How would Libertarianism work in an Irish context?

ryank3nny

Hawkeye123 wrote: »

Stats are invariably selected to support arguments and not to represent truth.

1. Stats are facts written in numbers instead of letters.
2. "The truth" is a collection of facts
3. If a claim is correctly based on relevant, empirically verifiable statistical evidence, then it is based on fact, and so it is true.

The fact that this is a political theory thread doesn't mean you can entirely abstract the discussion from any basis in reality.

Hawkeye123 wrote: »

For example, if I gave you the co-ordinates to the worlds highest mountain you could reasonably assume that location to be in the Himalayas but of of course you would be mistaken since the worlds highest mountain is in fact underwater.

As always, these examples are entirely irrelevant. In what way does this show that statistics are inherently misleading in all cases? "The coordinates" of the worlds highest mountains are just their locations written in numbers, so if, having been given their location, someone makes an incorrect assumption, they have only themselves to blame for their misconception, they have not been somehow mislead by statistical magic.

Hawkeye123 wrote: »

Dublin and its crony counties cannot support themselves without subvention from the rest of the country.

Since you have disavowed all evidence, we should all accept this claim - flying in the face of the crushing weight of evidence to the contrary - based on...blind faith I suppose?

Hawkeye123 wrote: »

Furthermore, unless the Dublin government reverses its policy of hoarding the nations wealth in and around the pale - you will see a groundswell of disaffected regions demanding total autonomy for themselves.

Oh no

mollymosfet

The problem is that libertarians will compare a wasteful (Irish) public system with an idealised, often impossibly min/max'd private one. In reality, privatising things can result in all kinds of overheads, as seen in the public vs private healthcare debate.

mollymosfet

Hawkeye123 wrote: »

The quoted problems you refer to are not real problems. People who believe they are real problems need to address their victim mentality. It is not healthy to constantly see yourself as a victim. True disadvantage is a state of mind. It is the notion that you need handouts or subsidies or equality to succeed. Poverty can be a wonderful advantage if it helps to motivate children to improve their lot. The challenge for adults is to instill confidence and a can do attitude in the children. The worst thing you can do to a child is to tell her that she has entitlements or rights. It is much better to tell kids that they can achieve anything they want through hard work. How can you impart this wisdom to your child if you do not possess it yourself. You must deal with your victim mentality.

Honestly? Your post was the most ungodly lump of tosh I've read on the matter. Literally all you did was spam the buzzphrases "Entitlement", "Victim Mentality" etc. over and over and showed an enormously dense intellectual black hole when it comes to very basic sociological concepts such as privilege.

Do you want to know the truth? Your mentality is the real toxic one. It contradicts reality where social mobility is something we can scientifically measure.

http://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/CP172.pdf

There is no agree to disagree here. You are simply incorrect in the assumption that a "can do" attitude will allow you to succeed as many people work very hard and get nowhere. Some people work the same amount(or less, relatively speaking), and become quite successful. Luck and class are far more important than anything else.

The fact is that Social Mobility stands at only about 10% in most centre right nations. Many young people now have to face a future where opportunities have been denied to them, yet we have someone wattling on about a "culture of entitlement".

The problem is you're not just expressing a viewpoint - you're insulting the poor by holding them to a different standard to the rich. There's no room in your world for the rich to be "entitled" - they have no need to be after all. Why exactly is it reasonable in the first place that some people be born into great wealth, yet some into great poverty? It is not acceptable to simply say they should pull themselves up out of it when statistically that's unlikely to happen and none of your whining will change the fact that it's still unfair and illogical that some people should have it much harder for no rational reason.

No, bugger that. They SHOULD expect more, SHOULD feel entitled to more because nobody should have to start off on a much lower rung than another. It's only in the last 60-20 years of history that live has become something that basically isn't a pile of **** for most people. It is, simply put, attitudes such as yours that hold back progress, because the "entitlement" attitude you speak of can often be a drive similar to a "can do" attitude - as someone who has likely never had to fight for their rights or even consider doing so, you probably wouldn't understand how powerful this drive can be. Keeping your head down and working on your own lot will do nothing to improve the situation of others around you. Feeling that the disadvantaged should have better - that will.

I am also going to extrapolate that you really, really don't care about minorities, at all. Being born into certain groups statistically makes you less likely to succeed(For example being LGBT). You cannot ignore this and say they are somehow "entitled" for expecting society to treat them the same way as everyone else. That's very convenient when you're not the same as them and don't have to deal with it. It shows a great degree of selfishness and a a great lack of empathy.

This sort of argument generally comes from a deeply sheltered individual who is full of their own privilege. Not everyone is on a level playing field and your immature rant about socialists ruining everything has done nothing to disprove that.

The problem isn't that socialists want to give everyone something for nothing - it's that they want to make a level playing field, which we currently don't have. If we had that, then people making more money than others would be considerably less of a problem(if non existent). People like you don't want that because it's of no concern to you.

Memnoch

Maybe Hawkeye should tell the workers in China who are doing 100 hours of overtime with only 1 day off in a month in some of Samsung's factories that they need to work harder, lose their entitlement attitude and be more positive because that is all it takes to improve their lot in life.