Bitcoin Forum

Simple question:
what is your political preference?
Could be fun to see the results :)

I consider myself as a proponent of anarcho-capitalism

Basically,

I don't know about the politics at my internet provider, nor who the leader is.   I just care that there is competition and I get the deal and level of service I want and change provider if I want.
I don't know about the politics at my telephone provider, nor who the leader is.   I just care that there is competition and I get the deal and level of service I want and change provider if I want.

etc,etc...

What I want is the same for my security provider.  Instead, it is a monopoly with outrageous (and compulsory) fees and a crap level of service that I can supposedly improve but only by voting for the right person and that has never once shown to lead to improvement in the past. 

All of the above.

Y U NO enable multivote?
Prepper/anarchafeminist, ect. here.

Also, dear anarchocapitalists:
 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=210802.msg2516309#msg2516309

Anarchist leaning Libertarian :D

decentralist and variety-ist  :)

I consider myself to be an-cap, but I don't mind any means of human interaction as long as they are voluntary. I don't even mind communism as long as they don't force it upon me :)

That's the trick really isn't it? That's my only real problem with the leaders we have now, they think too much like the Borg.

I'm a Democrat, but the way things are going these days, I'm seriously tempted to switch to Green party.  Democratic presidency is definitely better than the alternative, but I'm getting rather tired of voting for the lesser of two evils and all.

Ugh, vote for what you believe in, not the group that you think will win if you decide to vote at all, I actually voted for the Green Party because even from an early age I despised the main parties and thought at least by voting third party something interesting might happen but of course that's before I knew the whole system was rigged and learned about the way the world actually works. These days though I know my beliefs about government and the way people can live their lives without it aren't at all popular with the loyalist crowd so I just support stuff like Bitcoin which is far more practical an option.

as i understand it gill stein wants a "green new deal" which involves stealing money from one group of people in order to give it to another. if stealing is infact wrong than voting for the green party would be voting for the lesser of 3 evils, not much better than the lesser of 2.

I'd like human beings to stop comitting armed robbery against me and stop threatening me with years in a dungeon if i dont use their services. Too much to ask ?

Dont care much for labels, but throw me in as a anarcho-capitalist/consentualist/voluntaryist.

This.

They believe that the government can do good if only they are in power.

I'd like to see an "evolve" poll. Like, if you are an Anarcho-Capitalist, or a Libertarian, or a Democrat/Republican, were you always like that, or did you "evolve" from a prior political affiliation? Mostly, though, I'm curious if libertarian types came from the big R or the big D.

I came from the left side (union blue-collar parents), I generally believed the right to be evil assholes when I was younger.  Gradually I saw the left were just as bad, but in different ways, was apolitical for a long time, then spent a couple of years as a minarchist lib, eventually realised it was inconsistent and explored anarchy ( the only option I hadn't yet thrown out ) for probably almost 2 years more before finally embracing it.

My anecdotal experience suggests though that libertarian types more commonly come from the right.

My story:

classic liberal / right winged liberal -> libertarian -> anarcho-capitalist :)

FTFY

The word leader applies a voluntary reciprocal relationship, a leader is chosen by those he leads. People in government thrust themselves upon you with or without your consent, this makes them rulers not leaders.

Help me here. Let's say I'd like to live in a society that can be best described as communist. However, I require all my adult comrads to be there of their free will, absolutely without State coercion of any kind. Does this make me a communist or an anarchist?

that makes you an anarcho-communist right?

How big do you imagine your community to be?  I see no reason if for example a small group of people decide to get together and live in a certain way as a community.  If you are talking about millions of people though, seems a lot less likely you will get consent.

Check out Anarcho-syndicalism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarcho-syndicalism).
Also: Anarchist-Communism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchist_communism)

i suppose its possible that it might end badly. still im willing to give it a shot. when societies outlawed slavery there was a risk that it could have ended badly, does that mean they shouldnt have tried? plus we dont want the entire world to test this out on, we are perfectly fine to just be left in peace on a few square miles of land somewhere. if cannibalistic death cults pop up somewhere on our few square miles and we dont find any way to solve that problem than feel free to invade us.

