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Re:What It’s Like to Almost Get Executed by rwjwjuwjudf on Saturday April 02, 2016 @06:34PM (#11413858)
If capital punishment is murder, then taxation is theft.
Re:What It’s Like to Almost Get Executed by jakub_h on Sunday April 03, 2016 @06:34AM (#11415639)
Is paying for services theft?
Re:What It’s Like to Almost Get Executed by zo1 on Sunday April 03, 2016 @08:00AM (#11415819)
Why don't you rephrase that with the appropriate level of detail and not leaving out important facts: Is not wanting to pay for something that you were given and didn't explicitly request theft? And yes, I'm an anarcho-capitalist and jumping in here.

There are a slew of assumptions that are being made when arguing for a pro-state stance. Eventually, you'll stumble on this thing called the "social contract", and then magically all questions of validity are somehow answered. It's a convenient answer devoid of any first-principles, that many are content with using as a basis to defend the status-quo of the existence of a state.

Re:What It’s Like to Almost Get Executed by rwjwjuwjudf on Sunday April 03, 2016 @09:05AM (#11415949)
There's no such thing as no state. For any conflict, whoever wins is the de facto state.
Re:What It’s Like to Almost Get Executed by zo1 on Sunday April 03, 2016 @09:21AM (#11416001)
I think you'd get disagreements from both sides of the fence on that definition of a state.
Re:What It’s Like to Almost Get Executed by koenigdavidmj on Sunday April 03, 2016 @11:05AM (#11416338)
All of the theories of who is a state or not fail as soon as real geopolitics is involved.

Taiwan is not a state in the eyes of the US simply because China wouldn't play nicely if we said otherwise.

Saudi Arabia during its formation in the early 1900s would have been indistinguishable from the ISIS of today.

Re:What It’s Like to Almost Get Executed by the_ancient on Sunday April 03, 2016 @08:03AM (#11415829)
If your window is broken and I replace your window but take your TV as payment, did I steal your TV?

Maybe you had a different window you wanted, or maybe you did not want to replace it at all.

"Paying for services" implies some kind of voluntary exchange. Government is not voluntary, government is violence, and any "service" provided by government is done so at gun point under the threat of violence and paid for in the same manner.

Re:What It’s Like to Almost Get Executed by jakub_h on Sunday April 03, 2016 @09:03AM (#11415941)
Yes, yes, you and the guy above are Americans, I get that. Me, I'm from Europe. I guess we see things differently.

Of course, none of us here has a country that would demand such ridiculous things as income taxes from expats, so I see where that may come from.

Re:What It’s Like to Almost Get Executed by rwjwjuwjudf on Sunday April 03, 2016 @06:52AM (#11415675)
I dunno, I'm not a libertarian :)
Re:What It’s Like to Almost Get Executed by the_ancient on Saturday April 02, 2016 @08:29PM (#11414283)
Correct