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> If by that you mean a democratic government (violent extortionate power) empowered to stabilise the currency via a variety of means, including supply inflatio

> If by that you mean a democratic government (violent extortionate power) empowered to stabilise the currency via a variety of means, including supply inflation (engaged in parasitism of the monetary base)... It's funny how many different ways there are to paint over the underlying unpleasant reality of the situation with pretty words designed to lend a veneer of legitimacy to the enterprise. It's almost like there's an uncomfortable underlying truth that many people would prefer you would not state in such a blunt fashion.

Nursie 14y ago
No, what's funny is how differently people see the world. You see a violent extortionate power, I see a cooperative, democratic government. You see parasitism of the monetary base, I see an important stabilising role in the common currency that keeps the economy ticking. These are not words I use to gloss over "the underlying unpleasant reality", there is no "uncomfortable underlying truth that many people would prefer you would not state in such a blunt fashion". We genuinely have different views on these things. This is one of the things I find so fascinating (and childish) about internet libertarians and objectivists - they assume that everyone that doesn't agree with them is either actively evil, totally deluded, or just hasn't been exposed to their self-evidently correct way of thinking yet. I bet it never occurs to you that other people think about the very same things you do but can come to completely different conclusions?
- etherael 14y ago
  No, as a matter of fact it simply never occurred to me that you might simply disagree thereby changing the underlying nature of reality in so doing. But I suppose I am not one for the acceptance that things are only what we label them with. If no differences can be iterated between one thing with a pretty label, say a democratic government for argument's sake, and another thing with an ugly label, say an organised crime ring with a byzantine structure designed to convey the perception of community support but which retains the core underlying features of being impossible not to participate in under threat of violence, parasitic and corrupt even by it's own rules; it just never occurred to me someone might truly be naive enough to honestly accept that the labels alone change the nature of the underlying labelled things. It's a fine trick if you can find enough suckers to pull it off I suppose.
  - Nursie 14y ago
    Of course, because only your views represent the "underlying nature of reality", and anyone with a more positive view of collective government is necessarily blinded by labels. And it's so obvious that when it comes to human affairs, particularly those of a social/governmental nature, that there is one single empirical truth. Of course! How could I be so stupid? I don't think that most western nations do have a government that could be described as an organised crime ring. I don't think you can cite this as an empirical fact. In fact I think that all of the words you used there are overly-emotional negative labels you use to reinforce your own belief that democratic government is necessarily evil, a view I don't subscribe to.
    - etherael 14y ago
      You completely missed the point of what I said. The labels you or I use to describe the institution in question are entirely irrelevant, it is the characteristics which those institutions have which dictate their actual material nature. Responding to my iteration of the characteristics that a government shares with an organised crime syndicate with "I don't think so" is exactly as effective as trying to tell me a marsupial is not a mammal despite its characteristics because you don't think so. If you hope to convince me that the state is not an intrinsically violent and extortionate body you would do far better pointing to examples of how one might choose not to participate in the structure of the state without being subject to it's violent sanction. That you can't do this is precisely why the pretty labels you plaster it with are utterly unconvincing to anyone unswayed by simplistic feelgood propaganda.
      - Nursie 14y ago
        "Responding to my iteration of the characteristics that a government shares with an organised crime syndicate with "I don't think so" is exactly as effective as trying to tell me a marsupial is not a mammal despite its characteristics because you don't think so." No, because we can point at a marsupial and agree on the characteristics. You and I do not agree on the characteristics of government or currency. --edit-- In fact many of the 'characteristics' you list are emotional labels as far as I can see. Yet you continue to insist that they are part of an 'underlying reality'. I disagree. "If you hope to convince me that the state is not an intrinsically violent and extortionate body" I don't hope to convince you of that, it's clearly central to your outlook on life. I only hope to convince you that not everyone sees it that way, and that not everyone that doesn't see it that way thinks the way they do because of ignorance.

Nursie 14y ago

No, what's funny is how differently people see the world. You see a violent extortionate power, I see a cooperative, democratic government. You see parasitism of the monetary base, I see an important stabilising role in the common currency that keeps the economy ticking. These are not words I use to gloss over "the underlying unpleasant reality", there is no "uncomfortable underlying truth that many people would prefer you would not state in such a blunt fashion". We genuinely have different views on these things. This is one of the things I find so fascinating (and childish) about internet libertarians and objectivists - they assume that everyone that doesn't agree with them is either actively evil, totally deluded, or just hasn't been exposed to their self-evidently correct way of thinking yet. I bet it never occurs to you that other people think about the very same things you do but can come to completely different conclusions?

etherael 14y ago
No, as a matter of fact it simply never occurred to me that you might simply disagree thereby changing the underlying nature of reality in so doing. But I suppose I am not one for the acceptance that things are only what we label them with. If no differences can be iterated between one thing with a pretty label, say a democratic government for argument's sake, and another thing with an ugly label, say an organised crime ring with a byzantine structure designed to convey the perception of community support but which retains the core underlying features of being impossible not to participate in under threat of violence, parasitic and corrupt even by it's own rules; it just never occurred to me someone might truly be naive enough to honestly accept that the labels alone change the nature of the underlying labelled things. It's a fine trick if you can find enough suckers to pull it off I suppose.
- Nursie 14y ago
  Of course, because only your views represent the "underlying nature of reality", and anyone with a more positive view of collective government is necessarily blinded by labels. And it's so obvious that when it comes to human affairs, particularly those of a social/governmental nature, that there is one single empirical truth. Of course! How could I be so stupid? I don't think that most western nations do have a government that could be described as an organised crime ring. I don't think you can cite this as an empirical fact. In fact I think that all of the words you used there are overly-emotional negative labels you use to reinforce your own belief that democratic government is necessarily evil, a view I don't subscribe to.
  - etherael 14y ago
    You completely missed the point of what I said. The labels you or I use to describe the institution in question are entirely irrelevant, it is the characteristics which those institutions have which dictate their actual material nature. Responding to my iteration of the characteristics that a government shares with an organised crime syndicate with "I don't think so" is exactly as effective as trying to tell me a marsupial is not a mammal despite its characteristics because you don't think so. If you hope to convince me that the state is not an intrinsically violent and extortionate body you would do far better pointing to examples of how one might choose not to participate in the structure of the state without being subject to it's violent sanction. That you can't do this is precisely why the pretty labels you plaster it with are utterly unconvincing to anyone unswayed by simplistic feelgood propaganda.
    - Nursie 14y ago
      "Responding to my iteration of the characteristics that a government shares with an organised crime syndicate with "I don't think so" is exactly as effective as trying to tell me a marsupial is not a mammal despite its characteristics because you don't think so." No, because we can point at a marsupial and agree on the characteristics. You and I do not agree on the characteristics of government or currency. --edit-- In fact many of the 'characteristics' you list are emotional labels as far as I can see. Yet you continue to insist that they are part of an 'underlying reality'. I disagree. "If you hope to convince me that the state is not an intrinsically violent and extortionate body" I don't hope to convince you of that, it's clearly central to your outlook on life. I only hope to convince you that not everyone sees it that way, and that not everyone that doesn't see it that way thinks the way they do because of ignorance.