I would imagine we would all change our ideologies as the forces around us change. Not that our ideology itself is changing but the relativity would be different.

I would imagine that if jews in prison camps during WWII were given a political quiz they would most likely return results leaning very libertarian and anarchist, basically not liking government one bit. I doubt any jews walking to the gas chambers were complaining about whether the 10 Commandments should be displayed in a school or not.

I believe that those that prefer smaller government would probably agree with each other to varying degrees of smaller government.

If we were to work toward getting the government to fit inside the confines of the Constitution it is something many people would be willing to work toward. But if that did happen, then there would be some people who are satisfied with it and others who think it is a good start and would want to start picking away at the worst parts of the Constitution such as the 16th Amendment and 17th. Once those were gone many would be satisfied but still others may believe that it is still too much while others are even dissatisfied with the Constitution in the first place.

The same probably goes for those who prefer more government. Many may be satisfied with socialism while others would want more and more control over their lives and move toward communism and fascism and beyond to total slavery to the state before they are truly happy.

Evolved. Either my political beliefs during Bush Sr. & Clinton were forgotten with most of the rest of my childhood, or I didn't really have an awakening until the 2000 election/when The West Wing was running. From day one I plainly saw Bush Jr. and Cheney as evil pieces of fucking shit, and Al Gore probably less so, so as a reaction, I was "liberal" or "moderate" around the start (but was Independent/DTS). Then evolved to supporting Ron Paul and registering as Republican only to be able to vote for him and like candidates in primaries, as both major parties seemed to mostly select evil pieces of fucking shit.

But I switched to Libertarian after the 2012 general election, having heard about violence perpetrated by the criminal wing of the Republican party against the libertarian wing at their caucuses/conventions. Last voted for Gary Johnson, the lesser of all the evils who was seeking to become the supreme, 100% immune from any prosecution, ruler of the world.

Who knows if the Republican leadership will see an exodus of party registrations from their own to the LP... not that it matters, since there's so much fucking election fraud the criminal government will never prosecute itself for.

Please stop misrepresenting us.  Obviously we are not for aggression against innocents.   It is the initiation of force, something you have admitted statists are happy to do.
 

The objective standard is the initiation of force.

i have no interest in politics as it is corrupt by its nature
the closest i have found that i am comfortable with entertaining is

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autarchism

Please stop misrepresenting us.  Obviously we are not for aggression against innocents.   It is the initiation of force, something you have admitted statists are happy to do.
[/quote]

Aggression against whom?
[/quote]

I would guess whoever it is that is initiating force against victims and is sacrificing/raping/molesting them? As far as I understand it, that whole NAP thing means "initiating violence against anyone else" is taboo, not just against you, so I suspect defending someone who is very obviously being aggressed against is ok too?

the courts/judges and juries today are kangaroo courts, juries are groomed to do what the prosecutors and judges tell them to do, not what is 'right'

All of that can be thrown out on the whim of the populace being governed, if the majority of the population decides to not follow those laws. So all of that is only in place because the majority of the populace has certain beliefs about "innocence" and "fair trial" with due process.
So, why can't the society, where the majority believes in those same things already, just follow those beliefs as general guidelines? Why would a society that believes "innocent until proven guilty" and "everyone should have a right to a due process" instantly turn into lynch mobs if the government says "That trial thing, you're on your own?" Better yet, how well did the laws and "fair trial" requirements prevent lynch mobs down in the south a hundred years ago, where the majority didn't care about them?

Aggression against any human being that didn't initiate agression (or equal to human in their ability to trade and sign contracts, e.g. robots, aliens, genetically modified super-smart animals, etc. but NOT ordinary animals, vegetables, mushrooms, bacteria or inanimate objects).

Innocence is a state of not having aggressed against anyone.
It works like this: there is a universally agreed implicit non-agression contract.  Any persons are born innocent, so they are implicitly signing this contract upon their birth.  As soon as a person initiates aggression, they quit the implied non-aggression contract, thereby agreeing to others commiting violence against them (fighting back).  Whether the act of aggression actually took place is up to judges/insurance companies to decide.

