians, I love this essay.
  3. thelunacy reblogged this from azspot
  4. uoit reblogged this from azspot
  5. spam420 reblogged this from azspot
  6. unapologeticexistence reblogged this from azspot and added:
    ^ this so much, and so hard.
  7. michaelangerlo reblogged this from barticles and added:
    Thank you. I countered two geniuses yesterday who promoted the same dumb piece.
  8. trotskitty reblogged this from azspot
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  14. kjartanthemagnificent reblogged this from azspot and added:
    Fuck yes.
  15. theadamglass reblogged this from azspot
  16. khronicbitchface reblogged this from sociolab
  17. sociolab reblogged this from azspot

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