Pro-choicers must be anti-tax, no?

[doucy]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm pro choice because I believe people should have very strong rights over their own body.

I'm pro tax because I don't believe people have very strong rights over every cent of the income they earn, since

- that money is gained in large part from interacting with society, and
- society itself has costs (current, future and historical) which go into providing this person with income.

Besides, taxation has a legitimate basis. If you don't think laws make it legitimate, then consider that the government could easily charge a road/water/electricity levy for land it legitimately owns (since most land under AC definitions of ownership was legitimately acquired by the private corporation that is the government). Such a levy could be made equivalent to taxation.

[/ QUOTE ]

Phil,

You wrote that you are in favor of people having strong rights over their body, but you didn't explain why. Please:

1. Explain why you are in favor of strong bodily rights.
2. Why those reasons do not apply to money.

This thread devolved into the usual AC/statist crapfest but I'd like to steer it back on track if I can.

[moorobot]

No it does not seem analogous at all, as you have no theory demonstrating who owns what. Put differently, you haven't shown why self-ownership leads to world-ownership, or how much world-ownership people should have or how they are allowed to legitimately come to own the external world.

BTW-I think that is an awful argument against abortion anyway. How could threatening somebody be worse than killing somebody? The general argument used by pro-choicers is: fetus is not a human being yet.

[moorobot]

[ QUOTE ]

you get wealth by performing labor. I would assert labor is a bodily resource.


[/ QUOTE ] This has nothing to do with anything (even when true); where you get something doesn't tell you anything about that things essence. To illustrate, consider this argument using your form and logic: you can get killed by eating something with protein in it. I would assert that protein is a bodily resource. Therefore, killing yourself is part of your body. And this is a statement that doesn't even make any sense, of course. So your logic is faulty.

[moorobot]

[ QUOTE ]


I said "if you are against A because it is coercive, then you should be against everything that is coercive."

[/ QUOTE ] This argument, while not as completely and obviously groundless and question begging as your explicit OP, fails as well. It presupposes that there is only one good thing or value in the world, namely lack of coercion. In A's case, the other values to be gained from using coercion may be low, but in the case of B, other values gained from using coercion may be high, and hence we may favor using coercion in case B without any inconsistency, because the trade offs between values makes using coercion worth it it in case B may be high.

[doucy]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]


I said "if you are against A because it is coercive, then you should be against everything that is coercive."

[/ QUOTE ] This argument, while not as completely and obviously groundless and question begging as your explicit OP, fails as well. It presupposes that there is only one good thing or value in the world, namely lack of coercion. In A's case, the other values to be gained from using coercion may be low, but in the case of B, other values gained from using coercion may be high, and hence we may favor using coercion in case B without any inconsistency, because the tradeoffs between values makes using coercion worthi it in case B.

[/ QUOTE ]

If the values gained from using coercion are relevant, then you must mention them in order for the statement to be completely true.

If your stance is "I am against A because it is coercive, and because the values gained from using coercion are low" that's not the same as "I am against A because it is coercive." I don't see any problem with assuming that lack of coercion is the only good thing relevant to the discussion.

[moorobot]

[ QUOTE ]

If your stance is "I am against A because it is coercive, and because the values gained from using coercion are low" that's not the same as "I am against A because it is coercive." I don't see any problem with assuming that lack of coercion is the only good thing relevant to the discussion.

[/ QUOTE ] Well than the statement "I am against A because it is coercive" simply begs the question: In basically all cases of coercion, somebody is coerced for/in order to bring about something that many other people think is valuable, and usually correctly so (positive liberty, stability, equal substantive self-ownership, efficiency, art, education, defense, safety, public health, protection from human rights abuse abroad, utility etc.) and sometimes even for things that the person being coerced themselves think is valuable (this is the case during coercive actions that solve prisoner's dilemmas, coordination problems, weakness of will problems, tragedies of the anti-commons, etc.). That's why they are coerced!

To assume that no other values are at stake in this situation would be like assuming that, when arguing that a baseball team should spend its money entirely on pitching, that fielding, management, hitting, advertising, etc. are not at all important. But the premise is clearly false, so the conclusion is not true. So there is an enormous problem with the assumption you claim is acceptable.

[NickMPK]

I am pro-choice because I don't think there is anything wrong with abortion, and I think it is a good thing for society to have fewer unwanted children born. It really has nothing to do with property rights. I don't see how this has anything to do with your argument vis-a-vis taxation.

[doucy]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

If your stance is "I am against A because it is coercive, and because the values gained from using coercion are low" that's not the same as "I am against A because it is coercive." I don't see any problem with assuming that lack of coercion is the only good thing relevant to the discussion.

[/ QUOTE ] Well than the statement "I am against A because it is coercive" simply begs the question: In basically all cases of coercion, somebody is coerced for/in order to bring about something that many other people think is valuable, and usually correctly so (positive liberty, stability, equal substantive self-ownership, efficiency, art, education, defense, safety, public health, protection from human rights abuse abroad, utility etc.) and sometimes even for things that the person being coerced themselves think is valuable (this is the case during coercive actions that solve prisoner's dilemmas, coordination problems, weakness of will problems, tragedies of the anti-commons, etc.). That's why they are coerced!

[/ QUOTE ]

I disagree with the point you're making. Let's use the example of public education.

Some authority charges you $x for public education. You are willing to pay $y. If x > y, then you are being coerced into paying for something that you don't want to pay for. Sure, you are still getting something "good" in that you will benefit from the education, but it is coming at a cost that is not worth it to you. In this way, your net utility decreases.

But then you might ask "but what about all those people for whom y > x?" Those people would pay for the education whether the authority mandated it or not. So although the authority is still requiring those people to pay for it, they really aren't doing any coercing, since the people would pay for it anyway.

In this way, coercion cannot be a good thing under any circumstances, because coercion must ALWAYS decrease the individual's net utility, regardless of the other values at stake.

[doucy]

[ QUOTE ]

I am pro-choice because I don't think there is anything wrong with abortion, and I think it is a good thing for society to have fewer unwanted children born. It really has nothing to do with property rights. I don't see how this has anything to do with your argument vis-a-vis taxation.

[/ QUOTE ]

If you don't subscribe to the belief in the OP then the post is not directed at you.

[Bork]

[ QUOTE ]
uote:
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If you think one kind of restraint/limitation is wrong then you must (ought to) think all of them are wrong..

Wow, you suck at reasoning.


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You are misrepresenting my argument. I didn't say "if you are against A, and A is coercive, then you must be against everything that is coercive."

I said "if you are against A because it is coercive, then you should be against everything that is coercive."

It's easy to say someone sucks at reasoning if you completely misconstrue their argument.

[/ QUOTE ]

Uh your 'new' argument is invalid and just as stupid. Mostly because it's the same basic argument I represented you as having. It's an unjustified universal generalization. Did you even read the rest of my post with the 'against stealing then against all wars' argument?
yeesh

If you are trying to make the actual valid argument that the retards who think any act involving coersion must be wrong ought to think taxes are wrong, then please please don't represent that as some kind of common standard view of pro-choicers.

Almost nobody believes any act which involves forcing somebody to do something is wrong. You made the principle sound vague and non-threatening, but then you make huge generalizations based on that principle. In order to validly make such generalizations then the principle has to be explicitly universal and obviously false, unbelievable, etc..

[ QUOTE ]
coercion cannot be a good thing under any circumstances, because coercion must ALWAYS decrease the individual's net utility, regardless of the other values at stake.

[/ QUOTE ]

You can't possibly believe this.. I guess we should release all the serial killers from jail and get rid of all the police forces, no? Trolling?