I suggest you read Rothbard or something...

Agorist (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agorism), but libertarian/minarchist if required to participate in the political process.

My evolution: right wing (because parents) --> minarchist (after discovering that the political division into "left" and "right" is laughably fail) --> anarchist (after discovering minarchism to be internally inconsistent)

I won't call myself an an-cap or any other sort of anarchist, since I suppose that the concept of anarchy implies the possibility of several different approaches coexisting. I support all of them as long as they're free from coercion, because I think that one of the biggest problems in politics is the desire to develop one perfect system suitable for everybody. Yes unity is strenght, but remember, that's a fascist motto. I'm interested in stability through diversity. That's how nature does it.

Nowadays I'm just happy participating in political discussions and mostly focus on the language people are using. Language creates reality (read Korzibsky) and exposes hidden assumptions, where people confuse the map with the territory. I find that most people are hopelessly awash in faulty either/or thinking, delusions of omniscience (knowing for sure what would happen if...), misrepresenting other viewpoints (like the poster in this thread going for the old "without law we would be all just killing each other" argument while talking to a proponent of the non-agression principle) and just plain old brainwashing. I admit that since most people (including self proclaimed anarchists) subscribe to some sort of dogma or other, it makes having an intelligent discussion hard and often impossible.

All in all my political stance can be summed up as: I wish people would stop acting like they know what's best for everybody, how to get it and trying to force everybody to cooperate at gunpoint. The rest is details.

My preference would probably be a mix of socialism and capitalism, with socialism prevailing. Our Governments are too interested in money and aren't interested enough in people.

Explain how this is settled in the real world, and then explain why that couldn't be done privately.

Careful!  Without professional minders with armys, you are sure to end up with "weird cult communities pop-up where they do ritual sacrifices/rape/molestation/whatever to prevent crop failure"

I started coin collecting at 6.  I think I was 8 when I declared my room a sovereign state.  I was born this way (independent/other).  Mark me unevolved.
There isn't a party platform that I agree with sufficiently to support the nonsense that gets bundled in.

The irony is that this is actually a pretty decent description of the western elites  ;D

Slavery is already a violation of the NAP and inherent human right not to be enslaved, so would-be slavers should surrender or be killed in self-defense. No laws codifying what is inherent are necessary, without a government existing to violate (or enable the violation of) those rights in the first place.

Sure, if you're willing to misdefine terms... but then nobody can debate your categorical BS. /ignore

Terms like slavery vs indentured servitude.

haha another person praising law for abolishing slavery (brought about by law in the first place). Gotta love statist logic  ;D

rofl, the ultimate argument that i could possibly make to show that your argument is erroneous is to show that you are actually arguing against something i didnt say and you have already done this for me. You defeated yourself and as a bonus pointed out that you were defeating yourself in the same breath that you used to defeat yourself! classic! if you have to qualify your argument by saying "im not actually going to argue against something you said but" than you probably should just keep your mouth shut.

Slavery was codified in law. If you stop "slaving" by, say, running away, or help a runaway slave, you are breaking the law. We all know what happens when you break the law: men with guns come chase you, and then either imprison or kill you. In this case, they take you back to your owner.
Your indentured servitude example is a contract. If you break that contract, you have only broke a contract between you and your "owner," at which point the two of you would have to go to an arbitrator, mediator, or civil court to figure out how to resolve the breach of contract. If I was mediating or a member of a jury, my "ruling" would have been that the indentured servant and the "owner" should figure out some other ways to resolve their debt issue, and that the indentured servant should be deemed as untrustworthy for entering into indentured servitude contracts, and thus not be allowed to enter into them any more. At least until they rebuild their trust. This indentured servant would have to start from scratch, maybe only doing short one or two days long indentured servitude contracts at most, and would take a while to build up their reputation enough to become a professional long-term indentured servant again.

Wikipedia on slavery:
Slavery is a system under which people are treated as property (first hint. no property without law) to be bought and sold, and are forced to work.[1] Slaves can be held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase or birth, and deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to demand compensation. Historically, slavery was institutionally(second hint) recognized by many societies.

