A good way to think of anarchists are pacifists. Pacifists think all violence is universally wrong. Most people are not pacifists although and feel like violence is OK in some instances. Many of these non-pacifists would also agree in an ideal world that pacifism is what humanity should follow. But they recognize they don't live in an ideal world and thus are not pacifists.

Anarchists are really the political equivalent of pacifists. No force or coercion is ever acceptable in any circumstance is the basic foundation of anarchism, everything must be voluntary.

So according to that political philosophy taxation is still theft or extortion, just like self defense is still violence and soldiers killing in war is still murder to a pacifist.

But if you walk into a room and make a statement about the just-ness of something, it's implied and assumed that you're talking about "in our state", not "according to the government system I wish we were using".

It really irks me when people have the opinion "I think a better government system would be X" but conceal it with playing-dumb arguments like "y is wrong!", where y is a thing allowed in our current government Y but not in X. Like, if you want anarchism, don't say "taxation is theft", say "anarchism is good because taxation is theft in anarchism". Taxation isn't theft right here, right now.

And if taxation is theft in your moral framework, fine, whatever, we can't really unify our positions unless you convince me that your moral framework is better than mine. But even still! start with "my moral framework is good", not "this thing we disagree on, I'm going to make blanket un-qualified statements about it and pretend they're obvious and universally agreed upon".

Most of the anarchist groups I used to know a couple of years back where full of force, coercion and exploitation. They just used psychological tricks and peer-pressure instead of physical force.

These things can happen. The victims within the anarchist groups just had the problem, that whenever they were trying to defend themselves, the (inofficial) leaders were able to use political rhetorics to declare them wrong and keep them in line.

It was always the power-hungry egoists shaping these groups. Some were ok, but some weren't better than sects. All-in-all I haven't seen less free people in my life.

Many human organizations have similar problems, I'm not really surprised it happens in an anarchist group as well.

They claim their moral foundations are universal. I have yet to see a comprehensive proof that they are in fact universal and overcome the is-ought problem outlined by David Hume.

Theft as a moral/philosophical concept doesn't mean "deprival of another's property against their will", it means "extrajudicial deprival of another's property against their will". The so-called governmental 'monopoly on violence' (probably better put as 'monopoly on compulsion'..) is encoded into the concept. So it's extremely relevant what governmental framework you're thinking in terms of.

I'm not saying "hey, if you look up theft in the right place, you'll find that it has this extra clause". Definitions in dictionaries aren't concerned with properly inflecting to handle philosophical debates, anyway. I'm saying "the meaning of the word 'theft' that everyone uses in real life seems to have this definition, actually, under inspection -- but you're operating on a different, more simplistic definition, and that's why you're reaching these nonsensical conclusions".

So you could stick with your (imo incorrect) definition of theft and continue declaring that taxation is theft, but I think you're just weakening your position by using an inaccurate model of the world. If you used the definition I'm using everything makes sense. You can still argue against taxation, especially the level we experience, without your argument being "taxation is theft!!" and alienating almost-everyone.

Doesn't this line of thought lead to the rather unpleasant consequence that the state is incapable of murder? I mean by definition, a legally sanctioned state killing of a person or group of people cannot be extrajudicial.

(That's in the political philosophy sense. You can argue that there's a universal moral sense above that and that's fine, but that's not what we're talking about when we're talking about the just-ness of government actions. It's totally possible to have a morally-wrong constitution, and it's on the governed to change it.)

The US government has this relationship with the murder of enemy combatants right now.

I am pretty sure people are talking in the philosophical sense when they say "taxation is theft". I don't know what it accomplishes to simply state "a democratic state has instituted it, therefore it's not a crime" - you could see how this would fall apart for other things we would consider crimes like murder.

Yes it is. If I lend you $10 and you refuse to pay it back, it is generally deemed "morally okay" for me to be mean about it. Courts, and by extension, police enforcement of court rulings are that principle writ large.

The whole concept of ownership is based on social contract. What is "mine" versus "yours" arises from that contract. Theft, because it is rooted in ownership, is thus a relative construct.

Except a social contract is not a contract at all. There's no offer, no acceptance, no consideration, no capacity to contract, etc.

