Richard Williams

Richard Williams

15p

4 comments posted · 17 followers · following 1

14 years ago @ A Division by Zer0 - The Tragedy of Boxes · 2 replies · +1 points

You make a good analogy, but I do not think it follows that physical force is necessary to prevent people from stacking boxes. In an anarchist/socialist system, the concert would likely be run by a collective of some sort; the collective could simply exclude anyone wishing to stack boxes from the concert. This would be analogous to a larger collective of people refusing to trade with anyone who hoards capital. How does this interfere with the negative liberty of those people?

I have always thought that negative and positive liberty are two sides of the same coin; one is meaningless without the other. That seems to be the case here as well.

14 years ago @ A Division by Zer0 - The three struggling p... · 0 replies · +1 points

Have you read 1984? The "book within a book" section makes essentially the same point about the upper class, the middle class, and the lower class. However, it's very interesting how you've tied each of these to a natural ideological group. It's true that the middle class does have a very right-libertarian streak, and although libertarian purism is relatively rare, so is conservative purism.

14 years ago @ A Division by Zer0 - Are the USA heading to... · 0 replies · +2 points

The very idea of this would be morbidly humorous, like the so-called "strike" of the upper class in "Atlas Shrugged", if I didn't think it just might be possible. I live in the southern United States, I know exactly what kind of rhetoric you're talking about, and I am frankly terrified by it. In retrospect, the events of the past few years, from the passage of the PATRIOT Act to the effective circumvention of posse comitatus, seem to have created the perfect environment for the establishment of a military junta. Even Obama's election fits in beautifully; after all, who better to serve as the fall guy for the capitalist upper class than someone who sounds, at least vaguely, like a leftist!

I hope you're wrong too. But I have to say, it's looking more and more like you may be right.

15 years ago @ A Division by Zer0 - "This ain't ... · 0 replies · +2 points

Alright. I've been pondering this point for awhile, and I think your approach makes the most sense. It allows the producer to keep the value of his labor and doesn't lead to exploitation of others or excessive accumulation. Thanks. :)