With law you mean "rules written on a piece of paper"?
Well, laws existed even before people knew how to write.
Even the very first human tribes probably had some rules.

Since it's common to conflate the concepts of "law" and "rules" and even Wikipedia is confused so I think I should clarify:


That's more or less what I mean by law. The part of it being enforced by a social institution and made by government is the crucial one.

People love rules, they always make up new ones. What I dislike is the idea of a single set of rules being enforced on everybody. I'd like to see a multitude of systems. I find it fair to assume that this might lead to better and more workable rules. You seldom get high quality with a monopoly and rules are no exception.

I'm a political atheist - I don't believe that there are special people who can be trusted to steal people's money and then do good things with it. :)

There is no law beyond do what thou wilt.

I like the looks of that poll! :)

Wouldn't that effectively make you an anarchist though? After all, society will always be organized in one form or another; that way, you would get to organize with other people and decide what to do with your money/resources, instead of entrusting it to others and hope for the best.

I'm a Rand Paul Republican which is the growing brand in the GOP. Or course, I have ancap roots but will work w/i the system to attempt to downsize it to nil.

Broadly libertarian with some basic layers of social safety built in

Good luck with that! i truely hope you meet with some success. But as stefan molyneux always says, if you have grand aspirations you should always test on a smaller scale first. Like if you ever watch the myth busters they always start with a small boat in a fish bowl before they move to renting out some cargo ship. You should try infiltrating the local mafia and turning it into a charity organization first. IF you can manage to do that than you could prove the concept on a small scale fist, then you could show that there is atelast a chance that the basic idea is possible on a larger scale.

There are some options missing, like communist, fascist, islamist, etc

I see myself as social-liberal: I believe the state's role should be reduced to an absolute minimum but some services like security, education and justice should be public, and others like healthcare (up to a certain level) private but with state regulation (like in Germany).

And of course I believe in direct democracy (Swiss style, but powered by new technologies), where the role (and number) of politicians is also minimized.

But the all improtant question. Who's money is providing this safety net? Is it your's? or someone elses? did they agree to it? is it ok to threaten to murder them inorder to aquire their resources for this end? Im not saying it isnt, all i would ask is that you treat this question with the seriousness it deserves.

Communists are radical socialists, so they can vote for socialism.

It will be interesting to watch the 2016 Republican primaries. Right now it seems that Rand Paul is one of the strongest contenders. Let's hope that he will be able to achieve what his father never did.

don't get your hopes up. rand paul will be president but he will be just as corrupt as the rest of them. this is not just corollary either, its causal, the reason why he will become president when his father never could is precisely because he will be corrupt when his father would not have been.

I am not saying that he is perfect. But he is much better than the other available choices (Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Huckabee, Bush.etc). Also, he is quiet supportive of the Bitcoin:

Rand Paul Has An Idea For Improving Bitcoin

http://www.businessinsider.in/Rand-Paul-Has-An-Idea-For-Improving-Bitcoin/articleshow/34489641.cms

Hello - my name is Practical Dreamer.

BTW - when you say "of their free will", what exactly do you mean ?

What means "Libertarian" ?
Honestly I don't know.

Why don't you look it up on Wikipedia?

I guess he means that people would be allowed to leave at any time without iron curtains impeding their escape.

BTW, those places already exist on a smaller scale. There are kibbutz in Israel, the village of Marinaleda in Spain, several self-sufficient hippy communities around the world...

yea if he even gets 1 single issue right he will be better than the rest ::)

I am a liberal, fiscal conservative with somewhat libertarian instincts

I'm a hardcore statist.  Answer me this, """libertarians""": who will build the roads?

Statists: 1
Libertarians: 0

I'm a hardcore libertarian.  Answer me this, """statists""": Who will invade neighboring countries to capture their resources?

Statists: 1
Libertarians: 0

Without government suppression of technology, we wouldn't need roads anymore.

^^^ They will not let the taxpayers deal directly with the construction companies... because they are afraid of losing the bribes and commissions. In my place construction companies pay some 20% of the total amount as bribes. 10% to the politicians, and around 10% to the bureaucrats.