> Theft, because it is rooted in ownership, is thus a relative construct

I don't disagree here. But I'd like to see the social contract be an actual contract that you opt-into. Specifically, one that can be arbitrated on and dissolved upon violating terms of the agreement.

Of course there's a million reasons why people would disagree with that statement. Which is fine, but let's not pretend the government and governed have a voluntary relationship established in some sort of contract.

Fine, don't call it a social contract. Call it a foo. People, collectively wielding more power than any individual, agreed on a set of rules that make collective life better (in the view of those people). These rules are the foo. If you are in the geography where these people, your fellow citizens, have power then you must follow the foo or face consequences. If you don't like the foo, you can leave.

> I'd like to see the social contract be an actual contract that you opt-into

How would you propose enforcing laws? The U.S. Constitution and its ensuing legal corpus is the law of the land. If you don't like it, you can "opt out" by leaving.

Are you saying that because you agree? Because that was the only point I was making..

We can all agree that gangs, mafias and cartels have collective power and use the threat of force to govern territories. The distinction we're making is whether these cartels constitute a "legitimate" government - whatever that means.

I think legitimacy should be measured by consent (crazy idea I know), and that not leaving a territory doesn't constitute consent. Mexican families living in cartel-land do not give consent because they're too poor to leave. Because a said cartel provides "protection" from other cartels does not mean a service was provided.

I'm just asking people reason about government in principle, rather than in terms of what they think a government should be.

No. I just find discussing ideas more meaningful than arguing definitions.

> "legitimate" government - whatever that means

Don't handwaive this away. The boot-up process, which builds founding myths and their related constructs, is integral as much as with any other venture.

Ignore it and you will be advocating for the unrealistic (e.g. "everyone signs a contract at 18 or gets banished") or the abominable (e.g. "we will have an efficient, culturally homogenous society once we kill the Jews").

If the law is just. Otherwise it's literally a Crime Against Humanity to force that choice on someone.

We recognize that a person cannot be deprived of statehood. (Or, put in a situation where they must deprive themselves of their own statehood to escape, such as threatening them for their religion, sexual orientation, etc.)

Most people view theft as wrong because it takes someone's property from them by force, not because it's illegal.

You don't get to both 'give away a freedom to the government via the social contract in exchange for protection of your other freedoms' and then also say "hey, it's immoral to not have this freedom; Give it back!". It's one or the other.

A group of people calling themselves the government and creating ideological constructs like "social contract" are still committing a human rights violation when they throw someone in prison for refusing to hand over a share of the currency they receive in private trade.

Hum, the whole point of anarchism is that they don't even recognize the first as valid, let alone wanting both.

Seriously, this is some of the craziest doublethink imaginable. Something is not made just just because the majority say so, or just because the state says so. There are unjust laws.

This is the opposite: you seem utterly incapable of understanding basic, well-known positions, and you imagine I am delusional (lizards? really?) when your comprehension fails you.

The state as a concept is not the same as a normal person, obviously. It is subject to different rules.

Something is made just because the governing system that the people have agreed to says it is just. That's the theory that our system of government operates under. You don't have to like that, but you're ignorant if you just say it's false without going and doing some learning.

I am also wondering if you know what a 'law' is and how it differs from 'the text of the constitution'.

That's not an accepted definition in most of the world, including the US, which accepts stuff like the UDHR. We in the West consider many States unjust if we consider that they violate human rights, even if their population supports that.

A person acting under the auspices of a state has no right to violate human rights. A state is merely a human construct. No human construct grants a person a right to violate human rights.

Human rights are a human construct. Moreover, they only make sense within the context of social contract which only becomes practical when enforced by a government.

And 'social contract' is double speak. It's an attempt to misappropriate the concept of a contract to confer moral legitimacy to majority dictates.

The phrase "taxation is done with consent" uses consent to mean "the collective's continuous consent", due to the understanding that the collective is capable of changing the system if they deem it important enough. But I think you knew that already and are playing dumb as some kind of rhetorical strategy.

> which is a pretty good system that we have not seen fit to radically change

Slavery was "a pretty good system". Any action the state takes can be justified using this line of reasoning.

