Alex,

That’s fine with me. In fact, that’s along the same lines I was thinking. Brad doesn’t seem to do this, however. He seems to treat them as separate species each with its own inherent theory of progress.

If the state’s power rests upon the assumption of consent, then a strong showing for anti-government or small government candidates can signal to those who, although not consenting to being governed, still don’t bother to actively oppose the state in any meaningful way that discontent with the status quo is much stronger and more vibrant than he/she may have initially suspected. Moreover, radical candidates have often achieved political change–without having achieved much electoral success–by swaying the Establishment in their direction. At the risk of making it seem that I’m employing a straw-man argument, I wish to stress that, while we still oppose and condemn the Establishment as inherently resting on corruption and while we maintain that the end goal still needs to be fought for, we can still celebrate those tiny steps in the right direction. Insofar as the radical candidates who lean in our direction sway the Establishment toward its own demise, the situation indeed does improve. And insofar as the vote totals for radical candidates indicate (A) and (B), the appearance of impracticality of agorism will fade (to what small or great degree, I cannot say) and the tendency for libertarian radicalism will become more acceptable both popularly and individually.

(A): to the populas that these radical views are not necessarily “extremist” views (in the derogatory manner people typically use the term “extremist”)

(B): to those radicals who feel alone that they are not alone, and that it might not be futile after all to be more active in their opposition to the state,

Do we come to agreement there? (My apologies in advance for the convolution in a couple of my above sentences.)

Yours,
Alex Peak

Anyone who advocates using counter-economics as a tool for the abolition of the state is an agorist. But even though most agorists do not put much faith in the idea of fighting the system from the inside, there doesn’t seem to me to be anything preventing someone from advocating both methods.

There is no term to my knowledge for those anarcho-capitalists who explicitely oppose agorism. In fact, I don’t know if such persons even exist, including Rothbard. Although Rothbard had problems with Konkin’s New Libertarian Manifesto, I don’t recall getting the impression from him that counter-economics should be discouraged.

I believe it’s a misrepresentation of those-anarcho-capitalists-who-advocate-fighting-the-system-from-the-inside that they “identify with the state.” I can’t, of course, declare objectively that none do; but I would suspect that most who advocate fighting the system from the inside have already “killed the cop in their heads” and chosen to advocate this as either A) an additional tool for defense, in addition to counter-economics, or B) a way to show the world that the idea of freedom is not dead.

I personally have no objection to fighting the system from the inside, but would never proclaim that agorists are not serious about politics. I accept counter-economics as a valid tool.

Speaking of Ron Paul, I plan to vote for him despite believing him to be flawed on a variety of positions. In no way, however, do I interpret my vote as giving the system, or giving a Paulian government, justification or validity. Government would still be unethical even if Ron Paul wins, and his use of big government (i.e. coercion) equally unethical. My support is simply defensive.

If I’m a slave and I vote for my slave master, I will never assume the process somehow justifies my position. But I’ll nevertheless vote if it means I get whipped less. And if I find a potential slave-holder who refuses to whip anyone for any reason, I’d all-the-more-gleefully vote for him/her.

Respectfully,
Alex Peak

“While agorism grew out of “anarcho-capitalism” and retains much from it, their respective theories of progress toward the goal of a stateless society are entirely different. The anarcho-capitalist is a reformist, or at best a gradualist. The agorist is a revolutionary.”

This is an arbitrary and false distinction. There is no inherent reason why an “anarcho-capitalist” should be reformist or gradualist rather than revolutionary. An anarcho-capitalist could be either depending upon his theory of progress. Do you have some other criterion to distinguish anarcho-capitalism and agorism? If not, they seem to be two words for the same thing.

Also, what do you mean by de facto liberal? Classical liberal? Left-liberal? Just a liberal as in working within the system instead of rejecting it outright? Perhaps it is idiosyncratic on my part, but I tend to think of libertarian market anarchism or anarcho-capitalism or whatever you want to call it as the logical conclusion of a fully consistent liberalism.

One last thing, while it might be acceptable to treat the nonaggression principle as an axiom for the sake of argument, as a mutually agreed upon starting point, it is not in fact an axiom but rather a conclusion requiring philosophical argument to justify.

I support the Ron Paul campaign because it might be our last chance in a long time to propagate freedom ideas to the general population, not because I want to make people vote for Ron Paul. Of course I am against any law enforcement in any form, I wouldn’t “narc” on anyone!

Precisely. The idea that we libertarians, anarchists, and everything in between can’t take a nuanced position on this - that if we support the Paul candidacy we are BY DEFINITION in favor of Paul ruling us and everything Paul does or believes in being O.K. with us - it’s just ridiculous. Frankly, it is here that I think you and I really butt heads, Brad.

We are complex beings. We’re in a messy situation. Following mechanistic principles for consistency’s sake to whatever conclusion they take you is a great way to engage in thought experiments and explore ideas. It is not a way to live - at least, I choose not to live and die by consistent principles. I don’t believe I’ll ever have the world figured out in my head that well. In fact, I don’t believe anybody does.

If you honestly think the Paul campaign should be opposed, then oppose it. If you think it should be supported, then support it. Make your arguments, attempt to persuade, but let’s have enough respect for the tradition of anarchism to understand that none of us have it all figured out yet; none of us really, truly know what to do. Anarchists and libertarians have always employed a variety of means towards their goal, and the worst thing we can do is draw sweeping conclusions about others’ intentions or honesty - least of all because of some highly structured value system we’ve worked out in our heads.

I really don’t see where Ron Paul figures into this, unless you are confusing folks like me with the paleoliberals over at LRC.com.

On the subject of politics, I must add that I find political action as repulsive as much as I would participation in a mafia gathering, although like sexual/racial discrimination, I accept that millions of idiots can and will make the wrong choice when they are blind to the full cost of their actions.

I don’t support any change in government except its swift implosion through direct action and active resistance. And I also support counter-economics, although counter-economics alone is not the solution.