"Libertarian" with an uppercase "L" is a political party in the USA or a member of the Libertarian Party (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarian_Party_(United_States)) and "libertarian" with a lowercase "l" is someone who believes in libertarianism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism).

I'd have voted Progressive if it were on the list.

I voted Socialist which is closest to true and makes a point better than Liberal.  I'd change my vote if we got close to what are widely conceived of economic principles associated with Socialists.  I'm more of a capitalist in this respect, but at the present time we here in the U.S. are far to capitalist end of the spectrum and the difficult-to-avoid crony nature of this is a real threat to our political survival.

'SHTF/prepper who doesn't care' is a fun label which I would not reject out-of-hand.

I guess it's not a bad idea in principle; you can't expect non-tech savvy people of his age to understand exactly how Bitcoin works and why its decentralized nature doesn't allow the implementation of such ideas.

Other people would argue that we're too close to the socialist end of the spectrum due to the very anti-private means of production nature that is government laying its hand over everything.  I think both you and those other people are correct: you're looking at the same thing and interpreting them differently.  What's really happening is a centralization of the means of production into a few hands, and political preference on economies usually revolve around its decentralization back into the hands of individuals.  It's for this reason why the left/right dichitomy is false; socialists see libertarians and think, "These people are going to drive us to fascism", and then libertarians see socialists and think, "These people are going to drive us to communism" (and same effect with democrats/republicans, liberals/conservatives etc.); the two ideologies are really the same thing (complete centralization of the means of production), and neither groups are actually advocating for this to happen except through accepting central government and businesses which use it to their advantage.

So it would seem, the true difference in political thought revolves around pro-centralization or pro-decentralization.

Yep. That and/or the fact that Government concessions of these contracts almost always goes to "friends" (not necessarily the one with the best offer on the table), leading to enormous losses caused by inefficiency.

This is really outstanding analysis in my opinion.  Thanks for the input.

This is an interesting question. I'm American and lean left, particularly on social issues. I use to be very liberal when I was younger but I feel like I've been making a gradual move towards the center... that or I'm just fed up with the two major political parties.

I just choose to not have one. All parties have pros and cons and I would rather adapt to the changes then try and change them myself.

Doesn't matter. In case you missed it, the US is not a democracy. A Princeton University study by Gilens and Page performed a regression analysis on over a thousand public policy decisions, and determined that the effect of public opinion on public policy is nil. That's right, nil. Voting doesn't affect the outcome in any measurable way.

So stop voting and get yourself a crossbow, a first aid kit, and a 55 gallon barrel of beans and rice.

I see politics as business as so far seeing how politicians act
Why do you think what politicians do when they run for candidacy? They treat politics as a business. I mean other than money, since that one is an obvious reason. Do you think there will ever be a politician who doesn't care about how much money he'll make and would actually run to serve the people?

you knoww there are people out there who become politicians just to serve the people, but people of this breed is very rare. even For better or worse, holding political office is still the best way to affect change in the society. This aspect alone is a pull factor for idealists who envision a better country for future generations to become politicians. Unfortunately, due to the power that one might eventually hold as a Minister or whatnot, this path attracts far more people who are self-serving, greedy and ruthless.

I had see one who became a politician with pure intention to help the citizens and get rid of corruption in the past but he didn't last for more than two years or so. Not other politicians were backing him and supporting his intentions because they themselves were already corrupted before the man became our prime minister.
So I do believe there are some people out there who wants to become a politician with good intentions but if they do then I don't think they would last for long which is very sad.

Some people might enter politics and be attracted by the amount money they can earn, not just for being a politician. There are plenty of money making opportunities for someone in politics. A well known politician might also be paid as a business advisor, an after-dinner speaker, a writer or a broadcaster. That does not include illegal opportunities for taking bribes to support or vote against certain policies.
I don't think anyone enters politics with a view to making large profits, but when they do get into a position of power, they will start to see how their situation can be used to make more money. Many of them will make the most of what they can get out of being in politics.

Some were successful enough, see de Gaulle for example.

