It seems most people I interact with online are Libertarians of one form of another. I should begin by stating that I don't reject Libertarianism wholesale, and I will in fact find myself agreeing with many policies they advocate.
With that being said I have often come across weak arguments in defense of Libertarianism and I want to go through some of them. My goal is mostly to clarify to myself why I find Libertarianism unconvincing, to the best of my ability. The plan is to write a few of these short essays explaining things I disagree about Libertarianism or aspects I find unconvincing.
I want to start with the Non-Aggression Principle which is something many Libertarians appear to advocate. Some call it the non-coercion principle or some other names I can't think of now. The idea is simple enough and on the initial pass, it seems almost convincing. It really comes down to the idea that the use of force should only be done in a "defensive" manner, and never initiated. This argument does nothing in favor of Libertarianism. All it does is presuppose the theory of entitlement a Libertarian holds, in other words, it begs the question.
Let's take a Libertarian favorite, Taxes. If my theory of entitlement states that the amount of money you are taxed is not yours, you are not entitled to it, then the use of force to collect the tax is not aggression. A Libertarian stating that taxation is aggression is presupposing their theory of entitlement. They can say it is aggression, I can say it is a defensive use of force and we would get nowhere. In this case, aggression does nothing to decide who is entitled to what. We could go through other examples where the Libertarian would be on the other side of, such as paying Rent. The concept of Coercion or the NAP again does nothing for us here. If I don't agree you are entitled to that land, then forcing me to pay rent is aggression, a Libertarian said this is a non-coercive exchange. There is no definition of aggression here that can decide that Taxes are aggression and Rent is not.
By calling on the NAP, one is just stating that "I am entitled to this" by using different words. If I have a different theory of justice (and by extension theory of entitlement) than a Libertarian, calling on non-aggression or defense of coercion will offer no insight on which theory is correct.
Borrowing from Popper, to make sense of any piece of data, one must have a working theory. The piece of data alone can't tell you much, as he said "all observations are theory-laden." The same goes for coercion or aggression. One needs a working theory of entitlements to decide what is coercion or aggression vs defense. Unfortunately, many Libertarians do not understand that aggression is merely a way to define violence presupposing a theory of entitlement. Instead, they think that non-coercion is a theory of entitlement itself, aka begging the question.
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