L.P.D.: Libertarian Police Department | Hacker News Reader

L.P.D.: Libertarian Police Department

newyorker.com

51 pointsminikites34 comments

Seeing various media outlets attempt to portray Bitcoin as some kind of Randian fetish with criminal undercurrents is getting rather tiresome.

"computer money invented to buy drugs." -- come on.

I get that the New Yorker is middlebrow yuppie polemic, but they could at least put a modicum of effort into an attempt at satire.

The majority of the cypherpunks behind the development of the crypto in Bitcoin are libertarians, that's just the unavoidable fact. Hal Finny, Nick Szabo, you name any of the heavy hitters of the original cypherpunks list.

Then, if you move on to look at the Bitcoin Talk forums, you'll see they're infested not only by libertarians, but crazy right wing gold-bug types.

Maybe as bitcoin goes more mainstream, you can claim it outgrew these sensibilities, but you can't ignore the disproportionate number of rabid anti-government types who are the early adopters.

Some of the community is like that, sure. But it doesn't follow that the technology as a whole was created as a political vehicle, nor does it follow that it will necessarily serve as one.

A technology cannot possess sensibilities.

But there are plenty of people willing to assert otherwise.

Are you aware of the history of cryptocurrencies and who is behind them? See http://www.cypherpunks.to/faq/cyphernomicron/chapter4.html#1...

The core people who worked on the algorithmic components that form the basis of Bitcoin, are not only sympathetic to Libertarianism, but are sympathetic to anarcho-capitalism.

I used to be heavily involved in cypherpunks myself (search for "cromwell" in the cyphernomicon, see my Anonymous Remailer stuff http://marc.info/?l=cypherpunks&m=85281458701690&w=2 or search Cromwell here http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~daw/papers/privacy-compcon97-www... to see my note on the Decense Project, one of the very first anonymizing web proxies), and I used to be a rabid libertarian myself and I can tell you from personal experience it's not an exaggeration to say where the sympathies of the creators are.

I personally developed cryptotools for anonymous double blind mailing lists (neither the recipients of the list nor the list itself know each other's addresses), shamir sharing, and distributed publishing, on the basis I believed I was defeating government surveillance and censorship. At the time, there was a vague notion that untraceable anonymity, absolutely secure communication, and digital cash would permit the creation of an online world which was 100% free of government.

That's lovely for you, but not terribly relevant to anything I've stated.

An appeal to personal experience does not constitute a refutation of the assertion that a technology cannot possess sensibilities. Nor does it provide evidence that the majority of the present Bitcoin community shares such beliefs -- asserting otherwise constitutes a fallacy of improper generalization.

It's quite possible that the views most frequently articulated on Bitcoin Talk, etc. are those of a vocal minority.

Unless you have a statistical survey of the bitcoin community, all we have is the anecdotal evidence. And the anecdotal evidence, both from my personal experience, as well as _objective sampling of the celebrities of the community_ is that libertarianism is disproportionately represented compared to the populace in general.

And since the early adopters and pioneers of a community often mirror the philosophy of their founders, it is highly probable that the bitcoin community is overrepresented with libertarians.

That this seems surprising to you or you're so defensive over it seems strange. It seems pretty self evident. As if you found a community of gun owners producing crypto-guns, and were shocked to find they were NRA members too.

> Unless you have a statistical survey of the bitcoin community

I don't, and I don't think it's appropriate to make generalizations unless one has access to a sufficient body of empirical evidence. So I'm not making generalizations.

With that in mind, none of your opinions strike me as self-evident in an objective/empirical sense. Perhaps they're self-evident to you, but that doesn't make them the basis for sound argumentation.

It's unclear to me how I might have come across as defensive with respect to your comments; I merely don't find what you're saying to be convincing.

I disagree that there is a disproportionate number of crazy ultra-libertarian members of the Bitcoin community and it seems more likely that the more fringe members of the community are also the most vocal and they tend to drown out the more reasonable and level headed members of the community.

Well, if you say "crazy ultra libertarian", it's hard to quibble, but if you say "more libertarian than Rand Paul or Ron Paul", I think that would be more accurate.