Easy retorts:

* Slavery was morally wrong (per almost all moral frameworks), but it was just per the government at the time. You should be opposed to immoral things regardless of how just they are under a government.

* You're still using the wrong definition of consent. Imagine there are two words - ConsentI and ConsentP. You're arguing against the phrase "taxation is done with ConsentP" by saying "well I didn't ConsentI!!!". No shit, we're talking about ConsentP. Get with the program or you just sound ignorant.

* The state does get a special exemption from definitions. That's the point of having the definition of 'just' come from the state. This is basic stuff.

(Specifically, defined in the constitution of the state. The behavior of the agents of the state are not exempt from the definitions.)

[0] steelmanning is the opposite of strawmanning: instead of fighting a fake, weak version of your opponent's argument, you go out of your way to fight the strongest possible version of it - which should be easy if your position is the correct one.

Where is the reason that consentp is not just "other people taking away the rights of someone"?

Fortunately, the majority also has a vested interest in the system being functional, so they don't necessarily change the constitution every time it rubs them the wrong way (and it's hard to change it, also, so it takes a lot of momentum and time for it to actually happen, giving everyone plenty of time to reconsider). In this case, it would be not in most peoples' interest to abolish taxation, because the country would immediately collapse.

I was only talking about the two terms to make it clear that the argument against that specific phrase was missing the point of the phrase entirely - inventing new words to clear up overloaded ones can be quite useful.

>The state does get a special exemption from definitions. That's the point of having the definition of 'just' come from the state. This is basic stuff.

No it gets no exemption. The state does not define justice. We categorize many state actions as unjust.

"The state does not define justice." It does for me. It does in America. So you're talking about "in your fantasy system, it doesn't". Who cares? You need to use the same definitions of words that everyone else is using. If you can't, won't, or are incapable of it, then talking to you is, indeed, like talking to a wall.

No, I really don't think so even in your case. You must have a limit where if a law was passed saying it was okay to .... something, that you'd object. Even if only such that you'd recognize it in a movie and say "Not in my America."

It really is the people who define justice. The state codifies and enforces that.

We try people (Nazis, Saddam Hussein, etc) for crimes that were legal by the laws of their state. The Italians try American CIA agents with kidnapping for extraordinary rendition. This is a widely held, almost universal view, that justice transcends law.

> It does in America.

We (my government and likely yours) recognize North Korea as a country, but we don't recognize it's actions as legitimate.

So pure minimalistic statehood - the ability to have and hold land - isn't enough for legitimacy.

What, beyond statehood, does America have that makes it legitimate. Can you put your finger on what parts matter to you?

> You need to use the same definitions of words that everyone else is using

You're the steelman. I don't think that's compatible with definitional nitpicking.

> > So the government is not made of normal people? Is the USA run by lizards or something?

> you seem utterly incapable of understanding basic, well-known positions, and you imagine I am delusional when your comprehension fails you.

The Lizard comment was valid sarcasm. You're not only not steelmanning, you're playing the victim.

You're rightly being called on your use of the word 'normal' because you're hand-waving so much away with it, and being so dismissive with the article.

>You need to use the same definitions of words that everyone else is using.

Everyone else does not use the same definition of justice as you.

This is how justice is usually defined (first definition found through a Google search):

>Justice definition, the quality of being just; righteousness, equitableness, or moral rightness: to uphold the justice of a cause.

just:

>just jəst/ adjective 1. based on or behaving according to what is morally right and fair.

When used in the context of laws, justice refers to a legal remedy that is morally right, equitable, etc. Legal rulings are not automatically considered justice on account of being from the state. State actions everywhere, including in the US, are widely characterized as unjust, a miscarriage of justice, etc., when they are considered immoral.

I suggest you stop being stubborn, because you're wrong.

How do we reconcile this with the unjust regimes practicing things such as slavery or capital punishment? It's not an obvious question, but one must be able to reason about it without resorting to trivialities such as universal unanimous consent.

If the majority of a group decide something then that implies collective consent unless and until the minority are so outraged that they either successfully agitate for change or the group splinters and starts fighting e.g. as happened with the abolition of slavery in the US.

Basically, collective consent is an implicit concept rather than an explicit one and doesn't require (nor imply) universal acceptance of something.