"If you can't annoy someone, there's little point in writing."
- Kingsley Amis
Apparently I annoy L Neil Smith. Boo-hoo. If my starting this blog lets him know that he annoys me back, well, then I am just giving his life meaning.
Now that the childish comments are over, lets get to some real discussion. I suppose the proper place to start is to explain where I stand, how I look at things.
Defining ZAP
Firstly, for the non-libertarians out there, the Zero Agression Principle means you believe that it is wrong to initiate agression, or force, against other individuals (and for other individuals or groups to do so). Understanding this requires you understand the meanings of a few words:
initiate - i.e. starting, launching, beginning. If someone hits you and you hit them back, their actions are initiation, yours are not.
force - coersion, compulsion, extortion. Physically this ranges from war down to cutting someone off on the interstate. Legally it includes (as examples of unjust force): fraud, theft, extortion, kidnapping, enslavement, breach of contract, taxation, government regulation, unjust imprisonment, emminent domain, tortious interference, libel, slander, among other offenses against the person by either individuals or groups (including governments). As examples of just use of force, it also includes: self defense, defense of others, and defense of one's property, which can range from litigation, to using personal weapons against criminals, up to guerilla insurgency, gun running, underground railroading for refugees and whatever other actions an individual or group of individuals could take against a tyrant.
As I described, there are two types of force: some just, some unjust. Unjust uses of force are specifically those which are initiations against peaceful individuals. Just use of force is defending the rights, liberty, and property of oneself or of others. You may have noticed that I included in the list of unjust uses of force some actions which some people look at as the just right of governments to engage in, particularly taxation, regulation, unjust imprisonment, slavery, and emminent domain.
Some libertarians approach the ZAP as if every day is a new one, and so long as they personally are not being initiated against at that time, well, it's no skin off their back. I maintain that statists (what we libertarians call pro-government/big-government proponents) initiate force with every moment, as an inherent and natural consequence of their being, against others, many others. I believe that not all persons in government are inherently statist. The occasional anti-statist does get into government and works to reduce the size and power of it.
I also believe that some statists are worse than others. Some are far worse than others. While many libertarians are of the opinion that the US is the worst, the sole remaining evil empire (neatly forgetting the existence of communist China), the den of all true tyranny, I tend to agree with Kristopher Barrett, who says, "As for the "we're doomed" crowd here ... The US is the healthiest patient in the World's tyranny cancer ward. If we don't win here, things are going to get very ugly." The US government is not the worst, not by a long shot, it is in the best shape of any, and particularly, it uniquely has the capacity to help reduce the average level of tyranny in the world by getting rid of some of the worst actors and helping their enslaved peoples become free nations.
Categorizing Libertarians
Some libertarians, like Neil, tend to be in one of three schools of opposition to US action overseas.
The Bunkertarian
The first are what I would call the bunker libertarians, or bunkertarians for short. These are the "screw you, I've got mine" brand of absolutely introverted isolationistic and autistically unsocial unreconstructable jerks who give individualism a bad name: the type who are always on the lookout for black helicopters, the CFR, area 51 aliens, JFK assasins, and other signs of The Conspiracy. The type who make John Birch Society members look like Rotarians.
The Bunkertarian believes implictly that the US government is inherently evil, possibly even an occupation government, totally impossible to reclaim or redeem, and many won't set foot east of the Mississippi for fear of getting infected with the memetic brain chips of the east coast Illuminati. If you think I am exaggerating, I am not, I have met and talked with a number of these people. I even like quite a number of them and would not hesitate to have any of them at my back in a bad situation (assuming they would show up), and was on the way myself to becoming one a few years ago until I started doing some fact checking about many of the claims.
The Bunkertarian is the extreme end of the spectrum, totally unwilling to lift a finger for his or her fellow man, and who believe that the ZAP limits them from initiating force against a government or other initiators for initiating force against other individuals. "Ain't me, ain't my problem. Just minding my own business." There are a number of gradients between the Bunkertarian and where I stand.
Next along the line would be the family libertarian. Defending one's own family, possibly one's neighbors or friends, is okay, but not required of the ZAP, they say. "Just don't say its an obligation, and don't let any of them make it a habit." Some make it an inherently tribalistic obligation of blood or familial affection. Various others tend to follow Maslow's heirarchy of needs in expanding the circle of obligation to mutual defense outwards to one's neighborhood, community, county, or state, until we get to the Nationalist Libertarians.
The Nationalist Libertarian
The Nationalist Libertarian is a person who believes that it is wrong to initiate force against other individuals within the national boundaries of the United States of America, and screw everyone else. A Nationalist Libertarian somehow believes that "other nations can decide for themselves how to treat their own people" and it isn't our business to do anything about it.
In this, I am entirely flabbergasted. I am flabbergasted to hear that an alleged libertarian of any stripe would presume to say that any government, group, or society, has any right to tell individuals in their jurisdiction how to live their own lives or use their own property. Because this is exactly what the quoted words above mean: it isn't our business as Americans and as free individuals what some thug dictator in another country does to the people under his control. If that dictator does terrible things, it may be wrong, it may be a terrible thing, but we are under no obligation to enforce the ZAP anywhere outside our national boundaries, as if the idea of national boundaries suddenly means something to libertarians, who previously were opposed to immigration limits because national boundaries are wrong.
Some try to wax practical about it. "We can't be the world's policeman," they say, as they condemn the first elections in Iraq and Afghanistan in decades. "Why aren't we doing the same everywhere else?" becomes some sort of rationalization, as in,
if we can't fix every country all at once, it is wrong to even try what we can with our limited resources with the worst actors of the bunch. They will try that cant no matter what happens next: if North Korea nukes Seoul, they'll whine about why the US isn't overthrowing the Saudis, if US forces blockade Syria, they'll demand to know why we aren't focusing on the bigger threat in Iran.
The smart ones get to the real heart of the problem, in that they agree that people everywhere should be free and it is wrong that they are not, but it is just as wrong for the US government to pay for the fight with funds confiscated through unjust taxation. A form of "it's okay if you want to do it, but don't expect me to pay for it." This is a very serious and very fair point to make and they are entirely right to bring it up, but it has very little to do with the Zero Agression Principle per se and has more to do with the more nuanced debate over positive and negative externalities, telling the difference between the two, and how they should be paid for. That isn't a discussion for this post, I will get into that in a few days.
International Libertarianism
Where I stand is what I call International Libertarianism, which tries to hew as closely to the Lockean ideal that all individual rights derive from universally objective natural law. If such do derive from natural law, then it is consequently proper that there can be no place on earth, and no individual or group of human beings, who do not posess such individiual rights as a natural consequence of their birth. The rights of Iraqis and Afghanis are just as important and needful of defending by free persons as a spouse or neighbor down the street, or of oneself. Now, Neil is right to say if everyone took care of themselves, we wouldn't have to worry about it. He is right. He is also incredibly unrealistic, because we quite clearly DON'T live in a world where that is going to be possible for a long time, and will be impossible until the worst perpetrators of group tyranny are put on the slagheap of history.
