All New Hard Truths About Liberals.

Various ^ | 5/17/02 | Various

[f.Christian]

7. Individualism demands moral responsibility. Collectivism hopes to eliminate the need for moral responsibility. To be Libertarian is to be individualistic, Big Goverment is collectivism, get it?

Strange dynamics...the more 'individualistic' society becomes the less responsible/more anarchistic---police statish it becomes!

Where does libertarians demand moral responsibility.

Most libraries I have been to...

don't trust anyone to put their books back on the right shelf---

let alone in numerical order!

[f.Christian]

Where does libertarians demand moral responsibility?

[f.Christian]

Where do libertarians demand moral responsibility?

Where does libertarianism demand moral responsibility?

[Luis Gonzalez]

Radio Free Republic Presents

Turn on the radio to listen live!

A Special Edition Of The Banana Republican Hour

With your host Luis Gonzalez

Tonight’s guest:

Jack Thompson

Tuesday, May 14th. 10 PM, EST.

Listen to Radio FreeRepublic live tonight, as the maverick Miami attorney discusses Janet Reno and the Florida Governor’s race.

Brought to you by FreeRepublic.com and The Free Republic Network.

RadioFR NOW Every Tuesday and Thursday at 9PM EST/6PM PST
Please note that effective the week of April 22nd,
we will be going to two shows per week, TuesdayAND Thursday,
Free Republic Radio is only heard on the internet at this url http://www.theotherradionetwork.com/pgs/schedule.htm

RadioFR Archives, Hear the shows you missed

[MrB]

Where does libertarianism demand moral responsibility?

I'll give it a shot.
Libertarianism demands that individuals take the full consequences of their actions and decisions, while at the same time stating that individuals can make any decision or action that does not directly harm another.

These consequences include death by overdose, starving, or accident in the case of drug use.
Promiscuous sex results in disease or death or pregnancy which lower the quality of life.
Committing crimes and denying others the rights to live in liberty results in imprisonment or death by the defender (victim with a gun).

Our current society provides all sorts of ways that other people must shoulder the consequences of an individual's immorality. This is not done directly, but through a taxing system that punishes good decisions and supports poor decisions.
Remove that system of support for bad (immoral) decisions, and people die due to their immorality. This only happens for a short time though, as people see the consequences are to be borne by the individual, not by society.
The general level of morality in society rises because of the survival factor. Immoral behavior leads to bad or deadly consequences. Moral behavior leads to a good life.

Remove the safety net, as libertarians promote.
After this, increased individual liberty does not lead to immorality because such behavior has undesirable consequences.

[f.Christian]

"Man's heart is prone to evil because justice(results) is not executed readily."

We are all keepers-defenders of the bias(ego)...vs reality(honesty)!

Good News For The Day

‘Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary, and lose heart. In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood.’ (Hebrews 12:3+4)

"Have you observed that when someone has a reputation for being 'good', that person is subjected to a more rigorous public scrutiny. When a well-known cheat is caught out at his old tricks, not much is made of it; no better was expected. But of a civic leader is booked for driving under the influence, or if a clergyman is discovered to be having an affair, the matter is loudly noised abroad."

"There are those in the media, who make it their business to sniff out, and expose the indiscretions of anyone who normally enjoys a high degree of respect. The longer any individual is able to stand against the general human weakness; set new standards of conduct; refuse to be seduced by the manifold rewards of giving in to the mediocre mainstream, the greater is the build-up of pressure for that person to fail."

"Evil is offended by good. This was certainly so with Christ. His detractors eventually brought violence to bear against him. In Pilgrim's progress, one of the jurymen in the courtroom is... Mr. Live---Loose. He condemns Faithful, and wants to put him to death because, "He would always be condemning my way."

"To be the exceptional person that Jesus was, meant for him the enduring of a great deal more than I have ever endured by way of temptation. He felt the tuggings and buffetings of evil more than others because he never gave in to them. His victory over sin was magnificent; it was grand; it was unique-and by it, he championed and lifted the rest of us. Thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.?

[MrB]

I don't understand your answer in the context of my post.
Given that immoral behavior always leads to undesirable consequences, and in the absence of others willing or forced to shoulder the consequences of the immoral behavior, humans, out of the need for survival, will choose the path that leads to more desirable outcomes.
In short, reward good behavior, punish bad behavior.

[ArrogantBustard]

This will sure be some fun reading

[f.Christian]

In the short run---small picture anything goes...

in the big picture---final results...loser/winners are known!

What would race tracks be like w/o the photo finish...the FR!

[Tench_Coxe]

"1. At the most basic level, the liberal is an adolescent forever in search of a world without moral consequence."

