The difference between being coerced and coercing

[John Kilduff]

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This is going in circles. Enforcement of assault laws are self-defense. Is it coercive of me to shoot you when you are trying to kill me? Maybe, but who cares? I really don't think this is the type of state-sponsored coercion that the ACers here are against, the coercive nature of enforcing laws. I could be wrong, but I think they are against the coercive nature of forced participation.

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You're exactly right. Self-defense is coercive, in a trivial sense, but the coercion is focused against someone who *initiated* coercion. When the aggressor initiates a force transaction with his victim, and does so withuot consent, without terms and conditions, without a contract, he by necessity does so without any legitimate expectation of how that transaction will be *closed*.

You can't force someone to interact with you then get indignant when that person shoots back.

Jogger ignores the coercion that opened the interaction. I suspect he knows what he's doing here, which would make him (as we say) intellectually dishonest.

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You're (still) ducking the question. When exactly does this initiation of force (the "initial" one, IE, the knife-wielder's "attack") begin?

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When a vicious dog gets loose from its tether and attacks you while you are out jogging, at what point, exactly, did the vicious dog's attack begin? At what point would you be justified in shooting, clubbing or pepper-spraying the dog?

The "exactly" part of the question is meaningless, for all practical purposes. The dog decided to attack and put the attack into motion. Hopefully, you responded in time if you were aware, and prepared.

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So when would it be okay to institute government as a preventative measure against the threat posed by my fellow inhabitants of North America?

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I don't know but that's a far cry from an examples of a knife-wielding attacker or a vicious dog. Let's note in both examples that you did not have the right to act violently until you perceived an attack in progress. Now you're asking about a preventative measure which is an entirely different thing than a reactive measure.