I can't tell if this is an intentional misrepresentation for attempted comedy, or if the author's only research into libertarianism consisted of jokes he heard at a party while shooting up that heroin mentioned the first paragraph. My bet is on the latter.

There are valid criticisms and parody of libertarianism. There are valid criticisms and parody of Bitcoins. This article doesn't provide any of that. It's just a big straw man.

The 'Fountainhead' reference annoyed me, privately funded police and courts are not a real objective as per randian ideology - Rand was an objectivist, not a Libertarian.

The rest of the article is just stupid stereotypes piled one on another.

"Oikos™ Greek Yogurt Presents Handcuffs®" really captures the Zeitgeist of Silicon Valley libertarianism. Public services are ad supported! Although, it falls a bit flat because without the government trademark monopoly there's no incentive to spend so much money advertising to build up brands.

Funny, and at the same time accurately representing their subscriber's understanding of libertarianism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pauline_Kael#Alleged_Nixon_quot...)

"Brought to you by Carls Junior!"

"Why do you keep saying that?"

"Because I get paid everytime I do! If you're so smart, how come you don't know that?!"

For whomever voted it down, this story mirrors similar concepts presented in Mike Judge's _Idiocracy_.

Libertarians still believe in a publicly funded police force (and military). It's one of the few things Libertarians feel should be publicly funded.

Depends on the kind of libertarian. Some libertarians would scope that down. Much of the court system can be privatized as arbitration panels and insurance adjustment show. Security can be privatized as well, so local police don't necessarily have to be government funded. National defense is the only area where anarcho-capitalism doesn't quite bridge the gap.

I don't really agree with any of the above, but I think it is disingenuous to claim that there aren't a lot of libertarians who fall along a spectrum including Minarchy.

Does such a consensus really exist? Who decides what the libertarian consensus is on a particular view?

I based it on the Libertarian Party platform.

Ah, but the Libertarian Party by definition represents those Libertarians who see a role for the state.

I believe private crime insurance is a more commonly advocated solution.

"I figured I could wait them out. I lit several cigarettes indoors. A pregnant lady coughed, and I told her that secondhand smoke is a myth."

Huh? Why does this person think libertarians would believe secondhand smoke is a myth? They might argue against laws prohibiting smoking indoors, but it wouldn't be because they believe second hand smoking is a myth.

This piece is filled with non-sequiturs.

The conflation of libertarianism with a variety of nonsensical positions is likely a deliberate attempt to discredit the ideology.

It's nonsense.

It necessarily follows. Even libertarians acknowledge that people's rights don't extend to hurting others. So any libertarian that opposes a smoking ban must believe that second hand smoke is a myth.

That logic would only apply to public property, right?

These libertarians oppose smoking bans imposed on private establishments. They believe that second hand smoke is fine if it only affects people who voluntarily enter the establishment (similar to how they're fine with people throwing concerts even though the noise level of concerts can damage the listener's ears).

Or one could think that second hand smoke is harmful, but that bans entail greater harm when all is said and done. I'm not saying I hold such a position, just that "I object to policy Y opposing X" does not imply "I don't think X is bad."

I can't speak for anyone else... I don't smoke, and don't care for it. My own position is that nobody is forced to be in a situation where they have to endure second hand smoke. It may be difficult, but if you chose to work in a bar that allows smoking, you chose to work there.

Oddly, about the only people who might be forced to endure it are family/children of smokers, specifically while passengers in a car where the parent smokes. And there's no law against this. If a business/property owner wants to choose to allow smoking in their establishment, then it's the customers (or potential customers) that have the choice of being there or not.

It really isn't the place of the government to nanny state this one. And, again, I don't like smoking but don't feel it should be outright illegal. Drinking 2L of soda is probably as dangerous as being exposed to second hand smoke, but that isn't illegal either. If you don't like it, walk away from it in favor of someplace/business/location where it isn't allowed by the property/business owner.

Libertarian != anarchist.

(I am not either of these, just pointing out that this is a straw man.)

Correct. But they can intersect. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarcho-capitalism

As a Libertarian, this is pretty funny.

Was this just copied from a 4chan troll post?

4chan usually does a better job than this.

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