Anyway, I think that only violent coup d'etat could resolve such issue in deeply corrupt country like UK or USA. And effect wouldn't last for long if coup leaders would try to implement liberal ideology again, because it's a dead end. Liberalism is a corruption itself, it directly converts money into the power.

I've always pondered Anarchism and Libertarianism. Haven't really been able to decide yet.

What people shouldn't do is get sucked into ideology and following everything just because they are a democrat or republican.

here in the US we had a politician like that, he ran for president. his name is Ron Paul. Unfortunately the majority of people rather be dependent on govt than have personal and economic freedom.

I am hoping his son can finish what he started. Ron brought a lot of attention to the liberty movement but his foreign policy was a little scary at times.

Think it already happen more than 2 decades ago. The 2008 financial crisis just speed things up and government can no longer hide the problems.

Who cares about USA and their "democracy"? I think that Platon and Aristotle already have told enough about the democracy. :)

I'm not so sure an armed revolt is the best way to go about it. A few months back there was an interview with Chris Hedges on The Real News Network in which they were speaking of the likely possibility of a revolution in the US. And one of the points they were making was that chances are that such a coup could easily turn the country further to the right, given the absence of progressive left leaning forces, extremely weakened unions, very divided and distracted population, and so on.

I'll try to find the video, and edit this later with a link if I do...

EDIT: here we go: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ff-G0DPkBv8 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ff-G0DPkBv8).

Thanks for sharing that - just watched it - never heard of the guy before but what a lot of sense he spoke.

I must say, the chances of an "uprising" in the US being led by the (far) right/soveriegn individual types/Bundy militia etc. seems much more probable to me than any other scenario. Reading the pages of BitcoinTalk over the last 8 months has convinced me of that.

The dollar is hit by China/Russia refusing to play ball anymore > hyperinflation > Weimar Republic. Doesn't seem too far fetched to me.



The left needs to start organising itself. Its exactly the same in the UK. There's a whole swathe of the populace who are not so much under-represented - they aren't being represented at all.

Maybe the internet/ anonymity may make the social organisation of the unrepresented more likely. Certainly, traditional workplace organisations and the unions have both been compromised and usurped.
  The "liberal elite" are pissing on the shoes of the poor - and telling them its raining. 

Social scientists find many questions about values and lifestyle that have no obvious connection to politics can be used to predict a person’s ideology. Even a decision as trivial as which browser you’re using to read  is imbued with clues about your personality. Are you on a mac or pc? Did you use the default program that came with the computer or install a new one? hehe , regards

If you liked that and if have the extra time, I recommend the whole thing (that was only part 5 of 7 total).

Here's the full list: ;D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1JF94vovww (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1JF94vovww) - Urban Poverty in America Made Me Question Everything
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XR0oGJ2yrmc (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XR0oGJ2yrmc) - Journalism Should Be About Truth, Not Career
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5vWcyetC3CI (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5vWcyetC3CI) - We Must Grasp Reality to Build Effective Resistance
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCjMdOo7KkY (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCjMdOo7KkY) - "America is a Tinderbox"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ff-G0DPkBv8 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ff-G0DPkBv8) - The Liberal Elite has Betrayed the People They Claim to Defend
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OX6n861Gu6Q (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OX6n861Gu6Q) - As a Socialist, I Have No Voice in the Mainstream
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hNm_GAIXOWw (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hNm_GAIXOWw) - Chris Hedges Answers Questions from Viewers



That's not just in the US and UK though; much of Europe is moving in the same direction, and particularly faster in the periphery. If the internet can help mitigate this in any meaningful way, I don't know; it certainly helps people organize all the better, but who is organizing and what they do with it is another story.

The next failure may be bigger than government.
Banking is more centralized now and more complex than it was in '08
More by % are in the too big to fail category.

I'm right winged but I would still legalize weed and prostitution :D

Libertarian. I'd wish the preference of the global population in my area would reflect the outcome of this poll :D

Elections are decided by who counts the votes, not who votes.

Lol this is really true, there have been alot of frauds regarding elections, in many countries the organism that count votes is not related to government but it still makes fraud