You probably could have stopped right there. Imagine, for a moment, a world in which there was truly no moral consequence for one's actions, where one could act upon their basest impulse without any fear of recrimination. It would, quite literally, hell on earth.

There is one addition to this. They would prefer the above situation, but only while there are people to 'do things to' that are constrained by moral conscience. Without that, the 'free' individual would indeed be subject to recrimination, i.e., 'you strike my cheek, I kill you'.

[Thraka]

Where does libertarians demand moral responsibility?

In reality. If there were no consequences for immorality, there would be no need for morality.

Morality is not some arbitrary code of behavior; it is distilled wisdom from God, and from generations of our ancestors who learned the hard way just what was and was not a good idea. It is a rule of thumb that one can use to judge his actions and the likelihood of bad results, even if he is not experienced enough to fully appreciate the full ramifications of his actions. This is why it is useful to teach children morality, and why our society, that has turned away from such things, is in such a mess today.

There are, unfortunately, many who never graduate from 'morality as rules' to 'morality as wisdom'. Some continue to keep the childish view of things as adults, and fall into two categories: tattletales and brats.

Tattletales have not embraced the reasoning behind their morality, they simply obey, and feel compelled to force others to do so, as well. The problem with this, however, is that tattletales cannot fully embrace morality. All of the pieces do not fit together if we try to cram in the notion that we can compel others to behave morally. For example, it is, IMO, immoral to practice violence against someone simply for being foolish, and yet this is precisely what, say, the Drug War does.

On the other hand, we have the brats, who refuse to admit that the countless generations of humanity who have come before them, much less God, might possibly have answers to common human problems. As is typical amongst juveniles, they know everything there is to know. They also see the tattletales deliberately behaving immorally in the name of morality, point to such, and declare morality to be bunk. And then they end up spending years of their lives regretting their stupidity, assuming they even live that long.

I do not understand why so many who call themselves moral cannot appreciate the morality of forbearance. Morality, in the end, is wisdom. One cannot beat wisdom into a man; it is something he must acquire for himself. Attempting to do so will simply make him hate you and everything you stand for, and give him all the more motivation to defy you when your back is turned.

Reality _is_ morality.

Thraka

[f.Christian]

Main Entry: es·o·ter·ic
Pronunciation: "e-s&-'ter-ik
Function: adjective
Etymology: Late Latin esotericus, from Greek esOterikos, from esOterO, comparative of eisO, esO within, from eis into; akin to Greek en in -- more at IN Date: circa 1660

1 a : designed for or understood by the specially initiated alone
b : of or relating to knowledge that is restricted to a small group

2 a : limited to a small circle b : PRIVATE, CONFIDENTIAL

- es·o·ter·i·cal·ly /-i-k(&-)lE/ adverb

Liberals deny--morph morality--reality...

libertarians inflate--float--bubble it away!

[MrB]

That was great!
And if you don't mind, I'm going to plagiarize the heck out of it.
I get so sick of younger, more liberal folks saying there can't be any moral right or wrong because it all depends on "whose morality".
You've nailed it though - morality is the distilled wisdom of generations of human kind who have learned the hard way what is a good idea and what is not. We could learn on our own, but why not take advantage of the mistakes of others.

[Freetus]

Dude. Figure out HTML.

[moyden]

Well, most of these are comments about modern American liberals, not FDR (who I like), or Europeans.

As for my appalling grammar, I agree with you. Fortunately, I am able to get by on my good looks.

Enjoyed your comments. Regards, Moyden.

[armedandtotallysafe]

I think you misunderstand one of the primary tenents of libertarianism. It is not about morality, it is about government. I am a strong believer in morality, and I believe it is my job to try and convince the immoral of the error of their ways. However, it is oppression to use the government to enforce that morality. I want a world that is free of coercion. I want to be free to stand in front of the "koffee house" and try and convince people not to go in, not make it illegal for them to go in. Once you start legislating morality, it takes a simple majority to be sworn in and a whole new morality becomes the law of the land. People should be free to make whatever ridiculous mistakes they choose to, as long as it does not infringe on my freedom. It is my moral obligation to try and convince them of the truth, not use "the barrel of a gun" (i.e. the government) to convince them. I want people to believe, not obey. We could have a perfectly moral society if we were willing to give up all freedom. Bottom line, libertarians are all about freedom from government oppression, not freedom from personal responsiblity, morality, or promiscuity as some of the threads seem to imply.

[f.Christian]

There'a a big difference between a Law/constitution/Republic and Democracy(anarchy)...

the word 'free' troubles me!