Comments on: Defining Libertarianism Down

By: Dave W.

Dave W. — Thu, 24 May 2007 11:37:31 +0000

I have long found it odd that people who don’t want the US military drastically slashed can be counted as libertarians. If you ask me, that is where this defining down started.

Drastic Social Security cuts should probably be used as more of a litmus test for “libertarianism” than the gun rights absolutism that is used in that fashion.

By: Eric the .5b

Eric the .5b — Thu, 24 May 2007 06:41:52 +0000

I suspect it is about marginalization. “While libertarians might complain about the government monitoring all our phone calls, sensible people have to come to terms with it”, etc. It’s a scare term for “insufficiently enthusiastic about the government thing I support”.

By: thoreau

thoreau — Thu, 24 May 2007 05:16:34 +0000

There’s nothing wrong with describing something as a “libertarian position” if it is indeed a libertarian position.

By: Julian Sanchez

Julian Sanchez — Thu, 24 May 2007 03:11:52 +0000

Matt-
Oh, no, I didn’t mean you… or, really, that there’s anything per se inaccurate as describing “the libertarian position” on all these issues as I have above. What I really meant was the implication that these are somehow exclusively libertarian positions, and that (for instance) a progressive who expressed reservations about limiting the freedom of adult women to make certain inds of choices was necessarily somehow infected with a libertarian worldview.

By: Matt Z

Matt Z — Thu, 24 May 2007 01:40:42 +0000

Yeah, I think I might be guilty of using the word “libertarian” to women engaging in a non coercive free market exchange to recieve money for taking off their clothes. Of course, my blog has a total of three coments and one trackback link, so I won’t be suprised if other writers were responsible for this post

By: LP

LP — Wed, 23 May 2007 20:10:20 +0000

Much depends on context here. Sometimes people drop the L-word as a means of marginalizing the ideas under discussion, which seems to be what you’re seeing. But sometimes, people are happily identifying themselves as ‘libertarian’ even when they’re adopting a relatively non-wacky, classical liberal idea. Of course, everyone still knows those wacky positions are part of libertarianism too, but this ‘mainstreaming’ can only be good for our side: it fosters the impression that libertarian ideas are cool and reasonable, not scary.

By: Kevin B. O'Reilly

Kevin B. O'Reilly — Wed, 23 May 2007 19:56:23 +0000

I don’t understand your complaint. None of the examples you gave sound as though liberterianism was misidentified with a given policy position. We should be encouraging those positions to be described as libertarian, even though they’re not uniquely libertarian. I mean, we don’t want to get ridiculous about it. Opposing monarchy isn’t really the “libertarian” position, so much as the republican or democratic one. But I view this as a healthy development in our political rhetoric.

By: Gabriel M.

Gabriel M. — Wed, 23 May 2007 19:40:49 +0000

There’s an upside. People labeled “libertarians” might make peace with it and take an interest in these ideas.

In the past, there were many libertarians in the closet. These days, they feel confident enough to come out.

On the other hand, there’s certainly a sort of vibe related to this… I called it Mainstream Libertarianism vs “True” Libertarianism:

http://gabriel.mihalache.name/econ/2007/05/mainstream_libertarianism_vs_t.php